'Marketing language' on Pflugerville ballot? Taxpayer groups sue to take it off Prop A

The Travis County ESD No. 2 board of directors voted Monday night to approve language that includes an apparent marketing nickname on the November ballot, the Tracker has learned.

Each time ESD No. 2 has been on the ballot previously they have been identified on the ballot as "Travis County Emergency Services District No. 2," without “Pflugerville Fire Department” -- a moniker the taxing entity has often employed informally.

The contested language on the November ballot, as approved by ESD No. 2, now reads, in the form of Proposition A:

"Proposition 1 Abolishing the 0.5% local sales and use tax imposed by Travis County Emergency Services District number 2 (also known as the Pflugerville Fire Department) in the city of Pflugerville and decreasing the sales and use tax from 1.0% to 0.5% in all other areas of the district." [emphasis added]

Given: ESD No. 2 is the direct descendant of the Pflugerville Volunteer Fire Department. having absorbed the organization's assets in 1991. But according to an exclusive statement by City Council member and plaintiff David Rogers, it's a name they've only went by casually since. Rogers is suing to take the "Pflugerville Fire Department" verbiage off the ballot.

“They just couldn’t help themselves!” said Rogers, attorney and spokesman for Keep Pflugerville Affordable and Pflugerville Residents for Responsible Taxation. “We demanded that this slogan be deleted because ‘Pflugerville Fire Department’ is not in the official name of the taxing entity. If they do not delete that self-imposed nickname from the ballot we will request the courts strike out the extraneous marketing language.”

Rogers said he firmly believes the courts will strike it out – a legal expense to ESD No. 2 taxpayers that could have been avoided.

ESD No. 2 has a history, Rogers said, of spending taxpayer dollars irresponsibly while offering service to only a select number of Pflugerville-area residences while serving an area about twice as large as the city.

"We the voters have the final say. And we will prevail," Rogers said. "Their irresponsible shenanigans and delays have unfairly burdened the taxpayers, and are designed to create confusion in the citizenry. We will cut through their confusion and overcome their delays."

For a little more background: On May 24, the Texas Supreme Court upheld a tax reduction election to appear on the November ballot (see the contested ballot language above). This opinion came after legal claims from groups such as Keep Pflugerville Affordable and Pflugerville Residents for Responsible Taxation that ESD No. 2 stopped providing ambulance services to the city of Pflugerville at the end of 2021.

ESD No. 2 counters that it continues to provide EMS "first response service" to the city. The district's website noted a longstanding three-way agreement between Travis County, ESD No. 2, and the city for emergency services dating back to 2013. The city, it said, has opted to use a private contractor for full ambulance services in previous years. Rogers said the city never had a formal agreement with ESD No. 2 for ambulance coverage. Before 2017, Austin-Travis County EMS had provided ambulance services. 

ESD No. 2's website claims that cuts from the proposition, if passed by voters in November, could result in eliminating 132 positions, closing four of the eight stations, and a resultant lowered response time. Rogers, however, claims ESD No. 2 has been on a "wild spending spree" under the current tax rate.

"ESD 2 submitted [a] proposal to provide ambulance transport service which would have provided 6 ambulances, with 4 being stationed inside the City, with the ability to staff up to 8 during busy or disaster periods for $1.9 million annually, with an annual cost increase of 2.5%. A majority of city council chose to renew the contract with the for profit ambulance company for $1.3 million annually for 4 ambulances," the site stated.

The back-and-forth may be nothing new to Pflugerville voters, but the effort to put "Fire Department" on an ESD No. 2-related ballot item is. The Tracker will keep an eye on this for our pfriends.

More info:

Pflugerville Residents for Responsible Taxation
Keep Pflugerville Affordable

ESD No. 2 

UPDATES (9/18/24): The Travis County Republican Party voted unanimously to endorse Prop. A at its executive committee meeting on Sept. 17.

(11/8/24): ESD No. 2 Prop. A failed according to unofficial results.