2/20/25 – Houston City Council Member Fred Flickinger has postponed Round 2 of Median Madness because of weather predictions. Instead of February 22, the City will now hold the event on March 8 from 8:30 AM to 12:00 PM.
Median Madness is a volunteer event in which Kingwood residents work with City crews to clear vines and underbrush encroaching on Kingwood Drive. The goal: to enhance the beauty of the community and improve traffic safety.
Weather predictions for this Saturday morning call for near freezing temperatures and a high probability of rain. Hence, the postponement.
If You Haven’t Yet Signed Up…
If you missed the first Median Madness event held last November, you missed some fun.
Residents and City Council Members attacked the vines which had been encroaching on traffic and trimmed them back with enthusiasm.
The November event focused on the south side of the median facing Kingwood Lakes. The March event will focus on the north side facing Kings Forest.
The City will close one lane of Kingwood Drive westbound traffic for parking. Please carpool to save space. And remember:
Park between Kings Creek Drive and Forest Shores Drive. That’s about a block past Kings Forest Drive and a block short of Shady Run. You’ll see markers when you get there.
Posted by Bob Rehak on 2/20/2025
2732 Days since Hurricane Harvey
https://i0.wp.com/reduceflooding.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Median-Madness-Flyer-Postponed-e1740073689629.jpg?fit=1100%2C1424&ssl=114241100adminadmin2025-02-20 12:21:492025-02-20 12:23:53Median Madness Postponed Due to Weather, Now March 8
2/19/25 – Eight Harris County department heads make more in salary than the President of the United States. All are women or minorities. The mega salaries go to the heads of the:
Institute of Forensic Sciences
Toll Road Authority
Engineering Department
Universal Services
Public Health Services
Flood Control District
Office of County Administrator
Office of Management and Budget
Moreover, 17 Harris County department heads make more than U.S. cabinet-level officials such as the Secretaries of Defense, State, Homeland Security, Commerce, etc., in the U.S. Government.
The U.S. President supervises roughly 3 million employees (as of January 2025, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics). Yet the head of Harris County Flood Control has roughly 300 and makes more money.
Her $434,137 salary is also $185,000 more than the U.S. Secretary of Defense makes. The Secretary of Defense oversees the nation’s largest department. He coordinates the national defense with more than 1.4 million active-duty service members and 800,000 reserve personnel.
In contrast, the head of the Flood Control District coordinates the design, construction and maintenance of infrastructure projects in Harris County. That’s certainly no small job. But it’s not nearly as large as the national defense.
Is Harris County the land of opportunity or what!!!
The heads of six other Harris County departments received even bigger raises. Several received those raises despite severe, withering criticism of their performance in open Commissioners Court. For example…
And if adjusted for construction-industry inflation, the spending rate shows she’s producing projects at a slower rate now than the Flood Control District did before flood-bond passage in 2018. Reportedly, her predecessors initiated virtually all of the HCFCD projects now entering the construction phase.
Discounting the $234.6 million that HCFCD spent in 2024 by cumulative 35% inflation since 2018 roughly equals pre-bond spending in 2017.
The loss of purchasing power to inflation means that many Flood Bond projects may never get built. And that will most affect people at the bottom of the county’s priority list, such as residents of the San Jacinto River watershed.
Pay More, Get Less
Overall, Harris County has increased taxes (rates x appraisals) 30% in the last two years. That’s 4-5X greater than the rate of inflation. And that included a 63% Flood Control tax increase last year.
So, how does the leader of an organization with plummeting performance get a salary increase for almost $90,000?
It’s all Monopoly money to the Democrats who control Commissioner’s Court. It’s not coming out of their pockets. It’s coming out of yours.
And they’re probably betting on the fact that you won’t realize you’re paying one of their political pals more money than the President of the United States to manage 10,000 times fewer employees.
But hey. We keep re-electing them. Maybe it’s time to get loud.
Posted by Bob Rehak on 2/19/2025
2731 Days since Hurricane Harvey
The thoughts expressed in this post represent opinions on matters of public concern and safety. They are protected by the First Amendment of the US Constitution and the Anti-SLAPP Statute of the Great State of Texas.
https://i0.wp.com/reduceflooding.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/HCFCD-Spending-2017-2025.png?fit=1488%2C888&ssl=18881488adminadmin2025-02-19 17:56:442025-02-20 09:00:078 Harris County Department Heads Make More Than U.S. President
2/18/2025 – Seven years ago, Texas Governor Greg Abbott took an aerial tour of the Lake Houston Area and the San Jacinto River to view the extent of Hurricane Harvey devastation. Afterwards, he met with area leaders and elected officials at the Kingwood Community Center. Together, they announced a list of seven actions that they hoped would make affected communities more resilient to future flooding.
Seven years later, the responsible parties have completed recommended studies. They have also completed dredging and buyouts, and pursued funding. But little else has changed on the ground that would actually reduce flood risk.
Below is a high-level review of the mandates and the progress made toward them.
Using Hazard Mitigation Funds, the Texas Department of Emergency Management (TDEM) has authorized $3 million to jumpstart the engineering and permitting process to determine where dredging should take place on the San Jacinto River.
Using Hazard Mitigation Funds, FEMA has approved over 900 voluntary buyouts in Harris County.
Instructing the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality to investigate and take action against sand mining operations violating regulations.
Directing the San Jacinto River Authority (SJRA) to immediately identify what can be done to prevent flood events along the West Fork of the river.
Directing the SJRA to implement immediate and long-term solutions to protect lives and property of Texans living in the watershed.
Directing the SJRA to identify funding to implement a long-term plan that better protects areas downstream of Lake Conroe.
Lots of Studies, Little Action
How many of these initiatives have become reality? Let’s take an inventory.
Dredging Study
Completed. Likewise for most of the dredging that came out of it. Dredging has visibly restored much of the conveyance of the San Jacinto East and West Forks. But to this day, we’re still pumping sand out of the West Fork deposited by Harvey. The City and Army Corps have spent $188 million on dredging since they started after Harvey. Those dollars have actually reduced flood risk.
Also completed … in 2020. But no one has implemented any of its recommendations yet. The study identified approximately $3.3 billion worth of upstream reservoirs to reduce water flowing into the Lake Houston Area. But Texas has not allocated nearly that much to fund a flood plan for the entire state.
Harvey flooded these Forest Cove townhomes to the third floor and swept several complexes off their foundations.
Action Against Sand Mines that Violate Regulations
Much of the sand clogging the East and West Forks after Harvey came from sand mines. But the TCEQ has done little to prosecute them. In fact, the sand mine situation has gotten worse. During the May 2024 flood, the rivers started flowing through multiple mines, a process called “pit capture.” But a TCEQ report on one of the pit captures failed to even mention the term.
Hallett Mine, West Fork Pit Capture. Notice river running through the mine rather than around it.
TCEQ did file a lawsuit through the Attorney General against the Triple PG Sand Mine in Porter back in 2019. However, the case has languished and still has yet to come to trial. A Travis County District Court has postponed the trial several times. But the TCEQ says things are now “full steam ahead” for an August 17, 2024 trial.
Bill McCabe of the Lake Houston Flood Prevention Initiative has tracked complaints against sand mines through Public Information Requests. TCEQ has sent him information on approximately 40 mines in the San Jacinto River Basin.
McCabe reports that most “Notices of Violation” from the TCEQ involve failure to file a mine plan (specified in the new Best Management Practices for Mines in the San Jacinto River Watershed). TCEQ issued four “Notices of Enforcement” since early 2022, but only one remains outstanding.
SJRA To Identify Immediate Flood Risk Reduction Strategy on West Fork
After the meeting between Abbott and local leaders, the San Jacinto River Authority (SJRA) identified a “Lake Lowering Strategy” for Lake Conroe that it could implement immediately. The idea: preemptively lower the level of Lake Conroe up to 1.5 feet in the Spring and Fall to create extra storage space, thereby reducing downstream flood risk until the City of Houston could build additional flood gates on Lake Houston.
Unfortunately, Lake Conroe residents didn’t like that idea. As the floodgate project encountered delays caused by funding and the constructibility of the initial crest-gate recommendation, they pushed back. As a result, the Lake-Lowering Policy morphed into an “Active Storm Management Policy.”
Mark Micheletti, an SJRA board member from Kingwood, says the SJRA continues to look for ways to improve its this policy and has added several gages upstream of Lake Conroe to improve inflow estimates. That enables them to better gauge the timing and magnitude of releases during flood events. “We get better with every storm,” said Micheletti.
SJRA to Implement Immediate and Long-Term Solutions
After the Abbott meeting, SJRA immediately pursued the Lake-Lowering Strategy mentioned above.
With an eye to the longer term, it also pursued several studies. It released the San Jacinto River Basin Master Drainage Study in 2020. The study identified ways to reduce a 100-year flood in West Fork watershed by almost 6 feet. But SJRA has not yet constructed any of the recommendations.
SJRA to Identify Funding to Implement Long-term Plan
SJRA has no funding source, i.e., taxes, to implement any of the flood-reduction recommendations it has identified to date. It must piggy-back on partners such as COH, Harris County and the Texas Water Development Board. Micheletti says SJRA has applied for several grants, but has few other options.
He suggested re-engineering the way we think about flood projects to get funding commitments immediately after floods when critical political consensus exists.
Posted by Bob Rehak on 2/18/2025
2730 Days since Hurricane Harvey
The thoughts expressed in this post represent opinions on matters of public concern and safety. They are protected by the First Amendment of the US Constitution and the Anti-SLAPP Statute of the Great State of Texas.
https://i0.wp.com/reduceflooding.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/20220224-DJI_0339-copy.jpg?fit=1200%2C799&ssl=17991200adminadmin2025-02-18 18:30:482025-02-18 18:30:49Looking Back at Abbott Directives to Reduce Flooding in Lake Houston Area
Median Madness Postponed Due to Weather, Now March 8
2/20/25 – Houston City Council Member Fred Flickinger has postponed Round 2 of Median Madness because of weather predictions. Instead of February 22, the City will now hold the event on March 8 from 8:30 AM to 12:00 PM.
Median Madness is a volunteer event in which Kingwood residents work with City crews to clear vines and underbrush encroaching on Kingwood Drive. The goal: to enhance the beauty of the community and improve traffic safety.
Weather predictions for this Saturday morning call for near freezing temperatures and a high probability of rain. Hence, the postponement.
If You Haven’t Yet Signed Up…
If you missed the first Median Madness event held last November, you missed some fun.
Residents and City Council Members attacked the vines which had been encroaching on traffic and trimmed them back with enthusiasm.
The November event focused on the south side of the median facing Kingwood Lakes. The March event will focus on the north side facing Kings Forest.
The City will close one lane of Kingwood Drive westbound traffic for parking. Please carpool to save space. And remember:
All ages are welcome but those under 16 must be accompanied by an adult. Sign up for more details and to download a release form at: https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10C0848A8A823A5FBC70-55227367-median.
Park between Kings Creek Drive and Forest Shores Drive. That’s about a block past Kings Forest Drive and a block short of Shady Run. You’ll see markers when you get there.
Posted by Bob Rehak on 2/20/2025
2732 Days since Hurricane Harvey
8 Harris County Department Heads Make More Than U.S. President
2/19/25 – Eight Harris County department heads make more in salary than the President of the United States. All are women or minorities. The mega salaries go to the heads of the:
Moreover, 17 Harris County department heads make more than U.S. cabinet-level officials such as the Secretaries of Defense, State, Homeland Security, Commerce, etc., in the U.S. Government.
The President of the United States makes $400,000 per year. Members of the President’s Cabinet make close to $250,000 per year.
The salaries of the Harris County department heads vary. See below.
Harris County “Going for Broke”
The U.S. President supervises roughly 3 million employees (as of January 2025, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics). Yet the head of Harris County Flood Control has roughly 300 and makes more money.
Her $434,137 salary is also $185,000 more than the U.S. Secretary of Defense makes. The Secretary of Defense oversees the nation’s largest department. He coordinates the national defense with more than 1.4 million active-duty service members and 800,000 reserve personnel.
In contrast, the head of the Flood Control District coordinates the design, construction and maintenance of infrastructure projects in Harris County. That’s certainly no small job. But it’s not nearly as large as the national defense.
The head of the Flood Control District got a raise this year of almost $90,000 – approximately one third of the total salary made by the Secretary of Defense. And far larger than what the average Houstonian makes in an entire year.
Is Harris County the land of opportunity or what!!!
The heads of six other Harris County departments received even bigger raises. Several received those raises despite severe, withering criticism of their performance in open Commissioners Court. For example…
Billions of Dollars Being Eroded by Inflation
The latest head of the Flood Control District has roughly $3 billion of 2018 flood-bond/matching-grant dollars at her disposal. Yet Flood Control spending has seen its fourth straight year of decline.
And if adjusted for construction-industry inflation, the spending rate shows she’s producing projects at a slower rate now than the Flood Control District did before flood-bond passage in 2018. Reportedly, her predecessors initiated virtually all of the HCFCD projects now entering the construction phase.
The loss of purchasing power to inflation means that many Flood Bond projects may never get built. And that will most affect people at the bottom of the county’s priority list, such as residents of the San Jacinto River watershed.
Pay More, Get Less
Overall, Harris County has increased taxes (rates x appraisals) 30% in the last two years. That’s 4-5X greater than the rate of inflation. And that included a 63% Flood Control tax increase last year.
So, how does the leader of an organization with plummeting performance get a salary increase for almost $90,000?
It’s all Monopoly money to the Democrats who control Commissioner’s Court. It’s not coming out of their pockets. It’s coming out of yours.
And they’re probably betting on the fact that you won’t realize you’re paying one of their political pals more money than the President of the United States to manage 10,000 times fewer employees.
But hey. We keep re-electing them. Maybe it’s time to get loud.
Posted by Bob Rehak on 2/19/2025
2731 Days since Hurricane Harvey
The thoughts expressed in this post represent opinions on matters of public concern and safety. They are protected by the First Amendment of the US Constitution and the Anti-SLAPP Statute of the Great State of Texas.
Looking Back at Abbott Directives to Reduce Flooding in Lake Houston Area
2/18/2025 – Seven years ago, Texas Governor Greg Abbott took an aerial tour of the Lake Houston Area and the San Jacinto River to view the extent of Hurricane Harvey devastation. Afterwards, he met with area leaders and elected officials at the Kingwood Community Center. Together, they announced a list of seven actions that they hoped would make affected communities more resilient to future flooding.
Seven years later, the responsible parties have completed recommended studies. They have also completed dredging and buyouts, and pursued funding. But little else has changed on the ground that would actually reduce flood risk.
Below is a high-level review of the mandates and the progress made toward them.
Seven Actions Identified in Abbott Press Release
Abbott and the officials identified seven actions or directives (quoted below from the press release):
Lots of Studies, Little Action
How many of these initiatives have become reality? Let’s take an inventory.
Dredging Study
Completed. Likewise for most of the dredging that came out of it. Dredging has visibly restored much of the conveyance of the San Jacinto East and West Forks. But to this day, we’re still pumping sand out of the West Fork deposited by Harvey. The City and Army Corps have spent $188 million on dredging since they started after Harvey. Those dollars have actually reduced flood risk.
But the sand keeps coming. That’s why State Rep. Charles Cunningham has introduced a bill to continue the program by creating a Lake Houston Area Dredging and Maintenance District.
Watershed Study
Also completed … in 2020. But no one has implemented any of its recommendations yet. The study identified approximately $3.3 billion worth of upstream reservoirs to reduce water flowing into the Lake Houston Area. But Texas has not allocated nearly that much to fund a flood plan for the entire state.
Voluntary Buyouts
Abbott and the civic leaders called for 900 voluntary buyouts. HCFCD completed buyouts of all Forest Cove townhomes in 2022. County-wide, Harris County Flood Control District had completed 1,150 by July 24, 2024.
Action Against Sand Mines that Violate Regulations
Much of the sand clogging the East and West Forks after Harvey came from sand mines. But the TCEQ has done little to prosecute them. In fact, the sand mine situation has gotten worse. During the May 2024 flood, the rivers started flowing through multiple mines, a process called “pit capture.” But a TCEQ report on one of the pit captures failed to even mention the term.
TCEQ did file a lawsuit through the Attorney General against the Triple PG Sand Mine in Porter back in 2019. However, the case has languished and still has yet to come to trial. A Travis County District Court has postponed the trial several times. But the TCEQ says things are now “full steam ahead” for an August 17, 2024 trial.
Bill McCabe of the Lake Houston Flood Prevention Initiative has tracked complaints against sand mines through Public Information Requests. TCEQ has sent him information on approximately 40 mines in the San Jacinto River Basin.
McCabe reports that most “Notices of Violation” from the TCEQ involve failure to file a mine plan (specified in the new Best Management Practices for Mines in the San Jacinto River Watershed). TCEQ issued four “Notices of Enforcement” since early 2022, but only one remains outstanding.
SJRA To Identify Immediate Flood Risk Reduction Strategy on West Fork
After the meeting between Abbott and local leaders, the San Jacinto River Authority (SJRA) identified a “Lake Lowering Strategy” for Lake Conroe that it could implement immediately. The idea: preemptively lower the level of Lake Conroe up to 1.5 feet in the Spring and Fall to create extra storage space, thereby reducing downstream flood risk until the City of Houston could build additional flood gates on Lake Houston.
Unfortunately, Lake Conroe residents didn’t like that idea. As the floodgate project encountered delays caused by funding and the constructibility of the initial crest-gate recommendation, they pushed back. As a result, the Lake-Lowering Policy morphed into an “Active Storm Management Policy.”
Mark Micheletti, an SJRA board member from Kingwood, says the SJRA continues to look for ways to improve its this policy and has added several gages upstream of Lake Conroe to improve inflow estimates. That enables them to better gauge the timing and magnitude of releases during flood events. “We get better with every storm,” said Micheletti.
SJRA to Implement Immediate and Long-Term Solutions
After the Abbott meeting, SJRA immediately pursued the Lake-Lowering Strategy mentioned above.
With an eye to the longer term, it also pursued several studies. It released the San Jacinto River Basin Master Drainage Study in 2020. The study identified ways to reduce a 100-year flood in West Fork watershed by almost 6 feet. But SJRA has not yet constructed any of the recommendations.
SJRA also released its Sediment Removal and Sand Trap Development Study in 2022. No concrete actions have yet resulted from that study.
SJRA to Identify Funding to Implement Long-term Plan
SJRA has no funding source, i.e., taxes, to implement any of the flood-reduction recommendations it has identified to date. It must piggy-back on partners such as COH, Harris County and the Texas Water Development Board. Micheletti says SJRA has applied for several grants, but has few other options.
He suggested re-engineering the way we think about flood projects to get funding commitments immediately after floods when critical political consensus exists.
Posted by Bob Rehak on 2/18/2025
2730 Days since Hurricane Harvey
The thoughts expressed in this post represent opinions on matters of public concern and safety. They are protected by the First Amendment of the US Constitution and the Anti-SLAPP Statute of the Great State of Texas.