Travis County Commissioners Court
March 31, 2009,
Item 2
>> our next item is number 2.
2.
consider and take appropriate action regarding the prohibition of outdoor burning in the unincorporated areas of Travis County.
>> good morning judge, Commissioners.
fire marshal of Travis County, pete baldwin emergency management coordinator.
i guess this is a good thing because every time we come to talk to you about burn bans it either rained yesterday or is going to rain tomorrow, in this case it rained a little bit in some areas of our county.
the current drought index is at 497, which before this morning was on the rise.
the forecast for the next four days are for dry, windy conditions.
so the effect of the moisture that we received this morning will very quickly dissipate.
i know that consideration I think for the court is that the -- the idea of -- of lifting the ban one week and putting it back in and lifting it and putting it back in is somewhat confusing.
and the local fire chiefs, the fire chiefs, they are -- they are about 50/50 on the matter, not really opposed or pro one way or the other.
the recommendation of the fire marshal's office of emergency management is to err on the side of safety and to keep the burn ban in place.
i would be glad to answer any questions that you have.
>> what -- do we know basically as far as outlook, are we getting maybe into a -- into a rainy situation where I guess maybe it's in the near future.
how much rain do we really need to lift the ban itself?
because there has been some concerns brought up because of the fact that we have the ban invoked and in place where other counties may not have the ban, so it's kind of -- kind of poses a concern I guess to those that -- that are under the ban.
and would like to be -- would like to be not under the ban as far as -- as far as -- as far as the action is concerned.
so I guess the question is what substantial amount of rain do we need to -- to lift the burn ban?
>> Commissioner, I believe it's going to take another period of slow rain over a number of days to continue the green up and to continue to -- to allow the surface fuels to absorb moisture before we can get to that point.
and -- and right now, we are -- we are about even for the month.
but for -- as you're aware, over the last 12 to 24 months, we are severely down and -- the long-range forecast is for the drought to only deepen for this area.
so -- so in the short term, we may get sufficient moisture over the next four or five weeks, it's not predicted for the upcoming week.
but -- but we may get some moisture, but in the long term it looks like we are in this for a while.
>> in it for a while.
okie-doke.
>> in view of what you just told us about the index, how does this recommendation square with the other information that we received regarding that 500?
>> we have always used 500 as a benchmark.
it's not the law.
it's not written in the statute.
but we have come to an agreement with all of our fire chiefs that 500 on the index is a benchmark.
i have seen it in years past and we have been up in the 6 hundreds and not have a burn ban in place because it was in the middle of summer, it was too hot to burn, nobody was getting outside, we weren't running any fires.
again I have seen it down in the 480's, 470's where we are covered up with fires.
if we use it as a benchmark, rising currently at 497, by tomorrow we will probably be at 500, 501, something of that nature.
with the high wind and the lower humidities that they are predicting for next week, we felt it would just be prudent to leave the burn ban in place.
>> so we had fires during the last week.
>> we were running some fires last week, yes, sir, even with the burn ban in place.
>> by taking no action we leave the ban in place.
>> thank you very much.
>> thank you.
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Last Modified:
Tuesday, March 24, 2009 1:42 PM