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Dripping Springs adopts limited Founders Day rule: two political party booths, no candidate booths allowed
Summary
After debate over timing and enforcement, council adopted a 2026 Founders Day policy that reserves up to two vendor booths for qualified political party organizations (not individual candidate booths) and prohibits campaign activity at non-political vendor booths; the policy applies to vendor booths for 2026 only, with staff to refine future language.
City attorney presented a draft policy April 7 to manage limited vendor-booth space at the 2026 Founders Day Festival and to limit political campaigning at vendor booths. The draft treats political-party organizations differently from individual candidates: the city will approve a maximum of two political-expression vendor booths to be assigned to qualified party organizations, not to individual candidates or political action committees.
Under the adopted approach for 2026, candidates may participate in a party booth with party consent and may appear in the parade only if registered participants; however, non-political vendor booths are restricted to their approved, non-political purposes and may not be used for organized campaigning or distribution of campaign literature. The policy also clarifies that elected officials acting in an official capacity (for example, as a city-hosted representative at a city information booth) must refrain from campaign activity while using the official platform.
Council members debated whether to adopt the full draft (which also addressed parade participation and official-capacity issues) or to confine the new rule to vendor booths for the 2026 festival. Several members said the timing — with application deadlines already passed — made last-minute changes undesirable; others argued the city needed an enforceable rule because staff already told at least one applicant they could not have a candidate booth. By council vote, the policy was adopted for 2026; staff will refine the policy language and enforcement procedures for future festivals.
