Spring-area voters will wait hours longer for election results and Harris County taxpayers will cover a roughly 30% higher price tag for general elections under a new state law that expands weekend voting, with no state money attached.

Harris County Clerk Teneshia Hudspeth told the Texas House Elections Committee on Tuesday, Aug. 4, that Senate Bill 2753 would raise the cost of running a large countywide election by nearly 30% and smaller local elections by about 9%. The increases stem from added staffing, voting equipment and a voter education campaign the county plans to launch.

The law does not include state funding to cover those costs.

Hudspeth told Hearst Newspapers that implementing the law for every election cycle would place "such great demand" on operations that she doesn't know how the county could sustain full-time staff, let alone temporary election workers. Harris County has already conducted eight consecutive elections since October 2025, including three simultaneous elections in May 2026.

What the law changes

SB 2753, authored by Sen. Bob Hall and passed in the 89th Regular Session, eliminates the current three-to-four-day gap between the end of early voting and Election Day. It replaces the existing schedule with a continuous 12-day voting window that runs straight through Election Day and includes two full weekends, according to Community Impact.

Under current law, early voting begins 17 days before Election Day and runs for 12 days, ending four days out. That break lets election workers set up polling places, prepare submitted ballots for tabulation and rest before a long Election Day.

Without that break, early and mail-in ballots can no longer be pre-tabulated. All results will be reported together, likely several hours later than the familiar 7:01 p.m. election-night drop voters are used to.

"The concept of some results coming out at 7:01 [p.m.], I think that's gone, because your mail-in ballots won't even be complete by then," House Elections Committee Chair Rep. Matt Shaheen, R-Plano, said at the Aug. 4 hearing.

Scale of the problem in Harris County

Harris County currently employs nearly 200 full-time election staff. Hudspeth said the county would need to roughly double that workforce to keep up with continuous operations, according to Texas Scorecard. The county's election operation expands from about 60–80 early voting locations to 600–700 Election Day vote centers for a general election.

Spring lawmaker raises concerns

Rep. Valoree Swanson, R-Spring, sits on the House Elections Committee and participated in the Aug. 4 hearing. Swanson told Hudspeth she was sorry for the headaches lawmakers caused and called the situation a nightmare, according to Hearst Newspapers reporting.

"I have a lot of concerns about it," Swanson said.

What happens next

The law technically took effect in September 2025 but does not apply to any election until the Texas Secretary of State publishes a report stating the office is "confident that the counties in this state are prepared." That report had not been issued as of Aug. 4.

Christina Adkins, director of elections for the Secretary of State's office, told the committee that all county officials analyzing the changes asked the legislature to delay implementation until the November 2027 biennial constitutional amendment election. The bill's legislative history is available on the Texas Legislature's website.

Full implementation is required by August 2027. The next regular legislative session begins in January 2027, giving lawmakers a window to amend the law. Shaheen pushed back on county complaints about unfunded mandates, arguing counties can raise local taxes to cover costs, though he said he is "conflicted" on the issue.

The Secretary of State's confidence report has not been issued, and no public comment deadline specific to SB 2753 implementation has been announced.