Fort Worth is working to better navigate natural disasters. A new plan could mean faster response times for crews working to clean up debris after a major storm.
Fort Worth City Council have extended “standby contracts” to six companies to remove debris.
Charleston Akins knows the frustration of life after a tornado. He works in Downtown Fort Worth and will never forget the tornado on March 28, 2000.
“It was horrible. I came back to work that night and we weren’t able to get into the downtown area. They still had the downtown area blocked off. It was dark. You could still see the emergency vehicles,” Akins recalled. “If something does happen like that again, I would like to see a faster clean up.”
Brandon Bennett, Fort Worth Code Compliance Director, hopes the contracts will make cleanup efforts move quickly.
“You don’t want to be in the middle of a disaster and go to the yellow pages and start calling for help. That’s too late,” Bennett said. “If we get a big tornado or a big wind storm or some other event, we have contractors that we can immediately go to and immediately put to work.”
Up to $50 million is allocated for the execution of these contracts.
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“If we go back to the 2000 tornado here in Fort Worth, it was less than $50 million. If you look at the big tornadoes that have hit Missouri and some of these other states, it has been $50 million or more,” Bennett said.
Bennett said the ability to get crews on the ground and working within 24 hours will help several aspects of the city’s efforts to recover after a storm.
“If there are large trees blocking roads, if there are signals that are down… all these things that impact the ability of public safety to do their job and for people to get to the hospital and to get commerce back online,” Bennett said.
“It’s getting kids back to school. It’s getting businesses back open. It’s getting power lines back up. You have to deal with that debris as quickly as you possibly can.”
