Celina officials ask state legislators to fund water infrastructure, maintain local authority in 2027

As the Texas Legislature gears up for its 2027 regular session, Celina officials are hoping to shape policy that affects the city and its residents.

Celina City Council discussed the city’s legislative priorities at a Sept. 8 meeting and approved them Oct. 13.

City officials emphasized four topics in their legislative agenda:

• Water

• Land use and growth management

• Sustainable local government finance

• Infrastructure funding and debt

Diving in deeper

One of the council’s top priorities is securing state support for water infrastructure, Mayor Pro Tem Brandon Grumbles said at the September meeting.

City officials want the state to invest more in infrastructure like reservoirs, pipelines and desalination plants, according to the city’s legislative agenda.

“A really big part of our job is trying to fight for some of these things, especially with the water situation we’ve got,” Grumbles said in September. “We’ve really got to get extremely vocal on that.”

Supplying water for Celina’s growing population has been top of mind for city officials in recent years, according to previous reporting.

Lake Ralph Hall, an Upper Trinity Regional Water District lake project in Fannin County, wrapped up major construction and began to fill with water earlier this summer.

While the lake will increase Celina’s water supply, the city’s projected population of more than 350,000 people at buildout will require even more capacity, officials have said.

“Finding additional water sources outside of Lake Ralph Hall is City Council’s #1 priority objective in our strategic plan,” Mayor Ryan Tubbs said in a Sept. 9 social media post.

Growing challenges

Other components of the city’s legislative agenda also reflect the challenges of a fast-growing city, like officials’ request to preserve their authority over Celina’s extraterritorial jurisdiction.

Celina’s city limits are surrounded by unincorporated land where some of the city’s rules apply, but city officials can’t enforce zoning ordinances, according to the city’s website.

While property owners in Celina’s extraterritorial jurisdiction can defer annexation, city officials generally prefer to incorporate land by annexing it, per the website.

Annexation gives city officials greater control over what gets built on the land and lets the city collect property taxes that go to services like public safety and infrastructure.

In their legislative agenda, city officials ask state legislators to maintain cities’ existing ability to regulate certain aspects of their extraterritorial jurisdiction and annex land with consent from property owners.

What else?

City officials highlighted the importance of funding infrastructure, especially roads, as Celina grows.

In Texas, local governments can fund large infrastructure projects by calling a bond election where voters can decide whether the city is allowed to issue debt.

Celina officials are planning for a number of infrastructure projects to prepare the city for an influx of residents using its roads and facilities. They could call a bond election to fund some of those projects in the coming years, officials said at a Feb. 4 work session.

In their legislative agenda, city officials support keeping the current bond election system, where cities only need approval from a simple majority of voters to issue debt.

The city could call a bond election as early as May 2027, the last opportunity to hold an election before new rules from the 2027 legislative session go into effect, in case legislators make it more difficult for cities to get bonds approved, officials said at the February work session.

Officials also want to explore whether the Collin County Outer Loop and Denton County Outer Loop can be turned into toll roads in order to fund planned construction as soon as possible, according to the legislative agenda.

The takeaway

Overall, council members want to take a more active approach to promoting their legislative priorities in 2027, they said.

“Our representation in Austin talks a big game … but they seem to forget that we put them in Austin, and we’re big enough and smart enough to take care of ourselves,” Deputy Mayor Pro Tem Andy Hopkins said in September. “All politics is local, and this is as local as you get.”

City officials plan to hire a legislative consultant to represent the city’s interests during the 2027 legislative session, Strategic Services Director Brad Kearney said.

The council is also organizing a potential trip to Austin to meet with state representatives in person, Kearney said.

The Texas Legislature’s 90th regular session will start on Jan. 12 and end on May 31, according to the Legislative Reference Library of Texas.