City Considers Apartment Moratorium

LEAGUE CITY, TX - Apartments may have worn out their welcome in League City. Phyllis Sanborn, mayor pro tem, will ask city council members on Tuesday to discuss a moratorium on the development of new multifamily housing until the city fixes problems with traffic and infrastructure.

In an e-mail to constituents this week, Mayor Toni Randall railed against expanding apartments. "Our roads are beyond capacity, our infrastructure is straining at the seams, and we are all scrambling just to keep up, and here come another 600 units with their schoolable children and several cars per household," she said.

The city's relationship with apartment developers became strained after the Tuscan Lakes developer successfully pushed for an amendment to an agreement with the city that would allow for 567 new units. Although density studies must first be done before Johnson Development can nail down plans, the new units would bring the number of apartments in Tuscan Lakes to 1,641, said LaShondra Holmes, planning manager.

Tuscan Lakes, at League City Parkway and FM 270, is an 870-acre master planned community that will include apartments and houses. City staff and members of the planning and zoning commission were not pleased with the expansion, but because of wording in the development agreement, commission members had little choice but to approve the expansion, said Tony Allender, director of land management.

The planned expansion infuriated residents. "With each new apartment complex will come the strain of additional traffic and lowered tax revenue, not to mention the strain of additional students in our already overcrowded schools," said Shirley Hendrickson, who is pushing for the moratorium.

It's no secret that League City is experiencing growing pains. The city has been developing plans to improve and expand its strained wastewater facilities. City streets, including the main FM 518 corridor, are often jammed with traffic. "Five-points," where FM 518, FM 270 and FM 2094 meet, is among the five most congested intersections in the state. City schools, including those in the Dickinson and Clear Creek public school districts, are at capacity, district officials said.

In other suburbs, where residents are frequently worried about expansion of new apartments, city officials have imposed restrictions and limitations on growth, Allender said. Imposing a moratorium on new apartment development is the most severe measure a city can take, he said. "That's kind of like the atom bomb of ways to bring a halt to things," Allender said. But imposing a moratorium may be especially difficult given the recent demand for apartments in League City.

The slumping economy makes apartments more attractive to middle- to low-income people seeking places to live, Allender said. Combine that with Hurricane Ike, which displaced thousands of Galveston County residents from their homes, and all of a sudden, League City was slammed with demand for apartments, Allender said. Multifamily rental units make up about one-fourth of the city's housing stock, Holmes said.

Now, the city has no restrictions on how many new apartments can be built within city limits. But, city staff is working to fix that, Allender said. "There will be changes," he said. Residents like Hendrickson hope so.

"Past mayors and city councils sold the citizens of League City out to developers," she said. "Our current mayor is beholden to no one, and we want city council to work with her to undo the damage done by past administrations through poor planning. We want more business and less roof tops. We want fewer traffic jams and more light industry. We want a mayor and city council that has the backbone to stand up to the developers and do the right thing, even it means having to pay an attorney to go to court for us."