2022

Petitions Delivered!

December 16, 2022

Pflugerville, TX – December 16, 2022 – Pflugerville Residents for Responsible Taxation, a non-partisan group of long-time and new Pflugerville residents from all walks of life, announced a successful petition drive to decrease the rate of local sales and use tax imposed within Travis County ESD 2 by .5 percent.

On Friday, December 16th, at 12:04 p.m., 511 pages with more than 7,000 signatures were handed to Travis County ESD2 Deputy Assistant Chief AJ Stacer with a letter requesting to call an election in May 2023. These petitions have obtained the minimum number of signatures required by Health and Safety Code, Chapter 755.0752, for 5 percent of the district’s registered voters.

It is our expectation that ESD2 will validate the petitions and forward them to the ESD2 full Board of Commissioners to adopt a resolution to call an election to be held in May of 2023.

Travis County ESD 2 has been collecting sales taxes within portions of its district to fund its EMS. Starting in January of 2022, Travis County ESD 2 stopped providing Advanced Life Support and ambulance transport services to the City of Pflugerville, forcing the City to use alternate service providers for ambulances without additional funding.

“This petition is not about reducing funding for EMS, but rather about transferring the control of the funding to elected officials,” said Melody Ryan. “We must transfer taxes from ESD 2 to the City of Pflugerville in order to keep allowing the City to offer EMS. This allows our elected City Council to make the decisions that best serve our City residents. Everyone inside of ESD 2 will need to vote on this.”

Within the boundaries of the City, we can choose to forgo paying a half-cent sales tax to ESD 2 and instead choose to give that half-cent to the City of Pflugerville. Once the ESD 2 sales tax is transferred to the City of Pflugerville, the City Council will have the option to establish its own EMS department. There is no overall tax increase and a tax decrease will occur in the ETJ areas.

May 2023 election: Vote Yes to remove the half cent sales tax to Travis County ESD 2. Vote Yes to give the City of Pflugerville the half cent sales tax to fund emergency services.

https://VoteYes4EMS.com

https://www.facebook.com/PfRRTAX/

pfrrtax@gmail.com

(320) 322-1696

The Big Announcement

December 13, 2022

December 13th 2022 city council meeting, we announce our plans to fund long term emergency services for the city of Pflugerville.

For the past 2 years, the city has been working with Travis County ESD2 over emergency services.

Unfortunately, issues were not resolved and Travis County ESD2 stopped providing Ambulance services to city residents at the beginning of this year.

Consequently, the city was forced to engage with a private company to continue ambulance services to its residents.

This city council has asked city staff to come up with a long term plan for emergency services. Unfortunately, no long term plan has been presented to the public.

We believe that is because city management believes no easy funding mechanism is available for the city to support emergency services.

So we have come up with a plan. The first step is to petition to take back the half cent sales tax that Travis county ESD2 is receiving.

The second step will be to transfer those taxes to the city, with the intent that the city will spend the taxes on emergency services.

We have collected over 7K signatures to call an election in May 2023 to reduce ESD2 sales tax allocation, by a half cent.

If this proposition passes, then it will free up a half cent sales tax for the city to collect.

We ask the city council to please pass a ballot proposition for the May 2023 election to collect that half cent sales tax, if the voters decide to remove the half cent from Travis county ESD2.

This half cent sales tax should be used to provide emergency services.

The city can choose to continue to give it back to Travis County ESD2 or use it to establish its own city emergency services.

In any case, this should put the city in a better position to negotiate terms for our emergency services, rather than leaving it up to a non-elected board.

Please allow our citizens to vote to fund emergency services for the city of Pflugerville.

Why Are We Using a Private EMS?

November 26, 2022

Here is a timeline of how we got to this point with our emergency services.

In 2013, Travis county ESD2 attempted to create a duplicate emergency overlay taxing district?

When that failed, they added an additional sales tax for EMS in 2014.

In 2017, ESD2 assumed ambulance services.

In 2020, ESD2 presented a doomsday forecast unless the city gave it a $2.7M annual subsidy.

In 2021, Travis county ESD2 threatens to discontinue to provide ambulance services, if an overlay district is not approved.

By a vote of 2 to 1, the duplicate overlay district was turned down by the voters.

In 2022, Travis County ESD2 stopped providing ambulance services, yet we are still paying sales taxes for it.

Additionally, net assets have increased far beyond dire predictions.

The city of Pflugerville was forced to take over ambulance services, without additional funding.

In 2024, vote yes on Prop A to approve reducing sales taxes by a half cent.

In 2025, vote yes for the city to gain a half cent for EMS and local control of our emergency services.

Press Release

October 26, 2022

KEYE TV Story

Petition Kick Off

October 22, 2022

The city of Pflugerville is the largest city in Texas without control of its own fire and emergency services?

The city of Pflugerville has been getting its emergency services from Travis County Emergency Service District 2.

But at the beginning of this year, 2022, Travis county ESD2 stopped providing advanced life support services and ambulance transport services to the city of Pflugerville, claiming they did not have enough money.

We voted in May of 2014 to give more sales taxes to Travis County ESD2 to support advanced life support services.

Since Travis County ESD2 suspended ambulance services for residents inside the city limits, we should stop paying the sales tax to ESD2, for services that are not delivered.

We can give that funding to the city of Pflugerville to establish its own city owned emergency services department.

From October 2022 to January 2023, sign the petition to add a ballot proposition to remove the half cent sales tax from ESD2 and transfer that to the city of Pflugerville to help fully fund emergency services for the city of Pflugerville.

In May 2023 election : Vote Yes to ESD2 Prop A to remove the one cent sales tax going to Travis County ESD2. Vote Yes to City Prop A to give the city of Pflugerville the half cent sales tax to fund emergency services.

Long term planning for Emergency Services

July 2, 2022

Does Travis County Emergency Service District #2 want to work with the city of Pflugerville on a long-term emergency services plan? Listen to the May 31 meeting where long-term planning was attempted but ESD2 was unprepared and very reluctant to talk about it.

ESD2 wants the city to pay $2.7 million for ALS ambulance services, despite the fact that it has been funded for years through existing revenue streams of property taxes, sales taxes and fees. ESD2 has received millions more in sales taxes above projections and spent millions less than budget. They are well-funded, and their doomsday prediction never came true.

Council Votes NO to ESD2

June 14, 2022

June 14 2022 Pflugerville City Council Meeting

Council votes No against ESD2 contract.
- Voting No – Councilman McDonald, Metayer, Rogers and Gonzales
- Voting Yes – Councilman Ruiz and Holiday
- Absent – Weiss

Council Votes YES to Allegiance Mobile Health
- Voting No – Councilman Metayer and Gonzales
- Voting Yes – Councilman Ruiz, Holiday, Rogers and McDonald
- Absent – Weiss

EMS Saga Continues

May 24, 2022

May 24th, 2022 City Council Meeting

The city council has changed its mind on utilizing ESD2 for ambulance transport. A final attempt to directly engage with the ESD2 Board will be made on Tuesday May 31st, 2022. If that attempt fails, Pflugerville will use Allegiance until a long-term plan can be created.

Pflugerville City Council initially approved negotiations with ESD 2 at a May 10 meeting. However, City Manager Sereniah Breland said at a meeting May 24 that negotiations hit a roadblock when, before formally meeting with the city, ESD 2 officials spoke with media outlets stating they would maintain their request for an additional $2.8 million in annual funding.

“We do not negotiate through the media,” Breland said. “Despite our best efforts, ESD 2 has not provided a justifiable reason for that amount.”

Council members echoed Breland’s point, holding that they would respect Pflugerville voters’ decision last November not to use ESD 2 if it meant additional taxes.

“The good folks of Pflugerville overwhelmingly decided on no new tax,” Council Member Ceasar Ruiz said.

At Council Member Kimberly Holiday’s recommendation, the motion also directed Breland to begin negotiations with private ambulance service Allegiance Mobile Health as an additional option.

Weiss said Allegiance will be a necessary fallback in the event that the city cannot reach an agreement with ESD 2 in time.

“I don’t have confidence that we can get all that done in the next six weeks to come together and finalize a deal,” Weiss said.

Breland said her goal is to present a finalized contract for approval at council’s next meeting on June 14.

Council members agreed that whichever provider the city ends up choosing, developing its own in-house ambulance service should be a priority in the future.

“We have to build toward having our own internal EMS services,” Council Member Rudy Metayer said. “Something sustainable will need to be under the city.”

Sign The Petition

April 30, 2022