ATX-GEO: Impact 10/24/2025

With 2,338 weddings taking place in Williamson County in 2024, the local wedding industry is worth over $90 million, according to The Wedding Report.

The overview: Georgetown has about 20 wedding venues and a number of other businesses that support the industry. The businesses drive hotel occupancy tax and sales tax revenue to the city.

Quote of note: “If we have a client who wants to keep everything [in] Georgetown, you can source pretty much everything you need directly in Georgetown,” local wedding planner Alyson Desha said.

The big picture: Home to a bridal shop with its own signature line, and with businesses offering services from custom flower arrangements to personalized wedding invitations, residents and guests alike have chosen Georgetown as their wedding destination.

Desha said she’s seen an increased interest in people getting married in Georgetown.

For couples like Rachel Vaughn and Mitchell Pham, who are getting married in November, it wasn’t only Georgetown’s businesses, but its location and character, that secured their booking.

There are several upcoming and ongoing road projects in Georgetown, including plans to build medians on Williams Drive and constructing the first phase of expansion on DB Wood Road. 

Williams Drive

• Project: Construct medians with turn lanes on Williams Drive from I-35 to Serenada Drive, including a shared-use path on the north side of Williams Drive and a new waterline
• Update: In the design phase, with street light work anticipated to begin in early 2026
• Timeline: 2023-27
• Cost: $18.6 million
• Funding source: city of Georgetown

• Project: Add four lanes, a center turn lane and a shared-use path from Hwy. 29 to Oak Ridge Road
• Update: Anticipated completion in May
• Timeline: 2023-26
• Cost: $29.4 million
• Funding source: city of Georgetown

As the Austin metro area continues to see expansion in the technology sector, industry leaders are highlighting key critical area of interest: power delivery. 

What you need to know: In an Oct. 22 meeting of Opportunity Austin's Economic Development Council, panelists representing a variety of arms of the local technology industry shared insights regarding technology industry expansion in the area. 

What they're saying: The technology sector in Austin has experienced rapid growth, panelists said, and one of the first questions being asked by companies seeking to locate here are about power supply. 

"So much of our current project was defined by how much power we could bring into the building," said Eric Van Hensbergen, a fellow and member of the leadership team of the architecture and technology group at semiconductor and software design company Arm. "In speaking with a lot of our partners, that's the No. 1 thing that they're looking for in regions that they're expanding into."

These considerations are especially relevant for data centers, he said.

Two constitutional amendments on the Nov. 4 ballot would impact the operation and oversight of Texas’ judicial system if approved by voters.

The details: State Proposition 3 seeks to require judges to deny bail for certain felony offenses, keeping more defendants in jail as they await trial. Proponents of the measure, which passed the Legislature with bipartisan support, said in June that it would improve public safety by keeping violent offenders behind bars.

Proposition 12 would rework the 13-member State Commission on Judicial Conduct, allowing the governor to appoint a majority of the commissioners and requiring most sanctions for judges accused of misconduct to be issued publicly. The bipartisan proposition faced pushback from some House Democrats who expressed concerns that allowing the governor to appoint a majority of commissioners would politicize the nonpartisan judicial conduct commission and give Abbott more power to remove from office judges whom he does not agree with.

Zooming out: The measures are among 17 state propositions being considered by Texas voters in the Nov. 4 election.