Dawn Buckingham - Texas Land Commissioner Joins Houston's Morning News

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Seven fifty two our time here in Houston's Borning News.
We were joined by Texas Land Commissioner Don Buckingham. Dawn,
thank you for taking the time. I you know, this
has been a difficult week or more for just about
everybody here in Texas, including Texas officials. I know that
the governor and the Lieutenant Governor and yourself have spent

(00:20):
a lot of time in the Hill country. Just if
you would give me your impressions of you know, how
people are holding up there and what the state's trying
to do to help.

Speaker 2 (00:31):
Yeah. Absolutely, thanks thanks for having me one this morning.
I wish it was on a happier topic, because I
do think every Texan is touched by this disaster, probably
one or two degrees away from this disaster and the
people it affected. I myself, of course, my mom lived
in Curville a long time, my daughter went to Mystic,

(00:53):
my son went to Camp Stuart. Those were two of
the camp directors that were lost in their pursuit of
saving their camper. So I've lost several very dear friends
in this process, and of course have several other friends
who've lost be it their granddaughter, their niece, you know,
whatever it is. This is a terrible tragedy. I think

(01:13):
we're transitioning into the most deadly disaster that Texas has had.
I think the death count has surpassed Harvey, or getting
pretty close to that. So basically what happened was mother
Nature dumped what would normally go over Niagara Falls in
twenty four hours in the hill country in a matter

(01:34):
of hours, and that the river came up, depending on
where you're talking about twenty five to thirty feet, and
it did that very quickly. And you know, unfortunately it's
a rural area, there are not cell phone receptions. Camp
Mistic has been in place ninety nine years, the water
had never gotten that high, and then we had the

(01:55):
devastating losses that we've had. I think the local state
and that our response has been amazing. You know, the
Texas Department of Emergency Management mobilized early, knowing that a
storm was coming into the area. Remember there are twenty
one counties in this flood disaster declaration by Governor Abbott.
That's bigger than several states by the way, in geographic area.

(02:17):
But Texas mobilized, the state did. The locals were obviously
already mobilized. The FUDS came in right at the same time,
you have thout dudes on the ground, you had over
eight hundred rescues, you had neighbor rescuing neighbor. The community
is heartbroken and crying and mourning the loss. But at

(02:39):
the same time, they're a community and they're dedicated to
rebuilding even better than it was before.

Speaker 1 (02:44):
Yep, and that'll require a lot of help from the state,
no doubt. But I just want to quick thought. Aus
We're up at the end of the show here, but
I'm very proud of the governor yesterday for taking on
reporters who always want to find somebody to blame for
these things. There's nobody to blame for this, is there.

Speaker 2 (02:58):
Unfortunately, mother and mature just does some things that you
can't fully prepare for. So I'm with Governor Abbott and
I agree. I think everybody did the very best they
could in this situation, and the people trying to detract
and lie around.

Speaker 1 (03:13):
That have no place, no especially the ones that want
to politicize it. Thank you for joining us this morning.
Do appreciate it. Thank you you. Bet. Texas Land Commissioner
Dawn Buckingham