HB3680

HB3680 creates a separate subdivision-platting framework for a county bordering both Mexico and the Gulf of Mexico—Cameron County. A plat is the recorded map of divided land. The law moves that county out of the existing border-county subchapter and into new Local Government Code Chapter 232, Subchapter G. It took effect September 1, 2025, after being filed without the governor’s signature. It is not a statewide repeal of subdivision regulation. Final law; official history.

Scope and exceptions matter. Section 232.202 generally covers divisions into two or more lots with at least one smaller than five acres, outside city limits, subject to its city–county agreement exception for extraterritorial territory. Unlike the old border framework, its basic definitions are not confined to residential use. It excludes qualifying gifts between relatives within the third degree and subdivisions with the specified county Water Code exemption. The text says Subchapter G does not apply when every lot is at least five acres. However, Section 232.203 also authorizes a county plat requirement where none is smaller than five acres and at least one is larger than five but no larger than ten. Those provisions should be read together with the county’s applicable rules; this briefing does not treat the five-acre language as an unconditional guarantee that a particular parcel needs no plat.

The law provides more specific routes around a full plat requirement:

• A county cannot require a plat for qualifying lots sold to adjoining owners and added to their adjoining parcels; the purchaser must supply an updated metes-and-bounds description.
• The county may grant an individual-lot exception for good cause when the lot is within 50 feet of municipal water, borders a public road, has suitable sewer capacity or a public sewer connection within 50 feet, and an independent licensed civil engineer certifies adequate drainage and no floodplain location. Recorded findings and supporting information are required; this is not automatic approval.
• A funded county or municipality may grant the specified model-rule exemption for four or fewer lots fronting an adequate existing street, with compliant water and sewer service within 50 feet of each lot and no new street or water/sewer extension. The state model rules do not override Subchapter G’s platting exceptions.

Water, sewer, drainage and buyer safeguards remain central. Covered plats require engineering/survey information, water and sewer plans, drainage and floodplain information, county approval and financial security for unfinished facilities. A developer must furnish compliant water/sewer service, roads and drainage and make reasonable efforts to obtain electric and gas service. There are bilingual disclosures, contract-recording and annual statement requirements; certain purchasers may deduct 15% of monthly payments after giving notice and waiting 25 days when a required annual statement is missing. Tax and execution sales carry specified bilingual warnings; a sale violating that warning section is void.

Water/sewer hookups generally require county plat approval or the prescribed determination, with detailed older-lot, reconnection and publicly funded improvement exceptions. The new framework omits the old separate electricity/gas prohibition tied to an adequate-water/sewer determination. It expands the conditional owner-occupant reconnection route to water and sewer and drops the old January 1, 2001 ownership/service conditions, but retains the five-year disconnection limit, no increased volume or extra dwelling connection, documentation, and restriction on modified improvements. It does not promise a utility connection for every unplatted lot.

The county may release a sewer-construction bond for an unoccupied lot after the specified 60-month period only when water and roads are complete, the lot can accommodate compliant sewage facilities, and the owner signs the required affidavit voluntarily assuming installation costs. Other provisions cover delegated approval with appeal, inspections, planning commissions, conflicts of interest, cancellation and replatting, limited variances, and applying updated infrastructure standards to qualifying subdivisions at least 25 years old with at least half their lots undeveloped or unoccupied. That last power is limited to commercially marketed lots, not every homeowner’s property.

Enforcement is not erased. The framework includes $500–$1,000 civil penalties per violation per day, capped at $5,000 per day under that provision; selling unplatted lots or allowing specified nuisances can bring $10,000–$15,000 per lot or nuisance subdivision plus enforcement costs. The nuisance provision has a 30-day correction exception. Specified advertising, commissioner-conflict and subdivider offenses are Class A misdemeanors; knowingly failing to file a required plat can become a state-jail felony if the defendant caused at least five residences to be inhabited. Section 232.221 requires dismissal of an enforcement action when the defendant remedies the violation within 45 days after notice and shows good cause. That is not a general advance waiver of all violations or private claims. Qualifying buyers in economically distressed areas retain a statutory route to seek rescission and specified recoveries. Final sections 232.209–232.229.