A new exemption law now in effect puts San Antonio’s main source of drinking water at greater risk for environmental degradation, a new report released by the Greater Edwards Aquifer Alliance finds.
The report published earlier this month states that the recently passed Senate Bill 2038 has the “potential to put much of the land over the Edwards Aquifer Recharge Zone and throughout the environmentally sensitive Edwards and Trinity Aquifer watersheds at risk of environmental degradation.” The bill allows property owners to petition to disannex their land from a city’s extraterritorial jurisdiction (ETJ), freeing them from municipal regulations — including those meant to protect the Edwards and Trinity aquifers.
The intention of the bill as written was to give landowners an option to opt out of being subject to regulation without city representation, according to comments added by legislators when the bill was filed.
Environmental advocates see the new law as a blow to efforts to add land protections for the Edwards Aquifer, which supplies drinking water for about 2 million people in the San Antonio area. The aquifer supplies about half of the potable water utilized by San Antonio Water System and spans across eight Central Texas counties.
The Greater Edwards Aquifer Alliance (GEAA) study was performed by Policy Manager Rachel Hanes, who collected data for the study from when the law went into effect on Sept. 1 through early March. Hanes said each of the 13 cities analyzed received multiple petition requests from landowners seeking to disannex; at least 551 requests totaling more than 17,000 acres were received during that study period.
“Unfortunately, cities do not have any real means to reject or disapprove an ETJ release petition,” Hanes said. “Even if cities do attempt to disapprove a release, the land is released by operation of law after a certain time frame.”
The petition to disannex must contain signatures from more than 50% of the registered voters or a majority in value of the titleholders of land in the area. See the full list of petition requirements here.
After these properties are released, they are subject only to county and state regulations, which are often far less strict than the municipal ETJ regulations, she said.
ETJ ordinances related to tree preservation, regulating nuisances, impervious cover, limits, water quality protection and limiting incompatible land use through development agreements all protect the general health, safety and welfare of residents in ways that county governments currently do not, Hanes said.
“This regulatory shift could negatively impact the quality of life of residents, both in the ETJs and in city boundaries who expect these protections, especially as the region experiences rapid growth,” she said.
Texas is already seeing ill effects from this new legislation, said Annalisa Peace, GEAA’s executive director. Peace said that GEAA has been working with several small towns in Hays and Travis counties that have seen developers who own properties already utilize this new law to avoid having to adhere to aquifer protections that are in place.
“It’s very concerning to us, because municipalities — several of them — have done a good job in trying to protect their water supplies, their groundwater supplies, and this just pulls the rug out from under them,” she said.
The law does have several limited exceptions to its applicability, including one for land within 15 miles of active military installations in large counties, Hanes noted.
“By including an exception for these areas, the legislature acknowledged ETJ regulation by cities was beneficial both to the natural environment and to rational subdivision development near these military bases,” she said. “There’s no reason why these same benefits would not apply in other ETJ areas throughout the state that are not located near military installations.”
As accelerated development and climate change affect the local water supply both in quality and quantity, it is antithetical to the health of the Edwards Aquifer and to Central Texans to allow people to skirt existing regulations, Hanes said.
GEAA believes the legislature should consider amending or repealing SB 2038, or that the law should be amended to ensure that land overlying aquifer recharge and contributing zones is still subject to protective municipal regulations, she said.
“Regardless of whether the legislature chooses to amend SB 2038 they should grant expanded authority related to water quality protection and land use to counties — at least in the fast-growing Trinity and Edwards Aquifer region,” Hanes said.
