At an April 8 meeting, City Council passed a resolution declaring its support for local Rep. Vikki Goodwin’s House Bill 359, which protects homeowners from fines imposed during times of drought. Associated duplicate bills, Senate Bill 542 and House Bill 517, also received support from council.
Supporting
Goodwin stated at the meeting that HB 359 is intended to prevent homeowners associations from fining homeowners if their grass turns brown during a drought.
“The state recognizes that water is a huge issue right now,” Goodwin said. “There will be a bill that passes, likely, that will put another billion dollars into the Texas Water Development board, into a Texas water fund, to work on some new water projects and water infrastructure which is really important.”
While Goodwin acknowledged the importance of building new water infrastructure, she stated that HB 359 was put forward in an attempt to focus on water conservation efforts, which she described as important and significantly less expensive.
Although House Bill 359 has not had a hearing yet, HB 517, put forward by Rep. Caroline Harris Davila, has.
“[House Bill 359 is] moving and it’s exactly the same as my bill, basically just saying that an HOA can’t fine a homeowner if their grass turns brown during a drought,” Goodwin said. “So it looks good, like it could potentially pass.”
Goodwin said she had put forward several other bills this session relating to water conservation.
“The importance is just educating people about how much water we use on our landscaping,” Goodwin said. “That is 70% of the water used in a municipality. I think education is also very important.”
Council ultimately moved to support HB 517 and HB 359, as well as another duplicate, SB 542, put forward by Sen. Charles Schwertner of District 5.
Opposing
House Bill 19, put forward by Rep. Morgan Meyer, was opposed by council.
This bill relates to issuance of repayment of debt by local governments, including adoption of an ad-valorem tax rate and the use of ad-valorem revenue for the repayment of debt, City Manager Julie Oakley said.
“What this bill does is [it] moves elections for general obligation bonds to November, so we wouldn’t have the flexibility of issuing a bond in May or November—so it could have a timeline effect on some capital improvement projects,” Oakley said.
Another problem with the bill is that it would limit the amount at which a general obligation bond could be issued to 20% of the last three years of the city’s ad-valorem tax collection. Because the city’s property taxes are minimal, that amount would total around $350,000, Oakley said, essentially killing the city’s capital improvement plan.
“We can’t even put In a stoplight for $350,000,” Oakley said.
Council also formally declared its opposition to House Bill 4316 and Senate Bill 2238 by Rep. Cecil Bell and Sen. Paul Bettencourt, respectively. These bills prohibit the authority of a municipality to restrict certain use of transportation on a roadway.
Oakley stated that the city would oppose the bill in order to maintain the city’s ability to restrict city road traffic.
“If, say, there was a public necessity to limit traffic on a roadway, we would want to be able to have the authority to control the modes of transportation for public safety on our own roadways,” Oakley said.
Senate Bill 2354, put forward by Sen. Charles Creighton, relates to the authority of certain individuals to obtain a third-party review of plats and development plans. Oakley stated that the city would prefer for its engineers to stay involved in the review process.
"Right now, the city does the reviews of site development plans through our city engineer and makes sure that the environment is protected for water quality purposes,” Oakley said. “We’re an environmentally sensitive zone, and we want to make sure that our heightened requirements that the city has and our codes are being followed.”
What’s next?
Representatives and senators will consider bills filed until the 89th Texas Legislature adjourns June 2.
A full list of House bills and Senate bills filed in this legislative session is available on the Texas Legislature’s website.
