AUSTIN, Texas – Just as the state is dealing with one crisis, it's also preparing for the next. But this time, it's trying to get ahead of the problem.

We all remember Hurricane Harvey's devastating impact on the Gulf Coast in 2017. That's triggered an unprecedented effort to prevent the same damage from happening again.

State lawmakers passed a nearly $2 billion flood control bill during the last legislative session. Thanks to that, 15 regional groups are now developing Texas' first-ever statewide flood plan which is being supervised by the Texas Water Development Board.

"Texas is such a diverse state that there is no way to create a one-size-fits-all,” Floyd Hartman, Amarillo’s Assistant City Manager and Region 1 Flood Planning Group chair, said in a video posted by the Texas Water Development Board. “So, it has to be tailored to the region."

“Coordination up and down watersheds is a critical part of why this plan is going to be such a change for how Texas fights floods. What happens upstream impacts folks downstream and vice versa,” TWDB Chairman Peter Lake said in an interview on Capital Tonight.

Lake said by January 2023, each region must submit their plan to the Texas Water Development Board, which will then compile them into a statewide report to be finished in September 2024.