Shell Road in City MUD

Have developers, with help from the City, found a new way to transfer development costs from the developer to the home owners and renters?

The City has plans to approve an in-city municipal utility district (MUD), which under state law possesses taxing authority.

Here is a location map of the proposed MUD.

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This development encompasses 317 acres and includes multiple uses. Here is the breakdown of land use.

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This development includes 1046 Single Family homes, 246 Town homes and 220 Multifamily units.

Is Shell Road and Williams Drive designed to accommodate the traffic generated by another 1513 residences?

Another interesting factoid. The electric utilities service area is split between Georgetown and Pedernales as show below.

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The blue line designates the boundary of the Georgetown electric service area, yet, the chart indicates the City will be the exclusive electric provider for the MUD. How does that work?

Here is the "money" chart for the development.

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Here we see that the MUD is authorized to impose taxes and sell bonds with value up to $39,500,000. These bonds, which are to be used to build infrastructure, will be paid by the residents/property owners within the MUD.

Notice how the developer has transferred his costs to the new property owners in the MUD. At the same time, the City gets paid for the services it provides and does not incur any debt and associated payments. The City will be free to raise it's fees to the MUD without raising property taxes, and the MUD will just raise its taxes.

This is a classic example of socializing private costs to the public property owners.

Since the developer has to pay for minimal development costs, his profit is maximized with the help of the State of Texas and the City of Georgetown. What a deal!