Travis County approves ambitious ‘Marshall Plan’ for northeast planning district

According to Travis County commissioners and staff, eastern Travis County has long been blighted. Lack of investment and economic opportunities along with displacement and systemic racism have left the area systemically impoverished.

In 2024, after years of dilapidation in the area, Travis County and the city of Austin have set their sights on changing – if not transforming – the lives of residents of this swath of the county.

On March 19, the Travis County Commissioners Court approved an interlocal agreement (ILA) with the city of Austin to plan, prepare and implement a “Marshall Plan” – an ambitious program which, according to the Travis County Office of Economic Development & Strategic Investments (EDSI), “identifies quality public investments and funding mechanisms to support communities in East Travis County that have faced displacement and systemic racism that has left people of color falling further behind economically; made them more likely to be in a generational cycle of poverty; and less resilient to natural disasters, weather events, and national or personal economic or health crises.”

The city of Austin’s district plan addresses these concerns, setting out “to review past and present inequities as well as disinvestments in services and infrastructure within the district, address them, and provide guidance for retaining existing residents and businesses, creating and maintaining great neighborhoods, spurring economic development, creating and retaining stable jobs that pay a living wage, improving connectivity, providing high-quality public spaces, and meeting community needs.” Commissioners, staff and community members supported – often gravely – the call for intervention.

John Lawler, a representative of Austin Council Member Natasha Harper-Madison, was emphatic about the district’s derelict condition. “If you take a bus out there, you have to sit an hour at the bus stop before the bus comes to get you,” he said.

“When there were pocket parks that should have been there in 1975 when a lot of that property was taken by eminent domain, they don’t exist,” he said. “On the other side of Johnny Morris Road, there are a lot of properties, even commercial properties, that are on septic that don’t have a water/wastewater infrastructure.”

Later, Lawler emphasized Harper-Madison’s enthusiasm for the project, remarking on a letter of support from state Sen. Sarah Eckhardt and recalling state Rep. Sheryl Cole’s appearance at Austin City Council to cheer on their ILA.

Finally, after a string of acknowledgement and praise for involved staff, the Commissioners Court passed the motion unanimously.

The plan for eastern Travis County will proceed in two phases. First, the entities will conduct “foundational collaborative work” – including demarcation of a service area (neither the county nor the city has actually defined the boundaries of the impoverished districts they reference), surveys of existing conditions and activities, and creation of community advisory committees.

“That foundational work, the phase one of the scope, is really to identify everything that exists, everything that’s been done previously, everything that is planned to be done and how is it going to be paid for,” said Christy Moffett, director of economic development and strategic investments. “And so it’s not stopping anybody from doing anything. It’s just the first things we’re doing is basically a catalog of all the investments.”

In the second phase, “co-creating a plan,” the jurisdictions will work “jointly on finalizing a geographic area, summarizing existing conditions, current plans, assets, and activities in the area, and creating a community advisory committee and collaborative engagement plan.”

“Once these tasks are complete,” states the project’s scope-of-work plan, “their discrete deliverables informed by community engagement will create a plan for the Northeast Area District to guide the vision, projects, prioritization, and investment for the next 20 years and beyond.”

Per the ILA, the two phases of the plan will stretch over approximately 18 months, though this figure may be highly flexible depending on community engagement.

EDSI first proposed the idea of drafting and implementing a plan for eastern Travis County to the Commissioners Court in June 2023, after a coalition of city and county leaders and staff met to discuss the possibility of a community-led improvement plan for the area.

The court, in unanimous support, allocated $250,000 of the Fiscal Year 2024 budget to support their work.

The city and county each directed their staff to prepare interlocal agreements, which would coordinate and ensure synergy between their efforts. The city of Austin approved its ILA on March 7.

At the Commissioners Court meeting Tuesday, city and county staffers and community members were enthralled that the project was approved in full.

“I know my boss, Council Member Harper-Madison – if she could be here this morning, she would be buzzing in her seat over this,” Lawler said.

“I sit here not only representing ATX, but also some other stakeholders such as Colony Park Neighborhood Association, the Colony Park CDC, Lakeside CDC, Austin Revitalization Authority and others,” said Ashton Cumberbatch. “And so we very much want to encourage you all to go ahead and pass this resolution. We have long been supporters of the county and the city working together to bring holistic, comprehensive, sustainable development to the northeast quadrant portion of the Eastern Crescent.

“We look forward to working with the folks at this table and others to implement that and to make it a reality. And absolutely have a dream come true in this region.”

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Posted In: Travis County, District 1