The background
In 1999, when The Woodlands community was 25 years old, the path to a new form of governance began when its community associations began working with the city of Houston to prevent the possibility of annexation in the future.
Concerns about annexation came in the wake of Houston's annexation of Kingwood, said Bruce Tough, who served on the township's first board of directors, which took office in 2010.
Under the new form of government, covenants within The Woodlands Township still provide deed restrictions for properties, but in 2010 the responsibility for covenant administration transferred to The Woodlands Township. These covenants are in place through:
- The Woodlands Association (villages of Alden Bridge, College Park, Creekside Park, Sterling Ridge and Indian Springs west of Falconwing Drive)
- The Woodlands Community Association (villages of Panther Creek, Grogan's Mill, Cochran's Crossing and Indian Springs east of Falconwing Drive)
- The Woodlands Commercial Owners Association
"We did not want to be part of the city of Houston unless we agreed to it," Tough said. "But we did want to work with the city of Houston and be a regional partner ... and have the ability to form our own governance."
How we got there
According to materials from The Woodlands Township at the time of the transition to township services in 2010, a history of the process can be traced to 1999.
- 1999: A moratorium is signed between the city of Houston and The Woodlands municipal utility districts preventing annexation of The Woodlands.
- Spring 2007: Senate Bill 1012 enables The Woodlands entities to enter into regional participation agreements with the cities of Houston and Conroe to establish a new governing body for The Woodlands.
- Fall 2007: Three propositions are on the ballot through House Bill 4109, expanding the special-purpose district, called the Town Center Improvement District, to cover The Woodlands entirely. The bill also organizes the governing board into a seven-member board elected by residents and authorizes it to assess an ad valorem property tax. TCID also changed its name to The Woodlands Township.
- May 2008: Five at-large members are elected as representatives to The Woodlands Township.
- 2009: Transition plans continue throughout the year and a budget and property tax levy are set in September to replace community association assessments.
- 2010: The Woodlands Township assumes full responsibility for services previously provided by the associations.
"[The creation of The Woodlands Township] showed you the power of how what you can accomplish with everyone working together," Tough said. "If you told everyone, 'Let’s try this,' no one would believe you could do this."
"As time goes on, if the community sees a need for some changes or additions to the authorities granted by the state legislature to the township, we can bring those forward and tweak the township enabling legislation," said Joel Deretchin, a former member of the township's board of directors.
“All we had to do was get The Woodlands residents, all of them, to agree ... to expand the boundaries of [the Town Center Improvement District] to the entire Woodlands ... [and] to take 31 community leaders under all these HOAs and other entities, and turn that into a seven-member board," said Nelda Blair, the chair of the first board of directors for The Woodlands Township. "The third part was to get them to impose a property tax. We were told it was impossible, and most of them passed by close to 80%.”
How it's going
Additional legislation has helped to define the township in recent years, including House Bill 5311, which allowed the township to collect mixed-beverage taxes starting Oct. 1, 2023. The first year the township was eligible to consider incorporating into a city was 2012, Tough said. In 2021, voters rejected a proposition for incorporation on the November ballot by more than two-thirds of the vote.
Editor's note: This story was updated to include a quote from Nelda Blair.
