The big picture
Today, there's no statewide standard for housing in Texas to offer residential cooling service. Some cities have adopted their own air conditioning rules, but Austin doesn't yet have any in place.
Amid the record heat the city experienced in summer 2023, officials asked to lay out new rules ensuring all Austinites can keep their homes cooled to comfortable and safe levels. An air conditioning mandate will officially be created with the city's adoption of new property maintenance code in April, following a March 27 public hearing and after moving through public review last year.
The local update will be added to Austin's version of International Property Maintenance Code, used to establish minimum guidelines for the maintenance of existing buildings to protect public health, safety and welfare, according to the city. The amendments to that and other technical codes were covered during the March public hearing and will be followed by more consideration in two weeks, Mayor Kirk Watson said.
The details
Under the proposed code, Austin property owners must provide equipment that keeps indoor temperatures at least 15 degrees cooler than outside, and below 85 degrees at all times, in every habitable room of existing housing units. They'll also be required to keep air conditioning systems and related equipment in working condition.
Additional code updates include similar requirements for new construction going forward. The city plans to provide more information about the changes before they officially go into place.
"If these amendments are adopted, we will educate and work with property owners as needed to achieve compliance. If adopted as planned, these codes would go into effect this summer," Development Services Department Robbie Searcy said in an email.
Staff also said the change won't significantly affect housing affordability or development costs in the city.
"The new air conditioning requirements enshrine in code what is already a basic health and safety necessity for people living in Texas. ... As it is commonly accepted that air conditioning habitable rooms is a minimum standard of quality and safety, it was determined that the proposal would have a neutral impact," staff wrote in a 2024 analysis.
The new code is up for final approval following extensive consideration. After City Council asked for the change in 2023, reviews were conducted in 2024 by several city commissions working with development and utility issues. Extra time was also taken to incorporate other council requests into the several maintenance and technical code revisions on the table this year, Searcy said.
Why it matters
When Mayor Pro Tem Vanessa Fuentes first drafted the new cooling standard for Austin, she noted the hundreds of heat-related calls Austin emergency medical services handles each summer and the hundreds of people who die statewide each year due to heat—conditions that are expected to worsen locally over the decades ahead. Austin Public Health has also labeled extreme heat as a "growing public health concern" for the Central Texas region overall.
Last year, local hospitals handled nearly 900 emergency room visits for heat-related illness and a total of 15 people died due to heat over the course of the summer, according to APH.
If the new air conditioning standards are adopted and residents believe a building is out of compliance, complaints can be filed through Austin 3-1-1 for investigation by DSD's Code Compliance team.
