The winter months are an unpredictable time for weather in Austin, this causes trouble for school districts, government agencies and their decisions on whether or not they should cancel school. The decision to cancel school is up to a certain group of people who takes all of the families in AISD into consideration.

“AISD, City of Austin, ACC, Travis County, and the University of Texas all work together to decide if there should be a cancelation or a late start on any bad weather day,” Interim Assistant City Manager Sara Hensley said.

The group, City Agency, is in charge of several things having to do with city operations.

According to the Emergency Operation Plan, one of the tasks assigned to the City Agency, Activating internal emergency plans (including the provision of supplies, equipment, and facilities), resource management plans, and human resource management plans, according to established criteria and notifying the EOC when these plans are activated.”

Austin has developed an Emergency Operation Plan that provides overall guidelines for their decision on several different city threatening issues, including winter weather.

According to the Emergency Operation Plan Handbook, “This plan should be used as a reference when integrating internal plans into strategic, City-wide operational plans; it does not replace the responsibility a department has in developing and testing its own emergency plans.”

The group above also puts together another group that is titled the Situation Assessment Team, who looks at all of the factors of the situation and then they take action depending on those results.

According to the Emergency Operation Plan Handbook, “The Situation Assessment Team is responsible for collecting and analyzing information relative to the situation, providing direct response to the degree allowable, and relaying other matters to the appropriate level for an executive decision.”

This plan is used by the group to decide whether the weather constitutes closure. Some of the specific weather threats that mainly cause cancellations in AISD include, flooding, fire, hail, and more.

According the the Emergency Plan, “Inland flooding, wildfires, and hail constitute a high risk ranking. And tornadoes, terrorism, and winter storms only constitute a moderate risk ranking.”

Recently school has been canceled due to winter weather, there are a lot of risks that winter weather brings with it, this includes several things that may cause issues for families and faculties if they have to attend school.

In the Basic Emergency Plan, it states that “ Freezing rain or sleet can cause accumulations of ice. Ice can topple power and telephone lines, television towers, and trees. Highways may become treacherous for travel, and walking outdoors can be dangerous.”

The group that has the difficult decision of calling school off or not does sometimes receive backlash on the decisions they make.  Last late start day, students and parents were commenting on AISD social media, criticizing their decision.  

“I think it can be stressful when you are dealing with making decisions that impact schedules for students and employees,” Hensley said. “As well as the safety and security of people.”

Once the executive decision is made on city closures, the agencies that were listed above all work together to make sure everyone knows the plan and how it affects certain groups or agencies.

“The five agencies above are the ones that work together to make the decisions,” Hensley said. “They try really hard to be on the same page so that one agency closure/open does not impact others.”