Editor's Note: Find the debate article between the county commissioner precinct 2 candidates, incumbent Damon Beierle and challenger Leonard Guenter, in the Tuesday, Feb. 3. edition.
A Burnet County Candidate Forum Jan. 29 allowed Burnet County judge and precinct 2 commissioner candidates seeking the GOP nomination to introduce themselves to the community.
The event, hosted by the Burnet Chamber of Commerce, involved a Meet & Greet at 5 p.m. followed by a forum with debate questions at the Burnet Community Center.
Milton Rister of Georgetown served as the moderator. His experience includes executive director of Railroad Commission, chief of staff for the Secretary of State’s Office; and in 2004 he was the executive director of the Republican Party of Texas.
Vying for the Republican party nomination for Burnet County judge are incumbent Bryan Wilson and challenger Alan Trevino.
During introductions, Trevino described himself as a Christian conservative and lifelong law enforcement officer and trusted business owner for over 23 years.
“I want to address a concern that some people have come to me about, and the concern is that if I get elected county judge, I’m only going to care about the sheriff’s office because of my current job,” he told the audience. “Can’t be any further from the truth. My ability to perform as your chief deputy is very important for the position that I’m running for.”
He explained that he’s involved in the budget process for the Burnet County Sheriff’s Office. He has worked with three of the budgets “looking at items we need for the sheriff’s office to move forward.”
Trevino further explained that the sheriff’s office focus includes commercial vehicles. “Currently, we have two commercial vehicle deputies. I’d like to have four. That’s something I want to bring forward on this next budget, when we’re looking for positions.”
He shared details about his role during the flood event in Burnet County on July 5, 2025.
“I was also the incident commander on the planning for the eclipse – months and months of preparation,” Trevino said. “Can’t on the one hand praise me for the job that I’m doing as your chief deputy and then on the other hand, hold that against me because I’m running for county judge.”
He also mentioned that he was passionate about serving on the Texas governor’s security detail.
During his introduction, Wilson offered details about his service.
“I’m a family man first. I’m also a servant who believes that experience, relationships and education matters in this job. I’m a Christian. I’m married to Holly Jacoby Wilson. I am a grandfather … I’ve got my bachelor’s and master’s from Texas Tech as well as over 30 years of managing statewide programs, probation courts,” Wilson said. “I’ve served the state and worked with all 254 counties on a regular basis. I was always considered a reliable friend and contact across the entire state – not just for the courts that needed my help but other state agencies that need my help in Austin.
“That’s what I’ve been doing here is figuring things out with the people who live here and taking care of people. That’s what I’ve said when I applied for the commissioners court, that people are first.”
His style of leadership colored his aim to improve the budget.
“Since I’ve become judge, I’ve opened a transformative, open budget process that resulted in lower taxes and for the first time in eight years, no new debt,” Wilson said. “I was committed that we would not issue a tax note for the sake of issuing a tax note just because the law says we could.”
He added that he researched and found that the sheriff’s office needed more funding, so he added $1.2 million to their budget in fiscal year 2025. He also acted as emergency management coordinator during the July 2025 flood and the tornado.
Law Enforcement
Trevino was asked about steps to take for funding law enforcement.
“The two things that county government, city government, state government, federal government need to do and need to do right is public safety and roads,” Trevino said.
He touted his familiarity with the BCSO budget.
“I have an exceptional background in doing that in being able to fund the equipment, the new positions and making sure that through the budget we are locating funds,” Trevino added. “This past budget, we found over $500,000 to add to the sheriff’s office for four new deputy positions that this judge voted against. … not only that it went to requesting that they be put under the constable’s office. That’s not pro-law enforcement. That’s antisheriff’s office. We need to fix that.”
Wilson countered, “One of the things I’ve done is for the past four years, I’ve run a statewide law enforcement program.” Wilson’s area of expertise included vehicle theft, drug cartels and human trafficking.
“One of the things that will distinguish me from the other candidate is that I’m a datadriven person,” Wilson added. “When the crime rate fell the last three years by 31%, that’s not the time to add more deputies.”
When asked about the county jail revenue, jail management and controlling cost, Wilson stated: “I did run the law offices for the prison system for three years. I worked in the prison system for many years after that in community corrections, dealing with local jails all over the entire State of Texas. … all different types of programs for the courts and the jails and managing millions of dollars in state revenue.”
Wilson added in one stint working through the auto theft program, he collected over $110 million for law enforcement in a year. I understand revenues and expenditures.
“My priority will always be data-driven information and making choices based on facts,” Wilson continued, adding, “Every year the county has had to front the money” for the county jail operations.”
He explained that the jail expenditures continues to exceed the amount the city allocates for operations.
To counter Wilson’s jail expense concerns Trevino said: “When I started as your chief deputy, Burnet County was $40,000 in debt on jail beds. The first thing I did was look at the numbers. I’m a numbers guy, data guy. Call it what you want. So we changed some numbers on how we charge for beds.”
Trevino expounded on the progress.
“We went from negative $1.1 million to $40,000 plus. The very next year we went to $1.4 million plus (in) what the jail was asked to bring in by budget. And then just this past year, we brought in $3.3 million plus,” Trevino added. “For the last eight years, the commissioners have provided a $5.4 million expense for the jail. This year they were able to increase that. Now we as the jail have to bring in an additional $1.7 million to match the budget.”
On development pressure versus rural character, Trevino said: “We’re about to have some significant change in this county. When you talk about the rock crushers plant, when you talk about the transmission line, something that’s going to change the horizon of Burnet County forever, we’ve got to address that.”
Trevino contended that he “started the conversation” about the transportation plan.
“The infrastructure for roads, infrastructure for development, how we handle the development that’s coming in, and doing the (zone) that was just passed doing the water restriction on 10 acres in that one northeast of Burnet County section. Those are things we have to do as we are planning longterm for this county,” Trevino said. “And roadwise, the traffic and people are coming from all directions from Liberty Hill, from Spicewood, from Bee Caves, coming from Burnet County, we’ve got to address our roads in more in depths. We’ve got to have relationships with our cities with the City of Bertram, the City of Burnet, the City of Marble Falls and all the other cities.
“I’m a relationship building and that’s when we start bringing all those stakeholders together with TxDOT, with all those entities and forming our longterm goals,” Trevino concluded.
Wilson responded about the diverse groups of rural, lake and city residents.
“I’ve been reaching out to the cities and have a relationship with everyone of our mayors and councils,” he said.
Wilson described his achievements to include a transportation plan with CAMPO, commissioners court adopted capital improvement program and land use plan.
“Our courthouse is crumbling. We’ve got all kinds of land where we can’t put offices. All that planning has been implemented since I’ve been here,” Wilson contended.
In other discussions, Trevino broached an alternative meeting times, while Wilson said since 1874 county meetings have been conducted “in daylight hours.”
“We do livestream it and make it available,” Wilson said.
Wilson added that improving communications during the recent floods is a priority in lieu of post event assessments. Trevino said it was tremendous response and utilized state leaders to fill the gaps.
