Plot Twist in Granbury Recall Fight

Granbury, TX – Granbury’s fight over recall elections just got another player. Kolton Krottinger has filed to intervene in the lawsuit brought by Mayor Jim Jarratt, Mayor Pro Tem Bruce Wadley and Councilman Gary “Skip” Overdier, challenging the effort to invalidate recall petitions seeking their removal from office.

Pipkins Reports has confirmed, Krottinger has entered the case as a self represented intervenor in Hood County’s 355th Judicial District Court, Case No. C2026539. His filing opposes the officials’ attempt to stop the recall process and argues that allegations of fraud or defective signatures should be supported by evidence and evaluated under the law.

The intervention means another participant is asking the court to hear his side of a dispute that has already raised serious questions about the public’s ability to hold local officials accountable.

A lawsuit filed at the eleventh hour

As Pipkins Reports previously reported, the three officials filed suit on October 6, shortly before the Granbury City Council was expected to address scheduling a recall election for May 2027. The lawsuit alleges that the petitions contain insufficient valid signatures and that one or more circulators engaged in fraud, forgery or other improper conduct. Those allegations remain unproven.

The timing was striking. The council had been preparing to move the recall process forward, but city attorney Jeremy SoRelle advised members to halt the scheduling process after the lawsuit was announced.

The recall effort targets five elected officials: Jarratt, Wadley, Overdier, Greg Corrigan and Zeb Ullom. It grew out of residents’ concerns over the proposed Project Patriot data center and power generation campus at Knox Ranch, including questions about transparency and the city’s handling of the project.

The dispute has already taken a winding path. On July 28, the city announced that the petitions had not been certified, citing signature problems and deficiencies in the stated grounds for recall. After recall supporters challenged that decision in the Second Court of Appeals, the city informed the court on August 24 that City Secretary Carla Walker would present the petitions to the council following further review of legal authority. The appellate proceeding was subsequently dismissed as moot after the city agreed to proceed.

At a September 28 special meeting, the officials addressed the recall allegations and said they believed there was no evidence of wrongdoing. None agreed to resign.

Then came the October 6 lawsuit.

What Krottinger is asking the court to consider

According to the Hood County Express account of his filing, Krottinger argues that alleged misconduct involving particular signatures should not automatically invalidate otherwise valid entries without a legal basis. He asks the court to require evidence supporting the accusations, determine which signatures were affected and reject efforts to disqualify signatures beyond what the law permits.

His filing also points to the city secretary’s certification of the petitions and argues that filing a lawsuit does not, by itself, suspend the city’s obligation to conduct the recall process.

Krottinger submitted a declaration describing what he says he personally observed while volunteers collected signatures at the county annex. He says volunteers checked identification and voter information and turned away people who said they lived outside Granbury city limits.

He does not claim to have verified every signature.

There is another qualification: Krottinger acknowledges that he lives outside the city limits and neither signed the petitions nor collected signatures. His asserted interest rests on his advocacy for the recall effort and his observations of portions of the collection process.

The intervention seeks no damages or attorney’s fees. Krottinger is asking to participate in the case and present evidence and legal arguments against blocking the petitions.

Under Texas Rule of Civil Procedure 60, a person may seek to intervene by filing a pleading, although another party can ask the court to strike the intervention for sufficient cause. The filing is not a judicial endorsement of Krottinger’s arguments, and the court has not determined the merits of the competing positions.

The voters are still waiting

The latest development does not resolve the central question: will Granbury residents get the recall elections the city’s charter provides for, or will the legal fight delay or prevent them?

The officials have a right to challenge petitions they believe are defective. Allegations of fraud should be investigated when supported by evidence, not dismissed simply because they are politically inconvenient. But residents also have a right to expect that a recall process established by their city charter will be administered according to the same law for everyone.

Granbury’s citizens have already watched the petitions rejected, reconsidered and certified, only to see the election scheduling process interrupted by a lawsuit from three of the officials facing recall.

Now a new intervenor is asking the court to examine whether the effort to invalidate those petitions has a sufficient legal and evidentiary foundation. The court will have to decide the issues, not Facebook commentators or political allies.

One principle should be beyond dispute: elected office is not a shield against accountability. If the petitions are legally defective, the evidence should show it. If they are valid, the voters should have their say.

Pipkins Reports will continue following the case and reviewing the available court records as the dispute unfolds.