Community and faith leaders joined North Houston residents under the banner of The Metropolitan Organization (TMO) announcing they are in the process of scheduling a meeting with Houston’s Mayor John Whitmire “to discuss the [power] outage, the response to the outage and to look at future activities that need to happen to be proactive so that we can prevent this [in the future].”
“Because we know this is just the first hurricane, early in the season, and we’ve got a long way to go,” said Linda Hollins a TMO leader and member of Trinity United Methodist Church.
But TMO members didn’t wait for the yet solidified meeting date with Whitmire to voice their frustrations over the slow, and in many cases still non-existent, restoration of power to the 180,000 citizens across Houston and Harris County still in the dark, and more specifically residents of the Kashmere Gardens/Fifth Ward community where their press conference convened at St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church (5102 Dabney St., 77026).
This untenable situation amid a typical Houston scorcher of a summer is having an outsized negative impact on Blacks and other members of the global majority, as well as many seniors, one of whom, 94-year-old Enola Zenon, attended the recent press conference accompanied by her daughter, Mary St. Julian.
“My mother is 94 years old and stays with me,” said Julian, “and seniors should not have to go through this.”
A TMO member who was assisting with Zenon highlighted one source of community resident frustration – some have electricity, while others don’t.
“And what’s so killing is, right on the other side of Cavalcade, there’s power. This side, there’s not. And it’s been a week today [without power].”
Charles Turner, pastor of New Pleasant Grove Baptist Church and TMO member made plain TMO’s message to elected officials and energy company leaders.
“In the wake of this tremendous weather event that has impacted each of us… we are here today calling on our elected officials, on the leadership of CenterPoint, and all other responsible parties to do better,” said Turner. “We’re here today advocating first and foremost for those who we have surveyed and many others that we have discovered that while many people are still having their electricity restored and coming back online, there are still several thousands that remain without power, that continue to struggle to find resources to recover, that have lost food, that have lost wages and are suffering from medical conditions, and the like. So, we’re advocating for those who haven’t been able to get to the food lines; those who have been struggling even before this hurricane to get their basic necessities and needs met. This is just another storm on top of the persistent storms they have been experiencing. This is another storm, another recovery, that for many is their daily reality.”
Specifically, Turner said TMO seeks accountability, more aggressive outreach, and transparency so the general public knows what’s going on and collaboration so Harris County residents aren’t running around like chickens with their heads cut off” seeking much-needed resources like food, water, and medicine.
“Many people simply don’t know what the plan is. We suspect that there simply is no plan,” he added.
Turner was asked if he agreed with the common refrain from Black Houstonians: under Mayor Sylvester Turner’s tenure, there was constant public communication and transparent coordination regarding city and county efforts to deal with storms and their aftermath, which is visibly absent regarding Mayor John Whitmire’s team.
“I don’t know. I can’t speak to that. I just know what I’m experiencing right now. It seems very uncoordinated,” stated Turner, no relation to Houston’s former mayor.
Hollins spoke to TMO’s 330-page survey of over 1,000 persons impacted by the storm, saying it “really shows us the pain and the impact of this outage and storm on our community.”
Here are some of the findings:
70%
Don’t have home electricity
39%
Don’t have access to a place with electricity
25%
Families have no food or money since they haven’t been able to return to work
13%
Have a person in their home with a medical device but no access to power
49%
Accessed their overall situation as either dire or of extreme concern
Hollins and other press conference speakers shared countless harrowing examples of individuals in need of dialysis who had no power at their home and could not receive their critical healthcare because the facilities that provide it were without power.
Several persons needing dialysis and other such services had to venture to two, three and even four hospitals before finding service.
Robin Stillwell of First Congregational Church shared words that spoke for many: “It is unconscionable that CenterPoint over many years, Governor Abbott, LT. Governor Patrick and the Public Utility Commission have not held CenterPoint accountable to harden and protect the distribution systems that collapsed during Hurricane Beryl. In 2008 after Hurricane Ike, Mayor Bill White commissioned a study about what to improve and protect the distribution system. Sixteen years later, Houstonians are still waiting for many of those improvements. We want everyone who has dragged their feet on this to be held accountable. No more studies, we need accountability.”
