In an unconventional maneuver, four Planning Commissioners hosted an impromptu press conference Thursday at City Hall, announcing their opposition to voices critical of the CodeNEXT timeline. Commissioners Chito Vela, Greg Anderson, Jeffrey Thompson and Angela De Hoyos Hart all made statements urging the city to proceed as planned on the current draft schedule. The land […]
Joseph Caterine
Posted inWhispers
Environmental Commission commemorates former chair
At its Oct. 18 meeting, the Environmental Commission voted unanimously to approve staff’s recommendation to rename the Slaughter Creek Management Unit as the Mary Gay Maxwell Management Unit, after the former chair of the commission who died last year in a car accident. Kevin Thuesen, environmental conservation program manager at Austin Water Utility, explained that the […]
Posted inWhispers
Commission chair highlights intense development outside urban core
At its Oct. 17 meeting, the Zoning and Platting Commission unanimously approved staff’s recommendation to allow an additional 800,000 square feet of industrial office uses at 7700 W. Parmer Lane. The site is located northwest of the intersection of U.S. Highway 183 and MoPac Expressway, the unofficial boundaries of the urban core. The commission has […]
Posted inLand Development Code
Commission vents about CodeNEXT’s momentum
Somewhere, hiding mysteriously in the drafting timeline of the new land use code, there is a point of no return. The Zoning and Platting Commission, a body that has repeatedly called for the CodeNEXT review process to be slowed down, questioned at its Oct. 17 meeting if it was too late to postpone adoption of […]
Posted inLand Development Code
CodeNEXT density increase could mean parking requirement decrease
The spirit of road rage sometimes goes beyond Austin’s congested highways and injects itself into debates revolving around the city’s transit problems. That angst could be felt at the Oct. 10 Planning Commission meeting, when staff presented how parking requirements would shift under CodeNEXT 2.0. In the Mobility Code Prescription paper published in July 2016, […]
Posted inCourts
Council rejects settlement with apartment complex owner in substandard housing case
The plot thickened in an ongoing affordable housing saga as City Council Thursday denied a settlement in the city of Austin’s lawsuit against Orchard Plaza apartments owner Walter Olenick for substandard housing code violations. Council Member Greg Casar, in whose district the complex is located, said on the dais that it simply was not a […]
Posted inLand Development Code
Commission casts aside CodeNEXT timeline
A code rewrite is by nature a precarious undertaking, where even an informal conversation can trigger a tectonic shift in the entire process. At its Oct. 10 meeting, the Planning Commission played around with the idea of shifting gears to a different timeline for CodeNEXT. “I don’t think this commission should be worried at all […]
Posted inPublic Safety
Travis County sheriff responds to community outcry after ‘sanctuary’ policy reversal
At a town hall meeting on Monday organized by the Commission on Immigrant Affairs, Travis County Sheriff Sally Hernandez faced a crowd of immigrant rights advocates, service providers and undocumented community members, many of whom expressed disbelief at her Sept. 25 decision to back down from her tenacious policy to reduce compliance with federal immigration […]
Posted inLand Development Code
The new ‘old code’ zoning category makes waves at commission
If adopted, CodeNEXT will be a total rewrite of the Land Development Code, but as comprehensive as the revisions will be, remnants of the old code will remain. At their Oct. 3 joint meeting, the land use commissions learned about the proposed zoning category for these vestiges of the current code: Former Title 25, or […]
Posted inLand Development Code
CodeNEXT 2.0 facilitates affordable housing, but where?
The Halloween deadline for CodeNEXT’s third draft recommendations is closing in for the land use commissions, and the sense of urgency that has driven the review process thus far teetered on full-blown panic at Tuesday’s joint meeting. The new land use code’s promises, like enough affordable housing to meet the Strategic Housing Blueprint’s goals, continue […]
Posted inWhispers
Indigenous Peoples’ Day Resolution Revised Last Minute
Today, City Council will be weighing a resolution proposing the city officially celebrate Indigenous Peoples’ Day every year on the second Monday in October. If the resolution passes, Austin will join the cities of Los Angeles, Salt Lake City, and Nashville who also passed similar resolutions this month. The movement to replace Columbus Day, a […]
Posted inAISD
AISD fails to acquire additional voting sites
Travis County has denied a request from the Austin Independent School District Board of Trustees for additional mobile early voting sites during this year’s bond election. In a Sept. 27 memo to County Judge Sarah Eckhardt, County Clerk Dana DeBeauvoir explained that the deadline for additional site requests had passed. On Sept. 8, the county […]