Lawmakers to focus on flood preparedness Wednesday during special session

With the heartbreak caused by the Hill Country flood fresh in their minds, Texas lawmakers begin work on flood preparedness Wednesday. The sense of urgency may push them to pass solutions they’ve failed to act on in the past.

Governor Greg Abbott and Lt. Governor Dan Patrick promised people in Kerr County to devote part of the special session to improving flood warnings and flood response.

That will include holding a hearing in Kerrville next week to hear from those who have lost so much.

When President Trump visited Kerr County a week after the devastating flood, Texas lawmakers pledged to include the impacted communities in the special session.

“We’re going to have a meeting in this room so that the residents of this area don’t have to come to Austin we’re going to come here and stay as long as it takes to hear their stories their needs and their wants,” said Lt. Governor Dan Patrick.

Governor Abbott wants lawmakers to focus on four areas:

Flood warning systems, flood emergency communications, relief funding for the Hill Country, and natural disaster preparation and recovery.

“We need to assess the failures, but through the lens of, how do we make things better,” said State Senator Jose Menendez of San Antonio who is on the Senate committee that will look for ways to warn people in areas vulnerable to flooding.

He says they intend to learn from the painful lessons in Kerr County.

“The people who received emergency text messages some people ignored them, some people were allowed to build in the flood plain,” Menendez said.

Flood alerts that many communities send out by text, robocalls or email can work well in densely populated areas like San Antonio, where our system is called Alert-SA.

But people have to sign up for them and there’s the chance some people will ignore them if they are used too frequently.

As we’ve reported some communities like New Braunfels and Comfort are using tornado sirens to warn campers, tubers and residents about flood danger.

The sirens make more sense in remote areas where people may not have good cell phone service.

“Sirens can be a part of it but we have to get the message out about what’s happening in my opinion sirens alone may not be good enough,” Menendez said.

Lawmakers will also consider legislation to provide more relief funding for the Hill Country, where an early estimate of property loss is at least $200 million.