The grant stems from severe flooding that hit Kendall County the morning of July 4.
KENDALL COUNTY, Texas — Kendall County officials are moving forward with plans to expand outdoor warning sirens after receiving a $1 million grant from the state. County commissioners voted 4-0 Tuesday to accept the grant from the Texas Water Development Board. The funding will be used to purchase and install outdoor warning sirens.
“This next one I am pretty excited about,” County Judge Shane Stolarczyk said during the meeting.
Stolarczyk said the county now has $1 million set aside specifically for sirens and alert systems.
“So, we have one million dollars waiting for us to spend, dedicated for sirens, alerts,” he said.
The grant stems from severe flooding that hit Kendall County the morning of July 4. The wall of water that ripped through Hunt, Texas, at 5 a.m. also went through Comfort in Kendall County just before 11 a.m. While the county already has warning sirens, they are currently limited to the Comfort area. Stolarczyk said no one from the county is believed to have died as result from the flooding, but major damage was reported.
“Those sirens were very instrumental in our flood response,” Stolarczyk said. “But this grant is going to allow us to improve those sirens but also add sirens to our other flood-prone areas throughout the county.”
Stolarczyk said he would like to see sirens installed along the Guadalupe River corridor, stretching from Comfort toward the county’s border near Kendalia.
“Getting the sirens and any alerts we can through at least from Comfort all the way to the other border near Kendalia, throughout that whole stretch of the Guadalupe River in Kendall County,” he said.
While $1 million is significant, Stolarczyk said it’s unclear how far the funding will go.
“A million dollars is a lot of money. I just don’t know how far it is going to go,” he said. “But I am going to stretch it as far as I can.”
The county judge also said he wants to ensure the new sirens can communicate with alert systems used in neighboring counties, including Kerr County.
“To me that means having multiple counties having similar equipment, so it all talks to one another,” Stolarczyk said. “We can get similar information from our neighboring partners.”
There is currently no timeline for when the sirens will be installed. Stolarczyk said county leaders want to take time to evaluate vendors, equipment and coordinate with first responders rather than rush the process.
“For me, I would rather do it right and do our homework,” he said, “rather than rush out and install something just to say that we did it.”
The next step, according to county leaders, is reviewing potential vendors and bringing first responders to the table to determine what equipment best fits the county’s needs.