Category: Public Safety

Laredo City Council approved a design contract for $14 million in improvements to the Laredo International Airport on June 15. The airport’s Terminal Improvements Program includes an addition to the north of the existing building to include a new security checkpoint, consolidated secure exit, and the associated infrastructure impacts incurred by expanding the building. At […]

Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner launched Resilient Houston on February 12, a plan to help the city mitigate flooding risks and improve climate readiness. Resilient Houston is a framework for collective action and links existing efforts with new ones that will work collectively to protect Houston against future disasters and chronic stresses such as aging infrastructure, […]

California – The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and the state of California approved statewide public testing of the California Early Earthquake Warning System. The system is powered by the USGS’s early warning alerts, called ShakeAlerts. These alerts will be delivered via the federal Wireless Emergency Alert (WEA) system, as well as through the University of California […]

California – The State of California Department of Technology issued a request for information (RFI) for Owner Occupied Reconstruction (OOR) to assist the state’s Department Housing and Community Development (HCD) in developing a new federally funded program named ReCoverCA. Using the OOR process on www.RecoverCA.org, the department plans to provide federal disaster funds to assist homeowners […]

New York – Officials at the New York Department of Design and Construction (DDC) are undertaking an $8.7 billion effort to construct four city jails in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx that would allow for the closure of its Rikers Island Jail Complex. DDC recently awarded a contract for program and project management to a joint […]

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has awarded more than $20 million to the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) for providing safety, support and security to areas affected by Hurricane Harvey. More than 1,800 DPS employees including state troopers and criminal investigators as well as communication and aviation operators were deployed to areas affected […]

Virginia– After three years of research, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), in partnership with the city of Norfolk, has reached a milestone in the Coastal Storm Risk Management study. The project moves onto the next phase with the approval and signature of Lt. Gen. Todd T. Semonite, chief of engineers and commanding general […]

The city of Houston is seeking public feedback through March 5 on whether to approve a new ordinance that would require structures within the 100 or 500-year floodplains to be built 2 feet above the 500-year floodplain. Currently, only developments located within the 100-year floodplain are required to be built one foot above the 100-year […]

The fate of children in the care of Child Protective Services (CPS) was hotly debated this week. The Texas Senate Finance Committee met on Wednesday to discuss a CPS reform plan after a recent Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) report revealed nearly 1,000 children were not checked on over the course of six months […]

On the heels of an unusually wet, cold and long winter comes a welcomed prediction about the upcoming 2015 hurricane season. A pair of expert hurricane forecasters at Colorado State University (CSU) has released their prediction for the upcoming 2015 season, which runs from June 1 through November 30. This is the 32nd year that […]