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As Austin prepares for colder temperatures, a coalition of teams led by the city’s Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management has theirs Post-action report during the winter storm Uri in February.
The city council stayed well after 10 p.m. last Thursday and ended its session with a briefing on the results of the report. The briefing, which included presentations from the city’s water and energy companies, outlined a set of ambitious recommendations based on the shortcomings in the city’s response to the disaster.
“I’ve been involved in emergency management for over 27 years … in over 15 presidential disaster statements … (including) floods, tornadoes and hurricanes,” began Juan Ortiz, director of HSEM, “and I have to say that the events we in February 2021, required me to bring all of these previous experiences together. “
Uri, which took 164 hours of sub-zero temperature and broke the record for consecutive days with grounded snow, left up to 40 percent of Austin residents without power, with some outages lasting up to 72 hours. When pipes burst and streets froze over, many residents were trapped in dangerously cold houses with no access to food or water.
Staff noted that the overlapping pandemic, which was already draining the city’s resources, seriously challenged storm-defense efforts. After investing in extensive Covid shelter and vaccine induction programs, the city was in the process of reorganizing and meeting more pressing needs.
“The city departments do not currently have adequate multiple-response staffing models,” said Hagerty Consulting’s Allan Freedman, who was involved in the report. With reference to the likelihood of future “overlapping disasters”, the report recommends a major strengthening of the city’s civil protection infrastructure.
The report includes a total of 132 recommended actions, including expanding HSEM, developing staff training programs, investing in weatherproof housing and transportation, and improving critical communication lines such as 311, 911 and the Warn Central Texas notification system. She proposes the creation of a new emergency management plan officer charged with overseeing a FEMA-informed “mass supply plan” for the distribution of shelter, food and water in times of crisis.
Ortiz noted that work on several of these recommendations was already underway, including a plan to organize and expand a network of shelters that received council approval back in April.
The Austin Energy and Austin Water reports identified communications systems and system maintenance practices as key areas that need improvement. Both departments said they had started improving their outage map technology, highlighting the importance of sharing real-time information with the public.
“A major outage is very information-intensive and the public wants to know what is going on,” said Greg Meszaros, director of Austin Water. “Up until winter storm Uri, we never had a large-scale outage… we are technically very good, but people want to know where is my water? When will it start? Show us a map. “
Meszaros also announced that the department’s winter storm working group had taken action to better organize incident response tasks, weather the infrastructure and develop better communication tools. Key changes include adapting the utility’s maintenance and repair program, which was previously scheduled for the winter, to address year-round capacity threats. The department has also increased its emergency water reserves tenfold and added to its electrical system to withstand extended outages.
Ortiz said HSEM will begin formally implementing the recommendations immediately and will return to the council update in the next few months. City officials will also be preparing for a winter weather prep seminar, due to take place on November 17th.
“Winter storm Uri is a precursor to future events,” Freedman warned, emphasizing the urgency of these changes. “Climate change is affecting these events … and we need to be prepared for a fundamentally new reality.”
“This can be a turning point for the city of Austin,” suggested counselor April Geruso. “The key is to spend money upfront on infrastructure to reduce the impact and invest in staff at a level where they can plan ahead and act effectively. The moment of disaster is too late to become resilient. “
Due to time constraints, the Council members have postponed questions about the report to a later, not yet scheduled working meeting. The Audit and Finance Committee will meet this Wednesday to discuss funding for an appropriate disaster preparedness plan.
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