Bastrop, Texas Events, News & Stories

Bastrop, Tx (Nov. 17, 2008)–At a meeting today Bastrop County commissioners declined to end a county wide ban on outdoor burning to near year’s end. Commissioners on Nov. 10 extended the ban for 45 days, and Monday they did not amend or cancel the emergency order.

Bastrop County Emergency Management Coordinator Mike Fisher said the area, now one of the most drought-stricken in the state, has received no notable rainfall and no rain is in present weather forecasts.

Outside the meeting, Fisher told Bastrop-News.com that area residents may be ignoring the ban or not heeding the current danger of a wildfire disaster. Bastrop County fire departments responded to as many as 20 fire calls and reports of burn ban violations over the preceding weekend, he said.

In 2008 the county has received less than half its average annual rainfall, according to Fisher.

Bastrop, Tx (Nov. 17, 2008)–Bastrop police said today that Jeffrey White, 51, of Bastrop, who was found floating in The Colorado River Nov. 13, died of drowning. That was the conclusion of a Travis County medical examiner, said Bastrop Police Chief David Board in a Monday interview with Bastrop-News.com.

How White, the brother of the late Pct. 1 Bastrop County Constable Carl White, came to his death remains something of a mystery, however, said the chief. The medical examiner’s report suggested no evidence of bodily trauma, such as might have been expected from a fall into the river from the Texas 71 bridge where White was seen the day before his body was recovered from the river, according to Board.

The chief said no official ruling on the death has been filed, but he expects the Justice of the Peace to find that it was an accidental drowning. No physical evidence hints at a different conclusion, said Board.