After Town Hall Meeting, Confusion Still Swirls Around Status of Mouth Bar

To hear the City tell it, we’re days away from agreement to dredge 1.5 million cubic yards of the mouth bar. To hear Congressman Dan Crenshaw tell it, the permit application hasn’t even been filed yet.

So where do things really stand. A reader asked last weekend, whether the Houston Chronicle story about the meeting was accurate.

The Chronicle headline said, “Crenshaw frustrated with delayed application for federal funds to remove notorious Kingwood mouth bar.”

Specifically, the reader asked, “Based on your knowledge, is this factual (City of Houston dragging its feet) or just politicians pointing the finger at each other?”

Before I step into the cross-fire, let me say this. Officials have conducted most meetings on this subject behind closed doors. But I shall attempt to answer the reader’s question based on public statements and documents supplied by Houston City Council member Dave Martin and the Army Corps.

Mouth Bar Chronology

To answer the “Is it foot-dragging or finger-pointing” question, I need to go back to the period after Harvey and put this subject in a historical context. Foot dragging depends on where you want to start the clock ticking. So bear with me.

2017: Post Harvey Discovery and Early Efforts to Raise Awareness

September, 14, 2017 – Two weeks after Harvey, I photographed the mouth bar from a helicopter. In the next few months, I began calling attention to it and other sediment problems every way I could. They included this web site, newspaper articles, and testimony before Texas Senate and House committees. At the House Natural Resources Committee hearing at the GRB, Dave Martin was present.

Mouth Bar of the West Fork of the San Jacinto. Like an iceberg, most of it is below water. To get past this blockage, water must flow uphill more than 30 feet.

Early 2018: Early Efforts to Forge Political Consensus

  • February of 2018 – Houston City Council Member Dave Martin began calling Governor Greg Abbott for help on an almost daily basis.
  • March 6, 2018 – Mayor Sylvester Turner announced at a Kingwood Town Hall meeting that he had on that same day spoken to Governor Greg Abbott about the urgent need to remove sediment from the San Jacinto River.
  • March, 15, 2018 – Governor Abbott visited Kingwood, took an aerial tour of the East and West Forks of the San Jacinto and met with local officials. After the meeting, he announced that, using Hazard Mitigation Funds, he was authorizing the Texas Department of Emergency Management (TDEM) to spend $3 million to jumpstart the engineering and permitting process to determine where dredging should take place on the San Jacinto River.
  • April. 6, 2018 – An Army Corps sonar-equipped boat began surveying a five-mile area between Hwy 69/59 and West Lake Houston Parkway.
  • April 10, 2018 – The Army Corps announced that it had completed the first leg of its survey of West Fork sedimentation.
  • May 9, 2018 – The Corps announced that it had completed the value engineering phase of its Emergency West Fork Dredging Program.
  • May 28, 2018 – DRC (under a contract with the City of Houston) began removing debris from Lake Houston to clear the way for dredging.

Mid-2018: Mouth Bar Excluded from Scope, Scramble to Identify Solutions

Second Half 2018: Effort to Save $18 million

  • July 19, 2018 – Mobilization for the project officially started. About this time, it became clear that mobilization represented 25% of the total cost of the $70,000,000 job, or about $18 million. If the dredging scope could be extended BEFORE the end of “Phase 1,” taxpayers could save the cost of a massive REmobilization for a second, separate project.
  • July 26, 2018 – Members of the Lake Houston Area Flood Prevention initiative meet with County Judge Ed Emmett to discuss priorities for the upcoming flood bond including additional dredging for the mouth bar.
  • July 27, 2018 – Tim Garfield and R.D. Kissling, two retired top geologists for a major oil company publish a paper describing why the mouth bar should be included in the scope of dredging.
  • August 9, 2018 – Houston City Council Member Dave Martin holds a meeting to line up the support of Senators Cruz and Cornyn for extending dredging to the mouth bar.
  • August 21, 2018 – Lake Houston Area Grass Roots Flood Prevention Group meets with Ted Poe to urge extension of dredging.
  • August 25, 2018 – Harris County voters approved a flood bond package that included money to extend dredging.

Late 2018: Countdown Clock Keeps Ticking

Storage Permit Controversy and Delays

Costello’s notes on the December 14th meeting also indicate that he had applied to the Corps for a permit to dispose of the dredged material. “A nationwide permit was submitted and subsequently denied by the USACE. We are meeting with all parties involved to discuss the next course of action required to obtain the necessary permits,” says the letter.

It would be another FOUR months before this meeting happened…by conference call.

A confidential source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, indicates a difference of opinion about the permit application. The source says the permit application, filed sometime in November of 2018, was NOT DENIED and that the Corps simply requested more information.

The City still has NOT supplied the additional information, nor has it reapplied for the permit.

Specifically, the Corps wanted to know how much material would be excavated, where it would be stored on the landowner’s property, whether there were any mitigation requirements, and whether there were alternative disposal sites in case the primary site proved unacceptable for some reason. There was also some confusion over the type of nationwide permit (NWP) requested. According to one source, the permit requested was for drying/dewatering the spoils and then hauling them off-site. However, the landowner wanted to keep the fill and use it to raise the level of his property.

“Tomorrow Afternoon”

On January 14, 2019, Costello told a group of Lake Houston Area leaders that he hoped to be taking core samples “tomorrow afternoon” and have results by the end of January. That did not happen.

It since has become clear that Costello met with TDEM Chief Nim Kidd on February 6th to discuss his data acquisition plan. He summarized it in a memo dated February 8th titled Lake Houston Dredging Analysis Workplan. The plan included three stages:

  1. Using a high frequency “Chirp-type” acoustic sub-bottom profiler data-acquisition tool
  2. Core sampling
  3. Sediment analysis

Note that on five other occasions between mid-January or mid-March, Costello told people that the City would be taking core samples “tomorrow afternoon.” Martin says they finally took the core samples the week before the March 21st town hall meeting.

No explanation was given for these delays. With $18 million dollars in remobilization fees at stake, no one ever even acknowledged the delays.

Core Sample Results

The results that Costello reported at the town hall meeting – $1.5 billion cubic yards – were preliminary estimates. At the meeting, Costello said he expected the final number “tomorrow afternoon” (there’s that phrase again) and that he would send the final report to FEMA no later than Monday, March 25. He vowed to refile an amended permit with the Corps by Friday, March 29. As of 5PM Monday, Costello still has not replied to inquires about whether he transmitted the results to FEMA.

Estimated depth of Harvey Deposits at core sample locations. Shown by Stephen Costello, City of Houston Chief Recovery Officer and Kingwood Town Hall Meeting on 3/21/2019. For a high resolution pdf of this image suitable for printing, click here.

Remember, there are two issues: FEMA controls funding; the Corps controls permitting for the storage.

Note that FEMA wants to limit funding to Harvey-related damage only; but the Corps is looking for a disposal site that could hold far more sediment, i.e., for pre-Harvey material. Other sources (City, County, State) could fund removal of pre-Harvey sediment to restore the full conveyance of the river. Having one site that could handle everything could save considerable permitting work.

Also lost in the Town Hall political pep rally was the fact that the Corps volunteered to prescreen the application to make sure it was complete and that the the city filed the right type of nationwide permit this time.

When the City says “We are moving as fast as humanly possible,” that sounds like a bit of exaggeration. It took the City four months to acquire the core samples needed to determine the Pre-Harvey volume of the mouth bar. Ultimately, they did it in an afternoon when facing the deadline of last week’s town hall meeting.

Next Steps vs. Deadline to Save $18 Million

So will the City be able to save the $18 million. The current dredging program is due to demobilize in a little more than a month, at the end of April. Before then:

  • FEMA must rule on findings of the core sampling before it can fund the mouth bar project (or at least the initial phase of it).
  • Several parties must audit any grant.
  • City must refile the correct type of permit with additional information.
  • Corps must review and comment.
  • Corps must hold a 30-day public comment period by Federal law.
  • Corps must issue final ruling on permit application.

That looks like at least several months worth of work.. So no, it doesn’t look like the City will be able to save taxpayers $18 million unless they can pull off a miracle.

Is the City moving “as fast as humanly possible?” as one city official said at the Town Hall meeting last week.

You be the judge. How long this has taken depends on where you want to start the clock ticking. It’s not as clear as either side would have you believe. Still there are huge gaps in the timetable that need to be explained to the public…especially if we lose $18 million.

Late-Breaking News: Huberty Amendment to CSSB 500 on Mouth Bar

Meanwhile, State Representative Dan Huberty filed this amendment to CSSB 500 on March 22. It would provide $30 million for dredging the mouth bar. (CSSB stands for Committee Substitute Senate Bill. SB 500 is an omnibus spending bill approved by the Senate, now being considered in the Texas House as CSSB 500.) That money, if approved, could go a long way toward dredging the portion of the mouth bar that FEMA doesn’t fund and the rest of the West Fork.

Posted by Bob Rehak on March 25, 2019

573 Days since Hurricane Harvey

County Demolishes First of Buyouts In Forest Cove

Harris County Flood Control District, working with the help of the City of Houston, has demolished 803 and 805 Timberline Ct., and 1060 Marina Dr. (a burned structure) in the Forest Cove Townhome complex. 

Demolition Work to Date

The parking lot and sidewalk at 1060 Marina are in process of removal. Grading of the lot is scheduled to occur by Friday.  Please see the attached pictures of the progress and map below.

Townhomes demolished to date and others that will soon be.

HCFCD also now has complete ownership of 1050 Marina Dr. and is requesting the demolition (paperwork) process beginning this week. Below are some pics of work completed so far.

1060 Marina Drive once stood here. Someone’s home. Someone’s dream. Now gone forever.
Another angle of 1060 Marina Drive showing other townhomes in background soon to be demolished.
803 and 805 Timberline Court once stood here.

About 30 More Units to Demo

To date, Harris County Flood Control (HCFCD) has purchased about 30 total units.  HCFCD plans to submit the demolition request for 1050 Marina Dr. shortly.  “We’re also close to having complete ownership of 1020, 1030, and 1040 Marina Dr.  We will proceed with demolition of these buildings once we have complete ownership,” said Matt Zeve, Deputy Executive Director of HCFCD.

From Destruction to Construction

Harris County Precinct 4 plans to begin construction of a new Edgewater Park at the intersection of Hamblen Road and 59 later this year. This area, once cleared of flood-damaged structures could become part of a linear park along the San Jacinto.

Harvey destroyed dozens of townhomes in this area, even sweeping some off their foundations. The ones still standing have become the target of vandals, thieves, squatters, and graffiti artists. The roads and parking lots remain littered with refuse.

These abandoned townhomes took on more than 17 feet of water during Harvey.

When FEMA visited Houston last year to check on the status of the Hurricane Harvey recovery, they chose these townhomes to feature in their video that showed the destructive power of Harvey.

Posted by Bob Rehak on 3/25/2019

573 Days since Hurricane Harvey

Stilts Not Always Answer, Evac Not Always Possible For High Rises Near Floodway

Last Monday, Gabriel Haddad, the Romerica developer who wants to put up 25-50 story high rises and 5,000 condos near the floodway of the West Fork, told a packed audience at the Kingwood Community Center that he would construct his buildings on stilts.

Of course, he also wants to put 150,000 cubic yards of fill in wetlands and streams which is why he’s applying for the Army Corps permit. But put that aside for the moment.

Catching Debris and Creating Backwater

Stilts may be the best answer when building near floodways. They can reduce the net impact on flooding compared to fill. However, they still have their drawbacks…as these pictures show. For instance, stilts, stairs and anything below a building will catch debris being washed downstream and back water up.

Debris washed downstream and caught on Balcom property
Debris washed downstream caught on stairs. Photo by Melissa Balcom.
All the trees caught in the bridge supports for the old 59 bridge reportedly formed a “dam” during Harvey that backed water up into Humble businesses. Ask Humble Mayor Merle Aaron about his feelings on the subject.
Debris caught under bridges during Harvey. Photos by David Seitzinger.
Stilts didn’t help thousands of homes on the Bolivar Peninsula during Hurricane Ike. They have to be high enough to elevate the home above the flood. More than a 100 people died on Bolivar who failed to evacuate before Ike. They thought their elevated homes would keep them safe.

Evacuation Routes Flooded

The next three pictures show one of the planned evacuation routes, Hamblen Road. As you can see, connecting Woodland Hills to Hamblen might help with normal traffic, but it would not help at all during a flood.

Hamblen Road during the Tax Day Flood of 2016. Photo by Melissa Balcom. Note height of street lights.
Hamblen Road during the Memorial Day flood of 2016. “This is when we thought things were as bad as they would ever get!” said Melissa Balcom who lives between Hamblen and the West Fork of the San Jacinto.
Same area on Hamblen during Harvey. Compare street lights in the background. The brick wall on the left is completely submerged.

“The water is actually even deeper than it appears because those street lights are on a hill that lines the side of Hamblen,” said Melissa Balcom, who took these photos. “The water is so deep you can’t even see the white brick fence that lines Hamblen.  It completely covers it!  That’s one of the reasons why making Hamblen a cut through street is so ridiculous.”

Horror Movie in the Making

When I asked Mr. Haddad how he planned to evacuate 15,000 people by boat if there were ever another midnight release from the Conroe dam without warning, he said that people could shelter in place.

Imagine being in a high rise…in August, when the water comes up, the power goes out, the toilets overflow, the AC fails, the humidity hits 99%, and you can’t open the windows. That may be a Navy Seal’s idea of luxury living, but not mine. I’ll pass, thank you!

Posted by Bob Rehak on 3/24/2019

572 Days since Hurricane Harvey

Simple Policy Proposal to Change Economics of Floodplain Development

Want to change the economics of floodplain development? Deny flood insurance to anyone who builds new structures within a floodway. Grandfather structures that already exist. But don’t sell flood insurance policies to anyone who wants to, for instance, buy a new condo in a high-rise in the floodway of the west fork of the San Jacinto. And don’t sell a commercial policy to the 50-story hotel next door.

Respect the Rivers

Harvey was a wake up call. It taught us to start respecting rivers by giving them the distance deserve. It’s time for taxpayers to stop encouraging risky developments with taxpayer subsidized flood insurance. When investors, mortgage lenders and buyers can’t get that insurance, they will turn their backs. It will be much harder to build such harebrained ideas.

Siding from home washed downstream during Harvey. Photo by Dan Monks.

Stop Subsidizing Risky Behavior

This isn’t such a radical notion. Most private insurers peg the price of insurance to risk. More risk, higher price. It’s simple. At a certain point, when behavior becomes too risky, you can’t get insurance at any price. Right now, people can get flood insurance anywhere because it’s subsidized by taxpayers. Artificially low rates encourage floodplain development and discourage conservation.

So we have a developer trying to build 3.2 million square feet next to an area where the county is simultaneously buying out homes that have flooded repetitively.

By weeding such high-risk developers out of the pool, the cost of flood insurance should come down for people who give rivers the respect they deserve and build a reasonable distance away.

Start Encouraging Conservation with Economic Incentives

For those who want waterfront views, and those who are willing and able to lose everything, go ahead. No one’s stopping you. Just don’t expect taxpayers to subsidize your insurance through the National Flood Insurance Plan. If developers, lenders, investors and buyers couldn’t get flood insurance on newly built floodway homes, demand for such homes would likely fall. Thus, developers would have an economic disincentive to buy that cheap floodplain land. Owners would leave it in timber or grass. And we could give them even bigger tax breaks for doing do. Take the tax rate on timber land in floodways down to zero.

Smarter Land Use Policies = Fewer Flooded Homes

More floodplain land might remain in the hands of Mother Nature. More natural green space would slow rain from getting to rivers and provide more natural retention. Less development in floodways and flood plains just might reduce flooding further from the river, too.

Posted by Bob Rehak on 3/23/2019

571 Days since Hurricane Harvey

Storm Surge and the Houston Ship Channel: A National Security Issue?

Jim Blackburn, a professor at Rice University noted for his work in predicting and modeling the effects of severe storms, has released an except from a larger paper that he is preparing with Amy Jaffe of the Council on Foreign Relations.

The report, titled “Storm Surge and the Future of the Houston Ship Channel,” models a series of storms with increasing intensity to examine their impact on Galveston, Galveston Bay and the Houston Ship Channel.

Houston ship channel, chemical plant and tank farm.

Refining Capacity Vs. Surge Height

The report begins by outlining the importance of these areas for national security. For instance, this Bay and Ship Channel are home to eight major refiners and more than 200 chemical plants that provide 12% of U.S. refining capacity, 27% of the nation’s jet fuel, 13% of the nation’s gasoline, and 25% of the nation’s ethylene and propylene.

Blackburn and Jaffe note that the largest surges recorded up the Houston Ship Channel to date were from Hurricane Ike in 2008 and Carla in 1961. Neither of those storms generated more than about 13 to 14 feet of surge, a level that can generally be accommodated by industry. 

Modeling Surge Damage from Future Storms

The authors then play “what if.” What if the winds were 15 mph stronger and extended out a few miles farther? The “what if” scenarios are based on recent storms such as Hurricanes Irma and Maria (Category 4 and 5 storms) with hurricane force winds extending 80 miles out from the center. Such storms could generate surges in the range of 22 to 25 feet in the ship channel. Those are NOT levels that industry could handle with existing dikes.

An associate of Blackburn’s, Dr. Jamie Padgett of Rice’s SSPEED Center, predicts that some percentage of storage tanks would fail. They would either be lifted off their foundations, crushed by water or penetrated by debris. Dr. Padgett’s team estimated that a 24-foot surge event could lead to the release of at least 90 million gallons of oil and hazardous substances. It could threaten the US economy and raise concerns about the availability of transportation fuel.

Confined in Galveston Bay and its surrounding wetlands, such spills could also turn into an environmental debacle that lasts for decades. Far fetched? Consider what happened this week when a fire erupted in a few storage tanks at one facility in Deer Park. It shut down the entire city for close to a week.

Significantly, the modeled surge event does not include the effects of sea-level rise or climate change.

Inability to Deal with Mitigation

Blackburn and Jaffe then shift their focus to mitigation strategies such as the Ike Dike and the Galveston Bay Park Plan. I will not review those here; they have received much coverage in other venues. And the report contains far more detail than any summary could.

The authors conclude by saying, “A major threat exists to the refining and chemical industrial complex that is based around Galveston Bay. This issue has not received the attention that it should from a national security perspective, from a national economic stability perspective and from an environmental risk perspective. The SSPEED Center’s experience in modeling and planning to protect the channel highlights the disconnect between past observations and future likely events being encountered everyday throughout the world with our changing climate. We are facing situations that differ from the past, but we seemingly lack the institutional ability or fortitude to address these future risks and avoid the national security consequences that are foreseen and forewarned.”

“What If” We Actually Came to Grips with Flood Mitigation?

Whether you believe in climate change or not, it worries me to think about what would happen if a storm like Maria came up the throat of Galveston Bay like Ike did. We had two storms in the last decade (Ike and Harvey) that wiped out major portions of the region. The possibilities are not remote that another could strike before we prepare for it. I wish someone had done this kind of analysis with a rainfall event like Harvey before Harvey hit. Think how different life might be right now.

Posted by Bob Rehak on 3/22/2019

570 Days since Hurricane Harvey

Creighton’s SB7 Passed Unanimously by Senate, Bill Goes to House Today

NOTE: This article has been updated to include the paragraph below entitled Floodplain Implementation Account. I also added a mention of a separate appropriations bill, SB500.

One of the most important pieces of legislation in Austin this session is SB7, sponsored by Senator Brandon Creighton. It relates to flood control planning and the funding of flood planning, mitigation, and infrastructure projects.

Light pole near River Bend in North Shore as Harvey receded. Note the “wet marks” several feet up on pole. Photo by Jim Balcom.

Status of SB7

The Texas Senate passed the bill unanimously yesterday. It is now engrossed and in the House. Engrossed means it has been recorded in its final legal form by the chamber in which it was introduced and passed to the opposite chamber.

SB 7 started life as SB 695, but was renumbered when it became one of the Lieutenant Governor’s top picks for the session. The lower number makes it one of the first bills to be considered, thus increasing its chances of passage during this session.

Last week, the Senate heard testimony on the bill. Yesterday, 31 senators voted by voice FOR the bill. None opposed it.

What SB7 Includes

Key provisions of the final version of SB7 include:

  • Creation of a Texas Infrastructure Resiliency Fund outside of the General Revenue Fund. Within the Resiliency Fund, it also creates:
  • A Floodplain Management Account to provide financing for: (A) the collection and analysis of flood-related information; (B) flood planning, protection, mitigation, or adaptation; (C) the provision of flood-related information to the public through educational or outreach programs; or (D) evaluating the response to and mitigation of flood incidents affecting residential property, including multifamily units, located in floodplains.
  • A Floodplain Implementation Account to grant, low-interest, or zero-interest loans. Purposes: (A) to provide matching funds that enable local governments to participate in a federal program for a flood project; (B) to provide loans at or below market interest rates for planning or design costs, permitting costs, or other costs associated with state or federal regulatory activities for flooding; or (C) to provide grants that enable local governments to participate in a federal program for the development of a hazard mitigation plan.
  • A Hurricane Harvey account, also within the resiliency fund to grant low-interest or zero-interest loans to eligible political subdivisions. The loans can be used as a local match to enable political subdivisions to qualify for a federal match. The loans will help local governments seeking federal grants for hazard-mitigation and public-assistance plans or the cost of flood-project planning, design, permitting, etc. associated with state or federal regulatory activities.
  • A Federal Matching Fund Account. The board may use the account only to meet matching requirements for projects funded partially by federal money, including projects funded by the United States Army Corps of Engineers.
  • Rules regarding the distribution of funds, administration, transparency, etc.

What SB7 Does NOT Include

Not in the engrossed version sent to the House: a specific dollar amount to establish the fund. When introduced, SB 695 called for $3 billion to be transferred from the “rainy day” fund to establish the resiliency fund. That’s no longer in the bill.

In its place, the bill now has some vague language that refers to:

  • Money deposited to the credit of the account under Section 251.004, Insurance Code;
  • Money directly appropriated to the board;
  • Money from gifts or grants from the United States government, local or regional governments, private sources, or other sources.

This bill sets up the accounts. A separate bill, SB500 handles the appropriations for the accounts.

How SB7 Will Help Flood Mitigation

Still, if funded, the Texas Infrastructure Resilience Fund, will provide a wonderful vehicle to help jumpstart critical flood mitigation projects. It provides low- or no-cost LOANS, to help local governments get matching funds to:

  • Study flood problems
  • Design solutions
  • Fund construction.

Why SB7 Is Necessary

These loans can be used to help local governments bypass the begging phase of flood mitigation where they look for grants to fund grant writers or study problems. Example: It took almost 18 months after Harvey for Montgomery County, the City of Houston, Harris County and the SJRA to come up with a local match and get FEMA to cover the rest of a $2 million San Jacinto River Basin Study. That study will that take another 18 months to complete.

SB7 could have saved half that time. SB7 deserves the support of all Texans who would like to see flood mitigation efforts accelerated.

To review the status of other legislation affecting the Lake Houston area, check the Legislation page of this website.

Posted by Bob Rehak on March 21, 2019

569 Days since Hurricane Harvey

Reminder: Townhall Meeting Thursday Night at Kingwood Community Center, 6:30 PM

City Council Member Dave Martin will host a  Capital Improvement Project (CIP) Town Hall meeting  Thursday, March 21, 2019, at 6:30 p.m. , at the Kingwood Community Center, 4102 Rustic Woods Drive, Kingwood, Texas, 77345. 

Costello Will Update Community on Flood Mitigation

Post-Harvey updates will be provided from Flood Czar Stephen Costello. Expect Costello to address additional flood gates for the Lake Houston Dam and dredging of the mouth bar.

Capital Improvement Projects also on Agenda

During this meeting, residents will also hear from Mayor Sylvester Turner, and other city and community representatives about ongoing and future capital improvement projects, local issues and community news related to the Kingwood and Lake Houston areas of District E.

Congressman Dan Crenshaw will be in attendance to meet with community members. 

Harvey Aid Specialists in Attendance

The District E office has arranged for Hurricane Harvey intake specialists to host an information table at the meeting for those impacted by Hurricane Harvey and interested in learning more about the resources available to them. If you are seeking Harvey aid, before attending the meeting, please make sure to take the Harvey Recovery Survey online or by calling 832-393-0550 (Monday through Friday, 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.). 

For more information, please contac t Council Member Martin’s office by calling (832) 393-3008 or via email at districte@houstontx.gov . 

Posted by Bob Rehak on 3/21/2019

569 Days since Hurricane Harvey

Harris County Flood Control to Begin Restoring Conveyance of Bens Branch In April

Jason Krahn of the Harris County Flood Control District (HCFCD) revealed plans tonight to begin restoring the conveyance of Bens Branch, one of the largest drainage channels in Kingwood. Bens Branch runs diagonally through the center of Kingwood from the new St. Martha Catholic Church to east of Kings Harbor where it joins the San Jacinto West Fork.

Harris County Flood Control will soon begin removing more than
8000 truckloads of sediment clogging Ben’s Branch.

Welcome Relief

News of the project will bring welcome relief to those who live near the creek and who flooded during Hurricane Harvey. Among them are residents of North Woodland Hills, Kings Forest, Bear Branch, Town Center, the Enclave, Kingwood Village Estates, and Kings Harbor.

Restoring Conveyance to 1990 Level

The objective of the project: to restore the conveyance that existed in 1990 when the creek was last widened and improved. Large portions of the creek have severe silting.

Krahn says Flood Control plans to excavate 1.3 miles of the ditch from near Kingwood Drive to past the YMCA – a total of 6,851 linear feet. The project will stop approximately 1,800 feet from Lake Houston. From that area, they plan to excavate 77,365 cubic yards of sediment that have built up since 1990. That equals about 8,600 dump-truck loads.

Flood Control also plans to bring in rock to shore up areas that have severely eroded.

Project Phasing and Timeline

The design phase of the project has completed and bidding will begin within two weeks, says Krahn, the project manager.

To access the areas to be excavated, Flood Control will use a combination of roads and adjacent property owners. They include Kingwood County Club, Harris County Precinct 4 Library, the YMCA, and the Kings Crossing Trail Association.

Expect the following phases:

  • Establishing access
  • Erection of construction fencing
  • Mobilization of equipment such as amphibious trackhoes and shallow-draft barges
  • Excavating material and storing it along the edges of the creek
  • Waiting two weeks for it to drain and dry
  • Hauling it away

Krahn expects to haul off 40 truck loads per day. He says the project should take a total of 250 calendar days. Thus, they should complete the project by next January.

Some trees may have to go, but Krahn vows to make every effort to keep as many trees as he can. He says he understands how much Kingwood values trees. He also points out that any trees on the banks did not exist when the ditch was last excavated; they have grown up since.

Procurement, bidding, and planning will run from April through June. Expect to see boots on the ground no later than July 1.

$2.1 Million Cost Expected

Total cost of the project is projected at about $2.1 million out of a $17 million total maintenance budget for all of Harris County. This money does not come out of the flood bond. It comes from the normal HCFCD maintenance and operations budget.

Soil Already Tested; Non-Hazardous

The county has already sampled and tested the soil that it will remove. It received a Class 2 Non-Hazardous Rating. That means it is not contaminated and can be stored anywhere. Krahn says that the winning contractor will propose disposal sites. Sometimes the fill will be used in road beds, to elevate property, or returned to old sand pits.

Warn Kids to Stay Away

Many people fish and play in the creek and job on its banks. Krahn requested residents to keep their children away from the construction zone once heavy equipment starts moving in. Operators will have their eyes on the job and not people jogging or fishing.

Thanks to Barbara Hilburn

A shout-out to Barbara Hilburn of Kingwood Lakes who has doggedly led the charge on internal drainage improvements since Harvey. Hilburn emphasized the need for a Kingwood-wide study of internal drainage to restore the entire system to its original capacity. She hopes that will work hand-in-hand with other improvements being made to the San Jacinto and the Lake Houston dam to reduce flood risk.

Posted by Bob Rehak on 3/20/2019

568 Days since Hurricane Harvey

High-Rise Meeting Doesn’t Change Many Minds and Raises Big Concern

A standing-room-only crowd of 800-plus people packed the Kingwood Community Center last night for a high-rise meeting. They were there to hear for the first time from Romerica and the people who hope to build high rises in an area deed restricted to single-family residential.

Gabriel M. Haddad, one of Romerica’s partners, seemed decent and sincere. He answered questions directly with a few exceptions, and remained cool in the face of hostile questioning. His main point: he wanted to solve the flooding and sedimentation problems on the river and in Lake Houston to make his project viable.

Haddad even admitted that the property where he wanted to build most of the high rises was deed restricted to single-family residential. He said that his plan was to get a permit and THEN get Friendswood to change the deed restrictions.

No Details, No Plan

However, neither Haddad nor the other speakers provided specific details about the project. Several people commented that the speakers from SWCA and Civil Tech seemed unprofessional, unprepared, not responsive to questions.

Several posters scattered around the room made grandiose claims without any support. For instance, they claim:

  • The high-rise project would generate $135 million of property tax revenue for the City.
  • Up to 70% of the property is planned to be preserved.
  • They will preserve wetlands (while filling them in).

Few Chances for Followup Questions

Upon questioning, Haddad confessed that it might take 30 years to reach property tax revenues of $135 million. That would translate to almost $5 billion in appraised value. That’s more than all the appraised value of all commercial properties in the entire Humble ISD including Deerbrook Mall! But then the meeting format didn’t allow for follow up questions.

Weasel Words

Regarding the “up to” in front of 70%: that includes a lot of territory starting with 1%.

That’s a pretty neat trick with the wetlands. Oops, they forgot to mention the wetlands will be preserved somewhere else.

Omissions, Insufficient Explanations, and Public Meetings for Dummies

I was very concerned about evacuation plans, so I asked. Guess what. There is none. “We’ll have people shelter in place.”

No evacuation plan? I guess someone forgot to consider heart attacks, sewers that back up in floods, and power outages that would leave people sweltering in their vertical footprints for days in August. No evacuation plan needed for high-rises in what soon will become the floodway of the San Jacinto! Seriously?

They also hoped to address traffic problems with a bridge and a Hamblen-Road extension that voters already rejected, thus showing a total lack of understanding of local history and values.

A Civil Tech employee couldn’t tell me where more than 150,000 cubic yards of fill was coming from or going to.

Mr. Haddad felt that his condos were no longer in the Kingwood Lakes Homeowner Association. (They are.)

Mr. Haddad claimed that they were no longer soliciting investments through EB-5 visas because the project had “outgrown” them. (However, they still operate an EB-5 regional center and website.)

Financing for a supposed $5 billion project was never addressed.

They invitation said they would talk about phasing and they didn’t.

Sizzle No Substitute for Substance

The posters seemed to revolve around buzzwords, such as conservation, preservation, sustainability, mobility, and resiliency. However, they used the same support points over and over again for each…without ever explaining how they supported the buzzwords.

For instance, they supported sustainability with “natural water systems, promoting alternative modes of transportation, vertical development and preserving forests.”

To mix it up a little bit, they promote resiliency with “natural water systems, preserving forests, a compact development footprint, and alternative modes of transportation.”

You get the idea. You’ve heard it all before. And that, I think, pretty much sums up the takeaway for most of the people that I talked to. “No substance. No specifics. No plan. No answers. No way.”

Not Buying It

During the Q&A at the end of the meeting, one of the questioners asked people in the audience who were still against the development to stand up. Almost everyone stood.

People standing to show their opposition. Photo and video courtersy of Jim Zura, Zura Productions.

Now that was one message that was clear and unambiguous.

Reinforcing Worst-Nightmare Scenario

At one point, Mr. Haddad said, “We’ll start slowly, and if we see it’s uneconomic, we’ll do something else.” This confirmed the worst fears of many in the audience who saw the developers disturbing the environment and then abandoning the job half finished.

They never did address the vast majority of the questions I posted on Friday. Had they done so, they might have changed some minds. But by ignoring them, many people felt the developers had something to hide or that Kingwood people were easily bluffed.

Little wonder that Manlove chose not to have a public meeting while the Army Corps’ public comment period was still open.

As always, the thoughts herein represent my opinions on matters of public interest. They are protected by the First Amendment of the US Constitution and the Anti-SLAPP laws of the great State of Texas.

Posted by Bob Rehak on March 19, 2019

567 Days since Hurricane Harvey

They Took Questions from the Floor After All

Romerica packed the house with perhaps 800 to 1000 people. Both large rooms of the community center were standing room only. Contrary to pre-meeting guidance, the Romerica developer and his team DID take questions from the floor. The meeting lasted more than three hours.

Gabriel M. Haddad was not what I expected. He was disarming and appeared to answer questions candidly even when they were hostile. He seemed cautious and reasonable.

However, nothing I heard tonight changed my mind about the development. I had some questions answered. Some answers raised more questions. Many questions remain unanswered. And there were many contradictions and surprises. This will require sleep, food, and thorough review of my notes before I can make sense of it.

Please check back tomorrow for a rundown of the entire meeting.

Posted by Bob Rehak on March 18, 2019

566 Days since Hurricane Harvey