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When I first moved to Texas in 2006, I spent several months living with my in-laws in Georgetown, a quiet town of about 46,000 people located 30 miles north of Austin. There was a giant house in their neighbourhood that looked different from all the others; apparently the owner had sold a much smaller property in California and built this dream home with the proceeds. Large-scale migration from California to Texas had not yet begun so nobody thought this was a harbinger of social and political change. The concern, rather, was that too many of these “McMansions” would increase property taxes.
But internal migration to Texas did kick in, and then some. Newly released census data shows that between 2020 and 2023, nine of the 10 fastest growing cities in the US with a population of 20,000 or more were in Texas, and Georgetown was on the list having grown by 40.1% during that period. Today, census data puts the population at 93,612. Other towns grew at an even faster clip: Celina — outside Dallas — by 143.2% and Fulshear — outside Houston — by 142.7%. Now the possibility of social and political change seems very real — a popular T-shirt/bumper sticker reads “Don’t Californicate my Texas”. The country singer Creed Fisher (whose oeuvre includes such classics as “Girls with Big Titties”), released a song about the same anxiety: that exiles from the sunshine state will vote for the very same policies that caused the conditions they fled from, changing Texas forever.
Certainly, there are California transplants who intend to do just that. But the overall picture is more complicated than it appears. First, some Californians who move to Texas are conservatives. Second, migration into Texas is from all over the US. And third, Texas has already changed forever.
Georgetown is an excellent case study. When I first visited, it was the seat of archly conservative Williamson County, the Yin to the Yang of Travis County, which was home to all the hippies and nudists and slackers of Austin. The town was everything you’d expect in Texas: a picturesque courthouse, lots of churches, sheriffs with guns on their hips, harsh penalties for marijuana possession and a Walmart as big as an aircraft hangar. I remember eating at a barbecue joint where the staff wore T-shirts that said “Keep Georgetown Normal” — a direct riposte to the famous slogan Keep Austin Weird. Later, the restaurant was converted into a church.
Georgetown was also a bit snobby. It was home to the first university in Texas, a private arts college with a meticulously maintained campus. There were old families with deep roots, such as the Wolfs, whose surname is now attached to a shopping centre and a subdivision built on what was once their land. Then there were the Stumps, who practised law and had an office on the town square: Stump, Stump and Stump. One Stump was very involved in St John’s United Methodist Church, which was founded by Swedish immigrants in 1882. They had a Swedish-language service early on Christmas morning for descendants of the original members. But most impressive of all was that Williamson County was “dry”, meaning restaurants in Georgetown weren’t allowed to serve alcohol.
It all feels like a lost world now. Things began to change with the opening of Sun City, an “active adult community” for people aged 55 and over that brought an influx of retirees. Sun City was my first exposure to that bizarre American style of authoritarianism, whereby free people submit to strict rules about what colour their doors should be, what kind of plants they can grow in their gardens, and so on.
The inhabitants of Sun City wanted places to go in the evening, so it wasn’t long before the whole dry county thing was abolished and upscale restaurants selling alcohol appeared. My wife and I visited one of them for our anniversary. I remember watching a diner with a personal oxygen tank sipping on some wine. The vibe was snooty and stifling, although rumour had it that Sun City was not quite as buttoned up as it seemed to be. I once met a nurse who told me that the “active adult community” was active in more ways than one and had an unusually high rate of STDs. “They have swinger parties,” she said. To be honest, this is so similar to a myth that swirls around a notorious Florida retirement community that I think it’s an urban legend. But it’s a good story.
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SubscribeThis Austinite thinks the author paints a fair picture of Georgetown. But if he wants to be accepted as an impartial observer, he should stop with the snide use of ‘Democrat this’ and ‘Democrat that’ and use the appropriate term “Democratic”. This is an old Republican slur from way back.
I reread this article to see what you mean about the use of “Democrat”, but I still don’t know what you mean. Do you mean as in the party name?
Brett, Democrats are just way more sensitive than Republicans. Omitting the “-ic” is a huge offense to them; however, all Republicans are used to being called “the Far Right” no matter how moderate they might be.
The word Democratic is not a word that rolls off the tongue so easily in conversation. But I imagine they like it because they get to own the word and meaning. To say a “Democratic sheriff” carries a lot of weight. Which is probably why the the Republicans won’t do it.
What could possibly be more democratic than a party that has corrupted its own primary process for the past three election cycles. If you’re going to feign indignation, have the good grace to do it at the people who caused it, not the ones who notice it.
On the surface, the issue is that ‘Democrat’ is a noun and ‘Democratic’ is an adjective. So when someone says, say, ‘Democrat senator’, they’re (purposely?) using the wrong part of speech. Of course, this is NOT why they do it. They do it because ‘Democrat’ rhymes with ‘rat’ and just comes off sounding nasty when used that way. The R’s deftly avoided this whole mess when they got together in 1856 and gave their new party a name which is both a noun AND an adjective. A wily bunch indeed.
Of course. We’re sneaky. You’re not supposed to notice.
This is truly pitiful stuff! Brat, cat, mat, etc etc rhyme with rat too…. The word “Democrat” doesn’t sound nasty to any normal person.
Eh? Does that really make much of a difference? The omission of two (unnecessary) letters hardly amounts to calling you Marxists or something.
Still you Americans do occasionally love being long winded “Transportation….”!
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I lived in Austin for a few months in 1978. The hippies who’d fled there from San Francisco in 1967 were moaning about the influx of the Outlaw Country crowd.
There’s always been large scale migration to Texas. I spent a year there in 89/90 and most of the tech people I worked with were from out of state – the company I worked for recruited mainly from the mid-West (no one from California would have dreamed of moving to Texas at the time). At times, Dallas felt like a transit camp where people moved purely for work reasons. And might equally move on again later. The far higher mobility of US workers was quite striking coming from the UK – seeing U-Haul vans from all over the US.
I think that when you move somewhere for any length of time, you do adapt a little and absorb some of the local culture. Much as if you move from a UK city to a village. But then we don’t go in for housing enclaves and gated communities (and rightly so in my view) nearly as much as the Americans do. Also notable that the more dangerous areas (I was frequently told to avoid South Dallas) are always quite separate from the safe suburbs and hard to stray into by accident.
Dallas was really quite insular for such a large city – but typical of the continental US at the time. Austin was already weird, but felt closer to normal for Europeans.
And yes, Texas voted Democrat in those days. Though I’m not sure that “Democrat” in Texas was at all the same thing as in other parts of the US.
Actually a very friendly and welcoming place. But too hot and – in many places – humid for my taste. And you can’t walk anywhere (except perhaps in Austin).
Sad to learn that many of the smaller towns west of Dallas-Fort Worth are really struggling these days.
Given the nocturnal habits of these randy retirees, one assumes that pampas grass is on the list of approved garden plants?
You’ve actually made the case for TEXIT. Hopefully the legislature will see the wisdom in allowing the ballot measure requested to proceed
There are many examples in the US of people leaving certain cities and states due to the foreseeable consequences of political decision-making only to insist on bringing that same lousy decision-making with them. The level of self-awareness among such people is zero. It’s as if they forget why they’re moving as soon as they are clear of the previous state’s border.
not one word about the Lgbtetc crowd. or trans texans
Trans-Texans: “Lost my Willie” Nelson, perhaps?
Author seems to think that so much change in 20 years is distressing. Could he be right about that?