COLLEGE STATION, Texas (KRHD) — Texas A&M University's Veterinary Emergency Team (VET) is set to receive $5 million over the next two years, which will help expand their disaster response capabilities.
Watch the full story here:
"We've been doing the work for years — we're doing the work with sometimes hand-me-down equipment that we're constantly repairing," Dr. Deborah Zoran, director of the VET at Texas A&M University, said.
The team has been assisting with recovery efforts after the devastating Texas floods, helping both small and large animals impacted by the disaster, as well as supporting canines who are part of search-and-rescue teams.
"It's not focused in one area, it's all along the river," Dr. Zoran said.
The VET has been operating since 2009, responding to various disasters and gaining valuable experience with each deployment.
"You have to have that base of folks that is keeping the equipment ready, the team ready, the students ready, and that's been a bit challenging over the years, not having that permanent recurring funding," Dr. Zoran said.
In their deployment to Kerr County, limited staff has once again made it tough.
15 ABC asked Dr. Zoran how the VET's deployment could have looked if they had the funding and more resources earlier.
"We don't have a three or four person logistics team… We have people that can help and people that are handy guys, but we don't have our own staff and our own resources to be able to do that and continue to go into these really difficult areas, we're gonna have to grow into that," Dr. Zoran said.
With the additional resources, the team plans to enhance their disaster response capabilities significantly.
"We need to be able to have a team that can be in more than one place, and right now, that's really difficult for us because of the lack of ability to expand the number of people we have and expand our resources," Dr. Zoran said. "So, this is going to allow us to become even better [and] even more able to assist our state."
The team will begin planning for a warehouse, teaching classroom, and office area on the veterinary school campus at Texas A&M in College Station to consolidate their home operations in one place.
This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.