Issues/Questions from the MIP Studies Workflow Open Conference Call on April 10, 2008 Issue/Question I am at the Letter of Final Determination stage and went to print the Final SOMA from the MIP, but it didn’t include the Effective Date at the end of the first paragraph. Where/how is the Effective Date entered so that it appears on the Final SOMA? Answer There is a situation where we would place a LOMC in Category 2 but would not revalidate the case. Therefore, we would need to keep the question in the SOMA tool that says Revalidate Yes or No. The specific situation is when you have a LOMA that was issued as an Out as Shown determination. We would place the case in Category 2 on the SOMA but the case would not be revalidated. Issue/Question New LOMCs appear on the SOMA tool after I complete the Prepare LFD activity. Do I need to keep categorizing these or is there a cutoff date for what is to be included in the final SOMA. Answer Currently there are no dates built into the system to cutoff adding new Revisions and Amendments to be included in the SOMA. The current process is for a mapping partner to submit their LFD and SOMA to the NSP for review a minimum of 2 weeks prior to the scheduled LFD date and suggest this is the cut off date for what LOMCs should appear on the SOMA. However, the user must be aware that if a LOMC is issued during the time between when the Final SOMA is sent to the NSP for review and when they try to complete the Distribute LFD task they will need to go into the SOMA tool and categorize the LOMC as “No” to show on the SOMA. The system will not let the user complete the Distribute LFD task if all LOMCs are not categorized. It must also be noted that the user must continue to update any LOMCs in the SOMA tool after the LFD because they will still need to issue the Revalidation letter approximately 1 month prior to the Effective Date. Issue/Question If I am doing a PMR or partial DFIRM and only dealing with a few communities, how should the other communities be handled in regards to the SOMA? Answer SOMA works based on CID and automatically brings forward LOMCs to be included in the SOMA. If a PMR is only affecting certain communities, the MIP project should not be set up on the CW basis, rather only including the communities affected. To quickly eliminate the non-relevant LOMCs, click the OK button below the SOMA panel to indicate you do not want to include any LOMCs in the SOMA. Then you can sort the SOMA by different fields (i.e. Map panels) to organize the areas affected that you want to check. You can then individually recheck the LOMCs you want to include in the SOMA and categorize just those. Make sure you recategorize all appropriate LOMCs because you will not be prompted to do so in the future, and LOMCs inadvertently missed will not show on the SOMA, resulting in the need for a reissuance and a headache for the homeowner. Issue/Question If I am doing a PMR or partial DFIRM and only dealing with a few communities, how should the other communities be handled in regards to the SOMA? If the LOMA is large enough to affect map panel, should I add it as a Category 1? Answer Yes, put it in Category 1 to reflect that you have incorporated the LOMA into the new maps. Issue/Question Some of my workbench items (especially QA tasks) have been assigned to a generic user called “bpeadmin.” Currently, I have to be aware of what task I’m missing and then ask MIPHelp to assign it to me. This can take a few days. Is there an easy way to resolve this? Answer This issue is a result of no users matching a particular role, organization or geography when the activity was created. The MIP team will run a report to identify affected activities and work with the MIP Champions and Black Belts to resolve the issues. Issue/Question I’ve noticed that the confirmation email sent from FAFS is not going to the right person and it is frustrating because I do not know when my submission has been verified. Will this be fixed any time soon? Answer Currently, in some cases, the person submitting the DFIRM is not receiving the email notification. This has been identified as a problem with the software and is scheduled to be fixed in the scope of SP15 to ensure that the email notification will be routed to the person who performed the upload. The situation in which this occurs is when the Producer submits DFIRM for validation and subsequently the Manager takes action on the activity. The current logic will send the email notification to the last person that claimed the task, regardless of what work was done. Until this is corrected with SP15 (planned for May 2008) if you incorrectly receive the email, please forward it to the correct person. Issue/Question In the MIP Post Preliminary Processing workflow there is a task called 'Determine if Appeal Period is Required'. If the study had no BFE changes then no appeal period would be required and the user does not have to complete the 'Manage Appeals' tasks. If a study did have BFE changes then the user would have to go through all tasks involved with 'Manage Appeals'. Towards the end of the 'Manage Appeals' process it asks if an appeal OR PROTEST was received. If only PROTESTS were received it still prompts the user to complete an 'Appeal Package'. My question is 'What happens to the study that had no BFE changes, therefore there was not an appeal period, but the study did have protests that were received during post preliminary process?' This study is never prompted for an Appeal Package because it never had to go through the Manage Appeals tasks. Answer The person that raised this question is correct if there are no BFE changes the MIP workflow does not take the user through the “Manage Appeal” process. If in fact there are no BFE changes but comments are received the Post Preliminary Manager can capture the information in the “comments” section of the “Manager” screens. If the user would need to discuss the comments with FEMA or need FEMA approval to make the changes they could document this in the “comments” section as well. If there is pertinent information the user can upload the material through the “Upload Portlet” and save it as a “Correspondence.” The material would then be available through “Search and Retrieve.” Issue/Question We are having trouble accessing the files once we retrieve the files from the archive – especially in our WISE projects. Specifically when opening an archived terrain project, we are getting errors and having trouble reading the returned files. Answer The MIP team is aware of the data retrieval problems and is working diligently identifying root causes and potential solutions. When you experience a problem with file retrieval or retrieved files, please submit a MIP Help ticket. MIP Help will help restore your data or restore the problem data from a separate archive. It is important to submit the ticket so that MIP Help has a full understanding of all of the issues while working on solutions. Issue/Question In the WISE tool, I turn the pass/fail spots into a shape file and I am getting duplicate records (same X/Y coordinates) in the CSV file with different water surface elevations. There shouldn’t be duplicate points. Do you have any suggestions as to how I can avoid this? Answer The WISE team identified that it may be that one of the TINs being created may be doubling back on itself, but the team needs additional information to provide a complete answer. Please contact MIP Help with WISE tool questions. Issue/Question I’m in Crystal reports looking for a particular LOMC case. When I drill to the community level, all of the cases show up. But if I drill to the county level, not all of the cases display. Answer It may be possible that the hierarchy set in the report makes it so you look at the projects at the lowest level of the hierarchy – which in this example sounds like it is the community level, not the county level. If you continue to experience this issue, please contact MIP Help with the name of the report and the specific project or case. MIP Help can then do further investigation and provide a more specific answer. Issue/Question In Crystal reports, I’m looking for community names, and I choose the option for county-wide, but the system doesn’t provide a response to the query. Answer County-wide is a separate entry from a reporting perspective because LOMCs are not associated with county-wide, but are for individual communities. Issue/Question Question from Kristen Heavener: Have people noticed performance improvement since last service pack? Answer Comments: Had a quick glitch in the workflow, but otherwise running great. It’s a lot better. Issue/Question Question from Kristen Heavener: Are you reading the MIP Insider? Do you have any feedback? Answer Contact Christina Bassis at ChristinaBassis@mapmodteam.com to provide feedback on the MIP Insider and/or to suggest article topics.