AUSTIN — Gov. Greg Abbott Sunday demanded CenterPoint take immediate action to improve their hurricane preparation and response efforts following their repeated and ongoing power failures in the Greater Houston area.
During a press conference Sunday in Houston, Abbott also issued a letter to the Public Utility Commission (PUC) of Texas directing them to launch an investigation regarding utility companies’ inability to restore power following Hurricane Beryl’s landfall.
“First and foremost, Texas’ No. 1 goal is to protect life,” Abbott said. “An issue that we see in the ongoing response to Hurricane Beryl are lifebased issues, not because of the hurricane itself, but because of the lack of power supply.”
Abbott called the failure of power companies to provide power to their customers “unacceptable.”
“ CenterPoint has repeatedly failed to deliver power to its customers,” Abbott said. “To help Texans in the Greater Houston area and to avoid a repeat of unacceptable power outages, I will give CenterPoint until the end of the month to provide my office with specific actions to address power outages and reduce the possibility that power will be lost during a severe weather event.”
If CenterPoint fails to comply, Abbott said he will issue an executive order “to impose actions on the company that are geared to keep the power on.”
Abbott was joined at the briefing and press conference by LT. Gov. Dan Patrick; Texas Division of Emergency Management Chief Nim Kidd; Senators Carol Alvarado and Paul Bettencourt; Representatives Briscoe Cain, Charles Cunningham, Dennis Paul, Jon E. Rosenthal, Lacey Hull, Mano DeAyala, Mike Schofield, Sam Harless and Valoree Swanson; PUC Chairman Thomas J. Gleeson and other state and local officials.
At the press conference, Abbott directed Center-Point to provide his office with the following action plan by July 31, 2024, on how they will address current power issues and reduce the possibility that power is lost in the future. CenterPoint must: — Provide in detail how it plans to remove all vegetation that threatens any power line; — Specify how it will prepare in advance of any tropical storm that enters the Gulf Coast; — Specify action it will take to pre-stage enough linemen and other personnel to be able to immediately respond to any power outages that may occur for any tropical storm that hits their service region.
Texas’ ongoing recovery efforts to provide needed resources and assistance to impacted Texans and communities — including generators, tarps, fuel, ready-to-eat meals, water and ice — was discussed at length To date, Texas has distributed more than 5,171,000 bottles of water, more than 679,600 ready-to-eat meals, and more than 206,300 bags of ice to communities.
Abbott directed TDEM to request additional counties be added to the federal disaster declaration for the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) Indiv idual Assistance programs. The additional counties include Austin, Bowie, Shelby, Trinity and Waller.
Texas may request additional counties for federal assistance based on completion of damage assessments in impacted communities.
A request from Texas to the federal government to reopen the incident period and instead designate it as “continuing” amid the ongoing response and recovery to Hurricane Beryl remains pending with FEMA.
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