2026 SESSION
ENROLLED
HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 16
Continuing the Joint Subcommittee on Recurrent Flooding. Report.
Agreed to by the House of Delegates, January 30, 2026
Agreed to by the Senate, March 3, 2026
WHEREAS, House Joint Resolution No. 50 and Senate Joint Resolution No. 76 (2012) directed the Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS) to study strategies for adaptation to prevent recurrent flooding in Virginia's Tidewater and Eastern Shore localities; and
WHEREAS, the resulting VIMS report, titled "Recurrent Flooding Study for Tidewater Virginia," published as Senate Document 3 (2013), stated that recurrent flooding impacts all localities in Virginia's coastal zone and is predicted to become worse over reasonable planning horizons (20 to 50 years); and
WHEREAS, VIMS offered several recommendations, including that the Commonwealth, working with its coastal localities, (i) begin comprehensive and coordinated planning efforts; (ii) initiate identification, collection, and analysis of data needed to support effective planning for response efforts; and (iii) take a lead role in addressing recurrent flooding in Virginia for the following reasons: (a) accessing relevant federal resources for planning and mitigation may be enhanced through state mediation, (b) flooding problems are linked to water bodies and therefore often transcend locality boundaries, and (c) prioritizing flood management actions must be based in part on risk, and therefore the Commonwealth must oversee the necessary studies to determine adaptation strategies, as well as implementation of the agreed-upon strategies; and
WHEREAS, House Joint Resolution No. 16 and Senate Joint Resolution No. 3 (2014) established the Joint Subcommittee to Formulate Recommendations to Address Recurrent Flooding as recommended by the VIMS report; and
WHEREAS, the Joint Subcommittee to Study Recurrent Flooding met four times during the 2014 interim to collect information from federal and state agencies, localities, and stakeholders and to carry out its work; and