Near Richland Chambers, Navarro County zones land it otherwise wouldn't

Richland Chambers is one of the biggest reservoirs in Texas, and the rules around its shoreline are the exception to the usual Texas truth that unincorporated land has no zoning. Navarro County adopted a Richland Chambers Lakeshore Area Zoning Ordinance, first in 2017 and amended since, that reaches 5,000 feet back from the water. Inside that band, a tract that looks like ordinary rural acreage actually sits under county zoning.

The practical bite is the building permit. Within that 5,000-foot jurisdiction the county runs a residential building permit process, and the ordinance ties your address to it: you get a permanent-residence address through the permit, not automatically. Permits in the zone are priced by the building's size, about fifty cents a square foot, rather than the flat fee that applies to development further from the lake.

So if you're eyeing a lot near the water, the first call is to Navarro County Planning and Development at 601 North 13th Street, Suite 1 in Corsicana, (903) 875-3311. Ask whether the tract falls inside the 5,000-foot line and walk through the permit, address, septic, and floodplain steps before you buy, because those answers change what you can build and how fast.