Houston mayor thanks Walsh for assistance
Mayor Martin J. Walsh is calling on Boston residents to donate goods for a massive care package for evacuees in flood-drenched Houston — and he got a shoutout from Houston’s mayor for being willing to lend a hand.
Walsh said he spoke with Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner on Sunday and initially planned to send surplus cots for evacuees, but the Army has since provided 100,000 cots to the city. Massachusetts is sending 16 members of its urban search and rescue Task Force 1 team along with four boats.
Turner thanked Walsh in a press conference yesterday.
“I want to thank Mayor Martin Walsh out of Boston, because he’s sending down some high-water rescue equipment and vehicles, and I thank him for that.”
Now Walsh is asking residents to donate clothing, blankets, toiletries, diapers and baby formula to City Hall and other city buildings today through Thursday, and the collections will then be shipped to Houston.
“I know thousands of people in Boston who would like to be helpful to people in Houston. If they need our assistance we will do everything we can to help them,” Walsh said. “It’s like a movie or a dream, it’s a bad dream ... we’re going to stay in touch with them and do whatever we need to do.”
Walsh said Boston has received aid from other cities during tough times, including the record snowfall of 2015, and said he wanted to pay it forward.
“When we had 106 inches of snow, we had people calling us saying, ‘What do you need?’” Walsh said. “You help each other out. ... It’s important for us as a city that we stand up with our cities around America.”
As many as 10 people are believed to have been killed since the storm blew in over the weekend, flooding parts of Texas and Louisiana and hitting roof lines of single-story homes in Houston, and two more feet of rain are expected before the storm subsides.
The Task Force 1 team is expected to arrive today, according to engineer Thomas Gatzunis, spokesman for Massachusetts Task Force 1 and a former commissioner of the state Department of Public Safety.
“All of us never want to be deployed because we never want the event to unfold to a degree that we are needed,” Gatzunis said. “But if it does happen, every one of us wants to be the first one there to help.”
Donations of supplies for Houston can be dropped off at City Hall; 1010 Massachusetts Ave.; the Bolling Building at 2300 Washington St.; 26 Court Street; Boston Centers for Youth and Families headquarters at 1483 Tremont St.; and Boston Centers for Youth and Families sites.