Fall 2022 Highland Neighborhood Association meeting

9/13/2022

6-6:15pm Introductions and welcome

6:15pm - Councilmember Chito Vela

CM Vela: 

  • About: Lives in Windsor Park, offices in Highland. Elected February ‘22. High-paced city council, lots of items moving quickly and in depth. 

  • Budget summary: City just passed new budget with booming additional sales tax revenue. Raised city minimum wage to $20. Wanted to raise pay because of vacancies in 911/EMS, water department, fire department, filling potholes, park maintenance, etc. Hoping pay bump will help address vacancy rates. Also $8 million funding for displacement assistance, especially in district 4. Folks renting affordable apartments for a decade, getting kicked out, trouble finding new homes – can become a pipeline to folks being unhoused. City has a “bridge” strategy (hotels); get folks off streets into “bridge” shelters, sign up for assistance, food stamps, Social Security, etc. Hoping that next year to 18-24 months will see a noticeable lessening of folks having to live on the streets. 

  • Encourages folks to contact his office (“the volume of emails is phenomenal,” so please be patient) – info available on city website.

  • Q from HNA President Nick: If there are development issues relevant to D4, or votes coming up that concern our neighborhood specifically, what’s the best way to weigh in with you?

    • A: Email is the best way. Make it clear right away you’re a D4 constituent in Highland. For constituents, go ahead and email CM Vela directly at chito.vela@austintexas.gov. 

  • Q from audience: What’s the best way to find out what is upcoming for our neighborhoods?

  • Audience Q: What do we do if we have concerns about unhoused people near schools, etc?

    • A: City keeps list of camps on priority lists – top priority is where unhoused people are themselves in danger in flood zones, camps near highways, etc. After that, there’s a matrix of factors based on how “problematic” a site is. City HEAL Initiative important part of efforts – trying to keep folks from moving from place to place and instead get people into stable housing. Closing unhoused camps is expensive – police, resource recovery, etc. – and it’s ultimately just moving people around.

  • Audience Q: What is status of fundraising efforts in coalition between city and county?

    • A: city and county got a lot of COVID money re: homelessness, goal was to get to $500m, thinks we’re close to $400m for now. Will buy hotels, apartments, some existing and some new builds. Resources are there. Money was announced 15 months ago, money received 6 months ago, now we’re in procurement and RFP process. Some projects ID’d on last council agenda. Just need a little more patience from folks, things are in motion.

  • Audience Q: Update on RFP for ? from Austin Energy?

    • A: Background: city owns coal power plant east of Bastrop, joint ownership with LCRA. City wants to close, LCRA does not; have been at “loggerheads.” Has to be mutually agreed upon situation. “We’re just kind of stuck in this relationship we can’t get out of.” Issues: in addition to greenhouse gasses, coal pollutes heavy metals into atmosphere, groundwater, etc. CM Vela amendment secured $125k for groundwater study. Now developing RFP for study. Austin Energy is supposed to report back to council in December with RFP, then will publish RFP. Austin and Austin Energy are not going to meet any climate goals with that coal plant open. It’s one of the city, maybe U.S., largest polluters.

  • Audience Q: (from online) How can we expedite affordable housing? Is that a priority?

    • A: We’re about to waive fees for affordable housing, and past CM Greg Casar backed expedited processes/benefits for affordable housing. City has tried to expedite for private developers of affordable housing, we’re struggling with that right now. Development services division is really low on employees. Expediting housing development process “can be a bear” in general. But in particular affordable housing funded with public money, we want to expedite. Example: the St. John’s development at the old Home Depot site. We don’t want that to sit there 8-9 months waiting. 

  • Comment from HNA President Nick: Our neighborhood park permits got rejected in permitting phase. Nutty that city program can get rejected by its own department?

    • A: This is a thorny issue in Austin politics. In Dallas, mayor declared “citywide emergency” because housing permits were taking 90 days. Austin has been over 90 days for the last decade. What other cities would consider crisis is just kind of a Wednesday here in Austin. Even simple stuff like a deck, potentially you might have to get a survey or engineer, impervious cover, lots of things rolled into what 90 percent of other places wouldn’t be considered. Could be out $5k before you buy a 2x4. No one intended it to be like that, but layers of review that are making the process like that. In my opinion that’s driving up the cost of housing in Austin, too. We value environment, prevent flooding, but how to address concerns and simplify development processes? Other places do it better, how do they do it? Streamlining development is an issue we are definitely taking a look at. Not worried about big developments, but duplexes, smaller developments. 

  • Audience Q: Mental health seems to be cause of homelessness, what percentage of that is going to treatment?

    • A: Good Q. That’s one of the reasons the housing we’re purchasing, and dealing with homelessness, is expensive. Can’t just buy housing and expect it to go well. It’s providing wraparound services, identifying treatment needs, get folks on social security or disability. Folks who are unhoused may already have income, but it’s not enough for housing, have to decide between food and rent. Unhoused folks working, even if part time or sporadic, but nothing putting together enough for housing. Hard to come up with $2500 for rent and deposit just to secure a place. A substantial amount of money dedicated to housing is really dedicated to the services that will make that person successful.

  • Audience Q: What’s going on with the St. John’s housing development?

    • A: Goal is to have ~580 housing units, 15k ft retail, park from St. John’s to property line. Developer says we need one parking space per unit. Can we do ground floor retail and apts above? Or structured parking? Underground parking? Anything that isn’t a sea of a parking lot is expensive, it’s less affordable housing. No decision has been made; we’re in the design process. Parking is a concern and we’re conscious of it. Lots is gonna be really affordable housing.

    • Comment from HNA President Nick: Seems like parking along the frontage road is asking for trouble. Closer to downtown, apartments don’t have parking like that.

    • A: Absolutely prefer that. Parking on top of tower, that kind of thing. Is city going to put money to project? Then we’ll have less affordable housing – the developer is doing this if it works out financially for them. So then do we delay project? Get $20 million together? Then we’re talking about 2032 before build. It’s been delayed so long already. People want to see action. Feels like don’t want to see the perfect be the enemy of the good – parks are going to be really nice.

    • Comment from HNA VP Josue: Transit access also really important. That plan doesn’t cater to people who live there, who need services. Great that there are amenities, and walking from sidewalk to retail is a no-go. Feels like it’s serving 35 traffic and not neighborhood walkers/transit users.

    • A: Retail works on the frontage road. The site is designed around the freeway and around what works there, unfortunately, that’s a traditional auto-dependent development. Not my preference. I like building at street providing shade, 

  • Audience Q: What about new development in Windsor Park? Did that get approved?

    • A: Windsor Park opted into VMU (vertical mixed use). Project developer proposed was a sub-par VMU project, hints of VMU but not really. Neighborhood wanted something like The Triangle, not going to get that, no access through the property. Did get approved. In Phase 1 right now, gonna continue to push for better/higher quality development. Working on ordinance to tighten VMU requirements so this doesn’t happen again. 

  • CM Vela as he’s leaving – needs to email HNA President Nick about Motel 6 legal issues.

7:05 pm Neighborhood business 

  • Nick: We’re building a new park at St. John’s and Northcrest. Finally got a contractor, will vote in October, and will break ground in December. Construction for about a year.

    • Audience Q: Saw discussion about landscaping on north side of St. John’s? Any Update?

    • Nick A: Not really. But Kate Garza HNA VP got $150k grant to build bridge over creek there, will look like bridge over Skyview creek to increase accessibility. 

  • Nick: TA Brown president got $180k grant to put in new exercise equipment, etc. at TA Brown park. Construction starting in next three weeks.

  • Nick: We have $3300 in our bank account. In December we have annual elections and as of now, treasurer is leaving. Position is open. Nick will not be seeking reelection as HNA president. If folks want to get involved, it’s good stuff. Got porkchop reviews, parks built, stray dogs dealt with. It’s not a heavy lift. Some organizational stuff. Great way to be more involved with the city. Become more political, but also CMs come to meetings now with geographic representation. Highland and Windsor Park have highest voting rates in D4 – we are a source of votes for council. We don’t have political power per se, but we have a contact team that can weigh in on issues related to neighborhood. Come to next meeting and look out for newsletter on how to join the board/etc. 

  • Q from audience: How can we access track at Webb?

    • Nick: Brentwood Elementary was temporarily located there, so they had to limit access. Webb’s been kind of weird. I think it’s getting better. Used to be crowds, street parties, shootings. Webb hasn’t been part of convos with APD, group meetings with neighbors. 

  • Q from audience: Wasn’t there a plan to build a trail from Skyview to the Brewtorium? Buy an abandoned house to build a path through?

    • A from Skyview rep in attendance: They tried to approach me first. There were no abandoned houses. They wanted a path? A park? Unclear what the plan was. If developer donates land to parks department, could buy house and donate land to parks, that becomes whatever they want it to be. North Loop NA seemed to think the park/path was on the way. But no one wants to sell, we’re concerned about more traffic through there. They’re going to build apartments in the big empty field across from Brewtorium. 200 units, some retail. Want access to Redline, will connect to gas company redevelopment in North Loop. Has concerns about impervious cover, lots of parking lots etc., draining toward neighborhood.

  • Q from audience: What’s happening with beautification up and down Airport, to Koenig?

    • Nick: It’s starting tomorrow! Going to put in a new red light, pedestrian walkway, etc.

7:30 p.m – Celia Israel, mayoral candidate
Nick intro: We invited other candidates, did not respond or had conflicts but welcome Celia

  • Celia Israel: Opportunity to say hello. Currently member of state legislature, rep for district 50. Had to decide to reelection to House or lean into city that I think needs a kick in the pants. What are y’all here to hear about?

    • Nick: We’re interested in talking about parks and development and transportation safety. 

  • CI: Originally from El Paso, working class family, came here in 1982. Been with wife Celinda for 27 years. Learned from Gov. Ann Richards. Served in state house for 9 years. I’ve fought for immigrants, women’s bodily autonomy, voting rights, transportation safety. Big transit advocate. Dad was truck driver, mom never got her license. Always that bothersome rep asking the transit questions of TxDOT. That’s the challenge of our future. We’re 11th largest city in country but transpo system is not catching up to that. I’ve passed legislation about pedestrian safety, bike safety. Proposed taking speed limits down. Housing and the affordability and density issues. Go to CeliaForAustin.com I have a bold plan, we didn’t just throw pasta to wall and see what stuck. Talked to lots of different kinds of people. For me, example of Justin Lane at Lamar, Austin Energy has been using that as a storage facility for big hunks of metal, Crestview NA pointed out big empty lot. That’s a sin. This city hasn’t built up enough kinds of housing – market rate or deeply affordable. I want to look at my time as mayor, every city is struggling with this issue, I want us to be proud of this. There are bus drivers and city workers there. City is pushing them out instead of inviting them out. To take 12 years on an empty piece of land we own, is such a missed opportunity. We have 6k parcels, they’ve analyzed and reanalyzed. 

  • CI: Never thought I’d be running for mayor of Austin, girl from El Paso. It was the promise of Austin, go to UT, promise of Austin gave me courage myself to say I’ll run for office. Gave me courage to speak up for trans kids on House floor. We have a great opportunity to say Austin did some really cool things with what was a school, what was a storage facility, be mindful of neighborhood dynamics.

  • CI: I’m asking for your vote, your energy, your ideas.

Audience Q’s

  • Josue HNA VP Q: How can we have better connection in communities? Walkability is such a huge component, how can we better develop 

    • You can elect a mayor who happens to be a realtor, advocate for bike safety, grew up on the bus. I understand you. This has to be a part of our future. I’m 58 years old, I’m not leaving the state position I love to do more studies. I love walkability. I understand what that means on that 100 degree day, to say, I can walk to the 7/11. Big advocate for rethinking I35. It should be a connector – I like CM Vela because he was smart enough to endorse Celia Israel, he’s a smart and good-looking man (laughs). Chair of “small troublemaker advocacy group” that got city to partner with CapMetro to put in rail. 

  • Nick HNA President Q: The mayor role is different in Austin than other cities, is there a movement to change that? Would you support that? As far as being mayor now, what do you think isn’t being done now that could be done within the confines of how the role is defined?

    • CI: I’m a different kind of cat than Steve Adler, respect him a lot. Things work different in the Lege – with enough votes, things go through. Not the case with council. There’s delay, delay, delay. Coming from a place of urgency. I have more urgency to what I’m doing, wouldn’t wait for a “supermajority,” if we do it wrong, we won’t do it again, we’ll learn from our mistakes. Strong mayor thing failed miserably. Who doesn’t want to be queen of Austin? Don’t get to be queen, work with 10 members of council. Not time for another strong mayor referendum. But culture in Austin is about engagement, exchange. Every week in Israel Admin is housing and affordability week. There will be a standing item on city council work session is that agenda. Mayor can control that. Always be an affordability item on that agenda. I’m much more comfortable in jeans and boots.

  • Q from HNA Secretary Andrea: What’s your view on combative city-state relationships, how would you navigate?

    • I hope we have new state leadership to work with. Lege is broken. We told trans kids they couldn’t play basketball, made it harder to vote. If for some reason that doesn’t happen, my job is to respect office, will stand firm from time to time. Not engaging on twitter, doesn’t do anything for city budget, mobility, housing. Something to be said for saying I want to call CoS, that cuts through Kabuki theater to say, what are we going to do about this. I’m pretty pragmatic about those things. But I won’t back down from a fight that is ridiculous. You won’t see me punching and poking the bear all the time on Twitter. Had a president who did that, didn’t work out too well.

7:50pm Adjourned!