NORFOLK, Va. — On a recent rainy day, Deborah Miller and her husband Gary Chiaverotti enjoyed the views from their home without fear of it flooding.
"It's a beautiful sight," said Chiaverotti. "You can look out on the river. We see birds."
That wasn't always the case, though. Hurricane Isabel in 2003 brought water up to their porch.
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Today, their home in Norfolk's Colonial Place sits six feet above ground thanks to a FEMA program that helped raise it in 2008.
Miller remembers going to a meeting with FEMA to learn about their options.
"[The FEMA representative] asked out of the people with flood insurance how many have ever filed a flood claim of $10,000 or more?" said Miller. "I raised my hand."
Elevating homes is one way to combat repeat flooding, which data from FEMA shows more and more homes are experiencing.
"The bottom line is, we are adding properties to this list of the most flood-prone properties far faster than we're addressing the risk to any of them," said Anna Weber, a senior policy analyst at the Natural Resources Defense Council.
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Weber has been studying the data, which keeps track of how many insurance claims people have filed through the National Flood Insurance Program, which is the government-sponsored flood insurance program, meaning taxpayers are on the hook.
"When we're talking about flooding, if your home has flooded once, it's probably going to flood again," said Weber.
The data shows a home in Virginia Beach has flooded 52 times, which over the years has cost more than $780,000 to fix.
The home is in the 23451 zip code, which is the area around the Oceanfront.
Due to privacy concerns, the data does not provide exact locations, only zip codes.
How to handle these homes is a complicated issue.
"Severe repetitive loss and repetitive loss properties are everywhere in Hampton Roads," said Mary-Carson Stiff, the executive director of Wetlands Watch, an organization working to reduce the impacts of climate change.
In Hampton Roads, there are more than 5,000 properties considered repetitive loss flood properties, which means they've had at least two paid flood claims within 10 years.
It can be called severe if it's happened at least four times.
"Even an inch of flooding in someone's home can cost thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars in someone's home," said Stiff.
Another strategy some local governments use is to buy flood-prone homes, tear them down, and leave them as green space.
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"It is the best option," said Stiff. "It is the 100% most effective form of flood mitigation, but it does have its drawbacks from a government perspective."
Cities like Chesapeake and Newport News have used this strategy.
Chesapeake has purchased nearly 50 properties, according to a city spokesperson.
They can apply to FEMA, who can completely cover the cost, which is voluntary for the homeowners.
"Once you acquire property, you move people away from the risk and they are not dealing with the social and emotional hardship of not being safe," said Stiff.
The other strategy is elevation, which is a part of the City of Norfolk's flood plan, called the Coastal Storm Risk Management Plan.
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"With the Army Corp of Engineers project, the Coastal Storm Risk Management Program, we will—at 100% funded to the owner—we will identify many of the same projects as identified through FEMA to raise those as part of that project," said Kyle Spencer, the city's chief resilience officer. "We'll take a look at identifying gaps as well."
What else is needed? Wetlands Watch thinks there needs to be more protections for people buying homes.
Current Virginia law requires home sellers to disclose if their home is a repetitive or severe repetitive loss property, but Stiff questions whether the law is being followed.
"We're unsure how this law has been enforced," said Stiff.
They want lawmakers to take things a step further and require sellers to disclose more information, like if their home has ever flooded before.
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The effort is being studied and will be taken up again next year.
"People can make these decisions, but they can't make them if they don't have the right information in front of them," said Stiff.
Knowledge is power when it comes to fighting flooding, but advocates say just letting people rebuild isn't the answer.
"There's nothing to incentivize FEMA from refusing another claim," said Stiff. "Unless there is a mechanism that says, 'Sorry, we're no longer going to pay for you to fix your property.' We're going to continue this cycle over and over and nothing will change."
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But there's not just one solution and as we've seen, this all takes a lot of money.
"The goal shouldn't be to put you back where you were in the same risky situation, in the same risky location, but to actually do something to address that risk," said Weber.
In Colonial Place at Miller and Chiaverotti's home, an example of how to adapt.
"There's gotta be some way we can mitigate what's going on and live with it," said Chiaverotti.
"I love my house," said Miller. "I love living here."
