Cocoa, FL Environmental Rules: Flood Elevation Requirements (2026)

The Florida Building Code sets the baseline flood-construction standard statewide, but Cocoa has adopted its own local amendment to Section R322.2.1 of the Florida Building Code, Residential, codified at City Code § 6-105, that raises the elevation floor within city limits. As locally amended, R322.2.1 requires that buildings and structures in flood hazard areas not designated as Coastal A Zones "shall have the lowest floors elevated to or above the base flood elevation plus 1 foot or the design flood elevation, whichever is higher," and structures in Coastal A Zones carry the identical one-foot freeboard requirement.

In shallow-flooding AO Zones, the lowest floor (including any basement) must sit above the highest adjacent grade by whichever is greater: the flood depth number shown on the FIRM plus one foot, or at least three feet if no depth number is specified. Basement floors that are below grade on all sides must also clear base flood elevation plus one foot or the design flood elevation, whichever is higher. Enclosed areas below the design flood elevation, including basements not below grade on all sides, instead fall under the separate enclosure rules of Section R322.2.2.

Section 6-105 sits alongside the local amendment on minimum finished floor height found in § 6-104, requiring the higher of six inches above adjoining grade or ten inches above the average road crown, with the flood-resistant elevation controlling instead whenever a special flood hazard area applies. The one-foot freeboard was adopted by Ord. No. 12-2014 on March 11, 2014, and remains the operative local standard on top of the base Florida Building Code.