Nacogdoches commissioners take no action on burn ban for now

NACOGDOCHES, Texas (KTRE) - Burn bans could still be a possibility for East Texas counties that haven’t had one issued yet. On Wednesday, Nacogdoches County commissioners met to discuss whether or not fire conditions are serious enough for a ban to be issued.

“We were blessed with a very wet spring, and we have been coasting on that throughout the summer,” precinct three commissioner Robin Dawley said.

Like other counties in East Texas, Nacogdoches isn’t coasting anymore, and continuing high temperatures and dry weather are becoming precursors to a burn ban.

“When we start looking at a burn ban, there are a lot of different things we look at. We try to project when we’re gonna get rain which, who knows…we look at the trends,” Dawley said.

According to Commissioner Dawley, sporadic rain throughout the county has kept the court from administering a ban.

“It’s just enough to satisfy some areas, but then you’ve got some areas that aren’t getting rain,” he said.

But as emergency management coordinator Tara Triana points out, conditions put the county right on edge of needing a ban.

“We’re starting to dry out and as we see more fall fronts that bring more wind and dryer conditions, fire conditions will become greater,” Triana said at the court meeting.

Commissioner Dawley moved to take no action on the burn ban and was seconded by Commissioner Mark Harkness. Dawley says they plan to see if conditions will improve over the next few days.

“You got people that are clearing land for a living, clearing land for houses, this means they can’t burn what they pile up and what they clear, and so we’d be interrupting people’s lives,” Dawley said. “We’re thinking ‘okay, we can always within three hours notice, come back and have an emergency meeting and call a burn ban.'”

Commissioners said they were prepared to call an emergency meeting to issue a ban as early as Friday if conditions get worse. The Texas A&M forest service reports that as of Wednesday, 176 counties are under a burn ban.

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