Houston City Council Notes, prepared by Emily J Hynds

Agenda

1. Mayor’s Report
2. Public Comment
3. Consent Agenda (items that require a vote, like purchases, resolutions, ordinances, etc.)
4. Council Member Pop-Off

Mayor’s Report

The Mayor’s Report was all about Hurricane Beryl. Mayor Whitmire said, “We were hit with the dirty side of a dirty hurricane,” and called the storm unpredictable. He lamented the three Houston lives lost (the State total is 7) and initiated a moment of silence. He thanked Council Members for their work during the storm, particularly commending CM Kamin. Whitmire asked people to stay off the streets when possible, particularly at night, while crews work to repair traffic lights.

My grandma called me to do a post-storm check in, so I stepped away for a few minutes. If I hadn’t picked up she might assume the Beryl-related worst, so I couldn’t let that go to voicemail.

When I came back, Mayor Whitmire was complaining about fire stations and other City buildings that don’t have generators, including the George R. Brown Convention Center. He said, “What in the world were people thinking about how they were using the ARPA (American Rescue Plan Act) money?” And, “This is a great City, but somebody has been negligent in taking care of City services and proper use of resources.” He harped on the shortage of HPD and HFD officers. He said he wasn’t going to play the blame game, after doing just that and then continuing to do it some more. He emphasized transparency often. Whitmire thanked Harris County Commissioners Garcia, Briones, and Ramsay and the State for help with resources like extra ambulances. President Biden will sign a disaster declaration, freeing up federal resources like FEMA.

Tom Muñoz, Acting Chief of the Office of Emergency Management (OEM) made remarks. Here are the highlights.

• Chief Muñoz outlined OEM’s timeline for emergencies.
• The electricity outages for Beryl already exceed those for 2008’s Hurricane Ike, the previous record holder.

• 29 Houston hospitals entered an internal disaster mode, meaning their operations (computer systems, communications, etc) were affected. For reference, the May derecho put five hospitals in disaster mode.
• The State of Texas Emergency Assistance Registry (STEAR) is for people who have medical or alternative needs during emergencies. It has 33,856 registrants. OEM is coordinating with the State and other emergency services to reach the STEAR registrants. After three contact attempts by phone, emergency services will make an in-person visit.
• The City and its partners are operating 27 cooling centers. zTrip and METRO are offering free rides.
• CM Kamin lauded 911 call takers and wants them to receive the same care as other emergency workers. Chief Muñoz agreed, calling 911 call takers “unsung heroes.” 911 call centers are not meant for overnight stays but during emergencies many call takers are working more and longer shifts, so facilities need to include rest areas and provide meals. He said, “Every call they get, it’s, it’s a bad call. And imagine taking those 12 hours a day.”
  • CM Kamin also advocated for senior living facilities to be required to shore up their emergency plans. She particularly called out Heights House and Heights Tower which also underperformed during the derecho. Chief Muñoz said this type of neglect is “infuriating.”
• CM Evans-Shabazz complained about a faulty generator at the Sunnyside Multi-Service Center and said the HVAC doesn’t work very well there in general. She wants to require senior homes to have generators. She wants Centerpoint to do more tree trimming. She implored individuals to do their own storm prep so they don’t have to rely on aid afterwards.
• CM Martinez criticized the deferred maintenance of City facilities (like multi-service centers) and wants the State to use their surplus (or “rainy day fund”) for “life safety” things like generators. Martinez also pressured Centerpoint to trim more trees and wants to develop hyper-local emergency response plans. He advocated for interfacing with local faith organizations doing aid work.
• CM Flickinger asked if senior living homes are required to have emergency plans. Chief Muñoz said that nursing homes are (ones that dispense medicine) but assisted living facilities or affordable housing for seniors are not.
• CM Davis wants convenience stores to have generators. He wants to create a directory of faith orgs that can serve as cooling centers and emergency hubs. He said, “There are no perfect plans but there can be some perfect preparation,” which was a bit befuddling. Maybe he was referencing the Eisenhower quote, “Plans are worthless, but planning is everything.” IDK.
• Mayor Whitmire implied that previous administrations should have used the budget surplus to pay for critical services with unmet needs. He complained about a Chronicle article telling him to be transparent “about the need for additional drainage money.” He advocated for partnership with TIRZs and Management Districts, highlighting a new fire station in the works built with money from the Memorial Management District.
• CM Alcorn offered help contacting STEAR registrants.
• CM Pollard wants the State to use the rainy day fund to help Houston, and other areas presumably, prepare and deal with weather related events.
  • Mayor Whitmire claimed he is improving relations with the State, which will help with future aid. He said the State does well with rural initiatives but wants to propose an urban plan to help cities be more resilient. He said, “I think the State could get involved in the homeless issue for certain, because they contribute to it. When they release inmates from Huntsville, they come to Houston, [and] become homeless.”
• CM Kamin pushed back on the Mayor’s complaints about the previous administration, arguing that many have worked to address deferred maintenance for years. She said we need to address budgetary constraints. She said, “The reason we keep talking about generators is because our electricity is so unreliable.”
  • Mayor Whitmire agreed that the revenue cap needs to be addressed and advocated for City-owned utilities.

Randy Macchi, Chief Operation Officer of Houston Public Works, offered remarks.

• Houston has the largest sanitary system in the nation, and unlike many, it is not pressurized, instead relying on lift stations. I did not fact check any of this.
• Out of 378 lift stations, 178 don’t have generators and some treatment plants are without power.
• Drinking water is safe.
• Out of 2500 traffic lights, 515 have no power, 75 are flashing, 53 suffered significant physical damage.
• He described the preparations HPW does for emergency situations.

Next was Brad Tutunjian, CenterPoint Energy’s vice president of regulatory affairs. Everyone called him Brad, so I will too.

• Brad explained how Centerpoint prepares for disasters in general, hurricane season, and specifically Hurricane Beryl. He mentioned tabletop exercises, inventory management, timelines, resource allocation, etc.
• Here’s the timeline he gave for storm activation with notes for Beryl in parentheses:
  • Day 0 = Day of Storm (Monday)
  • Day 0/1: assess damage (Monday/Tuesday)
  • Day 1: mobilize resources (Tuesday)
  • Day 2: boots on ground (Wednesday)
• Centerpoint does not ask out of town crews to come in early and ride out the storm to protect both people and equipment.

• Brad brought up Hurricane Nicholas in 2021, which took five days to restore power to 700K customers. At the height of this outage, 2.26M customers were without power.
• Brad explained the effort it takes to address storm recovery of this magnitude: manpower, hundreds of trucks and power poles, meal tents, housing, office space, etc.
• CM Pollard asked if it was possible to mobilize faster. Brad had a long answer that basically amounted to maybe, given a specific set of circumstances involving the Texas legislature, the PUCT, vegetation maintenance, grid modernization. He asked for support on Centerpoint’s resiliency filing with the lege.
• CM Kamin thanked the line crews out there doing the work. She asked if the cost of repairing after the storm will be passed on to the consumers. Brad said yes. CM Kamin said, “Respectfully, [the lights] should be on,” and “This is not acceptable.” She pressed Brad on Centerpoint’s support of legislation that reduced the ability of localities to regulate utilities.
• CM Huffman asked what’s up with the outage tracker. Brad said after robots and third parties sent constant pings to their server during the derecho, the tracker crashed and Centerpoint deemed it unsalvageable. They are working on a new one that isn’t ready yet. He said the timing was “extremely unfortunate” and “we are extremely disappointed ourselves.”
• CM Peck complained about Centerproint’s poor alert system and bad communication. Brad said, “It sounds like there’s still room for opportunities.”
• CM Ramirez was grumpyyyy after 54 hours with no power. He asked why Centerpont doesn’t want to bury the lines. Brad explained that it is current policy to bury lines in new residential areas, but there are just so many pre-existing lines. He also pointed to issues with buried lines when it floods.
• When CM Kamin asked if Centerpoint plans to offer any financial assistance to people, Brad said that people won’t be charged for power during the outage.

Public Comment

There were two speakers, one on the 11th street bike lanes (I’m assuming here because her comments were unclear but this is what she usually talks about) and one on storm recovery.

Agenda Items, Selected Works

• Items 5, 6, and 7 approved funding ($5.7M total) for organizations that provide housing for people living with HIV/AIDS.
• Item 14 would have approved a $25M contract with the Houston Arts Alliance for professional civic art and conservation administration services for various departments. It was tagged by CMs Martinez, Castillo, and Kamin. Several CMs had things to say about this which I will cover in the pop-off section because CM Martinez would not release his tag for discussion on the item itself.
• Item 15 approved an agreement for the ForUsTree project, which includes a $2.7M grant. “The City’s ForUsTree Grant Project Goals: Plant 1,000 trees; Identify and remove 2,000 hazard trees; and Successfully engage and recruit households in DACs to participate in Hazard Tree Removal Program.”

Council Member Pop-Off

Many CMs thanked those who have stepped up to deal with Hurricane Beryl’s aftermath and shared distribution events. Follow their social media accounts and sign up for their newsletters to stay on top of that stuff.

• CM Carter lamented the 600 trees down across Kingwood golf courses.
• CM Evans-Shabazz plugged a chainsaw training event on Saturday at the Sunnyside Multi-Service Center from 8am-1pm.
• CM Castillo reminded people that zTrip and METRO are offering free rides to cooling centers.
• CM Flickinger remarked on today’s Item 14 which had to do with funding for Houston Arts Alliance. He would prefer to spend money on public safety and life saving equipment like generators.
• CM Kamin encouraged generator safety and asked people to take care with rising temperatures. She thanked the Houston Toolbank and Crowdsource Rescue for always stepping up and she advocated for more neighborhood investment.
• CM Huffman reminded people to treat broken traffic signals as stop signs. She asked people to contact their CMs to report broken traffic signals.
• CM Ramirez said that needing outside help in times of disasters speaks to the lack of resources here. He protested the HAA Item 14 and said it might violate State law, which he is looking into.
• CM Peck agreed with CMs Flickinger and Ramirez regarding Item 14, saying we need generators more than art. She said if it doesn’t have to do with public safety, infrastructure, or quality of life, we shouldn’t spend money on it right now.
• CM Pollard wants the State to release some of it’s rainy day fund. He said the State has $27B of our money. “It’s a rainy day in Houston every year.”

I think HTV might have cut the meeting short, but I’m going to stop there too.

Who took these notes? And what resources did they use?

My name is Emily Hynds and I am a writer, producer of the monthly storytelling series Grown-up Storytime, and lifelong Houstonian. I am not a journalist or government official. I am a local government enthusiast who believes meaningful change starts at home. These notes are presented from my point of view and with my framing, and are not comprehensive. Your notes will certainly be different, and I would love to read them if you attend.

While compiling these notes I used the following sources:
https://houston.novusagenda.com/agendapublic/
https://houwatch.com
https://www.tdem.texas.gov/response/state-of-texas-emergency-assistance-registry

You can find your City Council Member and their contact info at: http://www.houstontx.gov/council/whoismycm.html

My Patreon is patreon.com/emilytakesnotes.