This checklist can help communities identify opportunities to improve their resilience to future floods through policy and regulatory tools—including comprehensive plans, hazard mitigation plans, and local land use codes and regulations—and non-regulatory programs implemented at the local level. The checklist includes overall strategies to improve flood resilience, as well as specific strategies to:

• Conserve land and discourage development in river corridors;
• Protect people, businesses, and facilities in vulnerable settlements;
• Direct development to safer areas; and
• Implement and coordinate stormwater management practices throughout an entire watershed.

Completing this checklist is the first step in assessing how well a community is positioned to avoid and/or reduce flood damage and to recover from floods. If a community is not yet using some of the strategies listed in the checklist and would like to, the policy options and resources listed in the report Planning for Flood Recovery and Long-Term Resilience in Vermont can provide ideas for how to begin implementing these approaches.

This Flood Resilience Checklist was developed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in collaboration with the state of Vermont following the devastation caused by Tropical Storm Irene. Use of this checklist was piloted in Vermont's Mad River Valley—with the communities of Waitsfield and Moretown—and these towns, and others, have subsequently taken action to increase their resilience to future floods.