Pearsall’s Comprehensive Master Plan: A Road Map

By Editor | March 30, 2023

A WORD FROM THE MAYOR

Ben Briscoe

The City of Pearsall’s Comprehensive Master Plan (CMP), has 14 chapters that center on population trends, housing, land use, water supply and distribution, wastewater, gas system, roadways, parks and recreation, our Central Business District, recommended capital improvements, zoning and subdivision ordinances, and finally, funding options.
Identifying key needs of the city helps guide us in sustaining current operations and meeting future needs of our expanding population.
This road map for us and future councils addresses budget needs, critical infrastructure repairs and capital improvements. The detailed report puts us in the bracket of being ‘shovel ready’ for some of these upgrades, a key phrase for grants and various state and federal funding. Key to all of these recommended expenses funding; specifically can we afford to fund them?
The City of Pearsall operates on a $12 million budget. Two million of that is currently used for making payments on loans (generally called bonds in the municipal world). Today, we owe $14 million in outstanding bonds, so in essence, the city operates on roughly $10 million annually. The city doesn’t have the reserves to pay for improvements outright, so funding is procured through loans or grants. This creates a need to either raise taxes or utility rates or both to cover the debt service or payments. We have operated on a $12 million budget in the three years I’ve been involved with the city. With inflation like it is, running a little into the red is likely. The scale and price tag of these projects can be staggering. A current drainage study identified ten areas in the city with flooding issues. Addressing all ten areas would be $34 million. The capital improvements recommended in our CMP total $28 million. Last year, we fixed two small sections of streets. At the cost to redo those streets it would take over $30 million to repave every street in town.
Those numbers making you dizzy yet? Try working them into a budget. The city annexed the area north of Pearsall five years ago and part of the annexation plan was to bring them water and sewer. That engineering work is complete or being completed and the price tag is equally staggering. We have hired a grant writer/consultant to find funding to complete some of these projects. There are some intriguing funding options out there that include grants and low-interest loans that would help if we can get them.
Federal ARP funding over the last two years has helped to address a number of items in our capital improvements segment. Additional costs include addressing dilapidated vacant homes. Compliance issues forced the city to tear down two sets of playground equipment at our parks. Aging vehicles and equipment; maintenance at the waste-water treatment plant and water wells requires frequent and large expenditures.
Operating efficiently is key. Our solid waste disposal was losing money and was corrected. We’ve identified and are correcting high water loss rates in our water system. Our gas system isn’t efficient due to dwindling gas use.
So what does this CMP do for us? It helps organize and prioritize areas to address and pinpoint the most critical things that will impact and benefit the largest portion of our population for the dollars spent. Obviously, we can’t do all these things but it helps us to plan further than just one year at a time, to focus today on these intermediate and long-term municipal needs and insure today’s budget considers the longer term needs.
Folks, this, as well as numerous other challenges, are all in a day’s work of keeping the city operating, but this CMP, along with input from senior administration, our dedicated staff and your city council is going to help us keep a handle on it, today and into the future. That’s our plan.
God Bless the City of Pearsall, the County of Frio, the State of Texas, the United States of America and You.
Ben T. Briscoe
Mayor of Pearsall

Posted in Columns