Experts say that H ouston, the largest metro area on the Gulf Coast and one that has suffered four major floods in the past six years, has a unique opportunity to show how a region can transform to handle climate change. Longer-term, local leaders have secured nowhere close to the more than $30 billion engineers say is needed to fully protect the county from 100-year storms.
In the near-term, Commissioners Court may need to raise taxes or issue a new bond proposal, which voters may be wary to support if they feel hoodwinked by the first one. But that outside investment has not come through, at least not yet, and the county budget office last month announced a $1.4 billion shortfall in funding for current projects. Elected and Flood Control District officials pitched the program as a down payment on securing Houston's future, a serious commitment by taxpayers that would convince the state and federal governments to chip in billions more. A year to the day after Hurricane Harvey made landfall, Harris County voters approved a $2.5 billion flood bond, the single-largest investment in storm protection in county history. Halls Bayou resident Jessica Fuentes, walks near a section of the neighborhood where eight to ten homes were torn down after Harvey, as construction nearby continues, laying concrete pipes, Wednesday, April 21, 2021, in Houston. (Photo by Karen Warren/Houston Chronicle via Getty Images) So far, it has few completed efforts to show for its efforts since Harvey flooded more than 200,000 homes.
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