Wind Hazard Mitigation in Southeast Florida

Abstract eng:
In the years flowing Hurricane Andrew, Miami-Dade County and much of Southeastern Florida adopted one of the strongest wind hazard building codes in the country. The adoption of a statewide building code in 2002 extended wind related codes throughout most of the coastal areas of Florida. Research conducted in Florida has shown that the utilization of window protection measures ranging from high-impact windows to hurricane shutters are at their highest levels in Southeast Florida for both new and existing housing [1,2]. The most important factor determining window protection in Florida is being located in a county that adopted the South Florida Building Code prior to the statewide building code. However, this research has also shown that several additional broad categories of factors also influence the adoption of window protection measures. These factors range from risk perceptions and hurricane experience to the socio-economic and racial/ethnic status of the household. Unfortunately, that research has focused almost exclusively on households residing in single-family owner occupied housing; little is known of the residents of other housing. The aforementioned research also has implications for the notion of ‘choice’ related to the adoption and utilization of window protection. The literature on protective action decisions related to hazard mitigation and policy makers in general tend to assume that households make decisions regarding the adoption of hazard mitigation technologies based, for the most part, upon perceptions of risk, knowledge, and experience [3,4]. For policy makers and planners, this often translates into the perceived need for programs seeking to educate the public regarding its risks and how to effectively protect homes [5,6]. And yet, the social vulnerability literature suggests that choice may be limited and perhaps non-existent for many households because of a variety of factors often related to the lack of resources [7,8,9,10]. The literature on window protection clearly suggests that while perception, experience and knowledge are indeed important, income and minority status are also important. Minority and lower income households are much more likely to mention cost as an important factor for not having window protection [1,2]. For these households then, the lack of resources is a critical factor attenuating their ability to make choices related to window protection. This paper take wing hazard mitigation research a step further by examining window protection measures employed by households residing in all forms of housing both in terms of structure type and tenure status. Specifically, it examines window protection employed by households who are either renting or owning their dwellings, which might range from single family to multi-family dwelling units. Furthermore, it explores the role played by factors, ranging from perceptions of hurricane risk to socioeconomic characteristics, on whether a household’s home has window protection and on the nature of the protection in use. The data utilized in this research were collected as part of a telephone survey of households in MiamiDade and Broward counties during the summer of 2002, approximately ten years after Hurricane Andrew. The sample was a non-proportional stratified random sample, drawn using random digit dialing techniques, that over-sampled households in southern sections of Miami-Dade County, the area directly

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