Mark Richardson

It will not be your father’s public library.   Council members got their first look Thursday at the preliminary design for the new $120 million Central Library, which is scheduled to open sometime in 2015.   In a report from the project’s developers, several things were apparent: the 200,000 square foot facility will have a […]

Council members will vote next week on starting the process of placing several proposed city charter amendments on the November 2012 ballot that would ultimately transform the Council into geographic districts.    Mayor Lee Leffingwell, Mayor Pro Tem Mike Martinez and Council Member Bill Spelman are sponsoring the item that would instruct the City Manager […]

War chests are brimming with cash in the only truly contested race for the Austin City Council election on May 14. According to campaign finance reports, Place 3 incumbent Randi Shade is sitting on a $106,000 nest egg while challenger Kathie Tovo has more the $70,000 going into the last month of the campaign.   […]

Workers testing core samples for areas at or near the Water Treatment Plant 4 construction site discovered voids in limestone rock formations, two in an area of the main plant site on Bullick Hollow Road that will house the upflow clarifier and another along the planned route for the Jollyville transmission main.   City staff […]

This weekend’s news reports about comments made by Council Member Randi Shade in an email concerning environmentalist Robin Rather seemed to appear without the context in which they were made. While taken alone, Shade’s email seems to be an unprovoked attack, but in context, it is clear she was defending her friend and colleague Mayor […]

Urban watersheds in Austin are in crisis and the city will need to spend more than $1.2 billion over the next four decades to resolve the problems, according to a recent report by the city’s Watershed Protection Department.   The banks and streams of many of the city’s creeks and waterways are deteriorating, according to […]

A report out this week on the cost to taxpayers for processing plastic bags, requested by the Council last year, is likely to rekindle the debate over whether the city should ban single-use plastic bags   According to Bob Gedert, director of the Solid Waste Services Department, the city is currently paying about $850,000 a […]

All three Austin City Council members whose terms expire next spring have indicated that they plan to run to keep their seats.  Even through Council Members Chris Riley, Randi Shade and Laura Morrison can’t officially file to run for office until February, none are wasting any time naming a campaign manager after Monday’s legal starting […]

Perwez Moheet, the former deputy director of the Austin Water Utility, has been named Director of Finance for the City of Kyle. Moheet served in a variety of positions at the City of Austin for 30 years before retiring in April 2010.   “We are excited to have someone with the experience of Perwez join […]

Democratic office-holders are fairly rare in Williamson County, and it will apparently stay that way, as Republican challenger Larry Gonzales easily chased one-term incumbent Democrat Diana Maldonado from the District 52 seat in the Texas House of Representatives.   In what had been a tough campaign, with both sides running attack ads against the other, […]

(Editor’s Note: This report was changed to include information from a second finance report filed by the Get Austin Moving PAC on Oct. 25, which was inadvertently left out of the earlier version of the story.)   Proponents of the $90 million City of Austin Transportation Bond package have collected just over $102,000 for the […]

Recycling services could become available to almost every family and business in Austin over the next four years if the City Council approves all or most of the changes proposed to the city’s current multifamily/business recycling ordinance.   The Solid Waste Services Department staff and the Solid Waste Advisory Commission worked through their differences over […]