Parker, CO Environmental Rules: Flood Elevation Requirements (2026)

Parker Municipal Code § 13.08.040(a)(6)b sets the Town's freeboard standard for flood hazard reduction, going beyond the minimum federal requirement by requiring a full two feet of elevation above the base flood elevation rather than matching it exactly. For residential construction, any substantial improvement to an existing home must have its lowest floor, including the basement, along with its electrical, heating, ventilation, plumbing, and air conditioning equipment, elevated at least two feet above the base flood elevation. Nonresidential structures face the same two-foot elevation requirement or, as an alternative, can be flood proofed so that everything below that two-foot mark is watertight with substantially impermeable walls, structural components able to resist hydrostatic and hydrodynamic loads, and certification from a registered professional engineer or architect.

Critical facilities, meaning things like emergency response buildings, must independently meet a minimum freeboard of two feet above base flood elevation under § 13.08.040(a)(6)b.3. New buildings and habitable structures are separately barred outright from any designated 100-year floodplain under § 13.08.040(a)(6)a.2, and recreational vehicles cannot be parked in the special flood hazard area at all. The areas of special flood hazard are drawn from FEMA's Flood Insurance Study for Douglas County, Colorado, dated March 16, 2016, and any floodplain development requires a Floodplain Development Permit reviewed under § 13.03.040(e) by the Town's Floodplain Administrator, who also handles the certification of engineering compliance required for flood-proofed alternatives.