District 4 City Council Member Greg Casar is planning a community meeting Monday to discuss transportation issues. “I know our district has a growing list of transportation needs, and I want to make sure that improvements made to North Lamar, Rundberg Lane, 51st Street, Cameron Road and I-35 are being made with community input,” he said. “I’ve also received many requests regarding pedestrian safety and traffic calming in our neighborhoods, which will be discussed.” Casar said Monday’s meeting is the beginning of a series of community forums on important issues facing District 4 and the City of Austin. The meeting is set for 7 p.m. at Gethsemane Lutheran Church, 200 W. Anderson Lane. For information, call Casar’s office at (512) 978-2104 or email him at  Greg.Casar@austintexas.gov.

District 5 City Council Member Ann Kitchen will have a town hall meeting Saturday to speak with district residents and give updates regarding recent Council activities. While the program will be largely driven by the interests of District 5 residents, all are invited to participate. The session will begin with Kitchen’s report and an update of her policy priorities. Residents will have the chance to express their opinions on the challenges and opportunities on their blocks, in their neighborhoods, and across District 5 and the city. The meeting will be from 12:30 to 2 p.m. Saturday at the Ann Richards School Cafeteria, 2206 Prather Lane. For directions to the Ann Richards School, go here.

The city and other local agencies and employers are sponsoring a Career Expo on Tuesday. More than 100 employers will have job opportunities in information technology, engineering, manufacturing, banking and health care. Participants are encouraged to bring résumés and dress professionally for one-on-one meetings with potential employers. The event will take place from noon to 5 p.m. at the Palmer Events Center, 900 Barton Springs Road. Attendees may park for free in the center’s garage. A list of participating employers can be found here.

Mayor Pro Tem Kathie Tovo is among those who will likely show up at this morning’s meeting of the Texas House Transportation Committee. Tovo plans to talk about HB2440, which would create state regulation of transportation network companies and eliminate local rules, such as those passed by Austin. Tovo told the Monitor, “I’ll be testifying on behalf of the city in opposition to the bill. Last fall — and after many hours of working groups, stakeholder input, and deliberation — the City Council adopted an interim ordinance that allows transportation network companies to operate within the City of Austin. The resulting ordinance reflects the input of many stakeholders, including the TNCs themselves. Austin and other cities should have the ability to craft regulations that meet the particular needs of their own communities. If passed, this bill would limit Austin’s ability to do just that: to protect the safety and welfare of our residents in the ways we deem best.”

Gov. Greg Abbott signed a bill Wednesday authorizing the Summer X Games to apply for funding from the Texas Major Event Trust Fund. The legislation, SB 293, also allows NASCAR to apply for money from the same fund for races at the Texas Motor Speedway. The X Games will be held June 4-7 at the Circuit of the Americas. Richard Suttle, attorney for COTA, noted that the legislation became effective immediately after both houses approved it by more than a two-thirds margin. It was important to both events that the bill, which fixed an error in legislation approved in 2013, go into effect immediately so that they could be eligible for funding this year. The deadline for NASCAR to apply was Wednesday. The X Games has until April 16, according to Wayne Hollingsworth, a member of the Circuit Events Local Organizing Committee.

Austin Independent School District board member Paul Saldaña says he will propose that AISD sell its downtown administrative headquarters to cover all or part of the district’s looming budget shortfall. Saldaña made the comments to publisher Mike Kanin on the Austin Monitor Radio show (KOOP FM 91.7), which aired Wednesday. The show’s topic was the issue of the district’s planned equity self-assessment. He told the Monitor that the budget deficit is, in part, due to AISD’s shrinking student enrollment due to families finding it difficult to afford to live in Austin.  Saldaña said the district would assess itself on equity in education voluntarily after conversations with the Texas Civil Rights Project. He said the AISD board decided to take a “proactive” approach, deciphering the needs of its minority and economically disadvantaged students that, according to some, it has not adequately addressed in decades. He plans to make the proposal at an upcoming AISD board meeting.

The MoPac Improvement Project team says it will temporarily close a portion of the MoPac expressway in order to move the first piece of a 525-foot long bicycle and pedestrian bridge into place Thursday night. The bridge will be moved over the Union Pacific Railroad tracks south of Duval Road. Officials with the Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority say the move will require the temporary closure of southbound MoPac between Parmer Lane and Braker Lane about 8 p.m. so the bridge can be transported from the MoPac median near Parmer Lane down southbound MoPac.  The bridge is part of a shared-use path that will run down the southbound MoPac frontage road from the Walnut Creek Trail to Capital of Texas Highway near the Arboretum. The remaining two sections of the bridge will be installed over the next few weeks as conditions allow. Officials plan to have MoPac completely reopened by 5 a.m. Friday.

Last week, City Council Member Don Zimmerman announced that he would be opening a field office for District 6 at The Crossing on Anderson Mill Road. In a news release, Zimmerman said he plans to lease the office for an initial period of six months in order to gauge its effectiveness. According to Zimmerman’s chief of staff, Joe Petronis, the Council member will be able to open the office without increasing his budget by “restructuring his Council personnel.” At the same time, Zimmerman’s constituent liaison, Trent Pool, has left the city to return to campaign work, Petronis said. The new person in that role is Nuvia Devine, who worked on Zimmerman’s campaign and is married to Texas Supreme Court Justice John Devine. She will be in the City Hall office for only a short period of time before going to the District 6 field office, according to aide Gregory Watson.

A partnership between the Austin Water Utility and the Austin Independent School District has saved the district about 11.7 million gallons of water, or enough to provide water to 195 average households for a year. AISD took advantage of Austin Water’s new Commercial Audit Rebate Program to help pay for comprehensive water efficiency audits for seven campuses that had the greatest potential water savings. Utility officials say the changes will save the district $164,000 in water and wastewater charges. This effort began in 2013 to help the district conserve water and reduce utility bills. Audited campuses included Austin, LBJ, Travis, Eastside Memorial, Crockett and Lanier high schools as well as Murchison Middle School. The seven AISD audits identified a total potential savings of 24 million gallons per year with potential annual cost savings of $530,912 at 2014 rates, according to utility officials. Audits for five more campuses are planned for 2015. For more information about Austin Water conservation incentive programs, go here.

New sculptures have recently been installed in the cellphone parking lot area at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport. Landscaping work around the new art was completed last week. The two new sculptures, “Checker Burst” and “Shock Egg,” are inspired by and interpretations of vapor cones (called “shock eggs”), a phenomenon that can occur as a flying object approaches supersonic speeds. The sculptures were created by artist Eric Eley. The grounds around the sculptures were fashioned by landscape architect Carolyn Kelley, who said the landscaping was designed to be an integral part of the artist’s overall concept. The works were commissioned by the city’s Art in Public Places program, which marks its 30^th anniversary this year.

As part of Cities United for Immigration Action, Judge Sarah Eckhardt has announced that Travis County will join 73 other cities and counties to file a new friend-of-the-court brief in the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in the Texas vs. United States lawsuit. The brief urges immediate implementation of President Obama’s executive actions on immigration. Eckhardt said the brief demonstrates support from the country’s largest cities — as well as its suburbs and rural areas — for the president’s reforms, which will provide temporary relief from deportation to immigrants who have longstanding ties to the U.S., pass a background check and meet other criteria. Eckhardt said Cities United for Immigration Action is arguing that the national public interest is served clearly and overwhelmingly by implementing immigration relief by executive action without delay. The brief also argues that the District Court judge’s decision to block executive action with a preliminary injunction is bad for the economy, hurts families, threatens law enforcement priorities and will stall desperately needed changes to the federal government’s immigration policies.

At its April 1 meeting, Austin’s Environmental Board clarified a December 2014 ordinance, which outlined board membership requirements. The issue was brought before the board by Chuck Lesniak, an environmental officer with the city. The ordinance in question could be interpreted to mean that the board is requiring some members to have a desire in the city’s environmental preservation; professional expertise in geology, hydrology, civil engineering, land planning or ecology and expertise in horticulture, urban forestry or landscape architecture, which would recruit candidates who were overly qualified, Lesniak argued. The latter clause was added because the Environmental Board is going to be combined with the Urban Forestry Board, said Chair Mary Gay Maxwell. The “and” was replaced with “or demonstrated.” Board Member Robert Deegan also pointed out that the ordinance increased board membership from seven to 11, but the clause stipulating that no more than three board members should be employed in land development-related activities did not go up in accordance. Board members voted unanimously to incorporate the changes.