Early Voting Starts Today For Flood Control Bond

HOUSTON, TX – The memory of Harvey and the widespread flooding that destroyed homes and businesses may prompt the majority of Harris County voters to overwhelming approve a $2.5 billion Flood Control bond on Aug. 25 – the one-year anniversary Hurricane Harvey made landfall in Texas.

Early voting for the measure begins Aug. 8 and continues through Aug. 21, with 45 voting locations open from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. most days.

The voting begins as Harris County officials wrapped up a two-month tour visiting residents living along the 23 watersheds in Harris County to solicit ideas for the $2.5 billion bond, that if passed, county leaders hope will prevent another flooding disaster.

The measure has widespread support with about 55 percent of those surveyed saying they are likely to vote in favor of the bond, while 35 percent said they were not sure how they would vote and another 10 percent said they would oppose the bond, according to a recent poll conducted by the University of Houston Hobby School of Public Affairs.

Since 2015, Harris County residents have endured three significant flooding events beginning with the Memorial Day flood of 2015, which caused widespread flooding along White Oak Bayou and other tributaries.

The next year, the Houston area was hit by the Tax Day Flood with heavy rain causing Cypress Creek, and Spring Creek to overflow their banks, impacting areas throughout northwest Harris County.

Then in 2017, Hurricane Harvey dumped a record 51 inches of rain on hundreds of Gulf Coast communities and caused record flooding in downtown Houston as well as communities throughout Harris and surrounding counties.

If this bond is approved, it would be the most ambitious of its kind undertaken in the Houston area, and could involve thousands of home buyouts downstream of the Addicks and Barker Reservoirs, massive channel improvements on creeks and bayous and needed drainage improvements.

What will not be included are any improvements to the reservoirs themselves, which are federally owned and operated.

"After a series of catastrophic floods in recent years, Harris County residents rightly expect major improvements in the way we protect our homes and residents from disaster," Harris County Judge Ed Emmett said in June when the bond proposal was introduced. "We must take steps now to make our county more resilient. We all saw the way that Texans helped Texans during the Memorial Day floods of 2015, the Tax Day floods of 2016 and Hurricane Harvey last year. Now is our chance to work together to protect each other proactively."

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