Kimberly Reeves

Travis County has offered an olive branch to western Travis County – downgrading a portion of Hamilton Pool Road from four to two lanes between FM12 and the Blanco County line – but some residents there would like to see even more downsizing.   As Gene Lowenthal of Hamilton Pool Road Scenic Corridor Coalition told […]

Travis County Commissioners took the heat for three hours Tuesday afternoon over Sheriff Greg Hamilton’s decision to give the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency a desk in the county jail. However, following an executive session, Commissioners came to the same legal conclusion as Hamilton: the sheriff has the authority to hire, staff and provide space […]

The news on the federal funding front for Central Texas transportation projects has been grim lately and that stretches to include the annual discretionary funding in the categories of metropolitan mobility projects under the Surface Transportation Program and the Job Access and Reverse Commute/New Freedoms program (JARC/New Freedom).   The metropolitan mobility dollars go to […]

The Residential Design and Compatibility Commission will offer its own set of recommendations when the McMansions Task Force presents potential changes to the ordinance to Council on Feb. 28.   The task force has been working through a lengthy list related to the nuances of the ordinances, including issues raised by the commission.  At this […]

Sen. Kirk Watson (D-Austin) was front and center Tuesday among lawmakers grilling leaders of the Texas Department of Transportation at a joint hearing of the Senate Transportation and Homeland Security Committee and the Senate Finance Committee.   Watson lost patience with the transportation agency late last year, when TxDOT announced it would be necessary to […]

The timeline on the Waller Creek tunnel project is a long one, so long that it’s easy at times to forget this is a coordinated effort among every city department, three jurisdictions, multiple consultants and a tax-increment financing district board that will oversee the collection and use of incremental tax value along the one-mile corridor. […]

City Council approved an interim policy on affordable housing benefits at last night’s meeting, overruling the objections of the Downtown Austin Alliance in favor of creating some type of policy that will end up putting affordable units downtown. The proposal is a hybrid of the Affordable Housing Incentive Task Force and the work of the […]

A split Downtown Commission approved the interim affordable housing incentives that will go to Council today, with some members expressing reservations about whether the proposed $10 per-square-foot fee would discourage downtown development. The Affordable Housing Task Force and the Density Bonus Task Force developed the incentive proposal.   In a freewheeling conversation, members of the […]

Projects continue to move forward along East 11th and 12th street corridors, but with a new recognition about the timelines involved for each party on each project.   That extra attention to time – on everyone’s part – comes from a new tri-party agreement signed by the City, Urban Renewal Agency and Austin Revitalization Authority […]

If Travis County Commissioners didn’t have enough fun with the city’s Water Treatment Plant 4, they now have to deal with Son of Water Treatment Plant 4 – otherwise known as the northern suburbs’ alternative to the city water plant proposal.   Speculation was high during the early stages of WTP4 that one reason the city was […]

Damage from the fuel spill of an underground storage tank was minimized by proactive measures by the city and its contractor earlier this month, but it also raises the question: Would the city have been so lucky if Waller Creek had been full, rather than empty?   That is not just a theoretical question when […]

Assistant District Attorney Gary Cobb has emerged as a viable challenger for Travis County District Attorney in the Democratic primary on March 4, drawing a crowd of more than 100 supporters at a fundraiser last night.   Four prosecutors from outgoing District Attorney Ronnie Earle’s staff are vying to replace him. As of the Dec. […]