County Progress Awards Program 2006 Recipients

The following includes excerpts from the nomination applications of this year’s awards recipients. County Progress would like to thank everyone who participated in the nominating process. We will begin accepting applications for the 2007 County Progress Awards Program in May 2007.
Community Service
Rockwall County Commissioners Court
Rockwall County was named the fastest-growing county in Texas for the last seven or eight years. The 2000 census showed Rockwall County’s population at 43,000, and six years later it is estimated at 62,000 to 70,000, placing a huge burden on all infrastructures especially traffic.
The Rockwall County Commissioners Court started addressing traffic issues by being a facilitator between the cities, TxDOT, NCTCOG and adjoining counties. As a result, six traffic-related projects were selected and put on a $17 million bond issued in November 2004. The issues passed with 80 percent favoring.
The passage of the county road bonds resulted in the city of Rockwall passing approximately $50 million in road projects to coincide with the county projects; the continuing ripple effect is that the county’s $17 million has resulted in $100 million-plus in new road construction in Rockwall County.
The Rockwall County Planning Consortium has continued to meet to implement the traffic programs and has expanded to talk about subdivision development, public safety issues, and the continuing growth. The Planning Consortium meeting continues to be well attended with all participants entering into lively discussions as the problems of growth and governance continue to be addressed. The Consortium meetings have been extremely successful allowing for debate, resolution and solutions to problems in a fast-growing community.