Do you have anything to say? The Chronicle welcomes opinion pieces on any topic in the community. Submit yours now to austinchronicle.com/opinion. The City Council Candidate Forums, co-sponsored by the city, the Ethics Review Board and the League of Local Women Voters, will continue tonight at the South Austin Senior Center, 3911 Menchaca Rd., with District 5 at 6 p.m. and District 8 at 7:30 p.m. Watch in person, online, on TV or radio, or by phone; For more information, see austintexas.gov/candidateforums. Last Wednesday, 15. In December, council`s Audit and Finance Committee reviewed an application by three major urban planning commissions – planning, zoning and veneer and board of adjustment – to council to approve amendments to the bylaws to hold their open meetings at City Hall, revoking city staff`s plan to move them to the new permitting and development centre behind Highland. After committee members – CM Alison Alter (Chair), Leslie Pool, Mackenzie Kelly and Kathie Tovo, with Mayor Steve Adler absent but sending questions – discussed the issue a bit and agreed on what looked like a consensus: they could not support the specific motion for legislative changes (even City Council sometimes meets outside City Hall), and there is nothing wrong with the CFP being a meeting place. However, it seems illogical and wrong to remove the most visited and often controversial meetings from the city from the seat of government; There also does not seem to be any urgent need for the move (unsaid: except to prioritize the convenience of employees over the public). Sales/Edition: Questions, comments or suggestions? If you would like to post an event, please use these links (please note print times): Music offers | | Community Ads Food Deals | Art. The MCs floated ideas on the type of direction council could give to staff to ensure these meetings continue at City Hall, but after reminding staff to stick to the specific agenda item, they voted unanimously not to make a recommendation, but to convey the issue – not just the amendment of the statutes. but the more general question of the meeting places of the Bureau and the Commission – for the Whole Council, which will be discussed at its first meeting of the new year, on 27 January.
At the Austin City Council meeting last week, council voted unanimously to require commercial real estate to pay park opening fees and to clarify some of the bylaws regarding those fees; Amendments proposed by Council members Natasha Harper-Madison and Chito Vela, which would have limited these fee requirements, were rejected. In other measures, the council refused to pass the Austin Police Oversight Act, but instead put it on the May 2023 ballot and reinstated APD`s automated license plate reading program. Subscriptions: Visit our subscription information page or send your questions to the subscription service The Trash Makeover Challenge is back in person this year: The 12. The Texas Campaign for the Environment`s annual fundraiser features amateur and professional fashionistas who use at least 90% recycled materials for their creations. It`s this Saturday, September 24 from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. at the Texas Disposal Systems Pavilion & Wildlife Ranch in southeast Travis County and broadcast from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Food and drinks, a performance by SaulPaul and a live and online auction that is already taking place live online. For more information, see trashmakeover.com or texasenvironment.org.
Next week`s September 29 meeting has a relatively thin agenda, with the main event being the return of the statesman`s PUD, the massive development agreement to Congress 305 P. ; No signs of compromise yet, with affordable housing (as usual) being the main sticking point. It should also be noted that paragraphs 77 to 78 bring former planning commissioners Fayed Kazi and Conor Kenny back into the council chambers as owners and representatives of a proposal to build “60 housing units and support services for SAFE Alliance, [plus] a separate mixed-use building with 23 apartment buildings and business offices” north of the Mueller development on Lancaster Court. And, of course, citizen communication, when CarolAnne Rose Kennedy will use her three minutes of fame to discuss FEDERAL SHENANIGANS. She has been a regular for at least 15 years now; Maybe she will get a proclamation. Then, on Monday the 20th. In December, the entire board held a special meeting to consider creating a reinvestment area for the South Central Waterfront Reinvestment Area, which is essentially the entire business area between Auditorium Shores and the mouth of Bouldin Creek – primarily including the former Austin American-Statesman property at the South Congress (see “Council Slows Staff`s Roll..”; 10 December). Several of the CMs appeared to have significant concerns about the plan as a whole, but on this basis they reserved the right to amend or reject the proposal at that later date – and with a Tovo amendment adding affordable housing to the list of desirable public services – they voted unanimously (in the absence of Pool and Greg Casar) to create the TIRZ, and prepare employees for this in-depth discussion in the new year. Until then. The last regular City Council meeting in 2021 was held on December 9, but members ended the year last week with a few small meetings on big issues – they took care of two important unfinished tasks by eliminating them for the entire council in January. A note to readers: Bold and uncensored, The Austin Chronicle has been Austin`s independent news source for more than 40 years, expressing the community`s political and environmental concerns and supporting its active cultural scene.
Now more than ever, we need your support to continue to provide Austin with an independent and free press. If you care about the real news, please consider donating $5, $10 or anything else you can afford to keep our journalism on the stands. Opponents call it a $278 million tax donation: it`s the calculated value of taxpayers` money used for infrastructure and amenities in the county, rather than going into the city`s general budget over a period of 20 to 30 years if the plan is approved as proposed. The essence of their argument is that development would take place anyway without the need for these public investments, making this plan a violation of Texas tax law, which reserves this financing mechanism for real estate where “development or redevelopment would not be done solely by private investment in the reasonably foreseeable future” without the TIRZ. This is obviously not the case here, as Bill Bunch pointed out in a lengthy letter to council shortly before the meeting, in which he described the system as “another massive aid to corporate welfare” and urged them to reject it directly, or at least postpone it until it could be scrutinized more closely. which is possible at the moment. Mailing Address The Austin Chronicle 4000 N. IH-35 Austin TX 78751 Then there is Hays County itself. Becerra, Smith and Jones are all running for re-election in November, Becerra as a Democratic reformer, Smith and Jones as leaders of the Republican majority, who mainly oppose this reform. Smith, meanwhile, pleaded guilty to a lesser charge just yesterday in a 2021 DWI crash case on Lake Austin Boulevard, with critics claiming he also falsified the truth, saying “no blood was drawn, no breathalyzers were given, and officers at the crime scene expressed no suspicion of impairment.”. even though he had in fact refused the blood alcohol tests.
after allegedly failing a field cultivation test. And you could link the dots of that to last week`s cover article about San Marcos police officer Ryan Hartman, who escaped DWI charges and returned to his SMPD job after killing Jennifer Miller in a reckless driving accident with a 24-ounce open beer in his console. Or continue to two recent stories about conditions at the Hays County Jail in San Marcos, where Ranulfo Benitez-Morales could lose a leg because he describes it as inadequate medical care, and inmates languish because Hays County courts “are described as among the slowest in the state,” according to Brant Bingamon`s Sept.