Moving across, well technically halfway, across the country is a big undertaking. In our case it involved a lot of clearing out of old property, getting the house sold, packing,  finding a moving company, finding a new house, buying the new house, arranging to have our remaining property moved to our new location, unpacking, getting utilities turned back on, finding new doctors and new dentist.

None of that was particularly difficult, but did involve a lot of detail and a lot of communications. Some of the research into that started  before I was even sure we were going to be able to move. None of it bears retelling here and my only advice is to do research and have a plan. And a back up plan as well. As General Dwight D. Eisenhower said, “The plan is nothing, planning is everything.”

Just about a year ago we were pretty much “settled in” in terms of what we needed to do. Mrs. EMSArtifact and I were driving through the Texas countryside, seeing the sights and discussing our new state.

I joked that it was “Almost like we moved to a new state.” Mrs. EMSArtifact said, “It’s easier to think of it as moving to a new country so much is different.”

She’s right, there is a huge difference between most red Texas and completely blue Massachusetts. What follows are some of the differences, listed and discussed without judgement. Some things we love, some things we like, some things we just tolerate. I don’t think that Texas cares about our opinions and I’m sure that Texas isn’t going to change to suit. Doesn’t matter because here we are and here we are going to stay.

Things you need to do when you move to Texas.

You need to establish residency. It’s not enough to own a property, even if you live there. You need to establish residency to get the available property tax exemptions.

In our case we needed to do that before January 1, 2024. Which in essence gave us less than a full month as we closed on our new house just before Thanksgiving, but couldn’t move into it until after Thanksgiving.

To establish residency, you pretty much need a Drivers License or state ID. So, we had to get TX DLs. The first hitch is that in order to do that you need to either have first registered your vehicles or sign an affidavit swearing that you don’t own a vehicle.

So, here is what you need to do to register a vehicle in Texas.

First, you need proof of INsurance. More on that later. You have to contact your insurance and tell them that you now have a new state and need a quote for insurance. After they give you the quote and you wake up from fainting at how expensive it is you print out your INsurance cards and go to an inspection station.*

The inspection station does the inspection, you pay them for that, and they enter the system into the state system. You then drive to the county tax collector office and pay the registration and other fees. Some of that is an excise tax based on the value of your vehicle. It’s not cheap.

After you pay them, they will give you your new inspection/registration sticker and your “tags.” Which we call license plates.

In Texas, the most important part of this process is getting your INsurance. Even though registration is only valid for one year, people drive around with valid INsurance, but and expired inspection/registration sticker. Technically, you have a year after expiration, but I’ve seen inspection/registration stickers five years out of date.

If you get stopped by the police, the first two things they ask you for are DL and INsurance.

Once you have registered all of your vehicles, you can then go to a Department of Public Safety (DPS) License office and get your license. There is a whole list of things you can use to prove you are you, readers can look them up.

The problem in urban areas is that so many people are moving in that it can be six months before you can get a DL. Which means if you come late in the year, you might miss a whole year of property tax exemptions. I was lucky because the very nice young lady at the county tax collector office told me that I could go on line and search for offices with open appointments. She cautioned that it could be well over and hour drive.

She was right, but I found consecutive appointments for myself and Mrs. EMSArtifact. We drove down at the appointed time, went through the process and got our temporary licenses. It seems that they don’t print them on the spot, they print a paper temporary and then the regular license is mailed to you. You can also register to vote, which we did.

We also had to register with our HOA. Never had one in our old neighborhood. This is not mandatory, but is well advised if you want to know that’s going on. We did, so we did.

Another thing we had to learn was how to pronounce some proper names properly.

For instance.

Burnet – Burnit

Manor – May Nor

Elgin – El Gin with the G in Gin pronounced like the G in Gun.

Manchaca. No one seems to know. It’s either Man-Shak or Man-Chack-Ka. Seems to depend on the day of the week.

Since there is no X in Spanish and Spanish is the secondary language everywhere and the primary language in some areas, X is pronounced as an H.

So, Mexia is pronounced Mahaya.

Takes a while to get used to that.

Geography can be a challenge. A city can be in two counties, which complicates things. Then there is the city itself and the Extraterritorial Jurisdiction (ETC) where the residents pay some taxes to the city, but sometimes don’t get any services from the city. Where you live in the Certificate of Convenience and Necessity (CCN) determines from whom you get your water.

In my city there are three entities that provide water. You don’t get a choice, whoever has the CCN for you area provides your water. One is the city water department, the other two are Special Utility Districts (SUD). In our city and the ETJs, the city provides sewage and trash pick up.

If you are in an unincorporated area, you might get your water from a (Municipal Utility District).

This video  explains MUDs, PUDs, and PIDs.

SUDs are water only entities.

Electricity is deregulated in Texas. A state agency (ONCOR) generates the electricity, but you can’t buy it from them. You buy it from independent companies that act as brokers and compete on price.

Natural Gas is regulated and the state has a monopoly. Our neighborhood has propane instead of natural gas, which is uncommon.

All of these are quasi governmental entities.

Then there is law enforcement. City police have jurisdiction inside the corporate limits of a city. The County Sheriff has jurisdiction in unincorporated areas of the county. The Department of Public Safety (DPS) State Troopers have jurisdiction all over the place. Texas Game Wardens and Alcohol Beverage officers are “State Police” and spend most of their time doing Game or Alcohol related enforcement. However, they are certified police officers and can even pull you over for speeding or arrest you on a warrant.

Constables? Depends on the county, but a lot of what they do is property foreclosure related. At least in my county.

Texas Rangers are the Texas version of the FBI.

Got all that?

I mentioned that some cities are in two counties. That means that there is a city police and potentially two different county sheriff’s offices. Oh, and two District Attorneys and two County Attorneys. I don’t think all Counties have County Attorneys and I’m not quite clear what they do.

Then there are the schools. Schools are operated by the Independent School District (ISD) in the city. These too are quasi governmental bodies and are completely independent of the city in which they are located. Hence the name. Oh, mostly they have their own police departments. Again, fully certified law enforcement officers, they just work for the ISD.

Where you live determines which ISD your children will attend. It doesn’t have to be in the same city or even county. Cities can sometimes annex unincorporated areas and Austin traditionally has done a lot of that until last year when the laws were changed and people in an annexed area can vote themselves out of the city. Whether that will stop them or not remains to be seen.

We’re not done yet.

Outside of the major cities, the fire departments and some EMS systems are operated by Emergency Service Districts (ESD). Again, quasi governmental entities that are created by the voters in their areas.

Every county has ESDs, some have a lot of them. Travis County, which is where Austin is located, has seventeen ESDs. Not all of them have fire departments, some exist solely to collect taxes and then pay other ESDs to provide fire and EMS first response services.

Some cities are covered by more than one ESD, since the ESD is created by people who are willing to pay for better emergency services. There is a small ESD that used to provider fire services, but now pay Austin Fire Department to do that.

ESDs are completely independent of any cities that they may provide service too. So are ISDs for that matter.

Speaking of police, my former state was an outlier in that every city or town housed their own prisoners until the prisoners made bail or saw a judge. For that matter, that is the only state that has no bail bondsmen. The court magistrate comes out and sets bail for people arrested during off hours. Or he doesn’t and they sit in a cell until they go to court.

In Texas, the county sheriff runs the jails and prisoners are brought there for holding until they make bail. Which means they have to go before a judge. That’s normal in much of the country, so didn’t take much getting used to. Not that I’ve ever been arrested.

Back to Texas. Then there are the roads. Cities are responsible for city streets, counties for county roads, and Texas DOT for state highways, Farm to Market roads, and others. Except the toll roads. They are operated by a number of, hold on, quasi governmental entities that don’t raise taxes, but charge exorbitant tolls.

Driving itself takes some getting used to. A lot of drivers are very aggressive down here. Those are the same people who then go on Facebook and complain about how expensive their car insurance is.

When I say “aggressive” some of them drive like Kamikaze pilots on the highway, then like Demolition Derby drivers in the parking lots.

I learned early that it’s not good to be the first car stopped at a red light. You have to wait two to three seconds before you move because of those people who just have to blast through. Then they go on Facebook and complain about how slow people drive and how expensive their insurance is.

Non toll road maintenance is inconsistent. Back roads in particular usually need lots of work, but don’t get it because lots of people don’t live on them.

Even though much of Texas is a hub for technology, it is still very much at heart an agricultural state and so some of the roads are best driven in trucks. Or maybe tractors.

Depending on where you live, you can go from a city to farm or ranch land in 10 minutes. I love driving about that far from my house and seeing cows and horses grazing in the fields. It makes me smile every time.

Law enforcement on roads depends on where the road is. Of course if an agency has primary jurisdiction, that doesn’t mean that other agencies can’t pull people over.

Finally the weather. All I’ll say is that where we are there is not enough snow to shovel. Every once in a while I walk into the nearby Lowes or Home Depot and ask where they keep the snow blower parts. The blank looks remind me that we live in the right place.

It’s just Texas being Texas and it a long time to get here, but we’re home.

Here’s a musical finale,

*Texas stopped doing inspections January 1, 2024 except for emissions inspections in 16 counties. Guess who lives in one of those?