CWS in 30th year presents Holloway Citizen Award

Council proposes tax rate, discusses deer ordinance

By Glynis Crawford Smith

The Highlander

Rex Holloway can now say he received the Cottonwood Shores Citizen of the Year Award on the city's 30th Anniversary.

Cottonwood Shores incorporated Aug. 8, 1987, but only in the last three years has it begun honoring the volunteers who have done much of the work to keep improving the city.

In Holloway's case, that includes serves on the city's Board of Adjustment and as vice chairman of the Parks Committee.

“He has worked tirelessly for new playground equipment, and the addition of the splash pad and Memorial Day's grand opening with hotdogs and tee shirts for the kids,” said City Administrator Sheila Moore. “He also attends most city council meetings.”

“Rex is the moving force in the Parks Committee,” said council member Roger Wayson. “He has directed the parks through a time when we were not in ADA compliance to settle all the issues, has developed plans for parks to bring enjoyment to the citizens including a highly successful splash pad day with hot dogs, tee shirts for the children, and handouts, had a successful day of input from the citizens, completed plans for the new swing sets to be installed in community park, and given a tremendous amount of time to work on the parks.

“He was very deserving.”

The city has come out in the top tier of city's being considered by this round of Community Development Block Grants (CDBG) and should have a new $275,000 grant in hand in time to go on line with a new water plant in 2018.

Gandolf Burrus of Grant Development Services (GDS) outlined the process of accepting the grant and scheduling environmental studies before bids and construction can go forward.

“We were counting on that $275,000,” said Mayor Donald Orr. “We will need a $1.395 million grant from Texas Water Development Board for the new plant construction. This money...draws down the amount of payments.”

The strategy for managing the new water plant debt also plays out in a property tax schedule devised by the city—maintaining a tax level that prevents a sharp hike in any one year.

To that end, the council agreed to propose continuing a tax rate of $0.5438 per $100 property value, divided $0.3321 for maintenance and operation (M&O) and $0.2117 for the interest and sinking fund (I&S) that will absorb the demands of the new construction debt.

“Knowing we would need $35,000 to $40,000 a year (for debt maintenance) we decided to go to residents and suggest maintaining the rate at (around) 54 cents rather than going down to 48 cents and back up to 56 or 65 cents (per $100 valuation in subsequent years),” said Orr.

“The extra $42,000 we will collect this year will go into a special account to be used for debt service (in coming years).”

The council has been meeting to set a budget expected to come in at almost $1.9 million for the coming fiscal year. Property tax supports about 15 percent of figure. Citizens accepted the strategy last year without petitioning for an election, even though the rate exceeded the rollback rate.

Adjusted property values in Cottonwood Shore this year are about $64 million, a $6 million increase over the last. An effective tax rate, the rate that would yield the same revenue as last year, would have been $0.5082 per $100 valuation, but this year an election would have been triggered only by a rate of $0.6248.

Another intense debate over the possibility of an ordinance prohibiting the feeding of deer inside the city ended when a motion to instate an ordinance died for lack of a second.

“I want to come back to this at the next meeting when Stephen Sherry and Tony Satsky can be here,” said Orr. “I want everyone to be involved.”

“It is not that we are against deer,” Orr said earnestly. “But it is like the Parks & Wildlife rule that you can't have beer in a park. An ordinance would give us the ability to control it when it gets out of control. Presently, Texas Parks & Wildlife says we have 10 times the deer the habitat can support.”

Present for the meeting were council members Cheryl Trinidad, Brigitte Thomas and Roger Wayson, the later two opposed to the ordinance. Wayson said he basically is against trying to control people and envisions a successful education program that will help people learn how detrimental feeding is to the health of the deer. Thomas said she feeds deer and keeps a water source for them in her own back yard.

“But I am beginning to reconsider what I feed them, now that I am learning how harmful corn can be,” she said.

The natural foods deer are able to digest, in addition to acorns and nuts, are the reason gardeners lament their invasion: herbaceous flowering plants and tender leaves, twigs, fruit and high-growing vegetation on bushes and trees.