Mission
To facilitate underground utility & pipeline damage prevention, promote best practices, and contribute toward public safety and environmental protection through stakeholder education and communication.
Vision
- Identifying opportunities to heighten excavator and public awareness to “Call Before You Dig” and the consistent use of safe excavation practices
- Promote Common Ground Alliance Best practices
- Provide free safety meetings and review of regulations
- Work in conjunction with other damage prevention efforts (i.e. Common Ground Alliance, other damage prevention councils, One Call Board of Texas, Railroad Commission of Texas, etc)
- Provide information and/or updates to legislative actions and maintain a consistent, state-wide damage prevention message.
Call Before You Dig
Who We Are
We are a collective of industry leaders and stakeholders including contractors, utility operators, pipeline operators, municipalities, utility locators, excavators, engineers and other industry focused volunteers.
Purpose
- To facilitate communication, cooperation and coordination among all industry stakeholders in the prevention of underground utility damages.
- To heighten stakeholder awareness to the requirements of Texas Utilities Code, Title 5, Chapter 251– Underground Facility Damage Prevention & Safety Act
- To heighten stakeholder awareness to the requirements of Railroad Commission of Texas – Title 16, Chapter 18 – Underground Pipeline Damage Prevention regulations.
- To promote safe digging best practices;
- To sponsor, promote and participate in education and training programs related to the prevention of damage to facilities in an effort to increase public safety and environmental protection by including the four steps to safe digging:
- Call Before You Dig;
- Wait the Required Amount of Time;
- Respect the Marks; and
- Dig With Care.
- To establish and maintain relationships with related interest groups.
- Solve issues with the 811 process and underground facility locating on a local level.
- Provide educational outreach by providing on-site safety meetings and excavation safety festivals.
What We Do
Damage Prevention
Council of Texas
History of the Damage Prevention Council of Texas
The Damage Prevention Council of Texas, also known as the DPC of Texas, is the result of decades of work by pioneers in the field that had a vision for a state-wide program. While there were a number of UCC and LEPC damage prevention sub-committees operating across the state in the early days, it wasn’t until 2008 that Texas811’s Director of Damage Prevention David Wofford, began a centralized campaign to create a state-wide damage prevention cooperative.
Texas811 Damage Prevention Managers began developing regional DPCs statewide with the intent that access to meetings require less than a 2 hour drive to attend a DPC meeting. As a result, the Damage Prevention Council expanded into 23 independent chapters geographically aligned with the TxDOT districts representing all 254 counties of Texas.
In early 2014, Texas811 filed to establish a registered 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation which would officially be known as Damage Prevention Council of Texas as a non-profit entity allowing the DPC to conduct fundraising activities enabling the increase outreach capabilities.
In 2019, the Damage Prevention Council of Texas hired its first full time employee dedicated to managing the overall program offered by the DPC of Texas. In addition, the DPC of Texas underwent a restructure in 2020. Instead of operating as 23 separate councils, the DPC of Texas is now structured as on parent Council with 23 chapters. Chapters are assigned to four regions managed by the Texas811 Damage Prevention Managers.
