Ban the Box in Texas: Austin’s Ordinance and Your Rights

Ban the box in Texas is a patchwork, not a single rule. State agencies cannot ask about your criminal history on an initial job application and must wait until you’re otherwise qualified and have a conditional offer. Federal agencies and federal contractors operate under the same kind of delay. Private employers in Texas, however, are not covered by any statewide ban the box law, and the local ordinances in Austin and DeSoto that attempted to fill that gap were cast into doubt by a 2023 state preemption statute. What follows is how each layer actually works and what you can do when a record is holding up your job search.

State Agency Jobs

Texas Government Code Section 656.152 bars state agencies from putting any criminal history question on an initial employment application. Under Section 656.154, the agency can only ask about or consider your record after it has decided you’re otherwise qualified and has conditionally offered you the position.¹ In practice, your application gets judged on education, work history, and skills first. The record comes up later, if at all.

Private Employers and the Preemption Problem

Texas has no statewide ban the box law for private employers. The Texas Workforce Commission has pointed out that although Austin and other cities passed local fair chance hiring ordinances, Texas Labor Code Section 1.005 effectively nullified them as of September 1, 2023.² That section stops municipalities from adopting employment rules that go beyond state law, which puts the enforceability of local fair chance hiring ordinances against private employers in real doubt.

The 89th Texas Legislature (2025 session) considered bills that would have created statewide fair chance hiring protections for private employers with 15 or more workers, resolving the preemption conflict by making the rule a matter of state law. If you’re applying to a private company, check the current status of that legislation before relying on any specific protection.

This is where most of the confusion about ban the box in Texas comes from. The local ordinances still read as if they’re in force. Whether they can actually be enforced against a private employer is a separate question. The sections below describe the rules as written, with that caveat in mind.

Austin’s Fair Chance Hiring Ordinance

Austin City Code Chapter 4-15 covers private employers with 15 or more employees whose primary work location sits within Austin city limits for at least 20 calendar weeks in the current or preceding year.³ Covered employers cannot ask about or consider your criminal history until after they’ve extended a conditional job offer.

The ordinance exempts a long list of situations:

The United States government and its wholly owned corporations
The State of Texas, state agencies, and political subdivisions
Bona fide private membership clubs exempt from taxation under IRC Section 501(c)
Positions where federal, state, or local law requires a criminal background check, or where insurance or bonding requirements disqualify applicants based on criminal history

Those carve-outs cover a lot of ground in financial services, law enforcement, childcare, and other fields where background checks are legally required before hire.³

An employer who gets written notice of a violation from the City and fails to fix it within 10 business days can face a civil penalty of up to $500 per violation. First-time violators may be offered a warning if they attend a compliance training. Penalties are capped at one per job posting.³

Other Texas Cities

DeSoto

DeSoto’s fair chance hiring ordinance took effect in 2021 and covers businesses with 15 or more employees whose primary work location is in the city. Like Austin’s, it prohibits criminal history questions on the initial application. Nonprofit 501(c) organizations, state agencies, and government bodies other than DeSoto itself are exempt, as are positions where criminal history disqualifies applicants under existing law or where insurance and bonding rules require it.⁴

A first violation draws a written warning. Later violations carry a civil penalty of up to $500 each. An employer who fails to appear at an administrative hearing is treated as having admitted liability.⁴

San Antonio and Travis County

San Antonio adopted a fair chance hiring policy in December 2016, but it applies only to City of San Antonio jobs, not to private employers. Travis County likewise removed criminal history questions from its own initial application screening. Neither reaches private-sector hiring the way Austin’s ordinance attempts to.

Federal Jobs and Contractor Positions in Texas

If you’re applying to a federal agency or a federal contractor position located in Texas, the federal Fair Chance to Compete for Jobs Act of 2019 applies. It bars federal agencies and federal contractors from asking about your criminal history before making a conditional offer.⁵ That matters in Texas, which has substantial military bases, federal offices, and a large government contractor workforce.

If a federal agency violates the Act, you can file a written complaint with the agency’s Office of Inspector General within 30 calendar days of the alleged violation. The OIG investigates and sends its findings to the Office of Personnel Management, which makes the final call. Investigations generally wrap up within 60 calendar days.⁶

EEOC Rules Any Texas Employer Has to Follow

Even where no ban the box law reaches, EEOC enforcement guidance restricts how any employer in Texas can use your record. Under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, blanket policies that automatically reject applicants with criminal records can be unlawful discrimination when they disproportionately affect a protected group and aren’t justified by business necessity.⁷

Instead, the EEOC expects an individualized assessment that weighs:

The nature and gravity of the offense: a decades-old shoplifting charge is not the same as a recent violent felony.
Time elapsed since the offense or completion of the sentence: older convictions with a clean record since weigh less.
The nature of the job sought: a fraud conviction is more relevant for a banking role than a warehouse one.

Employers also have to give you a chance to explain the circumstances before making a final decision. Rehabilitation, employment history since the conviction, and character references all count in your favor.⁷

One point worth knowing: an arrest alone is never enough on its own to deny you a job. An arrest doesn’t establish that you did anything. An employer can look at the underlying conduct, but not treat the arrest itself as proof.⁷

Your Rights When a Background Check Runs

When a Texas employer uses a third-party company to run your background check, the Fair Credit Reporting Act applies no matter what any local ordinance says. Before an employer can reject you based on what the check turns up, it has to give you a pre-adverse action notice that includes a copy of the report and a summary of your FCRA rights.⁸

That notice is your window to dispute errors. Background checks often contain mistakes: records belonging to someone with a similar name, dismissed charges listed as convictions, offenses that should already be sealed. If you spot something wrong, you can dispute it with the consumer reporting agency, which has to go back to the source to verify. If the error is confirmed, the agency updates the report and notifies you and the employer.

After a final adverse decision, the employer must send you an adverse action notice naming the background check company, stating that the company did not make the hiring decision, and telling you about your right to dispute the report and get a free copy within 60 days.⁸ Employers who skip these steps are violating federal law, and you can act on that whether or not any ban the box ordinance covers them.

Clearing Your Record Is the Strongest Fix

The most reliable way to keep an old case from costing you jobs isn’t a ban the box law. It’s getting the record off your background check. Texas offers two routes.

Expunction

An expunction wipes the record out. Once a court grants it, you don’t have to mention the offense on job applications or anywhere else. Expunction is available for arrests that didn’t lead to a conviction, including cases where charges were never filed, were dismissed, or ended in acquittal. You can also expunge deferred adjudication for Class C misdemeanors. Any other conviction is not eligible.

Waiting periods apply before you can file: 180 days from the arrest for Class C misdemeanors, one year for Class A and B, and three years for felonies. If charges were brought, the statute of limitations for every offense from that arrest must have run out, unless you completed a pretrial diversion program.

Orders of Nondisclosure

If expunction isn’t available, a nondisclosure order might be. It doesn’t erase the record, but it seals it from public view. Courts, clerks, law enforcement agencies, and prosecutors are barred from disclosing the sealed records, and you’re legally free to decline to mention the offense on job applications.⁹

Nondisclosure covers a range of situations, including deferred adjudication for nonviolent misdemeanors, certain felonies, some DWI misdemeanors, and convictions for certain misdemeanors after community supervision. Separate provisions exist for veterans who completed a treatment court program and for trafficking victims.

There are limits. Law enforcement and certain state agencies can still see sealed records. You’re ineligible if you’ve ever been convicted of or placed on deferred adjudication for an offense requiring sex offender registration, aggravated kidnapping, murder, or other serious offenses listed in Government Code Section 411.074.⁹ Once a nondisclosure order is granted, the clerk sends it to DPS, which seals the record within 10 business days and notifies the relevant state and federal agencies.

Filing a Fair Chance Hiring Complaint in Austin

If you believe a private employer in Austin violated the Fair Chance Hiring Ordinance, complaints go through the city’s Office of Civil Rights. You have to file within 100 calendar days of the alleged violation.¹⁰ The office posts a downloadable Fair Chance Hiring complaint form on its site.

Pull together your evidence before you file. Keep copies of the job posting, the application form showing the prohibited criminal history question, any emails or screenshots from an online application portal, and the date you submitted. Detailed records are what move complaints forward.

You can reach the Office of Civil Rights at officeofcivilrights@austintexas.gov or 512-974-3251. The mailing address is 505 Barton Springs Road, 5th Floor, Austin, TX 78704.¹⁰ The office investigates and pushes for voluntary compliance. Keep the preemption question in mind: how a complaint actually plays out may depend on how the conflict between Austin’s ordinance and Texas Labor Code Section 1.005 gets resolved.

1
Texas Legislature. 89(R) SB 1628 – Introduced Version – Bill Text
2
Texas Workforce Commission. References and Background Checks
3
Municode Library. Austin Code of Ordinances Chapter 4-15 Fair Chance Hiring
4
City of DeSoto. DeSoto Ordinance Amending Chapter 4 Fair Chance Hiring
5
U.S. Congress. S.387 – Fair Chance Act 116th Congress (2019-2020)
6
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General. The Fair Chance to Compete for Jobs Act
7
U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Enforcement Guidance on the Consideration of Arrest and Conviction Records in Employment Decisions
8
Federal Trade Commission. Using Consumer Reports What Employers Need to Know
9
Texas Courts. An Overview of Orders of Nondisclosure
10
City of Austin. Complaint Forms and General Inquiries