Tuesday, January 23, 2018

Brock and Brock West



City of Brock / Brock West update
We have been having joint Commissioner meetings on the 3rd Monday of each month starting at 6:00pm at the lecture hall at Brock High School. We meet with Brock West Commissioners because we have the same direction for both cities to proceed forword. Please come if you have a chance.
We have had 3 partials of property in the Canyon Creek Ranch HOA voluntarily annex their property into Brock. I was the first because even though we have a court settlement stating that Weatherford would not encroach to the West past Dennis Road, I have been in on all the negotiations and I wanted the protection of the City of Brock and Mrs. Hicks our attorney who can fight for me if for some reason our neighboring city decided otherwise. My voluntary annexation moved our Extra Territorial Jurisdiction (ETJ) East to the west barrow ditch of Dennis Road. It does not include the paved portion of the roadway. The other two properties that voluntarily annexed into Brock are both on Duncan Court. If you haven’t voluntarily annexed into Brock to protect your property and want to let Bill Cooper know 817-313-7233 and he will get you the document and explain it to you. It is only a form to fill out and attach the legal description of your property and sign it. It is then put on the agenda at a regular scheduled meeting and voted on by the commissioners and added into the city. This is strictly the land owner’s decision because you are in the ETJ but do not receive any city protections if you are not in any incorporated city limits or have any voting power for the city. All other homes in Canyon Creek Ranch including those 3 on Duncan Court, a portion of Country Place, Comanche Crossing and a portion of Canyon West are in the City of Brock.
Currently both cities commissioners have voted to present a petition to our residents to place on the May ballot a vote to conduct the voluntary merge of both cities into one which will be called Brock. This merge will allow us to apply for and be eligible for government funds such as grants etc. if needed, but mostly it is what we told everyone we would do back when we first started. We need 100 signatures on the petition to let the voters decide if we should merge with Brock West. As like anything we do, it is up to each of us to make the decision for Brock as a whole.
This merge also will require the same action by the citizens of Brock West. Both cities will have to put it on the ballots and both will require it to pass. I’m hopeful this happens. Both cities have the same goal for our citizens.
I truly believe it is the right thing to do for our community and hope you will support our effort to keep Brock – BROCK, Rural and a great place to live and a school district everyone is proud of.
This merge would link our area west to the area on 1189 including the Olive Branch community, Young Bend Estates, all the business areas along 1189 going into Brock West, (the area we all have considered Brock) from interstate including the school areas.
It would require that one of the 2 mayors vacate their position as well as adding 2 more commissioners, and I would hope to merge the commissioners into one council. The Secretary of State rules for this type of merger if voted by both cites to do, would bring the mayor and council of the city with the largest population to remain seated into the newly formed Brock Texas. I would anticipate that it would be the wishes of that board to bring those from the smallest city over since whoever that might be has a good working relationship on the tasks at hand. Our goal is still to operate from Franchise taxes and sales taxes, No Property Tax!
We have had dialog with Tri-County concerning franchise taxes which I have seen on my bill already which I for one am glad to see to help out with what few bills we have. It was only a couple of dollars but right now it all counts.
Both cities voted in the increase in sales tax bringing us up to the 8.25% like all the cities around us. If we had not claimed this increase being an official city, any city within our county could have claimed that increase if we had not. Great job by the people of Brock.
Everyone representing the two cities are volunteers except for our legal counsel Eggleston / King with Mrs. Sharron Hicks is our counsel. They have been very lenient with us knowing we do not have any revenue coming in, but know the people of Brock are worth fighting for. Our attorney has worked tirelessly for months defending the people of Brock, we could not have had any better support.
We currently have about $15,000.00 in debt that is including legal fees, (over a years’ worth of work), an outstanding debt with the elections department who apparently miss calculated the expense of our November election and a bill we have not received for our official boundary map which is required by law.  Once we start receiving our taxes we will be paying our debts and will be in good shape. We are still accepting donations at First Financial Bank under the account of Brock Development.
We will be doing an inter-local agreement with our County Commissioner, Mr. Larry Walden who will continue to assist us with what few roads we have. We will be paying for materials at a discounted rate from what a private person would pay a private company and with no equipment to buy. A great deal for us. All HOA’s will continue to keep up their own roads.
The City of Brock is very blessed to have the citizenry we have. It has been a tough battle to protect what is ours but everyone gathered together and made a bold statement, “Not in Brock”. I could not be prouder to have been a part of this as I know each of you are. Not many people can say they were part of incorporating a city. I also want to thank the staffs from both Comanche Crossing and Canyon Creek Ranch for all their help in distributing this to each of you. Thanks so much for all your help.     
Bill Cooper
817-313-7233