When incoming City Manager Spencer Cronk moves to Austin next month, he’ll have some help. City Council members are scheduled to vote next week on a compensation package for Cronk, who comes to Austin from Minneapolis and starts on Feb. 12. When Council members announced their pick for the city’s highest executive position, Mayor Steve […]
Audrey McGlinchy, KUT
Posted inWhispers
First campaign filings show Adler coming out strong in re-election fundraising
Campaign finance reports reveal that Austin Mayor Steve Adler is the only member of the City Council who has begun seriously fundraising for re-election. Adler raised more than a quarter of a million dollars in just two months of campaigning. According to a report filed Wednesday with the Office of the City Clerk, he fundraised […]
Posted inPolice
APD makes final push to get body cameras on all patrol officers
By March, all Austin patrol officers will be wearing body cameras, according to estimates by the Austin Police Department. Currently, 658 body cameras are in use; another 200 will be added. “After that, we’ll be looking to (give them to other) units throughout the department,” said Cmdr. Brent Dupre, who heads the department’s technology unit. […]
Posted inAustin
This nonprofit will train you to run for City Council. And also make you compete to do so.
At 5 p.m. on a Friday at Native, a new bar and hostel in East Austin, half a dozen people occupied the blue velvet booths and dance-punk music blares overhead. Leigh Salinas, 31, walked in carrying a duffel bag. She was there to spend the weekend studying – sort of. “I was certainly impacted by […]
Posted inElections
Former Council Member Laura Morrison to run against Adler for mayor
Austin Mayor Steve Adler has his first official challenger in the race for mayor in November. Former City Council Member Laura Morrison announced in an email Monday that she will run against Adler for the city’s top elected position. “I’m running for mayor to reset that path that Austin is on, so that our future […]
Posted inCity Council
In unanimous vote, Council rejects police contract, sends back to negotiations
City Council members voted unanimously to send a five-year contract between the city and the local police union back to the negotiating table late Wednesday. The contract, which dictates pay, discipline and oversight of Austin Police Department officers, is negotiated once every several years. The city and the Austin Police Association began negotiations back in […]
Posted inZoning
How a 91-year-old Supreme Court case from Ohio echoes in Austin’s zoning plan
Austin Mayor Steve Adler sat in front of nearly 200 people gathered at the Covenant Presbyterian Church in early November. He’d been invited by the Allandale Neighborhood Association in Northwest Austin to answer questions about CodeNEXT, the city’s rewrite of its Land Development Code. Adler began by hyping the city. “(Austin) is a, uh, a […]
Posted inHousing
In this new neighborhood, none of the homeowners own the land
Laura Soto, 38, sands several planks of wood that will serve as the trim for the outside of her new home. A few feet from her lies a plank of wood labeled “front porch,” another labeled “door.” On a break from working, Soto talks color palette. “The trim will be the rich white, the outside […]
Posted inCity Council
Council reveals six finalists for city manager position
After getting heat for keeping candidates’ identities secret and evading reporters, City Council has released the names of six finalists for the city manager position. Mayor Steve Adler published the names and biographies to the Council Online Message Board Monday afternoon. The city has spent more than a year searching for a city manager, Austin’s […]
Posted inTransit
New to Austin’s public transit system? A Cap Metro employee will ride the bus with you
Priscilla Jove, 19, sat cross-legged on a bench at a bus stop on the corner of West Oltorf Street and South Lamar Boulevard Saturday afternoon. A biology student at Austin Community College, Jove was headed out to study. She said she rides the bus because she’s not just curious about the human body – but […]
Posted inTexas State Legislature
How three former federal immigration officials view Texas’ ‘sanctuary cities’ ban
The next chapter in the fight over Texas’ immigration enforcement law begins Tuesday, as attorneys on both sides of the case over Senate Bill 4, the so-called “sanctuary cities” law, head back to federal court. Judges for the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans will consider a temporary block placed on most […]
Posted inAustin
Austin’s new Central Library opens Saturday. Will people use it?
Taylor Barnett, 24, hasn’t had a public library card since the 1990s, when she was a kid growing up in Victoria, Texas. She would frequent the local library with her grandparents, especially after they bought a computer with little idea of how to use it. “The library had computer classes,” said Barnett. “My grandmother really […]