Lee's Summit, MO Environmental Rules: Flood Zones (2026)

The Floodplain Overlay District, UDO Sec. 140, applies to every numbered and unnumbered A zone and AE zone shown on the Jackson County flood insurance rate map (FIRM) panels adopted January 20, 2017, as amended. Inside those zones no development shall be permitted except through the issuance of a floodplain development permit, granted by the Governing Body or its duly designated representative, and the City Engineer is designated the Floodplain Administrator responsible for administering the ordinance (Sec. 140(B)). No structure in a special flood hazard area may be located, extended, converted or structurally altered without full compliance with the permit and the ordinance's other requirements (Sec.

140(C)). A separate floodplain development permit is required for each building, structure or other development undertaken in a floodway or floodway fringe district (Sec. 240). Development standards under Sec. 170 add substantive conditions on top of the permit: no fill, construction or substantial improvement can be permitted within a designated floodway unless engineering analysis shows it will not raise the base flood's water surface elevation more than one foot anywhere in the City, and until a floodway is formally designated, the same one-foot cumulative-rise limit governs any numbered A or AE zone development.

Hazardous material storage is barred outright from the special flood hazard area, and accessory structures used only for parking or storage may be built at grade and wet-floodproofed only if smaller than 400 square feet, single-wall, unoccupied, and granted a variance. A permit denial or revocation may be appealed to the Board of Zoning Adjustment under Article 2, Division VII (Sec. 260).