Travis County Commissioners Court
October 4, 2005
Item 7
Number 7, receive believing and take appropriate action regard prohibition of outdoor burning in the unincorporated areas of Travis County.
>> pete baldwin, I’ll put my other hat on here.
>> > the item is request an outdoor burning ban for the unincorporated areas of Travis County. The map I just handed out although may be somewhat difficult to read is the kbdi readings across the county. If you notice with Travis County, we have a mixture of colors in there. The yellow is over 500. Remember the scale goes from zero to 800. 500 is our bench mark. The yellow is 500. The orange is 600 to 700. The red is 700 to 800. As of yesterday, our county average was 643. Bastrop is well over 700. It is due to the lack of rain. We've had some cool fronts come through which bring lower humidities and drying temperatures. We have not had that rain that we thought we would normally get. As I mentioned earlier, we have been receiving requests for assistance to both backfill into the east Texas area while they've got Texas forest service people running points of distribution. And then we've also had specific requests from the state that if we could afford to send any tenders as they call them, water trucks. Because if you know anything about east Texas, there is not a fire hydrant on every corner. As the electricity begins to be turned on we're starting to see a lot of construction fires. It is not so much due to wild land fire because of the amount of rain they got, it's due to the electricity. So we will be doing seven to ten-day rotations. Based on the fact that we are extremely dry, our kbdi is up high and we are trying to assist the rest of the state with personnel and equipment has prompted the county fire chiefs and ourselves to visit and request that the court consider an outdoor burning ban.
>> what effect will the anticipated cool temperatures have on dry conditions?
>> this is anticipated to be a fairly dry cool front coming through. We've got a 20 and 30% chance for the next couple of days. We had little spotty showers yesterday which were nice, but they really don't impact the overall dryness. If we get a cold front through here, and I’m going to use cold front hopefully, but basically cold fronts that don't trigger rain tend to bring in drier, lower humidities which cause an even greater drying and more fire danger.
>> okay. So your recommendation is that we basically adopt the outdoor burning ban.
>> yes, sir. Currently in our surrounding area, Williamson, caldwell, bastrop, if you go to the state map and look, there is quite a few counties in the central Texas area that due to lack of rain have implemented outdoor burning bans.
>> move we approve the recommended outdoor order prohibiting outdoor burning and post this item weekly for any necessary follow-up discussion.
>> yes, sir.
>> seconded by Commissioner Davis. Discussion? All in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. Thank you very much.
>> thank you, pete.
>> and judge, there are two copies of that request for damages -- or requests for assistance. One is for the clerk, one I’ll need to pick up.
>> very good.
>> your diligent county judge has signed both of them, mr. Baldwin.
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Last Modified:
Wednesday, October 5, 2005 8:54 AM