Kerville, Texas – Before the sudden floods in the Texas Hill country materialized in the early hours of July 4, the highest elected official of Kerr’s County said he had no idea of the pending disaster that would sweep structures and undertook heartbreak rescues throughout the region.
“We did not know that this flood was approaching,” said County Judge Rob Kelly at a press conference later that morning, in response to why the summer camps along the Guadalupe River, supplied by the rain, were not evacuated before, before many disappeared or feared dead.
“We do not have a warning system,” he added, referring to the sirens along the river in other counties, he used to notify imminent floods.
The next day, at a press conference with Governor Greg Abbott and other state officials, Kelly said about the preparation effort: “It’s just Hill Country, and we didn’t know.”
In Texas, the County Judge fulfills many functions in addition to judicial tasks, including the emergency management and management service of many administrative functions in the county.
But with a number of deaths that exceed 100 people, 67 adults and 36 children only in Kerr Count
The efforts to get to Kelly this week, even on the phone and at the emergency operations center, their office and their home, were not successful. He has not spoken publicly since his appearances in news conferences after the flood.
In addition, William “Dub” Thomas, Kerr County Emergency Management Coordinator, has not spoken publicly and did not return repeated requests of comments. Nor could he be contact at the emergency operations center or his home.
Thomas, who has been the main emergency coordinator of the County since 2015, is responsible for its emergency management plan, the emergency notification system known as Codered, its search and rescue team and other tasks related to the disaster, according to the Kerrville Rotary Club website. Previously, while working for the Texas Public Security Department, Thomas helped direct the state’s response to several catastrophic events, including the disaster of the Columbia Space Transforder in 2003 and Hurricane Katrina in 2005.
Kelly, a Republican who assumed the position for the first time in 2018 and was re -elected in 2022, has worked as a lawyer for commercial litigation and, in her role as a County judge, supervises the commission of four people from Kerr county and her budget. Kelly was a certified member of the emergency response team of the Kerr County community, according to a biography on the Rotary Club of Kerville website.
“I really believe that God has been preparing me for this position all my life,” Kelly said at Kerville Daily Times in 2017 about running for the county judge before the elections. “I didn’t look for this job, I came to look for me.”
Tom Pollard, the former County Judge, Kelly, said that in any important event, such as a disaster that requires an evacuation, the Emergency Management Coordinator is in charge but takes the direction of the County Judge.
“The dollar stops with the County Judge’s office, but the management director drives it and starts,” said Pollard. “And he will talk to a county judge from time to time, and if there is a decision to be made, he will consult the judge who makes a decision.”
Pollard said that neither his wife received emergency notifications on his early phone in the morning of floods.
The mayor of Kerville, Joe Herring, said Tuesday in MSNBC that he did not see emergency alerts and was only awakened by a call from the Dalton Rice city administrator at 5:30 am at dawn, the Guadalupe River had increased 26 feet in 45 minutes, according to sensor data.
Just after 4 AM, the National Meteorological Service had improved its sudden flood warning to an emergency for Kerr County, advising that it was a “particularly dangerous situation. Look for a higher land now!”
Kerville’s Facebook publications were published after 5 in the morning with respect to “Life Threats” floods, but it is not clear if officials were communicating with residents in other ways before.
It is not clear if the emergency alerts around that time would not have been received on all phones. The stained cell service is not uncommon in parts of the county, northwest of San Antonio. It is possible that others have not had their phones with them, such as the young women who stayed in Camp Mystic in the unbalanced community of Hunt, where the authorities say that at least 27 campers and staff members died.
The records of the Federal Emergency Management Agency obtained by NBC Dallas-Forth Worth show that Kerr County officials did not use their integrated public alert and warning system, or IPAWS, to send warnings with safety instructions to all cell phones in the affected area on the day of floods.
As water began to increase in Kerr County, the National Meteorological Service delivered a IPAWS flood warning to the phones already at 1:14 am, NBC Dallas-Fort Worth reported.
However, it depends on the County or the city officials in general to send more urgent instructions, even if evacuating.
Some families said they received a coded alert from Kerr County, which is similar to an IPAWS message and can be sent through the Sheriff’s office. But the program allows people to choose not to participate, which means not everyone receives it.
Dispatch Audio obtained by NBC Kxan affiliate in Austin includes an Ingram voluntary firefighter who asks a sheriff dispatcher from the County at 4:22 am
The dispatcher responds: “We have to approve it with our supervisor.”
It is not clear at what time they were supposed to be sent alerts with coding. Kxan reported that a person near the flooded area said he received a voice email at 1:14 am from a tracked number to coded, while another area resident received a coded alert at 5:34 am
The San Antonio office of the National Meteorological Service did not immediately respond a request for comments on Friday on any communication that may have had with Kerr County.
Kerr County Sheriff, Larry Leitha, said at a press conference on Wednesday that his priority remains search and rescue efforts, but said there would be a “after action” review of what happened on July 4.
“We’ll get them,” Leitha said. “I can’t tell you when, in one or two weeks, agree? We are going to get them.”
Raymond Howard, a member of the Council in Ingram, another city in Kerr County, said he has a series of questions for County officials to investigate once the rescue efforts are exhausted, due to the preventive measures they plan to carry at the time of the moment of emergency alerts.
“I didn’t get a encoded,” said Howard, “and I enrolled in Codered.”
What is needed for the future, he said, is better planning and communication.
“It is too late for the victims and everything that has already happened, but for future floods, we can do something,” said Howard. “It will happen again.”
Minyvonne Burke reported from Kerville and Erik Ortiz in New York.
