Equity Action to continue push for community needs not met in new city budget

Late changes to Austin’s next budget, which was adopted on Wednesday by City Council, include a mix of items from the Community Investment Budget.

A coalition of community groups led by Equity Action months ago released a proposal for what they called “long overdue investments in public safety.” Equity Action’s members criticized city management‘s budget priorities, including a preference for increasing the cash reserves over addressing more needs of residents.

The group put forth a $74.3 million list of proposed expenditures in the Community Investment Budget, including:

• $15 million for rental assistance, weather sheltering and eviction protection;
• $16 million to increase Austin-Travis County Emergency Medical Services staff pay and fill roughly 100 vacancies; and
• $19 million to enact a $22-per-hour minimum wage for city workers.

Their effort faced a challenge in the proposed increase of city reserves from 14 percent of the total budget to 17 percent, which is seen as a prudent financial move for large cities nationwide.

An initial analysis by Equity Action after the budget’s Wednesday passage found 12 requests were funded, four were partially funded and a handful were put on hold for a mid-year review. Items cut entirely included $7.1 million for inclement weather response, $5.9 million for workforce development, $1 million for increased e-book availability from libraries and $1 million for park reforestation.

Kathy Mitchell, a senior adviser for Equity Action, said city management’s strategy of offering a “smaller pie” after increasing the budget reserves created a false choice for Council members trying to include some or all of the group’s requests.

“The last time that reserves were increased, not nearly this much, there was a public discussion about the trade-offs between spending now to address urgent resident service needs and saving, and that never happened this time,” Mitchell said. “At no point was there an open and vigorous debate about the trade-offs, which we believe were very significant. All of our Council members made a legitimate effort to incorporate as much as they could.

“The only problem was that we did not actually have to accept a smaller pie. And as a result of those negotiations, basically what we got was a promise that in six months, if there’s money, maybe some things will be added.”

Council Member Natasha Harper-Madison offered comments before the vote praising the inclusion of long-requested funding for the George Washington Carver Museum and Cultural Center, among other needs. She also expressed frustration at local and state efforts to undercut resources for needs in District 1 and elsewhere.

“This budget does not reflect each of my priorities. It does not encompass all of the needs and wants of my neighborhoods or the 90,000-plus people that I represent in District 1,” she said. “(This budget) does good at a time and in a state that it seems like those with more power are limiting our ability to do good. The budget does not end today. We have to go out and implement and prove to the doubters and deniers that these funds are well-spent and impactful.”

Daniela Silva, a campaign manager for Equity Action, said the group will spend much of the next six months communicating with city staff and Council members to push for money to come out of reserves and be spent on the requests that were put on hold for later review.

“We are going to continue to keep an eye on this process, and we’re going to hold the entire Council and (the) city manager accountable to this mid-year process, making sure these items can be included,” she said. “When we’re talking about preparing for emergencies, I suppose putting money into reserves is one way to do it, but so is making sure that people aren’t so heavily impacted by crises so that they don’t have the needs that reserves will pay for. It’s coming up with a preventative measure rather than a curative one.”

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