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There are a total of 20,767 communities covered by the National Flood Insurance Program. http://www.fema.gov/cis/nation.pdf . Of these, 2460 are in Pennsylvania, http://www.fema.gov/cis/PA.pdf, amounting to 11.8 percent of the total. Pennsylvania has by far the most NFIP communities of any state. The state with the next most communities is New York, which also lies in the Delaware River Basin. New York has 1489 communities, http://www.fema.gov/cis/NY.html , or 7 percent of the total. The number of NFIP communities in New Jersey, another Basin states, is more commensurate with other states, but still not insignificant. Specifically, New Jersey has 547 communities, http://www.fema.gov/cis/NJ.pdf or 2.6 percent of the total, more than the coastal states of both California (518) and Florida (452). The smaller state of Delaware has 47 communities http://www.fema.gov/cis/DE.pdf or .2 percent of the total. The four Delaware River Basin states, which account for 13.5 percent of the nation’s population, make up nearly a fifth of the nation’s NFIP communities, presenting extraordinary challenges to dissemination of information on the subject of flooding and flood safety measures. Three of the four Basin states, including Pennsylvania, are among the top ten states in terms of flood losses nationwide.
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