Richardson will oppose any state or federal legislation that would decrease local control over the city, Chief of Police Gary Tittle said at the Oct. 26 City Council meeting.
Tittle presented preliminary information on the city’s legislative priorities ahead of the upcoming state and federal legislative sessions, with local control being the city’s highest priority. Council is set to approve the full legislative agenda at a future meeting.
The big picture
The 90th Texas Legislative session and the 120th U.S. Congressional session will both convene in January.
Richardson’s legislative agenda is a “guide for council and staff to promote and protect our municipal interest” during the sessions, said Tittle, who leads the city’s legislative efforts at the state and federal levels.
“[The city’s agenda] establishes policy direction for topics that could affect the city of Richardson, but also it will orient and reorient elected officials representing our city,” he said.
In a practical sense, the legislative agenda could guide in-person testimony and letters, emails, phone calls and meetings from Richardson officials regarding legislative action. The city will also hold a Richardson Legislative Day on Feb. 23-24 at the Texas State Capitol.
“Our highest legislative agenda priority is really to preserve what we already have, making sure that we protect local control,” Tittle said.
A closer look
Tittle said the city will work to prevent home rule authority from being “further eroded” by legislative action. This could include attempts by the state legislature to restrict city control of taxes, revenues or expenditures.
“[We] certainly oppose any legislative action that would erode the home rule authority of municipalities or establish unfunded mandates that constrain the ability of cities to allocate scarce resources to locally determined priorities,” Tittle said.
In addition to local control, he said other key areas of focus include:
Fiscal management
Transportation
Economic vibrancy
Public safety
Environment
Education and workforce
Tittle said the majority of the city’s legislative agenda is similar to that of last session, which also prioritized home rule, fiscal transparency and transportation.
Looking ahead
Tittle said city staff will track legislative developments throughout the session that may require city participation. He said they tracked roughly 1,000 bills related to city responsibilities and 1,000 bills concerning the criminal justice system in the last state legislative session, and anticipates similar numbers in 2027.
Key dates for the upcoming legislative sessions include:
Nov. 9: First day for Texas state legislators to file bills
Jan. 3: U.S. Congress session begins
Jan. 12: Texas Legislative session begins
May 31: Texas Legislative session concludes
Council will approve Richardson’s final legislative agenda at a future meeting.
