Category: Top News Stories

OPENING CEREMONY 10:00 at the flagpoles in front of Museum with Judge Keith Lutz and members of Rio Medina Boy Scout Troop 471, SAR, SCV
Museum and outdoor exhibits will be open until 3:00 following the Opening Ceremony.
Exhibits include blacksmith shop, antique farm implements, 19th century wagons and buggies,
SAR American Revolution and SCV Civil War reenactors, 1913 D’Hanis Brick & Tile steam engine, old school house (complete with original WPA outhouses), 1964 (unrestored) caboose, and thousands of unique items portraying the frontier beginnings of Medina County when this 1893 Southern Pacific Railroad Depot was relocated from downtown Hondo to present location (2202 18th Street) becoming Medina County Museum in 1970.
Local DRT, CRT, 4H, CCHA organizations and vendors will be selling local honey, homemade soaps, lotion, yarn, and books.
There’s room for more vendors at no charge. Vendors bring your own canopy as shade is limited. No electricity available outside of buildings. We’d love to have music (piano, fiddle, guitar, harmonica, etc). Anyone wanting to sell hot food must get a (no charge) permit from City of Hondo; no permit required for sales of cold sodas, lemonade. If you’d like to bring a box lunch picnic, bring your picnic quilt and lawn chairs to eat under a shade tree.
The theme is Patriotic as we will be honoring our Veterans and our Nation’s 250 Years of Freedom so dress in Red, White and Blue; Veterans wear your Military insignia ballcaps. It’s also fun to dress in pioneer costume.
Come join in the fun!
For more information please contact Director @ 830-538-3911

Two local races will end with the runoff election ongoing right now. Early voting continues until May 22, and Election Day is May 26th.
Vying for the JP 3 spot is Teresa Koch and Michael Sanchez.
Cindy Modgling-Everett and Kimberly Bermea are running for the Medina County Clerk seat.
For the runoffs, Early Voting began this week, May 18-22, and Election Day is Tuesday, May 26.

By Anton Riecher
Concern about land rights, health issues and cost of a proposed 370-mile power transmission line project to connect San Antonio to the Permian Basin in West Texas monopolized the discussion during a town hall meeting May 13 at the Devine Veterans of Foreign Wars hall.
Brandon Herrera, a Republican congressional candidate for the Texas 23rd District, urged those tracking efforts to win regulatory approval for the 765-kilovolt Howard-Solstice transmission line project to contact not one, but all their elected representatives able to bring influence to bear.
“Everyone should be hearing about this from you because they need to know that this is an issue that they should be advocating for as well,” Herrera said. “That might be enough to push them over the edge, that maybe they make a phone call and maybe that call has a little bit of influence to push things down the line.”
Wes Virdell, representing District 53 in the Texas House of Representatives, and members of the Hill Country Preservation Coalition were also on hand.
Only a few transmission…LOGIN TO CONTINUE READING at www.devinenewsmembers.com. You will get instant access to our full E-edition, and begin getting the newspaper delivered to your home next week for $36 a year in Medina County. Support important local city, county, and school news like this!

By Kayleen Holder
Editor
In a packed house, the Devine City council, zoning commission, as well as two of our local county representatives took time to listen to the concerns, questions, and thoughts of local citizens in regards to impending and ongoing data center development in the Devine area and Medina County in general–and there were a lot. A total of about 60 people signed up to speak, most of them local city and county residents.
“We are here to look at both the opportunity and the risk based on facts,” Mayor Butch Cook said before opening up the podium.
The co-founder of Texas Energy Group, Ryan Nuckolls, gave a presentation on the facility’s projected plans. He discussed water use, and plans to produce half of the power the site will use by building a gas-powered power plant on site. So the 800 Megawatt site (which is the largest in Medina County), will rely half on the electric grid, and half on power produced by its own power plant using natural gas.
The City has two major things to decide on: Will it annex? And will it offer tax abatements?
Nuckolls declined to provide his contact information for additional questions, but stated the company wants to be part of the community and answer the community’s questions.
He stated that there would be 8-9 buildings on the site including an electrical substation and a power plant. When asked if they owned the property or leased the property, he said his company has the “developer rights” and he was unsure who the actual customer coming into the site would be.
“Who owns it? Who will run it? Who are we going to be dealing with for the rest of our lives?” local resident Heather Yanta asked.
“A hyperscaler data center operator will eventually come in and own the property,” Nuckolls said, noting they had several reputable clients.
TX Energy Group’s presentation stated that the entire facility is projected to use the 1.7 million gallons for the initial fill, though it will be staggered, and that won’t need to be replaced for approximately 15 years–except for a 2% evaporation rate which is an annual evaporation rate according to Nuckolls.
The developer stated the closest building on the site will be about “5,000 feet away from the closest community in Devine”. The site is a half mile from Devine City limits on Hwy 132 near the intersection of I-35.
Developers stated they would try to route traffic down I-35, and not through downtown Devine.
TJ Richardson was one of many residents who spoke.
“They are going to ask a lot of us, and so we need to ask a lot of them,” Richardson said.
Former County Commissioner Jerry Beck suggested that the center use “effluent water (treated water) that’s spit out of the sewer plant”. There are in fact, some data centers that do use effluent water so this appears to be a viable option if council pursued it.
Some speakers suggested that local leaders…LOGIN TO CONTINUE READING at www.devinenewsmembers.com. You will get instant access to our full E-edition, and begin getting the newspaper delivered to your home next week for $36 a year in Medina County. Support important local city, county, and school news like this!

The Lytle Pirates baseball squad took down Poth in a two game series sweep to secure the Area Championship and advance to the Regional semi-final round! 

The 2026 Lytle Pirate baseball team: Weston Jackson, Chase Guevara, Damien Barco, Easton Burely, Easton Davila, Toby Davila, Piercen Moreno, Patrick Guillen, Travis Norton, Jayson Fuentes, Lee Mills, Juan Patlan, Maddox Moreno, Ethan Elizondo, Seth Pierce, Mason Hill, Devin Cordova.

With a lifetime of shared memories, twin sisters Margaret Billebault and Marjorie Burris will celebrate their 90th birthday on May 21, 2026. The sisters were born in Waelder, Texas on May 21, 1936—Marjorie arriving first, followed just 15 minutes later by Margaret, much to their parents’ surprise. The youngest of six children, the twins were raised in the country outside of Devine on land gifted to their family by their great-aunt, Emma Dubose Taylor, a cattle baron.
In exchange…LOGIN TO CONTINUE READING at www.devinenewsmembers.com. You will get instant access to our full E-edition, and begin getting the newspaper delivered to your home next week for $36 a year in Medina County. Support important local city, county, and school news like this!

Texas can continue to be a leader in innovation with “the right guardrails” in place

A report issued by the Edward’s Aquifer Alliance doesn’t water down the reality of the strain data centers have put on water, one of our most valuable resources. The group decided it was time “to dive into the exploding phenomenon of data centers and their impact on our water supplies,” said Executive Director Annalisa Peace in her opening remarks. After sifting through what she describes as an “avalanche of new information”, the report was issued this April.
Authors describe the advancements of artificial intelligence as “both scary and wonderful” in various ways as real researched facts and figures leave little room for watering down the dire need for regulation, and fast.
The authors also acknowledged that Texas can continue to be a leader in innovation with “the right guardrails” in place, and hope this research will help as officials in the Texas House and Senate “have both pledged to study data center issues in preparation for the 90th Legislative Session in 2027.”
Some of the highlights of the report…LOGIN TO CONTINUE READING at www.devinenewsmembers.com. You will get instant access to our full E-edition, and begin getting the newspaper delivered to your home next week for $36 a year in Medina County. Support important local city, county, and school news like this!

UIL- Congratulations to Luke Brown, who placed 1st overall in Current Issues & Events and Maverick Beaty, who placed 6th in Copy Editing at the UIL Regional contest! Both students have qualified for the UIL State Meet.
Luke, a sophomore at Devine High School, was also the Current Issues & Events District champion in 2025, his first year ever competing. This year, he not only takes district again, but he won the Sweepstakes at District, won first place individual at Regionals and placed third as a team. Luke loves politics and has big plans to be President one day! When asked about his UIL experience and major achievement, Luke had the following to say…LOGIN TO CONTINUE READING at www.devinenewsmembers.com. You will get instant access to our full E-edition, and begin getting the newspaper delivered to your home next week for $36 a year in Medina County. Support important local city, county, and school news like this!

Luke Brown

City of Devine to consider annex providing water/sewer, tax breaks in future

By Kayleen Holder
Editor
The proposed data center coming in just south of the City of Devine near I-35 will be an 800 MegaWatt, with half of that power generated by natural gas and half of the power coming from its own on-site power plant. (It’s a good thing as that’s enough electricity to power as many as 200,000 homes by comparison at any given moment). In an interview this Monday, we learned a few interesting things about this project, which is rather unique in a few ways.
“There is a lot that we don’t know ourselves,” Mayor Cook said. “We have some of the same questions you do.”
Developer representatives (who haven’t disclosed the company’s name) have stated “this is going to be the largest one, the largest private investment in South Texas”, not in size, but money-wise.
Mayor Cook and City Administrator David Jordan emphasized that the city wants to get the information out to the public as soon as they can. They also acknowledge that the City has no say on deciding if a data center gets built here, or not. The land is in Medina County and it was sold to a data center company by a private individual.
“It’s not in the city. They want to be annexed for the water and the sewer, and they asked if we have the capacity to provide it,” Jordan said. “They are asking for a 2 inch meter [compared to another large business which has an 8” meter].”
“By the time the company came to us, they already knew they had a gas line running through the property and a transfer station on the property. They came to us to ask if we can provide water/sewer.”
The City of Devine is allotted 911 acre-feet of water from the Edward’s Aquifer. Last year, the city of Devine used about 183 million gallons of water out of its 296 million gallons normally allotted by the Edward’s Aquifer during non-drought times.
However, the City has been under Stage 4 pumping restrictions all summer…LOGIN TO CONTINUE READING at www.devinenewsmembers.com. You will get instant access to our full E-edition, and begin getting the newspaper delivered to your home next week for $36 a year in Medina County. Support important local city, county, and school news like this!

By Anton Riecher
Findings from a financial audit of the Devine Volunteer Fire Department for fiscal year 2023-2024 were forwarded to Medina County Sheriff Randy Brown following its presentation to the Medina County Emergency Services District No. 2 board of commissioners during the board’s April 21 meeting.
Board president Todd Summers said the intent is to give the sheriff the most complete information available in the aftermath of substantial fraud uncovered in late 2024.
“Let the DA tell us if they believe we need to go further or not,” Summers said. “Is this going to be enough to prosecute the case to the fullest?”
In other business, the board voted unanimously to

…LOGIN TO CONTINUE READING at www.devinenewsmembers.com. You will get instant access to our full E-edition, and begin getting the newspaper delivered to your home next week for $36 a year in Medina County. Support important local city, county, and school news like this!