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A municipality, also called a city, is a local unit of government in Texas. The largest municipalities in Texas are Houston, San Antonio, Dallas, Austin, Fort Worth, and El Paso.
General Powers
Municipalities provide certain public services like police, fire, and utilities, and they may levy taxes to pay for these services.
Municipalities have the power to adopt ordinances governing certain matters. Ordinances are the equivalent of a local law and deal with matters not already covered by federal or state law.
Violations of municipal ordinances are punishable by fines of up to $500, except in cases of public health, zoning, and fire safety violations, in which case the fine may be up to $2,000.
Types of Texas Municipalities
In Texas law, there are three types of municipality: general-law, home-rule, or special-law. General-law municipalities operate under powers given to them by the state, while home-rule municipalities also operate under a city charter.
Legally, there are no “townships” or “villages” in Texas, as there are in some other states, though some municipalities do refer to themselves by those terms.
- Home-rule municipality: operates under a municipal charter adopted by Article XI, Section 5, of the Texas Constitution. A city must have more than 5,000 inhabitants in order to qualify for home-rule status. The city may adopt a charter by majority vote.
- Special-law municipality: operates under a municipal charter granted by a local law enacted by the Congress of the Republic of Texas or by the Legislature.
- General-law municipality: operates under state law. Must have between 201 and 9,999 inhabitants at time of application for incorporation.
Mayor-Council vs Council-Manager Cities
Another key distinction is between the mayor-council form of municipal government and the council-manager form. Municipalities of both types are found in Texas.
In the former, the mayor is the chief executive and chief administrator of city government and exercises substantial executive powers in the day-to-day affairs of the city. This is also sometimes called a “strong mayor” form of government.
But in cities with the council-manager form of government, the mayor has little more authority than a council member. The mayor presides over council meetings and fulfills ceremonial duties, but day-to-day management of the city falls to a hired city manager, who is accountable to the whole council, not just the mayor.
Austin, Dallas, San Antonio, El Paso, Fort Worth, Arlington, Corpus Christi, Plano, and Laredo all have a council-manager (“weak mayor”) form of government; Houston has a mayor-council (“strong mayor”) form of government.
Eminent Domain
Municipalities may exercise the power of eminent domain–that is, they may seize private property for a “public use,” provided they compensate the owner.
Acceptable uses of this power include the building or enlarging a city hall, police station, jail, school, airport, park, or roadway, among others, according to the Local Government Code.
Zoning
Zoning is the practice of dividing a city into districts with prescribed building regulations for each district. Usually, a city that implements zoning is divided into residential, commercial, industrial, and agricultural districts. Zoning may regulate the height of buildings, percentages of a lot that may be occupied, the size of yards and open spaces, and other matters.
Texas cities’ zoning regulations must comply with chapter 211 of the Local Government Code, the state law that deals principally with municipal zoning.
Municipal Taxes
Municipalities are entitled to collect both property tax and sales tax.
Maximum sales tax rate: The maximum sales tax rate for a Texas city is 2%. However, local governments collectively are entitled to a 2% maximum sales tax rate, which means that a city may not be able to collect the full 2% if other taxing entities already have set a sales tax rate.
Maximum property tax rate: The maximum property tax (ad valorem) rate of a Texas city depends on the size of the city:
- Texas cities with a population of 5,000 or less can levy a maximum tax rate of $1.50 per $100 of assessed valuation.
- Texas cities with a population of more than 5,000 can levy up to $2.50 per $100 of assessed valuation.
- Type B general law cities can levy a maximum of $0.25 per $100 of assessed valuation.
These limits are set by the constitution and state law. City charters may further restrict the maximum property tax rate.
Creation of New Municipalities
In order to form a general-law municipality, the residents of a community may file an incorporation application with the county judge, signed by at least 50 qualified voters who are residents of the community.
A judge who receives such a petition must order an incorporation election to be held on a specified date and at a designated place in the community. The voters then get to decide whether to incorporate the area as a municipality or not.
