Over A Million Acres Of Texas Is On Fire
If you look at the Federal Wildfire Incident Information System you will see that 18 of the 20 fires on the first two pages are in Texas, and involve well in excess of a million acres, the Trans Pecos Fire Complex alone is in excess of 600,000 acres. The single fire in that listing that is marked “inactive”, was not put out, it merged with a larger fire. Those incidents called “complexes” are actually multiple fires that have merged.
Bill Hanna and Mitch Mitchell of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, are reporting on the Possum Kingdom complex that has already destroyed homes around Possum Kingdom Lake.
They reported the death of a second firefighter, Elias Jaquez, 49, of the Cactus Volunteer Fire Department, who died of injuries received while fighting a fire north of Amarillo.
Texas doesn’t have the resources to do this, and has asked for help. The Republicans in the House had better come back into this world and figure out that government is necessary. They had better be ready to approve funding to help fight these fires, because people won’t forget if they don’t.
6 comments
“They had better be ready to approve funding to help fight these fires, because people won’t forget if they don’t.”
They may be counting on the fact that those same people won’t survive the fires if they don’t.
There is no bottom, no lower bound on the GOP mind. However low you think they will go, they will go lower.
Yeah, I remember the Disaster Fund the Texas lege created after the hurricanes in 2005, and then they never put any money into it.
Someone should remind them that FEMA grants are matching funds and usually require the state to come up with 25% of the costs before FEMA will seriously consider anything. That’s why Waveland, Mississippi is so slow in rebuilding – they didn’t have a source of revenue left for their portion of the money needed to rebuild.
“That’s why Waveland, Mississippi is so slow in rebuilding”
And Galveston, TX. Nothing is happening there. People are still living in microscopic FEMA trailers, and IIRC, there was talk about forcing them to vacate those. But the FEMA money is not forthcoming for house replacement/repair.
Yep, it is getting to the time when the trailers have to be turned in, and if they don’t have the matching funds, they don’t get the FEMA money. Congress could have suspended that, but they didn’t.
That a lot of burning land! 🙁 I hope everyone stays smart and safe!
Hope things are OK in your area Steve, stay safe m8! 🙂
That’s absolutely disgusting about the Gov morons (whether local, State or Fed) holding people in serious need to ransom like that. And yet, they keep getting reelected! There is definitely something wrong with this picture. *sigh* (and yeah, I do know it’s the way the crooked political system *works* (sic) there).
They have managed to reduce government to the point that it doesn’t have the resources necessary to deal with emergencies. Texas has enough wildfires that it should have firefighting aircraft, on lease at a minimum. But they won’t do it for fear that there may be no fires one year.
The rules for FEMA are well known, and Florida has a fund to cover the 25%, even for localities, to be sure of getting the 75% from the Feds. I fully expect the current governor to empty that fund, along with every other one the state has.
Some states, like Mississippi, don’t even understand the concept.
Texas has a fund, but they haven’t put any money in it, so it is fairly worthless.
The concept of a rainy day fund doesn’t seem to be popular in most of the South. Florida actually requires it for cities and counties, around 15% of the annual budget. That was done when Democrats were in control.
The Congress can override the rules, or simply make a direct appropriation to cover the total cost, but that isn’t likely to happen with the current crowd in the House, even though Texas is a Republican state.
It is a mess.