Ryan Alter looks back on accomplishments of 2024

District 5 Council Member Ryan Alter is proud of City Council’s many accomplishments in 2024, starting with what is obviously one of his favorite topics: housing.

“I think first and foremost, we as a Council made some really important strides when it comes to affordability, especially around housing. A key priority of mine has always been making life in Austin more affordable not only for the residents of District 5 but for everyone who lives here and wants to live here,” he told the Austin Monitor.

Alter noted some of the major housing initiatives, such as HOME and HOME 2, that Council passed are already having an impact and will continue to do so. As evidence, he pointed to the widely publicized drop in Austin rents. That is not true in Dallas and Houston, he said.

Alter believes that homeowners will benefit also as more houses are built because taxes will be spread out among more homeowners. A recent survey shows that Austin homeowners, on average, currently spend about 46 percent of their monthly income on homeownership. That amount includes mortgage payments and taxes.

“Some of the housing reforms we made are at no cost to taxpayers,” he said, adding, “if you can build your tax base to a greater degree, that actually lowers the cost to taxpayers.” Alter said he would like to find a way for the city to help homebuyers. Access to capital is a challenge he wants to look at in the future, noting that “a lot of renters don’t have $100,000 to put down” on a house. He said Council members Vanessa Fuentes and José Velásquez are looking into that problem. He suggested that the city might also try to find ways to help prospective homebuyers who have the money for a down payment but not a high enough credit score to get a loan.

But the cost of living is not just about housing. He noted the high cost of child care. As the father of three young children, he’s particularly cognizant of how much day care costs a family. He said he could send one of his children to the University of Texas for what they are paying for child care. Alter is pleased that Travis County voters approved a tax increase in order to help people pay for child care.

“That is going to have a meaningful impact for families like my own,” he said. “So clearly there are needs in our community to make Austin more livable and this is a big one.”

Alter said Austin does not have enough family-friendly amenities, referring particularly to parks and playgrounds. Although his own family lives within a five-minute drive from Garrison Park, he said, there is no park within walking distance where he can take his kids. Districts 3 and 4 have even fewer playground and park amenities, he said.

Alter said he would like to see the city work with other entities, such as the YMCA and the Thinkery, to provide more playgrounds accessible to children.

“If you’re a family here in Austin with multiple kids and you don’t have a lot of money,” it’s difficult to afford a commercial play space such as one in Round Rock, which can easily cost a family $100 a visit, Alter said. Instead of going there, Alter said he took his kids to Veterans Memorial Pool in Cedar Park, which has a splash pad within a pool and costs just a few dollars.

Alter noted that Council took major steps to move forward with Austin Energy’s Resource, Generation and Climate Protection Plan to 2035. He insisted that the utility come back to Council before moving forward with any new generation that would increase the utility’s carbon emissions.

Austin Water is also a major concern for Alter, as well as taking care of trees and the environment generally. It was Alter’s idea to add a $50 million fund in the city budget for acquisition of more parkland. He said he expects a lot of that funding could be spent next spring as the city starts to allocate the funds for new land.

That was one of the big wins he noted, along with increased funding for the city’s NeighborWoods tree-planting program and adding more than $1 million to the Parks and Recreation Department’s plan to plant more trees.

Alter said the increased tree funding was “one of the big wins this year,” predicting that TreeFolks would be planting thousands of trees this year as a result of the budget amendments.

The District 5 representative also sponsored a resolution aimed at preserving smaller trees through an incentive program. The item directed staff to reduce development fees under HOME 1 for developers who preserve trees with diameters of less than 19 inches. Such trees are not automatically protected under city code. HOME 1 allows the construction of up to three residential units on one lot.

“More than anything, it recognizes the value of those trees, but it also makes developers think differently about trees, so it allows for a more thoughtful approach to development,” he concluded.

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Posted In: City Council, District 5