Category: Hour summaries

Hours 0:00 – 8:04, 2/17/26

by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

Citizen Comment:

This lasted for almost 5 hours. By my count, there were about 66 speakers, (plus another 44 at the public hearing that started twenty minutes later, and another five speakers at the 3 pm workshops).

Of the 66:

11 in favor. They break down as follows:

  • I am Maberry, just a guy trying to make a zillion dollars
  • I am Maberry’s lawyer
  • I am a guy from Kissing Tree who has gotten involved in local politics over the last six months. I see this as being pro-business!
  • 8 of us are union workers, all wearing matching orange shirts. Maberry promised to hire union workers to build this thing. We’re going to talk about why unions are generally good.

55 speakers opposed. The basic arguments:

  • Data Centers use too much water, and we’re in a historic drought, and climate change is going to dry out Texas further.
  • Data centers use too much electricity, which requires even more water
  • Data centers pollute the environment in general industrial ways
  • Approving this will not prevent a different one – ERCOT has stated that they’re committed to just growing the grid to meet demand.
  • There is not a significant gain in jobs
  • Listen to the people! Can you believe how many of us showed up tonight?!
  • About 3000 people signed an online petition against this. That’s more than most of you got in votes, when you were elected.
  • Emotional or spiritual arguments towards conservation, or talking more generally about AI

If I had to guess, there were about 300 people hanging out on the lawn outside the meeting, but not everyone spoke.

A couple specifically memorable comments:

  • Please don’t destroy my way of life. My family has put everything into this farm.
  • I worked at a data center. It’s basically a remote job, except two days a year when you work in person.
  • How will the waste from the closed loop system with all its chemicals be safely disposed of?
  • Study from International Energy Agency: Each MHW of energy uses 1850 gallons of water per day, onsite and offsite. Since Maberry’s is going to be 375 MWH, this would be 693K gallons of day.
  • John David Carson: yes, it’s true, I want to put in a data center next door to this one, too. But listen guys: mine’s going to be so much better! There’s gonna be homes, and a green space, and a data center, and you’ll just love it! Vote this other guy down though, please and thank you.

(I listened to everything, but I confess that I played it at 1.75x speed.)

Citizen comment lasts until 10:52 pm. Fortunately, the data center is the very first item.

….

Item 8: The Data Center

Back story: Discussed previously here, here,here,here, here, here, and here.

Here’s the super short version:

  • March 2025: Maberry wants to rezone his land to build a data center.
    There is a huge outcry from the public. P&Z denies the rezoning.
  • August 2025: The rezoning goes to council.
    It needs 6 votes to overturn P&Z. Maberry only gets 5 votes.
  • January 2026: Maberry re-applied for his rezoning to P&Z.
    This time P&Z approves it.
    This means that Council only needs 4 votes to pass it.
  • February 2026: Activists successfully file a “valid petition” with signatures from residents within 200 yards. So Council is back to needing a supermajority (6 votes) once again.

These are all the data centers (that I’ve heard about) trying to get built in Hays County:

  1. Maberry, the one that Council will vote on tonight.
  2. Carson properties. He talked at Citizen Comment, above.
  3. I don’t know who. These guys call it the “Doster property“
  4. Cloudburst Data Center (already being built)

There could be more – these are just the ones I’ve heard about.

The presentation:

It’s mostly the same presentation that we’ve heard for the past year.

  • All the concessions that Maberry is going to put in the restrictive covenant
  • How he’ll mitigate the noise
  • How it’s going to be a closed-loop system that uses less water than a field full of single-family homes.
  • Wouldn’t it be worse to put homes out there?
  • Yes, it’s a lot of energy used, but it comes from the entire state. It’s not drawing on our power plant in particular.
  • It’s a LOT of property tax income.

Council approval of the rezoning will require 6 votes, because of the valid petition.

A “valid petition” is a very specific thing in Texas – if you get enough signatures of land owners within 200 feet, the rezoning has to pass with a supermajority. The activists successfully got enough neighbors to trigger this.

….

The public hearing: Another chance for the public to weigh in!

Same arguments, minus the union workers who all went home. This time it’s 2 in favor (Maberry and his lawyer) and 42 opposed.

….

Finally, we get to the Council Discussion. It is 1:20 am. Holy moly.

Right out of the gate, Lorenzo moves to postpone.

Listen, this is insane. I was flabbergasted: literally hundreds of people have carved time out of their schedule to show up tonight, and this item has been kicked around for over a year. Nothing is being rushed through here!

Everyone wants to know why?

Lorenzo: There have been a lot of questions raised! We need to do our due diligence!

Amanda is spitting nails with fury. “That’s it? That’s your reason?” She’s seething with contempt. “Postponing would be torturing people. Stop playing with people. This is unserious and disrespectful.”

(She is 100% correct. Postponing is wild.)

Alyssa: Was the newest version of the restricted covenant available to everyone?
Answer: Basically no. We got it late this afternoon, and just kinda threw it up on the message boards. [Read it here, if you want. It’s pretty short.]

Jane: Postponement is a bad idea. If you sincerely need more time, you can vote yes tonight, and then we can delay the second vote.

Josh: I don’t get it. What’s the point of postponing this?

Lorenzo: I campaigned against single family sprawl. Right now, it sounds like we’re picking between a data center and single family homes in the middle of nowhere. I want to know if there’s a 3rd option.

Alyssa keeps speaking in coded language: “This does not exist in isolation. I am stuck on the larger conversation. I am not clear on the ripple effects.”

She is referring to John David Carson’s property, immediately next door. Legally, council members can only talk about the item on the agenda. She wants to be able to talk about both projects, simultaneously.

Matthew sounds genuinely stressed out: I used to be a yes. Things are changing and the water facts are weighing heavily on me. I truly don’t know how I am going to vote.

Amanda speaks to Matthew directly: I know you’re wrestling with this. But these people have been fighting for a year. It would be cruel to drag it out.

Matthew considers this and says: I don’t want to torture everyone by postponing, so I’ll vote no on postponing. But I might vote yes tonight, so that I can buy myself more time before the final vote.

The vote on postponement

Should Council kick the can down the road, till March 31st?

Thank GOD that failed. Good lord.

In hindsight, the pivotal moment of the night was when Amanda spoke directly to Matthew and got him to switch his vote to “no” on postponement. Otherwise, this tortured mess would have gotten prolonged for another six weeks.

This vote is a very bad look for Jane, Shane, and Lorenzo!

….

Onto the real discussion

Alyssa makes a motion to deny. This means a few things:

  • “No means yes” – if you vote no, you’re voting for the data center.
  • This would be the denial that never happened last August. Denials mean that the developer can’t come back for six months. Denials are important.

Jane: I feel good about the closed loop water system. But now I understand about the offsite water, from the electrical usage. That’s new to me.

Alyssa: This is a local pre-emption issue. Everything is always a local pre-emption issue. We’re always being screwed over by the state.

Note: “Local pre-emption” means that the state keeps taking powers away from local government. It’s a giant fucking problem in Texas.

However: for data center permits, it’s the counties that have been pre-empted, not the cities. Literally, San Marcos can vote no on this data center because we still have that power. The real fight is at the county level.

…

Amanda: I worked for five years at the capitol. I felt rage most nights. There are some very conservative forces up there. But listen: there are seeds of a bipartisan movement. Very conservative Republicans are actually saying things about water conservation that I agree with. The problem is that the legislation does not meet until 2027, and that might literally be too late. There are 400 data centers now, and 1000 more that want to get permitted before 2027.

College Station just denied a data center. Their mayor said, “Even if it’s not our water and our electricity, it’s drawing on someone’s water and someone’s electricity.” At least we can say no to one, tonight.

Alyssa: whoopsie! I zoned out. Amanda, can you catch me up real quick on what you just said?

Amanda: [throws knives with eyes] Are you serious?

Alyssa: tee-hee!

[Very tense, weird moment passes]

Matthew: Can they de-annex and build it anyway?
Answer: Not without Council approval.

…

Sidebar: Why WOULD anyone consider voting for this!?

The reason that councilmembers are struggling is because this city is very, very broke. This is their own fault. Or more specifically, it’s the fault of Lorenzo, Matthew, Shane, and former council member Saul Gonzales.

Last summer, staff gave a very serious budget presentation. Council was presented this choice:

For months, Council told staff to plan on a structurally balanced budget. They geared up for a tax hike. If you own a $300K house, you were going to pay an extra $10/month.

Literally at the last second, Lorenzo got cold feet and immediately, those four switched their vote.

So instead, we did this:

and now we’re like this:

That is why this data center is so tempting – the city budget is strained to its limit.

(I’m still angry at them for that vote. Read it all here.)

…

So let’s vote already!

The vote to DENY the data center (ie yes means no):

Famous image by now – you’ve seen this all over social media! This specific proposal is dead.

Josh: Thank you to everyone. The consensus tonight is what changed my mind. But look, I want to solve city budget problems, and this would have brought in a lot of money.

Translation: I might vote for the next one.

…

My $.02:

  • I sincerely think that Matthew was wrestling with the decision, and voted yes to buy himself more time.
  • I sincerely have no fucking clue what Lorenzo is thinking.
  • Carson’s data center proposal is clearly waiting in the wings

This is a big win for democracy. This was the right vote, because we live in a democracy, and the people expressed their opinion loud and clear.

But this was not the big win yet for water. I know that’s depressing. This was the easy part – really – because it happened within the rules. This was a symbolic victory.

The real victory will be getting the rules changed so that counties can regulate data centers.

Listen: if you signed the petition, or showed up on Tuesday, you must understand this. You have not saved anything yet. You need to join the data.center.action.coalition and Save Our Springs and SMRF, and bring all of this amazing energy to the county and state level.

  • Get Ruben Becerra to challenge data centers in court. Attend Hays County Commission’s Court on Tuesday, 9 am, at the town square.
  • Show up at the Texas Water Development Board meetings
  • Pressure all candidates running for office to take a stand on regulating ground and surface water. Make the November elections about water and data centers*.

This was a win for democracy, but it was not yet a win for the environment. Celebrate, but then buckle down again. Please.

* I mean, the November elections should be about data centers, but also ICE and Trump and all the other dumpster fires burning right now.

…..

Special note: As long as we’re talking about clean water, let me plug this SMRF petition against polluting the Freeman’s Ranch with rocket fuel because some company wants to test rockets there.

…..

Item 12: The Strategic Plan

Next September, Council will pass the 2027 budget. This is the first step.

Backstory:

As I mentioned above, last summer Lorenzo, Shane, Matthew, and former council member Saul voted for this:

(I’m really not exaggerating. See here.)

and so now our city budget looks like this:

The big theme for the Visioning workshops was this: “All the departments are making drastic cuts and it’s really awful and will make voters mad.”

As the kids say: we’re in the “find out” part of FAFO.

…

Anyway, Council heard a lot from each department, and then they put their own goals into the Vision Board.

Here are the major changes from last year, by category:

Category 1: QUALITY OF LIFE & SENSE OF PLACE

  • Identifying and addressing accommodations for community members with disabilities
  • Getting more town halls and videos from the city, and more zoom access to town halls
  • More public art, from diverse cultural perspectives.
  • Work with downtown partners
  • Work on making outdoor spaces more kid-friendly
  • Get some sort of volunteer home repair thing for home owners experiencing hardship
  • Get some affordability standards in our Public Improvement Districts

Category 2: ECONOMIC VITALITY

  • Safe working conditions and better wages for workers when the company is getting tax breaks.
  • Get some businesses in town that will create kid-friendly spaces
  • Figure out some way to work on the dire child care situation in town
  • Be realistic about our budget woes


Category 3: PUBLIC SAFETY, CORE SERVICES & FISCAL EXCELLENCE

  • Work on SMPD and SMFD staffing and training, in light of the budget woes.
  • Partner with Texas State on downtown safety
  • Make bills payable on the 1st and 15th, and have a better grace period


Category 4: MOBILITY & CONNECTIVITY

  • do something about replacing the scooter rentals
  • Maybe a free bike program!
  • Better bus shelters and seating.

Note: The free bike thing reminds me – we desperately need sidewalks all the way down to the high school. We do not need kids skirting the edge of 123.


Category 5: ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION

  • Get the word out on the water rebate program
  • Work on our drought stages
  • We are all thinking about the data center, but we can’t say “data center” because of legal rules around only discussing what’s on the agenda.

……

And here’s the whole thing, with changes highlighted:

Category 1: QUALITY OF LIFE & SENSE OF PLACE

Category 2: ECONOMIC VITALITY


Category 3: PUBLIC SAFETY, CORE SERVICES & FISCAL EXCELLENCE


Category 4: MOBILITY & CONNECTIVITY



Category 5: ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION

…

There were some other items – improvements on Linda Drive, some certificates of obligation to take on debt to fund some big projects, some nominations for boards and commissions – but council zipped through everything super fast. So I will, too!

Hours 0:00 – 7:27, 2/3/26

by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

Citizen Comment:

The biggest topic of the night is the data center. 12 people spoke:

  • 1 in favor
  • 10 opposed
  • One neutral board member from Crystal Clear Water, who says some interesting things.

I’ll summarize everyone’s comments when we get to Item 11.

Other topics:

  • The Teacher Re-use nonprofit in San Marcos sounds great.
  • San Marcos is busy, and needs more businesses!
  • Loose pit bulls attacked my dog and me, and neither SMPD nor Animal Control nor the animal shelter was willing to do anything about it.
  • The KZSM issue (2 speakers)

The KZSM issue: KZSM 104.1 is the local non-commercial FM station in town. (They’re great! Check them out here!) As the speaker says, “We bring the voices, music and culture of San Marcos to the airwaves, streaming and podcasting.”

The city used to also have it’s own radio station, KZOS. In 2022, the city agreed to shut it down and transfer the assets to KZSM. This was a big generous move, and everyone was happy.

But the city didn’t finish the transfer. Like, it fizzled out and lost momentum? You can still listen to KZOS here, and the city is apparently still paying streaming fees and music licensing fees.

The speakers say: “We have tried for more than a year to explain the facts to City staff, to ask them to correct the website and to keep its promise. That is, to transfer the hardware, software and music library to KZSM. That will turn off the KZOS stream… We could use the money the City is paying for this, since we have to pay these fees out of whatever we can get from donations.”

I gotta say: I’ve never heard of KZOS and it’s wild that the city is running a tiny, redundant little radio station.

…

Item 9: Historic Preservation Plan

Last time, community members had a lot of concerns about the plan. The plan has good details, but it is short on the implementation part. What’s prioritized? What’s first? Is this all going to get shelved and forgotten? Etc.

Staff brought back a summary of all the complaints:

Basically, they’re adopting all the red and blue comments. If you want to read all 39 pages of comments, knock yourself out, here.

There’s going to be an oversight committee that governs the rest, and quarterly reports to Council.

The vote:

I think Matthew and Lorenzo did not yet trust the implementation process.

If you’d like to read the plan yourself, enjoy it here.

On we go!

…

Item 10:  Post Road and Uhland

About a year ago, this little strip came to Council for rezoning:

It was these eight plots of land:

And the owner wanted to convert them to condos.

Notice how the top corner lot is missing?  That brings us to today:

There it is! It’s the missing corner lot. They want to rezone this corner to match the rest.  Great!

Everyone is fine with this.

….

Item 11: The Data Center

Back story: Discussed previously here, here, here, here, here.

Super short version:

  • March 2025: Maberry wants to rezone his land to build a data center.
    There is a huge outcry from the public. P&Z denies the rezoning.
  • August 2025: The rezoning goes to council.
    It needs 6 votes to overturn P&Z. Maberry only gets 5 votes.
  • January 2025: Maberry re-applied for his rezoning to P&Z.
    This time P&Z approves it.

Now it’s back to council. No vote tonight – it is just a public hearing.

Two notes:

1. Every step of the way, there has been a massive outcry from the community. There are hours of citizen comments, town halls, letters written, etc. A lot of people are furiously opposed to this data center.

2. There are a lot of data centers being built in Hays County.

These are the local data centers I know about so far:

  1. Maberry, the one that Council will vote on.
  2. Carson properties, see below
  3. I don’t know who. These guys call it the “Doster property“
  4. Cloudburst Data Center (already being built)

None of those, besides Maberry, can be stopped, because they’re all in the county.

And here are the ones in Texas:

About 400 so far.

…

Public Hearing:

There are 14 more speakers: 3 in favor, 11 opposed. (Some speak twice.) I’m combining all the major points from earlier in the meeting and this public hearing.

Here are the major points from the activists:

  • Data centers use an unbelievable amount of water. We’re in a severe drought.
  • They use a ton of electricity, and electric plants also use a lot of water
  • This is not going to create many jobs.
  • You’re ignoring the comp plan!
  • You’re ignoring hundreds of people.
  • It’s extremely difficult to win lawsuits against companies that use more water than they’re allowed to use.
  • This will cause ERCOT to grow the grid, which uses more water.
  • Crystal Clear Water is in water-debt and in financial debt. But they’re legally obligated to provide water that they literally don’t have.
  • This is a violation of the Land Development Code
  • The optics of this are horrible.

And the arguments from the supporters:

  • These will be union labor jobs!
  • We’re willing to make lots of concessions. You can’t negotiate with any of the data centers in the county.
  • This petition thing is bullshit! (more below)

One neutral person speaks: he is from the Crystal Clear Water Board. Crystal Clear is the folks who would be providing water to Maberry. He says:

  • Maberry claimed that he’s putting water use in the restrictive covenant, and that the water use is about half of what it would be if he built homes out there.
  • As a board member, I would like to clarify: he only has a residential use agreement. He’s not allowed to substitute for commercial, industrial, or agriculture uses. Strictly residential.

…

Two technical points that might swing this decision towards the activists?

  1. The waiting period.

(There has been confusion about Council’s non-denial. If Council denies a rezoning, there is a one-year waiting period. However, Council did not technically deny the data center last August.)

But there was a second technicality pointed out!

This is from the Land Development Code, section 2.5.1.2.F:

Maybe this does apply. Maberry did withdraw their zoning request after that meeting in August.

2. The Valid Petition

In Texas, there is something called “a valid petition“. This is a way for neighbors to prevent a rezoning. If 20% of the neighbors within 200 yards sign a valid petition, then the rezoning requires a supermajority at City Council.

So this is what the neighbors have done.

This might be a game-changer, because the data center can probably get 4 council votes, but not 6 council votes.

One side note on the valid petition

It is mostly signed by residents who own farms next to this site. But the last signature on the petition is not from a home-owner:

Carson Properties signed the petition. They also want to build a data center, right next to Maberry.

The home-owners are the ones who did the hard work of collecting signatures. But the petition definitely benefits Carson’s ability to build their data center.

…

Let me address the activism directly:

The activists are in an impossible position, because Texas politics is very rigged:

  1. They care deeply about the environment and critical drought in central Texas. (Me too!)
  2. Data centers, as an industry, pose a real existential threat to the water resources in this state.
  3. Texas has entrenched systems that make it virtually impossible to fight the data center industry.

This is a slow-motion trainwreck, and it’s really awful.

Maberry is a lightning rod for all this activism and anger, because he uniquely made the dumbass decision to get his land annexed into the city. So out of 400 data centers in Texas, this one can be fought.

A victory against Maberry is symbolic, but not much more than symbolic.

Here’s what Council’s decision is:

My two cents

I am a little exasperated with the activists, because I don’t like extremely hyperbolic language. I hear lots of people overstating the situation – “people will die!” and “the river will run dry!” and “there is literally no reason to vote for this!” – and none of that is accurate.

But far more than that, I’m angry at the state government. We’re in this no-win situation because they refuse to do their job.

I think the real path forward probably involves following:

  • Legal battles from water districts who are legally obligated to supply water that they do not have.
  • Legal battles from counties that have no mechanism to regulate natural resources
  • Activists and environmentalists who are extremely concerned about the drought.
  • ERCOT needs to continue to transition to low-water energy sources like wind and solar
  • the Texas Water Development Board needs to step in to help coordinate all this.

My sincere hope is that the activists see themselves as part of a much larger fight than just Maberry’s data center.

What does Council say?

Barely anything! There’s no vote tonight.

Here’s where we are on the timeline:

The big discussions and votes will happen on February 17th and March 3rd.

That is when all the wheeling-and-dealing will take place. Stay tuned.

…

Sidebar: Valid petitions are also called Tyrant’s Vetos, and they are generally not good:

Valid petitions are an obscure zoning procedure that have been used to try to obstruct a Dallas hospital expansion, student housing in Bryan, and Habitat for Humanity houses in Austin.

Lefty groups generally do not like them because they are anti-democratic and a big NIMBY problem. They make it incredibly easy to block things (like affordable housing) that a city needs to support its residents. Last year, the Texas legislature fixed it to some extent.

…

Item 12: Rooftop on the Square

This is one of those clubs on the square.  It’s located here:

and looks like this:

They first opened in 2012. Based on their webpage, it looks like this:

It advertises “first class vibes”, and looks like a good place to get blackout drunk and get felt up.  Maybe that’s your jam!

It is NOT the jam of P&Z.  

So, the Rooftop first pissed off P&Z back in August, 2025. The Rooftop is technically a restaurant and not a bar. (Can’t you tell?) So they have a restaurant alcohol permit, not a bar alcohol permit. This means that they’re supposed to be selling at least a little bit of food and pretending that patrons are not merely trying to get blackout drunk.

They were not selling any sort of food.

Here’s how Code Compliance writes things when they are really fed up with a business:

In August, due to all these shenanigans, P&Z gave the Rooftop a 3 month alcohol permit.

They were supposed to:

  1. Get some sort of food service up and running
  2. Get that nasty health violation stuff cleaned up.
  3. Keep your nose clean for three months.

December, 2025: they did not keep their noses clean!

1. The food stuff is fine: first they worked out something with Bagel Bros, and then replaced Bagel Bros with a food truck.  Great!

2. The health inspection stuff is so-so: they mostly got this stuff cleared up, but Matthew Mendoza toured the place and found it disgusting, even after they’d been working on it for awhile. He reported seeing these little buzzballz liquor bottles stashed all over the place:

3. Did they at least keep their noses clean? No. They got NINE police calls during that same three month window. 

To be fair, some of those were initiated by Rooftop staff. You don’t want to ding an establishment for calling the cops themselves. But the one that is a really big problem is Halloween weekend.

If you remember, that was the night that a person was killed downtown. That killing did not specifically involve the Rooftop, but a bunch of other stuff did.

So what did involve the Rooftop?

Here’s the police report from that one night:

Here’s the fire marshal report about why the Rooftop was shut down that night:

The fire marshal said to the manager, “I can either close you down, or we can empty the place and count how many people leave.”

The manager said, “Let’s empty the place out, and count!”

No one can recall the exact number of people who came out of the Rooftop, but the fire marshal decided it needed to be closed down.

Finally, and most damning of all, this police bit from after the shooting:

I mean, dude. DUDE. You’re letting in underage dudes with guns in their pajamas! While you’re on probation! If you’re trying to smooth things over with the grown-ups at P&Z, this ain’t the way.

Over the next few weeks, there was some mixed communication between SMPD and the manager, as SMPD tried to locate the Rooftop surveillance video for the night. It got automatically erased after seven days.

Bottom line: due to all this, P&Z denied the alcohol permit.  No booze for you, Rooftop.

…

Which brings us to tonight!

The Rooftop is appealing the P&Z decision. This means that it will take a supermajority of councilmembers to overturn the P&Z decision. In other words, it takes 6 votes out of 7 to overturn the denial.

At the public hearing, there are four people from the Rooftop who all try to plead their case:

  • We’ve gotten LOTS of renewals since 2012!
  • Sometimes WE’RE the good guys who called the cops!
  • On that crazy Halloween night, all the bars were shut down, not just us!
  • We have metal detector wands and dress codes.
  • Listen, it was a mix up about the security video from Halloween night.

And then there was the lawyer, who was mostly very repetitious:

  • This is arbitrary and capricious!
  • This is hearsay!
  • Quasi-judicial setting!
  • Not clear and substantial new evidence!
  • You can’t make decisions on emotions! P&Z does everything emotionally!

She seemed to be mostly threatening to sue if they were shut down.

Ok then.

What does Council say?

Matthew is a hard no: “When I toured your establishment, you all were very dismissive of all these problems. There were ball bottles stashed everywhere. There was a nasty patch in the kitchen that still wasn’t clean.”

SMPD:

  • This was not arbitrary and capricious.
  • It’s not hearsay when it comes from a police report.
  • We were at the Rooftop because of a fight – not arbitrary nor capricious.
  • The fight spanned two locations.
  • They were the only bar closed for overcrowding, before the shooting. All the other bars were shut down because of the shooting.

Manager:

  • We wand and pat down every person that enters!
  • Two separate lines for 18+, 21+
  • There’s a dress code! No baggy pants, no sweatsuits, no jerseys, no do-rags.

Alyssa: Sounds a little bit racist!

(I had that same thought.)

Code compliance:

  • We flagged a LOT of problems in September.
  • Since then, they’ve been very cooperative. Almost everything code-related is cleared up.

Lorenzo does his very Lorenzo thing, where he gets bogged down in overly technical amendments. “What if they try to outsmart us and serve food during the daytime and not serve food at nighttime? We should require two full time periods! No, we should limit their hours of operation! But what about the Superbowl on Sunday? Are they trying to pull a fast one on us?” None of this goes anywhere.

…

Other amendments that they consider:

  • Making the alcohol permit last 4 months. (this passes)
  • Make them 21 and up (this does not pass)
  • They must hire more off-duty cops (I don’t remember).

At one point, Josh Paselk asks SMPD Chief Standridge point blank: “Can you all work with this business? Do you feel okay about them?”

Chief Standridge: “We can work with ANYBODY. We will always do our best to keep the community safe! That said, the rest of the downtown businesses are sick of underage kids getting blackout drunk and puking everywhere.”

I’m paraphrasing a little bit, but that’s the gist of it. The Downtown Business Association would like to see some accountability among the bar owners.

Two hours later, the vote to restore the alcohol permit for the Rooftop:

<drumroll…> (Remember it needs six votes to pass)

That’s not a supermajority! IT FAILED.

The Rooftop has lost it’s alcohol permit.

….

How long until they can reapply and reopen? The city lawyer said he needed to stop and look it up, but then we never found out. It might be one year.

(I hunted around the Land Development Code and couldn’t figure it out, either.)

…

Item 13: Whisper PDD

Whisper PDD is this development, way up north:

PDD stands for “Planned Development District” and it means that there are all sorts of fiddly rules about what they can and can’t do.

What these guys want to do is….

a FOURTH HEB?! what? Didn’t we just break ground on our THIRD HEB?

Guys, this is like an embarrassment of riches. We’re going to be swimming in HEBs. You’re going to have so many high quality groceries from this good-hearted company, you’re not going to know what to do with yourself.

Here’s where it will go:

Everyone is a hard yes.

Just one thought: they’re not going to try to shut down little HEB, are they? It’s so well-loved.

…

Item 5: New train bridge!

Maybe you’ve noticed that we have a lot of trains in San Marcos. Here are the railroad lines through town:

source

This is why the trains sometimes completely stop – they’re merging or crossing tracks or avoiding another train.

Here’s the south side of town:

The tracks are running parallel to I-35. When there’s a train stopped, you have to go to Wonderworld to go over it (or find the end of the train and go around it).

But change is a-coming! Good news, Centerpoint fans! YOU get a train bridge!

You lucky dogs. Now don’t spend it all in one place.

…

Item 8: Downtown security

SMPD is trying to keep downtown from spinning out of control on the weekends.

They struck a deal with Texas State PD: Texas State is kicking in $150K to help pay for officers downtown.

Just this once, though! It’s not an ongoing deal.

…

Item 15: Appointments to boards and commissions

We were already six hours deep in the meeting, and I didn’t know any of the names of the people being appointed, and so I didn’t listen very carefully to this bit.

Sorry about that!

Hours 0:00 – 2:35, 1/20/26

by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

Citizen Comment:

Only six speakers! (Contrast that with P&Z – about 100 speakers. We’ll get to that!)

Topics covered:

  • Community Action is stoked about renewing the lease for the senior citizens center
  • Please postpone the Historic Preservation Plan
  • Oppression is violence. Your neglect is violence against us.
  • A list of names of people killed so far by ICE
  • Reappointing the chair of the San Marcos Housing Authority

That was about it!

….

Item 17: River Bridge Ranch PID

River Bridge Ranch is way out here:

It came up in December, here, when it shrunk to the new, smaller size.

They want to put homes out here.   It’s part of this larger cluster of developments that have been in the works for years and years:

I have never liked ANY of these, whatsoever.  They all fail four of the five criteria:

Price Tag to the City: Will it bring in taxes that pay for itself, over the lifespan of the infrastructure and future repair? How much will it cost to extend roads, utilities, on fire and police coverage, on water and wastewater?

Hard fail.  Cities lose money on remote developments.  The developer may cover the initial cost of infrastructure, but the longterm maintenance is on us.  Plus running fire, EMS, and police services way out there.  The property taxes will not cover the cost to the city.

Housing stock: How long will it take to build? How much housing will it provide? What is the forecasted housing deficit at that point? Is it targeting a price-point that serves what San Marcos needs?

It’s claiming to provide affordable starter homes. This is something that people want, yes.  

Environment: Is it on the aquifer? Is it in a flood zone? Will it create run off into the river?Are we looking at sprawl? Is it uniformly single-family homes?

Not on the aquifer. Somewhat close to the river. But it’s textbook sprawl, and sprawl is bad for the environment.  Most likely entirely single-family homes.  

Social: Is it meaningfully mixed income? Is it near existing SMCISD schools and amenities?

Not meaningfully mixed income.  Not close to any schools or amenities.  Not walkable. Council gave away potential nearby commerce spots in 2023, in exchange for more sprawl. 

The San Marxist Special: Is it a mixed-income blend of single family houses, four-plexes, and eight-plexes, all mixed together? With schools, shops, restaurants, and public community space sprinkled throughout? Is it walkable?

Ha, no. 

River Bridge Ranch also has a weird backstory.  Here’s what seems to have happened:

2008:  There’s some 563-acre property called The Mayan Tract, and the owner wants to be annexed into San Marcos.  Martindale agreed to this.

2014: New owners buy the property.

2018: The new owners file a lawsuit to challenge the validity of the annexation.  Martindale joins the suit.

2020: The suit gets settled in 2020.  This thing called a PID is formed as part of the settlement.  (We’ll get to what a PID is.)

Max Baker described the settlement as “They strong-armed the city into forming a PID.” He was on council then, so he was there. But he also tends to use inflammatory language to describe things. So that may not be the universal opinion – I have no idea.

2021: Lennar Homes purchased the land and they get the PID. 

In other words, people have been trying to do something with this land for 10-15 years, unsuccessfully.

…

So what is a PID?  

PID stands for “Public Improvement District”.  What this means is that all the home owners will pay a surcharge on top of their property taxes.  That extra money is used to make the neighborhood nicer. 

Here’s how much people might pay:

So that is on top of your regular property taxes, which is 65.15¢.

I don’t love PIDs. They are a little bit of a shell game – you can list houses at a cheaper price, because you didn’t have to include the cost of the neighborhood improvements. Instead of paying extra on their mortgage, the homeowners will pay extra in yearly taxes.

It’s fine as long as all home-buyers are perfectly wise and have access to enough wealth. Late-stage capitalism, eh?

Why is this coming to council?  

Lennar Homes wants to change the terms of the PID.  They want to reduce the size to match the new smaller footprint, and then increase the dollars.  

The new size:

(Also discussed in December.)

The new PID budget:

Like I said earlier, I think this project is terrible sprawl. It will cost the city more to maintain services out there than we’ll bring in, in property tax revenue.  

No vote tonight. The PID changes will get voted on at the next meeting.

….

Item 18. San Marcos Historic Preservation Plan

We’ve seen it before, back in October. We’ve been working on this for awhile:

They tried hard to get community input:

What’s it supposed to do?

Great! What else?

  • If we adopt this plan by mid-February, we qualify for a $5K grant from the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
  • We’re out of money, anyway. We’re using some consultants and we’ve given them just about the whole sum.

HOWMEVER!

The letters have been coming in, and people have a lot of complaints.

Here’s what I gathered: What’s here isn’t bad, but it doesn’t give a clear roadmap of how to proceed.
– What should be prioritized?
– What’s the order of operations?
– How do we implement this big list of lofty ideals, on a shoestring budget?*

Staff protests that they’ve had a TON of outreach, and that these complaints can be addressed, even if we pass the plan first. They seem worried that this will drag out forever.

Bottom line: Staff is going to compile a comprehensive list of all the proposed changes, and try to categorize them as short term or long term, and bring it back.

* Hat tip to Ryan Patrick Perkins for walking me through this.

….

Item 19: Rezoning

This church is right by campus:

It’s used by Christ Chapel and United Campus Ministry currently.

It’s right between campus and mini-Target:

It sounds like it will be a 6-story apartment complex, owned by the church, with church things on the ground floor.

The minister gives his pitch:

  • The church is going to keep owning the property. We won’t sell it.
  • They’ve thought hard and long about this
  • It’ll be great!
  • If we don’t get this rezoning, we’d have to sell it. Who KNOWS what you’ll get!

Will the old church building itself get torn down? No one asks this question. I assume it’s a goner. (Maybe they’ll let the new building eat the church, like Sanctuary Apartments did, a few blocks over?)

What do I think? Let’s check the five criteria!

Price Tag to the City: Will it bring in taxes that pay for itself, over the lifespan of the infrastructure and future repair? How much will it cost to extend roads, utilities, on fire and police coverage, on water and wastewater?

Very low cost to the city – this area is all built up and well-supported already.  I don’t know if it will bring in much tax revenue, because it’s still owned by the church.  But no concerns here.

Housing stock: How long will it take to build? How much housing will it provide? What is the forecasted housing deficit at that point? Is it targeting a price-point that serves what San Marcos needs?

I have no idea on any of this.  It’s a pretty tiny lot.

Environment: Is it on the aquifer? Is it in a flood zone? Will it create run off into the river? Are we looking at sprawl? Is it uniformly single-family homes?

 All of Texas state is uphill of most of San Marcos, and it’s mostly paved over.  The pre-existing situation is terrible for flooding.  This does add more pavement. 

Social: Is it meaningfully mixed income? Is it near existing SMCISD schools and amenities?

Extremely walkable and close to the university.

The San Marxist Special: Is it a mixed-income blend of single family houses, four-plexes, and eight-plexes, all mixed together? With schools, shops, restaurants, and public community space sprinkled throughout? Is it walkable?

Well, no, but you wouldn’t really put a San Marxist Special in the middle of downtown. 

On the whole, I’m fine with this! You want density in your downtown.

The vote: 7-0.

…

Item 12: Hays County Senior Citizens Center

This little Senior Center is run by Community Action:

It’s tucked away in Victory Gardens:

They do a lot of great things!

They lease the building from the city. It’s time to renew, for another ten years. It’s an old building, so they’ll let us know if there are any concerns on the walk through.

Great!

…

Item 20: Bitcoin scams

What’s the opposite of a warm, nurturing senior citizen center? Maybe scamming old people with a bitcoin ATM?

Apparently there are Bitcoin ATMs:

You can buy and sell cryptocurrency on these.

Google tells me they’re all over San Marcos:

As a crotchety old Marxist, I don’t like it. But here we are.

Apparently the scammers are here, too:

We’re going to require stores to put little warning signs by all the BTMs, saying “hey! Here’s some red flags that you might be getting scammed!”

It’s better than nothing, but wouldn’t it be nice if we had a functional federal and state government that cracked down on predatory scams?

[Sidebar: I don’t understand how bitcoins are untraceable. Isn’t the whole point that it’s a block chain that grows a little bit longer with every transaction, recording its whole history of where it’s been so far?]

…

That’s it for the regular meeting! Now comes the spicy stuff.

Hours 0:00 – 3:21, 12/16/25

by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

Citizen Comment:

Two big topics! (I’m combining comments from 3 pm and 6 pm.)

Cape’s Dam nomination to be on the historic registry:

  • 5 people opposed
  • No one in favor

    The Data Center

    • 2 people (both developers) in favor
    • 10 people opposed.

    Details on what people actually said when we get to these!

    Other comments:

    • Update on the San Pedro cemetery: replacing historic pillars, repairing fences, surveying property bounds. Issues of drainage and erosion. We support low impact development nearby, but we’re concerned about something busier.
    • Kissing Tree gets called wealthy, but we worked for decades. We pay a lot in taxes. We need good jobs to fix poverty. Yay development!
    • San Marcos Civics Club is going to start issuing environmental score cards for each council member.
    • Support for naming the new airport road after Lieutenant Colonel George C Carruthers

    …

    Item 8: Cape’s Dam

    This item was pretty infuriating!

    It’s also not the most important thing ever?  I’m trying to keep perspective? I was irritated, but this is small potatoes.  

    Backstory:

    From 1867-1942, Cape’s Dam was a functioning dam. The dam creates a calm little side channel to the river, called the Mill Race:

    Since the dam closed, the Mill Race has basically been treated as quasi-private property for kayak and paddling retreats.

    The Army Corps of Engineers often likes to remove old dams. In the 2000s, the folks at the Meadow’s Center started working on this study saying Cape’s Dam is bad for endangered species.

    Around 2015, Council is looking at whether they should remove the dam. But before they decide, Cape’s Dam is destroyed by the 2015 floods.  It’s now dangerous.  The Mill Race is also not usable anymore.

    2016: Council approves removing the dam and filling the Mill Race. The federal government will pay for it.

    This turns into a huge controversy. There’s a campaign launched – Save the SMTX River! – challenging the Meadow’s Center report and saying they’ve got different scientists who say different things. They basically want the Mill Race to be preserved for recreation, but they’re making an environmental argument? and a historical argument?

    (Incidentally, the Save the SMTX River guy is also one of the Brighter Future for San Marcos PAC guys.)

    Council backtracks on their decision. The federal funding expires.

    …

    Everything grinds to a halt for a decade.  Council keeps passing the hot potato.

    Ten years go by. In the meantime:

    …

    This past March, Council finally dusted this whole issue off. 

    They authorized a feasibility study, to answer these questions:

    1. What’s the current conditions of the dam and the whole area?
    2. What would it take to rebuild it? Or partially re-build it? Or just remove it?
    3. What’s the environmental situation? What’s the permitting process?
    4. Do a bunch of public outreach and get public feedback.

    I can already tell you some answers!

    • The current dam has to first be removed, whether or not it is rebuilt afterwards.
    • You cannot rebuild without permission from SMRF, because they own half the land, and they have said many times that they are a hard no.
    • You cannot rebuild without lots and lots of money, which we do not have.

    This will all come to a boil in the next few months! Exciting times. (Full backstory here.)

    …

    Which brings us to tonight! Cape’s Dam has been nominated for placement on the national historical registry.

    Is there a legitimate historical claim? 

    Kind of yes!   The area was has a historical plaque with the Texas Historical Commission from 1979, in 1985 it was declared eligible for the National Register, and in 2017, it was included with a broader number of dams declared eligible for inclusion in the National Register. In addition, there’s credible evidence by a Texas State prof about the role of slave labor in building the dam.  

    So what’s new tonight?

    Preservation Texas is nominating the Thompson-Cape Dam and Millrace to actually be on the National Register of Historic Places.  

    …

    Lots of things about this are irritating!

    1. This is a rush job. You can submit nominations every three months, but the nomination people are determined to submit by the January 16th deadline.  This one is URGENT, full stop, no flexibility.
    2. Whoever is behind this is keeping their name hidden*.  The nomination came from Preservation Texas.  No one with local ties has put their name on it in any way.
    3. The complex already has plenty of historical recognition! There is no new development.
    4. All land owners are supposed to consent, but SMRF was not notified, and has not consented.

    *Aren’t I the biggest hypocrite! I also love hiding out in shady anonymity. I’m a jerk.

    ….

    How does that long, tiring backstory affect Council’s thinking on this issue?

    Council: LALALALALALA WE CAN’T HEAR YOU!

    Basically, Council members all pretend to be brand new babies born yesterday, who have never heard of the 10 year fight I just told you about.

    The most generous interpretation: council members are willing to nobly set aside long-standing feuds, and consider this on its merits.

    The least generous interpretation: council members are gleefully taking part in a craven attempt to sway the larger outcome by miring it in bureaucracy.

    You be the judge!

    …

    What did people say at Citizen Comment?

    • This is a ruse to force Council to rebuild the dam.
    • The dam is full of contemporary materials, like concrete sandbags
    • No effort has been made since 1950 to preserve the historic nature of the dam
    • This was a timber dam, which is a low cost, quick dam
    • There are 8 other dams on the river, and they’re also all super old

    And most importantly, the San Marcos River Foundation: Look, we own the land on one side of the bank, and we were not notified. The rules require that all owners give consent. We didn’t.

    …

    Council discussion!

    Jane: What exactly do they need from us?
    Answer: The Texas Historical Commission (THC) wants two letters – one from Council and one from the San Marcos Historical Preservation Committee (HPC) – saying they support the nomination. 

    Jane: Can we postpone this?  It seems very rushed.  The State Board reviews these every three months. Can we just wait till March?
    Answer: The applicant specifically said they are not willing to postpone until March.

    Amanda: Yes, this seems very rushed.  What about just waiting until after the San Marcos HPC meets, and hear what they recommend?

    Answer: Usually yes.  We prefer to have committees present their recommendations to Council.  But the timing doesn’t work out.  SM-HPC will meet on Jan. 8th, and then you all don’t meet until Jan 20th. But the letter is due Jan 16.

    Saul: The dam is not even close to the original structure. It’s got cement sandbags. I’m a no.

    Lorenzo: I’m a yes!  Wouldn’t that be great for people to see SAN MARCOS on the national historic register, when tourists come to town? 

    Jane:  Why didn’t the people who nominated this reach out to the city?  Where are they? We have a priority list of historical places. This leap-frogged over a bunch of other places on our list.

    Saul: Would this prevent us from making a decision about whether to rebuild or remove the dam?
    Answer: It carries political weight, but not legal weight.

    In other words: this vote sends a message to the public about which side your bread is buttered on. But it’s not legally binding.  You’re allowed to tear down the dam. 

    Amanda: This nomination provides a specific historical narrative.  It was white-washed to make white people look like noble saviors of enslaved people. If we send a letter of support, then that’s the version that will end up in the national registry.

    Alyssa: Yes, they’ve romanticized it.

    Jane: That’s why I want to send a very minimal letter.  We won’t address the historical narrative part of the application. We’ll just say, “Yes, there is a historical element!”

    Alyssa: Omissions are just as bad! That’s how status quos continue to flourish!  Whatever is in this application will be the skeleton of the final narrative.  That’s how these things work.

    Jane: Then let’s just be vague!

    Alyssa: That doesn’t make sense as a response to what I’m saying.  We’re writing a letter in support of a nomination. 

    Jane: I’m trying to be minimal! 

    Alyssa: …which will be interpreted as support, unless we’re explicit about what we don’t agree with.

    Matthew:  None of this matters!

    Shane: What’s the harm? 

    Lorenzo: Surely the Historic Registry will do their due diligence.  Let’s just pass this and let them do the heavy lifting. 

    Amanda: I want the narrative to acknowledge the role of enslaved people. 

    Matthew: The Cape family did not own slaves!

    Jane: The whole slavery thing is very contentious. Different people think different things.

    Amanda: Slavery is actually in the nomination already.  Didn’t you guys read it? I just don’t like how they handled the topic.

    Amanda is correct:

    and

    Alyssa: Clearly this is going to pass, so I’m going to suggest some language for the letter. 

    Proposed language, after some tinkering:

    They also include a note about how SMRF wasn’t notified.

    The vote: Should we support the super urgent nomination that absolutely cannot wait until March?

    So there you have it.

    ….. 

    Finally, let’s have a little reality check!

    The national registry is a big deal. Currently there are four historic landmarks for central Texas on the national register:

    1. The San Antonio Missions
    2. LBJ’s childhood home
    3. El Camino Real trail
    4. Mammoth Caves in Waco
    via

    Will Cape’s Dam be the 5th most historic thing in the entire greater Austin-San Antonio corridor?!?

    Seems unlikely.  Like I said, this is small potatoes. 

    …

    Item 9: The Data Center

    Backstory: This developer, Mayberry, bought some land down here, a few years ago:

    Right next to the Hays County Power Plant:

    He wanted to build some homes. It turns out this was a terrible investment. Now he’d rather build a data center, instead. Could he please have a rezoning?

    The town responded HARD against this. People who live on nearby farms say it will ruin their way of life. People are worried about extreme water use during a drought and heavy electrical use from the shaky ERCOT grid. Tons of people have put in a lot of effort into fighting this data center.

    Last spring, P&Z turned him down. It went to Council in August, and Council didn’t have enough votes to overturn P&Z. So it failed.

    However, Council did not put the final nail in the coffin. They left a trail of breadcrumbs for Mayberry to come back.

    He dutifully followed the trail, and here we are. (Full version of the backstory here.)

    Tonight is just a presentation.

    Mayberry is back. Here’s the timeline:

    His pitch is going to be that he will sweeten the deal via a restrictive covenant.

    Here’s what he’s proposing:

    We don’t have the formal contract yet, though.

    The two big issues are water and electricity.

    Water: Texas has a big water shortfall. The 2022 State Water Plan projected big shortfalls, and everyone is working with those numbers. But ChatGPT didn’t come out until November 2022. There are now already over 400 data centers in Texas. The water use from these data centers is not included in the 2022 projections, but it’s all we’ve got.

    This data center would get their water from Crystal Clear. Crystal Clear gets their water from:

    • Edwards aquifer
    • Lake Dunlap
    • Carrizo-wilcox
    • SM River 

    By 2040, Crystal Clear is projected to be -40 acre-feet of of water. As in, they don’t have enough water rights to cover projected demand. And that’s using the 2022 pre-data center usage projections! Crystal Clear cannot deny service either. (This info was from an expert at citizen comment.)

    The proposal here is not the worst possible proposal. Evaporative cooling systems are the worst. This is a closed-loop cooling system. (I have no idea how many of the 400 data centers are evaporative.)

    Mayberry is estimating that they’ll use 25K-30K gallons of water per day, and they’ll put a hard cap at 75K gallons per day in the contract. That’s equivalent to the water used by about 235 homes. (Evaporative cooling centers are probably in the 100K-500K gallons per day range.)

    Electricity

    There’s a tradeoff between water and electricity. If you use less water, you’ll use more electricity. In addition, the Texas ERCOT grid uses water to cool the electrical generation plants.

    There is a longterm solution here – the more ERCOT switches to solar and wind-based energy, the less water needed to generate the electricity. (This is already cheap and available, if we want it.)

    Will utility rates rise? It depends on who you get your electricity from. This plant will be on Pedernales electric, so if you are too, then yes, it’s likely your rates will rise, too. But if you’re on San Marcos city utilities, your rates will not go up (yet).

    ….

    My $0.02: I’m conflicted, but I’m still basically in favor of this data center.

    Argument in favor: the data center industry is an absolute goddamn disaster for Texas. There are almost 100 between San Antonio and Austin. There are already four in the Hays-Caldwell area. This is catastrophic for the water shortage.

    But it is not a city fight. The heart of the problem is that Texas counties cannot regulate water and electricity usage. If we care about the water shortage and strain on the electrical grid, we have to fight that fight. Fight for county regulations of water and electricity use, and statewide data center regulation.

    In the meantime, we might as well take the tax revenue.

    Argument against: Maybe denying this one data center contributes momentum to a bigger movement against the other 400+ statewide?

    Listen, all you activists: You are on the right side of the issue, but you absolutely must join forces on a larger scale. The only meaningful answer is regional and statewide regulation.

    If I had to guess, good places to start might be:

    City Councils are much closer to everyday people than regional and state organizations are, but Council cannot move the needle on the problem. Any progress has got to deal with county land, outside of cities.

    …

    Just for kicks, how much money are we talking?

    I don’t really believe those numbers. It takes years to build these things, markets can crash, etc etc. But still, a fraction of that tax revenue would be helpful.

    Hours 0:00 – 1:17, 12/2/25

    by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

    Citizen comment:

    There were 12 speakers, and only one topic: Flock Cameras

    • 10 people: they’re authoritarian and hijacked by ICE. Hard no.
    • 2 people: they keep us safe! yay cameras.

    Lots and lots of details when we get to that item.

    …

    Item 10: The Downtown TIRZ

    TIRZ stands for “Tax Increment Reinvestment Zone”.   What this means is that we’re going to put more resources into a fixed area.  TIRZ #5 is the Downtown TIRZ.

    Here is the boundary of it:

    Boundary of the Downtown Tirz goes from Texas State, through downtown, to I-35

    Here’s how a TIRZ works: First, you fix a baseline year. For the downtown, it’s 2011. Back then, the whole region had a taxable value of $103 million.  

    San Marcos always gets to keep the taxes on  $103 million.  But the value of the land keeps growing. San Marcos agrees to split the taxes 70-30 on all the value added above $103 million, until the TIRZ runs out. (Hays County is also part of the deal.)

    So in 2025, the land is now worth about $550 million. San Marcos keeps the taxes on the $103 million base, and then splits the taxes on the other $447 million. All told, the TIRZ gets about $1.2 million from San Marcos, and another $600K from the county, in 2025.

    What does the TIRZ do with the money? The rules are that they have to spend it all on enhancing the downtown, which is supposed to increase its tax value all over again.

    Today they’re adding a little bit extra to their plan. Here’s what they want to do:

    The TIRZ expires in 2027.  After that, the city keeps all the tax revenue on that district.

    Fine! Everyone likes it.

    …

    Item 12:  Rezoning 24 acres on Wonderworld and 123.

    Here’s a little patch of land:

    Here’s what it looks like if you’re going south on 123, on the Wonderworld overpass:

    The developers want to make it CD-5.

    What is CD-5?

    In theory, CD-5 is supposed to feel like a cozy, dense downtown area where you have shops and apartments and all kinds of nifty things, kinda like on Sesame Street:

    But inevitably, it always ends up looking like this:

    Relentlessly giant apartment complexes. 

    …

    What about some stores and restaurants?

    I’m not actually opposed to giant complexes! Housing is great.  But this intersection is a great spot for some stores and commerce, no? It’s a constant drumbeat that the east side needs more commerce.

    Jane brings this up:  “Will you all put in some commerce?”

    Developer: “Who can say? We’re so mysterious!” 

    Jane: “It would be really great.”

    But then no one on Council actually does anything.

    COUNCIL!! You have powers!  There are zoning overlays and Planned Development Districts, where developers agree to make some portion of a development into commerce.  

    But here’s Council:

    So Council just tells the developer, “Fingers crossed! Thoughts and prayers for commerce!” and leaves it at that.

    ….

    Is this re-zoning a good idea? Let’s be a little systematic about it:

    Five Questions For New Developments

    Price Tag to the City: Will it bring in taxes that pay for itself, over the lifespan of the infrastructure and future repair? How much will it cost to extend roads, utilities, on fire and police coverage, on water and wastewater?

    There’s a lot of development around this already, and this will be dense.  This is a good financially for the city. A+

    Housing stock: How long will it take to build? How much housing will it provide? What is the forecasted housing deficit at that point? Is it targeting a price-point that serves what San Marcos needs?

    We’re still in a housing deficit, and more housing is good.  So I’m fine with this.

    Environment: Is it on the aquifer? Is it in a flood zone? Will it create run off into the river?Are we looking at sprawl? Is it uniformly single-family homes?

    Not environmentally sensitive, not a flood zone. And it won’t be sprawl, because CD-5 has to be dense.  So doing well here, too.

    Social: Is it meaningfully mixed income? Is it near existing SMCISD schools and amenities?

    I doubt it will be meaningfully mixed income.  Developers don’t care.  It drives me crazy though – wealth segregation is a societal problem.   

    It is very close to two elementary schools, Goodnight middle school, and SMHS, and also Bonham pre-K.   There are some restaurants near those schools. 

    The San Marxist Special: Is it a mixed-income blend of single family houses, four-plexes, and eight-plexes, all mixed together? With schools, shops, restaurants, and public community space sprinkled throughout? Is it walkable?

    This is literally what CD-5 should be.  A Marxist blogger can dream.

    My $0.02: If I were on Council, I’d push hard for a zoning overlay that guaranteed some commerce. But if that was impossible, I’d vote yes, anyway.

    …

    The vote on rezoning:

    Everyone: YES!

    No one: no. 

    So there you have it. 

    …

    Item 6: Mural at the Price Center. (Cousin to Panic! at the Disco.)

    This item is peak ridiculous, in all the best ways. This is why I love local politics: everyone’s a regular person, and regular people are totally absurd.

    This is the Price Center:

    It’s right behind Tantra, facing San Antonio St:

    It’s mostly a public event space – there are concerts and shows inside, people rent it out for parties, there are market days where you can buy stuff from vendors, etc.

    Here’s the front steps:

    No one ever uses this entrance.  You walk around through the garden to go in.

    Today’s item is about a mosaic mural to go on the front steps.  In other words, it’s a single picture that will be cut into strips, and go on the risers, like this:

    Maybe you’ve seen a photo of the proposed mosaic! If you haven’t yet seen it, I’m going to withhold it until the end of this item, for maximum comedic value.

    Because this is what Jane Hughson posted to the message boards ahead of time:

    This mosaic definitely involves cacti, and Jane is NOT a fan. 

    During the meeting, Jane brings up more points:

    • The mural is beautiful! But the cactus? Hard no. 
    • We’re trying not to have spiky plants like yucca downtown, because they are hazardous if someone falls in them.
    • We’re not Arizona. Feh, Arizona!
    • Cacti are prickly and unwelcoming.

    Lorenzo agrees: it does hurt to fall in a cactus.

    City Staff:  Some artists like cacti!  It’s subjective.

    Amanda:  Cacti stand for our cultural heritage in Mexico!

    Alyssa: I love ’em. Also they’re delicious.

    Shane:  If we asked the artist to take out the cactus and re-do it, and they said no, what are the sunk costs? 
    Answer: $1000.

    Saul: I guess I’m a yes, because I don’t want to waste $1000.

    …

    ARE YOU READY TO SEE SOME CACTI?

    Pause for a second.

    Before you see it, I want you to picture an unwelcoming, prickly mayor cactus.  Get a good visual image in your head, before you scroll down.   What kind of cactus would be too hostile for the front steps?

    ⋮

    ⋮

    ⋮

    Ready?? 

    ⋮

    ⋮

    ⋮

    ⋮

    ⋮

    ⋮

    ⋮

    ⋮

    READY??

    ⋮

    ⋮

    ⋮

    Here’s the proposed artwork:

    Guys. GUYS. It’s so beautiful.  It’s mostly prickly pear flowers, more than anything else.  There’s nothing remotely hostile here.

    This is the mural that we almost killed for being too prickly!  What a world.

    ….

    The vote on the beautiful mural:

    Yes, we love it!! :  Amanda, Alyssa, Saul, Shane, and Matthew

    Ow, thorns: Lorenzo, Jane

    So there you have it. Small town politics, eh?

    Hours 1:17 – 3:50, 12/2/25

    by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

    Item 19:  Flock Cameras

    This is the biggie!  

    What are Flock Cameras? 

    Flock cameras are Licence Plate Readers, or LPR.  They sit at intersections like so:

    We have 14 of them in San Marcos, and they’re located here:

    (We also have 8 downtown cameras that are not Flock cameras.  The city owns these cameras.)

    What makes everyone so mad about Flock cameras?

    Every single time you drive by a Flock camera, your license plate gets tagged and recorded.  Then Flock takes all this data, and pools it all together across the nation, into one big, sloppy data fest. 

    When your police department agrees to share all their data , they are given access to all the data about everyone who drives anywhere in all of the US.

    And the network is HUGE:

    via

    Here’s just the I-35 corridor:

    ..

    Privacy and Data

    Privacy rights are a tricky thing to talk about, because of a few things:

    1. Our private lives started getting tracked extensively about 20 years ago. Now it’s like being mid-avalanche – we’ve all gotten used to things that are extremely abnormal.

    This is the frog in boiling water scenario – as a society, how do we claw our private data back? (Europe has passed laws.)

    2. The consequences are fuzzy and abstract for a long time…. until suddenly they’re really, really bad.

    Your data is out there. Corporations sell it. It spreads like smoke. Nothing happens until it gets into the wrong person’s hands. Right now, because Trump has weaponized ICE and the FBI, people who want to abuse Flock data know they probably won’t be punished for it.

    And ICE is constantly using Flock data to find people to snatch.

    3. Freedom and safety are always in tension with each other. If you want to end all crime, you could put every single young man between ages 14 and 35 in jail.  Your crime rate will drop to <1%. 

    But one of our core American ideals is freedom. Freedom is so important that we’re willing to accept some loss of safety.  (“Innocent until proven guilty” literally means that we think it is wiser to let some guilty people go free than to risk locking up someone innocent.)

    Where do you draw the line between freedom and safety? That is the heart of this discussion.  

    How did we get here?

    April, 2022: Original Council agreement with Flock. 

    It was actually never discussed at that council meeting.  It was put on the Consent Agenda with 15 other items.  That means all sixteen items get one single vote, unless a council member pulls an item for discussion. 

    December 29, 2023: The first contract ends, and city staff signs a second contract with Flock Cameras.

    This contract never went to Council for approval.  Alyssa is pretty salty about this!

    But honestly:  in 2023, council was very very pro-cop.  Jude Prather and Mark Gleason were still on Council, plus Matthew Mendoza. 

    Furthermore, there was a post-covid crime bump:

    via

    There was a lot of nervous energy around that.

    All taken together, Council was extremely deferential to expanding SMPD in 2023.  Hypothetically, if they’d voted on Flock Cameras, it would have been 6-1. I promise you, that’s what would have happened. (Alyssa would have been the only No vote.) 

    February, 2025: The winds change! This was the first time I ever heard “Flock Cameras” uttered in a City Council meeting. SMPD wanted 19 more cameras.  Council postponed the decision until June, and then voted no. No additional Flock Cameras.

    What changed since 2023?!

    Well, Trump, obviously.  Biden certainly deported a huge number of undocumented people! But he did not weaponize ICE with the kind of cruelty that we see from Trump. 

    This is what I meant above, about consequences. During the Biden administration, the loss of privacy didn’t feel as real to many people. Now we hear how Flock shares their data with ICE.  We hear how Flock data tracks women who are leaving the state.  The abuses are systemic.

    Which brings us to today

    The 2023 contract is up at the end of this year.  Renewal was due by December 1st.

    But city staff needs Council direction before they can renew, for two reasons:

    • All decisions over $100K go to council for approval
    • Clearly this has gotten contentious in a way that it wasn’t in 2023. 

    For unclear reasons, it did not get on the agenda in November.  That means that we missed our deadline to renew.  

    Tonight’s topic:  What is Council direction to staff?  Do we want to renew after all, or modify, or just shut down Flock in San Marcos all together?

    What does the public have to say?

    Two speakers were pro-Flock cameras.  Their main points:

    • SMPD implemented a new privacy policy back in May.
    • Flock cameras are victim-focused
    • LPR cameras helped solve the downtown murders
    • Everybody gets captured on camera constantly! 
    • What about other technology that helps capture criminals?  Do you want to ban that, too?

    Ten speakers were anti-Flock.  Their main points:

    • Flock cameras are reactive, not proactive. They respond to crimes that have already occurred, but they do not prevent future crimes.  (More on this below)
    • Their networks get hacked all the time. Their data is not secure. (True, true.)
    • Peter Thiel is one of the creepiest billionaires around, and has funded ⅓ of the flock network. (Yes)
    • There is no accountability for Flock.  
    • ICE has access to Flock data.
    • Anecdotes of stalking incidents and tracking women who are leaving states to get abortions (for example)

    Do Flock cameras help prevent crime? 

    Basically, no.  Cameras work when they are visible and aimed at the location of the crime.  In other words, if you put a big, obvious camera aimed at a parking lot, you can reduce the number of car break-ins. 

    But Flock cameras are aimed at intersections. They just record license plates. They don’t prevent the victim from being shot on the square – they just help find the shooter afterwards.

    However, it does appear that Flock Cameras help solve crimes.  Or as Chief Standridge puts it, we can solve the crime much faster, at least. It saves detective time.

    What does Council have to say? 

    First off, Lorenzo recuses himself due to employment conflict of interest.

    Next, Alyssa and the city manager go back and forth on the timeline for a while. (About the 2023 contract, discussed above.)

    Amanda goes next. Her main points:

    • We had a community town hall on public safety.  There were diverse opinions!
    • Opposing flock is a pretty mainstream opinion
    • Surveillance doesn’t prevent crime.
    • This is about Flock, not SMPD. Focus on Flock.
    • Lots of people would be okay with a strictly internal SMPD camera system.
    • Flock opens us up to expensive lawsuits. Lawsuits are way more expensive than the cost-savings from the cameras.

    Saul: Are the city-owned downtown cameras LPRs? Are they License Plate Readers?
    Answer: No, they aren’t.  You have to go and watch them to get information out.

    Saul: If the National Guard or martial law comes to San Marcos, can they access the data?
    Answer:  Legally, it would require a subpoena.  Illegally, yes, systems can always be hacked or accessed.  No guarantees against that.

    Jane: Data is stored for 30 days, and we don’t share data with the rest of the Flock network?
    Answer: Right, we stopped sharing after June. Now other agencies have to fill out a specific request and send it to us.

    Jane: How often do we get requests from out-of-town PD?
    Answer: We’ve gotten 20 since July. We denied two of them.

    Alyssa:  Hays County tried really hard to create some safeguards, and Flock is not interested.  The Flock representative laughed when Hays requested some mild modifications to their system.  They won’t do anything and won’t disclose anything. 

    Jane: I love Law & Order, but this one company makes me nervous.  

    Jane’s main points:

    • I’m okay with cameras, but not Flock.
    • Can we get some non-Flock cameras? 
    • Let’s renew with Flock while we source non-Flock cameras, so that we don’t have a gap in surveillance. Then we can switch in 2026.

    Matthew: Samesies!  No longterm Flock, but I’m okay with short-term Flock.  No gap in surveillance, please and thank you! 

    Amanda:  If we’re so focused on avoiding gaps, what about our major gaps in crime prevention? How about the gap on mental health care? How about the gap in homelessness prevention? Those would actually prevent crimes from occurring. Reacting does not make us safe.

    Question: How much does Flock cost?
    Answer: About $43K for a year. 

    They get into the nuts-and-bolts of transitioning to a different company. How long does it take to solicit proposals? Could we piggyback on an existing contract? Could we get a pro-rated or month-to-month contract with Flock in the meantime? (Answers: 12 months, maybe, and maybe.)

    Extra details:

    • Back in the spring, there were five cameras that may have gone live without Council approval.  They were definitely mounted up on poles.  Council is very interested to know whether or not they were turned on and recording data? Or just mounted up there? We never got a firm answer on this. 

    Question: Could we create our own, internal system?
    Answer: Maybe! Seems plausible.

    Jane:  The story about Evanston, Illinois is creepy.  If we’re signing a new contract, put in a clause to avoid that.

    What she’s referring to is this:  Evanston took down their Flock cameras due to privacy violations.  Then Flock put them back up again.  It took a court cease-and-desist order to get Flock to stop putting the cameras back up, on their own.

    Question: How do you measure the effectiveness of Flock?
    Answer: It’s mostly anecdotal, because Flock won’t share the information that you’d need to know this.

    Saul specifically says that he supports SMPD and his own son is an officer, but he’s a no because of the risk of lawsuits.

    THE VOTE:  

    Let’s sign a whole new contract!: nobody.
    We want a short term contract with Flock, while we hunt for new options: Jane, Shane, Matthew
    Absolutely no contract with Flock at all:  Amanda, Alyssa, Saul

    So it’s a 3-3 tie. 

    What does that mean??

    It takes a little bit of time to untangle this.  Basically, it takes 4 votes for Council to take action.  Neither side got 4 votes.  So nothing happens.  

    But what’s the outcome then? 

    We have to go back to the timeline.  December 1st was the deadline to renew, and we couldn’t renew without Council approval.  So that deadline came and went.  We did not renew.

    And now… nothing happens.  Which means we’re done with Flock! 

    ….

    Look, I loathe authoritarian microsurveillance and I think the threat from tech billionaires and ICE is far greater than the danger of unsolved crimes.  So I’m good with this!

    … 

    Item 15: Speed limits 

    Here’s the new FM 110, going east of San Marcos:

    On that red stretch, should we increase the speed limit from 60 mph to 65 mph?

    This is pretty nutty:

    Here’s what I think that means: TxDOT came to us and said, “We think your speed limit is too low. If too many people are speeding, you have to raise the speed limit.”

    So we had to do a study, and the study did show that too many people were speeding! So now we have to raise the speed limit, so that they’re not speeding anymore.

    How ass-backwards is that?

    (Also: when national speed limits went from 55 mph to 65 mph, fatalities rose by 20%. It’s the whole freedom vs safety trade-off, again!)

    Council votes:

    Stay at 60 mph: no one.

    Go up to 65 mph: everyone.

    I mean, I wouldn’t want to take on TxDOT either. 😦

    …

    Item 16: River Bridge Ranch PDD

    River Bridge Ranch is always hopelessly confusing to me, because it is right next to Riverbend Ranch, and they both have had a hundred different names over the years. (Riley’s Point, The Mayan Tract, Baugh Ranch, etc etc)

    This is mostly for my benefit:

    For years I didn’t even realize these were separate properties.

    Anyway, I hate them all.

    Today is about #4, River Bridge Ranch.

    It’s getting a little bit smaller, I think:

    Good.

    Hours 0:00 – 2:04, 11/18/24

    by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

    Citizen Comment:

    There were five people who showed up to talk.

    Tonight’s the night that Council determines their HSAB grants, and so almost everyone speaking was representing nonprofits – one speaker from School Fuel, and three from Southside. I’ll save it for that item.

    One last speaker talked about Meet and Confer, and whether or not it was okay for Council to make recommendations to the negotiators who represent the Council in the negotiations.

    …

    Item 13: Rezoning a little street in Blanco Gardens

    Here’s Blanco Gardens:

    It’s a very cute old neighborhood with gorgeous trees.

    Here’s a close-up:

    Blanco Gardens has come up a lot over the years in the blog. They were ground zero for the 2015 floods, and they’ve gotten some some flood mitigation projects since then. They got some speed bumps and parking permits. Most recently, they were the first neighborhood to get its neighborhood character study. It’s also the closest neighborhood to Cape’s Dam.

    For an old neighborhood, there’s a surprising amount of undeveloped land in the middle of it:

    (I wondered briefly if that was because homes had been torn down after the floods. But nope, you can see on the 2014 satellite image that there’s just always been space there for years.)

    Over the years, developers have occasionally tried to put something in part of it, but so far it’s always gotten nixed.

    Today’s proposal is about this bit:

    A developer wants to build houses on it.

    They would look and feel like duplexes, but they’re technically different, because of how they can be bought and sold. The property line runs through the two halves of the house, so you can purchase one half of it, while someone else owns the other half. (It’s called a “zero lot-line house”.)

    Basically it’s a good way to fit more, smaller homes onto a street, and they tend to be a little cheaper, too.

    What does Council say?

    Question: will fit the character of the rest of the neighborhood?
    Developer answer: We have good intentions!

    (One block over, there are some extremely modern houses. The neighborhood is salty about this.)

    Question: Will the alley still exist?
    Answer: nope.

    …

    Nobody really asked about flooding. The 2015 floods are starting to fade from memory for the rest of San Marcos. But not in Blanco Gardens – they were the epicenter of the floods.

    I would have liked to know what the 2015 flood water line was for nearby houses – I bet it was about 3-4 feet of water deep. How elevated will these houses be? Will they be above the 2015 water line?

    My memory is that, in a 100-year flood plain, you have to build 1-2 feet above the Base Flood Elevation, based on FEMA flood maps. Does that get you to 3-4 feet off the ground? I just don’t know.

    …

    The vote on this cute row of sorta-duplexes:

    Yes:  Everyone
    No:  nobody

    The good news is that Council is enthusiastic about infill housing. (When I first started blogging in 2022, Council wouldn’t let a home owner build two small houses on a subdivided lot, on Lockhart street. That was crazy.) They’ve definitely gotten the message that San Marcos needs more housing.

    As long as the homes are safely elevated, I’m okay with this project. But the flooding risk makes me very uneasy.

    …

    Item 14: HSAB Funding

    HSAB stands for Human Services Advisory Board.

    These are city grants to nonprofits, for things like food assistance, eviction prevention, domestic violence help, mental health services, etc. For the past few years, we’ve given out $500K in grants. This year, Council bumped it up to $750K. (Of course, federal funding has gotten slashed, so the need has also grown. THANKS OBAMA.)

    It’s always a grueling process. All the nonprofits all do incredibly important work.

    In the past, we kinda made non-profits cagefight against each other. [Read all the gory details for the past few years.] The process was murky. The recommendations would come to council, and council members would start horse-trading around.

    It was a bad look! It always seemed very fickle – “Oh, we’ll take $20,000 from those guys and give it to these guys!” It felt like the main criteria was being friendly with council members.

    We’ve been working on tightening the process. It’s a super time-intensive:

    • the HSAB board meets weekly from August to October
    • They hear presentations from all 32 applications
    • Each one gets discussed and each board member ranks them on a bunch of different criteria
    • Eventually they recommend how much of each request to fund.

    Here’s the criteria:

    After all the ranking and discussion, they bring it to Council.

    …

    Just for funsies, let’s add up how much other non-HSAB money is getting allocated in this meeting!

    All this was approved in one single vote, on Tuesday:

    • “On-Call Title Research Services Contract with Hollerbach & Associates, Inc., to increase the price by up to $200,000.00, resulting in a total contract amount not to exceed $299,999.00”.
    • “RMO P.C. for legal services associated with land acquisitions to increase the price by up to $300,000.00, resulting in a total contract amount not to exceed $699,000.00”.
    • “Change in Service to the agreement with Baker Moran Doggett Ma & Dobbs, LLP for legal services associated with land acquisitions to increase the price by up to $300,000.00, resulting in a total amount not to exceed $600,000.00”.
    • “STV Incorporated to provide On-Call General Engineering Services for various projects in the amount of $900,000.00”.
    • “Halff Associates, Inc. to provide On-Call General Engineering Services for various projects in the amount of $900,000.00”.
    • “a 2025 Ford F550 Crew Cab Chassis from Rush Truck Center, through a Sourcewell Purchasing Cooperative Contract, in the amount of $82,043.63, and outfitted by E.H. Wachs, through a BuyBoard Contract, in the amount of $156,865.65, for a total purchase cost of $238,906.28”.
    • “SHI Government Solutions, through Omnia Partners, for a City of San Marcos job application tracking software system in the annual amount not to exceed $112,000.00, and up to four one-year renewals with a total amount of $560,000.00”.

    It comes to about $2.95 million. I’m not saying any of those were a mistake! I trust the city officials. Most likely, those are all totally reasonable.

    I’m just pointing out who gets scrutinized, in society, and who doesn’t. We approved almost $3 million without blinking, when it goes to those contracts above. But if it’s hungry kids, homelessness, mental health emergencies, etc, we rigorously grind these applications into pulp.

    …

    Back to the grant grind!

    There were 32 applications, and the total amounts requested added up to $1.2 million.

    Here’s the full list of scores and funding:

    In the presentation, they went through all of them, and why the committee might not have fully funded the request.

    For example:

    The rest of their thoughts are on pp 435-437, here.

    They were very thorough.

    …

    Back to Citizen Comment

    Three speakers from Southside show up to talk. Here’s what they say:

    Southside is in a funny position. In 2024, the city gave Southside $800K of Covid money to implement a Homeless Action Plan.

    They came up with a plan and put in all the work to get it up and running. Now they’re trying to sustain it over time. They asked for $100K from HSAB, but were only granted $50K.

    The $100K is for their homeless prevention program – giving families $1000-2000 to get through a one-time financial crisis, so that they don’t get evicted.

    …

    Let the horse-trading begin!

    Matthew kicks it off. He wants to try to get Southside back up to the full $100K that they asked for, for homelessness prevention.

    Matthew proposes:

    • Take $4500 from Rough Draft
    • Take $5000 from Lifelong Learning
    • Take $10,000 from Hill Country MHMR

    Give that $19,500 to Southside.

    Ok, what are these things?

    Rough Draft:

    Their funding would go to $0.

    Lifelong Learning:

    Ok. Their funding would go from $9000 to $4500.

    Hill Country MHMR

    Their funding would go from $60,000 to $50,000.

    ….

    What does Council think?

    Question: How many people would Southside be able to help, with this $19K?
    Answer: About ten families. Average cost to stabilize someone after a financial emergency is $2k.

    It’s actually a huge bargain. If they’d been evicted, it would cost $15-30K+ to stabilize a family once they become homeless. (Plus, y’know, becoming homeless is awful. This is way more humane for the families.)

    Question: Are you all applying for other grants?
    Answer: SO MANY. Funding is scarce, and federal funds have been slashed.

    Alyssa: The entire premise of horse-trading these dollars is problematic. Most agencies didn’t send someone here tonight to answer questions. We don’t have context and expertise. This is haphazard. I am not on board with any of this.

    Amanda: Matthew, what about moving some money from the School Age Parents Program? They said they’d be able to keep the program open on $7,500, but they’re being awarded $15K.

    Matthew: How dare you. Abso-fucking-lutely not!

    [I’m paraphrasing. Matthew just said something like, “They do great work!”.]

    Amanda: I’m trying to throw you a bone here!

    Matthew: Hard no.

    Amanda: Well, I’m a no on Hill Country MHMR especially. Their work is desperately needed. We are in a mental health services desert, and this program will fund teenagers without insurance.

    Alyssa: I’m a NO on all of this, but especially NO on Hill Country MHMR. Homelessness and mental health are completely intertwined. There’s so much need here.

    The votes are each held individually:

    1. Move all $4500 from Rough Draft to Southside Homelessness Prevention?

    Yes: Matthew, Jane, Amanda, Lorenzo, Saul

    No: Alyssa, Shane

    2. Move $5000 from Lifelong Learning over to Southside?

    This motion dies without getting a second. So it never comes to a vote.  That kinda surprised me.

    3. Move $10K from Hill Country MHMR over to Southside?

    Yes:  Matthew

    No:  Everyone but Matthew

    4. Amanda throws in a vote on the SMCISD School Age Parents Program:

    They get $15K.

    Should we take $5K from them, and give it to Southside?

    Yes: Amanda, Saul

    No: Matthew, Lorenzo, Alyssa, Jane, Shane

    So that fails.

    ..

    Me, personally: It’s an awful decision to make. I probably would have taken money from Rough Draft, Lifelong Learning, and maybe SMCISD School Age parents. But not Hill Country MHMR.

    ….

    So that’s where it lands. Southside picked up $4500 more, and Rough Draft went to $0.

    The final official vote on HSAB funding passes 7-0.

    …

    One more note!

    We just spent $750K on the poor and vulnerable.

    But we also spend $1.1 million on tax breaks to home owners every year:

    About 30% of San Marcos owns their own home. That $1.1 million is just for them.

    Also, remember that Kissing Tree is keeping $46 million of San Marcos tax dollars, for nice streets and trees that are then gated off from the rest of San Marcos! You can’t go visit the tax dollars. Sorry.

    This is why I get cranky about this:

    People who want to slash property taxes never seem to appreciate how much of their own lifestyle is being subsidized.

    ….

    Item 19: Dunbar Recreation Center

    Dunbar was named for Paul Laurence Dunbar. He was the first black poet to get widespread recognition. (He was not from San Marcos in any way. He’s from Ohio.)

    Here’s one of his poems, from 1895:

    via

    Originally, the Dunbar neighborhood did not have a specific name, besides being called “the colored neighborhood”. The school was called The Negro School. In 1961, that was renamed after Paul Laurence Dunbar, and then gradually the whole neighborhood came to be known as Dunbar. So the Dunbar Rec Center just got the name “Dunbar”.

    Would we like to include the poet’s full name here? Everyone says yes.

    Great!

    Lots of interesting history on the Dunbar neighborhood here and here!

    ….

    Item 20-21: Jorge’s Mexican Restaurant.

    Jorge’s is on Hunter Road:

    Separately, Miller Middle School is on Foxtail Road:

    Their front doors are far apart:

    …but they share a back fence.

    This causes all kinds of problems for Jorge’s, because there are extra-strict rules for selling alcohol within 300 feet of a school.

    This means that Jorge’s has to do a lot more:

    • Renew their alcohol permit every year, instead of every three years like everyone else.
    • Renew their distance variance every year, which grants them an exception to the 300 foot rule.

    The main problem is the fees – both of those cost $750, so Jorge’s is paying $1500 every year.

    Why is it so expensive?!

    Mostly because of postage. The city has to notify everyone within 400 ft. The rest of the cost is to cover staff time, to process the paperwork.

    Everyone wants to at least refund half of Jorge’s fees, since the city can save costs by processing both the alcohol permit and distance variance at the same time.

    They’re going to try to come up with a long term solution, too.

    Hours 0:00 – 2:29, 11/5/25

    by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

    Citizen Comment:

    Three people show up, plus one more at the 3 pm workshop. The basic themes are:

    • Yes on pay raises for police and fire fighters
    • What’s with the shootings and mayhem downtown?
    • If we’re so broke, why are we spending money on Kissing Alley and other frivolous things?
    • Remember, Mark Gleason got reprimanded by the Ethics Review Commission in 2023. This was because he received campaign contributions above the limit from SM fire fighters, but then didn’t recuse himself from the vote on their contract. Any council members need to recuse themselves?

    That last point is exactly the problem with the PAC!

    There’s also a short note from the city manager about the shootings downtown. Condolences to those grieving, thank yous to first responders, that sort of thing.

    ….

    Items 4-5: Contract Extensions and Raises for SMPD and Fire fighters

    Let’s start with some backstory!

    Backstory

    Unions are massively constrained in Texas. This is because:

    • Texas is a right-to-work state. You can’t make joining a union automatic. But unions are still required to represent all employees.
    • Texas allows at-will employment, so it’s easy to find a pretext to fire people

    Public sector unions are especially helpless in Texas. In addition to the constraints above, there are explicit laws:

    That all is a massive bummer. It means that public employees can’t speak in a coordinated, unified voice. (For a state that claims to worship freedom, it seems a bit off to outlaw employees from coordinating their actions, yes?)

    Anyway, there are two exceptions: Fire fighters and police departments are allowed full strength unions! They get a special carve out! How nice for them, and no one else.

    You’ll need some vocabulary:
    SMPOA: San Marcos Police Officers Association, which is their union.
    SMPFFA: San Marcos Professional Fire Fighters Association, the fire fighter union.

    “Meet and Confer” – the collective bargaining process. This is the negotiation process to come up with new SMPD and SMFD contracts.

    More backstory

    In 2021, SMPD officer Ryan Hartman blew through a stop sign and killed a woman, Jennifer Miller, in Lockhart. He was treated with kid gloves. He had an open container in his car, but wasn’t given a breathalyzer test. Etc. This all happened right when Chief Standridge was first arriving at SMPD. Hartman wasn’t indicted, and got right back on the force. (Hartman was later fired for excessive force in a separate incident.)

    [Updated to add correction: Hartman was later fired because he “failed to turn in incident reports under the required time limit for SMPD Officers“. That followed an incident where Hartman tased a compliant man, was lightly disciplined, and the city ended up settling with the victim for $125K. -TSM]

    Mano Amiga was FURIOUS at how poorly the Hartman investigation was run. In response, they came up with five Hartman Reforms that they wanted the city to adopt:

    In 2022, the SMPD contract was up, and it was time for Meet and Confer. The city ignored the Hartman Reforms and just passed a standard contract.

    So Mano Amiga fired up a petition to get the Meet and Confer agreement repealed. They were successful! Council agreed to renegotiate the contract. (It was either that, or they’d have to put Repeal Meet and Confer on a ballot for voters.)

    Spring 2023: Negotiations re-open. Some mild concessions are made towards the Hartman Reforms, and the contract is passed.

    That’s a breezy summary, but trust me – this was a huge production. Probably hundreds of hours of citizen engagement, all told.

    The 2023 contracts expire next October 2026. That means we should start Meet and Confer this spring.

    Which brings us to today!

    Should we sign a one year extension until October 2027? It includes a 4.5% raise for fire fighters, and a 5% raise for SMPD, effective in October 2026.

    City staff needs this extension, because they need to deal with the whole EMS mess, and also to deal with the fallout of how we sabotaged our own budget.

    Amanda proposes this amendment:

    Discussion ensues! Let’s break down the basics.

    Key points:

    • Meet and Confer meetings should be open to the public, recorded, and broadcast
    • There should be a citizen comment portion
    • Documents should be made publicly available.

    Question: How is this different from the current situation?
    Answer: Really, only the citizen comment would be new. We started recording and broadcasting meetings in 2023, and documents are always available under the Texas Open Records policy.

    Why do this?

    There are lots of good reasons!

    First off, legally there is a clause in Meet & Confer laws that requires transparency and openness to the public. So this is consistent with how these things are supposed to go.

    Second, this is public money! Here’s the General Fund breakdown for 2026:

    Those big blue and orange slices above are SMPD and SMFD. They make up about 36.7% of the General Fund, and combined, they are about $45 million. Citizens should get to speak up, just as they do for the rest of the budget.

    Third, this one-year extension is occurring with virtually no community discussion. It’s a good faith gesture by council to acknowledge the outcry in 2023, and make a move towards transparency.

    Finally, Austin has a similar resolution that applies to PD, Fire, and also their labor unions. It seems to work fine.

    How would this work?

    This is where conversation stalls out for about an hour. I’m going to give your the super abbreviated version.

    1. What would the details of the citizen comment actually be?

    Should each person who wants to speak get 1 minute? Should it be capped at 30 minutes? Should it be at the beginning and at the end of each meeting? Should it be on another night altogether, and recorded as a forum? Should there be an email address?

    Amanda’s pitch: Let’s leave these details to the negotiating team. Council does not need to micromanage.

    Jane is extremely uncomfortable leaving it vague. She wants to know how it will play out. She’s worried if the ground rules aren’t quite right, it will sabotage the collaborative spirit of the negotiations.

    2. How exactly does the timeline work?

    Does SMPOA and SMPFFA have to agree now, before the extension is approved? Or can this just be where our negotiators start, when Meet & Confer starts, in the spring of 2027?

    They settle on the latter. This is the starting point for the future discussion, where they lay the ground rules for the 2027 Meet & Confer contract. It got discussed a LOT, though.

    Here are the basic Council member reactions:

    Jane: I’m all for transparency but I’m allergic to leaving unspecified details like this.

    Saul: I’m all for it.  Sounds great.

    Shane: This is government overreach. I’m tired.

    Alyssa: This shows the community that we are responding to the activism of 2023. This is a good-faith gesture that makes progress towards transparency and community trust.

    Lorenzo: I have a lot of detailed technical questions about the legality and timeline, but I’m not exactly opposed to the premise.

    Matthew: <crickets>

    …

    Time to vote!

    Here’s the official language they settle on:

    And here’s the vote on the amendment:

    Should City Representatives start negotiations with a request for transparency and citizen comment?

    It sails through.

    Hey look – there’s that Matthew guy! The one who was literally just re-elected the day before, with 57% of the vote. He absolutely does NOT want your input on SMPD and SMFD.

    (SMPFFA and SMPOA were two separate votes, but everyone voted the same way on both.)

    …

    And then, the actual vote:

    Yes on a one year contract extension and pay increases?

    Great.

    (Again, there were separate votes for SMPOA and SMPFFA, but they went the same way.)

    …

    That’s basically the whole meeting! There are some appointments to committees and things, but nothing big.

    Hours 0:00 – 1:17, 10/21/25

    by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

    Citizen Comment: 

    Just six speakers altogether. Main points made:

    • Four in favor of the Tenants’ Right to Organize ordinance.
    • But not the landlords from the Austin Apartments Associations. They want us to carve out protections for property managers.
    • Other speakers, in response: Please do not protect property managers. That would create a loophole. [Note: we didn’t.]
    • We need managed growth.
    • Update on the EMS thing?
    • You all need to stand for the pledge.
    • Excited for new City Hall proposal
    • How about making the new City Hall environmentally sustainable? Like a One Water approach?

    Pretty breezy and quick.

    …

    Item 2: Tenant’s Right to Organize

    We’ve seen this here, here, and here. This is the final stretch!

    Lorenzo: Can tenant organizers go uninvited into apartment complexes?
    Answer: No, organizers are required to play by vampire rules. They must be invited in. 

    Lorenzo: Can we fix that?

    Amanda:  I don’t think we should fix that.  

    Amanda’s argument goes like so:

    • I wish this ordinance had more teeth
    • But Texas is a heavily pre-emptive state. (Meaning Texas micromanages its cities.)
    • Therefore I strongly recommend that we stick with the language that has held up so far in court.

    City Lawyer: It would be weird to meddle in this way.  Some apartment complexes let in Domino’s pizza to put out fliers, and others have gates.  Organizers are held to the same rules as Domino’s pizza, and it would be weird to carve out extra privileges for them.

    City Staff:  Plus, tenant organizers are not helpless. They can mail postcards to residents and see if one of the residents invites them in.

    So we end up not changing anything.

    The vote on Tenant’s Right to Organize:

    It’s official!

    Really great work by all the community activists! And I’ll single out Max Baker for kudos – he was really  the most visible driving force here.

    Educational fliers for sharing: in English and in Spanish. (Via Amanda Rodriguez on FB.)

    …

    Item 10: Sights & Sounds

    Last year we didn’t see nor hear the Sights & Sounds of San Marcos.  

    But this year it’s back, baby!

    And we’re spending $100,000 on it.

    • Half of that comes from Hotel Occupancy Taxes, which are supposed to be spent on tourism.  So S&S is a good fit.
    • The other half is for the lights, which are kept up all month long.

    Sounds great.

    Pro-tip: if you’ve got a kid who wants to win a hot chocolate, they might want to find out what year S&S was founded, how many light bulbs there are, and what most popular food is. It’s all very cute.

    …

    Item 17: ARWA

    ARWA stands for Alliance Regional Water Authority. These are the folks trying to arrange water sources for us, for the next 50 years. It includes San Marcos, Kyle, Buda, and also Canyon Region Water Authority.

    This started back in 2007, and it was a longterm plan to get water from the Carrizo-Wilcox aquifer. It came online this summer! So this is great. Almost 20 years of longterm planning!

    Currently we are dealing with this:

    That’s all I know!

    (I do worry that “stress on the ARWA participating water supplies” refers to things like Kyle Bass trying to pump 16 billion gallons of water out of Carrizo-Wilcox.)

    …

    Item 18: New City Hall

    Look, this is a super short meeting. This is the last item. So I had a little fun with it. Be prepared for an enormous number of photos.

    Whaddya gonna do, go read some other local marxist city council blog?

    Background:

    Here’s the current City Hall location:

    and here’s what it looks like:

    via

    It was built in the early 1970s, when San Marcos had 18K people. So cute! Little baby San Marcos. Now we have about 70K people.

    Apparently in the past year, they’ve had to evacuate multiple times due to gas and water problems. And whenever something big comes up at Council, community members don’t fit in the chambers. People spill out into the lobby and listen from there.

    So the old building has run its course. We’re looking to build a new one.

    …

    How is the Texas State Lege going to meddle?

    The state won’t let cities borrow money to build city halls without voter approval. This makes everything complicated.

    My pet conspiracy theory: this was done to deliberately manipulate cities into the loving arms of local private developers. This is called a Public-Private-Partnership, or P3.

    So here we are, being driven.

    …

    The options:

    Last April, Council was given the choice of Option A or Option B.

    Option A:

    In other words, keep it in the current location. They’d tear down the existing site and rebuild. Council would have to relocate during construction.

    Option B:

    ie move across the street, onto park land.

    Option B was super unpopular! A lot of community members showed up to argue against it, because of this:

    Both of these are heavily used and very popular!

    City Council decided that they could keep the skate park where it is. They would just squeeze City Hall in immediately right up against the skate park, looming like a big shadowy Gotham City Headquarters over your rebel anarchist skater good time. (But the dog park would be relocated.)

    In the end, Council went with Option B.

    My $0.02: This is a terrible option and they got it wrong! Don’t use up your park land!

    …

    Now, what if there was a Plan C?

    Intriguing! Over the summer, an unsolicited option came in.

    Here’s the new proposal:

    I love this location! There’s nothing particularly sentimental or historical there.

    Let’s check it out!

    This is the Hopkins view.

    Building 1 is this:

    No strong feelings from me.

    Building 2 is this:

    This is a cute old building! It’s been empty forever. It used to be an Ace Hardware store.

    Before that, apparently it was originally Moore’s Grocery Company Building and then King Feed Co:

    It’s cute! But it’s been empty for a long time.

    Number 3 is an empty lot. It used to be a Mr. Gatti’s Pizza:

    and then it briefly became this:

    ie a fever dream of a diner, painted all black with neon flowers. Did we collectively hallucinate this?!

    Anyway. Then it was food trucks:

    and since then it’s just been parking:

    Number 4 used to be where we had Tuesday Farmer’s Markets.

    Back then it looked like this:

    whereas now it looks like this:

    Progress!

    …

    Back to why this location is great! It would be a really healthy for downtown businesses if our city employees all worked nearby.

    Until around 2011, the county employees used to work here:

    I liked to call it the Supermarket of Justice:

    That is now where Industry etc are:

    In 2011, Hays County built the new County Government building, out on Stagecoach.

    All the county employees emptied out of the downtown business area. This was hard on the local downtown restaurants and stores – they no longer had a steady stream of pedestrian foot traffic during weekdays.

    So moving City Hall downtown would replenish some of that.

    This is all great!

    ….

    What else?

    The developers are local. They’re all graduates of either SMHS or Texas State, or both. That’s nice!

    In 2020, they pitched an earlier idea to the city – a combination City Hall-hotel-workforce-housing. Jane Hughson says, “They wanted the hotel to face Hopkins and City Hall to go in the back, which was a nonstarter.”

    What other projects do they have? Well, they have ideas. They have plans with Hays ISD to build some sort of workforce housing thing, and Lockhart ISD is looking at it, too. But there aren’t any lots or conceptual plans or signs of progress on their website.

    As far as I can tell, they’ve never actually completed a project?

    I think this is location is a great idea, though!

    …

    Two more bits that I want to note:

    1. We are paying them $767,970.00 for this conceptual plan. That is a hell of a lot of money for our broke government.

      Now, we’ve saved up about $12 million towards a new city hall, so that’s the source. It’s not displacing funding for something else. But it’s a lot.

    2. They’re actually drawing up plans for this whole area:

    Edited to add a corrected update: The map below is not the full scope of these developers. I got it wrong above! Sorry about that.

    This map below is just showing the full scope of Plan A, Plan B, and Plan C, all together. The Plan C developers are strictly drawing up plans for the downtown piece. – TSM

    WHAT IS GOING ON. Why is the Lion’s Club, and the stage area, the Veteran’s Memorial, the Activity Center, the library, the skate park, and the dog park all included??!

    Why would these (probably very nice) bozos have any say in what happens to ANY of those public facilities? They do not have any experience in that. What the hell.

    …

    What does Council say?

    First off, they’re only asking questions about this part:

    and not the extended map above, that went through the parks and old City Hall.

    Q: What about impervious cover?
    A: It’s already all impervious cover. It can only get better.

    Matthew: The old hardware store is historic, and I’m worried about the elevation drop.
    A: Architects can handle the elevation drop.

    Q: What would happen to the alleys?
    A: We don’t know yet. Maybe some kind of open air space.

    Alyssa: I’m having deja vu of their old proposal.
    A: The 2020 proposal was much smaller.
    Jane: Plus they had the hotel out front and the city hall in back. No.

    Saul: I like it! But I need to see how much it costs.

    Jane: Love a hometown developer!

    The vote: Should we spend $768K on this conceptual plan?

    I probably would have voted yes, because the location is great. I’m just wary because these guys seem inexperienced.

    …

    Final notes:

    Somehow, this City Hall project is going to go off the rails. Really. Not because of this Plan C option, but because the math on this next slide does not make any sense.

    This is from back in April:

    Let me see if I’m following: we’ve saved up $12.7 million. We think we can get $15-20 million more from private developers. That adds up to ~$30 million.

    But the whole project is supposed to cost $62-98 million! Where is this magical extra money going to come from?

    These are the only options I see:

    • Voters will have to vote to approve a bond to borrow the rest.
    • This project ends up being about half as big as they’re hoping.
    • This project takes 25 years to complete
    • We end up selling our souls to find an extra $50 million from private businesses

    In some way or another, reality is going to reassert itself.

    Hours 0:00 – 1:15, 10/8/25

    by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

    Citizen Comment:

    There were eight speakers, on diverse topics:

    • The first amendment is being trampled in the US right now.  (True!)
    • We need to be mindful of our budget and run San Marcos like a business.
    • Austin Apartments Association represents a bunch of landlords as members. They’re mixed on Tenant’s Right to Organize.
    • San Marcos Civics Club is holding their candidate forum on Thursday, and they also have their questionnaire available: Place 1 and Place 2.
    • Council candidate Chris Polanco echoes the first amendment crisis, and also talks about having a disability in San Marcos
    • Global issues – Ceasefire in Gaza and fascist tendencies of the state government.
    • The DR Horton homes in Cottonwood Creek were built so shoddily that foundations are cracking in the first three years. People up and down their street are finding themselves trapped financially because these homes are built so poorly. Can the city prevent DR Horton from building new homes until they stabilize the existing ones? Or something else?

    That last one feels like lawsuit territory. This sounds awful. (Maybe this is a good candidate for participatory budgeting – see below.)

    …

    Item 9: Tenant’s Right to Organize

    This is nearing the finish line! What should you do if you’re a tenant, and there’s mold in your bedroom, or your AC goes out, or you have no hot water, and your landlord refuses to fix it?

    In Texas, you have very few options besides suing. You can talk to your landlord, of course. If they start to see you as a problem, you might be evicted. Filing a lawsuit is expensive, of course, and if you try to sue, you might be evicted anyways.

    This is the point of this ordinance: tenants should be able to talk to each other about their landlord problems, and form tenant organizations, and bring issues to their landlords as a united front, without worrying that they’ll get evicted or face retaliation. (Discussed previously here and here.) 

    Under the ordinance, here’s what’s protected:

    (These are old slides from last month.)

    Here’s what landlords are NOT allowed to do:

    But they’re still allowed to do some things! Like so:

    This is great! No tenant should fear eviction when they’re fighting for clean and safe housing.

    …

    Council Discussion

    There’s one small discussion point: property managers.

    Suppose property managers are the ones doing the intimidating, and the landlord lives 1000 miles away. Should the property manager be held liable? Or does it go to the landlord, since they are responsible for their employees?

    Lorenzo proposes an amendment to exempt property managers. Unfortunately, this ship has sailed – employees are already held liable in similar situations. Even if we adopt Lorenzo’s amendment, it doesn’t really protect them. (The amendment fails.)

    …

    The vote on the Tenant’s Right to Organize ordinance: 

    Hooray! (Lots of hard work on this from the San Marcos Civics Club and TAG, so thank you to both of them.)

    This is just the first vote. It will come through for a final vote at the next meeting. 

    …

    Item 13: Participatory Budgeting

    Participatory Budgeting is a specific thing. It doesn’t just loosely mean “survey the people or invite them to watch the budget process”.

    It works like so: a city sets aside a pot of money, and asks for ideas from the public. The community develops proposals, and then the public votes on which project to fund.

    Here’s the graphic from the website:

    One of their taglines is “It gives people real power over real money.”  

    Alyssa (and Max Baker, back when he was on council) have brought this up for years. It gained a little more traction at the visioning workshop back in January, and then was included in the budget that we tried to pass in September.

    But then – I’m still cranky about it – Council sabotaged the budget at the last meeting.  One of the items that got axed in the carnage was $250K for participatory budgeting.

    Apparently Lorenzo felt a pang of regret for driving us off the cliff? Maybe Alyssa was extra-furious about this part?  (I shouldn’t speculate, because I have no clue.) All I know is that Lorenzo went to the city manager and asked if there was any way to fix this. Can she find some money to restore funding for participatory budgeting?

    And lo: she found some!  It’s displaced City Hall money.

    In theory, we’re trying to sock away $1 million each year for that project.  But this year, we’re using the most of that $1 million to put an offer in on the land next to Centro. 

    We’re expecting to have a little bit left over, and that’s going to be the Participatory Budgeting Pot of Money. Hooray! 

    Gentle readers: this is your call. Start brainstorming ideas!

    • Is there something in your neighborhood that could be transformed?
    • Do the kids in your neighborhood need a place to play?
    • Or a community gardens?
    • What about opening up the Activity Center on Sundays, or having longer front lobby hours for the library?
    • Or hey: a coordinated lawsuit or mobilization against DR Horton?

    Go think up great things! Your mom tells me you’re very clever.

    ….

    Note #1: This was just a preliminary discussion.  Participatory Budgeting will come back around as a formal proposal.

    Note #2: Since we mentioned the new city hall, let me say again that I hate this plan. They want to relocate City Hall across the street, and into our parks.

    Don’t use up your park land! They’re not making more land.

    …

    There were a few tiny other items – scheduling the election, filling some commission vacancies, appointing a municipal judge. And that’s all! It was an extremely short meeting.

    However! Keep reading, to hear about the river. The action was all in the 3 pm workshop.