Mark Richardson

Members of the Solid Waste Advisory Commission will meet in a special called session Wednesday night to review and make recommendations on a staff proposal for changes in the city’s Commercial Multifamily Recycling Ordinance. City Council is scheduled to consider major changes in the ordinance at its Nov. 4 meeting.   Both the timing and […]

Short of breaking the speed limit or ripping the tag off of a mattress, there is probably no law in the City of Austin broken more often than the ordinance requiring a fee to haul construction waste. And after more than two decades of study and controversy, the city’s Solid Waste Services Department wants the […]

Despite fervent opposition from neighbors, a “comedy of errors” by city staff and an eyebrow-raising sequence of events, the Environmental Board last week recommended approval of a request for a variance to the city’s Land Development Code for a landowner looking to build a home on Lake Austin.   The variance would allow the building […]

Residents from the Spicewood Springs neighborhood in northwest Austin continue to press their case at every opportunity to try and stop or divert the planned Jollyville Transmission Main project for Water Treatment Plant 4 from coming through their area.   City officials now say they plan to make a final decision on exactly which route […]

Think of it as CSI: Bull Creek.   Officials with the city’s Watershed Protection Department, the agency charged with keeping local creeks and other waterways clean, are still scratching their heads over just what is causing unacceptably high levels of E.coli bacteria growth in parts of Bull Creek Park. So they have ordered genetic testing […]

The Solid Waste Advisory Commission, after several months of study and debate, completed work last week on a recommendation to expand the city’s recycling program to include all commercial and multi-family properties over the next few years.   The commission is seeking to expand the reach of the current ordinance to all of the city’s […]

A number of environmental groups and low-income advocates are asking City Manager Marc Ott for a separate and exclusive meeting this week with the three final candidates announced for the job of general manager of Austin Energy. An opportunity for the public to meet the candidates is scheduled for Wednesday evening.   Ott named the […]

With Council members having officially bypassed the bid process and contemplating ordering staff to begin talks with two companies for the city’s recycling services, some of the players were revving up their public relations efforts Tuesday to try and tilt the playing field in their direction.A pair of competing items on Thursday’s agenda would allow […]

A hearing and public comment session on a proposed agreement to protect the Jollyville Plateau Salamander provided a glimpse into how both city officials and the environmental community plan to use the plight of the tiny amphibian to further their goals. The city wants to complete Water Treatment Plant 4, and environmental groups are trying […]

Hoping to secure an additional source of water for a growing population in Central Texas, the Barton Springs Edwards Aquifer Conservation District is looking for grant funds to study if a desalinization plant could make water from an underwater saline zone safe for drinking.   The district, along with Texas State University and Texas Disposal […]

City Council members will hear today that city staff is recommending they choose Allied Waste Services to partner with the city to build a new Single Stream Recycling materials recovery facility. Members will also hear from the Solid Waste Advisory Commission, which is urging them to reject that recommendation and start the process over again. […]

The Bull Creek Planned Unit Development is not your ordinary development. Instead of multiple homes, condos, shopping centers or commercial buildings, this 54-acre, multi-million dollar PUD project on prime property near the mouth of Bull Creek at Lake Austin will have only one home – plus a guest house, recreation building, a pool and cabana, […]