Kerr County, where dozens of people—many of them children—died in this weekend's catastrophic flooding, knew flash floods were a danger in the area—but its application for a grant to improve its flood warning system was rejected by the Texas Division of Emergency Management in both 2017 and 2018, USA Today and the Houston Chronicle report. The grants were available, some of them earmarked for preventative measures, due to Federal Emergency Management Agency funds that were unlocked after devastating rains in the state in 2016. More funds were unlocked following Hurricane Harvey the next year. The county also tried in vain to get funding from the Texas Water Development Board around the same time, but the board only agreed to provide 5% of the estimated $1 million cost to upgrade the county's aging flood warning system.
"At that point we sort of dropped it," says William Rector, president of the board of the Upper Guadalupe River Authority. Other local officials have similarly noted that the idea never got off the ground due to cost. State officials have not provided details as to why the funding was denied. The Chronicle says transcripts of the discussions about the need to update the warning system, which first started in 2015, serve as a "chilling precursor" to this weekend's tragedy. "We also have more summer camps than anybody else along the Guadalupe River," noted one Kerr County commissioner at a 2016 public meeting.
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