Comal County commissioners will decide Thursday whether to apply for a $1.19 million grant to fund the purchase and installation of four additional floating docks at Canyon Lake boat ramps #6, 7, 8, and 22.
The county leases nine boat ramps from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The grant is offered through the Texas Federal Lands Access Program.
Each floating dock would be custom-designed to avoid hindering waterway navigation.
Proposed work includes installing and constructing concrete walkways, abutments, gangways, and floating docks at the four county-managed ramps.
The project would provide an alternate access point for boat passengers and pedestrian traffic.
“I think it would provide easier access to vessels during the launch and recovery process,” said Precinct 1 Commissioner Doug Leecock, who previously served on the Canyon Lake Boat Ramps Community Alliance.
There already are floating docks at boat ramps #1, 2 and 23.
To read the grant proposal, visit comalcounty.gov.
Also up for consideration Thursday is a resolution regarding the establishment of additional data centers in the state.
Commissioners are asking the Texas Legislature to conduct an interim study to evaluate water consumption and to enact legislation establishing statewide rules for resource-impact review for large-scale data center developments.
There are around 400 data centers in Texas, with approximately 120 along the I-35 corridor from Austin to San Antonio, according to datacentermap.com.
No data centers are currently planned for Comal County.
Commissioners want the state to require artificial-intelligence (AI) companies to use closed-loop cooling systems or other low-volume, potable-water-consumption technologies in any future large-scale, high-continuous-load data center facilities.
Commissioners also want the state to build data centers in areas with “high water availability.”
” … Within water-constrained regions, specifically counties with Priority Groundwater Management Areas (PGMAs), the Court further stipulates that support for additional data-center development in the State of Texas should be conditioned upon the implementation of comprehensive, enforceable safeguards to ensure responsible, sustainable, and transparent water-use practices if data-center developments are allowed in these regions at all.”
To read the resolution, visit comalcounty.gov.
Western Comal County is in PGMA 9, and the eastern part of the county is in PGMA 10.
PGMAs are designated regions identified by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) as facing or expected to face critical water shortages, land subsidence, or contamination within the next 25–50 years.
In March, Texas State Rep. Erin Zwiener, the Democrat who represents neighboring Hays County, formed a Hays County working group to generate solutions to challenges created by water-guzzling data centers, which also require enormous amounts of electricity to operate.
“Together, we can find solutions at both the local and state level to empower our communities, to encourage wise growth, and to protect our water resources for generations to come,” she said on social media.
Comal County Commissioners Court meets weekly starting at 8:30 a.m. Thursdays at the historic courthouse on Main Plaza in downtown New Braunfels.
Meetings also can be viewed live and are archived online at comalcounty.gov.