The city has hired an advocacy firm to help move bills that reflect its priorities through the 88th State Legislative session.
At the most recent meeting, the Taylor City Council Members unanimously approved an $80,000 agreement until February 28, 2024 with Focused Advocacy, a firm that specializes in representing cities.
“There are a lot of bills that get introduced in each legislative session, and it gets complicated, very involved,” said Deputy City Manager Jeff Jenkins. “As a city, we need someone who can work on our behalf and advocate for us, work with any legal advisement, and help guide us through the priorities as we go through this … You can get some bills passed by your own advocacy, but it’s very challenging and difficult to do that. You need someone to help guide you through the Last fall, the city came up with several priorities for state lawmakers, including keeping the Chapter 313 Agreement, a school property tax incentive program that recently expired used by Samsung and other major businesses, preventing the expansion of an Emergency Service District into the city’s territory without the consent of the city, as well as allowing for greater control from cities on Municipal Utility District and the Public Improvement Districts.
Jenkins said on March 9, State Representative Caroline Harris filed House Bills 4491,92 and 93, which articulated some of these priorities.
“It was exciting,” Jenkins said. “We were able to work with Representative Harris and the senator’s office to get some of those filed.”
Mayor Brandt Rydell echoed Jenkins’ enthusiasm.
“I would like to thank Representative Caroline Harris for her support as well as that of Senator Charles Schwertner,” Rydell said. “Staff and I and Mayor Pro Tem (Gerald) Anderson visited with her and were warmly received, and they were very receptive to our legislative agenda.”
Focused Advocacy Partner and General Counsel Snapper Carr said their advocacy work involves nearly 100 years of experience working almost exclusively for cities.
“Unlike some of the people that do government relations, we really do pride ourselves on being an extension of municipal staff, and we have some subject matter knowledge in a lot of these areas that cities are faced with,” Carr said. “From the standpoint of a city like Taylor, and we represent everybody from much, much larger to some that are smaller, and everybody in between … but municipalities, almost regardless of size, have more issues before the legislature than any other entity, public or private, without a close second.”
Some of Taylor’s bills, are state-wide issues that match the goals of many of their clients, Carr said.
“One of the things that we also do is to try to build coalitions or to work with stakeholders that have common interests,” Carr said.
