Flood hazard mapping as it…

Flood hazard mapping as it is done now and how it is proposed is Urban focused. This is not necessarily a bad thing as the hazard can be amplified where there are a lot of people.
The area of concern is the agricultural impacts of the hazard mapping and the planning process including CA permitting.
The mapping guidelines recommend a lower level of resolution or detail on mapping the hazard in rural areas, which makes sense for predicting and modeling flooding in the downstream Urban area. However the problem is the rural areas are regulated as well, with this lower quality hazard mapping that is less precise and not ground checked at all. It also implies a hazard in headwater areas on farms where water levels will not overtop your rubber boots in a flood event.
In some cases this leads to very expensive approval processes for building permits and greatly complicates approval process for “development” as defined in the PPS.
(Note OFA recommends OFDUs be regulated by “site plan control” which makes them “development”).

While there is a solid rational for the mapping and modeling for flood prediction and mitigation, there is also a balance needed for regulatory oversight for agriculture.
I suggest that there be technical definition of where the hazard mapping starts in headwater areas (farms). Some examples to consider; drainage area (ie not mapped if that points has less than 250 ha of drainage area upstream); flow rate or depth criteria and I am sure there are others. Of course the area would still be modeled to improve predictions downstream, but would be excluded from hazard mapping.

Given this is the technical bulletin on flood hazard mapping, defining a starting point with a technical definition should be a fit.