Texas Border Business
By the Tribune’s Jolie McCullough, Cassandra Pollock and Neelam Bohra.
Texans of color earning low wages bore some of the heaviest weight of this week’s power outages, as the inequities drawn into the state’s urban centers were exacerbated in crisis. Some residents escaped to nearby hotels, but those who could never afford that option watched the food in their refrigerators — and the precious dollars spent on it — spoil in front of them.
Cities rushed to set up warming centers, but with public transportation shut down, those without cars were left further out in the cold. Local leaders pointed out that neighborhoods with mostly Black and Hispanic residents tend to have older homes with bad insulation, leaking roofs and older pipes that make them less likely to withstand extreme weather. Even as low-wage workers endured a crisis brought on by weather, those without a financial safety net are bracing for how they will make ends meet when they’ve been unable to get to work.
“When you didn’t invest in the whole community equally, then you’re going to see the disparity when we get into situations like this,” said Jill Ramirez, the CEO of the Latino HealthCare Forum. Read the full story by the Tribune’s Alexa Ura and Juan Pablo Garnham.
Power grid stabilizing, water disruptions persist: Texas is generating enough energy so that it doesn’t have to force electricity providers to cut power at people’s homes. But around 325,000 people were still enduring outages Thursday afternoon, Gov. Greg Abbott said. The remaining outages were due to more local problems in the electrical system, which local companies were scrambling to repair.
Temperatures are expected to rise well above freezing across much of the state on Friday, which could further help the electricity situation. Officials with the Electric Reliability Council of Texas said those still without power are likely to have been affected by ice storm damage on power distribution systems. In addition, more than 13 million people faced water disruptions as of Thursday morning. Cities across the state have required residents to start boiling water before using it for drinking, bathing or cleaning. Read the full story by the Tribune’s Jolie McCullough, Cassandra Pollock and Neelam Bohra.
