I am going to hold FEMA accountable for that.

The goal of the Menendez bill was to have a program that people could afford, a very big difference in goals.

I was pleased to work closely with my good friend Senator Bob Menendez to co-author the Senate flood insurance legislation along with the chairwoman of this Subcommittee, Senator Mary Landrieu.

Thank you, Administrator Fugate, for testifying this afternoon. You have one tough job, to implement this program, which is important to the whole Nation.

I am going to really be pushing this subcommittee, the whole Committee on Appropriations, the Committee on Banking, and the Congress to get complete and accurate flood maps done before we engage in trying to rewrite a flood insurance…

It shouldn't require an act of Congress to get them to do something that would be common sense.

We really have to be careful with this.

Alaska will take up half of the geographic space of the lower 48, and it deserves its own map.

I would like to announce for the information of the Senate and the public that a hearing has been scheduled before the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. The hearing will be held on Tuesday, July 29, 2014, at 2:30 p.m., in…

A lot of that is in South Mississippi. Senator Cochran knows this.

You can be outside of a floodplain and flood.

This bill included a critical affordability provision, which the Senate insisted on an 18 percent individual annual cap.

This isn't just a problem for the 7 percent or the 450 counties, it is not just coastal issue, it is an interior issue, and it is a national issue.

I find it puzzling, after working so hard to pass a law that specifically caps rate increases and encourages FEMA to strive to keep flood insurance affordable, that we are still hearing about outrageous increases that threaten to do more…

We have to make decisions about where we build going forward. This is not a sustainable risk we can continue to do with no change.

I think we are just going to call it the Menendez-Isakson bill.

I think, Mr. Miller, we really have to get this straight about these lower levels that are not living spaces.

This is not just a Louisiana, Mississippi, coastal issue. The 450 counties that are most threatened produce 50 percent of the GDP of this Nation.

And let me put up my favorite map again, and ask FEMA, would you please produce a map for Alaska that looks just like this, and for Hawaii?

The people on the inside of the levee should have much lower rates with that levee built than without that levee.

the reason we tend to want not to build in velocity zones is because that is the most vulnerable area to any type of flooding.

it is not a coastal issue. It is not only a coastal issue. It is an interior issue. It is a national issue.

I hope this spirit of bipartisanship will prove to be a catalyst for enactment of future bipartisan legislation.

I am happy to see that it has been established.

What it shows me is that we have a lot of work to do.