DAVID MARCUS: In wake of Kerrville flood, locals ignore blame game

KERRVILLE, Texas – It didn’t take long for Democrats to pounce on last week’s tragic floods here with false allegations that the Trump administration had cut the National Weather Service, leaving the community vulnerable, but the locals are having none of it.

With a death toll of over a hundred, many of whom are children, one might expect bitter anger and recrimination. But little of that is on display on the ground. Christian, an Uber driver in his 40’s who grew up in Kerrville, said of the flood that "the system will never be perfect, it just came so fast, there’s nothing you can do with 20 feet of water rising in a half hour."

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This was in the wake of aggressive questioning by reporters directed at local officials that almost seemed to be intent on finding blame, not explanations.

There was a tinge of anger in Christian’s voice as he added, "Now they’re going after the mayor and the fire department,. It’s not fair."

This attitude was echoed by Rob, in his 50s who was newer to the area, but told me, "it was a perfect storm," not intending the pun. "It probably didn’t help that it was the early morning hours of July 4th, but it was so fast, just a terrible tragedy."

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This attitude, which basically broke down to looking at the flash flood as an irrepressible act of God, stood in contrast to what I heard from victims of the North Carolina floods of last fall. But there, the anger was about the aftermath, not the lead-up.

Locals in Hill Country were also unimpressed by arguments that the Trump administration's federal job cuts had left the National Weather Service ill-prepared to forecast, reporting that was quickly debunked, as it turns out the agency had extra staff working.

Likewise, the ever-present left-wing argument that every weather incident in the country is the result of climate change and our inability to wean ourselves off of fossil fuels did not have much purchase. "They say that about everything," one woman told me, eyes rolling.

One possible cause of the floods that I did hear about from several residents was cloud seeding. In fact, they were bringing it up to me on Monday, before it broke through as a national story.

Crews work to clear debris from the Cade Loop bridge along the Guadalupe River on Saturday, July 5, 2025, in Ingram, Texas.  (AP Photo/Rodolfo Gonzalez)

Experts seem to agree that nearby seeding operations did not cause the massive rainfall, but there was an understandable concern from those I spoke with about the practice of fooling around with the power of Mother Nature.

One thing that came through with most of the people I spoke with was that when you live in such intimate proximity to powerful forces of nature, the risk of that is known and in large part accepted.

Much as people who choose to live in cities often accept higher rates of violent crime, those who live in the pathway of common natural devastation understand the tradeoffs.

There is no perfect safety. For all of our technology from space travel to the internet, in the face of enough fire or water, we remain more or less helpless. Just this year in Los Angeles, the fires raged until the wind died down. It could have been 1925, not 2025.

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There is no question that locals in Hill Country want the authorities to learn as much from this horrible event as possible, and to make changes where needed, such as calls for a siren system to alert residents of flooding.

Even sirens, though, are not perfect. If used too often, they will eventually be ignored. If used too sparingly, they might fail to provide warning when water as fast as Kerr County saw last Friday moves in.

Millions of Americans, for example, receive tornado warnings from their phones many times a year. Often they are ignored, usually with little harm done, but sometimes with tragic consequences.

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A final factor that helps the people of Hill Country focus on helping each other, rather than blaming each other or the Trump administration, is the powerful Christian faith held by so many here. 

It is not just that their faith allows them the comfort of knowing the lost are with God now; the churches themselves became powerful epicenters of volunteering and support.

There will be time for answers about the lead-up to this flood. Thankfully, at least for now, all the focus of the locals is on aiding one another and continuing the life and growth of their communities even under a cloud of nature’s dark power.

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