Fort Worth 2026 Bond Program & Charter Amendment Town Hall – April 13, 2026
Fort Worth 2026 Bond Program & Charter Amendment Town Hall
On Monday, April 13, 2026, the City of Fort Worth held a town hall meeting at the Diamond Hill Jarvis Community Center to present and answer questions about the proposed 2026 bond program and charter amendments. Mayor Pro Tem Carlos Flores (District 2) opened the meeting, emphasizing the city's fiscal responsibility and the bond's role in funding capital projects. The meeting included a pre-recorded video overview, presentations by April Rose Escamilla (registered civil engineer) and Assistant City Attorney Gavin Midgley, a question-and-answer session, and opportunities for one-on-one discussions with subject-matter experts.
Bond Program Overview
- The 2026 bond program totals $845 million (revised from an initial $840 million capacity after an additional $5 million became available in December 2025).
- The bond is structured to stay within the existing city property tax rate (14.75 cents per $100 valuation allocated to debt service) and is planned to be repaid over 20 years without increasing that rate.
- Voters will consider six lettered propositions (A through F) individually on the ballot. A sample ballot was provided.
- State law now requires all bond ballot language to include the phrase "THIS IS A TAX INCREASE" in capital letters, but the city has structured the program so that no tax rate increase is anticipated.
- Early voting runs from Monday, April 20, 2026, through Tuesday, April 28, 2026. Election Day is Saturday, May 2, 2026.
Public Comments & Testimony
- Speaker 1 (male resident): Raised several concerns:
- Noted that Proposition G would effectively give council members a 100% pay raise (from $25,000 to $50,000) while the city is in a hiring freeze due to an anticipated deficit (FY26 freeze; raise would be effective FY27).
- Questioned whether the $845 million bond figure includes interest; upon learning it does not, he calculated that at 6% interest the total cost would exceed $1.1 billion.
- Cited the city's $230 million unassigned fund balance at the end of fiscal 2025 and $84 million in interest and dividend income since 2020, asking why those funds aren't used instead of borrowing. He noted that city council changed the policy in August 2025 to pull $12 million of interest/dividend funds into the general reserve and used $2 million for city hall renovations, arguing council could change policy again to provide tax relief. He asked Councilman Flores to commit to bringing up a policy change at the next council meeting.
- Speaker 2 (male resident): Expressed concern about borrowing money for public art (up to 1–2% per proposition as per the public art ordinance). He argued that the interest paid on borrowed art funds (estimated at about $13 million total) could be better used for other city needs. Staff noted the public art ordinance is set for the 2026 bond program and encouraged discussion with council members.
- Additional speaker: Asked whether corporate naming rights have been considered for the animal shelter (Proposition F). Brian Docker (Code Compliance Director, overseeing animal care) confirmed that naming rights and donations (e.g., benches, bricks) are being explored and that the shelter design allows for future expansion using such funding.
Discussion Items
- Proposition Details: April Rose Escamilla presented the six propositions:
- A – Streets & Mobility Infrastructure: $511,480,700 for major roadways ($328 million for street rehabilitation), intersections, sidewalks, bridges, traffic signals, and safety improvements near schools.
- B – Parks, Recreation & Open Space: $185,140,000 for aquatic facilities, athletic complexes, botanic gardens, community parks, Fort Worth Zoo utilities, golf courses, gateway park, water gardens, and open space (now included in this proposition).
- C – Public Libraries: $14,586,000 for relocation of the Fort Worth History Center, renovation of Southwest Regional Library and Diamond Hill Jarvis Library.
- D – Affordable Housing: $10,000,000 (increased from $5 million after council discussion) for land acquisition, construction of affordable housing, infrastructure, home repair programs, and loans/grants for households up to 120% AMI.
- E – Police, Fire & Emergency Communications: $63,919,300 for new Fire Station 46 (Southwest Fort Worth), a new emergency communication center, and rebuilding Fire Station 40 (Northwest Fort Worth).
- F – Animal Care & Shelter Improvements: $59,874,000 for construction and equipping of a new shelter to replace the Chuck and Brenda Silcox Animal Care and Adoption Center.
- Charter Amendments (Propositions G–O): Assistant City Attorney Gavin Midgley explained each:
- G – Mayor and Council Pay: Increase mayor pay from $29,000 to $60,000 and council pay from $25,000 to $50,000, effective October 1, 2026 if approved.
- H – Remove hearing requirements for department directors removed by city manager.
- I – Remove redundant hearing requirements for council appointees (city manager, city attorney, city auditor, city secretary, municipal court judges).
- J – Remove separate meeting requirement for budget adoption (currently city holds a public hearing 15 minutes before adoption).
- K – Remove annual report requirement for public service corporations (franchisees) from the charter, as state law preempts local regulation.
- L – Remove ordinance requirement for granting of privilege (solid waste haulers); administrative approval could be used if applicants meet existing code requirements.
- M – Remove ordinance requirement for city department reorganization; future departments created by city manager could be reorganized without council ordinance.
- N – Align election timelines with state law to resolve conflicts between charter and Texas Election Code regarding special elections to fill vacancies.
- O – Modernize language for payment of claims by replacing "purchase order" with "appropriate written documentation" to cover items like court judgments.
- Community Engagement Numbers: The bond development process included 18,220 website views, 260 residents at 11 council district meetings, 1,109 YouTube views, 177 Balancing Act submissions, and 329 submitted comments (141 in-person/email, 188 from Balancing Act).
Key Outcomes
- The city will continue public education on the bond and charter amendments through two additional town halls (one online, one in-person) before the May 2 election.
- City council will consider the public art funding ordinance later in April 2026.
- Councilman Flores acknowledged ongoing discussions about public art funding but did not commit to bringing a policy change on using interest/dividend funds for tax relief, as requested by a resident.
- The bond and charter election will be held on May 2, 2026, with early voting April 20–28, 2026.
Meeting Transcript
Good evening, everybody. Let's all settle in and we'll get started. First, thank you all for being here this evening to learn about the 2026 bond program. I'm Carlos Flores. I'm the District 2 City Council member and also Mayor Pro Tem, City of Fort Worth. So I welcome you along with the rest of staff circling the room. We're here to answer your questions about the bond. Every four years we have a bond program. And this is very noteworthy because it's an indicator that the city government is working, that we are very responsible with your tax dollars, and we have the capacity to have these bond programs every four years. Why have a bond program? Very good question. Essentially, a bond program enables us to go further with our project goals. That is, capital projects need money to be funded to become reality, whether it be a facilities project, a street project, a park project. We need those capital dollars. And the bond program helps us get further along. This time around, the bond program is 840 million, maybe slightly north of that figure. So that's a pretty hefty amount, it sounds. But believe me, you when you start allocating that amount to different needs, it goes quickly. Approximately 60%, for instance, goes to streets and mobility infrastructure needs, right? But we're also very cognizant that there are other needs that the city, you know, has and that you all are interested in seeing some work being done. And some of those needs, and I'll list them in no particular order, you know, come with parks and open spaces, right? The amenities that come with those parks, maintenance thereof of those parks. Uh as a city develops, you know, we're very careful about maintaining our open spaces. Public libraries, you know, improvement of the public libraries and their facilities. It's very important to us because even over time, you might think if you haven't visited your library, you know, recently, visit it because it is really markedly changed. We've adapted to you know the current times, and the library serves more people, has better collections, and you'll be really surprised on how it's adapted to the times. Okay, following that, what else do we have? Affordable housing. That's something that we keep hearing about, right? As uh the city grows, the cost of living grows. We try to manage that by providing affordable housing in certain you know, AMI ranges. The city council talked about that recently. Originally, we allocated five million dollars. We went back and decided we wanted to allocate more. So in discussions with the city manager, he made that happen. Change the allocations a little bit so now it's 10 million dollars for affordable housing. And I think that's very important. And then we also have our public safety needs, you know, police and fire, including our communications. As you've probably heard, you know, we transitioned from a you know privatized ambulance service to now fire-based ambulance service. We're also improving our call centers, our dispatch 911. We're co-locating those, and we're gonna continue to do that to be more responsive, you know, to your needs. And so with these things, you know, we hope to bring to bear more dollars to make these improvements a reality. So I'll stop right there, and I think on display, you will see eventually A through F as far as propositions are concerned. And those particular propositions, you know, animal shelter also being one. Uh, we're replacing Chuck Silcox, you know, that uh old facility has uh, you know, the needs have outgrown it. So we need to replace that. We have a lot of uh furry friends that are in need, and we're gonna try to grow with that need. But when you see the screen here, we'll have a I think I believe a short presentation, right? Video presentation that'll explain it further. And if you haven't taken the opportunity to look around the room, you know, depending on what range in the alphabet you have from A through F, you can go to those specific tables and they will give you further information regarding any particular proposition or propositions that you might have further questions about.
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