10.2: Municipal (City) Government

City government was founded on the idea that local communities know best how to run their own affairs. Cities are incorporated communities, established by law as a city. Before 1836, there were no incorporated cities in Texas. After Texas became a republic in 1836, the Texas Congress began incorporating cities in Texas. The first city incorporated was Nacogdoches approved June 5, 1837. After statehood in 1845, city charters could only be granted by the Texas Legislature until the home-rule amendment in 1912. These charters set forth the type of government under which the city would operate, established the number of individuals to serve on the governing body, and authorized the city to perform those functions required when individuals live in close proximity to one another. City government was founded on the idea that local communities know best how to run their own affairs. Cities also provide those basic services—maintaining its streets, protecting its citizens with law enforcement, providing utility service, and passing ordinances to make the city a better place to live.

General-Law and Home-Rule

Cities can be classified as either a general-law or home-rule city. After statehood in 1845, city charters could only be granted by the Texas legislature, but in the early twentieth century, population growth outpaced the state legislature’s ability to regulate local concerns and the Texas Constitution was amended in 1912 to allow for home-rule.⁴ Once an area has a population of 201 or more, it can become a general-law city with a charter prescribed by the legislature. Once a city has more than 5,000 people, it can choose to become a home-rule city with a locally drafted charter that defines how it will govern itself. If the population of a city changes, it does not automatically have its status changed, the local voters must decide the legal status of its status. The key advantage of home-rule status is the flexibility in writing a charter to establish powers of the elected officials, setting salaries, and determining the process for passing, repealing or amending ordinances. They have the ability to manage its own affairs according to local interests. Currently, there are about 870 general-law cities and 350 home-rule cities.

More and more, ordinances from home-rule cities are unpopular with state government resulting in state laws preempting, or nullifying, local ordinances deemed in conflict with state law. Preemption was originally designed to provide a uniform baseline of state-wide regulations, but it has more recently become a tool used for policy change.⁵ Most cases in the twenty-first century related to upholding local regulations that impeded drilling and fracking in particular cities, but a 2014 bill overruled oil and gas regulation by local government. During the 2017 legislative special session, there were a number of preemption bills. Two popular ones passed—one limiting local regulations of tree removal and the second one restricted the annexation powers of local government. Others have been less popular, such as those rolling back local LGBTQ protections, including the failed “bathroom bill” that would have preempted local ordinances allowing transgender people to use the bathroom of their choice or those that allowed social workers to reject LGBTQ clients. That year, Governor Abbott also used preemption to impose fines on so-called sanctuary cities for not cooperating with immigration roundups.⁶ In 2021, Austin Mayor Steve Adler has come into conflict with the state over requiring masks after Governor Abbott lifted COVID restrictions. Mayor Adler has so far stood firm, saying “We promise to be guided by . . . science” and district courts have upheld the local health policy.⁷ Governor Abbott is also attempting to restrict voting through preemption by curtailing mail in voting and disallowing the extended hours of early and drive-thru voting enacted by local officials during the COVID pandemic.⁸

In addition, home-rule cities have three other powers not available to general-law cities or state government: recall, initiative, and referendum. Recall is a process for removing elected officials through a popular vote before their term is up. To initiate this procedure, citizens would file an affidavit with the alleged grounds for removing the elected official with the city secretary/clerk. Then a petition would be provided to collect signatures for the removal. An initiative allows residents to propose legislation themselves if the city government has not taken action. Citizens must draft the text for the proposed ordinance and gather signatures on the petition. The number of signatures varies from city to city but could be a certain number of voters or the proportion of votes in a prior election. If the petition is valid, the city government can adopt the ordinance or hold an election on the proposed ordinance. A referendum is a process by which issues are referred to the voters to accept or reject. Voters may also petition for a vote to repeal an existing ordinance. This process occurs in home-rule cities. On the state level, voters must approve state constitutional amendments.

Forms of City Government

There are two major forms of city government in Texas—the Mayor-Council and Council- Manager (Table 10.1). A third from of city government was the commission form, devised in Galveston in 1901 after the Galveston hurricane of 1900. Millions of dollars of property was swept away and there was an estimated loss of 6,000 lives. A commission was originally appointed, later elected, and each would handle some aspect of rebuilding the city. After World War I, very few cities used this form of government and by 1993, no cities used the commission form.⁹

Table 10.1 Two Forms of Local Government

The Mayor-Council can be furthered broken down into strong-mayor and weak-mayor, but there are very few weak-mayor forms. With a strong Mayor-Council, the mayor is the city’s chief administrator responsible for ensuring all laws and ordinances are enforced. The mayor can appoint department heads and those individuals serving on advisory boards. He will set the agendas for the council meetings and prepares the budget. With a weak Mayor-Council, his autonomy is much more limited. The council has a voice in staffing, setting the agenda, and budgeting. Houston is the only large city in Texas with a Mayor-Council form of government.

With a Council-Manager form of government, a professional city manager is hired to run the city on a day to day basis. The mayor is largely ceremonial and has no more authority than the other council members. The council will make the laws and policy decisions, and the city manager is responsible for making sure the laws and policies are carried out. All of the city departments report to the city manager. Most of the more populous cities (Austin, Dallas, San Antonio, El Paso, Fort Worth, Arlington, Corpus Christi, Plano and Laredo) have the Council- Manager form of government.

The major city officials for both forms of city governments include the mayor, city council, city attorney and the chief of police. The mayor serves as the presiding officer of the city council and may call meetings and set agendas depending on the city structure. The mayor will be responsible for emergency management both natural and man-made disasters, including hurricanes, tornados, wildfires, and the power outages caused by serve weather), appointing certain positions, leading the policy process and performing some ceremonial duties.

The city council will make laws and have broad policy-making authority such as approving the budget for the city. Depending on the form of government, either the major or the city manager will be responsible for carrying out those policies. They also determine salaries and benefits for city employees and sign/authorize contracts. The city attorney prosecutes city code violations and provides legal advice to the council or other city officials. Code violations could include where vehicles and trailers can be parked or putting up signs without a permit. They will also assist in the writing or proposed ordinances and defend the city in any possible lawsuits. One such case was filed by the city of El Paso against the owner of an establishment that featured live nude entertainment that was less than 1,000 feet from a public school, in violation of a city ordinance (law). The police chief is responsible for enforcing criminal state and traffic laws and all city ordinances. They oversee the police department including the budget, operations, conduct of police officers and the city jail. Finally, depending on the form of government adopted by the city, the city manager supervises city departments and can remove department heads. They will implement policy decisions made by the mayor and/or council, manage the budget, appoint city employees and oversee the enforcement of non-criminal city ordinances.

Elections

The mayor is usually selected in an at-large election where officials are selected by voters of the entire geographical area, rather than from smaller districts within the larger area. Council members can be selected at-large or from single-member districts where voters elect one member from a district. More and more cities are using a combination of both at-large and single- member elections for the council members.

Single-member districts can favor minority populations as many cities are still geographically segregated. At-large elections favor the majority ethnic group as people tend to vote for candidates of their own race or ethnicity. Some local governments use cumulative voting where voters can cast a number of votes equal to the positions available and may cast

them for one or more candidates in any combination. Before Amarillo changed its voting system, elections for the school board were elected at-large. The result was that the Anglo majority had all of the seats on the school board. After it changed to cumulative voting in 2000, the first black candidate won and a Hispanic candidate won, the first in over thirty years.¹⁰ Home-rule cities also have the ability to limit the number of terms that the mayor and council members may serve.

As the metropolitan areas get more populated, more problems will get identified and will require attention from local government. More people mean more traffic, more trash, more crime, more water supply, more parks/green space, more crime, more jails, more police protection, more fire protection and more pollution to name just a few. Texas cities use both local property and the sales tax to fund their police and fire departments, parks, utilities and other public services. Being known as a low tax state, this presents challenges to cities and other forms of local government.

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4. Terrell Blodgett, “Home Rule Charters,” Texas State Historical Society Handbook of Texas, https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/...-rule-charters.

5. “Part One: State Preemption Unleashed” New America, https://www.newamerica.org/political...ion-unleashed/.

6. Audrey McGlinchy, “ Texas Gov. Greg Abbott Signs Controversial 'Sanctuary Cities' Law,” NPR All Things Considered, May 8, 2017, https://www.npr.org/2017/05/08/52745...ary-cities-law.

7. Andrew Buncombe, “Austin Mayor Blasts Gregg Abbott for ‘Breaking Promise’ on Mask Mandate,” Independent, March 3, 2021, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-b1812111.html.

8. Alexa Ura, “Gov. Greg Abbott formally opens Texas GOP bid to clamp down on local efforts expanding voting access,” Texas Tribune, Mar. 15, 2021, https://www.texastribune.org/2021/03...g-greg-abbott/.

9. Bradley R. Rice, “Commission Form of City Government,” Texas State Historical Association Handbook of Texas, June 1995, https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/...ity-government.

10. “The History of Cumulative Voting in Amarillo,” Program for Representative Government, December 2009, http://archive.fairvote.org/?page=247.