Too tough a political tide for an insider
Bruce Tough, the chairman of The Woodlands’ governing board, ran as the ultimate insider in his bid for re-election.
The son of the award-winning model community’s architect, Tough has held multiple leadership positions over 15 years as he’s sought to complete that dream. The 62-year-old lawyer has been the community’s public face presiding over parades, ribbon-cuttings and festivals.
His opponent, Laura Fillault, couldn’t be more different. A stay-at-home mom with an industrial engineering degree, Fillault never held elective office. She had moved into the community only three years ago.
But like a microcosm of what’s happening on the national political scene, the consummate outsider — in this case Fillault — edged out the insider, Tough, who has served on The Woodlands Township’s board since its inception.
Both candidates identify themselves as fiscally conser-
vative Republicans. But Tough’s job experience became almost a dirty word as tea party groups who wield significant influence in The Woodlands portrayed him as “part of the establishment,” more likely to favor developers over residents. She won by 4 percentage points.
Fillault, who gained attention as a vocal critic of a controversial road project in The Woodlands, prefers to see herself as an “independent” rather than as an outsider.
“I see this as more of a grassroots movement. Bruce Tough has more of an establishment feel, like the Republican presidential contender Jeb Bush,” said Fillault, 43, noting how she spent only $4,000 on her campaign compared to the $18,000 that Tough spent.
She was part of a threecandidate slate endorsed by two local tea party groups — the Texas Patriots PAC and the Montgomery County Tea Party — that were instrumental in pushing her name before the public.
‘Kingmaker’ influence
Fillault said that one of these groups, the Texas Patriots, taught her how to campaign through block walking and introducing herself at the polls. It also used its volunteers to hand out literature and work the polls on her behalf.
While some refer to the group as a “kingmaker” in local politics, Fillault disagrees. “I met their criteria as a fiscal conservative, but that does not mean I’m in lockstep with all they do,” she said, noting that she attends occasional meetings but has not been a dues-paying member since January.
But the Texas Patriots’ website boasts that the organization has become the “trusted source for the Woodlands voter” and that 92 percent of its candidates, including Fillault, won this past election.
The organization’s president, Julie Turner, who lives outside The Woodlands in Montgomery, does not deny the group’s powerful influence: “I would certainly hope we have an impact. We take a deep look at people’s values and past actions. People rely on us for that information.”
Tough cannot fathom why he has never won tea party support. He recites a long list of accomplishments, from preventing Houston’s annexation of The Woodlands and fighting for the burial of utility lines to achieving the highest possible rating for the fire department and lowering the township’s tax rate every year.
Still, Tough didn’t seek tea party support this election, nor did he answer voter questionnaires from two tea party groups.
While not opposed to their principles, Tough said he knew the tea party groups would target him for supporting last spring’s $350 million road bond package that included the deeply unpopular road proposal, an extension of Woodlands Parkway to Texas 249.
Like Fillault and the tea partiers, he opposed the parkway extension. But he did not want to jeopardize the entire bond package over that one project, he said.
‘Political piñata’
In the end, county voters defeated that package — but six months later approved a scaled-back $280 million version that didn’t include the road extension.
Fillault believes the bond outcome showed why people should never compromise their ideals. Tough, on the other hand, contends it shows how residents eventually lost out on “millions” of other road improvements (besides the excluded one) that could have eased the traffic gridlock.
Fillault and the tea party groups also criticized Tough for failing to sign a petition opposing clearcutting in the last residential area being developed in The Woodlands, which is known for its lush forest.
“I felt like a political piñata, being bashed by a lot of contrived misstatements,” Tough said. He explained how he wanted to remain neutral so that he could work behind the scenes with the developer, which indeed led to the compromise in which 100-gallon trees are being planted as a buffer there, among other things.
“Bruce did as much as humanly possible to stop the clear-cutting,” said another township director, Jeff Long. “It’s a complicated issue because the township doesn’t have the power to order it. We must dissuade the developer from doing it.”
Tough said the person who circulated the petition, Matthew Burton, was supported by the tea party organizations for a board seat being vacated by an incumbent.
Burton, a political newcomer, narrowly lost to Ann Snyder, a longtime resident who’s headed everything from Interfaith of The Woodlands and its community clinic to the area’s chamber of commerce and school board. She, too, earned the tea partiers’ disdain for supporting the first road bond package.
Tough believes the tea partiers are after “control” and, in so doing, could stamp out independent thought.
“I don’t want to see any single group control the fate of our community,” Long said. “We’re bigger than one group. All the folks who live here should have a say.”
Mike Bass, a township director who was opposed in 2012 by tea partiers who had once backed him, agreed.
“They want to win control of the township board and then have us incorporate our township into a city,’ Bass said. “We have a perfect limited government and free marketplace now. But they really don’t want that.”
‘Victim’ of success
Community leaders agree on one thing: resident frustration over the area’s rapid growth is driving the discontent. Montgomery County’s population, now a half million, is expected to double over the next half-century.
“The Woodlands is a victim of its own success,” said Tough. “Once people build a house here, they want that one to be the last one built. I heard these special interest people saying, ‘Elect me and I’ll stop development.’ It may play well politically, but legally you can’t tell someone what to do with their land.”
The Texas Patriots’ Turner said that while nobody can stop growth, it could be better managed, possibly through incorporating as a city.
Bass said incorporation was put off three years ago because a study then showed it would triple the property tax rate.
‘But I won’
Meanwhile, Fillault thinks The Woodlands has moved too far away from the greenbelts and pathways through the trees displayed on the township’s website.
A self-described community activist, she blogs about how she and her husband left France, her husband’s homeland, to escape socialism and return to Texas. She writes on the website — rightstraightfromtheheart.com — about being a fighter who packs a gun and is not somebody to “mess” with as she takes the country back from “the leftists.”
After she filed for local office, her husband, Pierre, wrote a letter to the local newspaper in support of his wife, he said his vote for her would be his first as an American citizen.
As to what she hopes to accomplish after her win, she said she plans to do more listening and communicating with residents to keep them involved in their community.
“People look at me and say, ‘You took down Bruce Tough,’ ” she said, but insists that she has no wish to tarnish his legacy. “I don’t want him to go away or be put in an old folks home and shut the door. He’s done great things for the community. People respect him. But I won.”
Tough said he’s not ruling out anything in his future and intends to stay active in his community.