FEMA has designated areas called floodways, where water will flow when it spills outside a bayou’s banks.

Houston has outlawed new construction in these areas.

So if you can’t build on the land, why would its property value increase?

Digging drainage is part of life along the bayou Dave Wilson has seen his place flood too often.

“The last one was Allison,” Wilson said. “It got about two-and-a-half feet in there. In the house.”

That was the bad one. Water rose twice before too.

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FEMA just declared Wilson’s place in the floodway, but when the Harris County Appraisal District wanted to raise his taxes, Wilson protested.

How he did it is what caught our attention.

Wilson used Houston Mayor Bill White’s estate, located deep inside this gated Galleria community as an example.

Last year, Harris County valued the mayor’s land at more than $2.2 million.

This year it slashed Mayor White’s property to $1.2 million; it’s location in the floodplain was one of the reasons.

“You know if the mayor is going to get a 32-percent [sic] reduction, then everybody that’s in the floodplain should get one also,” Wilson said. “I don’t begrudge the mayor for getting that reduction, because we all pay too much in property taxes. We all should have it.”

The mayor's actual reduction is much more.

Over the last two years a record number of property owners have protested their values in Harris County. Exactly how many of those are related to flooding is uncertain. As for the mayor, his office said he didn’t ask for a reduction, the county just gave it to him.

Wilson didn’t get the mayor’s 45-percent discount.

Instead he got 5 percent.

“Five percent is all? That’s great,” he said. “Usually I get it raised every year 10 percent to 20 percent. I felt like I was a winner.”

Wilson estimates he’ll now save $1,200 a year in property taxes. And since FEMA just recently put hundreds of additional lots in the floodway, Wilson believes those owners have a case to lower their taxes at least as much or perhaps more.