Houston mayor defends storm response, honors fallen officer and vows to hold CenterPoint accountable

Houston's mayor and top emergency officials defended the city's response to the derecho that struck the region, honored a fallen Houston Police Department officer and said they will press utility CenterPoint on outages and communication as recovery continues.

"This afternoon, there's about 3,000 Houstonians still without power," the mayor said, adding that the city had mobilized emergency operations early and would hold CenterPoint accountable for failures in communication and detection. He called a news report and comments by a council member that suggested the city was unprepared "dishonest or misinformed," and said such statements had hurt the Richardson family.

The mayor framed the gathering as an effort to "clear the record," saying city employees across police, fire, public works and other departments worked around the clock. "Words matter," he said repeatedly, urging reporters and elected officials to check facts before suggesting different outcomes for the tragedy that claimed Russell Richardson's life.

Chief Satterwhite of the Houston Police Department paid tribute to Richardson, describing him as a military veteran and a dedicated officer. "The man was a hero," Chief Satterwhite said, and he urged anyone with questions about departmental preparation to contact him directly.

Tom Munoz, who the mayor asked to provide operational data, said city monitoring began in late June and the Emergency Operations Center activated on July 7. "In the middle of the storm, HFD made 3,003 calls along with 82 high water rescues," Munoz said, and he described the scale of the response: initial assessments of the city's more than 2,500 signalized intersections and clearing more than 1,500 tree-blocked locations within days.

Representatives of the Houston Fire Department and Public Works echoed that the city had pre-staged assets, embedded teams across agencies and used mutual-aid partners to relieve tired officers and crews. Chief West said the department's surge call volume approached triple the usual daily load and that vehicles and generators were strained.

Officials said the city avoided a boil-water notice seen in some past storms but acknowledged gaps they inherited: several fire stations and multi-service centers lacked backup power, and public works has identified 49 locations for potential barricade placement to reduce dangerous driving through high water. The mayor said the city will do an after-action review and continue coordination with county, state and federal partners.

The mayor also said he will travel to Austin on the 29th to participate in a state hearing to describe Houston's experience and press for better utility performance. He closed by repeating that while the city must improve, it had acted to protect employees and the public and that criticisms implying lives would have been saved by different mobilization are inaccurate.

The press conference concluded with officials urging patience for restoration work and promising follow-up reviews and data sharing.