Commissioners Court - Regular Meeting

invented the gavel you see this wonderful conversation going on here and it stopped just like that one tiny gesture and so i'm grateful for the inventor of this idea wherever it came from i would like to call this meeting to order this morning's invocation will be led by our very own pastor darius todd if you will please all rise

Let us bow. Heavenly Father, thank you for another day that you have made. Thank you, God, for the saturation of the rain that gives us produce and gives us grace to be able to go forward. Though sometimes we are struggling with the rain, we thank you that even in dark times, light can come and good things can flow. I pray now asking you for wisdom. Wisdom, Lord, like we never needed before on how to lead, how to work together, and how to direct the activities of our local areas and even our national and world stage. We ask for your wisdom, your grace, and your strength to do it. In the name of Jesus, I pray.

Amen. Thank you, sir. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice, Will you please call the roll?

Commissioner Hammer?

Here.

Commissioner Inglesby? Here. Commissioner Cohen?

Here.

Judge Becerra? Here. Commissioner Smith?

Public comments. Those that have signed up to speak will now have three minutes to speak. Our county clerk's office will start a timer for you. How many do we have? So when the timer goes off, please conclude your thoughts and we will be respectful throughout the process. Of course, we have a bailiff. We don't want to cause anybody any heartache, but be respectful. Whether you like what someone is saying or not, just be respectful. Let's call out the first one.

Rodrigo Amaya.

Mr. Amaya, three minutes, please.

Thank you, Judge. Court, just wanted to openly state that I was heavily opposed against the cancellation of the commissioner's meetings. Especially, as I said the last time I was here, on the backup there was no explanation. And it wasn't a question. It was being told that, you know, especially after it was shared with me that as a result of political ambitions was the primary reason for the cancellation. So there's a lot of serious business that needs to be discussed and for these coordinates to be canceled. It really disrupts, you know, my flow. And I have a lot of rituals that I do. But today, just wanted to share that at the same time about the Southside Community Center. After they all approved that $100,000 plus or whatever it was, I've got a bunch of figures. They went to the city and they didn't submit their application at the required timeline. They had to have a meeting up there and take a vote to see if they would accept their application. It is very concerning, offensive to me. You got an agency that's been around almost 100 years, and they still can't get their paperwork in order. Something's definitely wrong. Wanted to go now to open records. I came down to the second floor to file some open records requests. Lots of problems, court. I don't know what's going on, but information's being withheld from me. Luckily for me, I don't take no just and walk away. So I contacted the Attorney General's office to seek direction. There are going to be some complaints filed. Some of them have already been filed. You know, it's going to be serious now. But someone needs to tell that office down there that the law is pretty simple. You know, we come in, we submit. I got all kinds of conflicting responses down there. As far as the technology, lots of issues with the technology and stuff. The girl down there shared with me that a lot of people were having problems with their stuff. My question, what's being done? Just two of the things that I wanted to share with you, or a couple of things I wanted to share with this court. Again, very, very disappointed in the way things have been normalized. Things need to be improved some of the agenda items that I've been looking at I'll share my you know opinion on it as soon as I get my chance so just wanted to share that with you guys thank you thank you very much and next we have Laura Nunn

Good morning, Commissioners and Judge Becerra. Thank you for acknowledging the critical need for stewarding our natural resources by holding the Clear Water Summit. Hays County is in the potentially precarious position of running out of water. Regardless of political perspectives, this situation is both untenable and dangerous. It is my understanding that the closed-door Clearwater Summit produced recommendations for creating a, quote, high-intensity development review division within the development services department. That sounds to me like a very expensive commitment for something you all have the responsibility for doing without creating yet another bureaucracy. Let me give you a case in point. Hunt County, Texas is using the Texas local government code to build guardrails for developers, not creating a department just to review development. That is your job, commissioners and judge. You have the authority and responsibility to place guardrails around developers who are building brand new homes where sewage is leaking underground and mold drives homeowners out of their homes with no remedy. You can use those same constitutional guardrails to ensure proper water use and stewardship in Hays County communities. In my subdivision, water has to be brought in by truck to fill the well that services my area. During the freeze this year, we were without water because the tankers couldn't get through or so we're told. We are without water frequently throughout the year. It is your job to assess developers' plans and require common sense regulations for water preservation and stewardship. Again, the summit was a good start, but you must include public testimony before suggesting that we spend a dime on a new department. Skirting public scrutiny by holding closed-door summits is neither acceptable to the people nor compliant with Texas open meetings. So you all need to make sure we, the people, have access to these deliberations in upcoming summits and make sure they are open-door meetings, not closed-door meetings. Let's not make this a we-have-to-pass-it-to-know-what's-in-it moment. I hear you all using the word transparency, but how many of you are practicing it as public servants of the people? Closed-door summits do not qualify as transparency, no matter how many newspaper articles are bought, I mean purchased. Thank you.

Thank you very much. And who was next?

Danae Delaney.

Good morning, Judge and Commissioners. I'm from Canyon Lake. And I come about the water issue. I come to talk about that. So I do know that we are sitting over one of the most sensitive areas, the Trinity and Edwards Aquifer. And we are watching increasing pressure and rapid development happening. It's been happening for a while. And I'm glad that you had the Clearwater Summit. I would like to request in the future if there could be a group of community citizens that are well researched, if they could attend that summit and provide public comment. I receive comments all the time from people on Facebook, and I feel like that the people would also like to have a voice and to know what's happening and also be able to have someone represent them. So I am also establishing a volunteer citizen lobby to counter the business and development lobby in Texas because I know that lobby is really strong and citizens don't find out about things until well after things have already gone through a process. So I come also having spent a Texas girl having spent 30 years in California and I see California's policies and implementation things happening in some ways here, not in all ways. And I would just, for this commission and every commission, I would urge all commissioners and everyone to do their own research because California council members and commissioners often rely on recommendations and they don't, there are solutions outside of those. if everyone did their own research and even the public there could be many more solutions that could be had and made and possibly something that would benefit everyone so i appreciate your time and then i would also like for you to look over my comparative analysis because canyon lake is facing some really important developmental pressure and what i call the tceq of approvals that are pending because they they like to approve wastewater treatment plants, they will have cumulative impacts on the water supply and also on the water quality. Because if we're not doing reuse, then we're using tap water to water lawns and plants and things like that. And then the wastewater treatment plants, even though they are tier one, if you look at the standards, tier one is the bottom of the totem pole and tier three Then you go up tier two, then you go to tier three. And also in California, because they have had so many impacts on Southern California, they are now using the most advanced wastewater treatment plants to inject water into the aquifers. And I think Texas could avoid those future impacts if they really do the work right now. So thank you so much for your time. Bye-bye.

Thank you. And who else do we have?

FREDDIE ROLLIN.

MORNING, JUDGE, MORNING, COMMISSIONERS. MY NAME IS FREDDIE ROLLIN. I'M REPRESENTING AND ON BEHALF OF HAYES COUNTY IS THE NUMBER FIVE CAL FIRE DEPARTMENT, BUT ALSO I'M REPRESENTING THE HAYES COUNTY FIRE CHIEF ASSOCIATION. I CAME TO TALK ABOUT THE NEW FEES FROM THE CECC, COMBINED EMERGENCY COMMUNICATION CENTER THAT IS GOING TO BE AFFECTING ALL OF OUR ESDs IN THE COUNTY. I CANNOT SPEAK SPECIFICALLY FOR EVERY PARTNER BUDGET AGENDA. I CAN TALK A LITTLE BIT ABOUT what we handle on CAL FIRE, and we're talking about, you know, two-step payroll increase next year. I can talk about medical insurance going to the roof. I can talk about our firefighters' pension. I can talk about workers come, right, protect our firefighters whenever they get hurt going up as well. I can talk about personal protective equipment that of course is going up more pricey and we need to keep up replacing something that we don't do once and by and that's it. I can talk about operations, how much it costs to keep our fleet on the ground responding for the calls of our community. Last year, We responded to about 7,200 calls. And this year we're expecting to be close to 8,000. So we all know here that the growth of our area has been a challenge on us and how we can keep up with the needs of our community. So adding that extra layer of cost to our budget heavily impact how we can move forward and how we can keep up with the needs of our community. What I came here to ask is for a meeting with you, Judge, and the commissioners and all the ESD partners to discuss this point because it's really affecting us. And it's a number, right? But when it pushed back, our community response, our effectiveness, our growth is affecting everybody. It's not only about one organization. It's about all of us to talk about this issue and try to come up with some solutions. Thank you so much for your time.

Good morning, Judge and Commissioners. My name is Susan Meckel. I'm also representing Hays County Emergency Services District Number 5 regarding the CECC fees for ESDs. I just wanted to explain and piggyback a little bit on Chief Rowland's comments. For those of you that may not know, emergency services districts are capped. We can assess and levy taxes, but only up to $0.10 per $100 valuation. So we're very limited on what we can budget and what we can bring in. We're also subject to the 3.5% annual increase per the legislature. And we're already at our $0.10 cap trying to provide all of the essential services that Chief Roland explained. Even though our voter approval rate may be closer to 11 or 12, we can't even go there because we're capped at 10 cents. So when we're being asked to provide an additional fee that came up pretty quickly, honestly, we don't have the ability to raise any additional funds. So what I see, even we try to be very fiscally responsible. We've repurposed two homes and two substations, which have saved millions of dollars for our taxpayers. We constantly are reviewing our policies and procedures. We've implemented new auditing and expense programming to make sure that we're pinching every penny that we can. But what we're seeing from the initial discussions, I believe there was one meeting and then this fee was brought to our attention that we would need to pay for this call center. A question that I have is there's been, the county budget has covered the dispatcher's expenses. And from discussions of our chief with the county comptroller, basically one cent from the county would cover the 1.5 million that's being requested for all of the ESDs as opposed to asking each of the ESD to pony up a percentage which is going to impact our budgets for operations that we just frankly don't have. So the two solutions that I'm seeing at present are perhaps the county could continue to cover that one cent FROM YOUR BUDGET WHICH IS MUCH BIGGER THAN OURS AND YOU HAVE THE ABILITY TO LEVY A HIGHER TAX RATE THAN WE DO. AND WE WOULD BE HAPPY TO LOOK AT BUDGETING FOR ANTICIPATED UPGRADES TO EITHER THE SOFTWARE SERVERS OR THINGS LIKE THAT THAT DISPATCH NEEDS. AND THAT WOULD BE MORE FEASIBLE FOR US. OR WE HAVE TO, AS CHIEF ROLLMAN SAID, WE HAVE TO ROLL BACK. WE'RE GOING TO HAVE TO DELAY A HIRING PROCESS FOR FIREFIGHTERS our plan to go into service at our latest substation off of Highway 150, which is a very high service area. And that would impact our ability to respond during an emergency when people are expecting us to show up to save lives and property. The other ask that I would have so that we can discuss, maybe there are some other solutions, would be to have a meeting with ESD commissioners, our judge and county commissioners so that we all understand what each other's needs are and how we can work towards solutions to address this issue.

Most definitely. And thank you very much. Thank you. Absolutely. Thank you. Someone else or the rest is written now. Okay. So now we have one emailed. If you'll please start a timer and read that one.

This comes from Shirley Whitehurst out of San Marcos. To the Hays County Commission, I am writing you today because I have exhausted all other avenues I can think of regarding this problem affecting adults with disabilities. Attached is a photo of the handicapped parking lot area located closest to the main door of Walmart on Highway 80 in San Marcos. Every time it rains, even a small amount, this area of the parking lot becomes a lake, a filthy, slippery lake filled with debris, leaves, bird droppings that last for days. Asking an able-bodied person to navigate these parking places safely would be difficult enough, but asking someone using a cane, walker, or wheelchair is unconscionable. Every member of management at this Walmart walks past this issue every day during the rainy season. I'm sure if they were at all motivated, they could find a reasonable solution to this problem. Won't you please take a moment to look into this and see if there isn't some way your office might work toward a solution. I appreciate any assistance you would be able to provide. Sincerely, Shirley Whitehurst.

Thank you. And just to be clear, does that sound like Frontage Road or does that sound like City of San Marcos? Commissioner, I think that's your precinct.

Yes, it is. What was the location again?

Can you tell us again the location so we can take proper notes?

Yes, this is... the parking lot located closest to the main door of Walmart on Highway 80. Got it.

Total. Total. Got it. Okay. Thank you. Yeah, I've seen the footage. 100%. Thank you very much. Anyone else? You're done on that part? Okay. So now we're going to go through presentations and proclamations. In order, please open F1.

F1, presentation of the Texas Association of Counties Service Award to Commissioner Debbie Inglesby for her service on the Board of Directors. So moved.

Even though it's a presentation, I just never know. Some people want a motion or not. Second. All yours.

Thank you, Judge. Thank you, Commissioners, for giving me the time on the agenda today. Before I get into the presentation, I do want to take a moment to thank Hays County for your membership and support of the Texas Association of Counties. We're proud to represent all 254 counties in the great state of Texas, and your leadership in all areas of our association is greatly appreciated, from our risk management pool to our health employee benefits pool, all the way to our board of directors. I did bring a couple of pieces of literature as we celebrate National County Government Month. And, Judge, however you'd like me to share these with the court.

If you'll just hand it to our green shirt right here, she could pass it over.

Okay, perfect. The first is our County Storytellers Initiative. We would love for you to submit some stories about the great things Hays County is doing. You're definitely a trendsetter amongst our counties. And the second is a Who to Contact attack because we know that sometimes Finding your way through our association is difficult, so we try to make it as easy for you as possible.

Thank you. And thank you, Candace.

Thank you so much.

I didn't use your name at that moment because she wouldn't know who Candace is.

Thank you, Judge. Now, for the reason I am here, other than thanking you, Texas Association of Counties, we're proud to say that we are here for members and led by members. And our leadership is composed all of county elected officials. Our board of directors consists of 14 voting members and then six non-voting members. We are very grateful that you have had a member on this board for the last six years. Commissioner Inglesby has served representing the South Texas County Judges and Commissioners Association. from 2019 to 25. And so I would like to take a moment to thank her for her service. But before I do that, I want to make sure everyone knows that she has been a cherished leader on our board and in our association, leading with a calm, steady, even-handed mindset, making sure that we are here to serve not only Hays County, but we have all of our members in mind. So I have a small token of our appreciation for Commissioner Inglesby, if I could present this to her at this time.

Absolutely. Commissioner Inglesby.

Commissioner, thank you for your service, your leadership, all you've done for all 254 counties in the state of Texas and all you do for Hays County. We appreciate you. You, along with all of Hays County, is a great friend to our association. Thank you so much, Judge and Commissioners, for your time and for everything that you do.

You're very welcome. Thank you very much. Commissioner Inglesby, anything you'd like to add?

Susan, thank you so much for the recognition. I really appreciate it. TAC is certainly an awesome organization with your leadership. It has really come a long way, and I just wanted to also thank you and your executive staff staff and all that y'all do for counties. Y'all provide vital services to us. So thank you so much.

All right. Please. Oh, I was just alerted about a mistake on public comments. Can you pull up San Benavides, her intent was, she thought she marked it, to be at the public comments portion. So let's call San Benavides now. And I don't know if it was our air or yours, but either way, we'll give it to you because we're here for you. So if you will. Speak your name at the mic, and we'll give you three minutes. Good morning.

Real quick, I feel like the public comment form is a little bit redundant because it says agenda item or public comment, and then it asks the agenda item. So even though you mark public comment, it asks for the agenda item, so I put agenda item.

We will fix it. Thank you very much.

Because I think that happens quite often.

Thank you very much.

Good morning, Commissioners. My name is Sam Benavidez, and I am speaking in support of Agenda Item K-12, which proposes the creation of a high-intensity development review division within the Development Services Department. I'm really excited about this proposal. I think it is a very small but pragmatic and really significant step that the county can take to meaningfully review and address the rapidly growing number of developments that are depleting our already scarce resources. While I understand that the concerns around the last attempt to establish a pause in these developments, and while I personally believe it was a cause worth fighting in court for, I think this proposal is a creative way to continue to carry that same spirit. I appreciate Judge Becerra attending last night's meeting with data center organizers and alerting us about this agenda item. Based off of the feedback that I observed from folks in the room, it seems like a lot of people were pretty excited and supportive of this proposal. I do think that with more notice and coordinated effort, there could have been a larger turnout of support this morning. But regardless of today's turnout, I think that this is something that individuals who have been showing up and fighting these developments for the last year are overall really supportive of. In a moment when odds and time are stacked against us, it is incumbent upon our leaders to get creative about the ways that we address these issues. And I think the proposal outlined in Agenda Item K2 is a perfect example of the type of creativity we need in this moment. I ask that each of you vote yes. Thank you.

Thank you very much. And because I've had comments on that agenda item of that division, and I want to shed light on the intent, because I don't think we need to, although we've got to notch it out, I'm not interested in creating a bunch of positions and being bureaucratically wasteful. So I will speak on it when we open it. And thank you very much. Please open F2.

F2, adopt a proclamation recognizing Harper Clace as the 2026 Hayes Youth Poet Laureate.

So moved. Second.

Thank you. If you'll please read it. Proclamation recognizing the 2026 Hayes Youth Poet Laureate, Harper Clace. Whereas poetry as an undervalued form of expression, youth are waking up to its power because where there is death, illness, war, climate change, mass shootings, where there is uncertainty, the need to define ourselves, the need to place our pain within the larger context of the world grows. And whereas, despite the message that youth are disaffected and trapped by technology against all odds, in 2026, the editors at the literary non-profit Infrarealista Review received poetry manuscripts from all over Hays County written by teenagers. The Hays Youth Poet Laureate, HYPL, program and chapbook publication prize launched by the non-profit with vital support from the Burdine Johnson Foundation has brought us our third Hays Youth Poet Laureate ever, Harper Clace. And whereas renowned poet Kerry Fountain served as judge of the 2026 HYPL Chapbook Publication Prize and chose Harper Clace, moments made into monuments in my mind as this year's winner, citing the poetry as human and humane, bursting with image and specificity, feeling and purpose. And whereas we are certain this recognition will open doors for these Hays County young poets. We also know when we peer inside ourselves, as poetry requires us to, we emerge transformed, ready to change the world. As Fountain notes, Claes is already doing. A single small voice can speak for and to an entire community. Now, therefore, be it resolved that Hays County Commissioner's Court does hereby proclaim Harper Claes the esteemed 2026 Hays Youth Poet Laureate adopted this the 14th day of April 2026. Wonderful. Please call the roll. Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Commissioner Cohen?

Yes.

Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Judge Becerra?

Yes. And do we have someone here to speak on this item? There you are. Thank you. If you will please approach the podium and give us a few words, and then we'll come on up for a picture.

Hello. I was wondering if I could read one of my poems?

As long as it's not too long, just to be honest.

Yeah, it's not too long. Let me find the page. This poem is called God Fund Me. An endless list of names and goals, some reached, most status are unknown. A single mother needing $5,000 for her son's funeral, forever 14 years old. This ask replaced her earlier ask, $41,600 for surgery. He doesn't need that anymore. She prays for forgiveness and rest. She used to pray that he would get better. A family whose cornerstone is out of commission, a father who was injured on the job, he cannot work for at least six months. They need $71,000 for living expenses, medical for four. His daughter, 11, prays that her dad will get better. His son, four, prays that his dad will be home more. His wife, 34, prays that they can get food on the table. A dog in an overfilled shelter. She's on the euthanasia list. The staff asks for $200 or adoption. These are the dog's only options, death or life. The staff prays that they can raise the money for this one dog, but doesn't know what to do with the 15 others on its same path. Two new parents pray, tucked into bed by tubes and tape and an oxygen mask. preparing for the ensuing life of specialists in surgeries for the little baby boy, $128,000. A woman praying for a lawyer, $2,200. A 19-year-old prays to raise money for a plane ride home for Christmas, $452. A firefighter praying his lungs don't get worse, $4,000. A family praying that the celebration of their son's life will be as joyous as he was. complete with shirts and props and mementos from his much too short career on stage. $10,133 of $10,000 raised, 156 donors, a baby boy left behind. Everything has a price. Every life has a cost. Every payment can now be made online with three easy steps. Let's pray we can support each other. God fund us, please. I want to thank all of my teachers in Hays County and all of the people that have been with me to get me to this moment. Thank you.

So beautifully done. Thank you. Let's give a round of applause. Absolutely. Why don't you come a little closer? Come on. Mom gets special space. Come all the way up here. Come on, come on. This is a really cool moment. I'm grateful to have people that care like this in our community.

Please open F3. Ms. F3, adopt a proclamation recognizing April 2026 as Sexual Assault Awareness and Prevention Month.

Ms. And if you'll please read it.

Ms. Proclamation recognizing Sexual Assault Awareness and Prevention Month. Whereas 6.3 million Texans have experienced some form of sexual assault in their lifetime, and whereas two in five women and one in five men in Texas have been sexually assaulted in their lifetime, affecting all races, ages, genders, and economic situations. And whereas the Hayes Caldwell Women's Center provided direct services to 471 adult victims of sexual assault in Hayes and Caldwell counties last year. And whereas Hayes County is intolerant of sexual violence in any form and recognizing that education and awareness may prevent sexual assault. and whereas efforts to reduce sexual assault can only be successful through citizen involvement and the safety of the citizens of Hays County depends on our actions to end sexual assault. Now, therefore, be it resolved that Hays County Commissioner's Court does hereby proclaim the month of April 2026 as Sexual Assault Awareness and Prevention Month, adopted this the 14th day of April 2026.

Perfect. If you'll please call the roll.

Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Judge Becerra?

Yes. And we have someone here that would like to speak on this agenda item. If you'll state your name and title for the viewing public.

Good morning, Judge and Commissioners. My name is Melissa Rodriguez. I am the CEO of HCWC, and I'm privileged to stand in front of you once again recognizing an issue. Oh, did you want to say something?

Yes. We don't speak letters without following it up with what that stands for.

So I'll tell you why I say HCWC. The letter stands for East Colville Women's Center. However, interestingly enough, Judge, we have a strategic plan in place where we're trying to rebrand HCWC, which is why I'm saying that more intentionally to be more inclusive. We often debate whether the name encompasses the work that we're doing, and we want to recognize our founders and don't want to lose the spirit of what created us, but we also want to be inclusive. So thank you.

Good job. And I'm sorry I have to do that every time. No, it's okay.

It's absolutely fine. I also want to just recognize Sexual Assault Awareness Month as one that we typically don't talk about. Root causes of sexual violence are often misperceived as being just about sex, and it's really about power and control. And that exceeds every and touches every part of our community. In fact, in a few minutes, we're going to hear about Child Abuse Awareness Month, and there is an intersection between the two. So when you hear the statistic of one in five and one in four, a lot of those are childhood sexual abuse survivors, which is a the majority of the population that we serve in our Child Advocacy Center as well. So just want to recognize that. Also want to just invite the community. We have an event going on tonight called Take Back the Night. It is at Texas State, but it is for the community. And it's an event where people can come up and share their experiences, tell a story, do a poem. But it's also a very impactful night to break the silence and stop the myth of hiding behind victimization and really embracing that we are here as a community to support those survivors. So that's tonight at Texas State. We're partnering with them from 6.30 to 8.30 out at the plaza outside of LBJ Student Center. Thank you. And thank you for all the support. Y'all always have been great. Glad to see you made it. Well, finally. I'm just kidding.

Battery cables and a battery this morning. Come on. Losing one dress shirt to battery acid. Oh, no.

Well, I'm glad you made it in time. Thank you. Thank you so much. I appreciate everything you all do.

So what if we double dip the picture for the sake of time? Perfect. Perfect, and thank you very much. I love it, and I appreciate it. And, Commissioner, did you want to add anything, or do I go to the next item?

No. You can't show up without me commenting on the sexual assault and dating violence mock trial. So I'm glad it is happening again this year. All right. We're glad to have it back.

All right. Please open F4. Oh, wait. Yeah, we voted. Please open F4.

F4. Adopt a proclamation recognizing April 2026 as Child Abuse Prevention and Awareness Month. All right.

Do you read it? Second.

Thank you. Proclamation recognizing Child Abuse Prevention and Awareness Month. Whereas more than 51,985 victims of child abuse and neglect were confirmed in Texas in 2025, resulting in 4,287 children in foster care in Texas and the death of 125 children in Texas in 2025. And whereas 388 children were confirmed victims of abuse in Hays County in 2025. And whereas child abuse prevention is a community responsibility, and finding solutions depends on involvement among all people. Through the perseverance of our many community organizations working daily to end child abuse, we continually served children throughout the pandemic. And whereas locally, representatives from Hays County Child Protective Board, Hays County District Attorney's Office, Hays Caldwell Women's Center and Roxanne's House, Greater San Marcos Youth Council, Texas Department of Family and Protective Services, court-appointed special advocates, CASA, San Marcos, Buda, and Kyle Police Departments, Hays County Sheriff's Office, Bluebirds, Hope, and Christus Santa Rosa, San Marcos, has joined forces to provide preventive and supportive services to child victims and their families, and whereas every child in Hays County deserves to be safe, nurtured, and supported in caring relationships. Now, therefore, be it resolved that Hays County Commissioner's Court does hereby proclaim the month of 2026, April, as Child Abuse Prevention and Awareness Month, and do hereby call upon the citizens of Hays County to work together to raise awareness and prevent child abuse in our community and beyond. Adopted this the 14th day of April, 2026. Beautifully done. Please call the roll. Commissioner Inglesby?

Yes.

Commissioner Cohen?

Yes.

Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Commissioner Smith? Yes. Judge Becerra? Yes. And is there someone here to speak on that?

There you are. Perfect. And thank you. And then you'll state your name and title for the viewing public. And if you're going to use initials, please follow them up with what they stand for. Yes, sir.

Good morning, everyone. My name is Nick Sanchez, and I'm the marketing coordinator at Greater San Marcos Youth Council, GSMYC. And on behalf of my agency, I want to say thank you, Judge Becerra, county commissioners, for your support of child abuse prevention law. So our mission is to protect children and strengthen families, and we're eager to share that with our community. Over the past year, we have provided shelter for 136 children in Hays County who have been removed from their homes due to abuse and neglect. These children arrive alone, frightened, and with little more than the clothes on their back. So prevention is crucial. Last year alone, our FACE program serviced 1,280 individuals in the county. Through this program, we aim to strengthen and provide families with coping skills and parenting skills that can help provide their children with healthy and safe environments. Children thrive when they grow up with people who love them and care for them and when they maintain strong connections to their community. To help families flourish and prevent issues such as child abuse, neglect, and family separation, it is vital to implement effective prevention strategies. Local resources and community support are essential to providing children with the safe and happy environments that they deserve. And we're extremely grateful for your support in our mission and for the importance that you have placed on the organizations that are here with us today that do the same work that we do to provide children with safe and happy lives. Thank you.

Beautiful. Before you... Oh, okay. Yes, ma'am.

Hi, Judge and Commissioners. My name is Haley Brooks with CASA of Central Texas. I am the former Outreach Coordinator, current Events Manager, and I also have our CEO and our other... communications manager here with us. CASA stands for Court Appointed Special Advocates and our organization provides high quality best interest advocacy for children and youth in the welfare system. We train and empower dedicated CASA volunteers to ensure children's needs are met and their voices are lifted. Child Abuse Prevention Month is one of our biggest opportunities to step up and educate our friends, families, and neighbors about child abuse and neglect and how we individually and collectively can help prevent it. In Hays County, 388 children were confirmed victims of abuse and neglect. CASA served 85% of those children. Overall, 505 children were in our state care system across our four counties of Comal, Caldwell, Guadalupe, and Hays counties in fiscal year 2025. CASA served 379 of those children, which is 75% of the children in the foster care in our area, which means we still need to get 126 children who need someone to advocate for them. Thank you to Hays County for helping us raise awareness for this cause and for your support. We also want to thank our partners for joining us today. We work doing this mission in tandem, Hays Caldwell Women's Center, Greater San Marcos Youth Council, and everybody else involved. Every child has a chance and it's you. And then I did also want to plug one thing. Our biggest fundraiser event is this Friday. Without the support of our community, we couldn't do what we do. More information is on our website if you would like to look into that.

Perfect. Thank you. And I'll open it up to the commissioners, starting with Commissioner Smith.

I just want to say, for those of y'all who don't know what CASA does, it's probably one of the most important organizations we have here. And I was so proud during whenever we had the ability to get ARPA funds back in 2020, 2021, that I initially put additional funding specifically for CASA in that. And in doing so, each one of my colleagues, each one of my individual county commissioners stepped up and matched those funds for me. We were actually the first CASA in Central Texas that received ARPA funds. And they were very – I have to compliment our local group because they were very proactive and actually set up – LISTENING SESSIONS AND BRIEFINGS VIRTUALLY BECAUSE, AGAIN, IT WAS DURING COVID FOR ALL OF THE COSTS IN THE STATE TO LEARN HOW THEY COULD ACCESS THE FUNDS THAT WERE PROVIDED TO LOCAL MUNICIPALITIES AND COUNTIES THROUGH ARPA. AND THROUGH THAT PROCESS, I'M PROUD TO SAY HAYES COUNTY WAS REALLY THE MODEL FOR THAT. AND WE WERE ABLE TO EDUCATE OTHER AREAS THROUGHOUT THE STATE ON HOW THEY COULD STEP UP AND HELP THAT IMPORTANT ORGANIZATION IN THEIR AREA. Great work. If you have free time, it's a great place to volunteer, and I would sincerely ask that you go through the process or at least look at it. They're constantly looking for volunteers and great families and great homes or great places for these great kids. They just don't know it yet.

Well said. Thank you, Commissioner. Commissioner Hammer?

I just want to thank CASA as well as the Greater San Marcos Youth Council for showing up and for caring about our kids. Babies are just such a gift from God. And so thank you for all that you guys do to pour into our community, into our kiddos. It's very appreciated. And the work that you all do every day, I mean, it's second to none. So thank you all so much. Commissioner Cohen.

I just want to thank all three of the organizations that are here today. The work you do is amazing. And I'm glad that you all are here in Hayes County supporting those who are going through a very tough time. I do appreciate the work that y'all do and I'm glad that Hayes County supports you. Thank you.

Well, I want to echo what my colleagues have said. You know, I always say that it takes a very special person to do this kind of work. There are just so many kids that are suffering from, you know, the abuse or whatever it is that they're going through. And so it takes special individuals like you all to care for them, to love them, show them compassion. And so I just so appreciate the work that you do. So thank you all so much.

Wonderful. And to me, I mean, you've all buttoned it up beautifully. And I'm reminded of what you're trying to help break. And I know you're way more impactful than most may know. But the phrase that comes to mind is, I hold cliches, because he who seeks wisdom is wise, right? It's words from the past that transcend time. And the phrase that comes to mind is, hurt people hurt people. And that's literally what you guys are trying to break here, the cycle of hurt people hurting people. So thank you all for what you do. It's most magnificent. Now, would you like to come up for a group pic?

Judge, can we also invite our partners? We do this work in partnership with law enforcement, prosecution office, anyone who's connected to us. Lisa, you too. Come on up. Food Bank has been a big part of this. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Okay, looking right over here. One, two, three. One, two, three. Hold on a second. Alright, look right here. One, two, three. One, two, three. Thank you. F5. F5.

Adopt a proclamation recognizing April 12th through 18th as National Telecommunicators Week. So moved.

Second. And if you'll please read the proclamation.

Proclamation of National Telecommunicators Week. Whereas emergencies can occur at any time that require police, fire, or emergency medical services, and whereas when an emergency occurs, the prompt response of police officers, firefighters, and paramedics is critical to the protection of life and preservation of property, and whereas the Department Public safety dispatchers are the first contact our residents have with emergency services. They provide steady guidance and support in a caller's most frantic and panicked moments. And whereas public safety dispatchers are the vital link for our police officers and firefighters by monitoring their activities, providing them information, and ensuring their safety, and whereas public safety dispatchers are more than a calm and reassuring voice at the other end of the phone, they are the seen first responders. They are knowledgeable and highly trained individuals who work closely with other police, fire, and medical personnel. And whereas public safety dispatchers of Hays County have contributed substantially to the apprehension of criminals, suppression of fires, and treatment of patients, and whereas each dispatcher has exhibited compassion, understanding, dedication, and professionalism during the performance of their job in the past year, and whereas public safety dispatchers served the public in countless ways without recognition by the beneficiaries of their service. Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Hayes County Commissioner's Court does hereby proclaim April 12th through 18th, 2026, as National Telecommunicator Week, adopted this the 14th day of April, 2026. Please call the roll. Commissioner Hammer?

Yes.

Commissioner Smith? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Commissioner Cohen?

Yes.

Judge Becerra?

Yes.

Both of you. I'm always watching. You should both go up.

I think you're worthy of... Ladies first. I'm watching it.

There we are. Thank you, Sheriff.

Okay.

All the things we're saying without ever opening our mouths, right? Correct. If you'll state your name and title for the viewing public.

Good morning. My name is Stephanie Robinson. I'm the director of the Combined Emergency Communication Center. Judge and commissioners, thank you for hosting this proclamation. I always appreciate the support that the court provides to the services that we're providing. rendering to the public. I want to go down a list of people that I also want to just make comment on so I don't miss anybody because I feel like I do this. I want to thank the partnerships that we have with our local partners, our ESDs, our other city partners, City of Buda, City of Uland, obviously our constables, but most of all to the sheriff for the partnership that he's kind of worked with me in making sure that we're providing quality services to our to our first responders. One thing that I really want to hone in on this year is our trainers. We have emergency communication trainers that have put in thousands of hours of work over the last year, training up additional staff to support our fire and EMS partners, as well as opening a second channel for our law enforcement agencies. So there's a lot of work that's going in there. And it's hard enough to do the job on your own. But when you're trying to coach someone into doing that job, that takes a lot of work. I also want to thank all of our managers. We have three managers, Megan Jones, Amanda Oliver, and Stacy Johnston. They're amazing. They're leading from the front, and you should all be very, very proud of the work that they're doing. They couldn't be here because they're all working really hard to take us to the next level. We always want to be leading edge with the services that we're providing. And so we are working on that right now through technology, through implementing new national standards. And so they're working very diligently right now. I also want to thank my right-hand person, Todd Reif, Lieutenant Reif. Without Lieutenant Reif, I don't know. He brings the calm to our situation. But he is an amazing leader, and I'm so thankful to have him as my partner. So thank you guys, and we appreciate you very much.

Thank you. Dr. Stephan.

Anthony Hippolito, sheriff of Hays County. Judge, commissioners, I appreciate the proclamation. I look forward to April each month or each year because this is an opportunity for the chief and I to brag on the folks that we get to work with every single day. As far as the ECOs, they are the heroes behind the headset, the calm in the storm. I'm honored to be able to walk into dispatch every single day and get to spend just a few minutes and watch each one of them work with the professionalism and the integrity and the passion that they show up to work with every single day to serve the citizens of Hays County to ensure that when they call 911 that police, fire, and EMS gets there within minutes. I'm honored to be the sheriff here at Hays County because I get to see the work product that The five that are here and the other 39 that work in our office every single day. They truly care about their job. And there's a reason why the state of Texas deemed our dispatchers and call takers first responders. The thousands and thousands of calls they take each month. And they do it with pride and they do it as if their family members calling 911. I'm super proud of them. And I'm honored to recognize them this week. But I want them to know that I appreciate them every single week of the year. So thank you very much.

Thank you, Sheriff. Commissioner Smith?

I just, I mean, the best way to put it is you're the last person we ever want to talk to and our citizens ever want to talk to. But, man, they're thankful when they do. I know that several years ago we had a really hard time. not only filling those positions but maintaining those employees. And I'm very proud of my colleagues on the court who with me stepped up and re-evaluated during the middle of a CBA, well, in between a CBA, a collective bargaining agreement, that we needed to do more for those individuals behind the headset. And I look forward to trying to help do more of that within the next year. I can't say thank you enough for what you do. You're there at the most critical moments, and I just thank you.

Thank you. Commissioner Hammer?

Yeah, I mean, echoing what Commissioner Smith said, I can't imagine having to be on the other end of a call and trying to keep somebody calm and walking them through such a high stress point of their lives. So thank you all for what you guys do. I don't think people brag on you all enough with the good work that you guys have, and I want to thank the Sheriff's Department in general. I think that since Hipolito has stepped in, it's just been such a, and obviously Chief Bailey, it's been just such a night and day. I'm not saying anything was wrong with the previous, but you guys are really great. You're willing to work with everybody, see everything through different lenses, and it's awesome to watch.

Thank you. Commissioner Coleman.

Well, just thank you so much, the dispatchers, for all the work that they do. That is another position that takes a very special skill set. Not everyone can do those positions. I had to call that number a couple times and so it's always, my experience has been that they've always been very calming and in a time where I felt very chaotic. But thank y'all so much for the work that y'all do every day. It does not go unnoticed and it is very much appreciated. Thank y'all.

Thank you, Judge. Yes, I want to thank each one of you. You are the critical first point of contact in emergencies, yet you provide calm and compassion to those in need. And so we're here to honor you today and to thank you for your dedication to this profession. And yeah, I just am truly grateful for each one of you. Thank you so much.

Thank you. And I will say that I said this publicly, so no one's going to get their feelings hurt or maybe even care, but I said numerous times, Commissioner Schell is my favorite commissioner. And that's because of his way of thinking about things, and I really appreciated that. And he was... I tied that message in because he was the representative for the Combined Emergency Communications Center. I took his place in that spot when he came off the court, and I watched... the transition that Commissioner Hammer just referenced. And it's no snub on previous administrations or efforts. I was literally talking to our former Sheriff Cutler in Dripping Springs just a week ago. But it is very different, Commissioner Hammer, and I watched it firsthand, and I can't be more thankful for behind closed doors in a room full of law enforcement and firefighter leadership, we were having difficult conversations. You heard snippets of it in this morning's conversation of public comments. Tough conversations. Lots of things need to happen. And the state and the feds require evolution of our 911 system. When you call, by golly, we better get it, and we better get it right, and there is no variation allowed. So these men and women are fighting every second to give you a timely, intelligent response that is most meaningful. And when I saw Chief Bailey and his willingness, thanks to Sheriff Hippolyto, work with well it is what i was pushing for that thanks for stephanie for for leading that charge i'm just so grateful that they said yeah that's reasonable we should do it i really appreciate it and this is my opportunity to say thank you for the firefighters uh leadership thank you for the sheriff's office for cooperating and working together with the first responder energy as a whole. And thank you, Stephanie, for leading such a difficult conversation when you were in my office and you said, well, now you're the chair of the 911. I just told you most simply, let's make a single one-page document that we can all be proud of. And who knew that that one conversation, that one ask from me to you was going to be so much work. But I am just so grateful because your heart is in it most Most incredibly, and we don't always get the chance, we don't, we just don't, to acknowledge and praise those people that you never see. I bet you 90% of the people have no idea who you are, yet you hold such a critical space in our government operations, literally foundational backbone level operations of emergency response. As the county's director of emergency management, I see it oh so clear, and I'm oh so grateful. And those changes came, in my opinion, Because I served for seven years as the director of emergency management, because I got to be out there on the front line with the firefighters and with Mike Jones, our emergency services director, because we've been out there with these first responders, I remain eternally grateful for the collaboration that's taken place behind closed doors because everyone's being better supportive, better collaborative, and the community as a whole is being better served. So I just want to say thank you to all of you, all of you. And anybody interested in being a part of this picture, please come on up.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All right, look at my hero. One, two, three. One, two, three. Beautiful. Thank you so much, listeners. Most grateful. Thank you all. Thank you so much. Have a wonderful day. Thank you. F6.

adopt a proclamation recognizing April 12th through 18th, 2026 as National Animal Control Appreciation Week. Proclamation recognizing National Animal Control Appreciation Week, whereas animal control officers and animal care and control personnel work tirelessly to protect animals and people. enforce laws, rescue animals in need, and promote responsible pet ownership, and whereas these professionals respond to emergencies, assist law enforcement, and safeguard public health through disease prevention and humane enforcement, and whereas their dedication ensures the safety and well-being of our community's animals and residents, often working in challenging and unpredictable conditions, and whereas Animal Control Appreciation Week is nationally recognized during the second full week of April, honoring the vital work of these professionals. Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Hays County Commissioner's Court does hereby proclaim April 12th through 18th, 2026 as National Animal Control Appreciation Week, adopted this the 14th day of April 2026.

Perfect. Please call the roll.

Commissioner Smith? Yes. Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Judge Becerra?

Yes. And who would like to speak on this agenda item?

Good morning. Brett Bailey, Chief Deputy, Hays County Sheriff's Office. Judge and commissioners, thank you so much for putting on this proclamation. I have a thousand things running through my mind. I'm going to try very hard to be clear, concise, and erudite while I talk about this. But It is a tremendous honor to stand here today. I have a few things I need to give before I start talking about the ACOs. First and foremost, thank you, Sheriff Hippolito, for your leadership. He is literally running circles around me in the relationships he's building in the agency. When he said he walks into dispatch every day, he wasn't exaggerating. Every single day, he makes an effort to touch and speak to everybody that works at the PSV. Thank you for our partnership with the San Marcos Animal Shelter and all of the other animal shelters in the county and organizations that we work with. This is an extremely polarizing topic and today we're very lucky to have an opportunity to just say thank you and recognize those who are doing the hard work. I'm gonna give some real talk here. I know that I've heard people say that days like this when there's a whole lot of thank yous going around that it's just department heads and political figures blowing smoke. Well, I just want everybody to hear me say that I practice a very important philosophy that you always criticize in private and you praise in public. And so it's so important on my day-to-day operations where I'm making decisions and it's handling business, that we step up and really make a big deal out of days like today and weeks like this. So I did have an opportunity to ride out a couple of times with the ACOs that we have. And I will tell you that what they do day to day is not thanked enough. It's not recognized enough. I'm very fortunate to stand here in front of our entire ACO staff. We have two tenured ACOs and two relatively new ACOs along with their fearless leader, John Trinidad, their corporal. I want to say thank you, John, for all of your leadership and the knowledge that you've shared with the sheriff and I in this regard. So I'll wrap up just by saying it truly is an honor to work with these folks. They are not thanked enough and the sheriff and I are very grateful for everything they do day in and day out. Thank you.

Thank you, Chief, very much. Anyone else? Commissioner Inglesby.

Well, Judge, this is another very important division that provides vital services and I would imagine sometimes dangerous services to our community, but that is very much needed and we do appreciate you. You are important and we just thank you for what you do.

Commissioner Nicole. Just thank you so much for the ACOs, for the work that y'all do. I know y'all are probably overworked in your capacities, and we're trying to do something about that. But I just thank y'all so much for everything that y'all do. Thank you, Sheriff Hippolito and Chief Bailey, for your leadership as well with that team. I also want to thank just our public health for trying to, you know, working with ACOs and building up those relationships. Those are really important, too. So thank y'all so much every day for what y'all do. Commissioner Happ.

From personal experience, it's been amazing to be able to see. I picked up a little pit bull last year and was able to see our ACOs work in action. The fact that they truly do care about the animals and that they do everything that they can to love on them and get them in the proper places, you don't see that very often. Thank you all so much for your division. Thank you for having such kind hearts to be able to do that job and to do it effectively. We're really appreciative of you all and your leaders within that division. Thank y'all.

I would just say I had a conversation with one of our SOs probably three weeks ago, and the topic of our ACOs came up. And he said, man, I would much rather be on patrol at 2 in the morning in downtown Austin than have to do that job. He's like, I don't envy them in the least. It's a tough job, and it's really appreciated what y'all do. I mean, I... They're not, at times, they're not the most critical calls that I get, but some of the hardest calls I get are with people who are dealing with animal interactions, and y'all are always responsive and have always done a great job. So we really appreciate you.

Thank you. We heard a few letters, and I want to help people stay with us that don't know ACO is Animal Control Officer. I heard also PSB, Public Safety Building. And I just want to make sure you understand, We see this, we do this all the time. And it is my hope that I never forget being in the audience and hearing things and not realizing what was just said sometimes. And so I always lean into that. And it's not about anybody else using letters. It's just about me remembering when I sat there and I want to make sure you see and feel the full conversation taking place before you. But yes, this effort of taking care of people and pets is a very big deal. We've done a whole lot of things with it and I don't appreciate the pace at which government moves still holds true. We have Kyle, animal control officers here too. It is a unified effort. It is All of the above that are working in this space. And I just want to say thank you for the leadership. Thank you for the collaboration. Even our civil division has to update ordinances so that we have a unified countywide footprint in what we're doing. And so there's a lot to it just so that you could do the, as everyone's heard, very tough job that you have. So I would simply like to echo for sure and simply say thank you. Thank you for all you've done and thank you for what you continue to do. Let's come on up for a picture.

And one more time. One, two, three. One, two, three. Thank you. One more.

Thank you. Thank you very much. And I thank you guys.

Thank you. Please open F7.

F7, adopt a proclamation recognizing April 2026 as prevention of animal cruelty month.

Second.

Proclamation recognizing April 2026 as prevention of animal cruelty month, whereas April marks prevention of animal cruelty to animals month, a nationwide observance dedicated to raising awareness about the mistreatments of animals and finding ways to combat animal neglect and cruelty. And whereas animals play an important role in our lives, for many find comfort and security for their well-being because of the presence of animals. And whereas although animals play such a significant role in our lives, there have been instances where animals are neglected and abused. And whereas the month of April is dedicated to spread awareness of the abuse and neglect that animals may endure, it is a time for us to show our appreciation to animals. And whereas here in Hays County, we care about the lives of animals and support penalties against those proven responsible for the neglect and intentional abuse of domestic and companion animals. And whereas we must recognize and be aware of the connection between animal cruelty and human violence, this in turn can help and protect those who are vulnerable to such violence. Now therefore be it resolved that the Commissioner's Court of Hays County does hereby proclaim April as Prevention of Animal Cruelty Month in Hays County and invite you to join them in dedication to and appreciation of working together to prevent, recognize, and report signs of animal cruelty to protect all animals from neglect and abuse. Adopted this the 14th day of April 2026. Beautifully done.

Please call the roll.

Commissioner Smith? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Commissioner Cohen?

Yes.

Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Judge Becerra?

Yes. All right. Anyone here to speak on this agenda item? Come on up.

Shari Boyette, Hayes County Animal Advocates. Thank you for the recognition for both this as well as the animal control and protection officers. I think that it's important that we recognize that those two things are very interrelated. And also, as we have been hearing in the proclamation as it was read, the link to what happens in animal cruelty to the district attorney and the law enforcement officers, we see a link in animal abuse to criminal activity, child abuse, victims of all types of hideous crimes. I would be remiss if I didn't point out right now, today, the San Marcos Regional Animal Shelter has put out a plea um, they're over capacity and there are requests that we have, um, increased promotion for adoption and fostering. Right now there's a plea. Um, there are eight dogs on a critical list. So all of these things matter for human families because we do consider our pets families. And, um, I thank you for this court's continuous recognition for the important matters to build shelters. and programs. Thank you.

Thank you very much. And now let's come on up for a picture. Wait, wait, wait. I'm skipping something. Commissioners, would you like to say something?

Well, Judge, I just want to thank, I guess, you and Sherry, I know, has a big part of it, you know, for this recognition just to continue to, you know, make us aware and make everyone aware, actually, of this important issue. And thank you, Sherry, for your hard work and dedication for so many years. I really appreciate you.

Commissioner Cohen.

Thank you to all the animal advocates that are out there working to prevent animal cruelty and Sherry for your work as well. Thank you so much. Commissioner Hammer.

I mean some of what y'all do, especially the animal advocates within Hays County, it's still a full-time job. Some of y'all are retired and this is what you guys have done for And, I mean, you guys don't get as enough credit as you guys deserve. So thank you all so much for advocating for our animals. Thank you for trying to get them adopted, for fostering, for pushing that message to everybody to take care of our little fur babies. So I appreciate that, and I appreciate everything that you all do. Commissioner Smith.

I know all my colleagues have mentioned animal advocates here in Hayes County. Two organizations I specifically want to point out are Paws and Pals. They partner with the county. They do so much with the county and have done so much for so long. And while those two organizations are kind of, I guess, the more recognizable out there, I don't think a lot of our public understand that there's probably and Sherry, you can probably correct me here if I'm wrong, but I would venture to guess there's probably 20 at least other organizations in the county uh working on animal advocacy in one way or another whether that's um you know the regional cat organization that's in wimberley or the gentleman who came into my office several weeks ago who uh adopts and then re and rehomes like he does 15 dogs a year that's what he does every year um We have so many good people in our county who care so much about our animals and are really trying to address the issues that we have here surrounding animals. And I just appreciate all of them.

Beautiful. And thank you. Come up for a picture. Anyone that wants to be a part of this picture, come on up.

One, two, three. One, two, three.

Beautiful. Thank you.

Fix your pets. All right. That pushes us out of F8. And we're done with present. Oh, no, no, no. Sorry. Please open F8.

F8, presentation by the Hayes County Homeless Coalition on the 2026 point-in-time count, also known as the pit count.

Second.

All right.

All yours.

Thank you. My name is Nancy Hines, and I'm with the Homeless Coalition for Hayes County. I currently serve on the board. And for those of you who are not familiar with the coalition, we are the local homeless coalition that represents Hayes County and our members in the Balance of State Continuum of Care, which is led by the Homeless Coalition, Texas Homeless Network. And so we are part of a greater group, and what we're reporting on today is the annual point in time count, or the letters that we love to throw around as PIT. And so if you see the PIT count, this is what they're talking about, is the annual count that's taken. I want to thank, first of all, Isabella with the Health Department and Erica Rosa with Breaking Bread, who took the lead this year as the coordinators for this. That's a big job, having done it for a few years. And we're grateful for new leadership always stepping up. That's a good sign that shows that the coalition is doing part of their role. Again, I would say what the coalition, for those of you who are not familiar with the work of the coalition, we don't do the work of service providers. We bring service providers together so that we can coordinate efforts and see how we can advocate together to make occurrences of homelessness rare, brief, and non-recurring, or better yet, to divert people from going into homelessness. That takes a coordinated response, and we're still working with that. And we appreciate the part that the court has played, commissioners that have been involved with different conversations and roundtables, and we will continue have again those opportunities will come up again to have those conversations. So just again so you can see that we did on the point in time count this year and the date is selected by the Housing and Urban Development that organization HUD in Washington does this. This is a national count and so they pick the third week of January usually and then The Texas Homeless Network helps to select the day. We have done this in our balance of state on the third Thursday of the month in January. And so this year, it fell on January the 22nd. And the goal is, this takes a lot of volunteers. We had about 70 volunteers who participated. It's a 24-hour census, basically. And what we get from that determines what goes on the rolls with HUD for what's recognized as homelessness in Hays County. This is a mere snapshot. We can't feel too good about the numbers if they go lower or even higher. That still isn't reflecting the actual services that are being provided and the need that's there. So but this is what this particular data that comes from this count nationally directs funding nationally for all the kind of sustainable funding that provides permanent supportive housing vouchers and those kind of things relating to housing and services. The two categories that we address when our surveyors are trained to go out. We're looking for people in unsheltered locations and it's generally what you would think of where it's a place not meant for human habitation so they can be in their car. We're seeing more people sleeping in their car and still going to work. They've got to keep their car. But it can be under a bridge, in the woods, wherever they can locate themselves and find kind of a safe place to sleep. The sheltered locations for Hays County, they do their own surveys on the evening of the count. Our point in time is the night of the count date. So our point in time was who was sleeping in. SHELTER, EMERGENCY SHELTER, WE DIDN'T, ONLY THE WOMEN'S SHELTER IS THE EMERGENCY SHELTER. BUT FOR TRANSITIONAL HOUSING, WE HAD SOUTH SIDE WAS DOING THEIR ACCOUNT, THEIR SURVEYS THERE. So these are the two categories, emergency shelter and transitional is what you can see on your screens is it's the provide short-term housing. It's not the permanent solution. It's a transitional program to help people get out of homelessness while they're working on whatever issues that stabilize them and then they're ready to, they're empowered to take over. So what the count tells us, like I said, this is a snapshot or an estimate of the number of individuals that were experiencing homelessness on the night. of January the 22nd. It also shows trends. We can see on the data report, and we'll see this in just a moment, kind of what the trend has been. We've dropped off a couple of years. We've done the point in time count for five years, six years. This was our sixth year. So we dropped off half. We're only doing a three-year comparison at the data. And also about the insights. This is critical to a solution is the insights into housing programs that are available in Hayes County. And we're not unique in Hayes County. We fit into what's happening nationally. We just look at what we can do on the level of the county that we're in. So you can see the past, the current, the 2026 numbers. We had unsheltered. The orange color represents the unsheltered, 94. And the sheltered was 57. When you see the blue, that bright blue band, means they were only observations. And surveyors are trained to hopefully make that their least concern. way of engaging with people as possible but the observations are critical when you can't approach someone or they don't want to be talked to you can approach them because you have to get permission to speak with them but if they don't give you permission you can't talk to them so all you can do is then an observation you can step back and observe them and it's just with a few data points with gender, race and you age, you estimate their age. So, but you can see, go back one minute and we'll look at this. You can see how it looks like the, we kind of flipped numbers for in 2025, we had less unsheltered and more sheltered. We have to remind you that that was a cold weather night last year on the count. And when there's a cold weather night and Southside opens, they fall into the category of emergency shelter. So we were able to engage more people at Southside because they were being sheltered and they were going to sleep there that night of the count. So that's a significant part of how the numbers look a little different. Observations, we felt like we were doing more observations this year for also the presence of ice in Hays community in that time frame. We felt like people were laying low for whatever reason, so it was harder to find people. some people just to find them to locate them but some of it was getting them to talk to you so we feel like they were a little reluctant to speak just because of what was going on in the area Age summary, you can see what the demographics show. This is the value of data. This is why the surveys are so critical, because that means they've gone through and answered questions, and everybody's asked the same questions. They're taken, the answers are put in on a mobile app, it's called Counting Us, and those numbers are submitted to Texas Homeless Network, who then sends us back the report that you're seeing today. So most of those individuals, as you can see in the age groups going from 25 on up to 64, are in the unsheltered group. That's significant. When we've got that many folks and in that age range of people that are unable to be sheltered for whatever reason, whether there's barriers that prevent them or just the affordability or those type of issues that affect people being stably housed or the volume of housing that's available for transitional housing. That's one of those responses we would recognize as there's a need for a more increased availability of transitional housing solutions.

What's interesting about the chart that you just showed, if you could go back to it, in really urbanized areas, you really see a large number in that 18 to 24 category.

Right.

We're exactly opposite of what you would anticipate there. I mean, if you look at the large areas like Portland or Chicago or New York, that category, mostly runaways or unhomed people who have decided to leave whatever family environment they're in. that's a major category to have it that much lower than anybody else or the other categories is really kind of surprising.

Yeah. Yeah. We have some things that are unique because of what our, our, um, how we're identified as a rural County in a lot of times where we're being looked at for funding and things. So we're a real mix of, uh, And when you see the map, you'll see where most of our people were located. It was still in San Marcos, within the San Marcos area. Gender, we still see that there are more men that we're engaging with, we're locating and speaking with. We did have some data issue, but the Texas Homeless Network is still working on that. With the company that does Counting Us, there was some glitch. And so when we first saw the report, there was a little, there's some folks missing their gender. We know they all have gender, so we just are still trying to get that to come up on our report. Ethnicity, again, you can see that most respondents were Hispanic and white. Those are the two prominent groups that show up in our in our data. The additional, because these are the groups that you recognize, some of the folks today, those who work with domestic violence. We have a few people that identified that they answered the question about HIV and AIDS. Please be reminded that this is self-declaration. How they answer the question is the way the answer goes in. They don't show any verification of anything. There's nothing that shows documentation, but we rely on them to answer to their best knowledge. Adults with serious mental illness, you can see that number. Adults with substance abuse. Again, some of this, remember also, I'll remind, I know the court remembers this, but for some people who aren't familiar with this, one of the questions our surveyors are trained to ask is, would you rather not answer this question or do you not know? And so there's two things. And so the demographics don't necessarily match up to the number of people we talk to. If they did not answer the question, then the answer is just, No, no information collected. Chronically homeless, those are the people who have been sleeping out for a longer length of time. They're probably what most people have in their visual image of what people are. People that are struggling on the streets with their health issues or their mental health or substance abuse or whatever. And so we did locate 17 people, but those are the hardest to house. So that's not a surprising number for that many folks in the chronically homeless. Veterans, again, you can see what we're seeing. We know that VASH vouchers are still in existence. Here, VASH vouchers being Veteran Assisted Supportive Housing, which are managed by our housing authority and the VA. They collaborate on managing those. And so that's ongoing work to locate veterans that are ready. It's when they're ready that they would consider housing. So some of that's the challenge for that. This is the map where you can see where this mobile app drops points every time someone submits a survey. So that's where this map comes from, is that data that's created. And you can see that we didn't locate anyone in Dripping Springs, and we didn't locate anyone to talk to in Wimberley. They did a couple of observations. But the most of them were up the corridor, the 35 corridor, with the most concentrated area still being San Marcos. So you can see the trends over time. Despite a decline in total homelessness, the increase is unsheltered individuals. It suggests growing system strain and barriers to accessing shelter. So it indicates a shift toward more acute and visible forms of homelessness. So that kind of also helps our organizations if they're going after new programming. And once they see what HUD is, kind of focusing their dollars on. And we know that after they released the report from Washington, then that guides a lot of that federal funding and some of our state funding also. But our role as the coalition is to try to continue to advocate in front of you and all of our will be in front of every city council in every municipality and and talking about what we can do together to make some sustainable changes. Housing is always going to be at the top of the list. And again, when you hear affordable housing, there's a great gap between affordable housing and low-income housing. And low-income housing is not bad news. It's not some people think that's like public housing, again, gets kind of that, image of what it is, but it's affordable and that can change a lot of direction with what we're dealing with in Hays County around people, especially we have a lot of people that are on the edge. And so all it takes is one missed, a few missed things or a medical emergency and then you're in a bind with your housing.

I have a question, just going, you can go back to that. Why in 2024 did they counted the observed, but if you look at 2025 and 2026 numbers, it's obvious that they didn't put in the 18 and the 31 observed into those counts.

Well, the observed are always in the count, but they're reflected in the unsheltered count.

No, I know, but it says if you look at Hayes County point-in-time counts on the first page, 2024, the total of unsheltered and sheltered was 210. Adding in the observed would have been that 246. But then you look at 2025 and 2026, the total was 187,151 without adding in the observed.

That's a typo then because that shouldn't have been the observed because you don't get to speak to them. HUD directs us to count those as just unsheltered. So that was a mistake that we need to correct. Thank you for catching that. But wait, there's more.

Hi, I'm Lisa Young. I'm the co-chair of the Hays County Homeless Coalition and the executive director of the Hays County Food Bank. You've seen me before, but for the public record. So let me talk to you about the McKinney-Vento report. When we first see the numbers from the pit count, it's one number, right? It's the 150, 151, the 246 for another year. But there, we know that this is not, we did not go shake down every single person in the county and ask them these questions. So we know that there's some uncounted people. And we just can take from the pit count what we will. But if you have children in school, You may remember back in the days when my kids were little, it was a big old stack of papers. Now I think it's online. But the first week of school, you get a whole bunch of stuff you have to fill out about your kids. And one of them is, you may recall, a question that will ask, are you living in a home that you own or that you are the leaseholder of? Are you living with a family? Are you living in a shelter? What they're gathering there is the McKinney-Vento Report. Every school district is federally mandated to do this. And all the ones in the county have shared their data with us. This data was not taken on the pick count night. It was taken in the fall at the beginning of the school year. One thing I say at the food bank is that all rocky roads lead to the food bank. And that's why I do all this work with the homeless coalition and other groups in town. Every proclamation that we celebrate it today leads into these numbers. These numbers are the children registered in our public schools who are experiencing homelessness. And if you look at these totals, if you look at Dripping Springs, where we counted no one for pick count, 35 children are living in homelessness as reported by their own family. Wimberley, 11. And then San Marcos, 105. And then it says Hays total. It means Hays CISD. This is the school districts on the bottom, not the towns. So all of these children, 238 are homeless in our county this school year. This does not include their parents. This does not include any siblings that have aged out and are no longer in the public school or that have dropped out of the public school. And it does not include infants. It only includes school-age children registered whose parents filled out the McKinney-Vento report. So we know it's not overreported in that it reflects none of these children are filling this out themselves. They do not live alone in homelessness. They live in a household, but we only can count the child in the McKinney-Vento numbers. So these numbers, to me, are very important. When we talk about domestic violence, both spouse or dating violence, but also violence against children. That leads into these numbers. When we talk about emergency services, everything, like I said, and even one thing that is very difficult in this is people and their pets, dealing with pets. First of all, it keeps people in bad relationships because they're afraid something will happen to their dog if they leave, but it also keeps people sometimes out of shelters and out of other situations if the dog's not allowed. So like I said, today when I was listening to us celebrate the proclamations, every single category that you make decisions on leads to these numbers. And yeah, this is the minority of our population, but absolutely the most vulnerable part of our population, people who in a freeze are more likely to die, people who cannot get what they need, and definitely people that we see at the food bank every single day I, besides, you know, being here in county court today, I'm also, as you know, very boots on the ground. Well, I mean, it's Skechers on the ground, but I'm out there, and I've seen the children in these encampments. It is heart-wrenching, it is eye-opening, and it's something that really should be on our mind with every decision that we make. And I'd like to thank the Commissioner's Court on behalf of the Homeless Coalition, which represents I think 35 at this point, human service organizations in the county. I want to thank you for your trust and for the funding that you've given individual organizations, including the food bank, over the years and the ones that are dealing even more directly with homeless services. We are only providing food relief. Last year, when we came here to make this presentation to you, the big ask that we had WAS TO MOVE FORWARD WITH YOUR COOPERATION, WITH YOUR LEADERSHIP IN INCLUDING OUR HOMELESS NEIGHBORS IN EMERGENCY AND DISASTER PLANNING MORE INTENTIONALLY THAN WE HAVE AS A COUNTY BEFORE. AND WE'VE BEEN MEETING FOR NINE MONTHS I WANT TO SAY ON THAT WITH THE DIFFERENT MUNICIPALITIES AND WITH THE COUNTY. And I'm very pleased with the progress that we've made. Mr. Jones and his office have been really instrumental and been there with their listening ears to move forward. We don't like to make huge changes super quickly and change back and forth on people, of course. But moving forward to include those people has been really gratifying and has really felt like a big win for our organization, hand in hand, walking side by side with the county. So this year we have another ask for you because we wouldn't just come up here without asking you for something, without our hat in our hand, right? And that's that all of the organizations that are within the coalition, many of them are funded by you or by municipalities or both, some even by state or federal money. And we're seeking to meet with you and move toward a more consistent and consolidated FUNDING EFFORT FOR THE AREA OF HOMELESS SERVICES. THERE IS HUD MONEY, HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT MONEY THERE, THROUGH THEIR EMERGENCY SOLUTIONS GRANTS THAT GOVERNMENT UNITS CAN APPLY FOR, AND WE SEEK THAT YOU DO SO. WITH OUR, WE CAN PROVIDE ANY INFORMATION THAT YOU WANT. WE HAVE A LOT OF GREAT ORGANIZATIONS, SOME BIG, SOME SMALL, THAT ARE WORKING ON THIS PROBLEM, BUT WE'VE GROWN SO MUCH AS A COUNTY And a lot of our systems haven't grown with us. Some of the things where we were able to find two or three people and help them out and move them forward worked when we were just a little prairie, right? But now we are a bustling, this is a big city. The municipalities and the outlying areas, you all know in your districts, everything has grown. And I don't think we've kept necessarily in pace with that growth. I think the county, needs to look and analyze how much it spends per capita on human services compared to other counties in Texas and to carve this out so that we have something that's predictable and sustainable so that we're not, as organizations coming up here all the time saying, oh, we ran out of money again because we're fighting poverty with poverty, we always say. But we would like to have a more consistent plan to apply for these federal funds that we would need your assistance to apply for. And those funds are available for homeless prevention, for rapid rehousing, for emergency shelter, and for street outreach. And all of those together will go to lower these numbers into the future. Like I said, my particular heart numbers looks at those McKinney-Vento report. And I know how many children in our neighborhoods are living in poverty. and some are living without a roof over their head. So I know that we can count on your support moving forward, and Nancy and I are happy to take any questions that you have right now.

Thank you. Commissioners, any comments? I'm with Commissioner Inglesby.

Well, Judge, I want to say thank you both to Lisa and Nancy for all the work. I know it took a group effort, but y'all are amazing. A LOT OF TIMES THE FACES OF HOMELESSNESS AND FOOD BANK. I JUST REALLY APPRECIATE WHAT YOU ALL ARE DOING AND BRINGING THIS INFORMATION TO US EVERY YEAR. YEAH, JUDGE, I JUST, YOU KNOW, I THINK WE DO NEED TO STEP UP IN SOME AREAS. YOU KNOW, I KNOW, KANDICE, I'M MAYBE LOOKING AT YOU AND OUR GRANTS DEPARTMENT THAT WE CAN HOPEFULLY HELP, YOU KNOW, AND SEE IF THERE ARE ANY STATE OR FEDERAL GRANTS THAT CAN ALSO ASSIST IN THIS EFFORT. BUT, YEAH, I REALLY APPRECIATE YOU ALL AND I WANT TO HELP IN ANY WAY THAT I CAN.

COMMISSIONER COLLINS?

YES. SO THANK YOU AGAIN FOR THE PRESENTATION. I ALWAYS FIND IT FASCINATING TO SEE HOW WE'VE, YOU KNOW, HOW WE EVOLVE, YOU KNOW, OVER the growth of the county. It's always disheartening too for me to see the children that are displaced or homeless. And like Commissioner Ingsby, I think it's an area where I think us as a county need to be more accountable for and find avenues of funding like the grants that you mentioned for us to take a look at and see if we can help and apply for those to support the efforts that y'all do as a county. You know, we don't have those internal processes or systems to help, but y'all do, right? And so I think us finding that funding on y'all's behalf is the least that we could do as a county. So I do appreciate the information and the presentation. Thank you. Commissioner Hammett.

Appreciate all the information. I'm a big data person. So any type of data numbers Excel spreadsheets That's what I like to review and I will say that the grants and those types of things if you guys do see something that comes up We'd love to we'd love to apply for things and I saw Candace our County Administrator She was writing everything down. So I took note of that So we'll definitely move forward with those efforts big believer of big community and big church. So I Also hope our community can also step up and take care of their neighbors. I think the poet proclamation that we had this morning for that one was a really good poem to kind of give a background of I do think that our community needs to step up for one another. So I appreciate what you all have done and what you guys continue to do. Thank you so much.

Thank you. Commissioner Smith. I JUST, A COUPLE OF OBSERVATIONS. I ALWAYS LOOK AT THE McKINNEY VENTO NUMBERS. THAT'S THE ONE THING THAT I KNOW. THEY PROVIDE SO MUCH CONTENT. IT'S SO HARD TO DO THE POINT IN TIME COUNT AND I APPRECIATE WHAT YOU ALL DO IN JANUARY. That one day, it's all about the pre-planning and finding where those individuals are and hoping they're there the one day that you get to count and show up. I know there's a tremendous amount of effort that goes into identifying those individuals before the day of the count just to literally know where their physical location is to try to bring those numbers together. I want to say thank you to our health department for their broad participation in this effort. It's not one employee. It's a lot of employees who have made a personal effort to be involved in the point-in-time count, and I sincerely appreciate our employees. I just want to make sure to say thank you to them. A couple of things I would say that I find shocking, or maybe not shocking, but surprising when we look at the McKinney-Vento numbers are just the sheer size of Hayes ISD compared to the other ISDs in the county. I mean, it's exponentially larger, what, five, six times as large as San Marcos, and San Marcos is the second largest. I think Dripping is third, and then Wimberley after that. It's very interesting to see where those numbers fall because that's not seen in the numbers that you'll find simply because of the, go ahead.

So two things on that, on the comments you've already made. I'm sorry to come in the middle.

No, absolutely.

For one thing, the San Marcos numbers for children are often higher because the women's center is here. So all of those children are being counted in the San Marcos district unless they're commuting outside.

You beat me to my next talking point.

And then the other thing, just to clarify about the pick count methodology itself, is that we do have, this time it was shorter, was it a five day? We do have some days after, less than a week, where agencies can count, but they do have to ask the question looking back. So like if someone comes to get a go bag, which is geared toward unhoused people from the food bank on the 23rd, we can ask them, did anyone ask you about the pit count? If they say no, we can say, where did you sleep on the 22nd? So we can still count them retroactively, but just for a few days and only within service providing agencies. We get a little bit more. I think we get like six or seven from the food bank usually.

It's a service provider count i mean that's how it's labeled so it is and they did they did shorten the time the other thing i would say commissioner smith was that this is where people families will identify that that's a need and that's always a challenge for school districts that when families don't declare that when they enroll Sometimes it will come to light later in the school year just because of the situations, but a lot of it means that they're missed because these numbers, once they're turned in, they have to turn their official McKinney-Vento report in later in that fall, like in October. And so those numbers stand. So the numbers they give us are from the enrollment back in August, and things could have changed. But a lot of it is just self-declaration if they will actually ask for the help by identifying.

Yeah, I know you all have done a great job in doing individual outreach service organizations. One of the things I would say is, and I don't know about the other ISDs, but I know in Dripping there's a service organization that's, they literally on Fridays, they send kids home with backpacks full of food. So they'll have food over the weekend because they don't have that availability at home. Accessing those organizations, I think y'all have done a great job. I encourage you to do more of it. The one thing I would say, I completely agree with my colleagues when it comes to the possibilities of grants and those kind of things. I would just warn you that, and I say this with all With a full heart, we can't be everything to everybody. And we want to try to help as much as we can. But over the, like in the seven years, seven and a half years since I've been here, there's only been two organizations that have come in mid-budget and asked for increased funding. And both of them impact exactly what we're talking about. One was the food bank last year and Southside two weeks ago. knowing what that money is actually being used for and getting a real set of data for what you know south side was mentioned today we talked about the the uh the sheltering that they've done and and that was the big sell that they had when they came in two weeks ago having real numbers and real data around that would be exceedingly helpful because What we heard during that conversation, and I know y'all aren't with that organization, but what we heard during that conversation was, well, there's a need, and whenever there's a problem, the county comes to us, and we're the ones who step up and help. THAT IS PROBABLY 100% ACCURATE. BUT DOES THAT MEAN TWO PEOPLE? DOES THAT MEAN 50 PEOPLE? DOES THAT MEAN, YOU KNOW, WHAT, AND SIMILARLY WITH THE FOOD BANK, I KNOW THAT WE STEPPED UP LAST YEAR WHENEVER THE NEED WAS THERE. KNOWING WHAT THAT WENT TO AND KNOWING HOW THOSE FUNDS WERE MAKES THE DECISION IN AUGUST WHEN WE'RE ACTUALLY IN OUR BUDGET PROCESS, I'M NOT GOING TO SAY IT MAKES IT EASIER, BUT IT MAKES IT A LOT MORE SUSTAINABLE TO TRY TO SET UP SOMETHING FOR, YOU KNOW, INTO THE FUTURE INSTEAD OF ONE-TIME FUNDING. AND SO I WOULD JUST ENCOURAGE Get the ducks in the row for all these asks prior to our budget process. And I agree with Commissioner Cohen. Let's take a really hard look at how we can set up something that is sustainable so we can have that baseline funding where if we do apply for grants and when we do move forward to looking at other funding sources, we have it unified, but we have to have the data to support it.

And I will say this, that the way that works a lot of time in homelessness is when you project a project Say it's a pilot project that someone's doing. You don't have the data to show them. You have the accountability for them coming back to you and showing you the outcome. But it's based on, it would be based on maybe numbers that they've pulled from the count or other pieces of information that's not specific to that program. So you need that, almost some undesignated information funding in some cases to respond. There's some response funding that you learn about how the response was spent out. It's just like when Washington pulls back funds that you don't spend. I think that could happen, too, when we get to the level where municipalities are granting money. But they have to hold people accountable. Organizations, and that's one of the things that we're working with our organizations, is to go use the HMIS data collection. Use those that are recognized nationally. so that when they come to you for an ask or we come as a group for an ask, we can show you the numbers that support why we think we need that piece of, you know, a pot of sustainable funding that's harder to get. when you're doing a pilot project, but because of the knowledge of your county and what you see within your districts, you know that there's need. You just can't put numeration yet to it.

I completely agree with you. One of the things I would say is, for example, with the funding that we did two weeks ago for Southside, I think there was a tremendous, maybe I'm mischaracterizing, I don't want to mischaracterize this, but there's a tremendous leap of faith, at least on my part, that that's going to be used in a positive way and the right way. And I'm going to need, and I would hope the rest of the court, I'm going to need some data to show exactly that that leap of faith was well put and put in the right... It was done correctly in order to have that type of sustained... any type of sustained funding. So I just thank you for what you do. Thank our employees for their work in this. And as always, it's always good data.

And I would like to close with this little idea that for the viewing public, your presentation was wonderful. I've asked the county clerk's office to send it to me. The piece that we don't have Wimberley or Dripping Springs registering anyone in that space is twofold, minimum off the top of my head. One, we are the hub of services along the corridor, so people should understand that and not feel either any kind of way about that presentation slide specifically because it is highly likely that in all the great things you do, that little moment, that piece is not quite accurate. And so I just wanna make sure people, I know you're not saying 100%, but I just wanted to speak to it because I can already hear the people in the back of my mind thinking these thoughts. And so the other part is complexity, the difficulty. the rural part of the Western County is harder to get into all the nooks and crannies of, and so it'll be harder to count, among other things. And so when people see the concentration of people along 35 corridor and the numbers being higher, there's more than one reason that is happening. And I just wanted to point that out, but you guys did a magnificent, phenomenal job, very thorough, and we thank you so much.

Thank you. The one last thing I would say is like locations, like in Wimberley, our surveying teams found spots that looked like there was activity, but you can't base it on that. So you have to find the people. So it's all those things as well.

And some areas, particularly springs, have more car sleepers than they do people who are outdoors. And those people will move very early in the morning. So we usually have their heart pinned down.

It's just being in the right place at the right time.

Exactly right.

And thank you all so much for the thoroughness and completeness. We're going to take a 10-minute recess. I think he's there. Mike, will you close that button? Thank you, sir. Thank you. Great timing. All right, we are back from a short recess that was requested by a few people. Let's go, based on community input, let's go to K2.

K2, discussion and possible action to direct the Hayes County Budget Officer and County Administrator to include funding in the proposed FY2027 budget for a high-density development review division within the Development Services Department and to direct the Director of Development Services and Human Resources Director to develop job descriptions, salary data, and a proposed divisional structure as needed.

So moved. Thank you. We have a motion and a second. I appreciate it, commissioners. I want to talk a bit about the creation of this effort. It is a, and now I can address it because some people don't realize that during public comments, our job is to sit here and listen and not interact in that moment with whatever's being said. So I made a beeline to this agenda item so we can most quickly and efficiently address the comments that were brought up. And this agenda item is intended to be the spirit of this effort is to grab a current employee within that Department of Development Services. Commissioner Hammer actually suggested some position which I thought was perfect and in my talking with her about this and it is intended to be of no cost to the county. We're only setting up the mechanism to process what we know is coming down the pipe. We have large industrial users coming. We have a myriad of conversations taking place, not only throughout our county and neighboring counties, but even at the Capitol, there are hearings taking place. And so I just want people to know that there is a strong likelihood that we're gonna get some type of additional authority from the state. God knows what it's gonna look like, who knows how it's gonna be, but there's lots of serious conversations taking place by a lot of serious people at the Capitol about how we are so hamstrung on so many fronts. And with the universal, which I'm grateful for, the universal pressure that's gone forward against these out of place, A lot of people support some of these industrial models, but not necessarily the location of them. And so the idea is a straightforward one of setting the table without pulling funds but setting ourselves up to prepare for programs like someone applying with a nuclear power source over millions of people's drinking water with huge industrial water consumption that we don't know if we actually have. We need to weave in the water availability studies in addition to proper oversight of those availability studies and the power that is going to be used whatever it looks like, whether one facility, single user is going to use enough power to match what a current entire city uses. All those kinds of things, I mean, the Public Utility Commission, Lower Colorado River Authority, everyone from every level of our government is addressing this already. It is happening right now. And so this is this is my hope to get get commissioner support to create this just so that we can set the table but not have additional cost to it commissioner hammer would you like to echo any comments at this moment i would just say um and i i know that we have development services here that could kind of give us some insight as well on what they think would be best for their department but my main

topic of interest is that we passed a resolution last year stating that the water availability studies would be going to the groundwater conservation district to have their hydrologist review and approve and then send back to us. They have not been doing that to my necessary belief as frequently as maybe we should. So that was my big concern is if, hey, if we wanted to move forward in a way that is productive within this item. And I think that is like one of the things that we should address and maybe just a couple other checkpoints. But I don't agree. I don't think that this would be an entire position, but I do think that there is a piece in the puzzle where it does, it can exist within our development services.

Thank you so much. And I was just told by the county clerk's office that we have a couple of comments. We'll hear those comments and then continue with the conversation. Oh, okay, perfect. Let's hear the email. And thank you for the reminder.

Good morning, Judge and Commissioners. This comes from Kenneth Rocha and Kyle. I am submitting a comment today regarding the proposal to create a high-intensity development review division While the title suggests a focus on technical resources, the structure closely resembles the Texas Association of Counties, TAC, playbook used in the aggregate venue, specifically in counties like Kamal and Vernon. In those cases, when counties lacked the legal authority to zone industrial projects, they created technical review divisions to implement faux zoning through administrative attrition. by adding specialized FTEs to the M&O budget to demand exhaustive, non-standardized data. The goal wasn't just review, it was to create a regulatory gauntlet that mimics zoning without the legal authority to do so. This obviously raises critical concerns for the taxpayers. Overall legal liability and unnecessary fiscal expansion. The question the court must answer today is simple. Is this new division actually about protecting our water, land, and electrical resources? Or is it about expanding government control through administrative circumvention? If this initiative is just about data, then why can't existing development services engineers slash staff handle the data gathering? I read the claim that positions are budget neutral through fees aside from the initial start of cost. The salaries for these specialized high intensity reviewers must be allocated upfront before a single fee is ever collected. I also recall in the FY2026 budget review that y'all already added 53 new FTEs at a cost of $4.3 million. And we are already using $7.6 million in one-time reserves just to keep the general fund afloat. Since this new division is designed to review projects that may never reach the permitting stage if rejected, we are essentially voting to add permanent high salary positions to an M&O budget FY2027 that is already 63% payroll. Adding permanent review FTEs now effectively creates a permanent structural deficit. That must be fulfilled by future property tax. The intent is clear. You are not creating a resource. You are creating yet another legal target that drives us further away from where our money, time, and efforts should be. Thank you for your time and service.

Thank you. Commissioner Inglesby.

Well, Judge, I appreciate the explanation that you've given. I wasn't sure either when it said division. It just kind of, you know, I didn't know what to think. It sounded like we were creating a whole new division. of multiple employees. And so, yeah, I like the idea of looking at our development services and asking them and working with them to see what is best, what's the best fit and who we may have on staff that, you know, may have that expertise or, you know, just kind of gain their perspective on that. You know, we are doing a rewrite of our subdivision rules and regulations and we're doing our water study. You know, I think those are, you know, items that, you know, we can really drill down on and also the water availability. I know that I spoke to our folks that are, you know, helping us with that. And that is extremely important because I don't think we use that as we should, you know, I don't think, you know, I think we need to do better in that area. And so, yeah, I think, you know, we can get with development services, speak with them and then determine how best to move forward and look at our budget.

Thank you. Commissioner Cohen?

I think just a few things. I think I need more information about the proposed financial impact. That's one. Like Commissioner Inglesby did say, we are doing the water study, working on our regulations right now. I would like to see what we can do within the Developmental Services Department to see how we can address the concern that Judge Becerra is trying to address. And also, we are currently without a Developmental Services Director. My hope is that that individual would come in and be able to assess and see what we can do to help address these issues with the staff that we have internally. I do think that the initiative does need to be led within that office. I always kind of thought that we needed somebody focused on the water issues like you're talking about, Judge Becerra, and so to someone just keeping their eye on the ball. But as of right now, just for me, I just need to know more about the fiscal impact and just how we, developmental services, can better kind of address the issue and what we are maybe not doing in that department in regards to water. So there's just a lot of difference.

Thank you. Commissioner Smith. Yeah, I'm probably going to echo a lot of what Commissioner Cohen said, but there are some things that I really, I mean, I specifically, whenever I saw this agenda item last week, I specifically started going through statute. And one of the things that a lot of the general public doesn't understand or doesn't because they don't really have to is that we only have authority that is specifically given to us by the state. We're not like cities. And I know we've had this conversation recently in the past that we don't have the ability to do codes and ordinances. And under state development regulations, there's not a clear definition of what would be considered high-intensity development. We are mandated by the state to treat every development in a similar fashion, whether it's the mom and pop who wants to put an auto shop in their garage or a data center. We have to look at all of them the exact same way. We can't even dictate in a residential neighborhood, and this was a fight I had whenever I first got here to the court, I have a residential neighborhood in my precinct that somebody decided to put a concrete manufacturing plant on. We could do nothing about it. And so my concerns are from a well, I have several concerns, but from a statutory standpoint, how would we define what is high intensity? Because under state law, I don't think we can. I think it's very clear that we can't. Furthermore, when we look at that, our our Our development services department, I think, does a very good job of a standardized review of every single application that comes in into the county. And they ensure, believe me, I meet with them at least once a week. They're probably tired of meeting with me. But I have numerous questions every week because I have so much development coming into my precinct. And does high intensity, does that mean a data center? Or does that mean a subdivision that is 100 homes on 200 acres? My portion of the county, that's high density, a house over two acres. In Eastern Buda, a 45 foot lot is standard. And so that data center, yes, it may use half as much water as that community in East Kyle. But I would say as far as density and impact, intense development in the county, I would probably much rather have some industrial use than another 5,000 homes that's going to use the same amount of water. Because the other strain that we have to look at is those – 10,000 trips a day at those 5,000 homes. Not only the water demand, but the sewage demand and the transportation demand and those kind of things. And so I don't think there's a clear way, even if we tried to establish this. I will say I'm 100% in agreement with my colleague, Commissioner Hammer, that we made very adamant that the groundwater districts need to be looking at those water availability studies. I mean, we made it very clear. And it's disappointing if that's not happening because I've made a personal commitment to at least the Hays Trinity that we would do that. And so if we're not doing that, I feel like I've failed. And so I think just giving staff direction that that has to happen, I think we can do that and ensure that that happens. And I see a lot of nodding heads out there. I mean, that's a given. We should be doing that anyway. reviewing after we get a new director of development services as to what their needs are and allowing them to structure the department as they see fit and coming to us and trying to outline why and where they need those positions. I think that's the better course of action here. But again, at a base level, To establish a division to give additional scrutiny to certain projects, I don't think we have the legal authority to do it. I'm 99.99% sure we don't, and I think it would just be opening ourselves up for liability. Now, giving staff direction at this point without taking action to say, please review this, and once we hire a director and you do your budget submission, keep this in mind, I think that's a better course of action.

Okay, thank you. And I will reiterate because I heard a few comments like I need more information for the fiscal impact etc and I opened with this Reality that it is of no cost my agenda item is of no cost straight out of the gate to the budget to anyone's implications it is merely the setup for the inevitability that we are already seeing all around us and proposing the creation of a new division within development services charged with overseeing these high intensity developments to be defined by us, how that makes most sense based on our unique situation footprint and water and utility availabilities. This issue is one that virtually all residents in Hays County and around the state can agree with. We have new challenges and we need new oversight when it comes to extreme water usage, energy grid stability, and yes, nuclear power concerns. We must take measures now to ensure that we have resource stability in the future. No one wants to have their water or electric bill tripled because of a heavy industrial single user makes the utilities scarce. This division will not require the hiring of any full-time employees or anything that sounds fiscally irresponsible. Instead, we will train existing staff to engage the necessary professionals to examine the development and pass the cost to the proposed projects. If the Commissioner's Court supports this, we will direct the County Administrator to develop a program that will provide a detailed outline. TO PROVIDE DIRECTION, NO MONETARY OR LEGAL REQUIREMENT ASSESSMENTS REQUIRED. IT IS MERELY TO SET THE TABLE FOR THIS CONVERSATION TO TAKE PLACE SO THAT, AS MENTIONED, WE NEED TO BE LOOKING INTO THE, WHAT WAS IT HERE? Oh, I wrote that. Groundwater conservation districts, how they are not being looped in, and yet that's what we want. So it's important that if we have a centralized assessment of large single industrial users coming in, that we have a honed-in approach because this is... THIS IS THE MAC TRUCK COMING OUR WAY AND IF WE DON'T PREPARE OURSELVES, WE ARE NOT SET UP. THERE'S NO MORE CLEAR WAY THAN WHAT'S BEFORE US NOW TO DEFINE THE REALITY THAT WE AS A COUNTY ARE NOT SET UP TO PROCESS THESE TYPES OF APPLICATIONS OR TO COORDINATE WITH THE PROFESSIONAL SERVICES REQUIRED TO PROPERLY REVIEW ALONG WITH ANY STATE AGENCY TO GUIDE THE NAVIGATION OF THE As the county authority to oversee these development increases, our new division will be prepared to address these new challenges. If nothing is needed and if there is no legal capacity, there is no harm.

Well, Judge, a couple of things in your statement there. Quite literally, the only background we had on this item is the two sentences, or actually one sentence, not even two sentences, one sentence that was in background.

So what's left unknown for you?

Well, let me clarify here. You reiterated in your statement that there would be no budget impact whatsoever. The entire sentence for background until we came into court today does nothing but direct our staff relative to the 2027 budget. You specifically said in your statement a moment ago, that all of this would be paid for through fees on upcoming projects as we define them. We have no legal authority to define high intensity. The other thing that I would say is, if it has, no, no, please let me finish.

You will finish. I just want to say, as an attorney, I would encourage you not to say we have no authority when you're not the attorney of the court. Sorry. Just wanted to clarify that piece.

As an elected official in Texas sitting on a commissioner's court, we as elected officials have no authority. Is that clear?

That's better for you to say.

Okay, thank you. So I'm going to finish now because I didn't interrupt you.

Sure.

I would appreciate the same. Got it. Thank you. The other thing I would say is you're proposing additional fees and fines. FEES, SERVICES, THOSE KIND OF THINGS, TO REVIEW THESE WHEN WE DON'T KNOW WHAT IS OUT THERE. THE FACT OF THE MATTER IS THAT WE ARE PREPARING TO GO INTO THE STATE CAPITOL AND FIGHT FOR THESE THINGS. AS COUNTY COMMISSIONERS, NOT ONLY HERE IN HAYES COUNTY, BUT STATEWIDE, I've talked to commissioners from multiple other counties who have issues with projects similar to this. And the reason that they're talking to me and they've reached out to Hayes County is because they know that we've been involved in a water fight, especially in the west side of the county, for years. And we've been present in the capital for years on these issues. There's a reason that the Council of Urban Counties and TAC calls on... would call Commissioner Schell and call myself and call Commissioner Inglesby to go up there and speak on these issues because they knew that we were involved and they know that we understand those issues. What I will tell you is what those years of doing that tells me is that number one, we are preparing for the fight right now. If there are any bills that are filed that would give us additional authority to do these kinds of things, we would hope that they would be pre-filed in November of this year. After our fiscal year starts if and when the state does anything relative to any of these items it will pass in the spring in that 180 days that our legislature decides to show up every other year and the implementation date historically, I mean Literally 99% of the time will be September 1st of next year. So it September 1st of 2027 And so if that's the case, then why are we setting up, again, the background on this was to set up a division. I understand if we can reassign an employee to look at this with no authority to do anything other than to tell us, yeah, I looked at it. Or do we wait until we actually know where our fight ends and what the outcome of the scrap that we're going to get into in the state capitol is? will be and then the the duties that we have the authority to do in fy 27 whenever it would be implemented if and when we get anything now again to commissioner hammer's point i'm a hundred percent in agreement i mean whenever we talked about the data center item the other day i said you know let's give us let's let's give the groundwater districts a win and give our citizens a win and trying to to review these things by saying, instead of us saying, we're gonna put a moratorium on these, give the ability, you know, contract with our groundwater districts and say, look, it's gonna, to review these, it'll cost X amount of dollars. And when we accept that, we immediately turn it over to the experts in the field, our groundwater district and say, is this actually, is this engineering good? Is this a viable thing to do? And it would provide not only a true review of these projects, much better than we have the ability to do, but it would also provide a funding source for those groundwater districts. I think that is a win that the county could do that actually does something other than just sitting here and saying, well, something might happen in the future. Let's figure out, let's start something in case it happens. I don't think we need to be reactionary. I think we need to be very proactive in it, but This isn't it. And maybe I'm wrong in that, but this is a feel-good thing that does nothing because we have no authority to do anything. Let's look at actually addressing the issue and trying to get to the root of it and figuring out a way where we can help the groundwater districts and we can get to the end goal of having a better review of all of these projects. And again, whether it's a data center or whether it's 600 houses that decide to use wells, that's what my concern is. Because we can talk about one type of development over another and whether we like them or whether we don't. We don't really have the ability to like one over the other. I was one of the outspoken members of this court whenever we had the one data center that came in here. I thought it was a bad deal for the county. I still think it was a bad deal for the county. We got nothing from that. That specific development did nothing for my precinct, and I couldn't tell that it could do anything for the county. And I wasn't really keen on their presentation and how they spoke to our citizens. But that being the case, we still don't have the ability to say no if they decide to build there. I think that we really need to look at it and just saying we're going to assign, even if we just say we're assigning someone to do it, what are we assigning them to do? They should be doing this job already. I mean, our development services department is already reviewing them every application we get. to the letter of state law. Probably, I know, more so than some of our surrounding counties. As a matter of fact, the Greater Edwards Aquifer Alliance produced a study last year of all the counties in the Hill Country. And they rated them on how they're using their development tools as far as overall development tools that were statutorily given to us by the state. And believe it or not, Hays County ranked the highest out of every single county on trying to preserve our natural resources. And we were credited with doing a better job than any county in the Hill Country. And I'm very proud of that. And that's a third party, non-governmental entity that their whole job is trying to protect our resources. I would compliment our development services department. I think they do a great job. I think our employees do a really good job of that. And to throw this on them and say, go out and figure out how to do this while we're in the middle of a complete rewrite of our regs. And if you haven't read them, I've spent hours on these. This is our new proposed regs. And I will tell you, something tells me No offense to my colleagues, I'm probably the only one that's redlined this whole document who's sitting up here. Again, I don't think this is an effort that is going to yield anything, because number one, we're using every bit of authority we have. Are there some changes as far as the groundwater district ensuring that they get that data? Absolutely. We need to be doing that. And both Commissioner Hammer and I have been very adamant about that. And I've made personal commitments to them to get that done. So that will be done this week. but restructuring a department or telling them to restructure a department when we don't have a director there right now and tying their hands to something that we don't have the statutory authority for, I'm not going to be supportive of that.

That's good. And I'm glad we'll start with the end in mind here. And how you closed with was in part how a third party has evaluated our handling of and we are among the top in the state as a county. You also use that argument when we are talking about number of community members incarcerated in reference to percentages and population numbers as a sounding board to say we're doing a great job. No matter how good of a job we're doing, If we can do a better job, if we can do more, I'm always going to reach for it. And although you continue to say we have no authority, when you were talking about this groundwater district effort that we passed, I guess it was a year ago, you're looking out in the courtroom looking for heads nodding to confirm if it's been done or not, and you have no idea. And that is something that is so important and that Commissioner Hammer was actually... happy to see and support and move forward through, but you've talked about making personal commitments to people, and yet it's been, for the most part, not done or followed through on, and you don't even know. And so the creation of this division, as much as you want to... To that point, I have a question for you.

Just one question.

No, not going to happen. Not going to happen. I let you. I'm doing the same. And so the idea that you're calling this a feel-good kind of effort that's restructuring an entire department, your mischaracterization is either so far removed from the explanation just given or deliberately designed to deceive and scare fearmonger into paralyzing and doing nothing. Doing nothing is what we shouldn't be doing. No matter how small, no matter how symbolic, I feel and I think it's important that the community understand that we hear them loud and clear. And so if not restructuring an entire department, never did I ever say that, but if we HAVE A DESIGNATED POSITION TO START TO UNRAVEL SOME OF THE COMPLEXITIES OF, LET'S JUST USE ONE EXAMPLE, DATA CENTERS COMING IN HERE, WANTING TO GO THROUGH THE PERMITTING PROCESS, MAKING SURE WE GET OUR DUCKS IN A ROW BECAUSE WE NEED TO UNDERSTAND WHAT TCEQ is doing and what we're doing because we want to make sure that everybody sees it everywhere in one unified place so that we can understand more succinctly as things move through because simply to say I hope groundwater districts know my commitment is real I made a personal commitment and yet here we are looking out into the audience more than a year later and the commitment has fallen flat on its face I think goes to show that this can be of value to us simply simply just to help keep our eye on the precious resources that we all live off of and depend on. And so on the fees conversation, it was simply, again, my aim is a no-cost project adding of a direction of a job description update. And if you said no one's coming in one breath, but yet in the other one, we're not authorized to give fees. So let's just stick with the first part, no one's coming. So if no one's coming, the fees that can be proposed could support the research and the work and the services contract that we would need to go out and get to support development services. But if no one comes, what fees? As you said, there's no one coming. But in case something does happen, at least we're prepared to have the conversation. It's purely creating the conversation space and as legislation unfolds, because you know it's going to. As legislation defaults, we have the opportunity to have someone designated with the complete understanding of what it takes to get a large single industrial user moving through a process. I want to help people that want to invest in our county have a clear, concise roadmap. Because I understand that Dripping Springs, a two-acre house, can be a large, big deal, and not in Buda. I understand all the variables that could exist. That's not my intent. It is just to say, we want you to invest in Hays County. We want you to invest in our community. But if it's a dead end, we should tell people ahead of time, and that's all I'm trying to get to, or what the hurdles are to invest in our community.

The question I have for you, Number one, I never said no one's coming. Everyone's coming to Hayes County. I don't know where you got that, but please go back and listen to what I said a moment ago. I never said no one's coming. Everyone is coming here. The question I have is, just from a basic level, we're talking about these things. The only background we had on this today was the one sentence and a press release you put out yesterday. And in that press release, it calls for the establishment of a complete new division. It does. I can read your words back to you from your press release if you'd like, but I'm sure you know that you've called for a new division. And whenever we got here today, what you're trying to propose is something completely different as far as a restructure of one position is completely different than what you've put out. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I can read what you... Real fast, real tidy, easy correction.

The division within development services has always been coupled. The division within development services. That has always been the message.

Can you explain which division within development services? I would love... No, I want to hear from you.

Fine. What division did you suggest, Commissioner Hammer? No, I asked you... Listen, if you want to play gotcha, that's another setting. If you want to get them ball rolling in a meaningful manner and answer the question, then allow me to ask

THE POINT I'M MAKING IS THAT YOU DON'T EVEN HAVE A WORKING UNDERSTANDING OF HOW OUR DIVISION... IS IT OKAY?

CAN I INTERJECT? I'M SORRY.

THIS ASSAULT IS UNNECESSARY.

ALL I'M SAYING IS IF WE WANTED TO TALK ABOUT WATER EVERY SINGLE COURT, I WOULD LOVE TO BECAUSE I DO THINK IT'S EXTREMELY IMPORTANT. I THINK WE COULD ALWAYS MAKE STRIVES TO MOVING IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION, PERIOD IN THE STORY. WHAT I DO THINK IS I THINK YOU CAN ADD THIS AS JUST A PIECE AND WE CAN REVIEW, I KNOW CHASE YOUNG, ONE OF OUR ATTORNEYS IN OUR Civil division he this is like his bread and butter he reviews everything that he could possibly do to save our water And I'm so grateful and thankful for him, and he's got some really great ideas So I think that us constantly talking about this is moving forward in a in a right direction I agree there's bits and pieces on both of everything that's happening and being said and Uh, what we could do is we could, we, I think that this has to be in partnership with, from our watershed coordinator to our development services, to our civil division, to all these different areas to make sure that we're doing all we can. I do think we're doing a great job so far. I want to say that, but doing all that we can to work with our groundwater conservation district and to work with these various entities to create sustainable, positive development. I do want to say one thing, the, subdivision rules and regulations rewrite that it's just part one that has been completed from a draft perspective. So just wanted to highlight. We haven't even gotten to the flooding and drainage portion of everything yet, but I do think that that is extremely important and I have read that. So I'm going to call you out on that for a second. But with that being said, but with that being said, I think I do believe everyone can evolve in thought and I think that this may be the intentions could have been different and now we're here at a place where let's just add this into the mix from our development services and see how this discussion with the department head whenever they come in with Michael who's our development services manager with our county administrator and see where we can potentially add something in that would cover SOME TYPE OF AREA OF HIGH DENSITY, WHATEVER YOU WANT TO DEFINE THAT AS, AND MAYBE WE CREATE OUR OWN DEFINITION JUST FROM A TECHNICAL REVIEW PERSPECTIVE. I'M NOT SAYING THAT WE HAVE TO CONTINUE TO, IT'S NOT LIKE LEGALLY ENFORCEABLE, RIGHT? BUT I'M SAYING MAYBE WE CREATE OUR OWN. WHAT IS THE COUNTY VIEW? FROM A HIGH DENSITY PERSPECTIVE.

WHEN YOU HELPED CRAFT THIS AGENDA ITEM, I ALWAYS, WE WERE IN MY OFFICE AND I ALWAYS REMEMBER ASKING IT TO BE WITHIN THE DEVELOPMENT SERVICES AS YOU WERE WALKING OUT OF THE OFFICE. IS THAT RIGHT? WAS THAT THE INTENT? because I was asking to have it worded in that way for that purpose. I just feel because I want to clarify, because this is being sensationalized, even though it's been clarified in a way that is not useful. So I wanted to see if, as the person that wrote the item for me, if the direction was misunderstood when I wanted it to be no cost inside the development services. Is that the direction you heard from me?

So, sir, when we had the conversation, My understanding was your intention was for you to bring your vision to the court of what you'd like to see in the court, decide if this is something they'd like for staff to pursue, uh, related to the FY 27 budget. But when we did have the conversation, we discussed, uh, where would be most appropriate for that division. And we all agree that development services would be the place.

Thank you. Yep. So I've always had the intent of, there's always a potential to misunderstand, Commissioner Smith. I'll give you that. There is a potential to misunderstand, and that's why these conversations take place, to set some transparency and some clarification goals of the agenda item. And so... THERE'S NO BACKUP BECAUSE IT'S ALL WRITTEN IN THE ITEM TO SIMPLY SAY WE WANT TO CREATE A DIVISION WITHIN THE DEVELOPMENT SERVICES TO HELP OVERSEE. AND THE REASON I ASKED COMMISSIONER HAMMER ABOUT WHAT POSITION SHE SUGGESTED WOULD BE AN EASY NATURAL EVOLUTION OF IT WAS BECAUSE MOST NATURALLY COLIN POWELL SAID IT BEST AND IT STUCK WITH ME. WHEN YOU DON'T CARE ABOUT CREDIT YOU'D BE SURPRISED HOW MUCH YOU GET DONE. AND SO I DON'T CARE WHAT POSITION WE SUGGEST. create a checkbox page on a clipboard even, and when an application that fits the description, this person would check the box to make sure that we have a predictable roadmap for an applicant to follow. It is simply, who did you say, Commissioner Hammer? And that's all I was asking. Who did you say? Because it does not matter to me.

Judge, can we just direct Candace to work with development services and just take a look to see how we move forward regarding this effort. I think water is extremely important to every member on this court.

That's right.

Thank you. Candace, because right now we don't have a director, you've been putting your name on development services agenda items. And I'm hoping we can just give her direction, Judge, to move forward.

Do you need to vote on that so that you can have the clear direction? We can just give staff direction. I just want to make sure. Let me ask her, Candace, what makes you comfortable to make sure you have the clear direction?

No, I hear the court loud and clear, and I will work with our budget office as well as legal and HR to come up with some recommendations.

Okay. Judge, before we move on, and I know you're done with this conversation, but I just have to say, Something like this could be a win for our county if it was done the right way.

It's never the right way. I know. It's never that way.

I'm going to finish my statement if you would. My point is we could have come in here and had a well thought out conversation about and worked through what we saw as needing to happen in this situation. Worked through some of the issues that we talked about today. And we could have had that conversation. Whenever you say that we're sensationalizing this conversation today, there's one person on this dais who put out a press release saying what they wanted on this issue. And it wasn't me. We all want solutions here. We all want good policy. And when it comes at the expense of a press release, and then, you know, The statement, the reason that you reached out to Commissioner Hammer is you don't care about the credit. Well, then why did you put out a press release before we even talked about the item? I'll say I'm personally offended when you talk about our court doing nothing. We can do nothing. I've sat here eight years and looked at policy changes and how we implement things and really how members of this court have tried to make an impact on our county. And maybe I'm saying this because I'm not running again and I'm just going to be brutally honest. I aspire to be someone who can speak on policy at a level of you and still do nothing.

Anything else? You're good?

I'm good.

All right. Thank you. And now we move on. I move that we open all consent agenda items except for, are there any that we ask to pull? Any more ones that's a pull?

Item G16.

G16. That's what my note said. I want to make sure. So we're going to pull G16, and I move that we open the rest of consent agenda items.

Second.

I have a motion and a second.

Judge, just for clarification, we're pulling G16 totally off the agenda or pulling it to discuss separately?

Does that have to pull it?

It says it's a public comment. It's a public comment for it. So just for the item for the public comment to be read. But you don't want it pulled? No, I'm sorry. I was saying that it needed to be pulled from if you were really certain. Oh, okay.

Then that was just a mischaracterization of my intent. So please, I move that we open all... Approve all agenda items in the G section.

My apologies for the confusion.

Perfect. Thank you. We have a motion and a second for all public comment items. This was just worded awkwardly. Sorry. And so now we will get the one individual signed up for G16. It was a good idea, though, Mr. Rodrigo Amaya. It was a good idea to put this. I just didn't understand the way it was written, being the first time. But we can work on that. Let's make that because I really like it.

Really good. Thanks, sir. Yes, sir. On G16, I know last time I brought this issue up, about two members going to the, and what I got was logistics. I mean, I was looking at the tech average per diem lodged. IT'S $178 A DAY, I'M ASSUMING. I NOTICED THAT THE BACKUP FOR THIS COULD BE KEPT UNDER $6500 FOR THE TRAVEL. I NOTICED THEY PUT ON THERE THAT FOR THE FOOD, FOR DM-756, $378 EACH, ONE EVENING MEAL, FOUR DAYS, ONE MORNING MEAL, ONE NOON MEAL. First off, the hotel cost. If you look at tax recommendations for the average lodging, it's $110. I was doing the math and, you know, $2,492 for a hotel cost. I know the registration, that's not anything that can be dealt with, but as far as like the flights, it's a seven-hour drive. It's 511 miles. Is a flight necessary? I mean... You got TSA issues and stuff like that. I don't want these guys getting delayed, you know. So clarification on the per diem, 756, 378 each. You know, my math is, I've been trying to figure out how they came up with all that stuff. So on that per diem and the logic, and TAC recommends 178 a day. 110 for lodging and 68 for meals. How was that accomplished? If they can clear that up as to the per diem and the lodging. Thank you, sir.

Candace, that's all yours. If you'll state your name and title for the viewing public.

Candace Boutte, County Administrator. So I would have to look at the TAC recommendations, but we typically base it off of the federal standards for travel for New Orleans. And the per diem, it's for two people, but there is a rate that is listed in our travel policy for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, depending on what time you're leaving on the day of arrival and departure. And then there is a set amount for each day between. So it's my understanding that these dollar amounts and Scott Whitland, our budget officer, would be able to confirm. but they match what's listed in our travel policy. And in regards to the hotel, we are getting a specialized rate as being members of NACO. This is also the hotel where the conference will actually be held. So that will cut back on any additional transportation, taxi or Uber costs. So we feel it says up to 6,500, for both parties, it does not mean that we will use that full amount, but we wanted to be able to have the best estimate without having to come back and request additional dollars. So we may be below that.

Okay. And did you want to add anything, or is it all covered?

Scott Woodland, Budget Officer. Candace did a great job, and she was correct on those per diem rates.

Is there anything else on any of the other agenda items? Please call the roll.

Commissioner Cohen?

Yes.

Commissioner Smith?

Yes. Commissioner Inglesby?

Yes. Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Judge Becerra?

Yes. And now we'll move on from consent, and we'll just keep moving through. I guess we can do roads.

We're on I-1. I1, discussion and possible action to accept fiscal surety for street and drainage improvements in the amount of $4,620,654.75 for the Ranchette Calatera final plat bond number 800-241-665. Second. We have a motion and a second, and we're just accepting a surety bond. Please call the roll. Commissioner Hammer.

Commissioner Inglesby?

Yes. Commissioner Smith? Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Judge Becerra? Yes. I, too. I, too, discussion in possible action to release the performance bonds number 800192089 in the amount of $452,800.70 and consider the acceptance of road construction and surface drainage improvements for Calatera subdivision phase 3, section 10.

So moved.

Second.

And this is just releasing a performance bond. Please call the roll.

Commissioner Smith? Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Judge Becerra? Yes. I3. I3, discussion and possible action to approve the selection of Cobb, Fendley, and Associates, Inc. to provide utility coordination services for the Hillside Terrace Project in Precinct 2 and authorize staff and council to negotiate a contract.

So moved, second.

All right, please call the roll. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Commissioner Smith? Yes. Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Judge Becena?

Yes.

Aye for. Aye for discussion and possible action to approve the selection of KCI Technologies, Inc. to provide utility coordination services for the William Pettus Project in Precinct 1 and authorize staff and council to negotiate a contract.

So moved. Second.

So, Commissioner, I was being asked about the utility coordination. How much of that can you speak on what they're actually going to be doing?

Well, so, Judge, let me first say that it's important for me to give new firms the opportunity to work for Hays County and KCI. This is their first job in Hays County. That's refreshing, and thank you for doing that. Sure. And so, although KCI Technologies has not worked directly for Hays County, they have past familiarity working with multiple TxDOT districts and municipalities, most notably the city of New Braunfels, which is a neighboring community. They have specific experience completing utility coordination and Sioux work. What's the, it's an acronym, so can you help me with that, Aaron?

Sub surface utility.

Okay, work. And the project manager, Kyle Jones, has 23 years of experience. And so, yeah, they'll be working with any utilities that are in conflict with the project to help relocate them, Judge.

So they're going to help to do, I'm sorry, the utility piece. Can you repeat that last little piece?

Yeah, so any utilities that are in conflict with the project, they will help coordinate the relocation of those utilities with the property owners.

Judge S. Aaron Jones, Transportation Director, they'll research all the utilities that are within that easement. They'll also do with the with the sue of the services. There's different degrees of what they're looking at They'll find any conflicts with the roadway that way they can identify those if we need to Move those they'll also coordinate on that

Beautiful, thank you. We see this all the time, but I'm being asked to speak of it, so I said I will.

It's one piece of a big puzzle. Yeah, I've seen it for years, I know. And it's critical to get these at the beginning because typically what slows down the projects are the utilities on getting those and coordinating with those different utility companies to move these. Absolutely right. You said it exactly right. Okay, please call the roll.

Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Commissioner Smith? Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Yes. Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Judge Bissetta? Yes. I-5. I-5, discussion and possible action to authorize the execution of a professional services agreement, 2026-PSA-59, between Hayes County and Quiddity Engineering LLC to provide utility coordination services for the Darden Hill Road Phase 2 project in Precinct 4. So moved. Second.

So on this project, or this selection, the one thing that I would say is this... AND AARON, PLEASE, IF I MISSTATED ANYTHING, PLEASE CORRECT ME. BUT I BELIEVE WE HAVE A TOTAL OF FOUR PROJECTS THAT ARE AT THAT INTERSECTION. WE'RE GOING TO BE TALKING TODAY ABOUT SOYER RANCH, DARDEN HILL ROAD, THE SOYER RANCH PEDESTRIAN PATH, AND ALL OF THOSE PROJECTS CULMINATE AT THE CORNER OF SOYER RANCH ROAD AND DARDEN HILL WHERE WE CONSTRUCTED THE NEW ROUND ABOUT TWO AND A HALF YEARS AGO. to better coordinate those, again, to the point that Aaron made a moment ago about utility coordination, we're going to have, for all of those projects, we're going to have the same utility coordinator and the same CE&I coordinator because, again, we've got four projects that are going right on top of each other, and I don't want our poor transportation department to be stepping over themselves on multiple contractors and those kind of things. This is just the first, and it's more of an explanation, not just for item five, but for seven and eight as well.

And you're having, what you said we're talking about, you're having an event tonight, right, to talk about it with the public?

No, actually, this is the monthly meeting for the, the monthly meeting for the Driftwood Historic Conservation Society is tonight. And I address them about once, about once a quarter on what's going on in transportation in the general Driftwood area. And so they had asked me to do an update on all the projects in the area, not just one project, but all the projects in the area. We'll be doing that this evening. However, another organization that's newly formed, I have never even asked for a meeting. It's my understanding that they are going to be there to ask specifically about the Darden Hill project.

And so just to make sure I understand it correctly, I'll restate my question. You will be talking tonight about Darden Hill project at your meeting.

It'll be one of them amongst probably seven more at not my meeting again at the Driftwood Historic Conservation Society.

Okay, let me try it one more time. There's a meeting going on tonight that you will attend and Darden Hill will be there. Just want to make sure. I didn't want to get in the loops of it again. Okay, good deal. I plan on attending that so I can be brought up to speed on what's going on there as well. And on this agenda item, the way it was written, I want to applaud our county auditor's office. I know she's not here. She gave me a list of things that she wanted to talk about, but... Procurement officer. No, not with what I'm saying. Purchasing is not here, but yes. Two things happening in one sentence. So purchasing is not here, and I want to acknowledge her work in all this effort, but I also want to applaud our county auditor's office in her efforts to increase transparency... for the very expensive things that we do like professional services. These programs and the progress that we're having make persistent and direct impacts for accountability. By listening to the voices of our citizens, we can take these very important strides in rebuilding trust with our government and the people. At the time They have it all written down here at the bottom. At a time when the public is demanding more efficiency, transparency, adding another layer of costly consultants creates middleman bureaucracy. And so I am leaning in a little tighter on these types of tasks. And so I'm glad that we had that clarification of synchronizing of efforts. But I'm really most grateful for that line item in the back that's talking about conflicts of interest being now part of the backup. Thank you, Candace, whoever's putting that in, or if it is purchasing. I just want to say thank you because these things are better for all of us when we share openly what's going on. Anyone else have anything to say about it? Please call the roll.

Commissioner Smith?

Yes.

Commissioner Inglesby?

Yes.

Commissioner Cohen? Yes.

I'm recusing myself due to a family member that works at Quitty.

Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Judge Becerra? Yes. Please open I-6. I-6, discussion and possible action to authorize the execution of a utility reimbursement agreement in the amount of $164,950.27 in eligible reimbursement costs with the Go-Forth Special Utility District for water distribution line relocations located along FM 2001 East in Precinct 1 as part of the Hayes County 2025 Road Improvements.

So moved. Second. Judge Ann, so these water lines are in conflict with the proposed improvements to FM 2001 East project. I don't know if you want some more information, but so... Easement acquisition cost is $54,614.93 as adjusted for any applicable betterment. Right-of-way agent cost of $74,098.75 and associated legal cost of $36,236.59. All right.

Please call the roll. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Yes. Commissioner Smith? Yes. Judge Becerra? Yes. Aye. Seven. Aye. Seven. Discussion and possible action to authorize the execution of a contract for design services 2026-PSA-63 between Hayes County and Pape Dawson Consulting Engineers, LLC, to provide design engineering services for the Sawyer Ranch Road project in Precinct 4 and amend the budget accordingly. Second. Commissioner?

Again, this is another portion of the same four projects that are overlaid. In the 2024 road bond, along with the certificates of obligation, we specifically identified Sawyer Ranch Road for engineering only. This is, again, only for engineering. And we're just moving forward with it.

Please call the roll. Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Commissioner Smith? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Judge Becerra? Yes. I ain't. I8, discussion and possible action to authorize the execution of a contract for engineering design services 2026-PSA-61 between Hayes County and Volkert, Inc. to provide design services for the Sawyer Ranch Road pedestrian walkway project in Precinct 4.

So moved.

Second.

This project is actually part of the 2016 road bond was the establishment and construction of a pedestrian walkway walkway and path on Sawyer Ranch Road. Whenever it was constructed, it ended, I want to say, roughly two miles before Darden Hill in both the 2024 road bond and our follow-up certificates of obligation on transportation. We proposed and included an extension of that walkway to connect to the new site or the site of the existing Cypress Springs Elementary School, which is also the site for the new Dripping Springs High School, yet to be named high school. Again, Volkert did the original walkway from the 2016 road bond and has actually worked with us on this project at least three times, I know of, to apply to both Campo and TxDOT for additional funding for this project. And hopefully, once we move forward with some additional engineering and design, we can apply again and get some matching funds out of the state or federal.

Please call the roll.

Commissioner Smith? Yes. Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Judge Becerra?

Yes. Please open K3, 8, 9, and 12.

K3, discussion and possible action.

I got the text late. Sorry, guys.

to approve the expenditure of 2016 public safety bond funds on the following public safety capital improvement projects at the Hays County Law Enforcement Center. Thermoduct heating, ventilation and air conditioning, HVAC replacement and repair, intake door replacement and repair, interior door locking mechanism replacement and upgrade, installation of a new door control system, and authorize a discretionary exemption pursuant to Texas Local Government Code 262 point 024A74 related to the interior door locking mechanism replacement and upgrade and the installation of a new door control system and amend the budget accordingly. K12.

38912. All at the same time.

I can do that. K8. Discussion and possible action to authorize the acceptance of a grant award from the Office of the Governor State Homeland Security Program Law Enforcement Terrorism Prevention Act program in the amount of $57,952.22 and amend the budget accordingly. K-9, discussion and possible action to authorize the Sheriff's Office to purchase a Nighthawk BTX handheld x-ray backscatter imaging system from Paladin Defense Services LLC in the amount of $58,589.80. And K-12, discussion and possible action to convert a one-time food service worker position slot 0655-009 into a half-time FTE food service worker position and a three-quarter time FTE educator slash GED instructor position Effective May 1st, 2026. So moved.

Second.

And we have someone signed up for K3. Whoever that is, stay with K3. That is all you've signed up to speak on. Who is it? Mr. Rodrigo Amaya, stay with K3, please. Even though I've opened them all, you only get K3.

Thank you, Judge. Court, on this agenda item, notice the price is $625,247. I noticed this bond is from 2016 and the building was completed in 2020. Here we are, 2026. Just very curious. I know some of these buildings, you know, they require repairs, but I'm just wondering, I mean, I've been in conversations where they mentioned that old jail built in the 80s and these repairs don't come up as frequent as these new buildings. Who is responsible for making sure that whoever's building, designing these buildings, are going to create something that the taxpayer can say, I got my money's worth out of that door. You know, because it looks like the same types of repairs are coming up here. You got SI Mechanics just, you know, making money left and right because a lot of these, I don't know if it's the door, if it's the wood, if it's the hinge. I mean, is it the guy that put it up? Who is it? You know, that's a large, that's a big ticket right there, 600,000 plus. So just curious as to when are we going to start holding whoever designs them, builds them, maintains them, you know, whatever, accountable, so that we don't have these types of large ticket items pop up because that's not being fiscally guaranteed.

responsible thank you sir thank you very much and i believe uh i could start with commissioner anglesby but i'm gonna go to tammy only because if you don't mind tammy i'm not trying to put you on the spot but because you were there in that space at that time my question to you will be tied to the warranty perspective of it's a valid question if we if we have something that's six years old when does the warranty expire kind of thought process is what i'm wondering if you can speak to it if you don't that's okay

I'm sorry, I cannot speak to it. This is something that the sheriff's office has been working on themselves, and I think Chief Bailey has the information on this project.

Judge, what I will say is that I'm really thankful that it's been determined that these expenditures fall within the authorized use of the public safety bond funds. Chief, you're certainly welcome to come up and give more explanation regarding any kind of warranty or whatever, but we have to remember that this is a 24-hour-a-day operation, and things wear out. We have the funds to repair these items, and if there's more to add, Chief, please.

Okay. Chief Bailey, if you'll approach the podium.

Judge, I'm sorry. We do not, the facilities and resource management does not maintain the law enforcement center. So that's why that's. Okay.

I just know that when we were talking about building it, you were on the committee and I didn't know if you had any insight as to warranties, generally speaking, umbrella vibes.

I do not. I apologize. I was at the very tail end of the project.

Totally fine.

Chief Bailey. Thank you, Brett Bailey, Chief Deputy, Hays County Sheriff's Office. I cannot speak to Mr. Amato's question specifically as far as when we can hold the companies accountable and warranty and all that stuff. What I can say is that the jail staff have identified critical issues that need repair to extend the life of the work that we've done. And so these are all things that are covered. Under capital improvement stuff and working with the team, this is my first shot at going through executive committee and so forth. I just want to say thank you to Civil Assistant, First Assistant Jordan Powell for walking me through this. And we did have a meeting. And this is money that has to be spent. And my goal was to try to use the remainder of the money that was in the public safety bond to do this so we would not have to ask for it.

the 2027 fiscal year budget um and i believe we got there and i'm happy to answer any additional questions wonderful and i think uh my part of following up with the question was and that sounds terrible but uh through purchasing which she's not available today and she is really good at pulling up warranty information etc and i think that could have addressed some of the question but your approach and your use of money so it doesn't come out of instead of The regular general fund money, I think, is a smart use of money during the process and assessment of something we have to do, maintain and repair. Jordan.

You saw me moving the mic. Jordan Powell, Civil First Assistant. I heard Commissioner Eaglesby mention it, but I did just want to, for good measure, make it clear that we did pass all of these proposed expenditures through our bond counsel, Julie Huston of the ORIC, and confirmed that the items listed in the summary and in backup and in the agenda item itself are projects that these funds can be utilized for. They're proper projects for capital improvements.

Good. Thank you very much. Any other questions or comments? Commissioners, please call the roll.

Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Smith? Yes. Judge Becerra? Yes. Thank you. K-1, please. K-1, discussion and possible action to modify the 2B10... Did we vote on all the other ones also, Judge?

All at once. Okay. Thank you.

We voted on K-3, 8, 9, and 12 all at once. Thank you.

Thank you. To modify the 2B107 sick leave pool policy of the personnel policies effective April 14th, 2026.

Good morning, Judge, Commissioners.

So moved.

Second. Thank you.

Thank you. Good morning. Eric Renheno, HR Director. This agenda item is to have the court consider revisions to the sick leave pool policy. Our sick leave pool policy allows employees to request leave hours from a donated leave pool policy in the event of a catastrophic injury or illness. And so the revisions to this policy would expand access and eligibility to our employees who are requesting leave from this pool. So there's five revisions. The first revision would allow employees to also apply for an eligible family member who experienced a catastrophic injury or illness. Family member defined as what the Family Medical Leave Act, FMLA, defines family members, so parent, spouse, child, or another qualifying family member. It would also reduce the waiting period from 12 months to apply to three months. It would create leave tiers for FMLA eligible employees to request up to 720 hours of sick leave pool hours, and for non-FMLA eligible employees for 240 hours. It would also allow employees to request up to two times per fiscal year, so sometimes we have employees who under budget how much time they feel like they may need, so it allows them to come back for the same catastrophic event to request more time if needed. And then lastly, it would reduce the waiting period from four weeks for the sick leave pool hours to be granted until, grant the hours once their accrued leave has been exhausted. So if they have one week that they have exhausted their leave, the accruals that are granted by the sick leave pool committee would begin immediately.

Okay. Commissioner Inglesby, we'll start with you. Any questions?

No, Judge. I think I'm supportive of this. That's good.

Thank you. Commissioner Cole?

No questions.

Commissioner Hammer?

No questions.

Commissioner Smith? I just want to say thank you. I know a handful of employees that have used this in the past, and it's been exceedingly helpful. Expanding the availability to the rest of our employee pool is well worth it.

Thank you for the work, Eric, and the direction. Please call the roll.

Commissioner Smith?

Yes.

Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Commissioner Hammer?

Yes.

Judge Becerra?

Yes. So now, if I'm not mistaken, we are on to K4.

Quick question. Can we knock out J?

Anything you guys want, every time. Okay, perfect. J what?

J3. J3, please. J3, discussion and possible action to consider granting a variance to Hayes County on-site sewage facility regulations. Table 10-1, minimum lot size for the Pioneer Ranches, Section 1, Lot 26A, Replat, PLN-2745-PC. So moved. Second.

Any time, Commissioner, you want something moved up, just ask happily.

Thank you. So this is interesting, and I know Colby's coming up here. So with some of the things that we've done in the past with the resolution to not waive water availability study thus created kind of a trickle-down effect where some exemptions that were applied with our previous rules and regs do not apply now because of the waiver is not or because you have to do the water availability study so it's kind of confusing and complicated I'm gonna have development services and if Chase also wants to come up to and give his take on it that would be great but I think we have to take a look at this from a further perspective because we can't This is going to come up more and more often. And if this wasn't in the contributing zone and was in the recharge zone, it would be different than it is, which doesn't really make a lot of sense because the recharge zone is more important for our aquifer than the contributing zone. So it's kind of like it's a silly rule that we need to make sure that we can get some clarity on.

Good. If you'll state your name and title for the viewing public. Thank you, Commissioner Hammer, for the ground game of that.

Yes, thank you, Judge, and good afternoon, Commissioners. Colby Mahachek, Senior Planner with Hays County Development Services. So this project concerning Lot 26A and Pioneer Ranch's Section 1 will divide the property into two lots. Overall, it's 6.73 acres. One lot will be served by an individual private well. The other will be served by a rainwater collection system. The property does fall within the priority groundwater management area. IT DOES LIE OUTSIDE OF THE EDWARDS AQUIFER CONTRIBUTING ZONE, BUT I WOULD LIKE TO MENTION THAT IN THE PRIORITY GRANDWATER MANAGEMENT AREA THERE ARE TWO SUBZONES, ANY OTHER LYING OUTSIDE THE EDWARDS AQUIFER ZONE AND OF COURSE THE CONTRIBUTING ZONE OF THE EDWARDS AQUIFER. THIS RULE FOR THE SIX ACRE MINIMUM APPLIES TO BOTH OF THOSE AREAS, ESPECIALLY IF A PROPERTY IS USING AN INDIVIDUAL PRIVATE WELL FOR ITS PRIMARY WATER SOURCE. AND AS STATED, THE SIX ACRE THE APPLICANT FOR THIS PROJECT, US KNOWING THAT THERE IS ONE PROPERTY THAT'S USING A PRIVATE WELL, IS REQUESTING A VARIANCE TO THE MINIMUM LOT SIZE REQUIREMENT THAT WOULD OTHERWISE BE SIX ACRES. AS COMMISSIONER HAMMER STATED, THE STATUTE FROM TEXAS LOCAL GOVERNMENT CODE CHAPTER 232-0032 REQUIRED THE COUNTY TO ACTUALLY ASK FOR EACH APPLICATION THAT IS USING INDIVIDUAL PRIVATE WELLS OR GROUNDWATER UNDER THAT PROPERTY TO SUBMIT A GROUNDWATER CERTIFICATION FORM FROM THE TEXAS COMMISSION ON ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY AS WELL AS A PLATA TESTING FORM. BOTH OF THESE FORMS HAVE BEEN RECEIVED WITH THE APPLICATION. SO GROUNDWATER AVAILABILITY HAS BEEN DETERMINED. HOWEVER, THE PRIORITY GROUNDWATER MANAGEMENT AREA MINIMUM LOT SIZE REQUIREMENT, THAT'S WHERE WE'RE FACING THE LOT SIZE ISSUE AT THE TIME.

And beforehand, it used to be five lots or more fell into that six-acre. Go ahead.

Quick correction. Five lots or less would have qualified for an exemption from demonstrating groundwater availability, but Texas Local Government Code 232032 took that parameter out. So there are no exemptions from groundwater availability studies.

So basically this is caused, because this is not a variance from the groundwater availability study. It's a variance from the minimum lot size requirement that was triggered because we require a groundwater availability study, correct?

Essentially correct, yes. But essentially, we're not essentially right.

Yeah, tell me.

Priority groundwater management area, that's where we are. They're using a well. They have submitted a groundwater availability study, but our minimum lot size in this area is six acres.

Right on.

And one of these lots will only be three acres and some change, the other the same amount. One rainwater, one well. One private well. It already has a well on it, correct? Correct. The well is existing.

Did the water availability study go to the groundwater conservation district on this one?

Yeah.

Great question. Good question.

And if not, why not? So again, the form as required by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality is up on their website. Anytime we get an application and we see a private well or groundwater underneath that property, if that form is not received, part of our administrative review of that application is to send a comment requesting that form be completed by a Texas licensed professional engineer or geoscientist. And we do check that before moving forward with the project.

But did you share that with the groundwater district? I know we get them. That's the question that we ask.

Can you answer her question specifically? We did not share that particular form with the groundwater conservation district. And why not? Great question. What do we need to do to support you so that you can? That would be an initiative on our part to ensure that we send it out upon when we receive it with each application.

I guess, Kobe, you know, because we had a really long discussion, and I'm not criticizing. Please don't take it that way. I'm just saying that, you know, we had this long discussion about that, and I know that the judge said there were heads nodding. We're going to do this here forward, right? I mean, correct? Is that what our plan is to now start submitting those reports to the groundwater district?

All the groundwater districts, not just Hays Trinity, but all four that operate in the county.

Yes, that is what we will do moving forward. My understanding, just really quickly, I know Kobe can't answer these questions, but the process has been that... Hold on, Candace.

I was just saying, sending it to all four, like for every single one, and I was just getting clarity on that.

I think we should all benefit from that question.

Whichever groundwater district it falls under, we have four that operate in the county. Let's just ensure that whichever groundwater district it falls under, they get a copy of it when we get the copy.

Yes, sir. So thank you for clarification, Commissioner Howard, because the request was not to send one copy to all four, but only to the corresponding groundwater district. The one I was just discussing. Thank you. Okay, Candace, if you'll continue. Sure.

I was just going to say it's my understanding that staff has requested that the developers prior to this conversation today, we know how to move forward, that they submit that information to the district. So we will update our process and make sure that we send it to the responsible district moving forward.

Perfect. Thank you. And so what is the recommendation and directions?

So, Chase, is it okay if I call Chase up really quick? Sure, absolutely.

Chase, if you'll swap spots here with Colby and state your name and title. He did a great job explaining it. Yes.

Name and title for the viewing public. Chase Young. I'm an assistant criminal district attorney with Pace County Civil Division, and I work with development services fairly regularly on this. Do you mind if I try to restate the problem real quick? Please go for it. So this is a problem with updates in legislation and the interaction between the subdivision rules and our OSSF rules. Can you tell us what the letter stands for? On-site septic facility. Essentially what's happening is that prior to 2019 with the older 232.0032 groundwater availability study requirement, the legislator made it to where we could require groundwater availability statements, but we didn't have to. And so our old development regulations said in certain circumstances, we will require groundwater certifications. However, in one of the, I believe it was 23, the lead cycle that came out, they started making it mandatory for counties and different development services across the state to require groundwater certification, unless the commissioner's court found certain particular findings. And in response to this, one of the actions that the court took was a resolution that they were unable to determine that there is and will be water in perpetuity going forward. And so because of that, that means across the board, any sort of development under 232, we require groundwater availability study. And so what happens then is, Under our OSSF rules, there are a bunch of different categories that are out there. But inside of the PIGMA, the private groundwater management area, there are three different broad categories of minimum lot sizes when attached to an OSSF. And there's a private well. There is inside the contributing zone. There is inside of the recharge zone. And there is inside of the PIGMA, but not inside either the contributing zone or the recharge zone. And so for the inside PIGMA but outside of either one or in the contributing zone, there is one set of minimum lot sizes that are lower. And then there is a footnote, footnote 8, that says if the subdivider is required to have a groundwater availability study, it pumps it up to a much higher minimum groundwater area. which leads kind of to an odd result that the contributing zone or the recharge zone has a much, has actually a lower minimum standard than the other two zones when that is actually arguably the more important of the three different areas. And so it's an odd idiosyncrasy of how the rules work combined with the rules we've gotten from TCEQ and from the resolution and from the update state statute. And so the variance here would basically be to try to recognize that we can have equal protection in having a lower amount than what the rules currently allow us to acquire. Does that make sense? 100%. Perfect.

Just intricacies of rules that are extremely complex.

And in settings where it's not cohesive and you have the conflicting messaging.

So right on, right on. And this does do, sorry, one last thing, if you don't mind. This does make it to where we don't have to deal with our question of the resolution. It makes it into where we have to go through certain findings aspects because this would be a variance from the minimum lot size, not from the requirement to always require a groundwater availability study, which is slightly easier for the bear. We can have that conversation later.

Right on. Right on. Anyone else have any questions or comments?

I would just say typically I would always support my colleague, but this is a hard one for the specific reason of the variance because I probably denied a half dozen of these and never brought them to court. But the reason I would absolutely support this is the fact that one of the houses, and I don't know if it's in the platte, It's specified in the plat. I would sincerely hope that it specifies in there that it is going to be 100% rainwater collection. I find that much easier to deal with, and it makes it much more palatable. So thank you.

And that would go towards the protection that 30TAC 285 requires. And so we have a motion to grant this variance. Please call the roll.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Commissioner Smith?

Yes. Judge Becerra? Yes. We're going to finish J, so let's do one, followed by, let's just do one and two together.

J1PLN-2720-PC, ratify approval for the Cypress Creek Acres, lot 48 and 49B, replat. J2PLN-2854-NP, ratify approval for of Avery Estates' final plat.

So moved. Second? Second.

We have a motion and a second. Is there anything else that needs to be added to this conversation? We're okay. Please call the roll. Commissioner Hammer?

Yes.

Commissioner Smith? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby?

Yes.

Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Judge Becerra?

Yes. If I'm not mistaken, we are on K-4.

Back to K. K-4, discussion and possible action to authorize the execution of an engagement letter effective March 25, 2026, between Hays County and Waterloo Legal Services, PLLC, related to the planned development and financing of the Spring Trail Center project, Hays County Civic Center property.

So moved. Second.

Commissioner Inglesby.

So, Judge, let me make sure I'm on the right one. Oh, so we'd like to retain the attorney to work on this project that had previously worked on this project. He has moved to a different law firm, and so we're just wanting to retain that attorney.

Same attorney. Yes. In a new location. Any questions? Please call the roll.

Commissioner Inglesby. Yes. Commissioner Cohen. Yes. Commissioner Hammer. Yes. Commissioner Smith? Yes. Judge Becerra?

Yes.

K-5. K-5, discussion and possible action to authorize the execution of the First Amendment to the Ellington Development Agreement executed on or about September 16, 2025 between Hayes County and GBRK Edgewood LLC. Declare it.

So moved. Second.

Anything else to add? No, just this is the first agreement. This amendment allows the flexibility and a reasonable design standard for the cul-de-sac and knuckles throughout the development.

Please call the roll.

Commissioner Cohen?

Yes. Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Commissioner Smith? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Judge Becerra? Yes. Case 6. Case 6, discussion and possible action to grant a variance to Section 10.W.1 of the Hayes County Rules for On-Site Sewage Facilities, allowing for the use of portable toilets for the Old Settlers Music Festival, April 17th through 19th, 2026. So moved.

Second. Commissioner?

Pretty self-explanatory. The Old Settlers Music Festival is happening in Driftwood. It originally was there. It moved out of the county for a number of years, and they've come back at a much smaller scale, and they want the availability to use portable toilets there.

Please call the roll. Commissioner Smith?

Yes.

Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Judge Becerra? Yes. Case 7. Case 7, discussion and possible action to authorize the Director of Development Services or designee to establish protocols and requirements and develop related forms to bring back to the Commissioner's Court for purposes of administratively issuing future variances to Section 10.W.1 of the Hayes County on-site sewage facility rules related to the use of portable toilets.

Second. Please call the roll. This is just, instead of having to do this every time and approve portable toilets for events, I thought it would be better to just set up a protocol and let our staff look at it and make a determination.

Please call the roll.

Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Commissioner Smith? Yes. Judge Becerra? Yes. K-10. K-10, discussion and possible action to authorize the acceptance of Amendment No. 5, to the Department of State Health Services Public Health Emergency Preparedness Grant contract in the amount of $126,723. Assembly. Second. Please call the roll. Commissioner Inglesby.

Yes.

Commissioner Cohen. Yes. Commissioner Hammer.

Yes.

Commissioner Smith. Yes. Judge Becerra. Yes. K11. K11, discussion and possible action to authorize the purchase of furniture for the County Clerk's Office in the amount of $4,409.75. related to the approved office renovations and the fiscal year 2026 approved budget, and amend the budget accordingly.

So moved. Second.

Please call the roll. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Smith? Yes. Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby?

Yes.

Judge Becerra? Yes. K13. K13, discussion and possible action to authorize the execution of a contract for RFP 2026-P06HVAC preventative maintenance and repair services countywide between Hayes County and Jansen Luke Meyer, LLC, DBA, Ductman, AC and Heating.

So moved. Second.

Please call the roll. Commissioner Smith. Yes. Commissioner Hammer. Yes. Commissioner Cohen. Yes. Commissioner Inglesby. Yes. Judge Becerra. Yes. K-14. K-14, discussion and possible action to award and execute a contract for IFB 2026-PB06, concrete between Hayes County and True Construction, LLC, to provide concrete materials countywide on an as-needed basis.

So moved. Second.

Please call the roll. Commissioner Smith. Yes. Commissioner Cohen. Yes. Commissioner Inglesby. Yes. Commissioner Hammer. Yes. Judge Becerra. Yes. K-15. K-15. Discussion and possible action to award and execute a contract for IFB 2026-B04 Health Department Roof Repair Hailstorm May 2024 between Hayes County and Alamo Roofing to repair the health department roof due to hail damage totaling $159,319 and amend the budget accordingly. So moved. Second. Who would like to speak on this one?

Tammy Crumley, Director of Facilities and Resource Management. This was a TAC claim and also a FEMA reimbursement claim, so that's why it's taken a little bit.

But is that money coming out of us? No, it's an insurance claim. Insurance money coming to us? Correct. Okay. I just want to make sure because it seemed like it was coming from our budget.

It is not.

Scott Woodland, Budget Officer. Just for some clarification on that, We defer those insurance proceeds when received. It's a generally accepted accounting principle that you recognize those proceeds when the repairs happen. So we deferred them in a prior fiscal year, and we would be recognizing them this year. Very good. So it's not our money.

It's insurance reimbursement. Beautiful. Thank you. Call the roll.

Commissioner Hammer?

Yes.

Commissioner Smith? Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Judge Becerra? Yes. Let's open M1. M1, discussion related to the Hays County inmate population to include current population counts and costs.

The Sheriff's Office sends my office the jail report, jail's capacity report. Hays County's current maximum jail capacity is 464 inmates. Jail standards recommends holding approximately 10% of that open, which lowers our actual capacity to 417. The jail's daily average was 553 and peak was 560 on April 7th. The estimated cost for outsourcing inmates this week is $79,950. The estimated number of, the average number of outsourced males is 111, and females are zero, and they are all housed in Haskell County. Paper-ready inmates, we have 43. And if I'm not mistaken, all executive session items will be open? Let's open them all. The burn ban expired. It's lifted. And with this rain that came upon us, take advantage of the downtime to chop some wood and go burn.

L1, executive session pursuant to sections 551.071 and 551.087 of the Texas Government Code, consultation with council and deliberation regarding economic development negotiations associated with Project Grease Lightning Project Eagle Pro, Project Disco Inferno, and Project Flying V. Possible discussion and or action may follow in open court. L2, executive session pursuant to sections 551.071 and 551.072 of the Texas Government Code, consultation with council and deliberation regarding the purchase, exchange, lease, and or value of real property associated with parks and open spaces projects being considered by Hayes County including the Presa Grande Trailhead and Grammys Park. Possible discussion and or action may follow an open court. L3, executive session pursuant to Section 551.071 and Section 551.072 of the Texas Government Code, consultation with counsel and deliberation regarding the purchase, exchange, lease, and or value of real property located at or near Roger Hanks Parkway and Precinct 4. Possible discussion and or action may follow an open court. L4 executive session pursuant to sections 551.071 and 551.072 of the Texas Government Code, consultation with council and deliberation to consider a resolution determining the necessity and authorizing the use of the county's power of eminent domain to acquire fee simple interest in .0376 acres from property owned by 2300 Windy Hill Road, LLC and which is required for the construction of the proposed Windy Hill Roadway improvements and utility adjustments and take other appropriate action, parcel 40, possible discussion and or action may follow an open court. L5, executive session pursuant to sections 551.071 and 551.072 of the Texas Government Code, consultation with council and deliberation to consider a resolution determining the necessity and authorizing the use of the county's power of eminent domain to acquire a fee simple interest in 2.740 acres from property owned by Arenaman OG1 LLC and which is required for the construction of the proposed FM 2001 gap roadway improvements and utility adjustments and take other appropriate action. Parcel 29C, possible discussion and or action may follow an open court. L6, executive session pursuant to sections 551.071 and 551.072 of the Texas Government Code, consultation with council and deliberation to consider a resolution determining the necessity and authorizing the use of the county's power of eminent domain to acquire fee simple interest in .8928 acres from property owned by Satterwhite Multifamily LLC. and which is required for the construction of the proposed FM 2001 gap roadway improvements and utility adjustments and take other appropriate action. Parcel 29A, possible discussion interaction may follow an open court L7 executive session pursuant to sections 551.071 and 551.074 of the Texas Government Code Consultation with Counsel and Deliberation regarding the employment, evaluation, reassignment, duties, discipline, or dismissal of the Parks and Natural Resources Manager. Possible discussion and or action may follow an open court L8 executive session pursuant to sections 551.071 and 551.074 of the Texas Government Code Consultation with Council and deliberation regarding the employment, evaluation, reassignment, duties, discipline, or dismissal of the Director of Development Services Possible discussion and or action may follow an open court.

Beautifully done. I can't believe you did that whole thing without a sip of water. Honestly, good job. If you are not directly tied to these executive session items, please clear the courtroom. I should come in here when court is closed and just... All right, we are back from executive session, and we have a few motions. I will recap it. Two, three, four, five, six, seven, and eight. So we will begin with item number two, Commissioner Hammer, if I'm not mistaken.

Yes, and there's two items on this, Judge. So first motion, authorizing the execution of a real estate purchase agreement between Hayes County and Thornton Living Trust. regarding the purchase of approximately 2.75 acres of real property known as Grammys Park, located at or near 14703 FM 150 in Driftwood, Precinct 3, utilizing parks and open space bond funds as discussed in an executive session. And second is to motion to authorize the execution of a quick claim deed for Hayes County to Lisa Greaves Taylor, Lauren Greaves, Jennifer Roberts, and Emily Roberts, trustee of the Logan Preston Roberts Estate, or sorry, trust regarding 3.69 acres of real property known as the Presa Grande Trailhead as referenced in instrument number 22050584 filed in the real property records of Hays County, Texas and authorized the county administrator's office and the civil division of Hays County Criminal Court District Attorney's Office to execute any documents associated therewith.

Second. Please call the roll on both motions.

Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Smith? Yes. Judge Becerra?

Yes. Okay, if I'm not mistaken, Commissioner Smith.

This is on item L3. I move to exercise the county's right to terminate the commercial contract including any and all extensions between Hays County and 400 West Old 290 and Roger Hanks Parkway LLC related to the possible purchase of real property located at or near Roger Hanks Parkway in Precinct 4 and authorize the county administrator's office and civil division of the Hays County Criminal District Attorney's Office to execute any documents associated therewith.

Second. Any questions or comments? I will simply say thank you, commissioners. We dodged a bullet. Please call the roll.

Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Commissioner Smith? Yes. Judge Becerra?

Yes. And if I'm not mistaken, we will now go to Commissioner Inglesby with number four.

Thank you, Judge. I'd like to make a motion to adopt a resolution determining the necessity of and authorizing the use of Hays County's power of eminent domain to acquire a fee simple interest in... 0.0376 acres from property located along Windy Hill Road, parcel 40, owned by 2300 Windy Hill Road LLC and which is required for the construction of the proposed Windy Hill Roadway improvements and utility adjustments and authorize county staff and consultants to make other appropriate action related therewith. Second.

Please call the roll. Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Smith? Yes. Judge Becerra?

Yes. Commissioner Coyle, would you like to read five and six together? Yes, I would. Thank you. Thank you.

Regarding L5, motion to adopt a resolution determining the necessity of and authorizing the use of Hays County's power of eminent domain to acquire fee simple interest in 2.740 acres from property located along FM 2001 and Satterwhite Road, parcel 29C. owned by Aramon OG1 LLC, and which is required for the construction of the proposed FM 2001 gap roadway improvements and utility adjustments and authorized county staff and consultants to take other appropriate actions related therewith. Also, in regards to L6, motion to adopt a resolution determining the necessity of and authorizing the use of Hays County's power of eminent domain to acquire a fee simple interest and 0.8928 acres from property located along FM 2001 and Siderwhite Road, Parcel 29A, owned by Siderwhite Multifamily LLC, and which is required for the construction of proposed FM 2001 gap roadway improvements and utility adjustments and authorized county staff and consultants to take appropriate action related therewith.

So there was two motions, four, five, and six, and Commissioner Inglesby seconded them both. Please call the roll.

Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Commissioner Inglesby? Yes. Commissioner Hammer? Yes. Commissioner Smith? Yes. Judge Becerra? Yes. Commissioner Hammer, number seven.

To accept the regrade of the Parks and Natural Resources Manager Slot 0171-001 to Park Superintendent Grade 126, Step 9, effective as of April 16, 2026.

Second.

Please call the roll. Commissioner Hammer. Yes. Commissioner Smith. Yes. Commissioner Inglesby. Yes. Commissioner Cohen. Yes. Judge Becerra. Yes. Commissioner Smith.

This is item L8. I move to appoint Michael Burlad as interim director of development services effective April 16, 2026, and include an acting pay stipend of $1,000 per month.

Second.

Please call the roll.

Commissioner Hammer. Yes. Commissioner Smith.

Yes.

Commissioner Inglesby?

Yes. Commissioner Cohen? Yes. Judge Becerra? Yes. Commissioner Smith, one more time.

Motion to adjourn.