The Metropolis of Houston, already financially strapped, should allocate extra money to avenue and drainage initiatives after the Texas Supreme Court docket on Friday declined to contemplate its attraction in a longstanding authorized problem introduced by two native engineers.
The engineers, Houston residents Bob Jones and Allen Watson, supported a metropolis constitution modification initially handed in 2010 and amended in 2018 that stipulated the flood-prone metropolis should put aside 11.8 cents out of each $100 collected in property taxes for a particular drainage and street restore fund. Jones and Watson sued Houston’s mayor and metropolis council members in 2019, arguing that they had illegally adjusted the drainage allocation to issue for town’s income cap, leading to a fund shortfall of about $50 million in fiscal yr 2020.
The Fourteenth Court docket of Appeals sided with Jones and Watson final April, reversing a decrease court docket’s determination and ruling that the drainage fund allotment may now not be impacted by town’s income cap. The Texas Supreme Court docket successfully upheld that call by declining to evaluate the case.
Jones mentioned Friday the choice “will nearly instantly add $100 million to the accessible funds on an annual foundation.”
“I believe that is going to trigger town to need to look by way of its price range and determine what it is going to do,” Jones mentioned. “We have now a number of streets and drainage amenities within the metropolis which are in want of restore.”
A spokesperson for Houston Mayor John Whitmire didn’t instantly reply to an electronic mail Friday in search of remark.
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Final April, when Whitmire mentioned town deliberate to attraction the appellate court docket’s ruling, he mentioned he did not “consider drainage infrastructure ought to compete with public security funding.”
One among Whitmire’s first initiatives after being sworn in as mayor in early 2024 was to achieve a $1.5 billion settlement and contract with town’s firefighters, who had gone years and not using a labor contract below the administration of former Mayor Sylvester Turner.
“I actually agree town should make investments extra to deal with our infrastructure wants, however I don’t consider Houstonians would elect to do this by way of a court docket’s order that funds drainage infrastructure on the expense and sacrifice of public security or high quality of life companies,” Whitmire mentioned final April.
Jones famous Friday that about 350,000 Houston residents voted in favor of the constitution modification that created the particular drainage fund, whereas fewer than 150,000 voted for Whitmire in his 2023 mayoral victory in opposition to late U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee.
“The folks of Houston overwhelmingly need their streets and drainage mounted,” Jones mentioned. “It is terribly unlucky that we needed to undergo this, and that the need of the voters was denied for five-and-a-half years till we gained this swimsuit.”
