LEGISLATIVE BUDGET BOARD Austin, Texas FISCAL NOTE, 77th Regular Session January 19, 2001 TO: Honorable Frank Madla, Chair, Senate Committee on Intergovernmental Relations FROM: John Keel, Director, Legislative Budget Board IN RE: SB61 by Moncrief (Relating to the annexation of a county road.), As Introduced ************************************************************************** * No fiscal implication to the State is anticipated. * ************************************************************************** Local Government Impact The bill would require a city annexing an area bounded by a county road to annex the entire right-of-way associated with the section of road being annexed. Currently, municipalities with less than 1.6 million population are not required to purchase the entire right-of-way when they are annexing a section of road that is bounded by a county road. The bill would affect every city in Texas except Houston. Costs would vary based on what the nature of the use of the annexed road would be, cost for reconstruction for each city, and cost of expansion. According to the City of Odessa (population of 96,195), the expense of maintaining the annexed area would come into play and would impact their city. Another factor would be the expense of enlarging the road for development depending on the nature of development. The city attorney's office stated they have never annexed part of a road and part of a right-of-way. If they annex an area, they annex the entire area. Some of the costs would include mowing, traffic signals, stop signs, and resurfacing. The cost of resurfacing a road for Odessa is $9,152 per mile. In Gainesville (population of 14,760), the community development department said when they annex an area, they look at the center line of the annexed road and annex half of the right-of-way but maintain all of the right-of-way. They usually have an agreement with the county regarding the maintenance. Gainesville would incur costs of mowing, possible stop lights, and resurfacing of an annexed area, but the costs cannot be determined since it would depend on the development of the area. Their cost for resurfacing is $5,280 per mile. In Arlington (population of 306,497), the impact would be the police services, fire department, resurfacing of the roads, and mowing. If the city ordinance for roads is at a higher standard than the county, then they would need to bring the county road up to the city standards. The cost of resurfacing a road varies depending upon the type of surface that is used and how wide the road is to be resurfaced. The City of Brownsville (population of 137,883) said there would be a definite impact because they would have to maintain the trash pick up, fire and police protection, resurfacing and mowing. Currently, if the city does the resurfacing of a road, it costs $50 per linear foot or $2,640 per mile. It costs more if they have an outside contractor do the work for them. Brownsville officials said the costs cannot be determined because it depends on the road that is annexed, what type of development is to be done and what kinds of services have to be offered. The bill would result in costs for local governments. However , the costs cannot be determined since the development along roads in each city is different and costs for maintaining roads vary for every city. Source Agencies: 304 Comptroller of Public Accounts LBB Staff: JK, DB