By LYNETTE SOWELL
Cove Leader-Press
After a number of residential and non-residential town hall meetings, two things are clear: Copperas Cove business owners don’t like the proposed new street maintenance utility fee, and those seated on the Copperas Cove city council will likely suggest changes to those rates.
The proposed residential fee is $10 per month. However, the most talked-about was reactions from business owners who state that some of them will likely go out of business, due to the new fee.
The proposed ordinance has not been voted on by the city council but during the upcoming city council workshop set for Tuesday, Oct. 7, at 5 p.m., renewed discussion by the council of that ordinance is on the agenda. Several city council members also attended the town hall meetings. However, none of them spoke during the meetings. The Leader-Press emailed the seven council members and mayor and received responses from Councilmembers Vonya Hart and Dale Treadway. However, neither specified what changes should be made, such as if there should be a flat fee for businesses, or if business and nonresidential fee should be the same.
Treadway did say that he does intend to propose changes to that ordinance, although he did not elaborate what those changes would look like.
Andy Remedies and Betina Cash own three downtown Copperas Cove businesses – Herb & Earnie’s Restaurant, the Cove Theater, and the brand new Main Street Mercantile that opened in August 2025. Altogether, Remedies and Cash would pay more than $800 per month for the street maintenance utility fee between their three businesses. Based on the “band” into which the Cove Theater and Herb & Earnie’s fall, it means that Remedies and Cash would pay more than $300 apiece each month.
Remedies called the proposed fee amounts “nearly backbreaking.”
Carrie Harris is marketing director for GymKix, a dance and gymnastic center in Copperas Cove.
“Years of poor planning and mismanagement at City Hall should not be dumped on the backs of local businesses, churches, and families. This so-called Street Maintenance Utility Fee is nothing more than a hidden tax that will bleed hundreds to thousands of dollars a month from our community,” Harris said. “There is no clear plan and no sunset clause — the city is asking for money with no timeline or accountability for how it will even be spent. If they want better roads, they should tighten the budget and use the taxes we already pay, not punish the very people keeping Copperas Cove alive.”
City Manager Ryan Haverlah has said the City welcomes other ideas for raising the revenue needed to bring the street conditions to where they need to be.
At Saturday morning’s final town hall meeting, he discussed a number of options the council could recommend, as well as some ideas that would not work – and why.
“We have a quarter cent of sales tax that generates $1.3 million for street maintenance that will be used to continue the level of street maintenance that we have with our team, and we have identified a potential additional source, which is why we’re having these town halls in a street maintenance utility fee that would generate some additional revenue depending on how it’s adopted by council, if it’s adopted at all,” Haverlah said. “Now I will tell you already from the nonresidential discussions, and if you’ve been in any of those meetings or heard about it, or you read in the paper, our nonresidential customers have already stated it is not equitable, and the council has heard that.
“That will be a major change when we present this to city council in the very, very near future. On Oct. 7 is when we will present to council in a workshop, a summary of all the town halls that we’ve had, at other meetings the comments we’ve received, the questions we’ve received, and the recommendations we’ve received, so that city council can provide us direction on what they want to do.
“What is the range of direction that they can provide? They could say, ‘Scrap it. We’re not going to do this right now. There’s too much opposition, and it’s not the right time, so we’re not going to do this.’
“The other extreme is they say, ‘Oh, we’re doing this. We’re going to adopt it.’ I highly doubt they will adopt what we’ve proposed at all. There have been so many concerns and complaints, and like I said, the nonresidential customers have really come out and said, ‘This is not equitable.’
“It’s not, and I’ll be one of the first ones to say up here, it’s not. It has to change. City Council expects it to change as well. So there’s that range of not doing it all to doing it. It’s likely that if the council does decide to move forward with it, though, and especially those non residential fees, are going to significantly reduce.”
The council set a cap for the top customer at $2,500, and that was about an 82 percent reduction in the true fee, if calculated based on the single family equivalent, Haverlah said.
“And so that means, really, all customers should have that 82 percent reduction at a minimum. Now it may change even further than that, where it’s even below that. I don’t know what Council is going to do and what direction they’re going to provide, but they will provide direction on October 7.’
City council members can be reached via email at:
Dan Yancey, Mayor: dyancey@copperascovetx.gov; Vonya Hart, Mayor Pro Tem/Place 6: vhart@copperascovetx.gov; Christian Strohfus, Place 1: cstrohfus@copperascovetx.gov; Rita Hogan, Place 2: rhogan@copperascovetx.gov; Shawn Alzona, Place 3: salzona@copperascovetx.gov; John Hale, Place 4: jhale@copperascovetx.gov; Dale Treadway, Place 5: dtreadway@copperascovetx.gov; Jack Smith, Place 7: jacksmith@copperascovetx.gov.
Those with questions may direct them to Public Works Director Scott Osburn, who can be reached at (254) 547-0751 or by email at sosburn@copperascovetx.gov.
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