It’s time we have a talk about the M word. Many of you have asked for a moratorium on building in Leander for some time. I want you to know that I don’t disagree with you or it’s not that I’m not hearing you, it’s that moratoriums in Texas are….well, they’re complicated.

We’ve heard the rallying cry around our water issues. Quite frankly, Leander is notorious for having water issues the last several years. And most recently, we’ve heard it from the residents in Travisso, who dealt with Atmos Energy’s inexcusable cut off of service in the 2021 freeze and now like other areas of the city, region, and state had gas issues again with the freeze at the end of last month. Each time we hear it, it’s the same argument: “Dripping Springs had a moratorium, Leander should too.”

So let’s dig into that.

The 1st thing to know about moratoriums in Texas is that you have to be facing dire consequences right now.

Like right right now. Not 6 months or a year from now. Not “things might be a little tight”. Your issue has to be imminent. In the Dripping Springs example, they ran out of wastewater capacity. The city of Dripping Springs runs the wastewater system, so they know exactly what usage they have and what their capacity is. They previously applied to expand their wastewater facility and that permit was denied, which triggered their moratorium and what is now a few years of legal wrangling with the state.

More recently, the city of Magnolia enacted a moratorium. In their case, they were completely out of water connections AND had run into a bottleneck with their wastewater. Just a few weeks before the moratorium, Magnolia made the news for having brown and green water that was sometimes randomly shut off for hours at a time, according to residents.

The city of Cibolo has a great document about it in a council agenda packet from last year. They had contemplated a moratorium but fell short of the requirements. That discussion is still ongoing.

The 2nd thing to know is that they only last for up to 6 months at a time.

That’s right. 6 months, tops, and then you have to present your case to the state again. So if you’re going to do one, you’d better make it timely because you cannot drag them out for years at a time. The state will call your bluff.

The 3rd thing to know about moratoriums is that they do not apply to projects already in the pipeline.

That’s right. A moratorium does not mean that construction stops today. A moratorium will only apply to certain types of new development, and even with that there are some exemptions and waivers.

So how does this work when we’re talking about water?

Leander has had its share of problems and bad headlines. We even had a big shutdown this year as we repaired the BCRUA pipeline (and thanks again to everyone who conserved diligently – seriously, you deserve another round of applause). But, even with all our bad press, the truth is we aren’t close enough to hitting capacity to make the needed finding to the state. That doesn’t mean we won’t ever, but it’s not where we’re at right now. So an attempt for the city to enter a moratorium on that ground would be illegal at this point in time.

But what about Atmos?

When you talk about Atmos’s failures in Leander, you have to take the two events separately, because they were not entirely related.

The first event was during the freeze of January 2021. In that event, Atmos basically said “oops, sorry, turns out we undersized the lines in the system heading out to Travisso, so we’re going to cut off their entire gas supply so we can keep pressure in the neighboring cities Good luck everybody”. I’m sure we’re all muttering a collective WTF. It’s horrifying and it never should have happened. We were able to get two representatives from Atmos speak at a council meeting immediately after. They did the song and dance, fell on their swords, and said they were going to fix the issue and it wouldn’t happen again.

The issue, they said, was that Travisso was basically at the end of the service line so it was hard to get pressure through there during the freeze. They anticipated this and brought out trucks with compressed gas to feed into the lines. But after a few days, the road conditions deteriorated to the point they felt they could no longer do that safely. So they cut everyone off….for days. But, the good news they said was they knew the fix and that was to create an 8 inch connection through the back of Travisso alongside the extension of Osage Rd.

Fast forward to the freeze just before Christmas: The 8 inch connection has been fully completed and Atmos recognizes that everyone is giving them the side eye. They told city staff and residents that everything was good, they anticipated no issues, but just in case the worst case scenario happens, they’re going to stage those condensed gas trucks in the neighborhood.

So the freeze hit and lo and behold, Atmos has to start using the condensed gas trucks in Travisso. And the word initially was that it’s still sort of the end of the line and that they need to create more connections through neighboring cities to get the full pressure.

But then…we started getting reports of low gas pressure from other areas of the city. They came in from Grand Mesa. They came in around Glenn High School. And then we started hearing them from neighborhoods in other cities. Neighborhoods in Cedar Park, Hutto, Lago Vista, and the entire downtown and east side of Round Rock….all had the same low pressure and outages. People were waking up to freezing houses. Pilot lights were going out.

It turns out that this time, the issue was pretty much all over the state. Random outages here and there and no real answers from Atmos. This was not a Travisso problem. This was not an end of the line problem. This was an Atmos problem.

Well if you know Atmos is failing, why don’t you do something about it?

For the same reason the city couldn’t and didn’t do anything about it in 2021 when we didn’t like what Atmos did. We don’t have the authority. In the state of Texas, Atmos answers only to the Railroad Commission. As long as they are in good standing with the Railroad Commission, no municipality in Texas has any authority over them. None. I know that’s not the answer anyone wants to hear (except Atmos), but it’s the truth and it’s just as frustrating to us as it is to you.

Well then what are you doing?

We’re asking Atmos to come out to a council meeting like they did in 2021 to answer for what happened and what they’re doing to keep it from happening. I’m also going to do what I did in 2021 – contact representatives. In 2021 I only contacted the state representative over Travisso and never got a call back. This year, I’ll be contacting everyone who represents all of Leander since this is now an issue that impacted more of the city and that I believe could possibly impact every resident if Atmos doesn’t answer for it. If this is an issue that’s important to you, you should contact them also because the only way cities and mayors and city councils will ever have the authority to regulate gas in their cities or make utility providers answer for deficiencies is through legislation, period.

Are you taking any other actions?

Why yes, I’m so glad you asked. Just because we can’t enforce a moratorium doesn’t mean there isn’t anything at all we can do to slow down the pace of growth in the city. In late 2021, Council quietly started denying requests for zoning or projects that had more density than our Future Land Use Map had projected in an area unless there was a compelling reason for the change. A few months ago, we formalized this action by unanimously passing a resolution directing staff to write up an ordinance (law) codifying it.

But what about a moratorium in Travisso?

It won’t work. We would need to prove to the state that we know more than the Railroad Commission and that we know for a fact, with numbers and data, that Atmos does not have the capacity to deliver gas to Travisso. We can’t do that: we don’t have access to that data and since Atmos has sent in trucks and been successful, they can prove easily that they can deliver the gas when they choose to. Also, because most of the Travisso development is in the pipeline (no pun intended) development there, by and large, would not be impacted. If the December outage were sufficient for a moratorium, one could be enacted by nearly every city in central and northern Texas.

I cannot tell you how many times I’ve been contacted in the last few weeks and asked to be creative or think outside the box. The truth is though, we are bound by law. Everyone serving on City Council literally signs an oath vowing to uphold the constitution and laws of Texas, which means we cannot impose what we know would be an illegal moratorium. Even if we did want to try it, the amount of legal bills we would face on something we know we would lose could burden the taxpayers for years. Two wrongs do not make a right.

But that doesn’t all mean Atmos is off the hook

There’s always strength in numbers. Since this freeze saw gas problems all over the state with the only commonality seeming to be the gas provider, Governor Abbott has requested the Attorney General and the Railroad Commission investigate. Remember what I said about how Atmos only has to answer to the state? Well here we go. And even better, it turns out Abbott’s request actually came a day after the Railroad Commission launched one. Atmos has until the 27th of this month to answer to the state for everything. All the answers we’re requesting from Atmos are also what the state is demanding. And the state has the power to penalize the company and hold them accountable in ways we could only dream of.

I know I will be watching closely. I hope all of you who have been impacted look into contacting the Railroad Commission and letting them know your own personal stories. Let them know this is not the first time and that you’re concerned it won’t be the last. I know I will.