Ice Storm in Texas: A Natural Disaster Declared for Travis County

Austin, Texas – After boarding a StarFlight helicopter, Travis County Judge Andy Brown saw the winter storm damage from a bird’s eye view.

He says the areas northwest of Austin have been hardest hit.

“Based on what we saw today and our discussions with our first responders, I intend to declare a disaster in Travis County today,” said Travis County Judge Andy Brown.

Two disaster declarations signed Friday afternoon by Judge Brown and Austin Mayor Kirk Watson will provide FEMA public assistance funds.

“Under the FEMA Public Assistance Program, the threshold for accessing funds for Travis County is $5.7 million. If this threshold is reached, FEMA will reimburse 75 percent of the total costs, including the cost of debris removal and protective measures, and any damage to county-owned facilities. or, obviously, in the case of the city, the same for the city, ”says Judge Brown.

Part of the funds will also go to help residents who have lost electricity.

“If someone has some personal expenses, that is, for their household, as a result of which it is necessary to restore the connection and hire an electrician, some of this money can go to that,” says Austin Mayor Kirk Watson.

On Friday, Mayor Watson answered a question many wondered why they waited until Friday to declare a natural disaster?

“One of the reasons why we are doing this now is because, quite frankly, you have to go through some of them so that you can actually assess the level of damage,” Mayor Watson says.

Additional resources have already been brought in to help with the recovery from the winter storm, especially with all the downed trees and debris.

“We’ve reached out to the state for help, they’re going to deploy five groups of chainsaws,” says Juan Ortiz of the Austin Office of Emergency Management.

Mayor Watson says that after seeing a series of events this week, the city will now look for ways to improve its storm response and be prepared for such storms.

“When I say we’re going to look at this inside and out, we’ll look at what other cities are doing and have done and trying to overlay it here in Austin to see if it translates to what we’re doing and should have been doing here, to Austin,” Mayor Watson says.

To help those who still don’t have electricity, there will be a food distribution event at the Onion Creek Soccer Complex on Saturday, February 4th from 9:00 am to 11:00 am.