On January 6, the Texas Supreme Court denied the petition for mandamus in the first of two lawsuits over the Harris County Ellis-3 redistricting plan. The Ellis-3 plan completely flipped Precincts 3 and 4 while altering the boundaries of both. The likely end result will be a 4-1 Democratic supermajority in the next election. A […]
Some say that mining sand from our rivers and flood plains is the price of progress. Pros and Cons Sand has its benefits. We need it to make concrete. And we need concrete to accommodate a growing population. And a growing population creates income for builders, tradesmen and other businesses. But mining sand also has […]
Former Harris County Precinct 3 Commissioner Steve Radack filed a redistricting lawsuit on New Years Eve last week. This lawsuit comes hot on the heels of a previous lawsuit by Commissioners Jack Cagle, Tom Ramsey and their supporters. That lawsuit is now in the Texas Supreme Court. Here’s an overview of where both cases stand. […]
Ever wonder where your tax and flood-bond dollars go? Harris County Flood Control District shows all its active projects on one page. You can review those projects in tabular form or on a map. You can even click on links to learn more about each project. Or explore it in depth by going to its […]
The Preserve at Woodridge is a novel single-family-home rental development going in off Woodridge Parkway between St. Martha Church and Kingwood Park High School. As with Woodridge Village, on the other side of the high school, the developer claimed the property was in no known flood zone. Even though it’s just outside the pre-Atlas 14 […]
It’s always nice to start the new year by looking at the big picture. And big pictures don’t get much bigger than this. The image below comes from NOAA’s Global Data Explorer. It shows sea surface temperature anomalies in the Pacific and Atlantic. Reds show areas with warmer than normal temperatures. Blues are cooler. Degrees […]
Below are my personal picks for the top flood-mitigation stories of 2021. The Fight for Funding In 2019, Commissioners Court established “equity” guidelines that prioritized projects in Low-to-Moderate Income watersheds. Then this year: Harris County won no US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Grants in the first round of Harvey competition. To compensate […]
A myth being promulgated in Harris County Commissioners Court and certain low-to-moderate income (LMI) watersheds these days goes something like this: The FEMA Benefit/Cost Ratio (used to rank grant applications for flood-mitigation projects) favors high-dollar homes. That disadvantages less affluent, inner-city neighborhoods compared to more affluent suburbs. Therefore, less affluent neighborhoods get no help and […]
The new Harris County Administrator has proposed “excluding” potential partner funds from consideration in the allocation of flood-bond and flood-resilience trust dollars. There’s only one problem with that. Without partner funds, there won’t nearly be enough money to cover all the proposed flood-mitigation projects in the bond, the trust, or future bonds. The conclusions above […]
Harris County Flood Control District (HCFCD) has a large active construction project underway in Tomball. Phase I of the project stretches about two-thirds of a mile from SH249 to FM2920 on a tributary of Willow Creek as it arcs around a major shopping center near downtown Tomball and Lone Star College/Tomball. The project includes channel […]