Travis County Commissioners Court
January 31, 2006
Items 3 and 4
3. Consider and take appropriate action regarding the prohibition of outdoor burning in the unincorporated areas of Travis County. Let's call up four, too, pete. 4. Consider and take appropriate action on order declaring local disaster to address the potential threat of wildfires due to drought and adverse weather conditions and banning the use of combustible materials, including fireworks, in outdoor environments, pursuant to section 418.108 of the government code.
>> good morning, pete baldwin, Travis County emergency management coordinator. The small amount of rain that we got while welcomed was sort of negated by 14% relative humidity yesterday. Everything dried out. As we witnessed in hays and burnet county, fires began very quickly, spread very rapidly. For that reason, we are going to ask you to -- to continue the outdoor burning ban, except we are going to ask you to sign a new order banning, prohibiting outdoor burning. What we have done is taken the welding language that we had in the disaster declaration and added it to our outdoor burning ban. The reason for this is we are now covered under a disaster declaration, state-wide disaster declaration. It will be the choice of -- my recommendation would be to drop our disaster declaration and go back to our burning ban that contains the welding language. But -- but the other side of that coin is that if you kept the disaster declaration in, it still has that language called combustibles.
>> pete, does that in effect have any time constraints, the disaster language, and the burning -- burning language that we have, two separate distinct things they have basically two different time frames within them. So by combining the disaster situation along with the burning ban, does that give it longer time frame, what would be the time effect on combining the two?
>> the disaster declaration, that the court approves is good for seven days at a stretch.
>> all right.
>> has to be reconsidered by the governing body every seven days.
>> all right.
>> the outdoor burning ban, we can set as short or as long as we want. We normally run it for about 30 days at a time. And review it each week. So -- so but the state has declared all 254 counties a disaster.
>> all right.
>> so what we were trying to do is get back so that there was a little less confusion, go back to the outdoor burning ban, but expand it to include the welding information.
>> but my question is, what about the -- what about the time lines? Essentially whether seven day deal on the -- in other words, they still would have to come back to the court every seven days or when we approve the burning ban would that take it into the 30 daytime frame?
>> the outdoor burning ban would go to a 30 day time frame.
>> with the disaster declaration language included.
>> we would let the disaster declaration expire today and just go under the outdoor burning ban, it would run until March 1st.
>> that's what I need to get clarity on, there may be confusion, especially when we bring that disaster declaration every seven days, that's what I want to lay out so there wouldn't be no confusion on that.
>> without trying to get too many documents in front of you at one time.
>> exactly.
>> there's another document attached to the handout that we just got approved or brought to you, it is the request for public assistance, Travis County is eligible for fire related expenses back to December 27th. They will declare each county on a weekly basis, whether or not they are eligible for expenses based upon weather conditions. It will be an ongoing process. They are looking at this running probably sometime in March or April. The state has said they do not have the staff or personnel to operate four disaster declarations at once. So they have asked each county to become the fiscal agent for any fire-related expenses. Meaning we would be responsible for fire department -- any fire department in Travis County. The first step, though, is just to make sure that we have eligible, is to go ahead and approve the judge signing the request for public assistance, and designating an applicant agent which would be myself and my assistant as the primary contact.
>> so to take appropriate action for items 3 and 4, this request -- request for public assistance is covered?
>> I think so, judge. I think it's broad enough under four.
>> move approval of the proposed --
>> second.
>> outdoor burning ban. And those affected by this really should read it because we pull pooled two bans into one. My question yesterday was whether it was legal, the response that I got was that our lawyer was preparing it. I took that to mean yes [laughter] don't look around like that. [laughter]
>> it is.
>> my motion is to approve the new ban order and request for assistance.
>> the question is is this order legal?
>> yes, sir.
>> yes, sir, it is. [laughter]
>> any more discussion? All in favor? That passes by unanimous vote.
>> I have left copies in your signature file upstairs with that, I would ask that this item be put on again next week.
>> okay.
>> request for public assistance, am I supposed to sign it, too?
>> yes, sir. It's -- it's in your signature folder upstairs. It's marked. You can sign that one, let me know, I will fax it in.
>> okay. Thank you, mr. Baldwin. The rain boots I wore to work this morning, I really didn't need, did i?
>> I think you can safely put them in your closet for a while.
>> all right. Let's hope for better news on these bans next week.
>> [inaudible - no mic]
>> right. Okay.
The Closed Caption log for this Commissioners Court agenda item is provided by Travis County Internet Services. Since this file is derived from the Closed Captions created during live cablecasts, there are occasional spelling and grammatical errors. This Closed Caption log is not an official record the Commissioners Court Meeting and cannot be relied on for official purposes. For official records please contact the County Clerk at (512) 854-4722.
Last Modified:
Tuesday, January 31, 2006 3:38 PM