Shutting agency managing sprawl may have put more people in Hurricane Ian's way

1) After reading this article, I'm still very confused about what this agency actually did. What were the rules of this agency that were previously alleged to kill jobs and harm economic development? Quotes from the article like "Regulations only dealt with individual impacts to that wetland or that water body. They didn't decide what was going to get built where," feel like word salad to me.

2) Without knowing more details, it's hard to make a decision, but just an open thought experiment to ponder. Would a specific state that is in the line of big storms be better off poorer but with less property damage through tougher regulations, or would they be better off being richer and being able to build quicker but experiencing more damage from storms? How does one figure out the cost-benefit analysis of that? What if Floridians prefer less regulations, quicker rebuilding, and are willing to live with more storm damage once in a while?

That's what happens when you stack risk. The whole house of cards comes tumbling down.