6 towns to be folded into Abilene MPO operational boundary

ABILENE, Texas ( KTAB/KRBC ) – The Abilene Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) met Tuesday to discuss the final stages of expanding its operational boundary to include Merkel, Buffalo Gap, Tuscola, Lawn, Hawley, and Clyde. This expansion would provide oversight to and take input from these towns for construction and improvement projects on state and county highways and sidewalks. That map recently underwent a notable change, though, that would have placed Anson on the list as well.

“TxDOT (Texas Department of Transportation) anticipates, through their modeling efforts, that several parts of the region all around the existing boundary are anticipated to grow in the coming decades, and so that’s really what we’re planning for in the revised boundary,” AECOM Transportation Planner Matt Genova told the MPO board Tuesday.

An MPO is required by the federal government in any city with a population of 50,000 or more. Inclusion in the MPO granting access to a combination of federal, state, and local funds to be used for specific transportation improvement projects.

In drawing the new boundary, Genova said areas with growing population and increased travel were considered. He stressed that a major priority is the involvement of each town in the future planning process.

“One of the main goals of this overall process is to make sure that communities feel as if their voice is being heard in the draft boundary,” encouraged Genova.

Under the MPO each town would have a representative present on the Technical Advisory Committee (TAC) which makes recommendations to the policy board. With the boundary now reaching into Callahan County for the first time, the Callahan County judge would also join the policy board proper.

In keeping with the intention of making voices heard the initial proposed boundary draft has been revised, no longer extending up to include Anson. Genova said this was done because local stakeholders made clear their wish to be left out of the MPO.

“They felt that being included in the boundary at this time is not something that is necessary for them,” Genova added.

In a phone interview with KTAB/KRBC, Anson Mayor Pro-tem Robbie Patterson explained the city’s concern lied with the possible construction of a major road which would bypass the city center, feeling that participation in the MPO might further that perceived goal. Patterson also expressed concerns for the financial requirements of the city when compared to the attention or lack thereof that Anson might receive, given the large number of other towns included.

The City of Tye, which has been a part of the Abilene MPO since at least 2006, voiced its lack of enthusiasm in the MPO as a vehicle for progress.

“Over the several years that I have been a staff member for the City of Tye, I have not seen any outreach from this organization at all… I don’t think there’d be any disadvantages to being included, but I haven’t seen any advantages to being included also,” explained Tye economic development director Cody Ellis at a February MPO meeting .

Since that February meeting, Ellis told KTAB/KRBC he’s been appointed as a member of Tye’s TAC. This new responsibility, he said, is a step in the right direction towards giving the City of Tye a voice in the planning processes of MPO projects.

On Tuesday, the board voted unanimously to approve the newly drafted boundary which will now go to the State governor’s desk for final approval. Upon return to the Abilene MPO policy board, the new MPO bylaws will be further discussed and approved. Those bylaws address the members that will be added to the policy board and TAC when the expansion is put into place, as well as the various meetings that will need to take place in the future.

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