Politics & Power Quote by Earl Blumenauer

“Voluntary,” here, is doing the kind of political heavy lifting that should make you suspicious. Earl Blumenauer frames the National Flood Insurance Program as a simple opt-in choice, as if a town can casually decline and move on. That’s the surface intent: reassure critics that federal flood rules aren’t some top-down mandate, and recast complaints about “burdensome” insurance requirements as a matter of local preference. If you don’t like the strings, don’t take the money.

The subtext is sharper: participation may be technically optional, but for many flood-prone communities it’s functionally existential. NFIP isn’t just an insurance product; it’s an infrastructure of eligibility. Mortgage lenders often require flood insurance in mapped zones. Developers, homeowners, and local tax bases lean on that financing pipeline. So “they don’t have to participate” reads less like liberation than like a dare: opt out and accept higher borrowing costs, stalled growth, and political backlash when the next storm hits and the aid narrative turns ugly.

Context matters because flood insurance is one of the few places where climate risk, local zoning politics, and federal subsidy collide in plain sight. The program has long been criticized for underpricing risk and encouraging rebuilding in vulnerable areas; tightening building standards is the obvious corrective, and also the most locally unpopular. Blumenauer’s line tries to flip the moral frame: the burden isn’t Washington imposing rules, it’s communities choosing whether to internalize the real cost of living on a floodplain. Voluntary, in this formulation, becomes accountability with a polite smile.