District 10 City Council Member Sheri Gallo was sworn in Tuesday evening, along with the rest of Austin’s new 10-1 Council. Gallo, a longtime resident of the area, boasts a 35-year background in residential real estate and a legacy of civic engagement through her involvement with the Settlement Club, the Housing Authority of Austin and […]
Beth Cortez-Neavel
Beth Cortez-Neavel is a contributing reporter covering Travis County for the Austin Monitor. Beth works in words, data, photography and radio. She's a long-time Austinite living in the District 1 area.
Posted inCity Council, Local Politics, Public Health
Council approves 2016 social services contracts
The Austin City Council approved the next round of the city’s social services contracts Thursday, apportioning far less money than most agencies said they needed to serve their clients. For Fiscal Year 2016, the city received requests for more than $30 million but was only able to fund about $16 million. The process for determining […]
Posted inCity Council, Public Safety
Coyote management plan passes despite concerns
The Austin City Council approved the contentious city coyote management plan Thursday evening, to a loud round of applause and a few woofs of approval from community members sitting in the audience. “This may not be the last word on coyotes, but it does portend a very good effort on the part of many in […]
Posted inWhispers
Council gets social services proposal
City staff members brought the controversial social services final contract proposal to the full City Council on Thursday. The proposal would allocate $16,065,227 to 40 different programs for the 2016 fiscal year. Some organizations continue to protest that the funds are not enough. The proposal would require the city to shift an additional $2,250,000 toward the […]
Posted inAustin, Local Politics, Public Health
Groups call city social service contracts inadequate
Organizations that provide crucial community needs will walk away from Austin’s newly altered competitive process for assigning next year’s social services contracts without the funding they want, members of the City Council Public Health and Human Services Committee said Friday. Members Laura Morrison, Mike Martinez and Chris Riley unanimously approved the final draft of contracts […]
Posted inPublic Safety
Council to finally get controversial coyote plan
A new coyote management policy will be brought to the Austin City Council in November, following a nine-month-long and somewhat controversial process. The policy was most recently before City Council’s Public Health and Human Services Committee on Tuesday. In 2013, some Austin residents who were worried about coyote sightings in the Blunn Creek watershed complained […]
Posted inWhispers
No resolution on 2016 contracts
The new competitive social services contracts funding process through the city’s Health and Human Services Department is still proving contentious. (See Austin Monitor, Sept. 17.) There is a little over $16 million budgeted for the 2016 fiscal year to provide for what was originally $30 million in funding requests from various organizations, including Meals on Wheels, […]
Posted inLocal Government
Central Health OKs teaching hospital agreements
Despite public requests to postpone the vote, Central Health’s Board of Managers approved two crucial lease agreements for the new teaching hospital Wednesday night. Under the agreements, Seton Family Healthcare will pay $877,621 a year to the University of Texas for the land to build the Seton Medical Center teaching hospital. The hospital will be replacing […]
Posted inPublic Safety, Resources
Travis County battles shortage of foster homes
There is a severe lack of homes for children and youth in Travis County’s foster care system, according to the judges and officials who administer the system. They say the situation has become critical, to the point that children are often moved out of their home community and placed in homes that are many miles […]
Posted inLocal Politics
Search our advisory boards appointee database
The City of Austin has a plethora of advisory groups that each inform some aspect of how city government operates and regulates the services it provides for the community. There are more than 60 advisory boards, committees and commissions, including some that regulate water and wastewater, determine historical landmarks, monitor and support equality and quality […]
Posted inResources
Central Health’s 2015 budget up 8.8 percent
If you think your health care bill is big and confusing, check out the one at Central Health. The Travis County’s health care district brought its Fiscal Year 2015 budget to the Commissioner’s Court Tuesday with an 8.8 percent increase over last year’s budget. The main culprits for the larger amounts are construction of the […]
Posted inWhispers
County may act on Timber Creek buyout plan
Travis County Commissioners will consider action today on an agreement that would bring funding to the county for continued buyouts of flood prone homes in the Timber Creek neighborhood. County voters approved a $3.9 million bond to act as a county match for a $10 million federal buyout program in 2005. The U.S. Army Corps […]