Forney council directs staff to draft bill to shift housing-authority appointment power from mayor to council

Forney City Council voted to direct staff to draft proposed legislation to ask the Texas Legislature to change the appointment process for municipal housing authorities so the city council — by simple majority —, rather than the mayor alone, would appoint the local housing authority board.

Councilmember James Traylor said the intent was “to hopefully bring power back to the city and allow us to lobby our state legislature,” arguing that leaving the appointment power solely with the mayor creates “the potential for abuse.” He told the council the proposal would be drafted for possible sponsorship by the city’s state representative.

City legal staff reviewed the statutory background and told the council that, historically, state law has given the mayor the authority to appoint a municipal housing authority’s governing board after a city initiates a housing authority. Staff described differences with county authorities, where the full commissioners court appoints members to a five-member board. The city attorney noted that once a municipal housing authority’s board is formed it typically adopts bylaws and exercises self-governance, and that the council retains approval authority for those bylaws.

Councilmember Sarah Salgado said she was “very hesitant” to form a housing authority while “all the power rest[s] in 1 person,” and supported taking the question to the legislature so appointment authority could be considered for the full council. Discussion also covered jurisdictional reach — staff said a local housing authority would give a municipality certain jurisdictional reach outside city limits (mentioned in the meeting as a five-mile radius) — and tradeoffs between a local municipal authority and a county or regional authority.

The council approved a motion directing staff to draft legislation related to municipal housing-authority appointments and return with proposed language for transmission to the city’s state representative. The vote passed by voice/show of hands; the official motion was described as directing staff to draft the legislation as discussed at the meeting.

Next steps: staff will draft proposed language and return to the council for final direction before any submission to state lawmakers.