For starters, Margaret Brennan had Houston's Dem Mayor Sylvester Turner and Fort Worth's GOP Mayor Betsy Price in the Face the Nation classroom. Turner said that President Joe Biden was welcome to visit any time and he wouldn't be a distraction or a burden, and, as far as what his city needs, plumbing supplies, licensed plumbers and water are high on the list.
Brennan asked him why the water utility - which reports up to him - wasn't better prepared for the cold, and his plans for fixing things. He said "the power outages and the water system are all interconnected," and that they brought in extra generators to try and keep the water system afloat, if you will. He thinks maybe as soon as Monday or Tuesday, they'll be good to go.
He noted that when he was a legislator a decade ago, he submitted a bill to require adequate reserves be maintained to prevent blackouts; it didn't even get a hearing. The grid is built for hot summers, not cold winters - and, "climate change is real. It is real, and these major storms can happen at any time." That's why they need reserves, and why they need an open grid, connected to the grid outside Texas.
Turner said the bill needs to go to the state, not the consumers, and he said Houston has a "huge rainy-day fund" and
...for people in... this city or in other cities, when they're getting these exorbitant electricity bills and they're having to pay for their homes, repair their homes, they should not have to bear the responsibility of paying a thousand dollars a day, or two thousand dollars a day.
He said they're back on track already with vaccines; some started up this past Saturday, and a big FEMA site will open Monday; that one can handle an added 6000 shots a day for several weeks.
In addition to our normal supply, I suspect that this coming week we'll probably vaccine more than a hundred thousand people in the city of Houston. The people are resilient. I'm very proud of the people in the city of Houston, how they've come together.
Moving to Mayor Price, Brennan noted that the Rs have been in charge of Texas, and the energy system, for years and wondered if anything needed to change. Price said local leaders will demand answers from the state - "solid answers and solutions" - because "the citizens are depending on their local leaders to insist that we get answers."
I admit I was surprised to learn from Brennan that "the majority of the ERCOT board, the energy grid operator, the people on the board don't even live in the state of Texas." She wondered if they were "in touch at all" with what's happening. Price said she was surprised to learn that, too.
I certainly hope they're in touch, but it doesn't appear that way. And I think that's what surprised more people than anything is that they are not Texans who have not been living here. Most people didn't realize that, including myself. I didn't realize that. And, of course, now you've had the perfect storm, a state-wide storm that's tested our system. And we just have to-- we went through this ten years ago.
She said back when Mayor Turner put his solution on the table, "Texas was coming out of an economic downturn and they just didn't want to spend the money to do it." Now - even with COVID - the economy's strong enough and they have to take care of it, Price said.
Price also said while her attention is focused on getting "power, water and food delivered to our citizens," they'll look to partner with the feds, perhaps for grants for folks without insurance who have broken pipes and flooded homes. And, like Turner, she said they'd be starting vaccinations right back up, by Tuesday at the latest.
Finally, GOP Rep. Michael McCaul chatted with Dana Bash on CNN's State of the Union. Bash asked if what he and others have gone through with this storm isn't really "exhibit A of why some regulation is needed when it comes to protecting people's health and safety." He said it would have been helpful if they could have shared power with other grids, and he referenced the report from 2011 that recommended they winterize operations. Now, they have to look at how to implement those recommendations, "so this never happens again."
McCaul said he hoped that the emergency disaster declaration will help people with their outrageous electric bills, as well as with repairs to their damaged pipes and cleaning up from the water damage.
Bash asked him about the criticism and "some downright anger" at Rs in Texas, including Gov Abbott and Sen. Ted Cruz, and the "high-profile" Dems - Beto O'Rourke, who ran against Cruz in 2018, and AOC, all the way from Queens - "organizing phone banks, distributing supplies, raising millions of dollars for Texans in need." McCaul thought it was great that the two "are crossing party lines," and said the Rs "need to be helping as well." And that's the way it should be. As to folks taking heat?
Look, when a crisis hits my state, I'm there. I'm not going to go on some vacation. I know Mr. Cruz called it a mistake, and he's owned up to that. But I think that was a big mistake. And, as for me, I was on the ground trying to help my people out and my constituents. And that's what we should be doing in a time of crisis, just like we did during the hurricane season as well.
He appreciates the irony of Texas, "probably the energy capital of the world," literally powerless against a winter storm.
Houston, and Texas in general, we have more energy in this state than any other state in the United States, and arguably more than any in the world, and yet here we are without energy. How does that make sense? And we can blame it on wind and solar, but that's about 25 percent of the grid; 75 percent is natural gas and coal. They were all frozen in their operations. So, this winterization idea that I talked about that was set forth in the 2011 report is something that I believe we need to strongly move forward and make the investment that they failed to do in the past.
It's also ironic that it's likely going to take federal dollars to fix the grid they built to not have to deal with the federal government, isn't it?
See you around campus.
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