12/06/2021
In Kashmere Gardens, local officials heralded the progress of a $100 million Hunting Bayou channel improvement project that will remove more than 4,000 homes from the flood plain.
District B Council Member Tarsha Jackson said the project, which includes a detention basin and improvements to 17 bridges, is a welcome first step to protecting northeast Houston residents from flooding.
“Every time there’s rain in the forecast, I brace for calls from constituents who see their streets flooding, their lawns flooding and water coming into their houses,” Jackson said.
County leaders say the project, to be completed early next year, is an example of prioritizing poorer areas that historically had been neglected for flood protection.
The “worst-first” model Commissioners Court adopted to determine the order in which bond projects are completed considers a host of socioeconomic factors, including poverty and education level, rather than solely a neighborhood’s flood history.
“These are neighborhoods that in the past always not only felt left behind, but were left behind,” Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo said in Kashmere Gardens last month. “Now, projects like the one we’re visiting today are pretty much at the top of the list.”
Workers expand and deepen Hunting Bayou at Hutcheson Park in Kashmere Gardens last month, part of the $2.5 billion flood bond.
