Today's episode of the Tribe Cast is sponsored by the Texas Tribune Speakers Bureau. Welcome to the Trib Cast. I'm Eleanor Klibanoff, joined by co host and editor in chief Matthew Watkins. Our other co host, James Bargon, is off today. Matthew, how are you?
I'm doing great? How about yourself?
Pretty good? Pretty good?
Just the two of us, indeed lonely up here.
Yeah, we've got some guests on zoom that we're going to turn too shortly. But before we get into that, Matthew, I did want to talk to you about what's going on over at Texas A and M. You're a proud alum. I understand that is true.
Yet not hiding. I'm very I may have brought it up once.
Or twice, may have worn the ring occasionally, but you know, as the Texas Tribune has sort of exclusively reported this week, the Board of Regents is down to five candidates for chancellor. We're hearing down to Texas Controller Glenn Hagar, US Rep. Michael McCall, Texas A and M Foundation President Tyson Vocal. Is that right right? University of Alabama President Stuart Bell, and State Rep. Trent Ashby. Are you offended that you're not on the list?
I mean, you know, the chancellor does make a pretty good salary. I will say that it is a pretty hard job, though, you know, I think when you talk about like sort of differing constituencies, higher ed administrator right now in Texas is a pretty challenging one. You've got a very conservative legislator and governor who's appointing the board
of Regents. Many of those legislators and regents seem uniquely interested right now in the you know, social media postings and emails and various other things of a very large group of faculty members. It seems like if you're in this job, you're probably going to have to be called on to explain, you know, some of those things in a way that you're probably not going to find very fun.
You then also have a you know, young constituency, a faculty that maybe doesn't align as much politically with the rest of the legislature, and it creates just you know, it might be impossible to keep all those happy. So you're you're earning all those all those dollars in that jump.
You're also responsible for a bunch of eighteen to twenty two year olds, which is a nightmare.
Indeed, indeed and perhaps most challenging. You are, you know, at the very top of the food chain as things go down toward the football team, right and as you are an aggy Yeah, you're probably grumpy about all the football and all the the the you know, missed opportunities there, the losses to certain other teams and everything like that. That's why I have my eye on this Alabama University of Alabama president Stuart Bell. I wonder if he goes into the board of Regions and says, look, I know I.
Know how to win a couple of them. Yeah. I grew up in a a role tide family, so I am you know, gonna be honest, I don't know the Texas A and M that we want that, you know, people from Alabama want Texas A and M coming and taking their president.
But uh, well, you know you have to let people.
Hasn't been the best season.
That can't be you. You've found yourself in Texas, you can't.
You know, That's true. Me and Stuart Bell both finding ourselves in Texas. Perhaps, Yeah, well we'll be watching that. Our crack higher education team is like, you know, very well sourced on that front.
Yeah, yeah, seriously though, I mean, I think it's really interesting to watch because you've got a few, like pretty prominent political positions on this list, right, I mean, if if if Hagger is the choice, then you have a statewide elected office up for grabs, there will probably be some jockeying there. Of course, Michael McCall, a fairly prominent member of Congress, would also be a pretty notable change.
And then you know trin Ashby is well, so there's there's possible domino effects here that could be really interesting to watch.
Yeah, it really speaks to like how important this is not a figurehead position, and John Sharp, who held the position before, certainly I think contributed to making it into the political powerhouse role that it is.
Indeed.
All right, so we'll keep Matthew at the head of the Texas Tribune, We'll keep one of these guys at the head of Texas A.
And m I'm still available, willing to watch it call.
You know, I think everyone is in the role they should be. But you know, that is not what we are here to talk about this week. We are gonna this week, you know, usually we're sort of looking ahead to what the legislature is going to do this session, which we are going to talk about. But to start, we're actually going to look back on where the states stood about a year ago. Here in Texas, the largest
wildfire in state history ripped through the Panhandle. More than a million acres burned, at least two people and ten thousand cattle died. The financial losses totaled more than one billion dollars. We're gonna talk about things stand in the Panhandle now a year later, what ranchers and residents hope the legislature might do this session, and how Texas can better prepare for wildfires more generally. We're joined by Jamie
Lozano Carver, the Tribune's high planes reporter who's based in Lubbock. Hi, Jamie, Hi, eleanor how is in Lubbock these days?
It's actually getting warmer this week, so it's been pretty nice.
Great. We're also joined by doctor Carle Purdham from the University of Houston, who's the lead investigator on a research project looking at the Panhandle wildfires and how communities in Texas are managing wildfire risk. Welcome doctor Purdam.
Thank you. It's great to be here.
Thank you both for joining us on this really important topic. Jamie, you covered these fires a year ago. Just tell us about that experience, like what it was like for you going up there and seeing that.
Well, you know, it was it was a very hard experience. It was very sad because you know, I went up there within I think it was the first day that the fires had started, and so one of the first stops that I made was at the dairy queen and fridge, and that's where a lot of the firefighters were taking a break, and you could kind of see how exhausted they looked. A lot of them looked checked out at
that point after what they had been dealing with. And then even just driving around, you could already see the effects taking place. There was smoke all over the region. The ground was black. Unfortunately, like you mentioned, there was a lot of dead cattle that was just out in the open that people could just see. And of course, you know, we saw a lot of a lot of people coming through to help too. We saw a lot of trucks going through and carrying bales of hay for
the ranchers that needed it. And you know, I think that what it's probably stuck with me. The most was just kind of seeing the makeshift shelters that were put up around all the cities that were affected, where they just had people from the Panhandle Foal who were either helping or who were scared and trying to escape what was going on. So, yeah, it was just it was very it was hard, you know, just.
To put in context. I'm I'm looking this up on my phone as we're talking. The Los Angeles area wildfires. You know, obviously terrible tragedy, a much denser area. Fifty seven thousand, six hundred and sixty five acres burned in
that fire. The Panhandle fire burned over one million acres, you know, obviously different locations there, a lot of different properties, but still in the scale, the scale of the fire was pretty unbelievable in terms of how widespread it was across this area of the state.
Yeah.
Absolutely, Also, Jamie, you are just to let people behind the curtain a little bit, and you cited one of the number one reporting techniques in the world, which is go to the dairy queen. You can usually it's usually a good first stop. Jamie, Like a year later, what do we know about how these fires started? Sort of how they unfolded and looking back, like, you know, what's the sort of total count on the impact for ranchers and residents of that area.
So you know that I should really say that week, while everything was starting and really spreading around the region, there were five fires that were just going through that were scattered, and I would say within that first twenty four hours had already burned a lot of the acres that we were talking about. The House committee that investigated the fires last year, they found that the fires were
actually started by failed power lines. You know, in the case of the Smokehouse Creek fire, which, like you said before, it became the biggest fire in state history, the ignition was from a decayed power line that had the decayed power poll that broke and fell into dry grass. So it was just, you know, it was it was a ignition that was just waiting to happen, essentially, And we also know that they the fire spread and incredibly fast that day because of the high winds, So we just
kind of know how that played out. But as far as the impact goes, I think the financial loss has been one of the hardest aspects for the residents in the Panhandle to come back from ranchers in particular, have had to worry about, you know, equipment, like getting their fences and gates fixed just so they can keep their cattle in their pastures. And that's a lot, even if
you don't lose a majority of your livestock. And I think, you know, aside from financial I think the biggest toll would be the mental impact that this has had for people up there. I was visiting Canadian a few weeks ago, and there are people there who get scared whenever they hear the emergency sirens go off. You know, It's a year later and they're still very anxious about it.
Yeah, absolutely, I mean that sort of we talk about sort of like climate change and the almost like PTSD effects of living through a natural disaster, whether it's you know, a fire, a flood, anything like that. Doctor Purdam, your work looks a little bit sort of what happens after the fire recedes and the recovery begins. Tell us a little bit about the research you're doing in the Panhandle and the challenges these communities are going to face as they rebuild.
Sure, so I'm involved in two projects.
What I'm leading is looking at the Panhandle and a lot of the challenges that face emergency management, but also a lot of the healthcare infrastructure and just being in a rural area, how they how the disaster impacted their
decision making. You know, we invest a lot in plans and you know, putting together you know, scenarios of what would you do if a wildfire happened, and this was you know, wildfires are very different from say a hazard like a hurricane, because it's very difficult to predict, it's very difficult to keep track of where the impact is growing.
The situation just changes so quickly. So looking at you know, this disaster and how how emergency management, how local communities and leaders, how they responded, and what you know, how the unique, how the uniqueness of the massive scale of the wildfire, how that impacted their decision making, what would
they take into the next wildfire? And then you know, just broadly, Uh, I'm part of another project, uh working with folks at Texas A and M, the Hazard Reduction Recovery Center, the USA Center for Oral Preparedness, and we're broadly looking at Texas and other goal states on you know, how are communities responding to increasing wildfire risk, especially in rural areas, and so we see a lot of the same you know, challenges, and that folks are dealing with
increasing risk and increasing vulnerability. We know, the folks in the Panhandle know that this won't be the last wildfire in that area, and knowing that you are recovering and you're trying to you know, rebuild, and but also having to think, you know what, you know, how are we rebuilding? How are we you know, reviewing our plans and reviewing our practices to be prepared for what is coming next.
So they're on that front line of knowing that the risk is there and trying to you know, recover, but also be prepared for, you know, the next wildfire disaster.
Doctor Brintham. You know, I feel like when we talk about what led to an incident like this, it's often the same thing, right, you know, you had maybe a wet period, you know, in the time leading up to it, leading to lots of growth, then a dry period that follows that, which leads to a lot of sort of you know, for lack of a better term, sort of
kindling for a fire. Then you get a very dry period with high winds and some kind of inciting incident, right like a power line going down, you know, someone throwing a cigarette out the window or anything like that. I mean, a lot of those things are very hard
to control. I'm curious as you look back at this fire, whether this is an incident of just conditions were right for this and there's not much you could do, or were there things that went wrong either in the preparation or the response to the fire that made this worse than it might have otherwise could have been.
Well, I think you know, when we talk about disasters, most disaster scholars we don't even really refer to them as natural. We refer to them as disasters because the term natural disaster implies that there's nothing you could do about it, and that there's something that's coming from the outside. And that's how we've responded to disasters before. But we know with risk, there are a lot of things we
can do to mitigate risk. And you know, I know that the the areas that we are seeing that are impacted in especially rural communities, are you know, on the front lines. They are leading response efforts, and they're from our research and from a lot of that involves going
into communities in the Panhandle across Texas Louisiana. We know that especially local fire departments, they're on the front lines of responding to these you know kinds of crisis and not just in terms of you know, we think of firefighters as when the fire is there, that they're going
out and responding to them. But with you know, risk and the increasing risk is in so many of these communities, they know that it's there, they're seeing it, and they are working to you know, they have a new you know, you know task that's been put on them. Another another burden in addition to just responding to risk, but in communicating and trying to advocate to individuals in the communities
to local governments that where the risk is. In communities across Texas, you know, there's a lot of different challenges, especially with you have a lot of people moving in from out of state or from other communities into more rural areas and there's increasing development in the wild and urban interface and that has created a lot of challenges
especially in how just changes in land management. So in conversations with and with leaders and fire departments and emergency management, local government, you know, that's causing a lot of risk
to be developed. So it's people who you know, they may come in and be you know, a part of the community that maybe was before unmanaged wild land and now it's a development with say like ten acre lots in them, and each lot now has a fence line, and where before maybe that the land and the fuel there, the assets and things we're being managed and now it's all that kind of fuel is building up, and maybe that person you know in that community don't realize that
what they're doing is you know, creating more risk that's going to be difficult for the fire department to manage, and then also creating a lot more challenges in terms of responding to fires, So creating more fence lines and more private property that folks are going to have to navigate.
So there's a lot of different intersecting challenges and I can say from the most important thing that we've learned is really listening more to the folks who are on the front lines, who aren't just yes, they're responding to the disaster, but they're seeing the risk build up every day and are are working to try to communicate that.
But they need to be empowered. And that's what part of our project is is taking down the lessons that they've learned, and trying to communicate them so that they can be you know, empowered and listen to with with the increasing risks they're seeing in their communities.
Yeah. Absolutely, I mean, certainly that development I think we're seeing everywhere. We're gonna talk a little bit about, you know, how this is not just a Panhandle issue, but Jamie tell us a little bit. I mean, I know, after the wildfires, there was a lot of talk about, you know, the legislature is going to come back, there's things we need them to do to help us both you know, respond better in the future, but also sort of rebuild
these communities. What do people in the Panhandle want this session and what sort of are we seeing momentum on.
Well, really, I think people in the Panhandle just want this to be addressed in some way, you know. In particular, I was hearing that they want, you know, if there was some way like to do kind of like a fire task force. There's one proposal in the legislature right now where it would be creating a database firefighting equipment that's readily available in the state, and they love that proposal.
So really, you know, we're talking about an area that has historically felt ignored by Austin and by the lawmakers there, and I think that that's what they're aiming for. They want to see this get addressed on a much bigger level than how they typically address it at home. But then on top of that, I do think that there's momentum. I think that you know, there is probably people who may have forgotten about what happened, or you know, who
think things are fine now. But if that's the case, you know, there are lawmakers who represent the Panhandle that are not letting that happen. You know. Like I said earlier, it's it's Senator Kevin Sparks who filed the bill about creating the firefighting Equipment Database. He and Representative King also filed joint bills that would fund rural Volunteer fire Department.
But I think the one that people in the Panhandle are most excited about is another bill that was filed by King, who you know, of course, he was born and raised in Canadian so he has a really good idea of what they're dealing with and what they need. And his bill would essentially give that authority to address faulty electrical lines to both the public utility Commission and
the Railroad Commission. And so, for those who may not remember, this was a big point of contention during the investigative hearings last year because neither authority felt that it was their jurisdiction and it was being called, you know, essentially a no man's land, and so that made it very difficult to determine which agencies should be overseeing that maintenance.
And that is probably, I would say, the most pressing concern, especially for ranchers out there, who you know, aside from large wildfires just about every year, they also deal with smaller fires that still affect them on a daily basis.
Matthew, a thing we've talked about seemingly endlessly in the early episodes of this podcast, the Speaker's Race, it comes full circle. We have, you know, a speaker from from the Panhandle representing do we consider lub Oh my god, am I going to get chased out of town? Write a story that was like, this is the first Panhandle speaker, Oh God.
Close to the Panhandle. So technically technically Lubbock is the Panhandle.
Kelly On.
Yeah, if you ask anybody in Lubbock, they will not say we're the Panhandle. We are the South Plains or we're West Texas.
Okay, but I believe what I did here was technically I am correct.
I would like to have.
Yeah, sorry, I played by the rules. You know, We've got a lot more to talk about. I do want to take a quick break, and I encourage people stick around because we at the end of this episode, we'll have an update on one of the feel good stories coming out of the wildfires. We got a little update to offer you guys on that story, So do stick around. Let's take a quick break and thank our sponsors, the Texas Tribune Speakers Bureau. Deliver Texas sized insight at your
next event. With the Texas Tribune Speakers Bureau. Our reporters and editors are ready to bring your event to life with context and analysis. Only they can deliver. Book us at Texastribune dot org slash speakers.
I kind of interrupted you. Was there actually a question you were wanting to ask there about the speaker?
We actually did get distracted? Is that kind of like, well, no, I don't it doesn't apply anymore.
I ruined it.
Okay, Well no, Also, the question was like, do you think the fact that we have a speaker who is from near the Panhandle might put more attention on Panhandle issues, a region that, as Jamie said, often feels sort of ignored.
I mean, I think, Jamie, I'm interested in hearing your thoughts on this, but I think it's I think the
people up there found that very meaningful. I mean, you know, Caroline Fairly, who's from Amarillo, which is the Panhandle, you know, really actually cited that as one of the reasons she was she was getting on Burrow's side, and I think there were a lot of people kind of in that region feeling like someone who understands this very unique part of the state is meaningful for questions like this, not just around you know, wildfire mitigation or response, but also
healthcare and education and a lot of the other things that are you know, of course coming up this legislative session as well.
It's good that Speaker Burrows can understand the issues of the Panhandled despite not being from the Panhandle or representing it. We admire with that about him. Okay, doctor Purdam to actually, uh, this is a nice segue because wildfires are not a problem exclusive to the Panhandle, though you know, obviously it's an issue that ranchers in the Panhandle deal with a lot. You know, we as Matthew said, we saw these wildfires in Los Angeles, we see wildfires in cities as well.
What like wildfire threats do other states parts of the state face. Is this a threat for people in cities as if not as much in the Panhandle, you know to some extent.
Well, I would say that wildfire risk, you know, it's increasing everywhere. They might have a low risk, but whatever that lower risk is is increasing. Many communities think, you know, this couldn't possibly happen here. I think that, you know, many individuals think that with many different types of disasters, and they might not actually know what their risk is. And you know, there are you know, other states or places where wildfires are. They are you know, more understood
to be part of the landscape. And in Texas that's definitely you know, accepted and understood in many places. But there are rising risks and and folks just may not know what what their risk is or how that risk is increasing. So communities are I know in Texas there have been some really strong efforts to support communities to
become it's called fire wise communities, uh too. For I know there's a significant investment and trying to have communities and counties developed plans their wildfire wildfire I can't remember the exact name of the plan, but developed wildfire specific plans and so evaluating what is the wildfire risk in the community and what would be you know, ways to mitigate that risk, and you know, identifying areas of vulnerability. So there's you know, growing understanding and that you know,
those are things that need to be addressed. The challenge again is, you know, a lot of these planning efforts, Uh, they cost time, they cost honey, they require to be really effective engagement with the public, and you know that's you know, not a simple task. So uh, you know, the Texas A and M for Services a lot of support for those efforts. But I think it's it's a growing,
a growing issue. That's something we've talked with part of our project looking at Gulf States is people, you know, accept and understand that hurricanes are flooding are part of the risk landscape, but they may not understand, you know, that wildfires are part of that that landscape. And you know, we've talked about the massive scale of the Panhandle wildfire. But a fire doesn't need to be you know, on
that massive scale to really cause damage. You know, a fire of say one hundred two hundred acres wherever it is can still destroy many homes structures in communities. So you know, folks may think that would never happen here, but you know that's always something that you know could be a possibility. There's it's it's understanding what their risk
is and what they can do to mitigate it. And that's where I would say again, a thing that we're what we're learning from working with emergency managers, fire departments, folks, even you know, in local government, is that there is a there's a you know, gap between what they know and see and understand as the risk environment and what the community understands and sees. And you know, having that
knowledge is important for making plans for being prepared. That's one of the difficult things about wildfires is there's not that kind of lead up time to say evacuate that you get with a storm that is well monitored, and the situation just becomes it changes so much more quickly. It's a it's a in many ways, it's just a more difficult kind of disaster to prepare for. So yeah, there's there's definitely a gap in what the public knows
or thinks about, you know, what their risk is. And so you know, we're working to try to, you know, identify ways that communities can improve in communicating that and communicating that risk and then identifying you know, how they can you know, reduce the risk in our communities as well.
Yeah, I was you know, there's some reporting in the aftermath of the LA fires about how Austin at least one group ranked Austin as the sort of highest you know, mid to large sized city in the country in terms of that that's outside of southern California in terms of wildfire risk, right, And you know, a lot of us remember the fires in Bass Drop from you know, more than ten years ago, which we're very scary and kind of cree their way, and you know, if you drive
through Bastrop today, it's still you still see the effects and impact of that.
And certainly, like as you were saying, doctor Purdam, a lot more development, a lot more you know, like it's these are areas that have explored are they're exploding every year, So potentially have you know, grown a lot since they updated their wildfire plan or at least since residents sort of consider their wildfire risk.
Yeah.
I think that's a good way to you know, you know, talk about this is like this is obviously there's people, as you said, doctor Purham, for whom this is sort of a way of life and they are prepared for this and thinking about this a lot. And then there's people who, like in Los Angeles, I think we're very caught off guard.
I'm curious, doctor Purdham, what you think about the home insurance question about this. You know, after the fires in southern California, you know, there was all this conversation about insurers that had pulled out or what we're pulling out of California. You know, Texas, as you mentioned, has a lot of different threats, whether it's you know, tornadoes, floods, hurricanes, fires, you know, earthquakes maybe less so we have them, but
they're not so big. But let's not roll it out. Yeah, I mean, how much do we need to be worried? How much do homeowners in this state need to be worried about the insurability of their properties? And you know, from a long term basis down here is all these kind of risks seem to grow or at least we grow more aware of them.
Yeah, well, I mean I would definitely be concerned, just because as we're saying with you know, the same kind of trend with hurricanes and flooding in places along the Gulf coast. It's not my particular area of expertise, but I would say it's definitely something that we need to be watching and being prepared for as risk continues to grow.
I mean, we know that, like we said, there are some communities that are prepared for this, but they're prepared for maybe even a previous climate and a previous level of risk, and that risk is increasing. So even our current you know, communities that have plans that are you know, maybe have been adequate in the past, are increasingly less adequate there they are, you know, have to be updated for future scenarios that we have perhaps even yet to imagine,
you know, that kind of risk. So I would absolutely be concerned as we you know, as we continue in the future down this line of increasing risk, especially from climate.
Yeah, that's what.
Yeah, I would say, I'd definitely be concerned in watching, especially watching you know what's happening with other hats. It can absolutely happen here.
Yeah, certainly, I mean, I feel like between, like you know, we've had so many like once in a lifetime things happen, or worst or you know, worst case scenario things happened in Texas and the country and the world in recent years. So certainly, Jamie, I know when you were reporting at the time, you know, a year ago, there was a lot of talk from ranchers about, you know, can we keep going, can we rebuild? Do we have a future
in ranching? Do we have a future in this area You've been up in Canadian recently, I mean, what sort of what are you hearing now? Are people sticking it out? Did we see an exodus of ranchers and farmers?
Well, there are a lot of ranchers who are trying to get back to where they were before. But unfortunately it is a mix like what you were saying. You know, for example, Craig Cowden, he's a rancher up there that I've talked with a lot since the fires happened, and he didn't lose any cattle in the right so he doesn't know how, but he didn't, but his entire ranch
did burn out. So even though his cattle survived, he still had to sell sixty percent of his livestock because the ground wasn't healthy enough for his actual full herd. So you know, there's a lot of those kind of decisions having to be made. And I think, you know, on the other hand, like there are ranchers out there who lost both their ranch and their livestock and decided
that it was time to call it quits. And you know a lot of them, or at least I should say one in particular that I spoke with he was already at that age towards retirement. He was already considering it, and the fire just kind of helped him make that decision sooner. But that's that's just unfortunately, the reality of what they're they're dealing with right now is just making those hard decisions.
And this is not like the only challenge that ranchers and farmers in Texas are facing. I mean, we've got, you know, have had intermittent drought over the last of recent years. Now we're talking a lot more about Avian flu other threats, you know, just like the uh sort of a lot of farmers are reaching retirement age and not deciding not to you know, don't have anyone to inherit their their work. What is the current sort of
state of the state for agriculture. Was the impact for consumers too, as that sort of begins to face increasing threats.
I mean, you know, just thinking about consumers in general, we have to think about basic supply and demand, right. I mean, one of the biggest poultry farms in Texas last year had to kill more than a million infected chickens that had the bird flu. And you know, cattle country hasn't been the same since the fires happened. And so while we have our poultry producers and our ranchers kind of in that influx, you know, that leaves us the consumers kind of just waiting to see what happens.
And we have seen what has happened over the last few weeks with rising egg prices. But then you know, like you mentioned, you throw drought in there with all the other business ending type of factors, and it really just adds up. It's been a very rough couple of years for farmers in Texas.
Absolutely. Yeah, Well, I've got an update on a story. So we are very excited to bring this to you. The Texas Tribune so rarely writes stories with a little bit of hope in them. Increasingly we write sort of dismal stories about the horrors of our world. But in this case, right after the fires, my colleague Stephen Simpson was up in the Panhandle covering the hearings and he wrote a story about a Panhandle rancher named Dale Jenkins who emerged from the fires with one unharmed calf named Bobo.
This was the story of Bobo, and people loved this story. We got a ton of feedback on it. We should say, Dale Jenkins also his adult you know heard survived, so this was just one calf that was unharmed. So we asked Stephen to follow up with Dale ahead of this week's episode to get a Bobo update. And this is
what Dale had to say about Bobo quote. I actually had Bobo listed in my production sale for this March twenty second, but yesterday he failed a fertility test and I told my wife he would have to go to slaughter. She's insisting that I not do that and instead use him as a sterile bull often called a gomer bull for my AI parentheses artificial insemination not intelligence program to help me identify females in heat. So Bobo lives, no baby.
Bobo's but Bobo was saved from slaughter by Dale Jenkins's wife.
You know, I think I feel like if he if he had promoted him as an Ai cow, he sucker. You know, that's really buzzy.
Everyone in Austin was like, wait, an Ai, we're saving him for Ai. I'll give you a million exactly. But no, we're thrilled to tell everyone that, you know, Bobo almost died twice, survived the fires, survived the slaughterhouse, and it's going to be living out his days identifying females in heat. So that's our update on Bobo. Definitely, do you have any other Matthew. We have a forthcoming story this week from Jamie on you know, sort of the legislative priorities
around wildfires. But I just want to thank Jamie for joining us and for your coverage, you know, during a very difficult time last year. And doctor Purdham for your for joining us and for your ongoing work in the Panhandle on the wildfires. Thank you both for joining us. That's it for today. You can find all episodes of the Trip cast on YouTube or wherever you find your podcasts. Be sure to like, subscribe, and share the podcast on
all of your platforms. If you'd like to get in touch with the team, you can reach us at tripcast at Texastribune dot org. We want to thank our sponsor, the Texas Tribune Speakers Bureau. Our producers are Rob Avila, who has returned from Japan.
I hope the Japanese musical tour was great. I hope everyone rocked out to the tripcast.
Theme absolutely and Chris Swoboda, who was not invited to Japan. And there's no beef happening in our back room right now.
And much like we will not forget Bobo, we will not forget this injustice.
Absolutely until Chris is taken to Japan, we will not rest our theme music is composed by Rob the Betrayer. See you next week.