Arlington Street Maintenance Sales Tax Up for May Vote

Arlington voters will decide May 2 whether to renew a one-quarter-cent sales tax that funds nearly all of the city’s road maintenance operations, keeping it alive through 2034.

The Arlington City Council voted Feb. 10 to place the Street Maintenance Sales Tax renewal on the May ballot. The tax, which Arlington voters last approved in 2018, is set to expire Jan. 1, 2027. Without a renewal, the city would lose what it describes as the primary funding source for day-to-day roadway maintenance, a gap that would fall heavily on the General Fund to absorb.

The tax currently generates between $25 million and $30 million annually, according to the city of Arlington, and that sum typically covers 90% of the city’s street maintenance budget. The General Fund covers only the remaining 10%. That ratio shows how much the city’s basic road upkeep depends on shoppers, not property owners, to keep pavement in shape.

Crack seals. Pothole patches. Concrete panel replacements.

Those are the kinds of routine fixes the program funds under the Street Maintenance Sales Tax, along with asphalt reclamation, mill and overlay projects, sidewalk replacements, and installation of ADA-compliant ramps. The Texas Tax Code prohibits the city from using these funds to build new roads or repair roadways and sidewalks it doesn’t own, so the money stays narrowly targeted at existing city infrastructure.

If voters approve the renewal, the tax stays in place through Dec. 31, 2034, giving the city an eight-year window of dedicated street funding. That’s the same structure voters backed in 2018, when Arlington residents first extended the tax under what has since become its standard renewal cycle.

“The Street Maintenance Sales Tax is the primary source of funding for the City of Arlington’s day-to-day roadway maintenance operations,” the city said in its description of the proposal.

Early voting is underway through Tuesday, April 28. Election Day is Saturday, May 2, with polls open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tarrant County is participating in the Countywide Polling Place Program, which means registered voters can cast a ballot at any polling location in the county rather than being tied to a specific precinct. Voters still in line at 7 p.m. on Election Day will be allowed to vote.

For Preston Hollow and Park Cities residents, this is an Arlington story. But it carries a lesson that travels. Dallas has its own street funding mechanisms, and the gap between what dedicated infrastructure taxes produce versus what general funds can cover is a conversation city councils across North Texas return to on a regular cycle. The Texas Municipal League has tracked the use of street maintenance sales taxes across the state as an increasingly common tool for cities trying to keep road budgets predictable without repeated bond elections.

The arithmetic in Arlington is stark enough that it should make any North Dallas homeowner think about what their own city’s maintenance budget actually looks like. When 90% of a city’s road repair money depends on a single voter-approved tax line, a failed renewal doesn’t just mean potholes. It means deferred projects stack up, budgets shift, and the General Fund absorbs costs it wasn’t built to handle.

Arlington leaders haven’t publicly said what happens to maintenance schedules if voters reject the renewal in May, but the structure of the budget makes the math straightforward. The city would need to find $25 million to $30 million per year from somewhere else or cut the work accordingly.

Voters looking for more information on the May 2 ballot can visit the Arlington elections website for full details on polling locations and what’s on the ballot in Tarrant County.