The Texas County Commission announced the appointment of Jack Watson as new emergency management director (EMD).
Watson has for more than 30 years been Cass Township board president and is also chairman of the county’s township advisory board. He replaces Bennie Cook, who recently resigned to take a job at Congressman Jason Smith’s Rolla office.
“The EMD is kind of the eyes and ears of the commission,” Texas County Presiding Commissioner Fred Stenger said. “If there’s a disaster coming our way – like an ice storm – he’ll stay in close contact with the National Weather Service and adjoining communities to help determine the steps to take.”
JACK WATSON
Watson is also board president of the Houston Rural Fire Association, and is a retired phone company worker after a 42-year career. His experience with the township advisory board and the vast knowledge of county roadways he gained working for the phone company in this area for close to 28 years will both be valuable in his role as EMD in terms of gathering post-flood road damage information (one of the county EMD’s primary functions), Stenger said.
Stenger said one of Watson’s focuses will be to increase the amount of disaster relief funding that comes in following major flooding from the State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) and Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).
“He’s well known and well respected by the people at both SEMA and FEMA,” Stenger said. “He’s a good fit for this.”
Watson hopes to increase the flow of funding from those agencies by simply increasing the number of townships that apply for the relief; it’s not uncommon for elected officials in several of the county’s 17 townships not to complete the necessary paperwork, which in effect leaves thousands of dollars on the table.
“Jack will act as sort of a mentor or mouthpiece to help some of the townships who have road damage that would qualify for funding to get their paperwork done,” Stenger said. “In some cases, they may not know what avenue to take how to make something happen, and Jack is very well versed with the procedures of both FEMA and SEMA. But you know when a disaster hits, it affects more than a handful of townships – it doesn’t hit one hard and then skip over the next one.
“We’re losing a lot of money every year on these disasters by people not doing paperwork, and really, that’s a big part of what they’re elected for.”
Watson said he’ll start by visiting with each township’s officials.
“I won’t force them to do anything,” he said, “I’ll just suggest what they can do. But there’s a lot of paperwork that goes into it, and I think that’s one reason a lot of them don’t enter into it. They either don’t understand, or think they can get by without it.
“I always get what I can for Cass Township, because that’s who I represent. But a lot of them are losing money, and by doing that, they’re hurting the people who live in their township, because they deserve roads that are as good as in any other part of the county.”
“Even if we go from 10 townships participating to 12, that’s progress,” Stenger said. “That’s a lot of money – and I don’t think we have any townships who would think they shouldn’t be getting so much money to take care of their roads. Jack isn’t going to do things for them – and he shouldn’t be expected to.
“But if the commission gets 1,000 complaints, 999 of them are usually about roads. I just think we should be taking advantage of the total availability of resources that’s out there.”
Watson said repairs from last summer’s big flooding episode were barely complete before most of the same roads were wiped out again by the huge December flooding. A SEMA meeting is set for March 2 in West Plains regarding the December disaster.
“Nobody really knows what’s going to happen,” Watson said. “But we had the same thing happen two years ago when there were two big floods, so they’ve got an idea from that.”
During periods of emergency, Watson will work out of an Emergency Operations Center (EOC) next to the new Texas County 911 call center inside the county administrative building in downtown Houston.
To reach the Texas County EMD, call 417-967-0720.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) will provide grants to local governments in 37 Missouri counties (including Texas County) and the city of St. Louis to help with their costs for restoring or repairing roads, schools and other public facilities damaged by the severe storms and flooding from Dec. 23, 2015, through Jan. 9, 2016.
On Feb. 10, these counties were designated for FEMA’s Public Assistance Program: Barry, Bollinger, Camden, Cape Girardeau, Cedar, Crawford, Dade, Dallas, Douglas, Dunklin, Franklin, Gasconade, Greene, Howell, Iron, Jasper, Jefferson, Lawrence, Lincoln, McDonald, Newton, Ozark, Perry, Phelps, Pulaski, Reynolds, St. Charles, St. Clair, Ste. Genevieve, St. Louis, Scott, Stoddard, Stone, Taney, Texas, Washington and Webster, as well as the independent City of St. Louis.
The designation makes public entities and some nonprofits in these counties eligible to apply to FEMA for reimbursement of 75 percent of their eligible costs for emergency response activities and permanent repairs to roads and bridges, water control facilities, buildings and equipment owned by the city or county, utilities, parks and recreational facilities, and some nonprofit facilities that serve the public.
Over the next few weeks, the state and FEMA will conduct briefings about infrastructure assistance for officials and other personnel in the affected counties and provide technical assistance to the applicants as needed.