Government - Bulverde/Spring Branch Texas EDF

City of Bulverde

The City of Bulverde known as the “Front Porch of the Texas Hill Country” is located north of San Antonio near US Hwy 281, FM 1863 and State Hwy. 46. Bulverde was originally settled in 1850 and called “Pieper Settlement”, after Anton Pieper. For many years the closest post office was at Smithson Valley, and mail was delivered once a week to the house of Carl Koch in Bulverde. A local post office that operated from 1879 to 1919 was named for Luciano Bulverdo, an early area landowner.   

 In the period between 1996 and 1999, 5 separate municipalities were incorporated and combined in the Bulverde area to form the current City of Bulverde. This process required 22 separate elections and was done as a grass roots effort to create a large extraterritorial jurisdiction (ETJ) that span across the hill country north of San Antonio touching the New Braunfels ETJ to the east and the Boerne ETJ to the west to stop San Antonio from annexing north into the hill country. This effort is commonly referred to as the “Boerne Wall.” At that point in time the City of Bulverde was incorporated as a Type A general-law municipality, however, in May 2015 the citizens voted to adopt a Home-Rule charter to have more control over development in the area which includes annexation authority within the city’s extraterritorial jurisdiction (ETJ). 

Its form of government is “Council-Manager” and its governing body is comprised of a Mayor and six Councilmembers elected at-large, all of whom are elected to staggered three-year terms and may not be elected to serve more than three consecutive three year terms. The City Manager is the administrative officer of the City who serves under the Mayor and City Council and is responsible to the governing body for the execution of the laws and administration of the City government. 

The City of Bulverde is a limited-service municipality with 25 employees providing the following services:   

•  Police – Residential and Business Patrol, 911 calls, traffic enforcement, school assistance
• Planning – Zoning, Transportation, Economic Development, etc.
• Public Works – Street Maintenance, Mowing, Animal Control, Code Enforcement, Building Inspection
• Parks – Bulverde Community Park, Community event support, Community Garden

In July 2017, the City of Bulverde was selected as 1 of 13 Texas municipalities to be awarded Scenic City Certification through the Scenic City Certification Program, a project of Scenic Texas. The Scenic City program supports and recognizes cities for commitment to high-quality scenic standards for public roadways and public spaces. Five cities were certified for the first time—including Bulverde—and eight were re-certified or upgraded their existing certification status, bringing the total number of certified cities in Texas to 71. Bulverde has been certified at a Silver level, which indicates a score that falls within 70–79% of the points available. The scoring process is explained and well-documented on the Scenic City website. As a first-time certified Scenic City, Bulverde joins other Silver ranked cities such as College Station, Granbury, Grapevine, and Irving.

For more information on the City of Bulverde, please visit their website by clicking here.