{"id":4553,"date":"2012-01-17T13:54:59","date_gmt":"2012-01-17T19:54:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/?p=4553"},"modified":"2012-01-17T13:54:59","modified_gmt":"2012-01-17T19:54:59","slug":"drought-roundup-burn-bans-back-in-austin-houston-drought-level-lowered-and-some-predictions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2012\/01\/17\/drought-roundup-burn-bans-back-in-austin-houston-drought-level-lowered-and-some-predictions\/","title":{"rendered":"Drought Roundup: Burn Ban&#8217;s Back in Austin, Houston Drought Level Lowered and Some Predictions"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_1895\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 150px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"A stock pond south of Dallas, TX, dries up due to drought.\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/51636665.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-thumbnail wp-image-1895\" title=\"A stock pond south of Dallas, TX, dries up due to\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/51636665-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/51636665-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/51636665-140x140.jpg 140w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/51636665-60x60.jpg 60w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/11\/51636665-100x100.jpg 100w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Paul Buck\/AFP<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">A stock pond south of Dallas, TX, dries up due to drought.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Some drought news from across the state today (95 percent of which is still in drought):<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Houston (specifically, all of Harris County) has been lifted out of the most severe stage of drought, &#8220;exceptional&#8221; for the first time since March. An &#8220;exceptional&#8221; level of drought means &#8220;widespread crop\/pasture losses; shortages of water in reservoirs, streams, and wells creating water emergencies&#8221; according to the US drought monitor.<\/li>\n<li>But the western half of Harris County is still in &#8220;extreme&#8221; drought, and the other half is only one level better, &#8220;severe,&#8221; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.chron.com\/news\/houston-texas\/article\/Harris-County-no-longer-in-exceptional-drought-2574062.php\">according to Eric Berger<\/a> of the <em>Houston Chronicle<\/em>.<\/li>\n<li>The burn ban that had been lifted for several weeks in Travis County (where Austin is located) <a href=\"http:\/\/kutnews.org\/post\/travis-county-burn-ban-back\">has been reinstated<\/a>. &#8220;At their meeting this morning, the Travis County Commissioners approved a recommendation from county Fire Marshall Hershel Lee to reinstate the ban,&#8221; StateImpact partner KUT News reports.<!--more--><\/li>\n<li>Nearly half of Travis County is <a href=\"http:\/\/droughtmonitor.unl.edu\/DM_state.htm?TX,S\">still in the highest level of drought<\/a> (&#8220;exceptional&#8221;) and the other half &#8212; to the West &#8212; is at the next highest level, &#8220;extreme.&#8221; Dallas-Fort Worth and El Paso are faring much better, both of them in &#8220;moderate&#8221; and &#8220;severe&#8221; levels of drought.<\/li>\n<li>What does the future hold? No relief anytime soon, according to climatologist Brian Fuchs of the U.S. Drought Monitor. He<a href=\"http:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/weather\/drought\/story\/2012-01-16\/drought-texas-california-snow\/52604882\/1\"> told USA Today <\/a>that &#8220;there are fairly good odds that the winter will continue to be on the warm and dry side in the Southern U.S.&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Some drought news from across the state today (95 percent of which is still in drought): Houston (specifically, all of Harris County) has been lifted out of the most severe stage of drought, &#8220;exceptional&#8221; for the first time since March. An &#8220;exceptional&#8221; level of drought means &#8220;widespread crop\/pasture losses; shortages of water in reservoirs, streams, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":50,"featured_media":1895,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[58],"tags":[61,85],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4553"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/50"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4553"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4553\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4556,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4553\/revisions\/4556"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1895"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4553"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4553"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4553"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}