Kyle Police Department chief presents emergency plans to council

KYLE — Kyle Police Department Chief Jeff Barnett presented the city council with an update to the city’s emergency response preparedness at its Feb. 6 meeting.

This presentation comes after the Kyle City Council’s discussion on the city’s preparation and response to emergencies at its Jan. 16 meeting, where city manager Bryan Langley was directed to provide an update on the plans and procedures during emergency weather events, partnerships and collaboration with neighboring entities.

According to Barnett, preparedness is the development of disaster preparedness plans, training, exercises and the implementation of revisions after exercises.

Currently, the city adheres to the Hays County Emergency Operations Plan, which provides: hazard and vulnerability assessment; vulnerable needs population assessment; contact lists for departments and partners; identification of countywide resources; policies in place for mass care, public health, utility restoration, etc.; and collection of emergency management agreement and contacts.

Barnett then covered the preventative measures and responses. The first was how the city responds to the threat of winter weather on roads. The preparation begins with fueling the vehicles and equipment needed and loading them with salt, which prevents ice, as well as parking the vehicles throughout the city for quick access. Then, on-call and essential staff report to the Public Works building ahead of the event and treat the streets with salt or sand, the latter of which allows cars to gain traction on slippery surfaces. Staff will continue to drive on roads to determine driving conditions and treat the streets as necessary.

Other measures were for heavy rainfall or flooding events and water/wastewater in winter weather and heavy rainfall, all of which were essentially preparing the equipment needed and staff monitoring the situation.

Next, Barnett discussed a topic that has recently been discussed at council — shelters and centers. The city defines a shelter as a long-term stay, where the facility would provide overnight shelter, a place to sleep, meals, showers and serve as a reunification center, while a center is short-term and only operates during the business’ normal hours. The center would provide water and chairs.

“The city does not have an adopted threshold to initiate a center or a shelter. What we would do today, in current operating procedures, is we would rely on our partnership and that emergency management plan, that I mentioned earlier, with Hays County would be utilized to implement a shelter,” explained the chief.

The county has created various shelters throughout the county, namely schools and churches, that would house individuals in a long-term situation if needed and the city is prepared to use its facilities, such as the Kyle Public Library, to serve as centers based on the emergency event. He also noted that Parks and Recreation staff is trained for those situations and would be at the centers.

An example is a cooling center. These are used when temperatures reach an experience of 110 degrees, meaning that the actual temperature is not used, but rather the temperature it feels outside. Centers have cooling mists, fans and water. Council member Miguel Zuniga requested that this temperature be lowered due to the high risk of dehydration and heat strokes. He also stated that collaborating with the hospital to have medics ready would be a good preparation.

Council member Bear Heiser requested that Kyle’s Uber program be implemented into the new emergency plans for families that do not have the ability to drive to these shelters.

As far as communication during emergencies, there are several services that the city utilizes.

“Obviously, we want to make sure we get good, vetted information both to city leadership as well as to the community,” Barnett said.

The city of Kyle website, along with news releases, is used for detailed information on boil water notices, weather events and prolonged emergency events. Emails are also sent to neighborhoods, homeowners associations and apartments with information.

Everbridge is another method that the city will use during intense emergencies, such as evacuations, shelter-in-places and weather warnings. These are sent directly to the phones of residents.

All information will also be shared on the city’s social media to ensure that it reaches as much of the community as possible.

In addition, the city will have an Emergency Operations Center that will be open during a long-term emergency event, which will serve as a location for all staff directors, leadership and council members to gather at one location to receive timely information and make important decisions.

Although there is a lot that the city has prepared for, there are more plans in the future. Those include:

• To acquire brine, which is applied prior to a winter weather event. The cost will be approximately $25,000 to purchase the necessary equipment and storage needed.

• Staff will purchase additional and improved equipment for salting and sanding the roads.

• Critical facilities, including city hall and water/wastewater facilities, will receive backup generators.

• Permanent generators to provide a permanent power source will be installed at critical facilities. This will have a preliminary cost of approximately $129,290 and an estimated $3 million in total costs.

• Requesting access to shelter facilities as needs arise. Currently, Kyle does not have facilities that would qualify as sheltering, but the city could choose to add shelter space in the future.

• Staff is looking into purchasing CivicPlus at $12,000 per year, which is an opt-in system and would allow additional information, such as road closures, to the community. This new system would have less restrictions than Everbridge, which is strictly for emergencies.

• The city is also looking into setting up a contract with United Way to handle donations during certain emergency events.

Barnett concluded his presentation by requesting council feedback to understand what expectations are and to bring staff a policy with guidelines they would like.

Council member Robert Rizo was the first to begin the discussion, noting how overstretched the county is, yet the city is relying on its resources: “I was on board for creating emergency management within our city, so what I would encourage us to do, as a city, is not rely so much on the county, but do our own in-house, as well.”

In response, Barnett noted that the city hired an emergency management coordinator, William Paiz-Tabash, to aid the city in becoming more independent.

Langley also commented that, currently, zero facilities have backup generators, so that is also a battle they are facing. If power outages happen, it could become problematic, he explained, but said that when a community center is built, it will give them the capacity to have a shelter.

“What I would like to see, before we start getting into any budgeting situation, is how often have we encountered this situation and how many times has the city faced a problem that we need to activate shelters or activate churches … [Is there a] budget for a generator for a church and is that what is currently needed,” said council member Daniela Parsley.

The chief relayed the numbers that they had, which is that to run a shelter, it would take approximately $5,000 per day, not including the preparation. As far as the other questions Parsley had, staff will report back with answers at a later date.

As the discussion concluded, Langley stated that city staff will have upcoming disaster drills and training to learn more about how to handle the situations because “unfortunately, we will have one of these that we have to deal with, either this year or next year or some year in the future.”

The next council meeting will be held on Feb. 20.