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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsHow Much Does Houston Spend on Flood Control?
In the coming century, the burgeoning metropolis is going to have to make huge investments to ensure its future.
Texas continues to battle the ravages of Hurricane Harvey, which has dumped more than 30 inches of rain across the greater Houston area. The record-setting rains have caused devastating floods for the third straight year in the area, following the Tax Day Flood of 2016 and the Memorial Day Flood of 2015.
Houston keeps flooding, but local authorities have long tried to mitigate the risks of living in the Bayou City. Houston is located inside Harris County, and after a series of floods in the 1930s, the county created a flood-control district to regionally manage the areas flood-preparedness system. Over the years, the Harris County Flood-Control District worked with the Army Corps of Engineers to make the entire city of Houston into a hydraulic machine that can direct water into a series of bayous, canals, and reservoirs, then on into the Gulf of Mexico. There are now 2,500 miles of channels for moving water and a total of $4 billion of flood-mitigation infrastructure.
As bad as things are in Houston right now, theyd be much worse without all this infrastructure in the ground. So, to keep these mitigation measures working, the Harris County Flood Control District spends roughly $100 million per year.
That sounds like a lot, but Houston is now a metropolitan powerhouse. The fourth-largest city in the country, its also the primary home of the nations oil and gas industry. The areas real GDP is approaching half a trillion dollars a year.
And consider what some other agencies spend. The South Florida Water Management District spends $664 million per year on its operations. The California Department of Water Resources, which operates the states dams and canals, spends more than $500 million per year on public safety and prevention of damages.
Or compare to road-infrastructure spending: In Houston itself, the public-works budget is $2 billion this year. In California, the state spends $1.9 billion on highway maintenance alone.
No offense to the good people of Houston. I'm not posting this to be critical of anyone, just to put numbers on the massive challenge they're dealing with.
Not Ruth
(3,613 posts)The optics are potentially very bad if there is significant loss of life
IronLionZion
(47,048 posts)and good ways for the job creators like oil companies to pay their fair share of it. Or go towards some sort of public-private partnership to create good construction jobs and get the work done.
Unfortunately we will see Trump fail miserably on this issue and blame the local Democrats and not do anything useful.
TexasProgresive
(12,313 posts)thunderstorms started being a real problem. If there was too much roofs, concrete and asphalt in the late 50's it has been compounded exponentially by the growth not only of the city but all the surrounding suburban cities and communities. I really don't have any kind of suggestions that might be a solution. Too many people, too close to the coast. The Houston of my youth has grown from less than 1 million to >6 million and all the communities around it as well. It's all very well for people to say, "Don't rebuild, Houston." That's not going to happen. A lot of people may relocate but it will be a (sorry) drop in the bucket.
Igel
(36,187 posts)It wasn't the story they wanted, I suspect, so it wasn't something they bothered to look for. However, it makes their big number, $100 million, a weak foundation for anything else.
Harris County is large. Much of it is inside Houston. Much is being developed and needs new infrastructure. Most of the $100 million isn't spent inside Houston these days. Note that Harris County ex Houston has had some flooding, but it's a no-win situation with bayous rising to record heights. (Remember, this is at least two different kinds of floods--one from bad drainage and not getting water to the watercourses, the other from watercourses' cresting.)
Houston has its own taxes and infrastructure program, and also has put something like $25 million/year into drainage maintenance and improvements. That clearly wasn't enough, politicians like "what's going to get me elected next year" projects. Pointing to a dry street and saying, "I didn't fund day care or street improvements, but look at all the houses not destroyed during the last non-flood" is called "losing." By next spring most voters who were flooded would probably say they'd rather see better day care and roads than drainage improvements. So the mayors always put money into "get me elected and make people happy" projects. They're worthy projects, but people prefer spending on them and not on equally worthy but utterly boring stuff nobody can see and won't help them this week but in 2023. So $25 million wasn't enough. Enter the previous Houston mayor.
Houston, for the last 6 years or so, has had a dedicated drainage infrastructure tax. Last year the "organization" responsible for using it had a budget of $227 million. Potentially twice the size of the HCFCD. It could have spent nearly $1.5 billion or more over the last six years for upgrades to drainage.
It was sold as a drainage tax, but was written as a streets & drainage improvement tax. I can't find out how much is used for drainage. The new mayor, when he took office, criticized the outgoing mayor (who got the tax voted into place) for not maintaining the roads and allowing potholes. So there's a "next day pothole repair" program--you report it, it's fixed next day. Houston roads have been better the last few times I traveled south into the city. Streets are a priority. You wreck your suspension on a pothole, you get mad today; you fix a storm line and you may simply not get mad in three years.
Of that $227 million, $200 million could be going for street repairs to keep people happy, and $27 million for drainage to keep people safe. Or maybe it's the other way 'round. Or some other numbers. I can't get the information I want out of their publicly posted budget statements. "Drainage" is mentioned once in the most recent completed budget (so that's 2016), as a goal: "Better streets. Better drainage." Doesn't make me hopeful.
It'd be nice if The Atlantic had dug up the numbers. I'd really like to see them. But they found $100/yr million and missed something like $250 million/yr. I give them a 100/250 or a 40/100 on that article.