Over four years after the 2013 Halloween floods racked the Onion Creek neighborhoods, the Environmental Commission voted unanimously at its Dec. 6 meeting to approve staff’s recommendation to move forward with 128 buyouts of houses at immediate risk of flooding…
Larry Jantzen, chief of special operations with the Austin Fire Department, told members of the Public Safety Commission on Monday that the department was able to respond more quickly and effectively to the Oct. 30 floods because of improvements it…
Last week, City Council voted unanimously to delay a proposed flood buyout in Northwest Austin in order to give members time to learn more about the program. Council is currently considering funding up to $328,000 for the purchase and closing…
A Travis County couple whose home was heavily damaged by the Halloween Flood last November told County Commissioners Tuesday of a 10-month ordeal of bureaucratic intransigence, inflexible regulations and endless red tape in their quest to get a permit to…
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The question of whether Austin should buy out 240 at-risk homes in the Onion Creek floodplain will not go before voters in November. During a special called meeting Friday, Austin City Council voted 5-1 against putting the buyout…
A plan to finance Onion Creek home buyouts through an increase in the city’s drainage utility fee found no support at the Environmental Board last week. Board members asked City Council members to find another way. In a resolution passed…
City budget writers are proposing a 2.2-cent decrease in property taxes for Fiscal Year 2014-15 but because the valuation on many properties has gone up, most property owners will still be paying higher taxes, according to Chief Financial Officer Elaine…
Though some relief is on the way for Halloween Flood survivors, the fact that nearly 15 percent of the funds could be spent on consultants raised some eyebrows at City Council Thursday. Council members approved all four items related…
More than six months have passed since Austin’s Halloween flood. At nearly 1 a.m. Friday, Onion Creek residents gathered at City Hall learned that relief may be in sight in the form of an expanded city buyout program. Two…
A community organization called the Travis Austin Recovery Group (TARG), formed in the aftermath of the historic 2013 Halloween floods, is noting the six-month anniversary of the event with the release of a Draft Recovery Plan for the people and…
Austin City Council Member Mike Martinez will announce a proposal at 10 a.m. today that would have the potential of greatly accelerating buyouts for homeowners whose houses were damaged or destroyed in last year’s Halloween floods on Onion Creek. …
An after-action report on the City of Austin and Travis County’s response to the Halloween flood released last week said that there were myriad serious problems with the response to the emergency. Chief among them was a lack of ability…
