During the April 8 City Council meeting, city staff shared a presentation highlighting the way the city pursues development, and addressing comments from a December community survey, which highlighted resident concerns for development.
The overview
While there has been a call from some residents to halt building in the city, Planning Director Nathan Crane said it is not possible for the city to do that since the state government is adamant about property rights.
Options like building moratoriums are available for cities to halt development, but these can only be implemented if cities can prove an inability to provide core services to incoming developments, such as providing water.
Even if a moratorium were possible, they can only be implemented for a set period of time before being lifted, and cities must provide a plan to address the development issue before the moratorium can be implemented.
Crane said the city of Boerne does not face challenges that would trigger the need for a moratorium, meaning the city has no ability to prevent incoming development.
Despite not having the ability to prevent growth, the city does have access to different tools that allow for the control of specific growth.
Crane said tools like the Comprehensive Master Plan, Unified Development Code and other agreements with developers help the city become part of the planning process and regulate development.
“The projects we are seeing today that are going up were for the most part [approved] prior to the UDC being adopted,” he said.
Breaking it down
According to the Future Land Use Map, the projected breakdown of Boerne land use will be around 80.8% residential and 19.2% other, which includes commercial, parks/open spaces and downtown.
Crane said there are around nine commercial developments ongoing in the city, and around four single-family residential developments within the city limits. Two additional single-family residential developments are being constructed within the city’s extraterritorial jurisdiction, or ETJ.
Throughout the city, there are 29 multifamily developments, either completed or under construction. Between these developments, 2,352 units are constructed and 830 units are entitled or under construction, Crane said.
Crane said when considering future development and working with developers, city staff is cognizant of the city needs and puts in an effort to ensure projects coming to the city are done in a way that provides an overall benefit to the community.
This is achieved through the permitting process, online project trackers, development agreements and other tools to communicate with residents and manage growth.
