i posted this a week ago in cr
after further review i can't see anything in it that is "against the rules" of dt so here you go:
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How do the failed barriers fit together?
The 2025 atrocity is neither a 2025 problem, nor a 2025 camp/citizen/tourist problem, nor a 2025 State/County/City government problem. It is instead a true example of an organizational accident with causes that existed for some time before the event. While no one person is responsible for the atrocity, the aggregate effect of actions and decisions by government officials and those they serve, over many years, created the physical conditions that made the atrocity possible.
For the current State, County and Local governments, Guadalupe Flooding was, and is, an institution. And leaders do not change institutions unless there is a clearly perceived need for change.
Guadalupe Flooding has grown from isolated events lost in institutional memories trapped in time into an atrocity with massive loss of life. From just a dozen deaths to hundreds. From the occasional high-water cleanup to a 100-year event every 10 years. For Guadalupe Flooding, the State, County and Local government’s role was to ensure that controls were in place so that if and when a flood occurred, the results would be non-consequential. But as Guadalupe Flooding has grown in frequency and intensity, the actions and decisions by government officials, taken or not taken, to prevent the flooding, have remained the same.
The State of Texas, Kerr County and the City of Kerrville do not have a proactive risk management approach for Guadalupe Flooding. As a result, behavioral and safety problems never prompted past or present administrations to reassess Guadalupe Flooding risk to campers, citizens and tourists.
The State of Texas, Kerr County and the City of Kerrville have a culture that instills bias and tunnel vision in decision making. No one in the current or past administrations ever interpreted ongoing behavioral problems as indications that Guadalupe Flooding risk mitigation was beyond the capabilities of past or present administrations.
There was no appropriate plan, policy or program to mitigate the risk of Guadalupe Flooding. Instead, important design details were communicated through an oral tradition. As a result, Guadalupe Flooding risk mitigation was never undertaken the same way twice, even though the accepted basis for risk mitigation was “we have always done it this way, and it has always worked.” Thus, changes made in the absence of a sound risk mitigation strategy reduced critical margins of safety.
Kerr County and City of Kerrville leaders were the sole design authority for Guadalupe Flooding risk mitigation. Yet they did not have the knowledge or skills necessary to identify and correct structural and institutional deficiencies of the type that caused the 2025 atrocity.
Though its individual components are complex, the central message is clear. The atrocity was about physical failures driven by organizational failures, the origins of which span decades. No single factor caused the atrocity, just as no single change will ensure that a tragedy like this never happens again.
https://www.surlyhorns.com/board/topic/44760-4th-of-july-texas-flood/page/29/#comment-7195227