College Station, TX Landscaping Rules: Native Plants (2026)

The statute protects named categories of installation: drought-resistant landscaping and water-conserving natural turf. For those, subsection (d-1) forbids a property owners' association from unreasonably denying or withholding approval, and separately forbids it from unreasonably determining that the proposed installation is aesthetically incompatible with other landscaping in the subdivision. The word doing the work is unreasonably. The association keeps a judgment role, but its judgment has a legal boundary.

What the association keeps is process. Under subsection (d)(8), it may require the owner to submit a detailed description or a plan for the installation, for review and approval, to ensure, to the extent practicable, maximum aesthetic compatibility with other landscaping in the subdivision. In practice, a College Station homeowner in a deed-restricted subdivision should expect to draw up the plan, submit it, and wait for approval before tearing out turf; the protection attaches to a proposed installation that goes through review, not to work done without asking. A denial is not automatically improper either. It must be unreasonable to cross the statute. Aesthetic compatibility with the rest of the subdivision remains a legitimate review standard, just one the association cannot stretch into a blanket refusal of drought-resistant landscaping or water-conserving natural turf.