Millennium Youth complex among first sites considered for creative space bond funds

The Millennium Youth Entertainment Complex may be one of the first two sites to receive some of the city’s $12 million in bond funding for creative space preservation.

On Thursday, City Council will vote on a request from the Austin Economic Development Corporation authorizing $2.4 million from the bond funds to be spent on the two projects. Millennium will receive $400,000 to make upgrades to the facility to support film and cinematic uses as well as general use by creative organizations, with more funding for improvements coming from the Parks and Recreation Department budget.

The other $2 million will be used to renovate more than 7,000 square feet of space in the city’s Permitting and Development Center on Highland Mall Boulevard and Middle Fiskville Road. The money will provide display and work space for the visual and performing arts, with a variety of shared work spaces and an art gallery, daytime cafe and general catering area.

Those two sites on city property have moved forward the most quickly from the 14 that the EDC selected from the 45 proposals submitted and evaluated during the past year. More deals are expected to come before Council for approval early next year.

Theresa Alvarez, CEO of the EDC, said the proposal and evaluation process, which included study of 16 possible future projects beyond the 45 official applicants, revealed the need of more than $300 million to meet the needs of the city’s creative and music communities. Artists and organizations are under increasing cost-of-living pressure in Austin as the city continues to grow, with City Council and other leaders hoping to use the lessons learned from the 2018 bond funding in the creation of another bond proposal in 2024.

Alvarez said the EDC, which was created to move more quickly than city departments to complete real estate deals, will likely seek a waiver on future bond-funded projects that would remove the need for Council approval and allow the group to complete its Council-directed business transactions more quickly.

Part of the reason for the slow pace of the first deals links back to the persistent concern the city’s legal department has had over how broadly the state will allow the bond funding to be used. Those questions were prominent in 2018 as arts stakeholders were deciding how much money to request from voters, with city attorneys advising caution over what proponents could say regarding what kind of construction or purchasing deals would receive the money.

“I talked about the urgency and the need that we have to address the loss of cultural organizations that are falling behind and not able to pay their rent or stay in Austin since organizations are leaving,” she said. “One process improvement would be giving delegative authority to our board … which would allow things to move with a much quicker process.”

Council Member Vanessa Fuentes praised the EDC for the first two projects that will help young and established artists around the city, and showed her support for granting the group more autonomy in carrying out its work.

“The intention in creating (the EDC) was that it could move more nimbly and much quicker than the city of Austin’s process. I would be in support if you all would bring forward a proposal that seeks a waiver for cultural trust projects,” she said.

Council Member Ann Kitchen, who has been one of the most vocal supporters of the cultural trust concept, said the slow pace of deal-making for the creative space bond money is unacceptable at a time when artists and musicians are increasingly being displaced.

“We’ve learned a lot about the bond process and I’m hopeful a bond will be crafted in 2024 that will expand on creative spaces since the last one was very small. Taking four years to spend $12 million during a time when our cultural facilities are losing their creative spaces is not going to work,” she said. “One reason we created the EDC was to move more quickly than we can as a city. We hold them accountable through our contract with them so the Council is still responsible and holds the authority on the use of dollars, but the actual implementation needs to move more quickly.”

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