Peoria, IL Environmental Rules: Flood Elevation Requirements (2026)

Sec. 12-2 defines FPE, or flood protection elevation, as the base flood elevation plus two feet at any given SFHA location, with one carve-out: in the Riverfront Redevelopment area, bounded by State Street, Spring Street, Adams Street, and the Illinois River, the freeboard is only one-tenth of a foot above base flood instead of two feet. Sec. 12-7 then applies that FPE standard to buildings: new construction valued over $1,000, structural alterations that add more than 20 percent floor area or 50 percent market value, repairs to a damaged building exceeding 50 percent of its pre-damage market value, new manufactured home placements, and travel trailers sited more than 180 days all must be protected below the FPE.

Compliance can be met by elevating on fill, elevating on a compliant foundation, or, for nonresidential buildings only, floodproofing certified by a registered professional engineer. Under the elevation method, the lowest floor, including any basement, and all electrical, heating, ventilating, plumbing, and air-conditioning equipment and utility meters must sit at or above the FPE, while water, sewer, electrical, telephone, and other waterproofed utility lines may run below it. Sec. 12-4 sets the base flood elevation itself from FEMA's 1979 flood insurance study profiles for the Illinois River and its tributary creeks, from flood insurance rate map data for AH and AO zones, and from Illinois State Water Survey data or USGS depth-frequency formulas where no FEMA elevation exists.

Sec. 12-3 assigns the director of public works to keep an as-built record of the lowest floor elevation for every regulated building and the floodproofing certificate for any floodproofed building.