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The Austin Fire Chief is facing a vote of no confidence—a formal expression of disapproval from the Austin Fire Association—along with significant public backlash, due to his response leading up to and during the July 4th flooding in Kerr County and throughout the Hill Country.
According to the Austin Fire Association, the Austin Fire Department could have helped save lives during the Hill Country flooding by deploying the day before the July 4th floods. They even had a request to do so, but that request never made it to the Fire Chief due to his standing order to deny such requests.
Austin Fire Association President Bob Nicks recently spoke at a press conference, claiming they could have saved lives. He said, "In emergency service departments, it's very common to say, 'We think something might happen, let's pre-deploy resources so if something does happen, we're in the theater ready to make rescues.'"
He went on to say that despite the Fire Chief's claim that there were budgetary and resource concerns preventing mutual aid deployments, there’s no reason why they shouldn’t have been sent. He stated, "When they get a request, you say yes. That’s your commitment to the state." Nicks reiterated multiple times throughout the press conference that the Austin Fire Department has plenty of resources and personnel to flex up and meet these requests while still fulfilling their top priority of protecting the city of Austin.
Nicks added that if the department had responded on time, they would have "been in Kerrville, pre-staged, late afternoon on the third. Before one drop of water had risen. That’s how good emergency services operate."
Nicks has maintained that his criticisms of the department’s response are not based in politics or anything else other than his concern with AFD Chief Baker’s response to the emergency. The results of the Union’s no confidence vote will be available to the public around 4:00 p.m. tomorrow.