Speaker 1: For more on the president's visit today and the damage
Speaker 1: caused by these deadly Texas was and what needs to
Speaker 1: be done. Next, we turned to George P. Bush, the
Speaker 1: former commissioner of the Texas General Land Office. Commissioner Bush,
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Bloomberg.
Speaker 2: It's good to see you.
Speaker 1: Everyone's been an expert on response and rescue operations over
Speaker 1: the past couple of days. I'm wondering what Texans actually
Speaker 1: want the extent to which they want the government to
Speaker 1: be involved here enhancing infrastructure for early warning.
Speaker 3: Well, I suspect that in July twenty one, when the
Speaker 3: special session gabbles back in, that the legislature will go
Speaker 3: back to the bill that was administered this past session.
Speaker 2: But was unsuccessful.
Speaker 3: It was a half a billion dollar package to create
Speaker 3: an early detection and warning system with respect to a
Speaker 3: state that, unfortunately, is subject to the most amount of
Speaker 3: natural disasters than any other state in America.
Speaker 2: People forget, since.
Speaker 3: Nineteen eighty our state has had more federal declarations in
Speaker 3: any other state, and then ranges from flat floods such
Speaker 3: as the one that we've seen in Curville to devastating
Speaker 3: storms like Hurricane Harvey, which I happen to preside over
Speaker 3: as the Land Commissioner, leading the state's largest housing recovery,
Speaker 3: and I think it was the second largest in American
Speaker 3: history behind Katrina. This storm is nothing short of devastating,
Speaker 3: but as you know, politicians typically respond after the fact
Speaker 3: instead of preparing before the devastating events.
Speaker 2: But we need to focus on the positives here.
Speaker 3: I believe legislators will reconvene past that half a billion
Speaker 3: dollar package that will implement early communication and warning systems
Speaker 3: along the Guadaloup, similar to what was done in the
Speaker 3: Wimberley storms from twenty sixteen, where the Blanco River Authority
Speaker 3: did set aside the dollars to create that early detection
Speaker 3: system that com mitigate lives that we need to prepare
Speaker 3: better for these storms.
Speaker 4: Well, when we consider the preparation and you speak to
Speaker 4: some of the recent natural disasters that the State of
Speaker 4: Texas has experienced, does it also need to be better
Speaker 4: adaptation and mitigation to what is a changing environment.
Speaker 2: Absolutely.
Speaker 3: When I was Lank Commissioner, I advocated for the largest
Speaker 3: storm surge barrier in American history. After Katrina, New Orleans
Speaker 3: and Louisiana were successful in obtaining a federal appropriation to
Speaker 3: create two swinging levees that now largely protect New Orleans
Speaker 3: from a devastating Category three plus storms. In fact, they've
Speaker 3: had a few storms and this system has actually worked.
Speaker 2: It's been accomplished.
Speaker 3: Before in American history, and we can do it again
Speaker 3: as Texans, whether it's flash floods or devastating storms that
Speaker 3: could hit the Galveston area.
Speaker 2: But I'm a big.
Speaker 3: Believer if you look at the economics of natural disasters
Speaker 3: and the recovery, it's so much cheaper at the federal
Speaker 3: level to allow states, counties, and cities to come forward
Speaker 3: to the federal government with well thought out plans that
Speaker 3: are NEPA compliant and working with the US corp of
Speaker 3: Engineers to.
Speaker 2: Help mitigate those future storms.
Speaker 3: Because, believe it or not, our climate is changing and
Speaker 3: violent storms like this will continue happening. So we can
Speaker 3: choose one path, which is to respond and ask taxpayers
Speaker 3: from other parts of the country to fund it, or
Speaker 3: we can come together as a country and put together
Speaker 3: those plans and better prepare and develop that infrastructure beforehand.
Speaker 1: Stories like these, unfortunately have a way of falling off
Speaker 1: the front page pretty quickly. Commissioner Bush once that's the case,
Speaker 1: and we're onto other things and whatever the crisis of
Speaker 1: the day may be in politics, what will be happening
Speaker 1: on the ground in Texas?
Speaker 2: How long will it take to clean this up?
Speaker 3: Man? I'm hearing estimates of several months, if not yours.
Speaker 3: I mean, going back to the experience at Hurricane Harvey,
Speaker 3: we were cleaning debris for over a year, attaining federal
Speaker 3: waivers and permits to allow us to just burn the trash.
Speaker 3: I remember an estimate that every single landfill in the
Speaker 3: state of Texas was inundated with debris.
Speaker 2: And if you look at just these images.
Speaker 3: That are occurring on the Guadalupe River, and if you
Speaker 3: can visualize a wall of water in excess of thirty
Speaker 3: feet in all the debris that are along the Balconi's
Speaker 3: escarpment along that way, this is going to take a
Speaker 3: long time.
Speaker 2: But as a former leader.
Speaker 3: In Texas, I can tell you that the people of
Speaker 3: Texas are so resilient and strong. There are tens of
Speaker 3: thousands of volunteers, including my church River Bend, which is
Speaker 3: on the ground in a church in curable helping people
Speaker 3: respond and getting badly needed supplies. And what's crazy about
Speaker 3: this Joe is that there are still over one hundred
Speaker 3: people missing. I mean, we are still in the search
Speaker 3: and rescue aspect of what's occurring here, and it's been
Speaker 3: a week, so recovery is never easy. Unfortunately, we're already
Speaker 3: pointing fingers at one another. But first things first, we've
Speaker 3: got to save lives.
Speaker 4: That is absolutely true. We should keep that in before
Speaker 4: we let you go, Commissioner. We just have a minute
Speaker 4: left here. But if a state like Texas, with its
Speaker 4: size and capacity, still needs the support of the federal
Speaker 4: government to respond to a disaster like this, what does
Speaker 4: it tell you about changes that should or should not
Speaker 4: be made to FEMA.
Speaker 3: I've long been an advocate for reorganizing FEMA and consolidating
Speaker 3: the disaster recovery components of what it does, along with
Speaker 3: the numerous other federal agencies in.
Speaker 2: Washington, DC that responded disasters.
Speaker 3: To make it simple, cut through the bureaucratic red tape
Speaker 3: for local, county and state wide officials. Just one quick
Speaker 3: example from Hurricane Harvey. To rebuild a home, it required
Speaker 3: over sixteen permits from different agencies underneath the National Environmental
Speaker 3: Protection Act. And if we can just cut through the
Speaker 3: red tape, essentially block rant the dollars down to the states, counties,
Speaker 3: and cities to allow them to adjudicate the recovery process.
Speaker 3: I assure you that most states are going to do
Speaker 3: it better than the federal government. Are certain just jurisdictions
Speaker 3: that don't have that experience like we do in Texas,
Speaker 3: But there's a lot that we can do at the
Speaker 3: federal level, all right.
Speaker 4: George P. Bush, former Commissioner of Texas General Land Office,
Speaker 4: thank you so much for joining us.