SAN ANTONIO, Texas – Out of 1,171 Texas cities represented at the 114th Annual Texas Municipal League (TML) Conference and Exhibition, one small Rio Grande Valley municipality repeatedly commanded the spotlight.
Held at the Henry B. González Convention Center along the San Antonio River Walk, the annual gathering brings together municipal leaders from across the state to exchange ideas, share best practices, and strengthen local government.Throughout the event, the name of the City of Elsa echoed across the convention floor as the community captured two prestigious TML Municipal Excellence Awards—marking the second consecutive year the city has claimed half of the awards handed out in its population bracket.
"The rest of the day, walking the conference in our Elsa shirts, people kept stopping me: 'Hey, heard your name a lot today. Congratulations,'" said Daniel Rivera, executive director of the Elsa Economic Development Corporation (EDC)."Our badges had a little 'TML Award Winner' flag at the bottom. Out of all the cities in Texas, people knew the name Elsa."
Elsa competed in the 25,000-and-under population category against municipalities across Texas, many of which are up to four times its size. The city submitted three nominations for this year's competition, winning two top honors and finishing as runner-up to itself in one of the categories.
"It was amazing because this was the second year in a row we won two awards, and so out of a total of four total awards that TML gives out every year, we won half of them twice in a row," Rivera told the Rio Grande Guardian in an exclusive interview. "And the interesting thing too is that we applied for three different awards, and we got runner-up on one of them to ourselves."
This year’s honors recognized two distinct economic development programs designed to bolster local entrepreneurs:
The back-to-back victories build on Elsa’s 2025 TML awards, which recognized the city's multi-year development of Pacific Trails Park—featuring a splash pad, community garden, dog park, disc golf, and sand volleyball courts—as well as the EDC's innovative AI podcast.
For Rivera, however, the true reward lies not in the trophies, but in how Elsa’s grassroots business retention strategies are evolving into a blueprint for other communities.
What began as an effort to help local merchants get discovered online through one-on-one counter visits has since expanded into "Digital Facade Texas," a scalable system that chambers of commerce and economic development corporations across the state can adopt. Rivera noted he is already offering an analog starter version of the program, dubbed "BRE (Business Retention and Expansion) in a Box," to fellow economic developers looking to replicate Elsa's success.
"That audit started with one goal: help our small businesses get found. We showed up one owner at a time. It grew into the Digital Facade Texas, and it’s one of the ideas I’m proudest of," Rivera said. "Now it’s a system that chambers and EDCs across Texas can use in their own communities. That’s what I want to do next: share it, so other towns can take care of their small businesses the way my team and I are working to take care of Elsa’s."
Rivera credited the back-to-back statewide recognition to a unified effort among local leadership, thanking Elsa Mayor Alonzo "Al" Perez, the city commission, city staff, the Elsa EDC board, and the local business owners who welcomed the team into their establishments.
"I think it just really proves that Elsa is on this growth path where we can continue to push forward, make a better community, and just kind of continue to grow Elsa to the future," Rivera said. "Everyone's proud. Everyone's excited to represent Elsa in South Texas over there."
