City predicted to DOUBLE in size within 5-10 years
Crystal balls have been used for fortune-telling and divination since at least the first century. Today clairvoyance for growth and prosperity for cities like Seguin is not arrived by spheres of leaded glass or transparent stone but by number crunching, growth formulas, and a list of other data-driven factors that puts communities on a roadmap toward their future.
In Seguin that roadmap, like it or not, is being directed to exponential growth – growth that has city leaders not only providing data behind why the city is projected to double in the next five to 10 years but is also allowing them to share their own personal vision of the city in 2032.
So why does there appear to be evidence that the city of Seguin will double its current population of 33,000 people in the next few years?
Seguin City Manager Steve Parker says much of it begins with the record number of rooftops going up in all four corners of the city.
An Increase in Residential Permits
“From 2010 to 2020, we grew 17.2 percent. Last year alone, we did 1,000 new residential permits and if you just have three people living in those houses that’s 3,000 people. That’s a 10 percent increase in one year –and so if we start to see that – we have several multifamily projects coming — that’s 240 to 300 rooms. If there are two to three people in that, that’s 600-700 people. That is going to lease up pretty quickly and should do very well. We’ve got three or four other multifamily sites that are projected to build in the next two years. They are in design. If you have 300 bedrooms, 3-3.5 people per unit, I mean you can easily add 1,000 people with one multifamily project and then you add the constant 1,000 to 1,500 to 1,800 — I think New Braunfels did 1,800 homes last year. We can easily do that in a given year,” Parker said.
Photo by Lizz Daniels
Home Sweet Home
Parker says not only is there building going on, but the price of these dwellings is making Seguin an easy place to call home.
“One of the big drivers right now is Seguin is still a relatively great price point for a new home. So the same home two years ago, in New Braunfels was $60,000 less in Seguin and that’s the price of the land. We are able to get people through the permitting process and so they know that we are a business-friendly community but at the end of the day, if somebody can get a larger home for less money, that’s when they are making the decision to come here,” Parker said.
Parker says the overall Quality of Life is also among the many measures that point to a population explosion. He says he can’t count the number of times people have come up to him to tell him that because of the great stories they have heard of Seguin, they decided that they, too, had to come and raise their families here.
“And then a lot of people that start to work from these other communities and come into Seguin, they really become attached to the community. They meet a lot of people from the community. They go out to eat and they figure out that this is a place where I would really like to live and just enjoy the benefits that this community has over other communities,” Parker said.
Also, the Integrity of its Schools is sending Seguin to a higher trajectory. Not only is Texas Lutheran University a feather in its cap but Parker says the success of local school districts is what attracts the attention of others into a community.
“We can only be as good as our school district is and we’ve got some great leadership between the Seguin and Navarro school districts – you know people won’t move here if the school districts aren’t good. I hear that a lot. And now people are coming because of those praises that those school districts are getting. I think in the next 10 years, we are going to be able to create the type of community that people will want,” Parker said.
Bringing the stats to the table in favor of a twice-the-size Seguin is Josh Schneuker, the executive director of the Seguin Economic Development Corporation.
Schneuker, whose job is to always have a pulse on Seguin, continues the city’s list of favorable factors that lead to sizable growth. He says his list plays a major role in why his clients (manufacturers and businesses) want to do business in Seguin.
At Arroyo Ranch, located near Vogel Elementary, construction of new homes by builder DR Horton is ongoing. With massive local growth expected over the next 5 years, city officials say, Seguin can expect to see more new families moving into homes like these and others in the county. Photo by Lizz Daniels
Location, Location, Location
“We talk about location and how those influence everything that a business is looking for. It is going to influence how quickly they can get the raw materials in, how quickly they can get their product out. It’s going to influence their access to labor. And being here in Seguin right off of Interstate 10 having pretty close to immediate access to the Interstate 35 corridor by 46 and 123, having 130 as our connector to the Austin metro area and the bypass of the highly congested Interstate 35 between Austin and San Antonio – our location is really playing a huge factor in a lot of the activity that we are seeing,” Schneuker said.
Cost
Schneuker says the more that large industries and businesses look to Seguin, the more people will want to follow.
“In terms of cost, Seguin is still compared to other rapidly growing areas especially with the 35 corridor (being) relatively affordable. That’s going to continue to drive business decisions, relocations and further growth. We’ve seen a lot of the communities along the 35 corridor experience the same rapid growth, but they’ve also experienced rapid escalation in cost for developing, for infrastructure, and for land. All of those factors come into play when a business is looking to relocate. If you can have a great location and affordability those are two check marks you definitely want to have in your favor when you are pitching your community to perspective businesses,” Schneuker said.
Not Land Locked
As headlines in surrounding communities continue to read “land locked” and “congested,” then Schneuker says folks will continue to look in Seguin’s direction.
“When you have less availability of land and there is really high demand and not a lot of options, that drives the price for land and development really high and that has forced a lot of developers to look in other areas and one of those areas has been Seguin and that’s why I think especially over the past five years, you have really seen some exponential growth,” Schneuker said.
Schneuker says being Hailed as a Strong Manufacturing Community will also continue to drive business and residents to Seguin.
“We are one of the areas where you have one of the strongest clusters of manufacturing employment in the state of Texas and I think that’s why you continue to see manufacturers grow in this area and you continue to see manufactures want to expand in this area. When you have that amount of folks who are employed, there’s a lot of transferable skills, there’s a lot of labor that can be tapped into and there’s a lot opportunity to develop talent pipeline initiatives and new training programs to provide upward mobility for folks that might be working for a manufacturer already and to get new folks into the industry as well. It really is our bread and butter of our economy,” Schneuker said.
Photo by Lizz Daniels
Numbers No Longer Stagnant
Also chiming in on the city’s future is Helena Schaefer, planning supervisor for Seguin. Schaefer says the city’s growth pattern is no surprise, especially since her office serves as the first point of contact for those looking to build in Seguin and/or relocate to the area.
“We are usually the first department that does realize when we are starting to grow because whether it’s through zoning changes or voluntary annexations, we kind of have an idea when a developer comes in and says, ‘I want to be annexed’ and “I’m going to put single family dwellings on this property,’” Schaefer said. “It’s an explosion. You could see it happening about three years ago. When I first started working for the city, we only had two major subdivisions Mill Creek Crossing and Meadows at Nolte Farms and then it seemed like overnight, we had three or four new developments sand then a few months down the road, two or three more.”
Mixing what is on paper with their intuition, city leaders say they can equate their Predictions for what the future of Seguin will look like in the next five to 10 years, if not sooner.
Explosion in Retail, Restaurants
“You are going to see the push for Panda Express, Las Palapas and maybe an Outback Steakhouse or Texas Roadhouse and then you are going to build that on top of the great shopping and restaurants that we have now, and I think it’s going to be the quality of life that people want,” Parker said.
Schneuker whose team has already helped recruit several new retailers to Seguin, says the future for customers couldn’t look brighter for 2023.
“Everybody wants the new retail and I know that we have been talking about it for quite a while and I can tell you from what we are seeing in the background and the folks that we work with, I personally think 2023 is going to be a banner year for retail in Seguin. We should see that Seguin Crossroads Shopping Center brought back to life. That center has been sitting there underutilized for years now and we finally have a group that is really working hard to bring new retail opportunities to that center and based off the activity that we are seeing, we anticipate that really by this time next year, that center could be fully leased bringing new retailers in front of HEB and I think what you will see after that is hopefully some straight out of the ground retail projects start to percolate and hopefully get moving so I’m very optimistic about the retail outlook in Seguin in 2023,” Schneuker said.
Texas 130
Strong indicators also have Schneuker predicting accelerated growth on the city’s east side.
“The push out towards 130 is going to start happening. We were already seeing the development come down 130 just to our north in Austin. Lockhart is starting to see growth along 130 and I think it’s really only a matter of time that we start to see development and investments being made out on that side of town.I’m really excited about the possibilities of growing out in that direction and seeing some new growth and really taking advantage of that thoroughfare. It’s a very critical part of our infrastructure and a huge asset to the city,” Schneuker said.
Workforce Development
Schneuker says he also envisions the creation of a strong workforce development program that not only fuels the current workforce but inspires more industry recruitment.
“To continue to make us really competitive, we have been working on this for years now, but I see an opportunity to grow and expand our workforce development and talent pipeline efforts and I hope that that might mean some new training providers possibly in the city of Seguin here in our own backyard. We are working on things in the background to try to make that a reality, but we know that we have to have a strong workforce development, eco system in place in order to keep our businesses here today and continue to recruit companies who are looking at us for future investment,” Schneuker said.
Following the Poo Line
Schaefer chimes in with her own thoughts for the future. She says paperwork in her office already anticipates new development on the city’s south side.
“To quote a former city engineer, ‘growth happens when it follows the poo line,’” said Schaefer. “You’ll see that the houses are coming up as they follow the sewer, the wastewater line. We do have it in the south. It’s slow. It’s been slow but we do have a few developments that are about to come online south of the river,” Schaefer said.
Infrastructure
Parker says the prep work for all this anticipated growth has already been headlined. He says the city now simply has to continue with its forward-thinking and make the necessary accommodations to welcome in this growth.
“We just have to keep up with the infrastructure so that we can do that. We’ve been able to leverage that infrastructure with some great federal grants and loans and so forth from the Alamo Area Metropolitan Organization that is going to be able to fund some of these things for us and so it’s not going to burden the taxpayers as much and we are going to get that in advance of some of this growth so roads like Rudeloff and Cordova, we are going to expand it to five lanes. You are going to see the Interstate expanded to three lanes in each direction with feeder roads going both ways. You are going to see 123 expanded in the next three years. Those are all going to help us I think grow at a rate that we can keep up with and not be overwhelmed,” Parker said.
Fastest Growing in the State
Perhaps the most exciting prediction for the city comes from the city manager, who expects that this growth will not only put the city on the map but also earmark it as a destination to live, work and play.
He estimates that in the next few years, the numbers will push Seguin’s population to over 50,000.
“I think in the next two to three years, Seguin could be the fastest growing city in the entire state of Texas. We’ve got that much land. We’ve got that much residential development underway that this could easily be one of the fastest growing cities in the state,” Parker said. •