Closed Caption Log, Council Meeting, 04/08/99

>>Goodman: Thank you all for waiting. We're too to begin our proclamations now. Our first proclamation for today is the national organ and tissue donor awareness week proclamation and if I could ask cynthia mckinley to come forward. Now, we all know how important these donors are and how important the gift is that they give us and our sense of well-being. So the proclamation reads: let it be known by these presents that I, Kirk Watson, Mayor of the City of Austin, do hereby proclaim april 18 through 24, 1999 as national organ and tissue donor awareness week in Austin. And he calls on all citizens to join us in recognizing that the donation of vital organs saves lives and vastly improves the quality of life to those whose kidneys, hearts livers, lungs and other organs are unable to sustain them n recognizing that the gift of life is one of the most meaningful blessings a human being can bestow upon another and that one person can create a miracle for those in need. Also in recognizing in today more than 64,000 people are currently in need of organ transplants and the need for organs far surpasses the number donated. In commending organizations such as the Texas organ shaving alliance for their efforts to heighten public awareness of the desperate need of organ and tissue donations and in urging everyone to give the gift of life by becoming a organize gone and tissue donor. Thank you all for the work you do. [Applause].

>> Just a quick message and the most important thing anyone here could do is discuss being an organ and/or tissue donor with their families. A lot of people don't understand or know that just signing the back of your driver's licenses, which that no longer happens if you get a brand new one, but also signing a uniform donor card is not enough. Your family becomes a suppose person for you once you have past from this life so your family decision or the family overrides anything that you may have once done or you may have once said to them so if you just say it one time they will always remember. Currently today we have over 3300 people in the state of Texas waiting for organs as well nas our local area we have over 800 people. So you can obviously see how important it is to see how something as simple as saying that I would like to be an organ donor can -- can help someone live or sustain life. Thank you. [Applause].

>>Griffith: is gary Godsey in the audience today? would you please come forward, Mr. Godsey. Hello. Before we do the proclamation, this is gary Godsey, he is our head person at the united way capital area and I wanted to tell him before we do this proclamation that probably one of the most important preparations I had to serve as a City Council Member was serving on the board of the united way. You really find out what is going on in every part of the community, what the needs are, who the leaders really are and I want to thank the united way and thank Mr. Godsey for the opportunity of preparation and learning that was afforded me as a board member. Thank you.

>> Well, thank you. Appreciate that. [Applause].

>>Griffith: now, this is national volunteer recognition week in Austin. And call all citizens to join me in recognizing that it is the tradition of volunteerism and service which sustains, defines and unites our country in recognizing the volunteers tear center of the united way capital area which promotes the spirit of volunteerism by fostering partnerships that mobilize people and resources to enhance our neighborhoods, in commending the millions of americans who are giving of themselves to help provide a better future for all americans, and in encouraging everyone to consider how in our own ways we can renew our sense of community, revitalize our people's spirit and reclaim our nation's promise by volunteering, and it's signed by our Mayor, Kirk Watson.

>>Garcia: thank you. [Applause].

>> Thank you very much. It's my pleasure to be here for a second year to receive this proclamation and to say thank you to the Council, the Mayor, everyone for their recognition of the power of volunteering. If you look around our community, you see special events taking place every day, you see things sometimes that wouldn't be possible without the hundreds and literally thousands of people who give of themselves throughout the day here in Austin, and we're really a blessed community to have a number of people who will step forward for lots of causes. I have a couple of people I would like to introduce today who came with me. Directly behind me are the two community service award winners this year, our volunteers of the year, if you will. Lynn sherman, who works at the lcra, is a united way board member and also the chair of lifeworks, was one of our award winners this year, along with gina schrader and she was recognized as an unsung hero, someone who works very hard but simply does it out of the goodness of her heart and because she shares for people. I would like you to help me thank these people who represent this community and represent volunteerism. [Applause]. Also if you would just allow me to introduce joyce horn, the executive director, she has two other volunteers she would like to recognize.

>> Thank you for this wonderful opportunity this afternoon. I would like to introduce leroy wormley, who has been a adamant supporter of united way capital area, served on our board and is currently instrumental in helping us to train people in the community through our blueprint for board members training. So if any of you are interested in being trained to serve on a board of directors in our community, please see us after this is over and we'll be happy to give you information. But thank you so much leroy for your support. I would also like to introduce barbara lightheart, she's the volunteer coordinator with the Travis County sheriff's office and she is our chair of our community resources team for the volunteer center which helps us to put everything together and do everything that we do and give us guidance and leadership. Thank you very much, barbara. Thank you all. [Applause].

>>Slusher: you all left your proclamation. [Laughter].

>>Slusher: is ron lucey in the chamber? hi there. This is to -- I'm Council Member Daryl Slusher, this is to recognize the volunteering disabled parking enforcement month. This is obviously something we -- can go a lot of time without needing enforcement to keep people from parking in disabled parking places, but that's not always the case unfortunately, and this has been a very good program run by staffed by volunteers so without further ado I would like to present the following proclamation. Be it known by presents that Kirk Watson, Mayor of the City of Austin, Texas do hereby proclaim april 8, 1999 as volunteer disabled parking enforcement month in Austin and call on all citizens to join in recognizing that the volunteer disabled parking enforcement program was initiated in February 1994 with 20 volunteers, has since grown to 35 volunteers, has been duplicated by other cities and counties including Travis County, el paso, fort worth, houston, and several others across the state, and in recognizing that this program is sponsored by the Austin Mayor's committee for people with disabilities and the Public Works and transportation department with morris poe transportation manageser as the lead. And in recognizing that the volunteers have issued tickets totalling $128,000 and commending the volunteers and staff which has made the program a success and in recognizing the disabled parking enforcement program as a sterling example of the community working together to enhance the quality of life for outline aur citizens with disabilities. Congratulations.

>> Thank you. [Applause].

>> On behalf of Austin citizens with disabilities and the Austin's Mayor's committee for people with disabilities, I would like to express my great appreciation to morris poe and the scores of volunteers for their past service to this program. Through the efforts of morris and the many volunteers, this program has been able to ensure the access to the community for the citizens with disabilities that depend on disabled parking. We hope that this program will continue to grow, but we also measure its success by the fewer number of people illegally parked in this program. One recent change to this program, when Council Member Slusher read the amount of money collected in fines, this money is now being reinvested in the community through accommodations to persons with disabilities and we look forward to using that money to help persons with disabilities better access City services. I would also like to mention that this program is going to be transferred to the Austin police department and I would like to thank the City for their ongoing support for this program and one of the colleagues from the police department has something to add to that.

>> I'm the director of the community liaison program for the Austin police department and it is with a great deal of pleasure and with huh million ti that we accept a program that morris poe has made a show case for the nation and it is our goal to grow the program with our additional resources and with the mandate from our chief of police to make this an even for successful and more important program to our community, and we are looking for additional volunteers and we have a lot of exciting new opportunities to go along with this so I'm very please to do have that opportunity and I thank the Mayor's committee for their support and I think morris -- I thank morris especially for all of his hard work. [Applause].

>>Lewis: good afternoon. I'm Council Member Lewis. The proclamation that I have honorary citizenship from the visitors from koblenz. Since we have a person that can pronounce the names a little better than I can, we're going to do that so the people will be able to recognize their names. In the meantime, what I'll do is I'll read one -- I'll read the greeting.

>> Should they all come forward?

>>Lewis: no, we will let them come and get the certificate. The greeting says, greeting in the name by the authority of the City of Austin to all whom these presents come. Know ye that the -- this day is hereby commissioned for the or now and for all terms to come an honorary citizen of the City of Austin. Under the laws of the City with the rights -- with all rights, privileges and [inaudible] pertaining to the said office. And as such enjoy a place of highest steam in the minds and hearts of the citizens of the capital City of Texas and in recognizing has been presented with this certificate of citizenship. And now we have Mr. Peter reek the director of Public Works, he's going to read the names and we'll pass out the honorary sit shen ship certificates. -- Citizenship certificates. I hope they are in the same order, peter.

>> Thank you Council Member Lewis. It's my honor to read those names here for you all. Andre spaumer, if you would please --. (Reading names) no he is here. (Reading names.

>>Lewis: hold it, peter. Thank you, sir. Congratulations. (Reading names) and some of the teachers: (reading names).

>> It's nothing special, just a short address. Dear City Council Members, thanks for your warm Texas greetings. It is a great pleasure to be here with you in Austin and we all enjoy our stay with our host families. Since 1991, both cities, Austin and koblenz, have benefited greatly from this sister City relationship and we would like to thank you by presenting this book to you and the citizens of Austin. Thank you very much. [Applause].

>>Goodman: peter, why don't you ask them if they can all line up. (Speaking in foreign language) [applause].

>>Goodman: okay, our next proclamation while we're waiting for the youngsters to go on back is for a City employee who has put in a great deal of time, energy, commitment and solid dedication to the City of Austin and if her friends are listening, we need to start getting together a little bit of the celebration we had planned to acknowledge and celebrate her service. So gina, are you back here listening to this?

>> here I am t.

>>Griffith: are you celebrating?

>> yes.

>>Griffith: would betty brown please join us at the podium? there she is. In every organization there are some who are center poles of the tepee. They are very, very sound and solid and others lean on them when the wind blows hard, and here is one. Her name is betty brown. And one of the times when the wind blows hard is during election season, and this person is so highly respected in the area of election rules that this is a time that I think is very appropriate to let her know how valuable she is. This is to certify that through her dedication to performance and professionalism and to furthering her professional education, betty brown, deputy City clerk, has qualified for third sustaining membership in the academy for advanced education in the international institute of municipal clerks by meeting requirements including attend answers at recognized academy and college programs, seminars and workshops, by participating in professional conferences and as the recipient of honors and awards, and she holds the distinction of being only the second clerk from the state of Texas and the 135th municipal clerk in the iimc membership to reach this goal. This certificate is hereby issued in support and recognition there off, dated this 8th day of april, ad, 1999, and it's signed by our Mayor, Kirk Watson. [Applause].

>> Thank you. I appreciate being recognized for achieving one of the goals that I set for myself many years ago. When they talk about international institute of municipal clerks, that is an organization of all the 50 states in the United States, the eight providences in canada and 15 other countries. So I feel very honored to have achieved this and especially being the second one in Texas. Thank you again for acknowledging this. [Applause].

>> Well, the Mayor has congratulated you and so now this is from the City clerk's office, and this is also to congratulate you and that we appreciate you and we all love you. [Applause].

>> The plaque just says basically all the achievements betty has done and this is just giving it from the City clerk's office from the bottom of our heart, and don't cry. [Applause].

>>Garcia: and now it's time for a little music and today jovenes latinos are here, jovenes latinos, and this is I guess a day in which we speak many languages, we spoke german earlier, we're now going to speak a little spanish. Jovenes latinos means latin youth and it represents the youth group of episcopal center. The group consists of 18 hispanic speaking students age 10 to 16. These students attend fulmore and bed check middle schools. A few students have come to perform for us today. These talented young people are working to develop individual talent through art and music. All this is made possible through the efforts of the youth coordinator, Mr. Francisco chavis who is here and the Mayor is going to read the proclamation. It's signed by you, it says I, Kirk Watson.

>>Mayor Watson: oh, well at least I'll get that right. Be it known by these presents that I Kirk Watson, Mayor of the City of Austin, Texas to hereby proclaim april 8, 1999 as jovenes latinos day in Austin and I call on all citizens to join me in recognizing the many outstanding contributions by the local music community toward the development of Austin's social, economic and cultural diversity and in recognizing the dedicated efforts of artists which further stib's status as the life music capital of the world and it's signed by me, Kirk Watson, Mayor of the City of Austin and I'm here to welcome jovenes latinos. [Applause].

>> Thank you, Mr. Mayor Watson and Council Members for this proclamation for swrof jof. We are very proud of them. We appreciate your hard work on behalf of children of Austin. [Speaking in spanish]. [Applause].

>> Thank you. We appreciate it.

>> Jovenes latinos will be performing april 24th at the sepeda branch library. This is an event of reading is fundamental, Austin public library and ameRicorps is organizing and we have here posters that we would like to present to all the Council Members and we hope you put them on your wall and we thank you Council Member Garcia for your support on this event [applause]. (Music)
(Music)
.

>> How many questions not asked?

>> how many answers not answered.

>> How many needs kill us?

>> how many of you [inaudible].

>> How much justice behind bars?

>> how many witnesses are missing? (Music)
(Music)
[applause].

>> Fwchlt racias. [Speaking in spanish].

>>Mayor Watson: I'll ask everybody to please rise. Please join us in a moment of silence and as you bow your head let's remember conflicts around the globe and those who are involved in those conflicts. Amen. I'll call to order the City Council of Austin, Texas. This is a regular meeting of the Council, we are meeting on Thursday, april 8, 1999, we are meeting at the City Council chambers located at 307 west second street. Let me provide items that have been changed or corrected on the agenda. Item no. 10 Should be 11 and should read delete the parenthetical for $7,9,193 and through the word budget and close paren these and should read amount and source of funding $7,9 -- 683 is available in the 1998-d approved operating budget of various City departments, Austin energy, 647,269 and other City departments, 46,600. 684,582 Is available in the 1999-99 amended capital budget for the information systems office of the frl and administrative services department. There is no unanticipated financial impact. A fiscal note is attached. Funding for the remaining 24 months of the arj contract period is contingent upon available funding in future budgets. Item 11 should be 10 and it should read amend the order answer, in 1998-99 operating budget by reducing the general fund by 1,323,. See related item, delete no. 9 And put no. 11. Item 25 should read, set a public hearing on proposed -- on a proposed neighborhood plan for the east Cesar Chavez neighborhood planning area bounded delete between and put bye east 6th street, chicon street, Town Lake and IH-35, there is no fiscal emphasis in setting a public hearing, close parenthesis, suggested dated and time may 13, 1999. Item 26, set a public hearing on a prosed neighborhood plan for the chestnut neighborhood area by mart looter King boulevard junior boulevard, east 12th street and miraim street. At the parenthesis there is no fiscal impact by set a public hearing. Suggested date may 13, 1999. Item 32, c14-98-public hearing to amend chapter 13-2 of the Austin City code by rye zoning property locally known at that time 8,000 block of the east side of fm 620 north from gr is postponed to may. Is postponed to may. Item no. 33, C14-98-is also postponed to may. Item 36, cr 14 r 85337 is pose popd to may. Item no. 38 To conduct a public hearing to consider an ordinance amending title 25 of the City code to establish regulations relating to bed and breakfast establishment is postponed until may. Item no. 40, Approve an ordinance amending title 25 of the City code to establish regulations to the bed and breakfast is is postponed. Items set for a time certain, 4 clone 30 p.m. Zoning items. At 5:30 a report on the pecan street station project at 500 Robert Martinez Jr. Street, that's at 5 stlon 30. At 6:00 p.m., conduct a public hearing on proposed amendments to the land development code to adopt the mitigation land policy in the barton springs zone including changes to the s.o.s. Ordinance. And couldn't a public hearing for the limited purpose annexation of the balfour pud tract, approximately 588 acres on the north side of bee caves approximately one-half mile west of the intersection of bee caves and sienna hills drive. 7:30 P.m. C 814980001, approve a second and third reading ordinances amending chapter 13-2 of the Austin City code, zoning property locally known as south mopac expressway and William cannon drive from sf 2 single family residence standard lot, grco, community commercial conditional over low and cs to p.u.d., planned unit development. The p.u.d. Foktsz property in barton springs sfwlon and proposes to modify the application of chapter 13-7, article 1, division 5 save our springs citizens initiative to the property. First item on our agenda is approval of the minutes of March 11, 1999, March 31, 1999 and april 1st 1999. Is there a motion? motion made and seconded to approve. Any discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. Motion carries on item 1. General citizens communication. Jim walker followed by richard Troxell and Rico gonzales. Mr. Walker.

>> I can't talk that fast.

>>Mayor Watson: give it your best shot.

>> I want to thank Council for the opportunity to speak for you. I'm jim walker with the Mueller neighborhood ko situation speaking on item 29 on your agenda today. I wanted to say first, I wanted to thank Council staff and psd staff for helping us get that item on the agenda and for what they've done over the last couple of years and I know we've been pushing it to get that agenda item on there in april and I know that that has caused a little difficulty but we appreciate it quite a bit that you are showing that kind of commitment to keeping the neighborhoods involved and there is no gap in neighborhood involvement in this Mueller redevelopment. One quick note, I think that the semantics of what we're calling various things has tripped up a lot of people and I think that we can deal with that over the coming months. And I especially think we can deal with it now that you've kept us involved. I'm not mentioning anything more about that. I think also that the citizens commission you are creating today is going to be multi functional in addition to advising staff on whenever we -- whatever else we create in the coming months, it can also help with other things related to the vision, to the master plan, to land use changes around the airport, to traffic impacts and so on. So I see that as a multi-functional, I hope you all do as well. And if you all have any questions that would be great. One other couple notes would be if you want to -- I just want to express my confidence that the City is working at the state level to make sure this gets off on the right foot. I think this project, redeveloping this airport is going to require an unprecedented level of state and City coops in many areas and so we -- we're working in both those levels and I know staff and Council is as well. I can quickly announce two dates coming up. This sort the 10th from 9:30 to 11:00 is a presentation by the state of Texas on their master plan for their 282 acres at the world pentecost promised land church on 51st street. I think it's street. Also may 2nd, barrett sunberg has spearheaded an effort to have a celebration of the transition in the airport property and that will be on may 2 from 2:00 to 5:00 at the signature flight hangar. If you all have any questions about this. I'm in favor of item 29. A lot of other neighbors are as well. No questions? thank you for your time.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you, Mr. Walker. Richard Troxell followed by Rico gonzales.

>> Good afternoon, my name is Richard Troxell, president of house the homeless. Members of house the homeless are very interested in imPault of life issues. Accordingly this Saturday we're going to conduct an educational picket in the heart of the sixth street entertainment district, 5:30, you are all invited. We're calling for those citizens that are in the business of selling alcohol to take responsibility for their actions. Especially concerning excessive drinking where already intoxicated people are being served even more alcohol remember, all dwi's are the result of excessive alcohol consumption. House the homeless is calling for an end to alcohol service to underage students. And house the homeless is calling for the stoppage of the sale of fortified alcohol which is being sold for the sole purpose of intoxicating individuals. Finally, house the homeless is calling for all responsibility -- responsible citizens to support house Bill 3611. This Bill will enable all Texas mu nis palts to set aside a percentage of alcohol sales for the creation of substance abuse treatment programs. I'll repeat that. House Bill 3611 will allow cities throughout Texas to set aside a penny or two per alcoholic drink so that we can create substance abuse treatment programs. It's really a simple idea. Understand that we support the businesses to make their profit, but at the same time understand the the -- certain Austin citizens are having medical, serious medical consequences as a result of consuming their product. It's alcoholism. We have no problem with their selling the product, but just like the tobacco companies, we are asking them to take responsibility for their actions. As a matter of fact, the alcohol businesses need to step forward and embrace this Bill to avoid the kind of lawsuits and the punitive damages and the punitive fines $80 million last week, for single individual cases that in no way enhance the benefit of the community. But by stepping forward and embracing this bill, that can happen here in Austin, throughout the state of Texas and we can lead the way across this country. Www.house the homeless.org, that's our website. Look us up for more information about this piece of legislation and our March on Saturday. Www.house the homeless.org. Thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you, Mr. Troxell. [One moment please].

>>Mayor Watson: the Mayor has to has to do that too.

>> Good afternoon City Council. I am second lieutenant brittany neal and I am a member of the junior development program at barrington elementary. I started the program in september and -- I had to go through training and I learned to trust in myself. I learned to lead a group of cadets. I was then promoted to first sergeant. I have already Marched in three parades and now I am in charge of training the new cad dats. I am proud to be -- part of this program and all the younger kids look up to us.

>> I want to bring some of the parents over here to talk to you about the program.

>>Mayor Watson: great.

>> By supporting this program, you have provided a resource to build self-esteem and civic pride in these young children as they represent their school and our City. Our families thank you for having the foresight to provide a focus of having a chide's dreams to be the best and bright evident can be achieved regardless of race or socioeconomic background: these young citizens are our future and through the leadership of great teachers and parents and through these programs, they will achieve the goals which will benefit both themselves and our community.

>>Mayor Watson: thank y'all very much. Thank you for all you've done. [Applause].

>> I would like to invite you to our showcase tomorrow for the after school program. The cadets are going to pass out the information and you can see what our children are doing.

>>Mayor Watson: great. Thank y'all for being here. Kids, thank y'all for doing what you're doing. Duley fonlt?

>> good afternoon, my name is dulcey font.

>>Mayor Watson: it's misspelled here. I apologize.

>> I'm a member of the Austin public library foundation. I'm here today to invite you and all the people of Austin to a special evening of story telling which will be held on Sunday, april 18th. The program will feature five award winning story tellers who will entertain with tales of Texas and beyond. Special guest is local author and personality, marion winneke. This event is being held for two reasons, for quality entertainment in Austin and secondly as a fund-raiser for the library foundation. The money raised from this event will be contributed to the children's summer reading program. Last year the Austin public library foundation provided about $2,000 to help pay for the summer reading program. The money was used for incentives and special events and guests. 7,800 Children registered for the summer reading program in 1998 and over 30,000 participated in the special events. The summer reading program is good for Austin's children and deserves our support. With cooperation of Austin community college, this year's evening of Texas tales will be held at the theater at the rio grande campus of acc. The program begins at 7:30 and I hope you will be able to attend. I have some fliers to leave with you so you can add this date to your calendars. Thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you. Jennifer gale? hi, Austin. I live in north Austin. I work in south Austin. I have an announcement. I'm a candidate for the Austin City Council. My name is jennifer gale. My announcement is that I have a solution for a group of transportation problems, a brand new transportation system. Most of us have trouble deciding how to slow vehicles moving through our neighborhoods. And by our children. We have trouble deciding how to get traffic moving more smoothly, how to clean the air, how to avoid dangerous accidents and reckless drivers. I am proposing that we create roads, streets, avenues or boulevards solely for the use of those with bicycles that will travel north south and east west through Austin and will continue to the country. This system will radically increase the default quality of line for Austinites as well as those visiting our City. The elderly, the infirm young people who travel unimpeded by cars from one end of the City to another, those now fearing for their lives on their way to work will be able to casually travel these lines, these avenues on their way to easy street by arriving at work ex-sill rated, in touch of nature and in a better mood and totally moeted vaited in approaching their workday. For safety these bike avenues will be specifically designed for the casual bike rider as well as those in a hurry. This will open up our world, freeing people from the real fear of being hit by a car, truck to a sense of serenity and a better appreciation of Austin. After work or after school, Austinites can enjoy the use of several different recreational activities, well rest and exercise because they will seem much closer with these bike lines lanes. This inexpensive transportation means more business, especially in the health industry and it will help bring Austinites closer. My name is jennifer gale and may 1st is election day. Thank you, Mayor Watson, honorable Council Members.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you, ms. Gale. Let's do the consent agenda quickly before we go to item number 6. The consent agenda will be, unless sums need to be removed or can be placed back on, 7, 9, 12, 13, -- item number 12 will be on second and third reading. 13, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29. And item number 45 will be appointments, the animal advisory commission, patricia mahon by Council Member Lewis, the arts commission, andrea bryant, a repoint by consensus, brackenridge hospital oversight Council, a reappointment by consensus. The child care Council, kay garamany. A reappointment. The construction advise vi committee, John armstrong, a reappointment by Council Member Slusher. Bruce wilson by Council Member Garcia. The design commission, Robert hey dixon, Jr. By consensus. The electrical board, David burgoff by Council Member Spelman. The quality assurance tim, Dr. Time fulkenberry. The telecommunications commission, ellen beeman by Council Member Slusher. The urban transportation commission, an dna in a lockler a reappointment, and carl temper by Mayor Watson. Are there any items that need to be added to the consent agenda or need to be pulled from the consent agenda?

>>Slusher: Mayor, I have a number of people signed up on 7.

>>Mayor Watson: yes, we do.

>>Slusher: why don't we pull that one.

>>Mayor Watson: all right. Councilmember Lewis?

>>Lewis: you can put number 8, 10, 11 and 20 back on.

>>Griffith: Mayor?

>>Mayor Watson: one second. Let me make a note of this. Councilmember Griffith?

>>Griffith: I'd like to go ahead and pull 10 and have a brief staff presentation on that and ask a couple of questions.

>>Mayor Watson: okay.

>>Spelman: actually 10 and 11, shouldn't it?

>>Griffith: 10 and 11, comes in a kit.

>>Spelman: Mayor, I'd like to pull numb 19. -- Item 19.

>>Mayor Watson: anything else?

>>Goodman: Mayor? did you read number 13 as being consent?

>>Mayor Watson: I did.

>>Goodman: what I would like to add to that to reaffirm the environmental protection that the zoning is is to add a condition that says simply no single family or --. [Inaudible].

>>Mayor Watson: why don't we pull that. All right? Council Member Lewis?

>>Lewis: the green builders task force --.

>>Mayor Watson: because of a of a question about one of the consent items, that's why I didn't read it. All right. Of the consent agenda will be 8, 9, 12, 15, 16, 17, 18, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28 and 29 and 45 as previously read. Is there a motion?

>>Griffith: Mayor? I have one quick comment on 29 before we vote on the consent agenda?

>>Mayor Watson: let me get a motion and get on the table and then I'll recognize you. Motion is made by Council Member Spelman, seconded by Council Member Lewis to approve the consent agenda as read. I'll call on one person to speak that's signed up on the consent agenda and then I'll recognize Council Member Griffith. Mr. Walker, are you still here?

>> yes, I'll go ahead and make that.

>>Mayor Watson: all right. Councilmember Griffith?

>>Griffith: I want to thank the sponsors of this item. And I can't let this go by -- this day go by without commenting about the exceptional quality of the work and length of the work that the neighborhoods around Robert Mueller have put in. And obviously jim walker is -- has been a leader through that, but there have been dozens of people who have put in thousands of hours over a period of four or five years. And the fact that they are willing to recommit and go 20 more is inspir railtion national and I just wanted to recognize them and thank them for what they have done and are willing to stay with us.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you, Council Member. Any further discussion --.

>>Lewis: we're not through yet. I just said we're not through with the Robert Mueller.

>>Mayor Watson: I thought you were getting ready to pull something again. [Laughter]. There being no further discussion, all in favor opposed say no. Motion carries with Council Member Garcia off the dias. We'll go to item number 6, which is a report on the pecan street station project, 500 Robert Martinez Jr. Street. That is set for a time certain. I'm southern, at a:30 p.m.. Let us go instead to item 13 and I'll recognize the Mayor Pro Tem.

>>Goodman: thanks, Mayor. Because this is sf-6 zoning and I think that is a really good agreement that the neighborhood worked out with the applicant, in order to reaffirm that sf-6 is environmentally protected and that the clustering notion is an absolutely good one, I wanted to add language to this ordinance which restricts or prohibits single family or duplex so that it does stay the sf-6 we've all agreed to.

>>Mayor Watson: the motion would be -- the motion made by the Mayor Pro Tem is to -- and for the record, the public hearing has been previously closed on this item. Would be to approve the ordinance making the amendment, but adding -- amending that arrested unanimous so say that there is a prohibition against single family or duplex construction in order to ensure the intent of sf-6 is met. Is there a second? seconded by Council Member Griffith? discussion?

>> I'm not familiar with those proceedings and it's not the way I understood it was going to go. I thought we had an agreement with the neighborhood association that we had worked out that we had agreed to prohibiting duplexes but we didn't agree to single family.

>>Goodman: you're asking for sf-6 zoning and I'm making absolutely sure that that's what we are zoning.

>>Mayor Watson: apparently there's some confusion that sf-6 wouldn't allow single family.

>>Goodman: sf-6 is condo, townhouse.

>>Mayor Watson: ms. Glasco, why don't you address that.

>> Very briefly before I respond to the question at hand: two weeks ago, Council allowed a postponement for this case so the applicant and the neighborhood would three trooi to resolve their issues. The proposal was for mobile home zoning. The applicant has since amended to sf-6,. The primary use is townhomes and condominiums and my understanding of Mayor pro tem's proposal is to ensure that you have a true condominium proposal based on her motion. Therefore in addition to the prohibition of complexes, she's adding a prohibition of single family detached uses, so you would then have a true single family condominium project or townhouse. A single family detached homes are allowed under single family 6 if that was the question.

>>Mayor Watson: Mayor Pro Tem, did you hear that? what ms. Glasco just said -- what? well, all right. What he's saying is single family detached is allowed under sf-6. The concern of Mr. Greenburg is he thought he had an agreement worked out with the neighborhood.

>>Goodman: the neighborhood agreement I understood was sf-6, which is town home, condominium.

>>Mayor Watson: ms. Glasco is saying detached single family is also under sf-6.

>>Goodman: it may be allowed, but that's not the agreement as I understand it.

>>Mayor Watson: well, do we have anybody from the neighborhood here? what is your understanding of the agreement?

>> that this would be under a condo regime that was what was presented to me in examples.

>>Mayor Watson: Mr. Greenburg, you've signed up to speak. Why don't you address this issue.

>> Thank you. My name is frank greenburg, I represent dii. We're the property owner. We worked with the neighborhood and the City staff and Council staff to my knowledge and everyone had agreed that the resolution or -- the consent was pretty much unanimous from as far as the property owners, Mr. Tarleton representing them and myself, and we gave the -- I'm sorry, I don't have a copy of it. Here it is. This agreement was signed by all parties and I would -- we would like to get the counsel's support as it is Written with the sf-6 regulations as they are presently Written. And that's why we would appreciate your support as Written with no more -- additional conditional overlays.

>>Spelman: Mr. Greenburg, what's your objection to -- as he said, a condo regime of townhouses.

>> We don't have a problem with it. Unfortunately, we are not knowledgeable utility of at this time of sf-6. This was kind of switched on us of what our original plans were for the property. We don't even have a site development plan at this point for the project. We would just like the options whether we develop it or we sell the property for the end user to have those options. And we feel like it would be sf-6 is pretty specific and we don't want to make the property economically undevelopable, for lack of a better term or unviable by putting any more covenants in it. That's the only reason -- we just don't know enough about it and we don't want to be limited about any additional restrictions. Thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: Mayor Pro Tem?

>>Goodman: what we could do is pass it on first reading if that's okay so the applicant can research what sf-67 means.

>>Mayor Watson: the motion has been made on item number 13 by the Mayor Pro Tem and seconded by Council Member Griffith to approve sf-6 with a prohibition on single family detached or duplex construction. It would be on first reading only in order to make sure that if there is an agreement. If there has been a misunderstanding about the agreement, there would be an tunlt to ensure there is no lack of clarity about the agreement as a matter of fundamental fairness. Is there any further discussion? Council Member Spelman?

>>Spelman: I'd like to direct a question, if I could. What's your objection to detached housing?

>> again, I'm not a zoning person, okay? detached housing was not what was presented in the examples to the community. What was presented was condo regime. That was actually said multiple times. And I was under the impression that sf-6 meant condo regime. And the topic of detached housing I was unaware that that was allowed under sf-6.

>>Spelman: it sounds like y'all have some more talking to do.

>> Well, sf 7 r.-2 is obviously detached.

>>Mayor Watson: if we pass it on first reading, you can do some further talking.

>>Garcia: I want to make sure that everyone understands that a condo regime is the way people that live there organize themselves. It's not a way of dictating or mandating what kind of housing there is. It just means that within that area the regime owns the property and everybody just owns what's inside, their condo itself, the air inside, but the whole property is owned by the regime and it's governed by the law.

>> And the format of a single foundation with several houses underneath one roof was also presented to the community as the definition of a condo regime.

>>Mayor Watson: here's where we are. Folks thought they had an agreement. It looked like there was an agreement. The Mayor Pro Tem has made a motion that if it passes it will pass on first reading, which means if there is miscommunication by the agreement, if there's misunderstanding about what certain terminology means, there's a period of time before this comes back that clarity and some discussion with occur. That's why it would be passed only on first reading. I think the Mayor Pro Tem is trying to, a, achieve what she understood was the agreement and b, be fair in terms of allowing for any more discussion to make sure everybody has clarify. Is there any further discussion by the Council?

>>Spelman: this is a question directed to the Mayor Pro Tem. There are four points list odd this letter. Sf-6 is obviously part of the motion. Duplexes are prohibited as part of the motion. Item 2 is a 25 foot set back. Is that part of our motion?

>>Goodman: yeah.

>>Spelman: okay. And then the access prohibited is also part of the motion?

>>Goodman: right.

>>Mayor Watson: any further discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. Motion carries. On item number 28, the City manager would like to make a commented.

>> Mayor, I would like to inform Council, with respect to this issue, what I would like to proposal at some future date of the Council an amendment to this. We believe as a staff that there are certain circumstances at which administrative approval of extensions even in the drinking water protection zone for limited purpose for areas that are limited purpose annexed should be done administratively when the lots are plattedded, 300 feet of infrastructure and things of that nature and it is not something that we're going to provide on-site collection systems to. And I wanted to say we're going to presented that at some future date.

>>Mayor Watson: all right. Item number 7.

>>Slusher: when do you anticipate that to be, City manager?

>> we can have that amendment next week. It's basically drafted now. But I didn't want to delay this item because I understand the direction that the Council wants to give, but I want to offer you some alternatives and options.

>>Slusher: that's fine with me. I don't know about the others.

>>Mayor Watson: I'm a little off what the item was, so we'll figure that out. Item number 7. We have a number of people signed up to speak. Councilmember Slusher, you pulled the item. Do you wish to say anything beforehand?

>>Slusher: no. If we could have a short staff presentation.

>>Mayor Watson: if you would come forward.

>> Mayor, members of the Council, I am your parks and recreation director. In your backup you have a chronology that we passed out to all the members. I have financial manager jayston run down this chronology for you so you can get an update on what this whole process has gone through and if you have any additional questions after that, we'll be more than glad to answer them. Thank you.

>> Mayor, Council, City manager, I'm jayston, financial manager for the parks and recreation department. A brief connology of events. On july 20th of 1998, an rfp was issued for the rowing concession. A committee was formed, a recommendation was to be presented to parks board. On november 5th the con 17 air, the present concessionaire, who was not accorded, filed a bid protest. In july of '99, purchasing and parts decided to go with -- we had pulled the bid and we decided to go with a request for clarification of the bid. February -- a decision was made identifying rowing dock as the best bid proposal, satisfying the neeteds of the citizens of Austin. On February 23rd, we took the recommendation to the parks board and the con sur ens was then met. After that a bid protest was filed. We went through the protest process. The purchasing officer made a decision that the recommendation was to move forward, and that's where we are today. The biggest difference between the two bids is that the recommended proposal will market -- we feel will market the rowing concession to a much broader public sector by increasing the ease of accessibility and lowering the cost to get on a rowing vessel to get out on the lake and get out and enjoy the rowing that's out there, kind of like a can knew. It's not out there -- canoe. It's just to get out there and row. You can't get down there and just, you know, you would have to take lessons. And what the proposal that we're recommending has expanded the concession concept to allow the general public to just walk down there and utilize the facility and get out on the lake.

>>Lewis: Mayor Pro Tem, let me ask you a question. You said so the general public can just go out and row. Is there any type of training? what is the --.

>> What the proposal is saying is they have pontoon boats that are more steady than the rowing and skulling. You will be instructed. They are just larger versions of when we were in camp and we would go out on a rowing exhibition into the lakes. So you would get some teaching on how to get out on to the lake, but it won't be necessary to go through a full hour or half hour lesson.

>>Lewis: when was the last contract? when was the contract -- when did the contract expire? you said it was -- this was let in, what, '98?

>> right, correct.

>>Lewis: when did the other contract expire?

>> it expired in 1994. At that time it went out for bid and a recommendation was brought forward to Council at the time. There was one proposer and at that time Council directed the department to go back and work on the concession policy and we did that in '97, worked on that, brought it forward to Council and in March, I believe March 12th of '98, it was -- Council approved it and at that point we were able to work on the rfp that went out on july 20th.

>>Lewis: so the contract expired in '94 and you have one proposal and we didn't resubmit it until '98. Is that what you're saying?

>> yes, sir.

>>Lewis: and was the other -- the other concession, was it still? operation?

>> yes. It reverted to a month to month.

>>Lewis: so it was extended on a month to month under the contract that expired in '94?

>> yes, sir.

>>Lewis: well, how much of the lake is -- I mean, what is the problem with both of them being on the lake? that's my first question?

>> well, presently there's only two facilities on the lake, that one right under that we're talking about under Austin high and the one by the four seasons.

>>Lewis: so what would be the problem with both of them getting contracts for both of them?

>> right now the -- there seems to be a lot of congestion on the lake between the two places at the peak times and that seems to to be a concern.

>>Lewis: well, if the pontoons don't have a contract, why are they on the lake now?

>> the pontoons are not on the lake.

>>Lewis: well, that's what I'm saying. If they was both on the lake, you said that the people that would be more accessible to the general public and from what I understand, if you was using the other ones that you have to take lessons, so the same people is not going to be using both -- we're not going to have the same group of people. You're not going to be targetedding the same group for both entities.

>> Well, the main thrust of the recommended proposer is still the rowing and sculling. We're not taking that off the lake. What we're doing in recommending the rowing dock is saying we're broadening the scope of who can go down there and utilize and do some rowing on the lake without having to take lessons and getting those particular boats.

>>Lewis: so the rowing dock is going to do sculling.

>> Yes. That's going to be their bread and buttedder. They just widened the accessibility for that concession.

>>Lewis: well, my question still remains if we was doing sculling for four years without a contract, was there any recommendations for the other people to add anything -- any additional? I mean, pontoons or anything during that time?

>> when we went out for proposal, we set out standards and both entities had the opportunity expand on them. We had certain requirements that we were looking for for the department's interest and the City's interest and they had the same opportunity as the recommended proposer to expand and offer those services.

>>Lewis: what was the -- who made the recommendations that we needed more stable boats, pontoons, or the reason we committed the rfp in that way?

>> some of that came out of the public hearing held on may 12th of last year. That was at the parks board.

>>Lewis: so it -- that was '98. It tooks four years for us to determine that we needed more activities on the lake?

>> I can't speak for '94 to '97. I wasn't --.

>> You didn't answer that.

>> Right. But we worked on it diligently to fulfill counsel's recommendation to relook at the concession policy, and that took about eight months to get it to where we -- we made the -- we proposed it to the parks board and the environmental board and had their recommendation and we forwarded it on. So that was an eight to nine month process to get it to Council and get it approved.

>>Lewis: what is the difference between the amount of concession that the City receives now and it did from the other sculler? is it more or less?

>> it's more now. What we is we used the new concession policy and instead of asking for a flat percentage based on your pro forma, which is really not a real dollar because you can tell me you're going to pay me 20,000, and that's 10% of what your gross is, but if you don't make 200,000, I'm not going to realize $20,000 in revenue. So what we did is we made it a set revenue minimum guaranteed to the City, plus gave you the opportunity to enhance that by saying I'm going to give you one percent of my gross above the guaranteed minimum. So there will be a significant increase to the department and the City's general fund of anywhere from five to $10,000.

>>Lewis: wait a minute. We're not getting but 12.

>> Right. But we're only average between five and 7,000 dollars from that concession air over the last few years. So both the recommended proposer did offer an incentive on a percentage of their gross.

>>Lewis: it just appears to me that this whole thing is reducing the competition because you have one or the other. You can't have both. And from what you're saying is neither one serves the same stwits.

>> They both should serve the same constituents. We're not taking away from the people that are presently do to do their rowing and sculling. They are more than -- the person really wants them to come aboard. That's their bread and butter. They want these people to say. All we're doing is changing the management of that concession based on conceptual ideas.

>>Lewis: well, I guess if the liability question is not a problem, you know, because if the group that we've had for the last, I don't know, -- how long was they there before '94?

>> I believe that concession was originally awarded for the original owner of the concession in the middle to late '80's.

>>Lewis: so if they've been there that long and felt they needed to give people lessons in sculling, then you people don't feel they need to give lessons to people that's going to walk down there and go out sculling, I guess it's if the liability question don't come up as far as the City, it being involved or having any liability to it, then to me it just seems like we're changing horses in the middle of the stream.

>> We're not saying that the people that are going to be doing the rowing and sculling, they're still going to need to take lessons. They're going to do the things that are being done now because it is a skilled sport and you do need some guidance to get out there on one of those scullers. But what we're saying is the people that won't need much training will be the ones using the pontoon boats kind of like the canoes, you don't get much training, you just gent out there.

>>Lewis: unless you run into the people that's doing the sculling.

>> No, sir.

>>Lewis: well, what is it, the rowing, do they have -- where else do they have concessions? what other places do they have concessions?

>> they do not have a concession. I believe the owners give lessons off of lake Austin out of a private dock. I believe in discussions.

>>Lewis: do they have just sculling or the pontoons, no, they do sculling. The pontoons of. Was just added to the City. I believe one of the owners, that's what she does is teach rowing and sculling and train people. But I think it's off of lake Austin. Lewis that's all I have at the present time.

>>Goodman: Council Member Griffith?

>>Griffith: thank you. Mr. Stone, the reason we needed to have this conversation is because there are stacks, literally stacks of e-mails, faxes, letters, phone calls about this situation, about the two proposers. And I have several questions that I think could help us through this, I hope so. First of all, have we done our study -- I know we intended to do several years ago on the carrying capacity of the lake? how many boats can that lake handle? I understand that it's almost like a road study. There's carrying capacity for peak, for off peak. I know we intended to do that study. Has it happened?

>> I don't believe so. No, it hasn't.

>>Griffith: the reason this is probably the critical question in terms of this is there's a great deal of interest among the public for both of these operations and both of these organizations. I know that since the mid '80's when the rowing concession first started, a community has come into being around that rowing concession, a group of friends and compadres who see each other and relate to each other around that particular place on the lake and that opportunity and those particular individuals. And that's something that's at risk here. Is there a way that we could do both of them so that the established community can stay together and so that the offerings to the public through this expanded service can also go forward?

>> Council Member, we can definitely look into that and to the possibility of doing something like that? [applause]. If those are the directions from Council.

>>Griffith: okay. So me this might be the impetus tus that we have needed for a long time to go ahead and do that carrying capacity on lake Austin. Do you know what -- I mean, Town Lake, excuse me. Do you know what would be involved in that? is it a big ticket item, is it hard to get done, does it take a long time? can we get some preliminary estimates so we can resolve this or what's involved?

>> we wouldn't recommend any preliminary estimates at this point. You do have high volume use time on the lake. Especially when you have some of the universities that are down and you have beautiful days, weekends and so forth that all the canoes are out. The lake then becomes a little bit congested. Those are the things that your staff would have to go out and take a look at, monitor, analyze and then bring back a report to the Council to see whether the capacity is there in order for us to be able to implement two concessions on both sides of the lake. One of the things that could also be done is push some of these concessions either a little bit further west, a little bit further east. And you're going to have to separate them because you do have some of these big boat from the universities that when they do get in the water, they cover a big span of space, especially when you get two of them in there.

>>Griffith: is there an analysis that you can do, like you've just described, and how long you might that take?

>> I think we can do an analysis like that and come back within 30, 60 days and report back to the Council.

>>Griffith: thank you.

>>Lewis: Mayor Pro Tem, I have a couple of questions. Looking at the matrix, and I'm not questioning the people that did the evaluation, I'd just like to know on what basis they did the evaluation. One is the safety plan. What safety issues have we had with the -- because I'm looking at a -- well, almost 2.1 --2.4 difference in the points, so if you have someone that hadn't been operating and then you have someone that's been operating for 10 years or so, I mean, unless we've had some -- have we had any safety problems?

>> at this point there's been no reported accidents that we know of, but when we grade the two rfp's against each other, the proposals, we don't take into consideration the committee that's formed -- the committee that's formed does not take into consideration past performance. What's taken into consideration is what is presented to us so we get apples to apples. Past performance does not play into that. It's what are you going to do in the next five or 10 years of your contract if you're awarded it.

>>Lewis: okay. So that brings up the other question, personnel qualifications. So the person that can write the best qualification is the one that gets the most points is basically what you're saying. Because we don't know the performance of a person that have never performed, so whoever writes the best qualifications is the one that we pick.

>> Yes, sir. You always run that risk any time you hire somebody or hire a firm to do something if they fulfill what they say they're going to do. We can do background checks. If the Council awards it today and we will further work out the contract and make sure what is in the proposal is true.

>>Lewis: all right. That's all I have. Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

>>Goodman: we have 28 people signed up, but as I flip among the cards, I did not see one for the chair of the parks board. Did you sign one? could I prevail upon you, if I can put you on the spot. Could you give us just a three-minute or so kind of overview of how concessions are allocated and kind of the process so that we're sure we know what the process is?

>> well, as you know, we did submit to you and you approved a new concession policy which will probably be done again due to some things that are getting ready to happen. If there's a need to change some of those things, then we will need to look at those. The process that we went through is that there are two members from the parks board, two members from the environmental board and two members from -- there was staff there from purchasing, I guess it is, and parks staff. We went over the proposals. It was not -- there was only one representative from the environmental board and one person who was myself representing the parks department and the rest of it were staff people. We looked over the proposals, the rowing dock was the stronger proposal. We went through it for -- for Mr. Lewis, we looked at the differences in some of those as far as the safety issue was concerned, how they were going to handle handicapped people and so forth. There are some very fine lines there. So that was done more in the second meeting than it was in the first meeting. The recommendation was there. It went back. There was some clarification that definitely needed to be done as far as this was concerned and we sent it back to them with clarification on -- to both of the proposers and they went through it and responded and we met again and again the rowing dock came out on top with their proposal. And I don't know what else you would like to know. I don't know how specific I should get on this because I know some of this is proprietary information, but we did look at the two proposals, contrast what they offered for safety and then the rowing dock again was the stronger recommended. What they were going to do was much stronger, what they said they would do for handicap was much stronger in their presentation. Again, go back to what jay says, we will see that that is add tiered hooerd to by the contract o. O. Adhered to by the contract. I don't know if that helps you any.

>>Goodman: it did help me and I wanted to be sure we all knew because simply because a vendor has a contracted with the City doesn't mean that's a gairn fee forever and ever.

>> Right.

>>Goodman: we have competitions and we have bids and we look at who has the best response and we do on indication give it to them.

>> Exactly. That's why it was sent out again.

>>Goodman: Council Member Griffith?

>>Griffith: right. Ms. Castle berry, certainly safety is all of our top priority. In your deliberations, did you consider doing some research to see what the carrying capacity of the lake might be with safety in mind not only for these two concessions but for all of the users of the lake?

>> we have been talking about those kinds of issues kind of off and on. We've definitely focused more on the lake Austin issues. Town lake, I think it's beginning to be apparent to us that there's a lot more usage and I think it's just beginning to dawn on us that we need to start talking about those issues. I think very definitely we ought to -- if we're offering -- because I know, I have been out there and I have seen how many. The universities have their long, long both out there and others have their boats out there. The canoes are out there. We will be adding to it with rowing dock a very fun kind of thing with the paddle boats and you still learn some of our things, but those are things that we thought could increase the revenue by offering something that people didn't have to pay 100 or more dollars to learn how to do a sculling boat. We felt it needed to be more accessible. I think that anything on the lake needs to be accessible to people.

>>Griffith: and that's certainly a priority too. The parks director suggested the possibility of perhaps separating the concessions and not having them in such a proximity that they could -- that would give each other a hard time.

>> Well, you know, we do have what's going on at the hotel, which is further west, and we do have -- this is east. And I think we're about as far east as we can possibly go without being a problem because tom miller, there are guys who have been known to go fishing there. Right now it's not available. But I'm thinking that -- I don't have an opinion about whether we can handle three. My feeling is that I don't see how we can do it unless you go way down, way east. And I'm not real sure there's a group of people from the greater East Austin youth area that are very interested in doing this kind of rowing. It's a possibility, but I don't know how much walk traffic you would get from that area to do that. The lessons for sculling are ultimately fairly good price and it could take awhile because it's a process of getting you into the water and from what I understand.

>>Griffith: certainly affordability is an issue as well as en trep nature yal opportunities, but safety being number one.

>> Right. At this point I would suggest -- my feeling is no, I don't think we could handle three, but I think if we studied it, there is a potential for offering that, though there are other activities that might be interested, though we haven't received any others, there's a possibility that other activities might want to come in because you've got canoes. You've got two sculling, plus the paddle both.

>> Now the Town Lake comprehensive plan envisions several other concessions in the basin area and that would certainly expand the uses too, so numerous concessions, rented al concessions, have ever since the Town Lake apprehensive plan was Written then envisioned. I'm just wondering if we really have to limit it this much.

>> I don't know. I don't know. Of course, as you know, we are now working on the town lake -- the auditorium -- the property, the palmer property. The Town Lake going plan is going and we're going to be in a charrette session next week. And there may be some opportunities that are going to be talked about there.

>>Griffith: do you think your board would be interested in studying with the director of the carrying capacity --.

>> The and a half yaition committee is a good committee.

>>Griffith: that would be a good place for that.

>> I think it would be a great place for it. I don't think it's part of the mandate, but I think Town Lake would fall under or a study of Town Lake would fall into that.

>>Griffith:.

>>Griffith: it sounds reasonable. I think it would be important for us and bairveg information for us to have in the same way that you study a road or a street in terms of capacity and safety.

>> If by developing the town lake area we start bringing more people into that area, it's going behoov he what's going to happen, if anything going to happen in that area.

>>Griffith: it seems to be heading that way, more folks on the same water.

>> I agree.

>>Griffith: thank you.

>>Goodman: are there any other questions? from the Council Members? thank you very much. Okay. What I'm going to do is read out the first four names and everybody gets three minutes. If you want to give your three minutes to someone else, who needs aittles longer, you can, but you need to physically be here to be able to do that. And there are two speakers, so as I read out the first four names, you can go close to wherever so that there doesn't need to be a lot of time in between waiting for other speakers to come to the podium. John l. Hixson. Christian nixon. Russell norberg and todd --. [Inaudible].

>>Goodman: thank you. Go ahead.

>> Hi, I'm John hickson and hello everyone. I signed up against this item on the agenda, but maybe I should have signed up for and against because I really don't want to be saying that having another rowing concession on the lake is a bad thing. I think maybe that is what needs to happen. There are a lot of people that really want the things to stay the way they are. They would like to keep them on the lake and there are a lot of people or apparently a lot of people who want to have the rowing dock on the lake. It's my understanding that the major difference between the two proposals is that the rowing dock wants to include more people on the lake. My thought on that is why not include everybody on the lake, let everybody have what they want. If congestion is a problem, I think there's some solutions that can be -- could be made to resolve that as far as, you know, I know like on the weekends when it's really crowded on the lake around the lamar bridge where all the canoers team to be, I go the other way. There are some relatively simple solutions there. I hope that you understand that the people that are going to speak today probably are going to be pretty passion nated about what they say. I know I am. I've been in this for about seven months. I've never felt so included in and part of something before because that is the feeling that people get when they go there. There may be some people that don't get that feeling and have other opinions about it, but I'm sure that every one of you are aware that you ant please everyone all the time and you can't always make a decision that everyone is going to like, but I think here with this decision, I think you can please a lot of people or more people if you let everyone have their place on the lake or have what they want on the lake so that more people can actually use the lake and use the park. Thank you.

>>Goodman: thank you. Christian lip ton? and let me reiterate. This is another podium here. Mr. Norburg is there. And -- Mr. Burger is there. And russell norburg is the other speaker.

>> Thank you. And for your information, Mr. -- Councilmember Lewis, the rowing dock is operating off the Austin rowing club on Town Lake. And I really appreciate Council Member Griffith, your recognizing that we are a family atmosphere, we are a close knit group of people that enjoy being around one another and we really want to keep that. And the director, I really like your idea of having another concession, possibly east of I-35. I've yet to see hardly anyone use that area of the lake and especially given the size of the pontoon boats, I think that would be a perfect lotion location to put them. I am, of course, in support of keeping la verone on the lake. Mainly what I wanted to express is the frustration that this whole process has been both for the biters and stited as well. I feel like I've needed a self help book to understand the communication of the City. Something along the lines of the City is from mars, the bidders are from venus. It felt like communication in a dysfunctional family where the bidder has to decide what the City means. Not by what it says, but what it's thinking when it says what it says or by what someone else said in the past that led for the City to feel a certain way when it says what it says. I submit to you that unclear communication happens when you don't clearly state what you want and how you want it done. And I feel this is what's happened in this bid process. In this case it turns out that what the City actually wants is more boats available on a rental basis by people who don't have to be trained and that is a great idea. Unfortunately, it was not asked for in the rfp. I really think that we're all smart enough that if we're asked to provide something, we don't deliberately ily provide another. Rentals are great. I think it's great to provide them only if safety isn't compromised. One of the reasons for the instruction in sculling is that you're rowing backwards. You can't see where you're going. You have oars that are about 12 feet long and you've got a sliding seat. So you kind of need to know what you're doing so you don't run into someone or have someone run into you. What the City did ask for in the qo for clarification was how the bidders planned to increase public interest and participation in rowing, specifically with regard to dock improvement, building improvement, etcetera. What la verone did plan to do was more clinics in use, added programs for Texas school for the deaf, but this didn't doesn't seem to be what the city was talking about. When the City was an fronted in an appeal process regarding the lack of specificity in the rfp, what la verone was told based on the public hearing back in may, we should have known what the citizens wanted. Since I was a late comer to this process, I decided to look at the minutes and out of all the speakers there are six people who are not actual bidrs for the rowing dock who spoke in favor of. [Buzzer]. Thanks. [One moment, please] and we can continue to make changes that will please the City and the citizens, but they need to be specified. They need to be asked for clearly. So I have to ask why the City really wants to remove a woman from business, someone who has been a City partner for ten years, someone who has taught over 6,000 Austinites how to row, someone who has never received a public complaint, never had a safety problem, someone who is making improvements to the concession despite having to read the minds of the City to know what to want, someone who has taught blind beam how to row, people with prosthetics, someone who was a united states certified coach and has three other -- one pre olympic coachs, two others on their way to trying out for the olympics. With all that going on, I ask if you really want to change that. I would urge the City to look into the possibility of adding a second rowing concession or actually a third if you count the Austin rowing club, possibly east of I-35, give that area a boost, get people using that part of the lake and provide everything that the citizens want. If you are unwilling to do that then I at least recommend that you stay with the current concession, la verone, and if all else fails, then I would ask the City to learn how to communicate openly and clearly so that the next bidding process isn't full of so many misconceptions. Thanks.

>>Goodman: thank you very much. [Applause].

>>Goodman: I guess Mr. Norberg left. Is that so? okay. Mr. Burger, if you would come up. He did leave a message on the back of the card and I'll read that in a second. The following speakers are sam field -- is he here? William gordon. Henry hellman, maybe. And peter eastwood. So if you all would get ready, Mr. Burger, please.

>> Good afternoon. First I want to make it very clear that I stand here before you this afternoon against this resolution because this resolution allows for the loss of one of Austin's greatest treasures and that is the la verone rowing club. Seemingly the board thinks that offering the public the opportunity to row a pontoon after 15 minutes of instruction is preferable to offering the public a recreational scull after one hour of instruction. To think that offering a larger and less maneuverable vessel with less instruction on a small lake that is already congested is absurd. Town lake is widely known across the nation as one of the best places to row. We do not want to stand in the way of this. Many college teams come to Austin specifically to row on Town Lake. Olympic hopefuls come here to row on Town Lake. And does -- I ask does the City of Austin really want to put pontoons in their way? the university of Texas crew team as well as our recreational rowers have already experienced the frustration when canoers travel across the path. The idea of putting these rowers, the pontoons on the lake, navigated by people with only 15 minutes of instruction simply does not make sense. It would not make sense to take away the current sculling concession. La verone has taught around 6,000 people to scull and is implementing expansion programs. They have worked with the Texas school for to blind to teach the blind to scull and is currently working with the Texas school for the deaf. La verone has taught young, old, young, small and novice rowers, they were specialized youth programs, nationally competitive instruck ters and they have become a valued part of Austin culture over the years and marie is an Austin personality who is known and loved by the many people who enjoy the trail around town lake. I would like to tell you so much that is in my background to let you know how strongly I feel about this issue. I never came to even even though I grew up in magnolia, Texas, until I went to college and was on the rowing team for the university of kansas. I and many others like me come here specifically for the sort of sculling that is offered by the la verone rowing club. When I came here, I saw a blurb in the paper, I went to la verone. Because of the accessibility and openness of ma rear and her club it became the place for me and many of my family members to experience rowing for themselves for if first time. This would not have been possible without ann marie and the openness which she extended her arms to me and my family. When I first came here after traveling in europe I was low on funds, I worked out a program with ann marie exchanging rowing lessons that I gave using my experience in college to row for the privilege and the opportunity to row with her and use her sculling equipment. I want you to realize --. [Buzzer sounds].

>>Goodman: can you do it --

>> I can have one minute? okay. I simply want to reiterate for the board that a decision against la verone rowing club and the sculling that that offers is a decision that does not reflect the -- that town lake is a sculling friendly lake, that Town Lake is not only one of the City's greatest resources but one of the state's greatest resources and one of the nation's greatest resources. Thank you.

>>Goodman: thank you. [Applause].

>>Goodman: that was 36 seconds so I guess we'll worry about that later. Let me read Mr. Norberg's comment before you start. Austin needs mauroing, a new concession should add to do the underutilized east end of Town Lake. There are many [inaudible] the area under highway 35 where mets park would be an excellent location for a rowing concession servicing East Austin residents. Thank you. Mr. Field?

>> thank you members of the Council for listening. I'm going to keep my remarks fairly brief and try to not repeat what has already been said. I'm a new member of the la verone and I'm geps the idea of taking the concession from that club. The reason that I'm against is I think that they do what they do very well and that is to take a novice rower and teach them how to scull. I have never rowed before, had never been in a scull, but always interested and I sort of recognized Town Lake would be an excellent place to do that. It was very easy, they are very approachable people and they are supportive of new rowers and I've improved tremendously and we're looking for a long career in rowing. I think the difference between the two concessions or the -- or the -- are the experience of rowing a pontoon with 15 minutes of instruction and rowing a scull for perhaps the rest of your life is really extreme. It should be taken into account. These are two completely different experiences and I think that the lake -- there is room for both of them and I am very incurred by some of the ideas I've heard about having the concessions exist on the lake at the same time, perhaps physically separated by some distance because of safety issues, but I just want to reiterate that the la verone club does what they do very well and I've been very impressed. Thank you.

>>Goodman: thank you very much. Bill gordon. And after him is ann marie.

>> My name is Bill gordon and I have been rowing at la verone for 57 years. -- Six or seven years. My two daughters row there also and my eldest recently took a silver medal in the spring boat races -- with her doubles partner. I'm very happy with what is going on down there. I don't -- I don't think there is a real accessibility problem. There's a number of -- as a number of people commented. There's certain peak periods when people can go row and la verone is open during those periods and if you are a rower who can take care of yourself, ann marie will give you the combination to the boat house and you can come down and get your boat and oars and take off and row. I don't really think there's a problem about accessibility. I also think that another good thing about the club is that it's got a very inclusive atmosphere. There's no attempt to exclude anyone. All ethnic backgrounds have been made welcome and I've seen people from all ethnic backgrounds rowing there and there's no ageism, which is good for me. Over the past 18 months, I've seen some new directions for the club. Ann marie has bought two new four person boats and oars. There's more people rowing those boats than there were two or three years ago and she's got a couple of new partners, math and kristen, I like their ideas and in summary, things have been getting better due to the efforts of a lot of people to improve the boats, the dock, the electrical system. I don't know anybody who rows down there who is in favor of awarding the concession to anyone besides ann marie. I do have a problem with the parks department's process, although they've had two public hearings, my perception is that the public hearings they were not interested in the people who spoke for la verone, which was, by the way, by and large the majority of people there at both meetings. I don't think they are very interested in what that community much people down there wants or thinks and as an example, people have been storing boats in the boat shed for more than ten years, but it's the parks department's position that shouldn't be happening. Where were they when this has been going on for more than ten years? they don't know what is going on so how can they know how to draw up a good request for proposal. I think that's what the problem is. As for the pontoons boats, you really ought to see a picture of those before you make up your mind. They are very large, bulky, someone who has only had 15 minutes of instruction is going to get out in the middle of the lake with a bunch of fast multi-person row boats and it's going to be a safety problem. There already is a safety problem from the canoes because they are put out there with people who don't know how to paddle a canoe either. [Buzzer sounds].

>> Thank you.

>>Goodman: thank u. [Applause].

>>Goodman: ann marie followed by peter eastwood, louisa silver. Come ahead. I'm just saying who is coming after. And libby farris. And any of those folks can come down to the other podium to be ready to speak. Go ahead.

>> Good afternoon and thank you. My name is ann marie and I'm the owner of la verone rowing school. I'm the only one -- this is a french name of course. I'm just giving trouble to everybody. They've taken all my best lines. I'm being accused of not giving access and my lifely hood depends on access and we teach every day people can come from the trail, ask for a lesson and it will be in a boat within five minutes. I have created a unique environment where everyone can feel welcome including people from the trail when they walk or go on their bicycle can even stop at our place. I probably know 2,000 people by names. Probably 5,000 people in Austin who know me by name and wave at me and hug me if I leave or tell me about their babies, show me their new dog and puppy and everything. So it's -- I think that in a City where things change all the time it's really wonderful that something stays the same and some people come back after two years and just love and come to hug me and everything. Especially in a society where everything is always changing and moving around. I want to mention that it's true that we do give lessons and when the people come and get the lesson, what they do is they learn the rowing basics so they do not hurt themselves and then they learn safety and traffic patterns so they do not hurt others. As a result what has happened is that I've taught in the last ten years 6,000 people, you've already heard that a lot. I haven't had one complaint or one lawsuit, one injury, and the reason of that is hard work, attention to details and -- let me see, consistency yes, I like that. Consistency. I have a immaculate record and we have about 160 members right now who are paid for 98-99, and we would like to keep our club where it is because we like it, because we built it, because the building belongs to us and we have made it and it's my business, my lifely hood. I'm happy to have no family, I'm single, as you can tell, everyone is mentioning that that it is actually a business and it's very dear to me. Thank you.

>>Goodman: thank you. Councilmember Garcia?

>>Garcia: can you tell me the difference between rowing and sculling? I'm one of those guys --

>> actually it's the same. Sculling -- rowing, it takes force. Sweep rowing is one they refer to the big boat where you only have one oar, sculling you have both oars. It requires some -- the main reason that you want to give lessons is that people don't hurt themselves. You can hurt your wrist and you can hurt your back, and if you are not properly taught what to do, you can hurt yourself, like anything that isn't done properly. So I think that people do need a lesson. In fact, I haven't had injury and I'm very strict. If anything can be said against me it's that I am very strict on safety. If people are not careful, I do jump up and down and I'm sure people have seen me jump up and down.

>>Garcia: is yours mostly sculling?

>> yes. We do only sculling.

>>Garcia: only sculling.

>> Yes. And all the people we have gotten, 6,000 people, are all novice rowers. We get very few people who actually have road except for math or -- matt or jason, people from harvard or cornell in college. Rowing is very much a collegiate sport and it's one of the best sports for people especially there's no impact. I just recently had knee injury, I should be back because it's not dangerous that way, you can drown and you need to be careful. People, there's no impact so for example in boston at the head of the -- where I've competed, several people, they were 70 and 80 years old who still compete and row and, you know, boston is known for the -- I mean they have -- what do I want to say? they have about 20 to 30 rowing clubs. Philadelphia, most of the olympic rowers come from those areas. We have -- we are thought of one of the best rowing clubs in the country. The coach for wisconsin actually just comes here and just like it should be a perfect place for the olympic rowing camp. And I don't know, it doesn't happen simply because it's east of washington, d.c. And that's where all the rowing is in the east, buff we have some great people, like my partner and coach matt who is a world champion. He is hiding. He's hiding behind his -- down there. He's a most wonderful person.

>>Garcia: you own the equipment.

>>Garcia: yes, sir.

>>Garcia: rent it by the hour?

>>Garcia: yes. You can rent them by the hour. We have a ten rule card which the City asked me to do that. It was a great idea. What it does is that allows people, especially people out of town or people can only come on weekends to row whenever they wish. The beauty of my club is that people can come whenever they want to. We have team, novice team, varsity, you know, we have all sorts of teams. But people can come whenever they want to.

>>Garcia: and you -- and if somebody like me that has never done this goes there, you give them one hour of instruction.

>>Garcia: that's a specialty. You get a lesson and one on one to make sure you don't hurt yourself, your back. We hold you at the dock until you are stable. We only let people go when we don't see fear in their eyes. When we see that, we keep on holding them. After that they go with an instructor in a double so that they are never by themselves and I feel that the reason that after ten years I haven't had one complaint, one accident, one injury or anything is because I am just so strict and I just give such good instruction. As a matter of fact, it's -- that's the main thing the way I train my people. Just the safety and making sure people don't hurt themselves. I want people to enjoy themselves, not the hurt themselves and to hurt others.

>>Garcia: so in essence during that period of instruction you teach them safety, teach them operations.

>>Garcia: yes, traffic pattern and the fact that you have to make them aware of they have to look back and when we say back actually it's not -- it's not the truth, you have to look forward. The back -- when you look in the front what is happening that's unfortunately the past. The future is --.

>>Garcia: don't they have rear view mirrors like the bicyclists?

>> it's not a good idea because it's not precise. Every ten strokes we instruct them you have to look back. Actually they do ask that question how do I know what is going on? we say you have to look back. Yes, I know.

>>Garcia: in the rear view mirrors you look at the mirrors and then you look back too?

>> you want to be careful. You really want to be extra careful. When you think of it, the little point there can impel, whatever, even the swans, you want to be careful with the swans. The other thing I want to mention -- I'm sorry, Mr. Slusher.

>>Slusher: go ahead.

>> The other thing I want to mention is I've been teaching the school for the blind for years now, we're even on channel 24 and I've done that after I had myself some surgery just because I realized this is -- it was views so bad and so anyway, I've been teaching them and it's been just a great joy. I teach them personally. I've taught them by sound. Of course since they can't look. I've been impressed even how fast they learn since they just hear and try to comprehend instead of just doing it and always have been impressed investments and have come back tears in my eyes. Right now even now I could just bring some tears in my eyes. It would be a really wonderful thing for me and I've been trying to make it my family and everybody knows that. I know the people on the trail as well and I am -- I care for people.

>>Slusher: Council Member Garcia was asking if a novice comes up for instruction, how much does that cost?

>> $55 for three hours. So we teach them -- I call it introduction to rowing. People really start mastering it after an hour. It's sort of precise. But the main thing is there's a tendency to lift so, you know, it just takes some precision, it takes for people to be actually pretty -- pretty willing to learn. You know, it's not something easy. We don't let go until they are stable. And their stability comes from when they put the oars in the water and when they just get them out of the water. It looks like a simple thing, but it really actually isn't.

>>Slusher: it takes a lot to get to that point?

>> it's like anything worth doing, you have to master it. I believe in mastering a few things instead of doing a ton of things really badly.

>>Slusher: that's all the questions I have.

>>Goodman: anymore questions? [applause].

>>Goodman: peter eastwood is from the uk and he liked what he saw obviously and signed a card in favor. Louisa silva has been taking -- says they are going to school for four months, I think -- six months? I read it in here somewhere. She signed in favor. -- I mean signed against a new concession. And ms. Farris. Sorry to make you wait.

>> That's okay. I was enjoying listening to ann marie because you can sort of see what a passion for teaching she has because you just got a lesson. I think you all ought to write out a check for $55. I've lived in Austin 30 years, past president of the zilker neighborhood association, working mom and avid rower. My -- I have two daughters who are fortunate to have as one of their earliest teachers Mayor Pro Tem good imagine at open door, whose mission is to provide access to all children. I mention this because the issue of access is near and dear to me and it appears to be at the heart of the decision regarding the rowing concession. My two daughters and I would not be rowing if it were not for la verone. We were able to immediately sign up and take lessons, given a reasonable family discount so we could all row. We have access to boats and equipment at all hours that are flexible and convenient. My eldest daughter recently competed with bill's daughter claire in the heart of Texas regatta and they did take a silver in the junior women's double. La verone is an equal opportunity get your butt in the boat and start rowing operation. From the moment you step on the dock you are made to feel welcome and valued. I have seen staff from la verone teaching blind people, the elderly, people of all ethnic groups and incomes. It is not uncommon for a jogger to stop and inquire about a lesson and within an hour see them on the water. If the City Council is confident that the rowing dock can maintain the current level of access to lessons, junior coaching and simple unstructured recreation at rowing, will the rowing dock make its equipment available at affordable fees to rowers such as myself, my children and the many other recreational rowers here in Austin in with these questions unanswered, I respectfully request that the City Council override the parks recommendation and grant the concession to la verone and preserve an Austin style, not eliteist measures on town lake. Thank you.

>>Goodman: that's why I remember libby. Debbie linder. Nancy peerson. Followed by jennifer lee and gina wilson. Are any of those folks here?

>> [inaudible].

>>Goodman: to whom?

>> [inaudible].

>>Goodman: okay. Is nancy peerson here? jennifer lee? gina wilson? they are both gone. Okay. Ann montmaer. Okay. Oh, arnie. Sorry. You are next.

>> I'm nancy peerson and I've been rowing with the club for about nine months and one thing that I was struck with when I joined was how easy it was to start. I think the two clubs have pretty widely differing at months fierce and one thing I really like about our club is it's find of neighbory and informal with enough structure to go out and get in a quad but if you want to go out when you want there's a boat available and you can do it. It's really become part of my life and it's just easy to do it and I hope it stays. Thanks.

>>Goodman: thank you. [Applause].

>>Goodman: are you arnie?

>> yes, ma'am.

>>Goodman: you are up.

>> Thank you. I want to thank you all for giving me the opportunity to speak. I'm here to testify on behalf of la verone and against the resolution. I've been affiliated with the rowing club for over ten years probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 11 or 12. Back when it had another owner even. Ann marie has been there during that entire time, has become a friend to me and my family throughout that time. I have had the opportunity to row there on and off almost the entire time I've been in town. I agree with some of the people -- many of the people that spoke that said that the organization has become a landmark on Town Lake. I guarantee you if you stop five people on the trail and ask them if they know ann ma rear at least will say yes. She is a gregarious person who I think is an incredible spokesperson for the City of Austin. I can tell thaw the access issue that I've heard here a lot, to me is a non-issue. Rowing is very much like playing golf or playing tennis. If you want to row and you have the em pe Tuesday to drive to Town Lake and see a person and say boy, I would really like to try that, here I am. That's what I did. I went, took a lesson and I learned how to row and I've been there ever since. The access issue as it involves this meeting here today, it's all been already said. We've had informal classes that ann marie teachs through the university. Anyone can sign up for those classes sight unseen. People come off the trail. You have junior groups, entire families as we've heard here today. As someone else mentioned I'm sure there have been some problems over there as any operation has. I think what I would like to illustrate is that during this r.f.p. Process, it's very easy to be critical of the group that is currently running an operation when you are not running a similar operation. It's very easy to stand on the sidelines and say those things. In my day to day employment I have worked many years evaluating rs and bid proposals and I know how that process works and frustrating it is. In this particular case as Mr. Lewis mentioned, I think it's very easy to look at someo e's safety record that doesn't have to hold that up for skrootd knee and say we are going to do a better job than they are. I think it's real easy to do those things when you are standing on the sidelines much I also ask that you consider just for a moment that the motivation for a lot of what is going to get said here today is personal to many people, but the motivation to get this concession taken away from ann marie is business, and so during my employment and when I've worked in the capacity I have, I have really very rarely seen two competitors say very nice things about each other because that is not the nature of competition. I think what you are hearing here today, the last time I checked, there was 17 people signed up to speak in favor. [Buzzer sounds].

>>Goodman: if you can wrap up in a sentence.

>> I can. There were 17 people here to speak last time I checked in the middle of the afternoon on a weekday, these people all left work to speak on behalf of ann marie and the rowing club. Had this taken place after 5:00, I think you would have seen about three times as many people speaking. I ask you consider everything that was said here today. I'm very much support in ms. Griffith's to allow all the concessions on Town Lake. Town lake is a big lake, a lot of people want to use it so give people as many opportunities as they can. Thanks. [Applause].

>>Goodman: I'm assuming that jennifer lee and gina wilson had to leave? right? they were both four-month members, they like it and don't want it to go away. Patty polinard. I have a [inaudible] on this one. Alvin ray kantu followed by barbara endbar. Is she here? all right.

>> Good afternoon. My name is alvin kantu. I would just like to say a few words about what the club means to me, what rowing school means to the City of Austin, the people of Austin. I've been teaching sculling at la verone rowing school since may 1996, and it was at a time when I thought that it was my time to leave Austin. I felt that I had experienced everything there was to experience for me in Austin and to this day I thank God that I met ann marie and the Texas rowing club. We teach men and women and we teach boys and girls of all ethnicitys, of all ages, Austinites and people from all over the nation and all over the world that come to Austin to visit to do business, to have fun, to find out what all the fuss is about here, this is a beautiful place and I would like to say that one of the things most important is that we teach all of these people to understand and to have respect for the sport of rowing, we teach them to understand and have respect for the river. Respect for the sport and respect for the river. Both of those things require a discipline of practice and a discipline of love. The Austin rowing school is made up of friends and people, people who care about the sport, people who care about the school, people who care about the river. La verone rowing school, it's one of those places that makes Austin uniquely Austin. It's one of the reasons why Austinites are still in love with Austin, why people who come to visit fall in love with Austin. I would just like to say that the Austin rowing school is a special place for me, a special place for my family and I would like everybody to consider those things when you are making your decisions. Thank you very much.

>>Goodman: thank you. [Applause].

>> Good afternoon, Council Members. My name is barbara eyebar and I'm not a rower. I am a friend of ann marie's and I just wanted to come down here to bring my support for her efforts. She is hard working, she is gregarious, she is friendly, she loves people, and I would hate to see her lose her position. Thank you.

>>Goodman: thank you. [Applause].

>>Goodman: okay, next is matthew neftin followed by ken hornbakey. And matt has six minutes.

>> Thank you, Council. My name is matt neftin, I appreciate you allowing us to come today and be heard. I think it's the first time a lot of our members felt as though they've been heard and that's been very important to them and we appreciate that. Quickly my name is matt neftin and I've been an Austinite for 20 years. I came back to Austin after rowing in philadelphia at the national training center which ann marie spoke about. I came back, have gotten involved in rowing and now become a partner with ann marie, which is a club at la verone, the place where I worked when I was training. I didn't have two nickels to scape together, but ann marie allowed me to teach less son there and for that I will always be grateful. Anyway, although I was able to -- I didn't train at the national training center under two national coachs, I have been a national champ shun in the double, one thing I never did achieve and that is world championship as ann marie mentioned so I'll clarify that. Anyway, I would like to -- this whole process has been very difficult for everybody. It's been very competitive. It's been -- both sides are very passion nature. Just for record, I think the rowing dock will provide a great service. I would like the rowing dock to see accessibility in Austin see it increased and would like to work with the rowing dock to see that happen. What I would -- from what I understand about the rowing dock, they have these pontoon boats which are larger and easier to row with less training. With that in mind I think the perfect location as the City Council Members have mentioned would be a second concession, and I would recommend that it be put somewhere close to I-35 let me remind everybody that the Austin rowing club itself operated out of that location east of I-35 for many years before 1987 when the present facility was built. So rowing in that area of Austin is not unheard of and I think it would be a great idea for people who have a lot of money to spend to create some interest in rowing on that side of I-35 and I think that we need to continue to do more at our club and one way I appropriate to do that is working with programs like the social fabric program which I know Council person Garza --.

>>Garcia: Garcia.

>> Beg pardon. I've been working with the railroad commission. Beg your pardon. Garcia. Something that is very important to them and I think that's something that I would like to work with them to bring at-risk youth into rowing fold which is definitely an area that has not been tapped. I think as everyone has mentioned, we have a wonderful resource having the Town Lake being what it is. It's underutilized -- it may be utilized to further extent in some areas and those would include down near mopac, the u.t. Is building its current boat house, its new boat house just west of mopac. There's going to be a lot of traffic there, and I think you are going to compound the problem by putting in these large pontoon boats which will be very difficult to navigate. They have two large -- look at the website, they have two large metal parts, the pontoon part and then there's a deck. They are much larger, heavier, and they are going to be slower. As a result I think you are going to find them congregating in that area around mopac bridge which is where you are going to have u.t. Operating and a lot of traffic anyway. I think as I said, the better place would be to put them in East Austin. Perhaps where the Austin rowing club used to operate. Quickly I just wanted to mention that although we've had our differences with the City on a number of issues, sue brewbaker did write in a letter both of these proposers are well qualified. Either of the two can operate a concession successfully. La verone klein even tell is pleased with the low pressure of the club and seem very satisfied with the current structure of the club. So this is not an easy decision or easy recommendation for the City. Let's see. A couple other things I just wrote down. I think obviously the best solution is two concessions. That will increase revenue for the City. This is not a big money maker. I think the numbers will reflect there's not a lot of money to be made. People -- we do it for the love of the sport and I think that the rowing dock would tell you exactly the same thing, that they are doing it for the love of the sport. I know they already have enough money as it is and that -- and I don't think they are getting into this to make more money. I think they are doing it as love for the sport. Couple of things about the r.f.p. That I just wanted to clarify. First of all, in the r.f.p., one of the problems I had was the word sibt, which is City has made clear is the no. 1 Priority and it's a priority of ours as well, was actually never mentioned. Two things the City did mention in the r.f.p. As something they did want was compatibility with current uses on the river, which I think we provide. I question whether the pontoons would. And low environmental impact. You've got to remember these large pontoons are going to have to be stored in a place and I understand they may be stored on the dock or inside but they are going to be large and cumbersome. Again, solution may be to put them east of I-35. With regard to whether there is enough rowing or that it can support two concessions, I would also like to mention the Austin rowing club and the rowing dock have had an agreement for the past six months to operate their facility off of the Austin rowing club dock. And albeit in a limited fashion, there have been two concessions actually operating in Austin for some time and doing -- basically providing the same service. And our numbers seem to indicate we've managed just fine. I'm sure they have too. We have also implementeded two very recent programs that I think address some of the City's --. [Buzzer sounds].

>> I have additional three minutes.

>>Goodman: no, you've used up -- if you can wrap up.

>> Wrap up in two sentences.

>>Goodman: one sentence was my thought, but --

>> we're currently providing hourly lessons and a family rate of $40 per the three -- the three session program which is actually more than three hours, and a group clinic option for groups of eight or more at $30 per person, so we have additional programs that address some of the City's needs and we would like to work with the City in the future to address other needs. Thank you very much.

>>Goodman: thank you. [Applause].

>>Goodman: bob King, julie hutchinson, michelle sayers, maybe. And gram -- well, I can read all the letters but one. Eastas maybe or p you are the fourth up. Mr. King?

>> Mayor Pro Tem, I think you left out one of the speakers over here, but actually I would like to go first from our side anyway, so if that's all right, we'll put me first and then ken hornbaker I think was ahead of me, wasn't he?

>>Goodman: sorry.

>> Don't put him in the box yet.

>>Goodman: oh, sorry. Yeah. So you do want to go first and then Mr. Hornbaker second?

>> yes, ma'am.

>>Goodman: thanks for pointing that out. I appreciate it.

>> That's okay. It is such a relief to be up here and have the opportunity to talk to you. I cannot tell you how much. These people came to me about two or three months ago because they were getting frustrated with the process of the City that had taken four years to put out a bid on a concession on the lake while the existing concession, which actually a lot of people have reported unhappiness with or short comings of, continued to have the concession by default and the staff didn't seem to be able to get organized enough to even put out the r.f.p.. The people I'm trying to help, the rowing dock, the partners are here and they are going to come up and talk in just a minute, but I think it's important to recognize that they have been very patient, they won the bid because they were recommended by the staff and by the commission. You don't have time today to know all that the commission knows and to really feel and understand what this has been through to get this far. There have been a couple of protests. There was a reissue of the r.f.p. To make sure that la verone knew everything that everybody else knew, had a second opportunity to do things. But I'll tell you something else, while we have been standing back and I have not come into any of your offices to lobby you on this, we have been very careful not to try and come tell what you is positive about the proposal that the City staff and commission have recommended, we haven't even had an opportunity to talk to the members of la verone and tell them what this involved. You heard people say, oh, we don't even know what's going to happen. That's true. I mean we're all talking about something and nobody until just now it's starting has anybody had an opportunity to tell you what we're talking about. I mean I think the staff has probably tried to brief you, but you've never heard from the people who have won this proposal and now is the chance to do that so I hope you listen. I also say that in terms of fairness and process, people came to a parks commission board when it was announced that rowing dock won this and asked questions and finally forced the staff to reveal things about why they picked rowing dock, and then they have used that against news a couple of ways. They are promising to do things now and have been doing things for the last couple of months they never did before because they real ised they were pretty good ideas. It wasn't the staff had secrets they kept from other folks, fact is they put out an rfp and found out there were some pretty creative ideas come in from these people. The staff hadn't thought bit. It wasn't that they hadn't asked forgiven the other team to do that. Ideas weren't the City's, thoreauing dock's: I also wanted to say it's regrettable because the process we have been in, from what I can tell, the members of the rowing club that's down there now have really been misled that the leadership has used fear to make them feel like they are going to lose their community --. [Buzzer sounds]. And lose a great deal and that's simply not true. You are going to hear in a minute these folks are offering everything that's been there with more, better equipment, service and better hours and adding just a little bit additional service in the way of different kinds of boats for a broader audience.

>>Goodman: thank you. Mr. Hornbaker followed by jewel I hutchinson.

>> Thank you. First a little background of my rowing experience. I was one of the early rowers in Austin in recent history having come here as part of a collegiate crew in 1976 rowing on lake Austin with k state while wichita state rowed on Town Lake and we began developing an interest in rowing way back then on a resurgence of this sport in Austin. So I come to you with many years of experience in rowing. I also am a current member of Austin rowing club and helped run the learn to row program as actually the director of that program for a year at arc. In that time period at arc directing that program I came across numerous individuals who were unhappy with the current program at Texas rowing, and basically because they didn't have access. They would come by the trail and no one would be open and were desperate to find a place to row. So part of our proposal at rowing dock is to increase that accessibility, not just to a broader spectrum of rowers as you've heard discussed, but also the number of hours of operation. And again, we have offered a proposal that will not only cater to the existing clientele and the existing club as libby was concerned about, we have a full fleet of boats to directly address the current needs of that club and will happily welcome those members in and offer our boats at reasonable prices with more hours of operation. Brand-new boats, not reconditioned boats, but a brand-new fleet of boats. From another standpoint on looking at the layout of the lake, Beverlyly, I think you raced a question of the capacity of the lake, I would urge you if a study is done to certainly include rowers who have had great experience on the lakes as part that have study, experience in other parts of the country which are far more congested and compete with motorized traffic. But in addition, I think you may not be aware of a couple of things that have happened recently. The u.t. Women, which matt neftin mentioned are building a house just west of the mopac bridge. It will be about a mile from red bud island. And you've got Texas rowinging another half a mile -- or la verone and the concession. You have arc sitting about three miles downstream from red bud, and one thing I -- no one seems to be aware of, but the past director of arc is now, according to him, on staff part time with the City developing an East Austin youth program at about half a mile from the other end of the lake. So we've got four rowing concessions or rowing venues dotted down the lake currently. So the East Austin area is developing rowing. [Buzzer sounds].

>> I guess that's it.

>>Goodman: thank you.

>> Thank you.

>> Hi, I'm july I hitch inson and I come to you with sperntion on both sides. I moved to Austin two years ago and decided I wanted to pry rowing so I went on text teb rowing club. I was unhappy with my persons and I want to share with you the experience I've had on both sides. When I went to Texas rowing club I was put into a boat for about 35 minutes. I was taught a lesson for about 35 minutes she then put into a double boat. I was out on the lake for about 30 minutes on a double boat and then they felt that I was proficient enough to go out on a single. The next time I came back I was put out on a single boat and I was out on the lake. I felt somewhat uncomfortable but a little uneasy because my technique was not down right. I didn't feel comfortable going down the lake very stable so when I came back the second time I asked for additional lessons which ann marie provided for about ten minutes just going over techniques. I paid for about three hours worth of lessons and didn't finish then. I learned of rowing dock, some friends came to me and asked me if I would like to join the inter immediate lessons because I had rowed before. They quickly asked me what my experience had been with rowing and I told them. I had to go back to the beginning lessons which they actually took me off the boats and put me in -- to ground to learn off some of the ground machines just to get the technique down. Then I spent ten lessons with rachel supervise odd every single lesson. I did go out and she let me go off on my own, but she was on the water every time I was on the water. I completed my ten lessons and then I competed in the heart of Texas regatta which was a couple weekend ago and won a silver medal. I don't know if I could have done that if I was at Texas rowing club because I wouldn't have the technique down. I think what the rowing dock will bring to the City is, no. 1, First and foremost is safety. That's what we've got to look at. They take the time with their students, they are supervised. The next set of lessons I'm going to take is going to be more advanced lessons and rachel will be there supervising me along the way with that as well. So as you talk about safety, I think you should look at the rowing dock first and foremost because that's what they are looking at. They are not just looking at this position to increase business, they are looking at it for the interest of gaining mauroers in Austin, hopefully getting mauroers into regattas so hopefully it can increase tourism as well. We had a lot of people on this one from out of state and we would like to increase that. Also, I think again the first and foremost thing we've got to look at is safety and the quality of the boats that the rowing dock is going to bring to the City. Thank you.

>>Slusher: ma'am, could you tell me -- over here. Could you tell me the price for those ten lessons?

>> I believe it was $140 for the ten lessons.

>>Slusher: for all of them combined?

>> yes.

>>Slusher: okay. Thanks.

>>Goodman: okay. Michelle sa -- segers.

>> Thank you for the opportunity to talk today. I'm a beginner rower, I'm also a friend of the rowing dock. I've been following the whole process, the whole bidding process over the last one and a half years and I found it very frustrating. The reason I'm supporting the rowing dock and have been rowing with them because I think those people would do a very competent job in managing the concession. They will be open all day long which is not the case right now. I get the feeling from -- I'm a jogger too so I get the feeling from jogging and passing the la verone right now that it's run a little bit like a private club. You know, if you know the people, you can call them and they will come and help you. And I would like to see -- I mean this is a public service. I think it should be open all day long. They are also going to have a attendant there which is very important. When you row, those boats are pretty heavy. You need help to put them in the water, especially if you -- you know, like in my case I can't really do it by myself. I have a young son, he's 8 years old, he has already row odd the pontoon boat. By the warx I hear they are so huge. I think if you just measure the square footage covered by a pontoon both, it's probably much less than a rowing boat. I think that is -- is not very correct information. You know, I know the rowing dock also has a lot of marketing ideas. They've been talking to corporations to programs in different corporations. They want to have summer champs. I think they are lofrg a whole whole group of services not available now. Making that concession more accessible and more attractive to the general public, which I think should be the goal of the City. As far as the bidding process, it seems like the rowing dock has had that concession for ten years and the last four and a half we thought even a contract -- like I heard a month, two months contract, seems like the bidding process took a year and a half. It was legitimate. The la verone had plenty of time to make protest and they did. It was delayed several times because of their problems. And you know, now we're coming to the point it's time to make a decision. If you go with -- if you go against the rowing dock, which is a recommendation of the staff, you -- in reality you are awarding it to la verone or the people have already had exclusive use of the lake for eight years. And so, you know, I hope you will choose the rowing dock and listen to the recommendation of the staff and realize that a lot of effort has been made in studying the pro proposals. Thank you.

>>Goodman: thank you. Gram eastwood and let me say that patty polinard who had not been able to stay did write a little letter that I'm passing down for Council to read and she was a posed.

>> I'm gram eaststap and I'm a member of la verone and I'm speaking against moving the concession to another company or organization. My wife and I are relatively new members of the rowing club. We've been rowing there about six months. In fact, we're new to town. We came here in the middle of last year and I would just like to say that we have been welcomed at this club. We knew very few people in this town. We knew nobody at that rowing club. My wife walked down there one day and just started talking to somebody and they said why don't you come rowing here? and that's something she had always wanted to do and that's how we have started rowing and continued and we've been very happy there. I have met people who have been very unhappy at Austin rowing club bus they've said it's a very regimented and rigid organization. Now, I know the new concession airs or proposed ones for this location are not the same organization but obviously there is some inter mingling. They are sharing current facilities she I guess. I would like to say that I'm a fairyly experienced boat person, experienced sea going saler anyway as well as in small boats for quite a few years. Rowing -- sculling does require instruction. You get in one of those small boats and you are going to roll over as I found out as I went and stood in the boat and you can tip it if not done correctly. I think ann marie and other instructors do teach correctly. It isn't something you are just going to get in the boat and start rowing. So I don't know how you can widen the experience for people or give greater access without giving instruction. I think that is something that is need understand this particular sport. Cn is needed in this particular sport. It was mentioned by Mr. Stone that rowing dock will market to a broader sector and lower the cost of membership. I think you have to consider is that a conflict, marketing to a broader segment, is that a conflict with the suggestion comments that have been made on the river. How much wider, more widely can you market this concept? I mean if you were going to make it a pleasure boat -- that may not be the intention. If you are going to have pontoons and things like that, it's -- you are going to get more congestion. Added to the fact is if u.t. Women's new facility is up that end of the river, then they are going to be using that section of the river quite extensively and again these pontoons may pose a safety hazard a.r.a.. From what I've heard today. I've heard more about them today than any other time. That is something that needs to be brought to mind, do you really want these slower, larger units out there where people are rowing more quickly. [Buzzer sounds].

>>Goodman: thank you.

>> It seems a waste of time and effort to move the concession from a to b just for a change of management. Why move it from a safe, proven management? in fact the only safety issue that I've ever seen was when a chase boat, which ann marie doesn't use a chase or coaching boat almost ran over within of her boats. In fact, they rowed over the top of it.

>>Goodman: thank you very much. [One moment please].

>> I want to speak principally to the issue of the upon ton boats. My roguing experience is quite long. I learned to row when I was seven in italy. I learned to row on a pontoon boat in open sea in the middle of lanch boats. Why do we use upon tons in europe so much? there are about 100,000 of them used in italy where I'm from. They're very stable boats, very safe, very easy to turn. They can be taught to just about anyone with a limited scope of training program. They make ideal rental boats. It's important to point out that our opponents do not have any experience with these kind of boats. They have never seen one physically other than in our website. More importantly they have never rode one. And those are folks who claim expertise in the rowing business. It's very important to understand what they're talking about with the boats is hearsay and not experience. We figured that the City would have questions about the boats and would want to know how safe they are and would want to see how they do. That's why together with our bid we submitted a nine minute video which submitted among other things the boats and how they operate. The video shows children as young and 10 years old that maneuver the boats without any problem. The next thing I would like to address is the size of the boats. The width of the boat, everybody keeps on saying these boats are huge. The width of the boat is really the width of its oars. All sculling both are approximately 18 feet wide. The boats that are used by la verone for single people are 21 foot long, a single pontoon boat is 10-foot long. The pontoons are smaller. A double boat is typically 25 to 32 or 33 feet long. A double pontoon is 15 feet long. So the point is there's a lot of misconception here, all of which has been very carefully reviewed by staff. The last point I would like to bring up is in fact la verone claims to have taught rowing to 6,000 people, they only have approximately 200 members. That's over 30 times the customer base. The reason why that happens is because the rowing and sculling boats only as difficult. Only so many people will put in the effort and the time to stay there because it's expensive. At their lowest coast, once you have learned how to row, you have to pay $100 to be able to row. When you come to rowing dock, you will receive all the instruction that you need. We haven't implied anywhere, and I don't know where this comes from, that we don't instruct them when they put them out on pontoon boats. If you wish to come back two months later, you will pay again $10. This will allow people to come back more often to make this large investment. [Buzzer]. Because our boats are easier to row, you can go ahead and. [Buzzer]. Do your rogue at a great interval of time and not have to learn every time the more complicated krulg boats. Thank you very much.

>>Goodman: thank you. Raiched, you have six minutes -- rachel, you have six minutes.

>> I'm the general manager of rowing dock. I'm very happy to be here to let you know what we have going on. I have some pictures and I'm definitely open to questions too. Rowing pock dok is going to provide full-service rowing for everyone. As has been mentioned we're going to have all sorts of boats and instruction, which I'll get to. We're both rowers. This is actually a picture of us rowing a marathon together. I've worked at the zoo and the dallas arboretum and the gardens and so I have a good background with public attractions and marketing and public service and his background in conservation and a small business background, they compliment each other very well. Basically rowing dock is more service for everyone. We're going to have a two pronged approach. Basically we're going to have a membership base and rental base and we think they will feed each other. Basically as a member I can go down and row a boat whenever I want to, but if my cousin comes into town, doesn't know how to row a boat, he can take out a rental boat and we can go out together. The same thing, families can come downtown and rent rented al boats and maybe the mom and dude want to learn to row the faster skinnier boats and they can come back another time and learn how to row those. So we think they will feed each other. That's why it's a great idea for them to -- well, to feed each other, like I said. We're focused on recreational rowing. We're going to have recreational rowers as members, we're going to rent them boats, as we said, and we're going to guarantee customer satisfaction and a low pressure relaxed atmosphere. We're going have all sculling boats. And sculling, as we said before, is when one person uses two oars, so this is ideal for the recreational rower because you can row in single or small groups and also very low impact. It's an ideal exercise for everyone. The services that we're going to have actually are going to double the amount of services. We're going to have individual lessons, personal training, three levels of rowing courses, so if you come through our beginning courses, maybe a year later you had intermediate, and then you want to perfect your technique and the faster boats you can go through an advanced course. And membership with unlimited access and rental boats by the hour. As we said before also, right now it costs $55 in order to get into a boat and you have to commit some time for a lesson. This is one of our pontoon boats that we'll be having for $10 an hour. You can bring your family down there and have some dock side instructions, make sure you know how to use the oars. They're very easy to maneuver, they're loss of fun. In fact, we can teach people how to row on these boats because they're good to teach you how to turn and man your the boats really easily. Can you bring your family down, which is something that you can't do right now. You can throw a cooler on the pontoon boat, go out for a row, bring your dog down, whatever. Of course, safety issues as far as life jackets and all those will be available. And we have full ada access to the docks and to the boats. And as far as the existing concession patrons, we want them as our new members too. So we are going to have a whole new fleet of boats. We're going to keep the same prices. We're going to have a new dock and of course the increased level of service, full time dock attendant, someone is going to be there from sunrise to sun ret to help people with boits, give them encouragement when they go out, if they haven't been out for a while, someone will be there to help out. We're going to have a smooth transition. We've put this in our proposal with the City so no one has to miss a row during the transition. Our equipment, brand new docks, brand new boats, oars. We're even going to have rowing machines. These are examples of our recreational rowing boats. Top quality boats for everyone. This includes our rental boats, recreational, intermediate and elite. We're going to have quadds, doubles, singles and as I've shown you before, the pontoon boats. And here is a picture of the pontoon boat, the single pontoon boat. As I said, it's very safe, easy to maneuver, even for a child. And these will be rental and beginning both, like I said. Here is a picture from italian pontoon boat that paolo actually began rogue when he was seven years old. This is where our concept came from. They're used all over europe. Children are out there on the seas, adults, a lot of people. Just easy to get into. They're safe rental boats for lakes, rivers and seas and will be great on Town Lake. [Buzzer]. I have one more slide. Actually, this is the last side. Basically these 11 sponsors are ready to start immediately. In the past year and a half we've done lots of research, talked to a lot of people to find out what they've wantedded. We're ready to provide full-service rowing for everyone. Thank you.

>>Goodman: thank you railroad very much. We have one more speaker. William allens worth.

>> I am a runner, not a rower. I'm the company's lawyer. The reason I'm up here to talk is just about the process for just a minute. I appreciate the interest that you all just showed in the slide presentation and I suspect that for most of you this is the first time you've ever really heard much about this particular concession. The reason for that is because I reminded them when they first hired me that they had executed an affidavit, as did the other side, that said that they would not lobby, had not lobbied, nor would they lobby the City Council in support of their rfp. My commentss, as I say, are limited to the process. The Council has delegated to a very competent staff the responsibility for issuing the rfp, which they did, in an area that the staff is uniquely knowledgeable about. When the rfp came back when they made our responses, the staff recommended us. It would have come to Council, but they filed a protest. The effect of which was to put this off. Staff was -- had mut out another rfp. We made other submittal. We were the ones that were successful in the second submittal. This would have gone to Council then, but they then filed another protest. The effect of which was to bounce this off Council and to allow the other side to continue selling memberships in their concession all spring long when we should have been underway with exactly the rowing concession that rachel 80's was just showing to you here. When someone is allowed to sir kim vent the rfp process, which is intended to be fair, non-patterson, non-political and when someone -- when people can circumvent that and if they circumvent it by going to Council or lobbying staff in the face of the affidavits that are attached to their proposals that say they will not and have not lobbied the thing, it sur verts the entire process. The -- sub verts the entire process. The Council is doing a million things, running the airport, the police department, the e.m.s.. I suspect you have learned more about the rowing concession than you ever dreamed that you would just this afternoon. This is why I would submit to you that staff and the parks board, who are intimately aware of the concession and how it's been operated and how they hope it will be operated in the future, that you should give respect to their judgment, to their recommendation, and award this concession per the rfp respectfully submitted. Any questions?

>>Goodman: thank you very. Are there any questions? okay. Is this a public hearing or was it an item --? okay. [Inaudible].

>>Goodman: I forgot for a minute. Okay. Well, those are all our speakers. Do we have questions on a motion? now is the time.

>>Griffith: yes, Mayor pro tem? I would offer a motion. Both of these proposers seem to be operating very much in the public interest and have only good intentions, the public health, safety and welfare. I would propose that we direct staff to award two rowing concessions with the priorities being the safety, accessibility and affordability, and that staff identify the appropriate locations with careful consideration for the carrying capacity of Town Lake.

>>Garcia: second.

>>Goodman: there's a motion and a second. Would you care to speak to your motion?

>>Griffith: yes. Both of these concessions have so much to recommend them and I feel like the most appropriate locations can be identified not by the City Council, as the attorney pointed out. We are not the persons who know the lake intimately. Our staff does. And especially our -- the director of our parks department. And I would hope that we would ask Mr. Olivares very closely with those provides, considering the carrying capacity of the lake and find two good places for concessions. These concessions are, as we have found out this afternoon, different. They're complimentary. They're not the same thing. So I don't feel like there would be duplication here and that they would be complimentary and that rogue would flourish in Austin and that both groups have a great deal to offer and both groups should be supported and encouraged.

>>Goodman: Council Member Spelman, did you want to speak to your second?

>>Spelman: only that I would like to add that there are several places along Town Lake which would be excellent places to put either la verone or the rowing dock. Both of those potential concession airs have very different personalities and I would urge the City Manager to match personalities to locations as best as possible.

>>Goodman: could I ask just a question of our parks director? can we do this?

>> yes, ma'am. I will work together with both contractors.

>>Goodman: for the moment we do have the winning rfp or the recommended rfp respondent, so they need not wait on your going back and doing another one with la -- I won't even try to say that. I don't have any french. So we can go ahead with the one and pick up the other. Will that come back to Council for a decision as well or is this --.

>> I think you've given staff clear direction to implement two rowing concessions on town lake. And your staff will go out and implement that.

>>Griffith: Mayor Pro Tem, my intent was that it not come back, but that the people who know the lake best and know the needs best and the safety issues best would execute those agreements.

>>Goodman: there's a motion and a second, Mayor, to direct staff to enter into two contracts with the two different providers, who have very different services. Both the one that we had on the agenda today and the previous.

>> It's my understanding we execute this, right?

>>Goodman: yes, sir.

>>Mayor Watson: further discussion?

>>Spelman: just a clarification. This would require the staff to both negotiate and execute, and some negotiation may be required because the original rfp called only for one concessionaire. If they are two concessionaires, some things may ching a little bit, great?

>>Garcia: how long is it going to take to evaluate the capacity of the lake to figure out how these two concessionaires would operate? you may have answered that question while I was out.

>> We're going to conduct a study, and I would predict anywhere between 30 to 60 days so I can go ahead and include all interested parties in the process. But at the same time as so directed by counsel today, we will immediately go to work and go and analyze two good locations for those two concessionaires.

>>Garcia: the second question, for the part of the lake that's west of I-35 we have minimal amount of residential areas. You cross I-35 and you get to the east side, there is residential areas there and one of the things that with the residents in that area have complained about is noise, traffic. In this particular case the boats are not motor rised so that the noise should not be, but traffic is going to be an issue. How are you going to address that?

>> that's something that we are going to look at very carefully and possibly staying on the north side of Town Lake would be one of the major concerns simply because that is where your parkland is located right now. The south side of the lake is all private. Accessibility would be a major concern that we would have, parking to where people could have access to some of these concessionaires. That's if we go past IH-35.

>>Garcia: does it look like you would be considering areas for setting up the operations west of I-35 and then just --.

>> There is a good possibility, Mayor -- Council Member, that we would be able to work something out like that in just briefly talking to staff right now.

>>Mayor Watson: Council Member Slusher?

>>Slusher: so Mr. Olivares, do you believe there is enough room on the lake basically to handle two concessions? I want to make sure we're not getting in a situation where both operations seem to be really good, have merit and different kinds of strengths, but can the lake hold both of them?

>> one of the things, Mr. Slusher, that we'll do is we'll work together with the Austin rowing club that is already there and has certain type of needs, we'll work together with them so that there could be a good consorted effort on timing as to when these boats do get out. Of course, some of these concessions are going to have to be open to the public, but most of your competing rowers do like to come out very early in the mornings when the lake is a little bit still. So we will work together with them in order to make this whole process a workable process, and statement we will be doing the analysis as to what capacity your lake holds at this time.

>>Slusher: and Council Member Griffith, this doesn't come back to the Council, this is just administrative from this point?

>>Griffith: yes, sir.

>>Slusher: okay.

>>Griffith: the rationale for that being the people who know the lake best and know the rowing needs are the professionals at the parks department and they would probably know the four or five, possibly six good places on the lake for rowing concessions and can evaluate those better than perhaps we can.

>>Slusher: I guess I'm for keeping the -- if things don't have to come to Council, I don't think they should. It does seem like if that was the case, then this contract wouldn't have been here today at all and it would have just been approved per the staff recommendation.

>>Griffith: if we direct it not to come back, then the parks department and the City manager are empowered to make it deal.

>>Slusher: do you want to jump into this?

>> we could always bring it back in the form of information so that Council can be fully aware as to how the progress on this is going. And get whatever feedback Council might want to provide us with. Whatever the wishes of the Council are.

>> Can I say one thing? this all assumes that we are able to negotiate. I mean, you've changed it from being the concession --.

>>Mayor Watson: of course it does. And what I would anticipate is regardless of whether the vote is negotiate and execute or not, if Mr. Olivares and his staff are unable to come up with something, they'll be coming back and we'll figure out what the next step is.

>> In the meantime is the lobbying cap lifted or can we talk to you all?

>>Mayor Watson: no would be the direct --. [Laughter]. I started to give you an explanation, but no. [Laughter].

>> I'm asking for everyone.

>>Mayor Watson: I think it would benefit us all -- the answer is no. I appreciate the situation y'all are in, but I think that particularly if the vote is to negotiate and execute, it would be inappropriate to then say, yeah, but y'all come lobby us so we can spend our time calling Mr. Olivares and second-guessing him, anybody lobbying.

>>Goodman: if I can add to that, we are allowed in that con sex to call and ask questions if there is information we want, so I'm sure you have your numbers.

>>Mayor Watson: I think sometimes people don't appreciate that you can talk somebody out of something by being a real strong advocate for it, by just -- and particularly on issues like this, the lobbying is really fairly phenomenal. So I would encourage everybody to kind of stay away.

>>Slusher: we had one similar recently.

>>Mayor Watson: yeah.

>>Slusher: I'm sorry to drag this out, but -- okay. I just need a little more rationale or explanation to what would constitute coming up with an agreement and what would -- and not having to come back to the Council or how would it get triggered to come back to the Council. Because it seems like there might be a problem with no lobbying, which I do support, I support that position, but that if these folks can't contact us on either side and then aren't happy or say one -- it's worked out and it doesn't work financially for one or both of them and they cannot call us and tell us that and it has to be decided administratively by the staff, it seems like we're creating a problem there. If that's just me, then I'll be quiet or whatever.

>> We'll be more than glad to keep Council informed on a weekly basis as we move --.

>>Slusher: not quite that often.

>> Biweekly. And we have to do that to the City Manager, so I guarantee you that the Council will be properly informed as to this whole process. I think we've gotten clear direction that you want these two concessions projects to work and your staff will go out and work together with the two concessionaires so that Austin can have the best product. And I think we can go out and get that accomplished for you.

>>Mayor Watson: Council Member Griffith?

>>Griffith: Mayor, I think part of the message here is we think it would be positive in terms of the public interest for both groups to work with the -- with the staff, with the manager and the parks director and to make a positive arrangement.

>> And I think we are very flexible.

>>Mayor Watson: motion has been made and seconded as previously stated. Any further discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. The motion carries with Council Member Lewis off the dias. That will take us to items 10 and 11: City Mrchg, do you have have manager, do you have a presentation?

>> betty dunke rechlt erly?

>>Mayor Watson: is she here?

>> shes and she's coming down, Mayor. And we also have linda brady, our director of information systems, information systems officer. Irene, can you guys go and -- thank you. Are you going to be making the presentation? here she comes. Okay. Betty.

>>Mayor Watson: hello. We're on items 10 and 11.

>> Thank you very much. My name is betty dunkerly. I'm the director of finance and I would like to address the budget amendment number 10 and then briefly item number 11, which is a contract for temporary contract programmers. Several years ago when we were planning on the year twous conversion and other technology needs, we made a very rough estimate at this time that for the general government, the total cost over a several year period would be somewhere in the range of 10 to 12 million dollars. Rather than set a budget for that amount in last year's budget preparation work, we actually went in and documented those things -- those itemized things that we knew about. That totaled some 2.8 million and that is what we put in the budget document. At that time we had not completed the inventory ies of all the departments, nor had we started the y2k testing. So we knew that the capital budget would have to be amendmented probably several times, and that was by design because we felt like we would spend less if we had to wait until people could actually document the project rather than putting in an estimated amount. Item no. 10 Then is our first amendment to this capital budget. It's some 1.3 million, and that part is for -- some of it is for contracted programmers and probably two to three million dollars is for actual hardware that has to be replaced. We anticipate another amendment that would come to that sometime during the normal budget process in the summer, and hopefully that would complete most of the y2k work. Item number 11 is a City wide contract, not just for general government, for contract programmers. This would cover electric, water and wastewater, the drainage utility and general fund. On this particular contract if you have any specific questions, I'd like to ask either eddie clark or one of the representatives from iso to answer them, but in general we've gone to contract programmers for two basic reasons. One, these resources are very scarce. Everybody is trying to hire folks to try to complete their work on a timely basis. It is a project oriented service, so it is usually not in our best interest to hire permanent, full-time employees because we hope that project would be over soon. So if you have any further questions about either of those contracts or items, if you could let us know and we'll get the right person up here.

>>Griffith: ms. Dunkerly? I hope I'm not being narrow minded, but this many million dollars for temps I'm having trouble getting my head around.

>> Well, I'll let the iso representative, laura snyder, talk to that issue. It is very difficult to get contract programmers. And these programmers are working not only in the iso office and out stationed to the various departments to help them, many of them are helping on the apd project, so it is a Citywide system. For example, electric has several million dollars of that contract designated for their work this year. Laura, if you or eddie would up and complete what I've tried to start.

>> My name is laura snyder. I'm with the information systems office. Our experience has been in trying to recruit staff in the current market for information technology that there is not an availability of people with the skills that we need in particular. Also what we're finding is that all other organizations are going through the same thing that we are in that they're having to have extremely expansive efforts to address their y2k problems also, and so a number of folks who would otherwise are available in the market for information technology skills are not there because they're already being used throughout the City, throughout the country. So our experience has been that getting them through a contract is the effective way to go and we're assured of getting the appropriate skills we need for the appropriate job, we're not having to spend the time and the efforts in recruiting and advertising, so that's one area that we're able to collapse some of the cost requirements.

>> You might want to explain to them out you go about proceed curing the contract negotiations.

>> When we go to acquire particular services, what we do is we identify what is needed, what is program needs to be worked on. Then we determine what skills, what particular languages, what particular knowledge about the kinds of systems are needed. We write those requirements down. Then we send out those requirements to this variety of contractors, vendors that you see listed here in the agenda item, and then they review the people that they have available to fill jobs and they match our requirements with the skills of the people that they have available. They send us their recommendations and the resumes of the people and then we review all of the those and match the best we can the best person to do the job that we need.

>>Griffith: on number 10 it says this is for hiring temporary technical computer staff in an amount not to exceed seven 7,993,, in a contract not to exceed 11 million dollars. What are all those -- what are those folks going to be doing for 11 million dollars? and is it a saifgs to the City to do this work on a temporary basis rather than doing it with full-time employees?

>> Council Member, I'm sue brew baker. It is mind boggling.

>>Griffith: it is.

>> We're all staggered by it. Grif it doesn't take much to bog he will this little one.

>> And I brought this as a backup sheet. I'll just name thees positions that we use quite a few of, support technicians. Their salary range is anywhere from 24 to $31. Programmers who can just do the main frame type programming, 55 to $65. We're looking at business analysts making $80 an hour. We're looking at -- they're called the y2k coordinators. This is obviously a temporary business right now specialty, but everybody in -- every big corporation is grabbing these kind of people. Their salary ies range from 54 to 75 dollars an hour. And I'm giving you those ranges because as laura explained to you, when you bring somebody on for a project, it might be a three month project, an eight-month project. So we may get one company's person in for 54 dollars. The next project we bring them in at $70. Database administrators, we can't get anybody less than $70 an hour. Technical writers we are paying $31 an hour for. A lot of this stuff is having to be documented as we go along on the y2k changes, the upgrades that are being made, so it's a massive infusion of asis sentence, but it's also a very high price. Our network administrators are 68 dollars an hour and then the jad facilitate easiers being used at iso right now are at a range from 65 to $110 an hour. What has happened since this contract was first approved, which is, gosh, a year ago, is there's been so much market pressure that these prices have increased and at the same time concurrent with the increase in the prices that we're being charged on an hourly basis, we're being hit with some major tasks.

>> The 11 million dollars is for a three-year period. It is not a single year.

>> That's right.

>>Griffith: okay. And on number 11, there's 1,333,thousand, from general fund contingently.

>> Those are for general government projects.

>>Griffith: how much are we already allocated for --.

>> We allocated 2.8 million, and those were itemized projects that we had. And keep in mind we estimated that just general government would take 10 to 12 million, so we allocated 2.8. This is the next amendment, 1.3, and that is -- and we've got that specifically identified about 700,000 or really more than that is for the contract programmers. Probably two to 300,000 is for actual equipment replacement that has failed during our testing. The next budget amendment would come during the normal budget process. Right now we've identified specifically about $500,000 worth of costs and we probably -- if I had to say just using a contingently what that next budget amendment would be, it would probably be a total of about 2.5 million. But our policy so far has been to bring to you only those things that are specific. And keep the contingency ies out of there so that we would hopefully spend less overall.

>> And this says that this item was to be reviewed by the Planning Commission. Was there some reason why the Planning Commission needed to comment on this?

>> usually we have a practice that any time we're increasing a capital budget, even though it may not be a typical construction project, they at least are -- we at least bring that to them for review.

>>Griffith: did they review it?

>> yes, they did.

>>Griffith: did they have any comments?

>> no. They passed it.

>>Griffith: okay. Thank you.

>> Thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: Council Member Garcia?

>>Garcia: betty, don't sit down yet. In item number 11, the 1.3 million, it looks like the approved contingency reserve that we started out the year with, which was 3.4, with this particular action we use up about 68% of that original amount. We're about at midyear. Are there any other things out there coming down the line that are going to require or are you going to amend the contingency reserve?

>> I'm not sure that I know what your question. Everything that was in the original capital budget, 2.8 million, has either been expended or it's designated.

>>Garcia: I'm talking about just the con continue jenltly reserve. It had 3.448. We used up --.

>> We're going to use all of the contingently reserve in general fund and in capital fund before the end of this year.

>>Garcia: well, let me ask the question again. We're at midyear and we spent about 68%. Are there any -- is there anything coming down the line in the next six months that would use up --.

>> Yes.

>>Garcia: and exceed the amount that we have.

>> Yes.

>>Garcia: and are you going to amend the contingency reserve?

>> in that case we'll probably recognizing last year's revenue and amending that reserve later this year.

>>Garcia: okay. This reserve is the amount that we budgeted into contingency reserve. We have another kind of reserve that is --.

>> We have an emergency reserve.

>>Garcia: I'm talking about in the equity section of the City we have earmarked reserves and we have those that are not earmarked.

>> That's right.

>>Garcia: I don't remember when we got the last financial report and how much was in that account and how much that amount was as compared to, let's say, other years, but could we get a report on that from you or Mr. Curry at some point.

>> Yes. We should be getting that. We'll have a report from the end of March within the next few weeks.

>>Garcia: the other thing I would like to do, and I think this was requested by Council Member Griffith, but I'm going to second that. I'd like to know how much we have spent on y2k because I see all these things coming down the line. I'd like to know how much this -- the whole project is going to cost. Is it seven million dollars y2k related or is this just --.

>> The seven million dollar contract is for y2k and other technology -- any technology issue that needs to be done. It is a broader scope because the electric utility is -- will be using that to do a lot of integration work or a lot of other kind of work that they have, so what we've done in the budget this year, we have coded our budget specifically for y2k so we should be able to pull that out for you relatively easily because we anticipated this because we wanted to track the technology that was y2k and then the technology that was simply replacement and/or doing the other necessary work. So we'll be able to get that for you.

>>Garcia: and the seven million actually is -- actually, that contract with this amendment gets to 11 million dollars, that fundamentally is software development, is it not?

>> that's true. It is for dealing with the y2k problems and other technology problems, dealing with software and interfaces and whatever you would need the programmers for.

>>Garcia: okay. So if I was to take the amount that we spent on hardware upgrades -- and I don't remember the exact amount on those contracts, but I think we were up to about, what, 20 million dollars or something like that? do you remember we -- we added added -- did we get to 30 million?

>> I don't think so. Let us pull those because we budgeted y2k and departmental budgets in this capital budget and we have them coded so we can pull those for you.

>>Garcia: okay. What I would like to know is how much we spent for hardware in those two contracts because we had one contract and then we said that's not enough and then we came back and added some more. And then we have the software that went with it and then we have the y2k. I'd like to know how much we're spending on those.

>> We'll try to get that analysis done for you.

>>Mayor Watson: Council Member Griffith?

>> within a week.

>>Griffith: ms. Dunkerly? I have a comment on 11. My concern is that the general fund contingency seems to be dropping pretty quickly.

>> It is.

>>Griffith: that's a concern to me. What's the healthy, prudent amount to keep in that general fund contingency?

>> the general fund contingent si that we're talking about is an amount that we budget per our financial policies that we anticipate will be needed to be spent during this year. And we knew that with -- and generally by the end of the year we're probably close to that balance, but the whole -- the whole philosophy behind that particular reserve is that these are things that we either can't anticipate or can't anticipate to the exact dollar, and we bring those to you for approval. So at the end of the year we frequently have zero. And so then the first step in the next year's budget is filling up that contingency reserve again. That gets done prior to any of the other budgets being put together.

>>Griffith: if it does get close to the bottom before the fiscal year is over, is there a way of reflen initialing it?

>> yes. What we would generally do and what I anticipate we will have do this year, and we have done it in the past, is to go back and recognize revenue from the end of last year that came in between the time we did the budget and the time we did the audit, and we would recognize that and have you appropriate it for that fund.

>>Griffith: thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: I'll entertain a motion on item no. 10 And 11.

>>Garcia: I move approval.

>>Mayor Watson: motion has been made and Council Member Garcia to approve, seconded by Council Member Griffith. Discussion? let me make sure no one has signed up to speak. The motion has been made and second todd approve items 10 and 11 -- Council Member Garcia?

>>Garcia: I think there's going to be a midyear -- ms. Futrell, is this correct, a midyear budget amendment? no? we usually do this. And we're at midyear and I haven't seen budget amendments.

>> I'm not sure that is going to be the case this year. Betty, do you want to speak to?

>> yes. Last year we asked the departments to send through requests for midyear budget amendments. In retrospect that was probably a mistake. This year we're not going to ask the departments to send in a budget -- any budget amendments, so -- and primarily that is because of the wiek issue and some of the -- y2k issue and some of the issues that the Council has had before them during the year. If any of you have specific needs or something that you certainly can discuss that with the City Manager, but we will not be asking the departments to submit any requests. They come through often enough without our asking this year.

>>Garcia: my hope is you would have told me that you're not going to have midyear budget requests because the first time we approved the budget we did such a good job, but I'll take that.

>> I wish I could tell you that. I was going to go with it, betty.

>>Mayor Watson: motion has been made and seconded. There being no further discussion, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. It passes with Council Member Spelman, Council Member Lewis, off the dias. Let's go to item number -- well, -- let's go to items 30, 31, 34 and 35: ms. Glasco?

>> good afternoon and Mayor and Council Members. I'm Alice glasco, director of development renew and inspection department. Our zoning cases or as follows, starting off with consent items, if I skip over an item, it means it will be a discussion item. I'll start with first postponement request for item number 31, case c 14-98-156, located on Johnnie morris road. There's a request from the applicant to postpone this case for two months. This is the applicant's second request. There are two owners involved in this property and we need additional time to come to terms on what the proposed uses will be. Item number 32 is --.

>>Mayor Watson: is there disagreement over the postponement?

>> I'm not aware of any, Mayor?

>>Mayor Watson: has anyone -- any wishing to speak on 31? I don't have anybody signed up. Is there anybody that is opposed to the postponement?

>>Lewis: Mayor?

>>Mayor Watson: other than Council Member Lewis. Councilmember Lewis?

>>Lewis: about the postponement, ms. Glasco, I would like to find out if they would give us an estimated monthly rent and which school district that the property is located in and whether or not the school district has been contacted?

>> we'll provide that information when we bring the case back.

>>Mayor Watson: on the consent agenda, item 31 will be a postponement on item until what date, ms. Glasco?

>> it would be june -- when is your next meeting in june?

>>Lewis: the last meeting?

>> the first meeting in june. June --.

>>Mayor Watson: june 3rd. All right. I'm sorry. Thank you for letting me interrupt.

>> I've listed the questions that you've asked and we'll have responses to that. The next consent item is item number 32, case c 14-99-11, the applicant -- the neighborhood association, namely canyon creek -- I need to change that name. It's the river place homeowners association, is requesting a one week postponement to april the 15th in order to discuss this case further with the applicant. And both parties are agreeable to april 15th. Item 33, case c 14-99-12, the same neighborhood association is also requesting a one week postponement to april the 15th and the applicant is agreeable to that request. Item number 34, case number c foun-nine-22, located at 10205 ranch road 620 north from development reserve to sf-2. This case is ready for all three readings. Item number 35, case number c 14-nine-26, located at 1517 west anderson lane from neighborhood commercial district to community commercial. And that's gr as the designation. The Planning Commission recommends gr with a conditional overlay. And this case is ready for first reading. On item 36, case c 14-r-85-337. This is a restrictive covenant request. And they would like a postponement to april the 15th. This concludes all the zoning cases that are on consent.

>>Mayor Watson: the consent agenda will be item 31, item 32 a postponement to april 15th. Item number 34, on all three readings, 35 on first reading only and item 36, postponement to april 15th. Is there a motion?

>>Garcia: motion is made.

>>Mayor Watson: the motion is made to approve by Council Member Garcia. Is there a second? seconded by Council Member Garcia. -- Councilmember Lewis.

>>Garcia: on item 34, ms. Glasco, this is an application to change the zoning from gr to single family and it's made by the church. Is the church going to build housing in that area? or are they just changing the zoning?

>> I'm not sure if we were given that information as to what the church is going to do. Churches are permit understand all zoning districts, so unless there is an issue with impervious cover, the change -- the zoning remains residential, but the agent is here to ee rehab elaborate. -- Elaborate.

>> My name is rick vaughn with lopez, felts and vaughn and associates. The church is rezoning to the single family so that vehicle have the impervious cover to enlarge the church. They're going to do some work on the sanctuary and adjacent buildings and put some more parking in, but in order to do that we have to have the sf zoning.

>>Garcia: thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: motion has been made and seconded to approve the consent agenda as read. Is there any further discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. The motion carries with the Mayor Pro Tem and Council Member Spelman off the dias. Ms. Glasco, before we go to item number 30, I'm going to go back to item number 6, and if you don't mind --.

>> I don't mind at all, Mayor.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you. I think we can deal with that issue more rapidly and let people go home on that item. What we're going to do is we're going to just pause for a moment until 5:30 rolls around. So if everybody just kind of wants to -- I'm not going to call for a motion to recess, but we'll just -- everybody take a pause. All right. Item no. 6, A report on pecan street project. I'll recognize Council Member Garcia. Hang on a second. If Council Members can hear me, I need one more Council Member. Councilmember Garcia?

>>Garcia: thank you, Mayor. Do you know who from the staff is going to handle this? while they're getting up here, I would like to make a motion to suspend the rules. This particular issue has been discussed at the planning commission, but I would like to have a maximum number of five community people speaking to the issue. I think we have received sufficient correspondence from the neighborhood. Everybody has looked at it. But I would like to give them an opportunity to speak for about 15 minutes so the issue can be summarized very well in that time frame. And that would be my motion, allow the community, not the proposer.

>>Mayor Watson: the rults are that on a staff briefing -- the rules are that on a staff briefing generally people do not sign up to speak, so the motion by Council Member Garcia is to allow for 15 minutes of public input on this item. Is there a second? seconded by Council Member Slusher. Any discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. The motion carries with Council Member Griffith and Council Member Spelman off the dias. So what we will do is we will have a brief plengs from staff and then -- presentation from staff and what I would do on item number is call the first five speakers that have signed up to speak. If I don't have five cards, then what we'll do is we'll take as many people as want to speak and then whatever remaining time if somebody wishes to step up to the microphone, we'll give them that time. Ms. Glasco?

>>Garcia: Mayor, the speaking time is for the community folks. We have had enough information coming from the applicant to know what the issues are.

>>Mayor Watson: I understood the motion and that's what I'll do.

>> Mayor and Council Members, Alice glasco, director of development review and inspection department. The -- it's my pleasure to present -- give you a staff report or position on the pecan street station project. Just very generally, I'd like to give you an overview of what happens when someone walks into our if to seek a permit. -- Office to seek a permit. What we determine is whether a site plan is required for a proposed project or whether we need to issue a form which basically indicates whether one is to go through the various stages of approval. In this particular case the case in front of you is a project that came to us in the form of a request to construct a fence, a six-foot concrete wall surrounding the prim tr of the site. And perimeter of the site. And I'll put a map up to show you the site. The site is bounded by Robert Martinez street and bounded by fifth and sixth street. This is right here. Here is east sixth street, Robert Martinez street along here and here is the site. The fence was supposed to go around the perimeter of the site and we issued a project exemption form so if an inspector showed up on the site they would know someone had been to your office and that the fence was allowed. A month later the owner continued to do work that was not authorized. Fill was brought to the site beyond what would be needed. We issued and exemption. This is the form that we issue that is in front of you, a form that the applicant indicates to us what they intend to do and the proposal from the agent was to construct a fence around the perimeter of the property. That is all we authorized. It's all that came to our office for this particular site. It came to our attention that there was more activity going on than we had authorized. We sent an inspector out there who came back and confirmed that they yes, indeed other than a fence being disrukted that the owner had authorized or asked people to bring in fill to the site. And what we've asked them is to cease and desist until all proper approvals are obtained. You have heard of the east oun Austin over lay and we will have a map that shows you the boundaries. It had several uses that are listed as uses that would require conditional use permit if certain criteria were met. So if one introduced -- according to the ordinance, if one introduced one of the 14 uses that were listed and that the use fell within a certain distance of the subject property, for example, if the subject property was within an area that had 20% or more of the area within 500 feet to be residential and was either zoned cs, commercial services, cs-1, commercial liquor sales or li, which stands for limited industrial, and met the locational criteria, then any of the 14 uses that were being proposed would require a conditional use permit by the Planning Commission. I do want to clarify and stress that because each time we've heard citizens speak before Council and the Planning Commission, there appears to be a misunderstanding that any time you change any use at all that is not any of the listed 14 uses that triggers a conditional use permit, and that is not true. Only if you are introducing a new use that falls within one of the 14 uses that are proposed and that the property meets the locational criteria which we think most properties do, then a conditional use permit is required. In this case, this is going to be an outdoor entertainment facility. Under the land development code and not the East Austin overlay, such a use requires a conditional use permit anyway. And what I'm about to put up here is our land use dhart that results to industrial uses. Under limited industrial, under outdoor entertainment a c means a conditional use permit is required. So what we had advised the applicant that in the event they continued to pursue an outdoor entertainment facility and if they were to sell alcoholic beverages exceeding 50% of food sales, a conditional use permit would be required, which is is site plan that goes to the planning commission, the neighborhood associations are notified, property owners within 500 feet of the property are notified and therefore you have a public hearing that would inform people what are going on and obviously a zoning change would be required to address the alcoholic consumption on the site. Just to give you an overview of where we are today, the watershed protection inspection division has issued a citation to the property owner and asked him to any -- cease any construction of the site until the proper permits are obtained. However I asked that the fill that was brought to the site to be removed, provided proper measures are taken. We have proper erosion controls in place and that restoration of the site is addressed according to the code before they can move forward in obtaining a proper permit. I will pause there and hope that you got a copy of a memo from me dated april 6th that outlines the information. I also want to point out that the Planning Commission two days ago on april the sixth held a hearing in what they received a report from staff that gave them the same report I have given you today to inform them of what was going on. The commission's action after that staff report was to convene their subcommittees that relate to land uses and ordinances in the East Austin area. They have a date scheduled on convene and discuss two things, to look at what should be modified within the east Austin overlay given our experience since the ordinance was adopted and to also look at either recommending to Council that you impose a moratorium in the area while they assess what changes should occur within that ordinance. Their subcommittee is going to be on april the 19th and they intend to make a full presentation to the commission on may the fourth. I hope that clarifies what the Planning Commission did on Tuesday. My understanding is that there was some ms. Understanding of what occurred at that meeting, but the memo from me to you clarifies the fact about the project and what the planning commission did. That concludes my presentation.

>>Goodman: Council Member Garcia?

>>Garcia: I'm sure there will be other questions after we hear from the presenters -- from the speakers, but the permit that you granted them was to put a fence. Did they tell you what kind of fence they were going to put up?

>> yes.

>>Garcia: and --.

>> It was a concrete six-foot fence.

>>Garcia: and that kind of a permanent facility is permitted under site plan exemptions?

>> a site plan exemption is not a permit at all. It's a form we use to identify -- to really give you a road map to the development process. You come to us and tell us, I'm going to construct a fence. We have a list of items in the land development code which tells you if you're building a single family house or fence, you're not required to submit a site plan. So what we do with this form is verify that you do not need to obtain a site plan from us other than to proceed with construction or to get a building permit if you need one. So the form is to give us an indication that someone has come to our office and a form that someone can have on the site, especially when you don't have any other activity other than a fence or a building that you're constructing. So that one knows that you have been to the City and that what you're constructing is indeed allowed. And especially for a commercial establishment, typically anything that exceeds a thousand square feet of impervious cover requires a site plan. We want to make shaur that what is occurring has been authorized by us. So this is all we authorized is the construction of a fence, and again, that does not require a site plan.

>>Garcia: the second question is they got a permit for a six-foot fence, but then I understand that it was actually going to be an eight foot fence and that they were going to fill in with that dirt that they brought in the two feet so that it actually would be six feet from where they filled in. Is that the way you understood it?

>> my understanding is the height going from six feet to eight feet has not been brought to my attention other than the they wanted to add additional footing and maybe that would raise it to eight feet. They would require a building permit to do that or to make sure that it set back. It requires certain setbacks to go up to eight feet.

>>Garcia: thank you.

>>Slusher: Mayor Pro Tem, so ms. Glasco, I want to make sure I understand this. In order to do the festival park that's proposed there or contemplated, the owners would need both the zoning change and a conditional use permit; is that correct?

>> yes, and I will elaborate on the zoning change. The outdoor entertainment use for the festival does not require a zoning change; however, if they intend to sell alcohol beverages for on-site consumption, they would need a zoning change to cs-1, which stands for commercial liquor sales. Does that answer your question?

>>Slusher: it does. They would need a conditional use permit to do the festival, but then that would have to be with no alcohol. If they wanted to sell alcohol, they would kick in a zoning change.

>> That is correct.

>>Slusher: thank you.

>>Lewis: ms. Glasco, let me ask you a question. The fence itself, the people came to my office and they said that they had informed staff that they was going to put the six-foot fence on a two -- on top of a two foot footing. But I see on this thing it says construct a six-foot fence. And how is the fence measured, from what point? is it from the ground when the fence is put in or from -- after it's filled in? you know what I'm saying? if you fill it in two feet, then you build a six-foot fence, I can understand you would measure it at the ground level, but is it after or before the fill is in place when they talk about the height of the fence?

>> let me get him to respond.

>> Councilmember, if they were to construct a fence, it would be limited to a height of six feet. If the codes allow them to raise the elevation of the property to go an additional depth of two feet or four feet or whatever, they could add the fill and then build the fence on top of the fill to a height of six feet. I think that's what you may be talking about in this particular case is they were putting in probably a footing and then adding the fill to bring the elevation of the land up to the elevation of that footing and then building a six-foot fence.

>>Lewis: well, yeah, they're building the footings first, but -- with the possibility of putting six feet on top of that. Now, whether or not they're going to do the infill, I have no idea.

>> If they did not add the fill, then you would have a height that would be eight feet and then there would be a violation.

>>Lewis: okay. So if -- well, I'll stop there. I'm not going to go on.

>>Mayor Watson: why don't we go to -- go ahead, Council Member Griffith.

>>Lewis: that's all I have. I'm not going to get into it any further. I'll wait for the speakers.

>>Slusher: Mayor --.

>>Mayor Watson: hang on. Councilmember Griffith was up and then Council Member Slusher.

>>Griffith: I'll make it quick. I saw a brochure that I believe is on this particular project, and it showed an estimate of 23,000 attendees at a festival, proposed festival. Am I thinking about the right place?

>> we got a copy of that broe brochure. It was sent to our office.

>>Griffith: can this site handle 23,000 people?

>> we have not made any official review of this project because all that has come to us officially to our office was the construction of a fence. Obviously with any details permitting like a site plan we'd be able to assess the traffic implications of such an activity and then the Planning Commission at a public hearing would determine whether or not the use was compatible with the neighborhood, whether the traffic was being mitigated accordingly and that fell within the nine criteria that they use to assess the uses.

>>Griffith: and I suppose we would find out then how many cars would be needed to get 23,000 people? and out at that point?

>> that's correct.

>>Griffith: we talk a little bit about the fill that you mentioned? what kind of material is that? is it fresh and clean or does it have some material in there that is questionable? do you know anything about the makeup of that fill?

>> I'm not aware -- I'm not familiar with what type of material went into the fill other than the fact that it was brought to site and it shouldn't be there without proper permits because it disturbs the site. I'm not aware that it had any concerns of --.

>>Griffith: any kmebl items in it?

>> correct. But if if there's more information about it, we'll be able to respond to that.

>>Griffith: okay. Does environment know anything about the makeup of the fill that was brought?

>> we did investigate. As far as I know there was no hazardous material as far as located or found in the fill. What there was was trash and debris, like concrete, rebar, large rock, construction debris. But I'm not aware that we have found any hazardous materials in the fill.

>>Griffith: are those things that you just listed typical of fill material?

>> typically not what you would want to build on, but it's typical construction spoil that you would haul off of a construction site. But it isn't what you would want on a site that you were trying to build on or turn into a grass area, for example. That needs to be cleaned out.

>>Griffith: thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: Council Member Slusher?

>>Slusher: that's all right. Let's go to the speakers, Mayor.

>>Mayor Watson: the motion was, and -- that passed was to allow for 15 minutes from representatives of the public to speak, so let me start calling those names. Susans al man sa. Marcos deleon and Mr. Hernandez.

>> Good evening Mayor and skoub. I'm ms. Almansa. You've heard a lot and there was a big discussion at the pik, but I think the bottom line at the planning commission, but I think the bottom line is we have an east Austin overlay ordinance that really isn't catching what needs to be caught. And the other thing is we're giving away administrative site plan extensions, administrative waivers in an area that should be covered by the East Austin overlay ordinance. And I think that this is an urgent matter, just as a developer comes in and wants to build over the edwards aquifer or the water quality zone, an automatic flag goes up in all the departments, yet that flag is not going up for East Austin. And I think we need to institute such a flag system so that we do not give waivers and site plans plan exemptions to people in the East Austin overlay ordinance even though we're talking about that this was just a fence. The fact is that this particular company had come to the subcommittee and to the Planning Commission with a big plan. Let's be truthful. It was not just about a fence. They're talking about doing an outdoor concert selling alcohol, bringing in over 23,000 people into the area. And I might add at the very same time, the planning commission is looking at doing a roll back zoning. In september the 22nd, 1998 el concilio came forward to initiate a roll back zoning of several of the properties along fifth and sixth street, with this property being one of them. It went before the planning commission. It was sent back to the housing and development review subcommittee in september and october. It then became the initiation of the plan. So we're talking over a seven month period this project -- this particular area for a down zoning. And yet we're giving a site plan exemption to a facility that we are studying roll back zoning in the area. There are no flags raised. There's a site exemption with staff already knowing that there is a big vision planned for this area. It's not just about a fence. And the other thing I need to question is it is a 1500 square foot fence. 1500. So does that not trigger some other kind of code also? with the footing being at two feet, which is not below or under ground, it is now technically it is an eight foot fence out there in that area. The other thing is that they did destroy the deep hole that was listed. You know, it's a historical site out there in the area, but the thing is if you look at those pictures of boulders, rooted trees, cement blocks, it is the most horrible things. It looks like a landfill, a mini landfill. You're talking about 6.41 acres of land out there that's been dumped on. When we're busy trying to change the environment and the status of East Austin, this is a real disgrace. And so I think that yes the Planning Commission is looking at bringing some changes, but I think it hasn't worked enough because I can assure you being appointed to the Planning Commission since august I introduced into the budget to look into the east Austin overlay because we were giving things like up to me, push up, the bathhouse, homeless shelter, all those things that the East Austin overlay ordinance does not catch and now the administrative exemptions that we know are not giving us that due process that we were looking for in the East Austin overlay. But since july I've been working. You can look at the subcommittee records and minutes. Since august I've been asking staff, I have put it on the agenda for the subcommittee for staff to come up with alternatives. It's seven months later and staff has yet to come up with one alternative. I finally convinced the Planning Commission just last Tuesday to have a joint session to come up with those alternatives, but meanwhile those things are happening. Now time warner is getting also administrative approval and so where is the process for the public? this is a crisis. I know it might not seem like a crisis to a lot of people, but for East Austin, it's definitely a crisis and we would put it in that same area as the s.o.s., that when these plans come up anything in east Austin, we need to raise those flags. Yes?

>> I'm sorry. Ifts looking for the time.

>>Mayor Watson: well, they set 15 minutes and you've been at it five and I didn't want to cut anybody off.

>> I'll let the next speaker go, but the bottom line is we do need to sput in emergency measures to put in this process.

>>Mayor Watson: I'll put up my hand and waive.

>> I'm not going to say too much, because I'd like to give some of my time to father Bill if I could. I want to mention again that I had been attending as co-chair of the tank farm wear neighborhood Council, I have been attending the subcommittee meetings that have been mentioned by commissioner almanza and back in the fall I was presenty meeting where the site plan of this particular project was presentedded. At that meeting we were also presented with all types of activities that they thought that would be a good thing for the neighborhood rx including transfer terminal of some sort. And at that time staff was told, well, that would be a different type of use and you would have to go through this process of the conditional use. And so this is a long-term project. It's not a temporary type of situation that we're dealing with. And so I want to make that real clear that this is a long range project that they were proposing from way back when. And so it's not just a one time deal. Thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you. Marcos did he lee -- deleon.

>> I want to give some of my time to father bill.

>>Mayor Watson: father Bill needs to sign up.

>> Did you sign up, father? put your name down.

>>Mayor Watson: what I was going to do as I explained is I'm going to walk through everybody that otherwise wanted to sign up and if father Bill is going to speak, I need to get a card from him.

>> Okay. I've been called on this -- calling on this issue time and time again and I have to agree with the community when they ask for possible moratorium on anything going in that community. These things are popping in all over the place, not only that one, but there's time warner across the street has got possibly administrative approval. Things are going to be happening, hospitalling, jumping since the action twaen by the Council on several issues in East Austin. This runs in the face of affordable housing. We've got the to lock in parcels of land to bring in affordable housing. If you allow this to happen, it would not hospital and we would have affordable housing. Also, this is a oldest trick in the book. Put our stuff up, put your house up and then ask for the permit. It's already there.

>> Mr. Fernandez? so that everybody will know, we have seven minutes and 25 seconds left. Mr. Fernandez? I'm sorry? [inaudible]. All right. Father bill, there's seven minutes and 15 seconds left.

>> I think you're telling me that because you know I'm a preacher, right?

>>Mayor Watson: actually, I've seen you at work.

>> Yes. I'm pretty good at it. I guess there's a real concern to me on standards. I really didn't want to get involved in this until I went down and took a look and met with some of the people in the community. It bothers me that there are standards and the lower end of the standards are us. You know, we can dump anything over into East Austin and then we're always kind of digging our way out. You know, instead of giving us an opportunity to -- when someone walks into an office and says we're going to build a seven foot fence in a a sensitive area, if those in charge don't have a spirit of East Austin, then we're really, we're always going to be in trouble. There's no spirit to save east Austin. We'll build a seven foot fence in a sense if I have area. Sometimes I wonder at times -- sensitive area. Sometimes I wonder if we went over to barton springs tomorrow and put a -- said we're going to build a seven foot fence whether there would be clam mer. There would be all kinds of clammer. And so that's the first thing is the standard. I would like to see a moratorium on so that we could really finalize the overlay. So that these things wouldn't happen. You know, people just walk in and take the land. We found out today, time warner is now got together 12,000 square feet of east Austin land to put up -- they may not call it a warehouse, but when you have a 12,000 square foot building with four people working in it, it sounds like a warehouse to me. It may not be, but you know it sounds like a warehouse to me. When we had the problem on east 11th and 12th street, Mayor, you suggested that we sit down as communities and talk this thing out. And that the community have an input. And we sat down and we debated and we discussed and we cried. There was a tremendous amount of tears. But they were concerned about that community. The result is an excellent project, the ara project. Why? because everybody in that community is involved. Everybody. No decisions are made without going influence the community. They meet every -- through the community. They meet every month regularly, community people. And it's going to be one of the model projects in this city. Why is it in our section of East Austin we get administrative site plans and we get exemption from site plans. We get everything and then we found out at the end that these things are happening. How could anybody give a site plan to guys walking around with a sheet of paper saying we're going to put 600,000 people down sixth street from may to december. We're going to build a venue that's going to seat 23,000 people and when we talked about the schools, we were told, oh, the children, they're not in school at nighttime. No, they're in bed in their homes down around the corner. The fact that who's going to clean it up afterwards, where's the traffic study, where's the environmental study, where is the ee kolg study. Nothing. This guy is floating this information around and then they're quoting the church and that's why I'm so angry. All of a sudden we get this thing in the mail that the churches can benefit from this wonderful thing. We can go down and we can station cars. We can park cars and we can make money from parking cars down at their venue. Isn't that nice? I don't need them to tell me how to make money. No church over there needs that. We don't need people from the outside coming in and telling us that they can misuse our hand and destroy the noise level of the community and put up anything they want to and drag in earth from God knows where and dump in in east Austin and tell us that it's okay and walk into my office and tell me that they're such wonderful people. Something's wrong someplace. So, you know, you guys all know me. I don't get hot too often, but this one has got me hot. It's an insult to us. I read, Mayor Watson, your letter on racism. Excellent document. Excellent document. You ought to be congratulated on for it, but that is exactly what it is. When hispanic people are totally ignored for economic development at any cost, especially at the cost of human beings, that's racism. It's subtle, it's horrible, it's hurting, it's debilitating and it's very insulting to the people who have lived and sweated there all their lives. So I ask you, please, let's have a moratorium until we get some of these things grounded out and let's get rid of this altogether. Please. Thank you. [One moment, please] if you drive around, you can see the nightmare of parking around the frank erwin center. Can you imagine 22,000 people coming to this area? there is no parking. There's going to be a lot of offsite parking and intrusion into the neighborhood. Another thing, one of the things that the inspector mentioned to me was that it was very -- they didn't have a mechanism to identify this particular work that was being done because they were real short on staff. But how is it ironic that we receive a lot of calls from homeowners that are trying to build only a porch where a site inspector has gone and red tagged that home. Yet we have a seven acre open land and inspectors drive by and we don't see any action. So again I ask you to please initiate a moratorium and strengthen the ordinance of the East Austin overlay so that it will protect east Austin, thank you, Mayor.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you, Mr. Fernandez. Mr. Shoemaker also signed up, tom knobloc signed up to speak. That concludes the 15 minutes. I will recognize Council Member Garcia.

>> Thank you, Mayor, what we wanted to do, like I indicated on the motion to suspend the rules, we usually don't have speakers when we are having a report. We suspended the rules to allow the community to speak, that was the only -- that was the scope of my motion to suspend the rules. I would like to see if staff can address the issues with regard to environmental assessment and to -- to the situation with regard to the red tagging and the issue with regard to the fill, the unclean fill that came there. Can we have a report on those issues?

>> yes, Council Member Garcia. What I will let you know is that what we have done is we issued a citation to the owner, that was ignored. The first time. The second time another citation was presented to the owner and we are proceeding to municipal court to proceed with filing of a misdemeanor on this project because our citation was ignored. We have let them know that we would like for the applicant to submit a site plan, a conditional use permit for the outdoor entertainment and to also address the removal of the fill from the site and also provide proper restoration to the site. That's what the letter of citation that's gone out to them has specified. We will work with them to make sure that the restoration is properly done, not to damage vegetation on the site. And I'm -- I have a copy of the citation here with me. And that's where we are with that. Does that address your --.

>>Garcia: with regard to the request that is being made by the neighborhood for a moratorium, what would that entail? we would have to pass an ordinance to issue a moratorium for that specific piece of land until we get a better grasp of what's going on? you know, I don't understand, you know, what needs to be done. The exemption was granted for the fence.

>> Correct. I want to clarify that the exemption, which is simply for the fence, not for anything else, we made it very clear to the -- the owner of the property or the applicant, whoever is intending to develop it here, to have the entertainment project that they are proposing requires a detailed conditional use permit, site plan which goes to the Planning Commission. So the site plan exemption was to allow them to do a fence, if someone were to come to our office to build a single family house, we give them the same form that allows them to pull a building permit if they are building a house. If you are building a do you Mrek the same thing. The reason is if for example you are building a single family house in the floodplain which is prohibited, we require the proper measures to be taken. If you are going beyond the scope of, for example, you have an existing business and you are adding to that business, if you are adding less than a thousand square feet of addition or impervious cover or parking, then we -- all we look at is to make sewer that you have met the minimum requirements, but you do not trigger a site plan. The ordinance requires that whenever you propose an addition of a thousand square feet or more to an exiting development that would require a site plan that you would trigger that refresh my memory. But if you are doing anything else that is listed in the ordinance, you are exempt from having to submit a site plan. That has been an area of misunderstanding for the last nine years since the land development code was adopted. The form we issue is to recognize that you do not need to obtain another approvals other than what you have indicated. And I would like to just let Council know, also, the time warner switching station that has been mentioned does not fall under the purview of the East Austin overlay. It is not a use that is governed under the 14 uses I have stated. It's a use that is under communication services facility and at this point all we have is a site plan that shows you a footprint of a building. Until we get a building perm that might show us whether it's a warehouse or not a communication facility, we cannot indicate to the contrary that what the applicant has given us that indeed a warehouse. So if we get more information that indicates something more than a warehouse, then we will certainly determine that it's a warehouse use and therefore that would require a conditional use permit. So staff is well trained on what the East Austin overlay requires, staff is sensitive to the East Austin issues and staff is very aware of cases that would trigger conditional use perm. I wanted the community to be aware of it, that we are not ignoring East Austin.

>>Garcia: with regard to the -- that issue of time warner, you are saying that the use that they are proposing is allow under the East Austin overlay?

>> it is not one that requires a conditional use permit under the East Austin overlay. It is not one of the uses listed.

>>Garcia: let me see if I understand what you are saying. The overlay says if you are going to have certain uses, you have to go through the conditional use perm. This is not one of the uses that's included in that listing.

>> That's correct. It's being alleged that what -- what the neighborhood thinks might occur here is a warehouse office. We don't have information to refute that. At this point.

>>Garcia: is miss almanza still here? could you come up for a second. Is this one of the issues that you are looking at in the Planning Commission with regard to amendments to the East Austin overlay?

>> yeah. I just might add, I think she brought up a real important fact. She's saying there's no evidence yet that they are doing, but what could be triggered is saying we can't give you an exemption until you give us a total site plan. Because why you are giving an exemption, what are you going them an exemption when you really don't know what it is. They are just telling you we are going to do an office. Yet it's within the east Austin overlay, they could say hold up, you have to tell us what that whole site plan is for the area before we can determine whether you could have a site plan exemption.

>>Garcia: what she's saying is that the ordinances that we have in place don't require them to do that. My question to you: is that something you are looking at in the Planning Commission?

>> yes, definitely something we are looking at, definitely.

>>Garcia: thank you.

>> Time warner requires a site plan. The type of site plan that is required is administrative not a conditional use that goes to the Planning Commission. The fence that we are talking about in a different project is one that received a site plan exemption. Two different requirements, two different projects.

>>Garcia: I saw pat murphy here on the issue of water quality and the condition of the field that was brought in.

>> Yes, thank you, patrick murphy with watershed protection. I understand that you had a question on the environmental -- an environmental assessment for this site?

>>Garcia: right. We understand that the fill that was brought in to that site is not clean.

>> That's correct. It's basically fill, dirt, mixed with construction debris.

>> So in a situation like that, what is the -- what recourses does the City have? do we order them to remove that?

>> let me explain what the options really are. The fill placed on the site is defined as development, it was not part of the site plan exemption which was issued to build a fence. So the site violated what was allowed to be happening under the site plan exemption. The options are to remove the fill, which is one of the option that's we proposed to applicant that they could do. We would not require a full-blown site plan to just bring it back to where it was. The other option that was proposed is that they can request a development permit in order to be able to place fill on a site. It is not a conflict with any zoning category to bring in fill. It is a drainage, it is a water quality issue. So that option was presented. So fit my understanding that is the owner is working towards a -- so at this time it is my understanding that the owner is working toward a site plan application to be able to do the fill, the fence that they are building out there. That is the current proposal. Two options.

>>Garcia: what does the City have in the way of recourse to get the applicant to move that dirt out of there, since it's not clean fill?

>> well, we don't really have a regulation that says that you can't have fill that has certain amounts of construction material in it on a site. It does come into play as it relates to building integrity and building on it and no one would have that sort of debris and fill on a site if they were going to be building buildings or so forth or if people were going to be walking. So it's inappropriate, but it is not something specifically regulated by our land development code. So as long as it's inert, in other words rebar, pipe, culverts, concrete blocks, things of that nature, it is not something that our code says you can't bring on to a silent. We regulate the -- on to a site. We regulate the impacts of fill on a site. If it's inappropriate for public use to walk on, to use or for building buildings on, then it's something that would be inappropriate as just a pure construction practice.

>>Garcia: maybe the question is more for [inaudible] ms. Glasco. What did they violate when they brought in fill into that site? they didn't have a site plan?

>> well, no, they did not. Because all we authorized -- the code allows anyone to construct a fence as long as you don't exceed a height. For example your home, you get a contractor, they know six feet is the maximum height, you don't come to us for a permit. Although if you come to our office, say, well, I am going to construct a commercial site, a huge site, I am going to construct a fence to ensure that if someone walks by they know we have been to the City, we give them that form that states you can proceed, you don't need any other permits. However to bring fill to the site, that's considered development and they would have been required to submit a site plan to us for review to ensure that the proper measures were taken.

>>Garcia: that the issue that you are taking to municipal court?

>> yes. If they don't address our concerns of complying with that requirement, that's what we would be taking them to municipal court on.

>>Garcia: you haven't made the decision to take them to municipal court.

>> As pat indicated the options were given to follow the site plan. If they follow the site plan it won't go to municipal court. If they don't within the time frame we have given them, then we will go to municipal court.

>>Garcia: if they file a site plan would that be approved administratively or through the conditional use permit.

>> That would be just to address the fill itself, not for the use of outdoor entertainment. That site plan would be detailed enough to show it's really a permit to allow disturbance to the site. You can do clearing of a site through that kind of a perm, also to bring fill to make sure that you are not affecting drainage to the site.

>>Garcia: Mayor, because of the magnitude of this project and particularly since it's -- since the record of -- of the proposal on this one has not been good, I would like to have some assistance in developing Council action to send this to a process where if they have a site plan, that that site plan goes to a Planning Commission and if it has, that it comes here. Because I don't want this kind of an activity -- what I am saying, in this particular respect our ordinances may not reach out far enough. Okay? and I don't want -- I don't want this site to develop in the margin in which the developer has done in the last few weeks, and I don't want it to continue. I want to see if there's a way for us -- I don't know if a moratorium is the appropriate way to do it, but I need some legal help in that respect, Mayor, I would like to see our attorney to help us on this. Since we don't meet on the 22nd or the 29th, I would like to have something on the agenda for next Thursday so that we can give direction to the City Manager. This is, I think, a very serious situation as it regards the well-being of a neighborhood that -- that this whole Council has, you know, pledged to protect and this particular development, you know, offers a significant threat to the well-being of that community and I think it's -- it really is an emergency that we need to address.

>> We can explore with the law department before the conclusion of the meeting tonight, then we can touch base with you to let you know legally what we can do, hopefully come up with something for next week.

>>Mayor Watson: while this is only a briefing, I can't imagine that there would be any dissent among any member of the Council from that request. So as soon as we can move forward on that.

>>Griffith: I did have one quick question. We have heard a litany of regular tags, violations, destroying historical structures, of several violations. Has any assessment of penalties or fees been associated with this string of violations?

>> yes Council Member Griffith. For the dem las vegas of the historical structure, the fee amounts to $88. However -- however, for -- I know that is minimal. However for not submitting -- for not having the proper permits to bring in the fill, once we filed this in municipal court, if they do not submit a site plan as required to rectify that problem, then that becomes a class c misdemeanor and it's $2,000 per day that they go past the order of the court to comply.

>>Griffith: I am wondering if the recent series of historic structures being demolished is associated with the $88. We may need to take another look at what the penalty is.

>> We are already looking into that. We will be able to -- we will report to Council as soon as we come one a legal solution to address that.

>> I think what Council Member Garcia was suggesting is what I would like to reiterate, which is simply we understand how complex this was. Very convoluted. How can we eliminate the possibility of this happening in the future? how can we just plug this up so that we can act quickly when citizens see something and get it stopped as fast as possible.

>> Thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you all. That will conclude the City manager's report on item no. 6 With the request that has gone out from -- the general request that's gone out from Council. Let's go to item no. -- Thank you all for being here tonight, too. Item no. 30, Ms. Glasco.

>> It's just going to take me a moment to reorganize my items here.

>>Mayor Watson: let me tell folks that are here for different public hearings where we are. On item no. 30, It is a zoning item, it was set for a previous time certain. It is a discussion item that two people have signed up to speak on. So I anticipate that it will be relatively brief, I use the word relatively advisedly. After we complete that item, we have two items that are set for a time certain, 6:00 time certain, we will go to those items immediately following this item no. 30. Ms. Glasco?

>> Council Members, item no. 3 Is c 14-98-269 located at 13,511 through 13535 north f.m. 620, Zoning from interim rural residence to gr, which stands for community commercial. This property was annexed a little over a year ago, the owner is seeking a zoning change to bring the zoning into conformance with an adjoining piece of property that he owns that was also zoned in 1996 by the City Council. At that time, there was numerous discussion about this property because it was outside the City limits.

>>Garcia: ms. Glasco? Glasgow yes.

>>Garcia: do you know why we don't have any backup on this item?

>>glasco: I don't know why you don't have it. If I have it, you should have it, too. You are supposed to have the backup. We will get you a copy immediately.

>>Garcia: could you? thank you very much.

>>Garcia: does every Council Member need a copy of item no. 30? Yes, we will get you copies, I apologize for that error. If I have a copy, it means that you are supposed to have a copy because the originals come from the copy that I have, we apologize. Is it okay if I continue with the presentation?

>>Slusher: do you have a map that put up while you are talking?

>>glasco: I don't have a presentation map prepared for this one unless Mr. Haijar has one, we had put it up here very quickly the concerns are because of the school, you heard from several speakers on March the 25th regarding this case, those speakers would not be here, so Council suspended -- not suspended your rules, you allowed the speakers to present their cases then. You indicated that you would suspend your rules tonight to allow them to continue to speak and the owner was absent that day. The Planning Commission recommendation to you is to grant the applicant's request to zone the property community commercial with a conditional overlay and also zone the area in the floodplain rural residential. The property comprises two acres, obviously part of that aerng will go towards the floodplain rezoning to rural residential. The Planning Commission has prohibited several uses in addition to what staff recommended. So the uses prohibited 11, also the that they comply with compatibility standards. They are really doing that to ensure that waivers are not sought as it relates to this project. I will pause there so that we can bring you back up for you to read and also hear from the speakers, I will be glad to respond to questions.

>>Goodman: let me ask you, Alice, was it the plan that we hear from the applicant and then to go the two -- I only have two cards, two speakers or were we going to go directly to the speakers?

>>glasco: the applicant was not here last time, so you would go directly to the applicant. I don't recall, I wasn't present when you made the motion, I will verify that as to what you would do next.

>>Goodman: okay. Well, we will just ask the applicant then.

>>Glasco: Mr. Haijar, you are up next. The order is the applicant goes first, unfortunately.

>>Slusher: Mayor Pro Tem, if I could, while the applicant is coming up, the backup is coming, I wanted to point out that professor bunny smith from st. Edward's here tonight with her Austin dilemmas class, we wanted to welcome them to the chamber. They do papers and intensive study of local government, local issues, they have come down to watch us for as long as they can stand it. Thank you.

>> We appreciate you being here.

>>Slusher: I wanted to add that I am going to be off the dias -- no I am not. But when I do get up and leave, I will be watching on tv, but in the back momentarily.

>>Goodman: okay. You get to go first, after the speakers, if there's any rebuttal, you get 3 minutes and you can speak at the end as well.

>> Thank you. I am jo haijar. I am the applicant on the land on highway 620 in which I am showing you the picture. I have been here trying to work on zoni g now for going on six years, I have been through two City Councils, Jackie Goodman and Gus Garcia were sitting here through multiple, multiple meetings trying to get this thing accomplished. It took three and a half years to get the zoning approved the first time. In excess of $13,000, my cost, I went to five neighborhood meetings, I agreed to covenants, restrictive covenants that were far and beyond what the City required, jariaga and gary gurns see sat through multiple -- guernsey sat through multiple meetings, the neighborhood association put up additional, additional things they wanted me to agree to. When all was said and done, I signed a restrictive covenant that is very restrictive, seven to nine pages long, we shook hands, we were in agreement. Fat the land we were referring to I am going to point to -- this was the only part of the area in the City limits. The only reason that I am here today -- the only reason that I have to come back today is because what we shook and agreed to and signed the restrictive covenant on was an agreement on the whole property. Not just the front, the whole property. So as far as I was concerned, everybody signed it, everybody agreed to whatever we agreed to. And now that the City has annexed the back half of the property, it should just be a formality that the City was just make whatever they agreed to on the front side the back side. So I am not only perturbed, but I just can't even imagine why anybody is now changing what they want to agree to in a restrictive covenant that is far, far greater restrictive than what the City already agrees to. Not to mention the fact that on this piece of property I am already losing more than half of the land in this floodplain. This is a 100 foot wide channel, all of this is floodplain. I am not quite sure that I understood they said it was two acres. This piece of land is in excess of five acres, but I am hoping some day through engineering or whatever I have to do to get some of the floodplain removed, but at this point I have been through a lot and I have agreed to things that most people wouldn't agree to, and Gus and Jackie, you were here through all of those meetings. I was asked to agree to these things to get this thing settled. I just can't imagine having to add more to the restrictions than we have already agreed to. It's already zoned for what I am asking for here. And now that's what it is. This school by the way, in order to walk from this shopping material to this school, this is going to be a 12 lane highway pretty soon within the next 15 years, 12 lanes between access road and highway. So this is not really a quiet residential street. This is highway 620. It's just across the street from the hog farm place that you all have been talking about. So it's not anything new and special. I'm just asking for what's agreed to on the front end to be agreed to on the back side, not any additions or changes to be made. Thank you.

>>Goodman: thank you. Councilmember Garcia?

>>Garcia: can you point to the perimeter of the property?

>> this is highway 620 right here. This is a convenience store. If you drive out there you will find 2,000 or so broken bottles or trash sitting along the street that the people are saying is acceptable for their neighborhood.

>>Garcia: and this land, the way that it's in the packet, it's the back side away from 620.

>> Here's the area that the city just annexed. They only annexed half because this was annexed before. They just annexed this half. There's -- there's going to be -- this is all going to be undisturbed wooded trees back in here. And in the last conversation that I had with somebody, there was -- there's always been a comment about the school. Well, in order to walk from this shopping center to the school, it would be faster to walk from here to the taco cabana across the bridge on lamar than it would be to walk to the school from this property. That's --.

>>Garcia: you with own frontage on 620.

>> All of it. It's all one piece of property.

>>Garcia: thank you very much. Sdwroom we have only two --.

>>Goodman: we have only two speakers signed up.

>> Three. Three people signed card. Another card must have gotten lost.

>>Goodman: well, I have two Charleses, Charles lowe and Charles roth.

>> We have a third person.

>> If we can get a replacement card then.

>> Before I begin, do you all have a copy of the notebook that I left at the City Council chambers for each one of you on Tuesday?

>>Goodman: is your third person tray cutler?

>> yes.

>>Goodman: yes.

>> I realize that the City Council doesn't want to hear a bunch of bickering, one of the difficulties that we've had with Mr. Haijar is that he makes statements that appear on the surface to be true, yet has he given you any documentation. The case in print, the case in point, the restrictive covenant that he said was 7 to 9 pages, was signed by everybody, I have right here. I will be happy to give it to you. It's 3 pages, the fourth page is a certification. It was signed by Mr. Haijar. I also have pictures of the school property and you will see despite his comments, that there's a wide area immediately behind the portable classrooms I also have a map showing the proximate community to the classrooms. I would also say there's evidence to support anything we say tonight in that notebook. Mayor Pro Tem Goodman and Council Members, good evening, good evening, I'm Charles lowe, I live at 9409 need dough heath drive, Austin, Texas, 78729. Meadow heath drive. I am the neighborhood president for the neighborhood association of southwestern Williamson county. We have approximately 750 members. Membership in our association is not mandatory or is not a requirement of home ownership in our area, it is strictly voluntary. You will recall that two weeks ago several officials of the round rock isd spoke to the City Council, including the president of the board of trustees, raymond hartfield, Dr. Thomas gall, the superintendent of schools for the round rock isd and romelle parker, principal of the forest north elementary school. They spoke to you on a number of points relating to this project, but especially of the close proximate community of portable classrooms -- proximity of portable classrooms to the subject property. In fact the portable classrooms are within a few feet of the property. And I want to get into that in a moment. But you've had testimony from officials of the round rock isd not just the neighborhood association opinion. They expressed deep concern on this issue. You will also find in the notebook that I apologize that you don't have, a letter from mike haligenstein a county commissioner in precinct 1 supporting the neighborhood association [buzzer sounding].

>> Oh, my goodness.

>> In closing let me just say that we support the planning commission recommendation. The Planning Commission recommendation was that the land be zoned gr-co. That it be rr in the floodplain, that there be no pawn shops and that the compatibility standing with the property forever or unless dually modified. That it not be a condition of some future zoning request. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much.

>>Goodman: thank you.

>>Slusher: Mayor Pro Tem, Mr. Lowe, thank you. Grc what? tell me again the nature of the overlay that you would request?

>> well, the planning commission recommended that the same overlay that applies to the front apply to the back half. That only makes sense. Someone said there were 9 or 11 land use restrictions. I only know of about nine. If you add in our pawn shop request, I guess that would be 10. I'm not sure where the 11th comes in.

>>Slusher: you were talking about the overlay that the Planning Commission recommended?

>> yes. We just say what the planning commission recommends sounds reasonable to us.

>>Slusher: thank you.

>> We have nothing really to add to that with the exception of a couple of items in the compatibilty standards that the next speaker will address.

>> Okay.

>>Slusher: I just wanted to be clear on that point. Thank you.

>>Goodman: thank you. Did you still need Alice?

>>Slusher: no.

>>Goodman: Charles roth, followed by tre cutler.

>> Good evening, I am charlie roth, the treasurer of the neighborhood association of southwestern Williamson county. I am also a member of the site based advisory community of the forest north elementary school. I also come to you in another capacity as the representative of the neighborhood association's community that discussed this rezoning case within the neighborhood association. And the community -- the committee came to a unanimous decision that was number one, accept the planning commission's recommendations, which included the gr with a conditional overlay, no pawn shops in that compatibilty standards be kept. But number two that has not been addressed enough, although the round rock school district officials did mention it when they were here, was that some form of noise control accompany this zoning. The neighbors were concerned that 770 decibels right next to the -- 70 decibels is not conducive to a good learning environment. The 70 decibels comes from the code that we have highlighted in those folder. The portable buildings at forest north are not coming down because of growth. They have to expand into portables, they are right on the property boundary. In order to recommend a reasonable reduction, I did some research of City ordinances across the u.s. We also included that in these folders. We found that about 60 decibels bells was about the average for cities with some cities like los angeles and some others having restrictions as low as 50 decibels for noise next to residential areas. I would also like to point out that according to an article in the american-statesman, dated back February 17th, the city is proposing taking noise abatement measures for homes that are exposed to greater than 65 decibels next to the airport. So 65 decibels is too much for the the houses around the airport, 70 decibels is certainly too much to have right next to portable buildings at an elementary school. In case you will not consider reducing the allowable noise on this property, we ask that you -- you require that a fence and maybe some trees be added to somehow reduce the noise that might come from that property. If you look at the pictures we provided, in the buffer zone it's only grass land, no trees, no fence. So to summarize, we wanted gr with conditional overlay, no pawn shop, compatibility standards and very important point that has not been mentioned, which is very important to us, noise reduction, either reduce decibels or require a fence and vegetation to buffer the potential noise. One last item just to mention in case [buzzer sounding] in case you are interested.

>>Garcia: let me ask you a question. The pictures that you have here of the portables show that there's an area between the portables and I guess the -- Mr. Haijar's property is to the left here; is that correct?

>> correct. The portables are right on the boundary. You can see it, let me show you --.

>>Garcia: I saw the drawing.

>> The mowed area is Mr. Haijar's property.

>> In the back behind there is wooded trees like Mr. Haijar said.

>> Way, way back. The mowed area is Mr. Haijar's property, also. He could develop that. The school I believe mows it, but that is Mr. Haijar's property, also.

>>Garcia: what you are saying is in this area, you want the restrictive covenant -- the conditional overlay items to apply.

>> Correct and we want some type of noise abatement because they could have 720 decibels of noise right there, there's nothing that impedes the noise.

>> Mr. Haijar will address that I am sure when he comes up for rebuttal.

>> In case you are interested, I have a little noise reader I can give you a demonstration what 70 decibels is.

>>Garcia: we know what it is.

>> It's pretty allowed to have right next to a portable building.

>>Goodman: thank you. Last speaker is tre cutler.

>> Yes, I would like to ask if I could have five minutes.

>>Goodman: you can have 3 minutes because that's what we give everybody, but we can ask you questions if you need more time.

>> Thank you. Mayor Pro Tem, and Council Members, thank you again for allowing me a few minutes of your time, I am tre cutler, the president of the pta at forest north elementary. I spoke to you all last time about some of the issues the school has along with the other speakers that were here. Just listening to the opening by Mr. Haijar just kind of stunned me, I was in awe that through all of this, the school and the pta on the concern of the kids beside the homeowners, we haven't been contacted, we haven't been asked -- he hasn't called to ask what he could do to help the school and what would be best for the kids. All that's been stated is that the kids would be in no danger. However I would like to add also that the travel or the usage of the road was brought up and as -- as Council Member Slusher mentioned last time, this is legislation on this land in that area, so that can't take any kind of a concern here. But kids do ride their bikes and walk to school. Any type of business you put there, the type of people that it would bring in needs to be a concern and addressed as well. Also in the -- with the Planning Commission, Mr. Haijar mentioned there were trees all the way back up to the portables. That is not true, as you can see there are not trees backed up to the portable. There is a good 100 yards with no trees there that I would like to ask the -- the Council to -- besides the noise level, to also consider possibly making it mandatory that there be trees and fence there as well. Also the noise level of 70 decibels I think is very high. As the report shows that you all have in that book, forest north, the noise level that's the highest there is around. Everybody else is around 60 to 50 decibels and I would like to see that brought down if at all possible. I think that the kids really need to be looked at in this situation. Their learning abilities be taken into consideration, great consideration by the Council. Also I would just like to throw this out, I threw it out last time, that the City look at possibly purchasing the land, keeping with trees and grass and donating it to the school to be able to use for play area. At the same time. Thank you. [Buzzer sounding] nature thank you, sir. Those are all of the people did that have signed up to speak on this item, entertain a motion to close the public hearing. Motion made by Council Member Slusher, there is a second? seconded by Council Member Lewis. Is there any discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no., the motion carries with Council Member Garcia and Council Member Spelman off the dias.

>>Slusher: I wanted to ask Mr. Cutler a question.

>>Mayor Watson: yes Council Member Slusher.

>>Slusher: you mentioned noise. What's the reason for this parted of the overlay, prohibiting business or trade school which teach manual labor skills such as automotive and equipment services, repair air conditioning, heat and maintenance repair, appliance repair, welding, any other industrial labor skills?

>> I would actually have to pass on that and let Mr. Lowe --.

>>Slusher: that's fine.

>> When this first began, I wasn't here.

>>Slusher: I appreciate that, sir.

>>Mayor Watson: I will entertain a motion --.

>>Slusher: Mayor this gentleman is going to answer my question.

>> I want to make sure I understand the question. Why is that in the restrictive covenant?

>>Slusher: yes, sir.

>> There was a committee at the time that gathered together, you got to think that this restrictive covenant was worked on, number one as the back property was still not annexed, we were trying to protect that property and many others that he owns next to it. Some of those are probably a copy of what was protected that was next to homes, what is what they did not want next to homes.

>>Slusher: I am wondering is that because of the noise or is that some other concern there? I want to make sure --

>> that was already restrict understand the restrictive covenant, though, I believe they are in the restrictive covenants already, right?

>>Slusher: is that correct, ms. Glasco?

>> you have that document that got passed around. I can check it.

>>Slusher: I am going to check with our expert here. Is number 8 in the overlay that I just read, I won't read it again, but about the industrial uses or industrial training, is that in the restrictive covenant?

>> industrial labor skills training as relates to welding is prohibited under the --.

>>Slusher: restrictive covenant or the overlay?

>>glasco: conditional overlay.

>>Slusher: I was concerned about the reason for that particular one.

>>Glasco: I am assuming concerns raised about the noise would be one of the reasons.

>>Slusher: come on up, Mr. Lowe.

>> Mr. Haijar owns three sort of pieces of property in a row. Broadmeade and brierhollow separate them, kind of a long rectangle divided by these two streets. There are a number of homeowners that live in the middle part and we formed a committee and theireeling was of compatibility with the neighborhood and with the school. The -- at that time the Planning Commission and the City Council approved the conditional overlay, which included that restriction. And Mr. Haijar signed it. I think it wasn't an intent to deprivate anybody of an education. In repairing cars. It was more of compatibility. With the neighborhood.

>>Slusher: so noise would be part of that and --

>> yeah.

>>Slusher: compatibility visually.

>> Yes.

>>Slusher: I wanted to make sure we weren't against training people in labor skills.

>> No. It was more that, you know, it's going to be right up against a neighborhood. And that particular usage didn't -- wasn't deemed to be appropriate and the City Council and the planning commission agreed.

>>Slusher: okay. I got you, thank you, sir.

>>Griffith: sir, before you --.

>>Mayor Watson: don't get too far.

>>Griffith: before you get away from us, I share your concern about the 70 decibels around the school. Can you tell us what's going to make that noise?

>> well, actually if you look, the request for the trees and noise, those are in the compatibility standards. This is for not something we invented. The compatibility standard says there shall not be more than 70 decibels from mechanical equipment at the property line. I am concerned about a couple of things. We did a lot of research on the internet and in fact I have contacted a bunch of professors at the university of Colorado at denver, u.t., and we've had sort of an internet e-mail discussion about noise. And I was concerned when you say just mechanical equipment, what you if you had 110 decibels from some other source. Why single out mechanical equipment because all kinds of commercial activities on a property can generate noise. Not just mechanical equipment. So I was concerned about that. But 70 decibels is quite loud, and decibels are logarhymitic, you are actually cutting the noise level in half. We are recommending 60 decibels at the property line as opposed to 70 or we were asking the City Council to consider that because it would cut the noise level down -- you have to remember these portable classrooms have thin walls and they are not really made to -- to prevent 7 on decibels from getting in the way of classroom instruction. So that was our concern.

>> What you are really asking for is a decibel cap. Rather than -- rather than identifying what could run it up to 70 decibels; is that right?

>> yes, when we mentioned this to the Planning Commission, there was a member, he has the beard, sullivan, Mr. Sullivan, he said, oh, I wished I would have known this was going to come up because apparently he's on some sort of City subcommittee that's looking at noise now. One of the things we found, we weren't trying to compare Austin with other cities so much as what we were trying to find out is find out by looking at what other cities consider a reasonable noise level, how does 7 on decibels stack up in this situation? in other words we are not qualified experts on noise, but by researching on the internet, what can we glean from the internet to tell us how bad is 7 on decibels or good. What we found is most cities across the United States have a daytime and nighttime level and a daytime level, which is higher than the nighttime level for obvious reasons is in the range of 60 decibels.

>> What you are saying is you really want that decibel level to be capped off at 60.

>> We think it's reasonable and to say from all commercial sources instead of just mechanical equipment. I would suppose an option, we have requested a 25 foot buffer with landscape, that by the way is also in the compatibilty standards in the Austin land development code. That is not something we just wanted to throw in. If -- I guess in lou of a cap, on the decibels -- in lieu of a cap on the decibels, if it were 25 feet planted that would probably absorb enough sound, I am not a qualified expert, but I would imagine that could absorb enough sound, but there's another issue associated with the fence or a buffer and that is the safety of the children. I think it would be very easy without some kind of buffer for children to go into the commercial area. They would have direct access and I think that opinion is supported by what the official of round rock isd expressed to you two weeks ago.

>>Griffith: so you are asking for a buffer and vegetation and trees to separate the commercial from the educational.

>> Yes. The land development code, in the compatibilty standards, talks about a 25 foot buffer, a vegetative whatever you want to call it, area and fences all in the same little paragraph. So .... I am not an expert on the land development code, but I interrupted -- I interpreted from reading that it means one or all of a combination of those kind of structures could go in a 25 foot buffer.

>>Griffith: would it be acceptable to talk about those midation options rather than a -- mitigation options rather than a decibel cap?

>> yeah. I mean, I am here pleading with the City Council to do whatever is reasonable and within its power to protect our children. These are our kids, this is not like real estate value. This is our sweat and blood and our flesh that goes to that school. In fact my daughter is -- my daughter is in one of those portables, for me it's a very real issue. If you can do it by putting in pine trees or -- you know, I am for it whether it's a decibel cap that accomplishes the same thing, to reduce the noise, protect the children, I am for that, however we can do it.

>>Griffith: thank you for that clarification.

>>Mayor Watson: I will entertain a motion with regard to item no. 30. Is there a motion?

>>glasco: the applicant has not been given a chance to do a rebuttal.

>>Mayor Watson: you are absolutely right. We closed the public hearing however. The motion has been ahead to reconsidering by Council Member Slusher, there is a second? seconded by Council Member Garcia. Any discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. Motion carry. Motion made that we reopen the public hearing made by Council Member Slusher, seconded by, any discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. Motion carries. I apologize.

>> I am frustrated and angry at this point. Mr. Slusher has exposed that group with a very important point and with a smile I can see that he didn't believe the answer. He sat there and read a restrictive covenant that restricted the "kind of people that would be trained to fix washing machines" or anything else indoors. Greg guernsey and joe arriaga sat with multiple meetings with this group and I and this group twisted and did everything possible to get that stuff put in the restrictive covenant because they didn't want those kinds of people coming out of the area and driving to and from. You are right. You exposed them. They don't want anybody that's not their kind in the area. How could you make noise indoors in a building while teaching a man how to fix a washing machine? explain that nofm you were right. That's what you have here. A group of people fighting to control stuff that's happening inside the City and none of them are City residents. It angers me that I have to sit here and listen to non-city residents lie. I want to see the picture, somebody has the picture of the wooded area. There is no part of my area that I own that's not wooded. You cannot walk through my land. That whole complete area that is graded and being cut on the grass is completely and total city property. If the last speaker, not the man who answered the questions, but the man who spoke from that side spoke the truth, he said there were 100 yards between my property and the building. Well, 100 yards is 300 feet, plus 25 foot of completely wooded area, the only area that's not wooded is the 100 foot wide -- I am angry, really angry. This is 120 feet wide. This is a river. That's the only area that's not wooded. It runs through the school. This is completely wooded trees. You can't walk from here to here. It's wooded. And lastly, not lastly. I am not done. I spoke to don hour, he's the assistant superintendent -- don howard. I quote, I have a I have a fax from him, they are taking down the portables and building a new building exactly where the portables are, I have it in the fax for you to read. Not closer to my property line. Where the portables are. 330 Feet away. 330 Feet is further than the back of your parking lot across the street. 7 On decibels is lower than -- 70 decibels is lower than what I am speaking. I am speaking louder than 70 decibels nature thank you very much, sir.

>> I am just requesting that you approve what the -- what has been asked.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you very much. I will entertain a motion to close the public hearing. Motion made by Council Member Slusher, is there a second is this seconded by Council Member Lewis. Any discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no., motion carries with Council Member Garcia after the dias. I will entertain a motion with regard to item no. 30.

>>Slusher: Mayor I have a couple of questions. The Mayor Pro Tem may have had a motion?

>>Goodman: I was going to give us something to start off with at least by proposing the Planning Commission recommendation.

>>Mar Watson: motion made by the Mayor Pro Tem for the Planning Commission recommendation, is there a second? I will second it for discussion purposes. Councilmember Slusher?

>>Slusher: ms. Glasco, could you clear up how much the area is wooded and that dispute?

>> I am not sure how much area is wooded at this point. I don't have an aerial of the site. We can certainly get that information to you when you come back for second and third readings.

>>Slusher: I guess -- let me get Mr. Haijar back up here.

>>Glasco: I would like to share something with you you can keep that in mind as you are thinking about your motion. Compatibility standards do require for all commercial projects that is adjacent to school or other single family use be set back 25 feet. The 25 foot is an area of no development, you cannot have a driveway or disturbance, really a buffer area. It's to remain unsdrbed, no building, no parking, no driveways, undisturbed, to provide some relief of xaitability, noise relief. The decibel requirement included in that obviously within -- if you have a 25 foot undisturbed buffer area, obviously if there's any noise associated with the facility, that there would be nothing within the 25 feet, obviously no mechanical equipment. If you were to have any noise, it would be measured from 25 feet from that setback. Height is also restricted. We are screening location of dumpsters have to be located 20 feet away from the property that is [inaudible] compatibility standards. There are a lot of elements that go into that. A fence would be required because as a commercial establishment next to a civic use, so there would be a fence. It would be -- there's a choice of either a wooden fence or shrubs or a concrete wall. The fence requirement is flexible, it does not provide what the neighborhood is asking for, that's an area to look at if you needed to provide some buffering beyond that.

>>Mayor Watson: do you have further questions?

>>Slusher: there seems to an dispute about where the property line is, at least as to where it is between these pictures, neighborhood folks say it's very close to the portable buildings. Mr. Haijar says it's the trees, I don't know if we are going to be able to clear that up here tonight. I would suggest -- hold on. I would suggest that we find out what is the exact case between tonight and the next reading, rather than trying to clear it up tonight, because we have several other hearings behind us, I don't know -- even if we tried to get to the bottom of that tonight that we would be able to do it from the dias.

>>Mayor Watson: further questions or discussion? Mayor Pro Tem?

>>Goodman: I guess for next time, too, we can make a point of the differences between the old restrictive covenant and the new proposed one and staff did not have two items did that the Planning Commission recommended. One was pawn shop, one was compatibility. So we can get better information on why those two additions were there as well. Meaning I assume we will each get in touch with various Planning Commissioners and find out what they were doing.

>>Mayor Watson: further discussion? Council Member Slusher?

>>Slusher: this is a clear case of why sometimes we need to have first and second or third reading, obviously there's some pretty serious divisions between the neighborhood and applicant on this. I think that you will see we will look into those, talk to folks on both sides of it in the interim period. And then we will end up having to make a decision. Nature motion made and seconded to approve the Planning Commission recommendation on first reading only. Is there any further discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. Motion carries. On item no. 30. Councilmember Griffith, I'm going to recognize you, let me point on items no. 10 And 11, the motion was made and seconded and there was a vote of 4 to 0, however those -- no. 11 -- No. 11 Is the one that I am focusing on, no. 11 Was only ordinance passed on all three readings, actually was not passed on all three readings, the attempt was to pass it. We need five votes. I will recognize Council Member Griffith.

>>Griffith: Mayor I would move reconsidering.

>>Mayor Watson: motion made to reconsider number 116789 any discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no., item no. 11, I will recognize Council Member Griffith?

>>Griffith: I move approval.

>>Mayor Watson: motion made to approve on all three readings is there a second. Seconded by Mayor Pro Tem. Hey, Council Member Slusher, I am trying to get five here, everybody stay out here for a second.

>>Slusher: I will say yes on the way out.

>>Mayor Watson: motion made and seconded to approve on all three readings, any discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. Motion carries with Council Member Garcia after the dias. -- Off the dias.

>> Earlier you indicated 38 and 40 would be postponed to the month of may.

>>Mayor Watson: it had not been posted on the agenda what that would be postponed to.

>>Glasco: may 6th.

>>Mayor Watson: may 6th on item no. 38 And 40. 38 Being the public hearing, item no. 40 Being the action item related to the public hearing will be postponed until may 6th.

>>Spelman: Mayor if you would like to clean up the agenda, we could take care of no. 19.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you very much, I will recognize you.

>>Spelman: my questions have been answered with respect to performance measures, the performance measures proposed by staff were all with respect to activities but not with respect to outcomes. Turns out the staff will have outcome measures available and will be reporting to us within a month or two, so I move approval of item no..

>>Mayor Watson: motion to approve item no. 19, There is a second? seconded by Council Member Lewis. Any discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. Motion carries with Council Member Slusher and Council Member Garcia off the dias -- Council Member Slusher is shown voting aye. I will call to order item no. 37, To conduct a public hearing to the amendments to the land development code to adopt the mitigation land policy in the barton springs zone including changes to the s.o.s. Ordinance.

>> I am mike heights, director of the watershed protection department. We have a lot of information to give, so we want to give it quickly. In december of last year the watershed department staff were asked to develop a draft mitigation land policy for consideration by the City Council. Our goals were to be -- were that this be environmentally conservative, that is that it clearly states it was better than the stat tut quo, that it be economically viable and that it would be simple to administer and simple to understand. We had a threshold question. Can a mitigation policy create a better environmental outcome than development without the policy. The process we went through, a committee of interested citizens provided input to staff, representatives from the development committee from other government organizations and from other groups environmental groups. Staff prepared a draft policy and we gave the Council briefing on February 10th. There was a series of sub committee members for further development in February and March and the public hearing which we are having today. The draft mitigation land policy had the resultant proposal which includes the following, two routes for approval, projects meeting all criteria may be approved through an administrative process, that criteria being the draft mitigation land policy. The second way would be the projects not able to meet the administrative criteria would be sent to Council with a staff recommendation. My staff members with me, nancy mclintok, John murphy, nancy will give the next portion of this presentation.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you very much, ms. Mcclintock.

>> The policy that I am going to describe to you is one that allows increases in impervious cover over that that which is currently allowed by ordinance in exchange for the preservation of acreage elsewhere. We have developed a policy that we feel has two environmental benefits. One of those is that it results in lower overall impervious cover, than current ordinance allows. The other one is it encouraging the preservation of our most highly sensitive tracks. This is a list of the general items that the committee who came together to develop this process agreed would have to be addressed by the policy. I am going to try to explain to you very briefly how the policy addresses each of these issues. Development tract eligibility, the policy is proposed for use only within the barton springs zone and only within the City limits. It was our desire to have -- not have the use of this policy result in the need for additional infrastructure and that is why we have chosen the city limits as the boundary for the use of the policy. There's two exceptions where the policy cannot be used within the City limits and that is, one, because we don't want the use of this policy to result in higher impervious cover in our most sensitive areas. We have made ineligible those tracts which score as highly sensitive on our sensitivity evaluation matrix. We will talk to you more about that matrix later in the presentation. In addition because we don't want the use of this policy to result in higher population density in the barton springs zone, we have also made ineligible residential developments. We wanted to develop a policy that would allow for commercial and retail development that would serve the population at a neighborhood or community level not to allow developments that would really serve as a regional draw. We therefore looked into the urban planning literature, found a couple of numbers that we thought would help us. It turns out that characteristics of neighborhood or community developments that are the building -- buildable square feet or the gross floor area tends to be about 150,000 square feet and the maximum square footage of any single tenant in those types of developments is been 100,000 square feet. So we set those levels as caps for this policy. I would like to say that we have information packets for the public that are at the desk outside in the hall. Our -- looks like we about have the presentation fixed, it was supposed to be sort of coming up on the monitors here, I think they will be able to catch up with us, but it still might help anybody who is interested in this policy to pick up one of those information packets. All other s.o.s. Standards would still apply along with this policy, quarter quality ponds will be required to control any additional peak flows or loads that would result from the additional impervious cover allowed by the policy. This is the part of the policy that really results from the environmental benefit that we are looking for. For every 5% increase in sight impervious cover, over the s.o.s. Limits, sufficient mitigation land must be acquired such that the effective impervious cover decreases. Now, the amount of mitigation land that is required various depend -- varies depending on how sensitive or how desirable the mitigation land is that's being acquired. However even if the most sensitive mitigation land is required, enough mitigation land is still required such that the effective impervious cover is still lower than s.o.s.. When I say effective impervious cover, I am talking about the impervious cover that you get when you average the impervious cover of the development tract with the impervious cover of the mitigation tract which should, of course, be very close to zero. In our briefing that we gave you before, we sort of showed you how that worked with big tall charts, some curves, so forth. But this time I think that I would just like to run you through some examples of what the results would be of the use of this policy. You have in your packets a chart that looks like this, which of course we can't read from, but I wanted you to have it and for the public to have it that wanted it because it will take you through a number of different development sizes, different development impervious covers and different land mitigation sensitivities and shows you what the results would be. I want you to -- I want to run you through one example. Let's take the very first one there. It is a 10 acre net site area development, which would normally have -- in the recharge zone which would normally have to be developed at 15% impervious cover. However a 50% impervious cover is desired by this applicant. The resultant mitigation land that would be required would be 52 acres. The resulting affected impervious cover would be 8%, that's a 7% decrease from what s.o.s. Would have allowed. Had that been -- now that is based on second priority mitigation land being acquired. For comparison's sake, if that has been first priority mitigation land, in other words more highly sensitive lands, only 33 acres would have been required, but you would still have gotten to an 11.5% impervious cover still significantly lower than the s.o.s. Level. Now, how do we distinguish first priority land from second priority land? that's another tool that we have developed, we are going to talk about that just a little bit later in the presentation. Mitigation land location. Where should the mitigation land be located? if we didn't put any constraints on this part of the policy at all, I think what we would end up with is all of our development tracts in close to town, our mitigation tracts out way at the end of the watershed where of course land would be cheaper. We didn't want that to happen, but we did understand that the applicants would need some flexibility in order for this policy to work. So we took a -- we struck a balance. For development on the recharge zone, mitigation land must be in the recharge zone. Enough mitigation land must be bought within two miles of the development tract such that the increase in impervious cover over s.o.s. Is offset. The remainder of the mitigation land could be bought anywhere in the recharge zone. In the contributing zone the same rules apply, but the required mitigation land within the two miles would also have to be in the same watershed. This is a strategy to make sure that we protect the creeks along with the aquifer. It's a very low risk strategy. The balance of the mitigation land for developments in the contributing zone could be acquired anywhere in the contributing zone but within five miles of the City limits. Operations and maintenance. The developer would be responsible for the o and m of the mitigation tract. Alternative if mutually agreeable by the City and by the applicant, the City could agree to accept the mitigation land with Council approval, of course, with or without operation and maintenance funding. Conservation easement alternatives. The policy provides for the use of conservation easements as an alternative to fee simple acquisitions similar to our strategy. Conservation easements would need to be 50 acres or larger. Buy-in alternative. This is a new part of the policy since we last briefed knew February. We wanted small tract owners to be able to take advantage of this policy. However what we did not want to see was a proliferation, a very small mitigation tracts has would be expensive to acquire, expensive to maintain and not as highly beneficial as larger tracts. We have recommended that a 10 acre gross site area mitigation parcel, smaller than that is probably not the most beneficial scenario. So we chose 6.5 net site area acres as a threshold to participate in the buy-in part of the policy. That's because a 6.5 net site area parcel would usually result in about a 10 acre gross site area parcel just because that's a good average of the percentage of net site area to gross site area. The fee to buy in to this part of the policy would include both the estimated cost of the land, of the required land as well as a 30 year o and m fee. Let me take you through an example of how this might work if a small tract. For those of you who haven't picked up one of these information packets, you will see on the next page, again a spread sheet that you can use to look at many examples of different development sizes, to see what the ramifications would be, but I will just take you through one example. Go to the next page. We will just talk about the very first example here. We have made some assumptions for the sake of this example. Number one the buy-in alternative fees will be calculated as if second party mitigation land were being acquired. The o and m costs were based on a $40 per acre per year cost. That is an estimate at this point that we would need to research further, but it's probably fairly close for the sake of this example we are also assuming a $10,000 per acre land cost. So if we look at the very first example. A development tract which had only two acres of net site area, which wanted to develop at 30% impervious cover, rather than the 15% impervious cover that the -- that would typically be allowed in the recharge zone, the required mitigation land would be three acres, therefore the gross site area would be estimated at about 4.6 acres. The estimated cost at a $10,000 an acre cost would be about 46,000 acres and the o and m costs would be about 5,500 based on that 40 acre per year cost at a 30 year rate. So that's the buy-in alternative for small tract owners. Option two Council consideration. This is just to remind you that any development that cannot comply with all of the parameter that's we have set forth in this policy still has the option to come back to Council and ask for special consideration. I mentioned before that we had developed a tool to help evaluate sensitivity of both the mitigation tracts and the development tracts. This is good we have been -- something we have been working on since we last briefed you in February. I have David Johns here who has lead that effort, he will brief you on the use of that tool.

>> Good evening, I get the task of trying to walk you through this matrix, hopefully trying to make some sense out of it for you. There is a full detailed copy of the matrix in the packets that you got. As you look through it, if you have any questions, please ask me, I will do my best to answer them. The matrix that we have developed is one that was similar to that use understand proposition 2, but we have sort of refined it to focus more on sensitivity. The matrix is a tool that we are using to evaluate both mitigation and development tracts. The matrix will characterize a tract into three different categories, these categories will determine how many acres of mitigation land an applicant will have to acquire. The matrix was developed with a lot of input from a sub committee, very interested, very interested citizens. This group came up with some environmental features or characteristics of the land which we feel make the land most vulnerable or sensitive to pollution. These features are characteristics -- or characteristics are slightly different from the recharge zone, contributing zone because of the unique characteristics of those areas. This line shows the components for the matrix for the recharge zone and the weighting we put on those components. Our first component, waterways and slopes, includes major waterway, minor waterways and we have given this a weighting of 20% of a total score for land over the recharge zone. For critical environmental features, we are looking at -- we are talking about caves and recharge features. These are the features that were really most concerned about over the recharge zone. We look at the number of features, their size, the amount of area that drains to them. Since these feefpts are most important, we are giving it the highest weighting of 30% of the total score. We also have a component in here of looking at flow route protection. This is intnded to protect those areas where our information suggests that ground water moves very rapidly in the sub surface toward our discharge points. The idea here is to protect these areas because any pollution, any contaminants that enter the aquifer in these areas can move very rapidly away and be very difficult to contain. The rest of the recharge components over the recharge zone, we have avoided pollution, this component will -- evaluates what would happen to a tract, what sort of water quality protection there would be for that tract. Our assumptions here are that something developed under the s.o.s. Ordinance would be protected the most. Something developed under the jurisdiction of another entity would probably have the least amount of protection. We also have a component in there for catastrophic spill potential and the main focus of this is areas with major petroleum pipelines. In -- this is trying to address the -- the very real potential of rupture of these pipelines if development occurs in the close vicinity of these pipelines. Also we are having sort of a bonus category where we will give the applicant points if there is documented significant flow loss across the applicant's tract. Now I want to try and walk you through an example of this. The tract that we are going to talk about is a tract that was ainquired through proposition 2. It is over the recharge zone, east of mopac, east of mopac is an area where we are looking for flow route protection. It contains a number of caves, contains major waterways and minor waterways. We give these attributes of the tract points, we weight them, come up with a total sensitivity score for that tract. For this particular tract it scored 3.37. This is out of a total of four points. We are looking at something similar to a college gpa here, four is high, one is low. What we did is ran about 27 properties through the matrix. We examined the distribution of these scores and our intentd is to only have a small percentage of these tracts that score in our highest, most sensitive category. Acquiring first priority land for mitigation means,ings, you have to buy less of it, but keep in mind, also, if a development tract also scores in first priority that this tract will not be eligible for increases in impervious cover under this ordinance. We are currently proposing that the send and third categories have approximately equal number of tracts in them. For the struking zone or components are essentially similar to the recharge zone, there are a few small differences, we are looking at waterways the same way, but providing them with a greater weighting, giving that 35% of our total score. Springs and wetland, features, critical environmental features we are concerned about in the contributing zone and we are giving those 25% of the total score. We are interested in the vegetation on the mitigation land and our purpose here is that we are trying to protect land that maximizes the natural infiltration of water, so we are giving value to land that has low ash-juniper cover. We also have an avoided pollution category, similar to the recharge zone, but slightly higher weighting at 25%, bonus category, also, where we will give points to an applicant if they can document significant flow gains on the tract. Let me run you through another example real quick. This is a tract of land that is in the acquired conservation easement, was acquired through proposition 2, in the barton creek watershed. It has major creeks on it, minor waterways, a number of springs and wetlands. We give these attributes points, weigh them, come up with a score of 2.8 on this. Again this is a 4 point system. We evaluated a large number of tracts in the contributing zone. We again looked at the distribution of these scores. And we came up with a small percent, 10% of those tracts that we felt like should be in our most sensitive or most -- highest priority category. In summary then, so our idea here is to evaluate these tracts, this is kind of where we are at in our matrix, I think it needs a little bit more work, but I think we have come a long way.

>> Mayor, again, in summary, this plan was put together as a process in which developers who would want to take advantage of a mitigation plan could do so administratively. Again if their plan did not meet this, then of course the next option they would have is come to the Council, two different ways, administrative approval, relatively quick if you could meet this criteria. If not it would have to come through the Council and go through that process.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you. We have a number of people that have signed up to speak. Let me go to that. If -- we have this hearing and we have at least two -- we have two other hearings tonight. And a couple of other items. My request is that in -- out of respect for other folks that are here to be heard on things, if all you are doing is repeating something that someone has previously said or you can simply say you are for or against this policy, please just do that so that we might allow those who are dealing with the hearing a little bit later tonight to have the opportunity to do that. If that doesn't occur, what I may do is at some point recess this hearing and we will go to another hearing and we will come back to it. That way. [One moment please] especially at this particular time without a land use plan for the barton springs zone. We feel like until we really have a handle on the grandfathered projects what that looks like, what that translates into in terms of traffic as well as air, water and noise and light pollution, what that translates into in terms of additional expenditures for roads, ex expansions, et cetera, we should not be approving any policy that has as its result even more development in the barton springs zone. It's -- we tried to give it the best shot. We were opening to looking at creative solutions, hoping that we could come up with something that was simple, straightforward, fair and better than s.o.s.. The mitigation policy doesn't do that. How many of you understand that matrix that you were just walked through? okay. How many of you --.

>>Mayor Watson: contrary to your belief, we are able to kind of come up with stuff on our own from time to time.

>> Okay. How many of you would spend the time playing the games of what number do you fill in to each box? and then lobbying the director of watershed protection as to whether a cave is a minor cave or a major cave, whether a sink hole is real asink hole or an armadillo hole. Whether these consultants who for years have been insisting sink holes aren't sink holes but are armadillo holes but are saying the opposite, you are seeding what -- what is proposed is incredibly complicated, it gives all the power to the developer and takes all the power away from the citizens who wrote petition 4 and passed the save our springs ordinance. The limit that was put in at 150,000 square feet of development was there and that was based on some research the staff did to say at about that level you are really getting to regional development, it's not commercial, it's just there to serve the neighborhood so you are inducing sprawl, you are creating growth where you don't want it to occur and you are therefore conflicting and convicting the smart growth initiative that finally we're trying to implement. And so that was good, you know that they heard that, yes, we want to limit it to just what's there to serve neighborhoods. But the way it's set up and we raised this, well, what if you just subdivide a 20 acre tract into four five acre tracts and get 150,000 square feet on each five-acre tract so now you don't have 150,000 square feet, you have 600,000 square feet on your 20 acre tract and they said yeah, that's a problem, but we have other problems. [Buzzer sounds].

>>Mayor Watson: thank you.

>> We need a land use plan before we go forward.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you, Mr. Bunch. John beall.

>> Thank you members of the Council. I will just briefly say that we support the theory of the mitigation policy. We do hope that some of the details that have been raised by Mr. Bunch are addressed. Thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you. Lauren ross. I'm sorry. Grant, come forward. I apologize. For some reason I flipped your card and --

>> I won't ask what the reason was, Mr. Mayor.

>>Mayor Watson: I'm sure it was sub conscious.

>> I'm grant Godfree and I would like to reiterate what Mr. Bunch said. It doesn't make any sense to go forward without a plan. Especially in light of what we've seen in the data that we've gotten back on the grandfathered projects right now indicates that most of them got through and so we're looking at there's a much lower margin to play with in the barton springs zone than we had thought perhaps. And so we need to nail that down, find out whether that is right or not and do stow real planning because otherwise -- do some real planning because otherwise you are going to have people looking at mitigation tracts that aren't appropriate and all of the other issues that we've talked about. But I'll get out of your hair now.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you very much. Lar run ross and julie jenkins and William russell.

>> Good evening, I'm lauren ross and I'm an environmental engineer. I'm here to speak tonight in support of mitigation policy by the City of Austin and I support that because the City can no longer afford to rely on the s.o.s. Ordinance to protect water quality in the barton springs zone for seller different reasons. One reasonable is -- several different reasons. One reason is that s.o.s. And the City's jurisdiction doesn't cover most of the zone. There are extensive areas that lie in the jurisdiction of hays county and other municipalities. A second reason is that the impervious cover limits in the s.o.s. Ordinance controversial though they were are actually too high. They range from 15 to 25% and the very best science that we have right now says that in fact if you want to maintain the very highest quality of water, the impervious cover limits need to be down around 8 to 12%. Another problem with the s.o.s. Ordinance is that it makes no distinction between very sensitive land and land that is less sensitive. You can put the same amount of impervious cover regardless of the kind of land that it is. And finally, the single phrase in the ordinance that says on the site by site basis has several problems. One is that it is -- leads to a inefficient use of the City's infrastructure. It represents challenges to landowners that decreases property values, and it's the perfect prescription for urban sprawl. What Austin and barton springs need to achieve a impervious cover cover limit of about 10% is a more creative approach and we need that aproch right now because we're fast approaching the limit of impervious cover. We need an aggressive land and conservation easement acquisition program and I think that we need to particularly address that program to areas that the s.o.s. Ordinance does not control. We certainly need a community based land use plan for the barton springs zone and the advantages of a mitigation program are, first, we can use it to shift development away from sensitive land and the City's policy will do that. We can use a mitigation program to result in lower overall impervious cover, and the City's program does that. We can make more efficient use of the City's infrastructure, we can give landowners more flexibility in achieving our water quality goals, and we can reduce urban sprawl. I think that now is the time to start and that Austin and barton springs cannot afford to wait to have more protection than is offered by the s.o.s. Ordinance. Thanks.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you, Dr. Ross. July I jenkins and William russell and joe straub.

>> Mayor Watson, we have William russell and I would like to donate our time so the Council can watch this very, very short tape we have.

>>Mayor Watson: all right.

>> I believe the booth has it and they were supposed to cue it up.

>>Mayor Watson: if you have the tape ready to go.

>> William russell and I are members of the Texas cave management association. We are in full support of this issue and we think that saving these caves and enhancing the water quality for barton springs is the most important issue here.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you very much. You will have five minutes -- set the clock for five minutes. Stop the tape and get it ready to go. Set the clock for five minutes and 30 seconds. Which is the amount of time ms. Jenkins and Mr. Russell together would have so we can watch the tape. Thank you.

>> I'm ray brownlie and this is my wife kathy brownlie.

>> Ray and 'kathy still raise goats at their small ranch and home in southwest Austin. They've lived here all their lives.

>> We have two sons that also work for the City of Austin, parks and recreation. They've been involved in a lot of the greenbelt construction so we're familiar with the needs of Austin, I think.

>> For 30 years, the brownlies have watched while the City grew until it completely sure rounded them. Now in your 60's they need to do something for their children and grandchildren. But they love Austin. They want to follow s.o.s. And do what is right for their hometown and the land.

>> We hope that you will enjoy and understand what we're trying to do with the acreage at mopac and William cannon. We hope it is something that will be desirable to the citizens of Austin.

>> The brownlie's solution is a model for the future. Their forum proposal develops less land than would be allowed under s.o.s.. Donates 312 acres of new park land worth $4 million to Austin. And gives to the City free of charge what has been called one of the most environmentally sensitive areas in the barton springs zone.

>> I also worked for 33 years with Austin fire department, retired in '85. So we're natives of Austin and we would like to see good things happen.

>> It's a great deal, and that's why many Austin environmental leaders, the Planning Commission, and every adjacent neighborhood group have endorsed the forum proposal. The forum will be allowed to develop 118 acres at the intersection of mopac and William cannon. In return, it will give 312 acres of park land to Austin at two other sites. It's a simple formula. Understand s.o.s. A total of 70.5 acres could be covered with development on all three sites and the City would get no donated park land. Under the forum proposal, only 60 acres will be covered and Austin gets 312 acres of new parks. Let's look at what the City of Austin will receive. First, the brownlie tract. 147 Acres located near brodie lane and William cannon, right next to a small 20 acre facility called longview City park. Longview neighborhood park already serves nearby neighborhoods with swings, outdoor basketball and baseball fields. But next to the ballfields lies a huge tract.

>> I apologize. This is not -- [inaudible].

>>Mayor Watson: is that what you want to do is pull this off? turn off the tape.

>> My apologies.

>>Mayor Watson: I understand. Joe straub, not speaking but in favor. John joseph. John joseph. Mr. Joseph is in favor. John tarbox. John tarbox. John tarbox is in favor. Mike mcinturff. He is in favor. John volente. Hang on. Several cards that are for the item no. 1 On the day den dumb which is the balfour tract were put into those cards. Is there anyone else here that wishes to sign up and speak on the mitigation policy? you did? apparently we've got some confusion on some of the cards. Mr. Mitchell, why don't you come forward. And you will have three minutes. Is there anyone other than Mr. Mitchell that has signed up to speak on this agenda item related to the mitigation policy? all right. Welcome, Mr. Mitchell.

>> Thank you, Mr. Mayor and Council Members. My name is kirt mitchell chairman of the advisory board of the s.o.s. Alliance and regarding mitigation policy proposed, I'm opposeed for the following reasons. I would like to make it really my personal mission to make the terminology that Dr. Kirk patrick, one of our board members mentioned in the last hearing that was a few months ago on this topic. Autocatalytic effects, I would like to see that becomes part of our language in discussing smart growth and how to make it happen. I believe the draft policy fails in the sense that I've heard nothing about -- I haven't read it in detail but in the presentation I heard nothing about evaluating what kind of development will go into the higher impervious cover tract and whether it has the kind of secondary growth inducing potential to cause tremendous pressures for regional increases in density. And the most exaggerated example you can think of would be -- I mean when we finished mopac there was a guarantee we would spend the next thousand years struggling over trying to keep a lid on too much development in a very sensitive area. That's a project with tremendous autocatalytic effects and elementary schools are another one. Even they we love education we don't bring the secondary effects of so I believe any policy that -- of the nature that the staff is proposing needs to include a very scientifically based and erring on the side of characters the effects of auto catalytic effects that will occur. Secondly I believe that mitigation tracts should -- that the market value of mitigation tracts should be one of the elements and market value is a rough indicator of development potential in the near future. Obviously the higher market value mitigation tracts would typically be those which have a nearer term potential of market -- of being marketable as developed land. And I believe that market value should be one of the factors included in the matrix of evaluation. I would definitely strenuously object to the item that the staff mentioned which is that if they don't like the deal they can get -- they can come back to Council and ask for a better deal. We've been through multiple decades of Councils, we have a great smart growth Council, everyone I know and work with supports this Council, but we will once again have a Council one day I regret to say in my life time I'm sure which is not as sensitive to these issues as you are. We need to establish precedents and policies now that do not encourage endless deal making and the necessity for --. [Buzzer sounds].

>>Mayor Watson: thank you. Those are all the people that have signed up to speak on this item. Since there was some confusion on the cards let me ask again is there anyone else signed up to speak or wishes to be heard on agenda item no. 37. I don't see anyone so I'll entertain a motion to close the public hearing on item no. 37. Motion made by Council Member Griffith, seconded by Council Member Slusher. Any discussion in hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. Motion carries. That will take us to item no. 39. I'll entertain either a motion or at least initially some discussion. Councilmember Spelman.

>>Spelman: Mayor, this is only the first public hearing we've had on this issue since we actually had a full blown mitigation policy in place. Or policy put together and there's been some very interesting conversation. A lot of people have some very interesting ideas. I think it would be premature for us to pass this on all three readings given there are a lot of interesting ideas out there which could be put into this policy and given we have a lot of other people who have not been involved in the form of boards and commissions. Let me start with a proposal that this -- that we pass this on first reading and send it immediately to our boards and commission for further comment.

>>Mayor Watson: motion has been made to pass item 39 on first reading. Is there a second? seconded by Council Member Garcia. Discussion? Mayor Pro Tem.

>>Goodman: I had a question for staff, if I could.

>>Mayor Watson: Mr. Heitz?

>>Goodman: as I was listening to you all I also was being talked to every now and then by somebody else so I didn't catch everything. In your matrix for weighting the value of property and its features, did you enter in any consideration of the different watersheds, the percentage of recharge they kbt to the aquifer?

>> the watersheds themselves we did not address. We addressed features on the tracts themselves.

>>Goodman: I think the one -- one of the more complex issues also has to do with the particular value and recharge capacity of any individual watershed. For instance, in a case we're going to hear later one watershed, although in the recharge and having recharge capabilities, is not the major recharge watershed and the area where the mitigation lane is offered is in a much higher percentage recharge watershed. So for me, I think that that is also something that has to be analyzed when you are looking at what has value or what has the more value.

>> One comment on that is that while we didn't address specific watersheds, we did address that the mitigation be in the same watershed as where the development was going to be. So the flow stream, if you will, is going to be within that same watershed. But --.

>>Goodman: which negates what I just said. Because if you are going to try to protect a watershed that is of greater contribution to the recharge and you are insisting on an area within a watershed which is not as great a value to the aquifer, you have just negate had your ability to take fullest protection.

>> The way we address that issue in the recharge zone is that in the recharge zone we're asking that a large percentage of the mitigation land be located relatively close, within two miles, of the development tract. That mitigation land could be in any watershed within two miles. That is addressing the nature of the car system there where recharge can go from one watershed to another in a matter of hours. In the contributing zone we're wanting to keep that in the same watershed to protect the surface water. Does that answer your question?

>>Goodman: yes.

>>Mayor Watson: are you finished, Mayor Pro Tem?

>>Goodman: the other thing and not to get an answer tonight, but we do need to keep an eye on speaking of land use plans or potential land use plans for the aquifer, I do believe that hays county is entertaining what in effect will be a land use plan for most of the aquifer with a certain bill, and we'll have nothing to say about any of it.

>>Garcia: Mayor?

>>Mayor Watson: Council Member Spelman?

>>Spelman: land use plans and while Mr. Looits is up here I would like to pursue that. Mr. Bunch suggested that -- in fact we didn't have much business doing a mitigation proposal unless we had -- at least land use assessment. Comment on what it would take for if staff to come up with assessment of where we stant currently with respect to impervious cover and entitlements that will need to impervious cover in the future.

>> We've had different requests on putting different information and overlay it, if you will, on to a map that would reflect that. And basically it would show the ultimate buildout within these areas or the ultimate amount of impervious cover that we have. Unfortunately some of the data that is available speaks in different language, if you will. Digitized. It doesn't talk to each other and uses different systems on overlaying it. So we do have a problem with that. What I would suggest is that if the Council wants us to look into that is to give us some time and -- for us to go back and figure out, see if we can find somebody with that type of expertise, how much time it would take and what cost it would be for us to put together such a map. I think we could do it in two different ways. I could look at it to see if staff could put together a map relatively inexpensively and relatively quick; or whether it would be better doing it digitally, if you will. And there's two wation on that. One is if we're going to be doing that initially and every time we get a special request we have to go back to the data banks, go back and recreate something. If we're going to do it, I would suggest we try to do it right, figure out the right way to do it, what expertise will be needed so this could be a pilot with the information we need and in the future we'll know how we can do it. We can give two option, the second would be if we could pull together some information and overlay it, what -- how long would that take and what would the money be.

>>Spelman: that second option actually that would be in line with what development review and inspection is doing with respect to the entire City.

>> That's correct.

>>Spelman: that would actually be moving us in the direction had where we're eventually going to have to go Citywide.

>> That's a real goal to be able to have this information so when all this data is requested we don't have to go back and pull everybody off what they are currently doing and put together some information for a specific need. Hopefully the data banks will be put together that whatever is requested we can bring it together and show maps.

>>Spelman: but you couldn't estimate for me today how long either of those would take?

>> we would have to go back and come back in a week or two spefl h..

>>Spelman: we don't have a Council meeting in one week. Could you come back in one week?

>> we could do that.

>>Spelman: I would like to add that to my motion, direct the City Manager to come back in a week with with the -- whatever options are available that would lead to a land use assessment as quickly as we can. And with a full expectation that we have that land use assessment in hand before we vote on second and third readings of this mitigation policy.

>>Mayor Watson: motion is to approve on first -- approve the mitigation policy on first reading and then -- but also as part of that motion is to have staff come back in one week with the various options and with if full expectation we would have a land use plan concept before we bring it back on second and third reading. I forget who -- I didn't make a note who made the second. Councilmember Garcia considers that a friendly amendment. Any further discussion?

>>Griffith: Mayor, thank you. Mr. Heitz, I think the idea that Dr. Spelman brought fort about that map is a very important one. What kind of map are we going to have of the barton springs zone for environmental assessment? is there a plan for that short range or long range? what I'm thinking of and this may be really long range, but when -- I think it was '91 when we got the national park service contract to study barton creek from mopac to Travis County line, I think it was, they used the ian mccarg overlay system and identified 14 critical environmental characteristics and put all of them on each one of those mylar sheets and piled them on top of each other and where it comes out the darkest is the most important environmentally and where it's the lightest is the least environmentally important and sensitive. Is there a possibility we could do something like that for the barton springs zone? currently we weren't planning on that because as each tract wants to be developed they have to do assessment themselves of the property and we get access to that property we're able to confirm whether the data that is there's is what we agree with. To do what you are asking of course we would have to get permission to go on all the different lands and be able to do that inspection. So that would probably be pretty timely for us to do and we just have not considered that at this time.

>>Griffith: long range I think that would really be a very important thing to have. Maybe we could do a lot of it off aerial photographs.

>> I agree it would be helpful but it would take us some time to do that.

>>Griffith: thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: kMrb.

>>Slusher: Mayor, Mr. Heitz, mismcclintock covered this a bit, but would you elaborate on what protections there are to keep say close end projects from getting too large, an accumulation of them and then having too large of a concentration of impervious cover in that area, or in any area, but I think that might be where we would end up with the large, more threatening concentration.

>> I'm going to less les address that. He's up on it more than I am.

>> Yes, could I -- hear the question again, sir?

>>Slusher: what I'm concerned about is if we had the mitigation policy and the projects were built closer in and they mitigated and bought land further out, that you would end up with two high of an overall impervious cover concentration in that one area. If you would elaborate on what this does to prevent that.

>> I guess the first thing I would have to pose as a question is whether or not that is a problem, having a higher intensity of impervious cover in just one area. First of all, we have looked at the fact that under this proposal, that utmost highly sensitive lands cannot even use this process. Those that are ranked as highest priority, highest sensitivity, which means they would have the greatest amount of creeks, cef's, recharge features, those things would not even be allowed to come in through this process for additional impervious cover. So then we would be looking at lands of less sensitivity where higher impervious cover is located.

>>Slusher: let me -- okay. But I'm talking about the cumulative effect, say there's all that development along mopac right behind zilker, why I don't think anyone up here would have voted for today, but is a result of a previous lawsuit settlement so we can't really do anything about it, but the fact is there's a lot of development on the ground there well beyond s.o.s. Impervious cover limits. Would this then allow people to build say over the s.o.s. Levels there and buy further out? I want to know -- sims like then you would have an area that is too heavily -- has too heavy impervious cover.

>> We worked very, very hard in trying to structure this policy so that water quality impacts would be minimized or would be less as a result of implementings this proposal. The safeguards that were built in are those requirements that that mitigation land be within a distance, a -- no further than two miles from the site of the development tract so that within that area you do not exceed s.o.s. And overall you are less than s.o.s.. And keep in mind every tract that is developed under this policy still must abide by all of the s.o.s. Pollution prevention measures which are structural controls and non-structural controls. And on that basis, we would not expect to see any increase in pollute ant loads and potentially because of a total land area that is being constructed on, being developed that is now less as a result of this, construction impacts should be less than would be typically might occur if you had land developing at s.o.s. Limits throughout the whole area.

>>Slusher: okay. Mayor, you just want to say that -- I just want to say that we have a debate here among environmentalists about how to best protect the aquifer, and I think it's worthwhile to move forward and explore this fort especially with the amendment that Council Member Spelman add to do the motion so I will be supporting the motion.

>>Watson: any further discussion in hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. Motion carries on item no. 39.

>>Slusher: Mayor, could I have the floor?

>>Mayor Watson: sure.

>>Slusher: I made this announcement about two hours ago I think. I said the same thing I'm getting ready to say now which was I'm going to be off the dais to eat and I will be listening to the Council and won't miss anything, but I hadn't been able to actually fulfill that promise because there were only four members here.

>>Lewis: you are going to eat again?

>>Slusher: I haven't gotten off to eat, Council Member Lewis. Thank you for helping me clarify that. [Laughter].

>>Mayor Watson: Council, let's do this. If you note in your addendum there is a notice of a special called meeting. What I'm going to do is I'm going to call to order that special called meeting.

>>Garcia: can we recess the other?

>>Mayor Watson: let me finish my thought process here. And pull up item no. 2, Which is related to what we just did which is to set a public hearing, again -- it's not precisely related to the mitigation policy but it has some of those aspects. Then what we'll do is go back -- I'll call to recess that meeting and go back and take up item no. 14. What we'll do is we'll take up item no. 14 And there has already been a public hearing on item no. 14. What I anticipate is going to happen is that Council will move to suspend the rules to allow for 20 minutes per side just because it's been a while since the public hearing was held and that way we'll get any new or additional information, then -- so that will be the shorter one and we'll get that taken care of and come back to the special called meeting. I'll entertain a motion to recess the regular scheduled meeting of the Austin City Council. Motion mad by Council Member Garcia seconded by Council Member Griffith. Any discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. Motion carries with Council Member Slusher off the dais. I'll call to order the special called meeting of the City Council of Austin, Texas for Thursday, april 8, 1999, we are meeting at the City Council came cham lers at 307 west second street. We have two items. I'll call item 2 which sto set a public hearing for 6:00 p.m. For april 15th, yoin at City Council chambers on an ordinance to expiration dates, a deechlt mitigation policy and related amendments to the s.o.s. Ordinance and the Austin City code relating to development in the barton springs zone proposed by the real estate Council of Austin and the s.o.s. Alliance. I'll entertain a motion to set that hearing. Mation made by Council Member Garcia. Any discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. Motion carries with Council Member Slusher off the dais. I will entertain a motion to recess the special called meeting. The motion was made and seconded. Any discussion in hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. I'll call back to order the regular scheduled meeting of april 8, 1999 of the City Council. We'll go to item 14. Councilmember Spelman.

>>Spelman: I move we suspend if rules and give each side 20 minutes fwlf motion has been made to suspend the rules to allow -- even though there has already been a public hearing, 20 minutes. Seconded by Council Member Garcia. Any discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. Motion carries with Council Member Slusher off the dais. Here is what we will do. Each side will have 20 minutes I'm going to go to the applicant first. The applicant will be entitled to use the full 20 minutes now if it wishes, or -- tl me how it wants to divide time, or can just tart talking until you run out of breath at which point if there is any time left I'll add that on for potential rebuttal. But it's a total of 20 minutes including rebuttal. I will then once they have done at least their initial presentation, I will two to those who have signed up in opposition. If there is an organized presentation, please let me know of that beforehand and I will try to do that as opposed to just reading through cards. It's my understanding there may be an organized presence. Or at least some semblance of an organized presentation. With that being said, we'll start with the applicant. 20 Minutes on the clock. Welcome, sir.

>> Thank you, Mayor. Good evening Council Members, my name is jeff howard I represent the applicant Mrs. Katherine brownlie. The applicant would like to divvy the time up 14 for presentation and six for rebuttal.

>>Mayor Watson: set the clock for 14 minutes.

>> Thank you, Mayor. As you all know and have come to know since first reading, the forum is a unique project in southwest Austin. It's one in which the landowner by working with neighborhoods, environmentalists and the City staff has developed a project that's environmentally sensitive, neighborhood compatible and well planned. As you recall, this project has the support of every adjacent neighborhood. It was recommended by planning commission and was unanimously approved by the City Council on november 18th of last year. Since first reading, we have improved this project that Council initially endorsed. First, as we stated at the first reading, public hearing, we've agreed to limit again rofs on 200,000 square feet with single tenants of the office use at 65,000 square feet. We've agreed through a restrictive covenant to fund 100% of the traffic improvements recommended in the tia, which incidentally we've added additional traffic improvements at mopac and William cannon that improve that intersection to within four seconds of a c. Those traffic improvements now total 650,000 dollars. We've agreed to further architectural standards with the neighborhoods to ensure the project fits in with existing neighborhoods. We are agreeing to reduce the impervious cover on the development tracts to 50%. We will meet the City's minority and women business participation goals for the construction and development of the project. And we will also contribute additional funds to a land conservation fund in keeping with the spirit of this project. I would like to turn it over to some others -- we've got a lot of people who would like to speak. I hope we have your continued support and request your approval. Thank you.

>>Goodman: thank you.

>> Good evening, Council Members. I'm sarah summers, members of the western oaks property owners association. I would like to take a moment and ask those members of the audience in support of this proposal to please stand. Thank you. Western oaks immediately abutts the western most edge of the project under discussion this evening. Were the neighborhood that would be most directly impacted by the area of densest development under this proposal. As a representative of the western oaks property owners association, I have been actively involved in land use planning with potential developers since 1983. That's over 16 years. I've been working with Mrs. Brownlie's current representatives for over two and a half years on the forum p.u.d.. The proposal before you is a reasonable response to managed growth in an area woe fully underserved. The save our springs ordinance as originally prepared and adopted was to be a minimum standard, not the only standard, not the maximum standard, but the minimum standard. We believe that the forum p.u.d. Is better than the s.o.s.. The s.o.s. Coalition has asked for innovative projects. This is one of the more innovative projects to ever be presented. Your vote for the forum p.u.d. As presented to you this evening will be indicative of your willingness to hear and listen to other voices. It will ab vote for managed responsible growth. Growth that for the most part has already occurred. Thank you.

>>Goodman: thank you, ma'am. [Applause].

>> Mayor Pro Tem, Council, my name is george kofer and I urge you to vote yes on this project. I strongly support this project. I believe it is the best project of its kind that has ever been before you. It has many benefits that you've heard about, and I am in support of this project. It has been recently improved. They've made a great many, I think, significant concessions worked with the neighbors, worked with the environmental community to address the concerns. I have a letter from ben heim seith who could not be here tonight. Ben is on the planning commission that approved this project. He is strongly in favor of this project. Mary Arnold on not be here and she asked me to share these comments with you. I wrote them down, she asked me to write them down so there would be no confusion and asked me to quote her tonight. She said that her support for this project is based on her concern about how the legislature will perceive your action tonight. Specifically she said a no vote would be played in the wrong light at the legislature the forum p.u.d. Has been in the process for more than a year and a half and deserves an answer. She said that she urges you to take positive action on this tonight. Thank you very much.

>>Goodman: thank you, george. [Applause].

>>Goodman: hurry, hurry.

>> Good evening, I'm Robert botto, your representative to the environmental board and I supported the forum p.u.d. As the representative to the environmental board and I continue to support the applicant as a citizen and encourage you to do the same. I believe that it represents an excellent and unique opportunity for the City to protect water quality and open space in the barton springs zone. It recognizes s.o.s. As the baseline for water quality protection while simultaneously enhancing water quality and open space protection. So I think it's a unique opportunity, a new model, and I think it takes us to the next step and I hope you all recognize that and support it. Thank you. [Applause].

>> My name is John beall, I'm currently the president of the Save Barton Creek Association. Last Monday night the save barton creek association voted unanimously in favor of not opposing --. [Laughter]. The forum p.u.d.. Thank you very much.

>>Goodman: thank you, John. [Applause].

>> My name is julie jenkins, I was just up here. I would like a second chance to cue the tape and show the video to Council. We are again are in full support of this issue.

>>Goodman: thank you. Jewel I.

>> That that gets cued, I don't know.

>>Goodman: we want the tape. [Laughter].

>>Garcia: bring on the tape.

>>Goodman: same tape. Who am I talking to? erroll?

>> they've lived here all their lives.

>> We have two sons that also work for the City of Austin parks and recommendation. They've been involved in a lot of the greenbelt construction so we're -- we're familiar with the needs of Austin, I think.

>> For 30 years the brownlie's have watched while the City grew until it pleeltd surround them. Now in their 60's they need to do something for their children and grandchildren. They love Austin. They want to follow s.o.s. And do what is right for their hometown and the land.

>> We hope that you will enjoy and understand what we're trying to do with the acreage at mopac and William cannon. We hope that it's something that will be desirable to the citizens of Austin.

>> The broken lee's solution is a model for the future. Their forum proposal dofs less land that would be allowed under s.o.s.. Donates 312 acres of new park land worth $4 million to Austin. And gives to the City free of charge what has been called one of the most environmentally sensitive areas in the barton springs zone.

>> I also worked for 33 years with Austin fire department, retired in '85. So we're natives of Austin and we would like to see good things happen.

>> It's a great deal, and that's why many Austin environmental leaders, the Planning Commission and every adjacent neighborhood group have endorsed the forum proposal. The forum will be allowed to develop 118 acres at the intersection of mopac and William cannon. In return, it will give 312 acres of park land to Austin at two other sites. It's a simple formula. Under s.o.s., a total of 70.5 acres could be covered with development on all three sites and the City would get no donated park land. Under the forum proposal, only 60 acres will be covered and Austin gets 312 acres of new parks. Let's look at what the City of Austin will receive. First, the brownlee tract. 147 Acres located near brodie lane and William cannon. Right next to a small 20 acre facility called longview City park. Longview neighborhood park already serves nearby neighborhoods with swings, outdoor basketball and baseball fields. But next to the ballfields lies a huge undeveloped hilly tract, prime park land that would enlarge longview park by seven times. Numerous trails lead into the tract where you can walk in sunlight or under a canopy of oaks and juniper. Neighbors already use it for walking and hiking. In some places the ground is covered with 50 million year old fossilsen the hilly portions of the tract have some of the business views in southwest Austin. All of this would be donated to the City. This is prime greenbelt land in a booming market, which is City cannot now afford to buy. Austin would also receive another 165 acres called the blowing sink tract. Blowing sink has been called the single most significant tract in Travis County for direct recharge to barton springs. You walk to blowing sink kaif through dense woods of juniper oak and elm. The entrance stares up at the sky barely large enough for one or two explorers. But blowing sink is the deepest cave in Travis County. 254 Feet deep. Only partially explored, it has great halls and galleries that drop down to the edwards aquifer. During rain storms, millions of gallons of runnoff pour down through the cave like a giant storm drain flowing straight to the stone heart of the aquifer. Blowing sink is a treasure that must be protected and there are six other cave openings on the land nearby. All would be given to the public and preserved forever. That's the proposal. 312 Acres of park land in the barton springs preservation zone. Total park land bigger than wild basin. Almost as big as zilker park. For the neighborhoods of southwest Austin. The forum will be a new model green style of development. It will be bufrd on three sides by thick forest, 50 to 200 feet wide. The water quality plan was designed by the same environmental engineer who helped write the s.o.s. Ordinance. The forum site itself is on flat land literally in the shadow of the freeway at the intersection of mopac and William cannon. Across the street from the forum is a randalls and a shopping center. This is an urban area, not wilderness. 60 Thaw people live within a radius of three miles. There are 20-year-old neighborhoods and two elementary schools nearby. The forum will be the most attractive environmentally sensitive development in southwest Austin. As the save barton creek association said, the forum plan may result in a greater positive impact on water quality than current s.o.s. Site by site limits. The forum is proposed by people who want to do what is right for Austin.

>> After you have grown up on it you learn to know it and it's like the trees have been my friends all along and you certainly don't want to lose any of them if you can help it so we would like to develop it in a way to leave as much as possible like it is in its natural state.

>>Mayor Watson: there are 28 seconds remaining.

>> This is a wonderful project. Austin has not seen any development along these lines before. This environmentally conscious this willing to work within the rules of the game to work within s.o.s., to best s.o.s. And to give to the City something that is really important to them and something that is really important to the City and that is preserving our water quality and barton springs and the edwards aquifer in general. Thank you very much.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you. [Buzzer sounds]. [Applause].

>>Mayor Watson: now we'll have 20 minutes for opposition. Who can speak to whether or not there is an organized proposal for the -- for that 20 minutes?

>> [inaudible].

>>Mayor Watson: all right. Then you all come forward and --

>> if Mr. Bunch needs my time, I would like to donate it. I didn't get an answer.

>>Mayor Watson: there's 20 minutes total so however you all want to divide it up.

>> Mayor, Council Members, my name is mark Kirkpatrick. I guess I have three reasons why I'm opposed to the forum development. The first is that I think that the scientific merits that have been argued in favor of the development are overstated. For example, the blowing sink cave system would be protected under s.o.s. Much that's not something that's going to be filled with cement if this project is not approved. Secondly, I think that the forum represents a blueprint for how to lay out an agenda of continued battles in City Council meetings for years to come. We're going to have to deal on a case by case basis with an end less stream of applicants asking for various variances. This is one of the things we're trying to avert with the development of the s.o.s. Ordinance in the first place. But the third and most important reason I have is that there is a bigger picture here than anything that is going to happen on this tract. The very professional video we just watched and the discussions that we've heard from the applicant up till now emphasize the benefits to water quality that will accrue from what is going to happen on this tract, and we can discuss the pros or cons of that, but what we're not talking about is the really big picture and that is what are all the secondary effects of the development like this going to be. The proposal is for something that is substantially larger than the arboretum shopping center, to give a mental image. Think for a spec'd about what we would see if we had a time lapsed picture from a satellite of Austin the last 30 years. We would see a little nucleus pop up at barton creek mall, another one up at the current arboretum. In what were previously almost pristine areas, low density areas. Around those urban nucleuses over the last 10, 20 years we've seen rapid growth. No matter how well you develop a particular tract, a travis county of that sort that's going to provide jobs and have a lot of retail space and so forth is going to be a malnet for further development and there is inevitably a very large amount of urban sprawl that any project like this no matter how well designed from an engineering perspective is done, there's going to be a very large number of secondary effects which are going to lead to serious problems for water quality and quality of life in Austin t bottom line here is if you build it she they will come. You don't build it, there's a hope that at least some of those people will go in the smart growth corridor and not over the aquifer. Thanks very much.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you. [Applause].

>>Mayor Watson: Mr. Bunch?

>> thank you, Mayor and Council Members. I'll Bill bunch speaking for the save our springs alliance. And while we do have a few board members who have indicated their either support or non-opposition, the vast majority of our board is very clearly against this, as contradictory to the s.o.s. Ordinance, three key components of that ordinance, we think it's going backwards rather than going forwards for a number of very important reasons. It's first important to think of the scale of this project. It's enormous. If you look at the draft mitigation policy we're discussing and the staff's efforts to limit that to essentially neighborhood commercial with a cut skrof of about 150,000 square feet, we're talking about six times that amount. We're talking about something that is roughly equal to the bart scare mall. And I'm talking about the -- bart square mall. I'm talking about the traffic that would generate acknowledge a mixture of office and retail that is enormous and will tax the already severe traffic problems that we already have on mopac. This is deal making at its classic which is exactly what the s.o.s. Ordinance was supposed to stop. It was supposed to set one rule across the board for the little guys and the big guys, the ones with interesting lobbyist and the ones who couldn't afford those interesting lobbyists. And to save the neighborhoods and the citizens the many, many hours that have to be put into a project by project deal making. So it violates that rule of law which was a key part of the s.o.s. Ordinance. For point of clarification, Dr. Ross did help promote and convince the public to support the s.o.s. Ordinance, but it is incorrect in saying that she helped write it. She did not help write it. And I think because of that doesn't fully embrace what all was meant to occur there and the deal making prohibition was one of those. Another one was to minimize excessive reliance on engineered controls which have to be maintained, repaired and built right in the first place. And of course we know you can drive all over this town seeing controls that simply don't function or function at greatly reduced levels than what were intended. If you approve this, how do you say no to the next one? how do you say no to stratus who wants to build at least this much or more at the next intersection. It's incredibly interesting to me that for the first time the s.o.s. Alliance and the circle c neighbors are on the same page. They wrote you a letter saying they opposed this because of traffic generation and if you build this then you are going to have to build a freeway enter changes at mopac and William cannon. How much will that cost? several tens of millions of dollars as most freeway interchanges cost. That's money that's supposed to be going elsewhere. That's impervious cover that's not being counted in this equation. That is exactly the kind of catalytic effects, additional impacts that are not being weighed into this decision making process. I can guarantee you when you walk over to ats when they are setting their priorities, doing their growth projections this project will be factored right in there. And while we're telling them you need to adjust your growth projections based on smart growth and redirect those funds elsewhere, they are going to say what smart growth? what are you talking about? it's a bunch of palavor over nothing because you are approving mega projects in the barton springs zone where allegedly you don't want it to go. The real estate industry itself produced a market study that we got, Mr. Heimsath wrote it and it says, quote, the biggest competition for the west and southwest office leasing market has been the downtown. Every square foot of office you approve out there is cop peegt with and taking away -- competing with and taking away the development from where we want it to go in the desired development zone. The cognitive disso in answer, the credibility that is at issue here is pretty overwhelming. I've been asking this question and haven't got an answer. We've had three questions that we tried to ask on motorola, on csc and other projects. First, what need do you have that cannot be met in the desired development zone. Second question is who is going to really pay the cost of infrastructure to serve it. And the third is well, if you answer those two in the right way, then at least comply with s.o.s.. This fails on all three. Assisted living, general office, that should be downtown in the desired development zone. Assisted living, you can have that anywhere, and it ought to be in the desired development zone. Maybe there is some neighborhood retail that's missing, a restaurant or two would be good. The biggest part of this retail is lowe's and it's going in to compete with home depot and steal the tax base and revenues from them. There ought to be some cooperation between Austin and sunset valley so we have one store serving the exact same needs instead of two people knocking each other out and paving the landscape to meet a need that is already being met these big box retail have unbelievable amounts of environmental pollution problems and to call them green builder is almost scandalous. There's web pages devoted to it. There's small hick towns in virginia who are fighting these things tooth and toenail and we're saying it's green builder to build these huge projects that are selling rain forest wood, selling old growth redwoods and doug fir that are full of nasty chemicals to put on your lawns and driveways and homes and calling it a green builder. That makes no sense. We -- we understand the legislative context, and this is the one point that our board chair, robin rather, asked hoe to convey to you. She had family business. She called all of your offices today to speak to you and this and at least left messages, but we are aware of the legislative context here. But we have to live with this forever. You have to drive down mopac and see this project and the scale. It doesn't go away. The legislature comes and goes and needs come and go and demands come and go. But you are going to have to see this and this is a barton square mall, this is almost two one american centers. This should be in the desired development center and there is no excuse to put it in the barton springs zone. The cave tract is zoned rural residential. It's fully under s.o.s. And it will be protected. That's the -- should be the lowest priority of areas that we want to buy. We ought to be trying to buy stuff that the grandfathered and has a bunch of intensive development and making that intensive development go away. We've heard -- they are going to limit the size of each office holder and nobody can lease more than 100,000 square feet. If you've got six people, leasing up to 600,000 square feet or 500, you know, whether it's several small ones or one big one, it's all the same. The square footage we're talking about here is creating a job center to generate 3,000 or more jobs. Those people are going to look for homes. These -- this is the impacts that Dr. Kirkpatrick was talking about. You are making it possible for people to live in dripping springs and commute to William cannon and mopac. You are creating demand for hundreds if not thousands of additional homes and other services to be developed in there. You are defeating on several levels your own smart growth proposal and you are undermining -- and that smart growth proposal was really just a restatement of the Austin tomorrow plan. Which was unanimously adopted by two City Councils and two Planning Commissions in the '70's. I thought we had worked hard to elect this Council who understood this. Who was going to do back flips as you've gone, to move intensive development out of the zone. So now we're faced with a purely discretionary 100% your choice zoning case, and while maybe the legislature is watching, but this isn't a grandfathered case, this isn't what they are fighting over up there, this is a grand mu case. There's no grandfathering here. And to say that this legislature should be telling you guys or pressuring you guys what to do on a project like this is really frightening. If this was the Bruce todd Council maybe I would understand it, but we don't understand it here. [One moment please]. Is this a standard that I think could apply effectively all across the City in the barton springs zone and throughout, and I think it does. And let me explain very briefly why. The most important or one -- the most important aspects is that it proposes less impervious cover than would be allowed by s.o.s. In the recharge zone. That's 15% and it's the highest standard of impervious cover that we have in this community. Under the s.o.s. Ordinance, the developed tracts would allow 70 acres of impervious cover and the forum is proposing to limit that to 58 acres. That's a reduction in impervious cover of 17 percent, and it's significant. I'd like to also emphasize that tom schuler, who is definitely a leader in this country in the area of impervious cover, absolutely believes that the policy of clustering impervious cover rather than spreading it out across the entire contributing watershed is something that must be addressed in communities that are attempting to protect water quality. The second point that I would like to make is that this development has completely committed to meeting s.o.s.' pollutant reduction standard of no increase in the average annual pollution load over the undeveloped case. And they have made that commitment with water quality standards that exceed the city's current rules to implement the s.o.s. Ordinance and we've gone one step further than that. We've said we will limit the total 58 acres to only an initial 35 acres of impervious cover. We will build the complete water quality control for that 35 acres and we will monitor it to demonstrate that in fact yes, we can meet the s.o.s. Pollutant reduction standard of no increase in the pollutant load. In summary, the forum has met many, many standards of water quality. It's also committed to design, build and operate to meet more than 60 different environmental criteria that address the widest range of environmental concerns from recycling to ozone depletion, from rainwater harvesting to preserving the view of stars at night. And if you think it was easy to sit in the room with low's and explain to them they would have to use non-toxic form oils, I invite you to share that experience with me. It's a challenge and I think that absolutely this is how we need to educate our community and our businesses on what it means to do business in Austin, Texas and what it means to achieve the highest environmental standard and protect water quality. [Applause].

>> Thank you, Mayor. I have just a few points in response to some of the comments of Mr. Bunch and Mr. Kirkpatrick. First I think it's important to view this in its proper context. The forum is not a comparison between this development and no development. The fair comparison is between the forum and development under s.o.s.. S.o.s. Does permit development and I think when you view it in that context, what you find is that the concerns of those opposed are actually reasons to vote for this project. First on water quality, you've heard Mr. Rob speak to water quality and I won't go over that. I think she's answered that well, but it's better from a wat er quality perspective. Size of the project. It's actually going to result in 10 and a half acres less impervious cover than s.o.s.. There seems to be concern about the size of this project and the square footage. Under s.o.s. You actually get over 450,000 square feet and more development of course, with s.o.s. You don't get any dedicated preserves. Traffic, this project actually improves traffic by funding 650,000 dollars of traffic improvements. It takes, for example, mopac and William cannon, which is operating at an unacceptable level of service to within four seconds of a level of service c. Under s.o.s. There's no money for traffic improvements. It's single family development it's not required to do a tia or fund money. In addition, it will exacerbate rush hour by having more single family development. That adds to the rush hour problem we have currently. Spinnoff development, possible growth. Let me say, so this is clear, this poj is not bigger than the arboretum. The arboretum has 1.4 million square feet of development. This project has 40% less development. It's also on less acreage. And, of course, is not located within the golden triangle. Of course, the arboretum does not have any dedicated preserves associated with it either. In addition, on possible growth, we have conducted a demographic analysis that shows that this area is out of balance. There's more single family there than there is commercial to support that development. And so this project helps address that balance. What we know is that retail follows single-family. [Buzzer]. Not the other way around. [Buzzer]. So under s.o.s., more single-family, more retail. Thank you. I hope you vote for this project. [Applause].

>>Mayor Watson: thank you, sir. Since we voted to suspend the rules and have basically conducted an additional public hearing, let me first entertain a motion to close the public hearing on item number 14.

>>Griffith: so move.

>>Mayor Watson: motion is made by Council Member Griffith, seconded by the Mayor Pro Tem. Is there any further discussion. Hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. Motion carries with Council Member Slusher off the dias. That will take us back to item number 14. I'll entertain a motion, but let me ask is there any questions or discussion before a motion? I'll entertain a motion. Councilmember Spelman?

>>Spelman: actually, I have several questions. I want to address those first.

>>Mayor Watson: that's fine.

>>Spelman: most of the questions are going to be directed towards the applicant and if someone could speak, be the emcee for the applicant's team, I would appreciate it.

>> Yes, sir. Spell speak the opponents to this have raised a lot of questions and I'd like you to help me work through them. One of the them is is that engineer willing controls were not going to be as effective at preserving water quality as just open space in the impervious cover. Could you address that? what are you going to do about engineering controls here?

>> I'll let Dr. Ross do that since he's the engineer.

>> There are several -- and I think of three major important pieces to preserving water quality. The first is that you have to get the pollutants that are generated by parking lots out of the water. The second is that you have to make sure that you don't discharge it at ee row sieve velocity ies because it strips the banks of the creek and carries a lot of sediment and the third is that you want to maintain the base flow. That's the sweet clear trickle of water in the stream after the storm event passes. And the difference between structural controls and open space had to do with which pieces of that -- of those three problems are addressed. Structural controls are proposed only for one purpose, which is to get the pollutants out of the parking lot water. And we're actually doing that in a very natural way by taking that parking lot water and actually reirrigating it on to a natural soil and vegetative system that will be carefully monitored to demonstrate that it is removing the pollutants. The erosio will also be addressed by that structural control in that we will very, very slowly release the water obviously from the three irrigation system so that you don't have peak flows from any impervious cover dumping into the stream and producing the stream bank erosion. The sweet trickle of base flow is what's maintained by the open land, in this case it will be maintained by infiltration from the reirrigation area, the 50% of open space around the impervious cover and particularly and most effectively by completely undeveloped land. Completely undeveloped land preserves that base flow much better than people's compacted turf lawns, even under the s.o.s. Ordinance. So it's the brownlee tract discharging just up stream from dry fork sink and it's blowing sink which contributes an amazing amount of recharge of that natural clear water that combined to achieve water quality. That was a really long answer. I apologize.

>>Spelman: I don't mind it bit. One answer to the question is there's more open space with the forum project than there would have been otherwise. That's the simple thing.

>> And even with 15% impervious cover, we would -- here is the short answer, sorry. Even with 15% impervious cover, we would still need some kind of structural control to address pulling the pollutants out of that are generated on top of that impervious cover. So s.o.s. Doesn't eliminate the need to do that.

>>Spelman: if you could speak to -- on the other hand, you are concentrating development in a smaller space than otherwise. It's not being spread out as much and that puts a little bit more of an onus on those engineering controls you have prescribed for handling those problems in that concentrated area.

>> Right. And what we've done to address that is increase their size by almost double what would be required if the contributing area was included lots of natural space. What happens when you -- you don't actually want all of that open area flowing into the water quality controls. You want to really focus it on the impervious cover and have a higher capture volume than you would if you were trying to capture runoff from the open space as well. And the City rules accurately reflect that requirement.

>>Spelman: okay. So by following the City rules you're arguing -- that's going to be sufficient to --.

>> Right.

>>Spelman: I think the argument was that sometimes engineering controls get clogged up, they're not well maintained. They cease working appropriately.

>> Right. I think it's important to remember that in this case the applicant and the ongoing commercial developer -- I'm not saying that right. In the City of Austin, the city maintains residential and the developer and the tenants are responsible for maintaining the controls for commercial. So there will be a -- it's not a homeowners association, it's a -- property owners association that will contribute to maintenance of the funds and you issue the annual operating permit. And if they don't do it right, I'm counting on you and I will be down here begging you to say get it right or shut the doors. Because they need that annual operating permit to do it.

>>Spelman: and you certainly won't be the only one that's begging us to apply that closely, I'm sure. If I can change the subject, you mentioned in your statement that Mr. Schuler argued that clustering was better than spreading out. Could you talk more about that?

>> yeah. Actually, he has a whole chapter in his most recent book on watershed protection and tom schuler works with communities across the entire communicate that are working for watershed protection and he has come right up against this issue of we know we want 10% impervious cover over the whole watershed and it's very inefficient to do that spread out over the whole watershed. So the whole idea of clustering is that you pull your impervious cover together, you limit the cost of infrastructure, you limit the cost to maintain the infrastructure, whether it's roadways, wastewater lines that don't leak or water quality controls, pull them all together and leave as much. Watershed in an undeveloped state as possible. And tom is clearly add kateding that. I talked to him specifically about the s.o.s. Ordinance and the barton springs zone and he told me that the City needs to consider that as a policy principle, this idea of clustering. And I've also -- I think the city is maybe the only City ahead of Austin, olympia, washington is also advocating -- not only are they advocating clustering impervious cover, but interestingly enough, they say -- this is thurston county, they say in our most sensitive watershed, you've got to do a pud because we won't let you do it any other way. We want this careful attention, we want this planning on a complicated -- this is complicated. When I said that word I kind of cringed a little bit, about but we want to look at all those factors together to make sure that we have a project that exceeds what can be Written down in code and applied across the board.

>>Spelman: if you could help me understand what it is about clustering that improves water quality.

>> Three things come to my mind right off the top of my head. One is that it preserves larger tracts in their natural conditions. The second is that it limits the requirement for extending frukted. When I put a sewer line down the middle of a creek, I don't add anything to impervious cover and s.o.s. Doesn't address that at all. The fewer feet of sewer line in the creek, the better water quality. So that's another way that clustering helps. And I said three, but it's just gone from my head. I'm sorry. More open space, less infrastructure and I think the third thing in my mind was this idea that we will have larger capture volumes and more forecussed water quality controls and not have them spread out trying to treat at 15% impervious cover.

>>Spelman: so water quality controls are going to be more efficient when you're dealing with a relatively high volume rather than a relatively low volume spread out over a period.

>> My goal is always to draw a line across the impervious cover and make that the only contributing area to the waut quality control. In other words, I want 100% impervious cover in the contributing area to the water quality control. I don't want to treat anything else.

>>Spelman: and that leaves you with zero percent elsewhere.

>> That leaves the whole natural system behaving in its or daned way. [Laughter]. I don't know. [Applause].

>> That really wasn't what I meant to say either. I wasn't sure what I meant to say, but you know what I mean.

>>Spelman: I have no more questions of lauren.

>>Mayor Watson: I think that would shut me down too. [Laughter].

>>Spelman: anyone else who is willing to try to top that?

>>Mayor Watson: Dr. Ross, hang on. You may have some other folks. Councilmember Lewis?

>>Lewis: I'll just ask you, Dr. Ross. The question was raised by increasing the cluster it would cause more automobile trips and probably increase the number of households in the area. I'm trying to understand whether or not it would be better to spread it out or cluster it as far as the automobile trips is concerned. Because if you don't have it -- and like they said, in one hearing that they wanted to -- that they'd rather drive a mile to go to a restaurant than to drive six miles to go to a restaurant. And my question is would it be better to have the cars going a shorter distance over the aquifer than, you know, a longer distance because the people that's out there -- and I don't remember the exact number of households that they said was in that area --.

>> It's about 67,000 people within three square miles. [Inaudible].

>> Let me -- do you want to give this to somebody else?

>>Lewis: in other words, they're going to have to go someplace. Those that's out there is going to be going someplace.

>> That's absolutely correct. And clearly -- I think one of the -- well, let me say this. The forum works because it's at the intersection of mopac and William cannon and because the transportation infrastructure is already there. And I also want to say that during the course of this project we looked at or attempted to look at vehicle miles traveled and I think it's interesting that we talk about trips, but we don't talk about vehicle miles traveled. But I think in fact when I turn this way I saw that Charles is sitting back here and actually, he's the person that's the expert on this subject, so maybe I'll just sit down.

>>Lewis: where is he?

>>Mayor Watson: I think she just vom tiered you to answer questions.

>>. [Inaudible].

>> Is it a pollution question about those automobile trips? well, I want to say two things about that then to be very clear, which is that the studies interestingly enough correlate water quality degradation more strongly with impervious cover than they do with vehicle miles traveled, which is pretty interesting. Impervious cover has a bigger effect, but there is a relationship between vehicle miles traveled and water quality degradation, in other words, increasing con traitions down stream. And so as you reduces the number of vehicle miles traveled, you will reduce pollution.

>>Lewis: okay. The other question I guess the applicant, you said it's going to be 650,000 dollars put into traffic to improve traffic at that intersection. If you do s.o.s., would it be any traffic mitigation?

>> no, not for the single family that's being rezoned. Single family, because it's already zoned, requires no -- and because there's no site plan required, there's no tia requirement. Because there's no tia requirement, there's no requirement to make recommendations or to fund recommended traffic improvements. So the answer would be no.

>>Lewis: so what would be the estimated number of single-family homes that would go in there.

>> We estimate at approximately 600.

>>Lewis: 600? add it to the ones that's already there?

>> yes, Council Member.

>>Lewis: so my question gets back to what would those people do for the needs of the community? I mean, if there's no commercial -- if there's no commercial at that intersection is?

>> I think they would do what a lot of neighbors do and that is to hospital on hospital on mopac and head into central Austin and go up to barton creek.

>>Lewis: is that what's they intersection, is that the total -- that's not the total of the three?

>> no, sir. That -- the development at the intersection is approximately Austin hundred 18 acres. That 264 includes one of the mitigation pieces. What we call the brownlee preserve tract. It's 147 acres. As this project was originally configured, it was brought into the zoning case and there's actually restrictions that limit it to zero percent.

>>Lewis: so -- okay. That explains that. I was trying to figure out why it was 264 acres versus -- so at 15% if you did it under s.o.s., instead of -- what could you develop at the intersection?

>> you mean the development tracts? 15% of approximately 118 is I think about 18 acres.

>>Lewis: okay. All right. Okay. That's all I have.

>>Mayor Watson: any additional questions at this time?

>>Griffith: yes, Mayor.

>>Mayor Watson: Council Member Griffith?

>>Griffith: the two compelling questions for me throughout this debate have been what's best for the environment and what's best for the neighborhood. We've had a lot of conversation and a lot of fine, high quality information about environmental concerns. I see a couple of folks from the neighborhood and I think they have some information that would be important too to share. Could I have someone that could respond to questions from the neighborhood? can you give us -- hi. Introduce yourself.

>> I'm Johnnie wells. I'm from the western oaks land development committee and I'm also a member of the western oaks homeowners association -- property owners association.

>>Griffith: very good. So you will definitely be involved long range, won't you?

>> yes, ma'am. I've already been there long range so I'm very familiar with this plans and the plans of southwest Austin in the areas around our home.

>>Griffith: I met you the night that the oak hill alliance of neighborhoods met with the developer, the traffic engineer, with Dr. Ross, and it was a very open, direct, productive meeting. Could you tell the citizens and the Council how it's been working with these people through the last several years?

>> I'll be happy to do that. Actually, we've worked with so many different developers and they all, with the exception of the most recent one, were unable to meet the needs that this project requires. Not only the protection of water quality, the appropriate use of this particular intersection and the intersection of two major arterials, but they also understooded to know that going in they were going to have to time and time again meet to educate us, to assist us in our own education. In other words, as we get information and needed to more clearly understand it, that information, they were going to have to provide us with access to all kinds of data. And we then would go and verify the accuracy of that data and come back with any questions. We also were approached time and again by this developer and the owner's representatives as to what we would like to see on this property. What did we need? what would encourage us not to make trips so that these services that we felt we needed would be provided? and we're very, very pleased, despite the number of meetings that were required, that that's exactly what's happened. We've come up with what we feel is the best plan for the entire property. We didn't do that just coming in our neighborhood alone. As you know from having been at the meeting that particular evening, we have encouraged, we have notified and we have worked with other neighborhoods to see what was best in their opinions for the tracts more closely involved with their particular homeowners association. But this developer has done an excellent job and I feel that five years down the road, and I've already been here since 1981 myself, a taxpayer at that location, I feel five years down the road and 10 years down the road this Council will be remembered if what they do tonight. And I feel that many people are saying that this is going to be a destination for people that are on the other side of the aquifer, and I'm going to tell you who the destination will be for. It will be for innovative developers, for politicians who have far sighted view for what Austin can be and this is going to be an agreement that will be a landmark of what is right to do with this piece of property. That's what this will be. This will be for people who are developers in other cities saying Austin did this right. Let's go and have a look and see how we can do it right as well. And my red bicycle is going to be the one in the parking lot because I won't have to drive anywhere any more so get some of the services we need, so look for it because it will be there. And I really appreciate the time you've taken to listen to the voice of neighborhoods that are immediately adjacent to this property instead of only people who have other interests to serve. Thank you for your time.

>>Griffith: thank you for sharing a perspective we needed. [Applause].

>>Mayor Watson: any additional questions at this time? I'll entertain a motion.

>>Slusher: Mayor? I'd like to talk about the traffic. First could I get a staff member up here? okay. I just want to first take you through the intersections of this project, how they're graded and probably have some explanation on that. What I'm looking at has three columns, well, four. One is the intersection and then there's the existing am-pm, the forecasted a.m.-p.m., which includes the recommended improvements and the site cast forecast and I explain the site forecasted.

>> It is simply the background growth that will occur from other projects in the area. Sight plus forecasted is that growth projections plus the traffic from the site.

>>.

>>Slusher: so the two columns to look at would be if you want to find oud what it's like now and what it would be like once it's built, you would like at existing and site plus forecasted?

>> yes, sir, that's correct.

>>Slusher: so mow pk and William cannon is a d in the a.m. And a e in the p.m.. It's going to be a d in the a.m., it will rise to a dm in the p.m.?

>> yes, sir, with the improvements that are proposed in the -- to be funded by the developer, the level of service would actually improve in the a.m. From e to d and it would remain at dm in the p.m..

>>Slusher: is that d in the a.m. Where it remains the same, is that a worse d, a better d, the same?

>> it's slightly better. Based upon the information that the applicant has provided.

>>Slusher: and how do they pull that off?

>> first of all, they've done two things. First of all, they did an analysis of what the traffic was. Right after mopac, the mopac overpass at 290 opened, there was a considerable traffic bottleneck at William cannon and mopac for some time and the delay at that time was measured at average delay per vehicle was measured at 10083 sikts or about three minutes in the a.m. And 135 seconds or over two minutes in the p.m.. That has been reduced recently by a change in the signal timing there. It's been brought down considerably in the a.m. It's been reduced to about a third of what it was before to 66 seconds. In the p.m. It's been reduced to about 36 seconds.

>>Slusher: signal timing improvements?

>> yes, sir.

>>Slusher: is that reflected in the existing number?

>> yes, sir, that is the existing number. The projected site plus forecast improvements were done as a result of adding right turn and left turn lanes.

>>Slusher: okay. Did the -- did the City take over that signalsation at some point recently?

>> I believe it's still operated by txdot at this point.

>>Slusher: okay. I know that's what happened at ben white. Okay. Let's go to brodie and William cannon. It's f, failing now a.m. And p.m.. It would still be failing under this proposal. Now, will that -- you don't get lower than f; is that correct?

>> that's correct.

>>Slusher: okay. And so would it be failing worse, would it be a longer wait with the development or would it be better, the same?

>> it would be slightly better.

>>Slusher: slightly better. And why is that?

>> again, that included adding a right turn lanes, dual left turn lanes and widening an existing turn lane.

>>Slusher: okay. And then brush country and William cannon, c and f to c and d, so that one comes up absolutely. And then brush country and -- well, I foregot the names. What does lta stand for? it's abbreviated. Is that lata.

>> Lata lane.

>>Slusher: thank you. I thought you would remember. That stays at b all the way. Is there any change one way or the other there?

>> no, sir.

>>Slusher: okay. What about the cumulative impacts around the area? have we looked at that at all?

>> these are the only intersections that were analyzed that were within the scope of the study for the project, so we felt that -- we tried to analyze sort of an area of influence where the traffic would have a measurable impact and these were the intersections that we felt would be most affected.

>>Slusher: so we would be -- would this be a fair analysis that on -- at some of the corners it's improving because of the -- because of the turn lanes and that sort of thing that are being added, but we're putting a lot more cars there and then adding some turn lanes and that sort of thing and that improves the weight slightly. So it's slightly better than it is now, but there will be more cars going through there.

>> Yes, sir, that's correct.

>>Slusher: okay. That's all I have on traffic. I might have some more later, but I don't think so. But demand, I would like to hear just a shorted debate on the demand. If I could hear from the applicants first. Okay.

>> Councilmember, I'll try to answer your questions. If I can't, I'll have Charles answer gem.

>>Slusher: okay. I appreciate it. You've been making the argument basically that -- and correct me if I'm wrong in characterizing your argument, but that this project will meet a lot of the demand in the area.

>> I think that's fair.

>>Slusher: okay. So I'll let you elaborate on that. The way I want to frame it is for the opponents to address too is does this meet demand in the area and therefore mean that there will be less development of worse projects that have grandfathering or does it just not meet the demand? we'll have this project plus other ones that are grandfathered under worse ordinances and this won't have some impact on that one way or the other.

>> Councilmember, I'll take a stab at that and any other specific information, Charles can give you some specific numbers of the analysis he did. But the analysis Charles did for us indicates -- and what Charles did is he looked at number of residences in the area, what their household income was and from that could get a concept of purchasing power and demand, noig what we know about single-family demand for retail services. And what we found is there is a great deal of demand for retail. And that that's due to the fact that this area is already largely residential. And that just confirms what we know about how retail development occurs. Retail development goes where the rooftops are. If the rooftops are there to support retail, retail will come in. So it's because that demand is there that this project can help fill that demand. My point in rebuttal was that by adding single-family, those approximately 600 homes under s.o.s., you just increased that demand. And I think you increase that -- and that demand -- that increased demand and the demand that gets unserved by the development has to get met by some other projects and I think you will see those grandfathered projects will be the ones that will be filling the need.

>>Slusher: okay. Someone from the opposition address that?

>> thank you for that opportunity. On the retail, we don't disagree that largely the retail follows the rooftops. But I think just like this project sees that the rooftops are there to build a bunch of retail, then every other location that has a lot of pass by traffic is also going to count those same rooftops and say let's build retail. And you've already got a lot of zoning and grandfathered projects that can build retail and meet that. If you just look at the lowe's. The home depot is there. It's the exact same thing. So it's not like there's some unmet need. These are two projects that are going to go head to head, probably eventually one of them will drive the other out of business or there will be a takeover and they will shut the other one down and then we will have a big ugly strip mall that's empty. And this is happening around the country where home depot and lowe's go head to head. But if you also look at the office, I mean, you're going to get more retail when you've got more traffic going by because they count trips not just rooftops, but they count trips going by. So now you have a couple of thousand people going to jobs down there. And so that's going to create even more retail happening, more other services. So yes, they're looking at rooftops, but they're also looking at other traffic going by. And this is generating more traffic. I think a conceptual difference that we have is lauren talks about we're pulling in development and clustering is and what she's assuming is that if you don't build it here, then it's going to happen further out in the watershed. To me that is a loser assumption. That assumes that we're losing the smart growth battle. Our assumption is the opposite that if it doesn't happen here and if we adhere to smart growth, it will happen in the preferred growth corridor. And we won't be en gendering even more of it going out. This is a sprawl project. It's not a cluster project. And it's not a smart growth project.

>>Slusher: okay. Thank you. I wanted to ask someone on the staff about flooding. I had asked a question about this last time and it was supposed to be addressed when it came back, which is now. I know our regulations prevent from adding -- state what the regulations, you can probably do a better job than me.

>> Simply stated, you cannot increase flooding off your site on to someone else.

>>Slusher: so this is in the Williamson creek watershed and down stream from here in october there were quite a few houses that were flooded. They were in the 25-year floodplain.

>> Yes, sir.

>>Slusher: my question, though, is -- okay. How much does the -- is this required to capture?

>> they're required to provide detention for the two, 10, 25 and 100-year storm events.

>>Slusher: so here is my question: if this project would have been built in there on october 17th of last year, would the flooding down stream have been worse, the same, not as bad?

>> it would be the same or better.

>>Slusher: even with the kind of -- I think we had eight inches of rain in one morning, and this project wouldn't have added to the flooding?

>> no. What detention controls do is they are designed to shave the peak flow, in other words, they control the elevation of flood water down stream. To there may have been -- I mean, any time you build impervious cover, you have more water running off, so volume is coming off the site, but the detention requirements basically make sure that there is no increase in flooding down stream and any of those two, 10, 25 and 100-year storm events. The rain that we had in that area, I'm not sure which storm event it was exactly, but it was not 100-year storm.

>>Slusher: okay. I think that one was a 10.

>> I believe it was a 10. And so our controls and our requirements ensure there will be no increased flooding. Now, it won't necessarily correct the existing flooding down stream because that is not the requirement. And it is not something that would be easy to do. It would require probably a much larger system, a regional type system to really reduce flooding down stream from its current condition. I will also add that the retention requirements on this site for s.o.s. Compliance, water quality controls catch a significant amount of water in the smaller storm events, so it could be -- and I haven't looked at this specifically, Council Member, but the volume of the retention pond may have actually held all of the runoff in that storm event from the impervious cover cover areas.

>>Slusher: okay. Let me ask you one under traffic that I think would apply to your area.

>> Okay.

>>Slusher: when we're talking about adding the lanes, is that a calculated in an impervious cover cover increases at the forum?

>> we do look at roadway and impervious cover as it relates to sites and they are required to account for boundary street impervious cover as it relates to the site improvements. I am not sure exactly at this time if that impervious cover for those additional turn lanes has been incorporated into this or not. I could control --.

>>Slusher: can you find that out?

>> yes. I can consult with lauren real quick on that.

>>Slusher: thank you. I'll yield now, Mayor.

>>Mayor Watson: Council Member Lewis?

>>Lewis:. [Inaudible].

>>Lewis: I guess I need my mic on. Ms. Glasco, do you have any idea how many acres is left other than these three tracts out there to be developed? or approximately?

>> are you asking about the entire area or just this one area?

>>Lewis: well, within this general area.

>> It's quite a bit of land. When you drive down -- at the two intersections you have land to -- facing north, the northeast part of the property is not developed. Heading south towards circle c you have some property that is not developed, but potentially they have some approvals.

>>Lewis: what I was getting at is if this is propped with -- as they say, people count rooftops. If you put more rooftops up there, then someplace out there that there's -- that is grandfathered as far as the development go is sure to be developed, but I'm trying to just take a look at --.

>> This is a land use map we put together that shows you the site. I hope I'm not blocking that. The yellow shows you single-family. The pink are the subject tracts to be rezoned. Here is mopac. And then in the yellow are your rooftops. And the difference, the red is retail, so it's just a along here -- this is not developed. This parcel here is not developed, so if you head down this way, you have this part that is not developed, so a lot of the blues that you see --.

>>Lewis: the blue is not -- the dark blue is, what, blowing sink.

>> That's the mitigation tract, yeah, blowing tract.

>>Lewis: okay. And the other green area up there next to the g --.

>> That's parkland.

>>Lewis: yeah. Where is the 147 acre tract that mitigation tract.

>> Here is one mitigation tract. This is one mitigation tract right here.

>>Lewis: all right. So I'm trying to put some perspective on it. If it's not developed and more houses is developed there, where would you have houses?

>> your single family that is plat sd in yellow. It's either built or has approval to plat. Everything is in light blue, your baby blue is undeveloped land.

>>Lewis: and we don't know how much of that is grandfathered, do we?

>> not from looking at the map. We'd have to look at what approvals we've had in the past. Does that help answer your question?

>>Lewis: yeah. Thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: Council Member Spelman?

>>Spelman: thank you, Mayor. Did you read my mind?

>>Mayor Watson: well, I'm getting better at it. I saw you riech. -- Reach.

>>Spelman: actually, if you could leave that up for a moment. I have a question for Charles if he will let me. It's been suggested -- I'm thinking you may need this as a prop. It's been suggested that this -- it's smaller than the arboretum but it's roughly the same order of magnitude in ais of the arboretum and we know what's happened to the area rur sounding the arboretum over the last 10, 15 years. In your opinion does this -- is this likely to behave like the arboretum does? and I'm thinking that your answer will probably be no, and why not?

>> this area is -- first of all, I'm Charles himesmith and I did a demographic analysis for this project. And this is not the arboretum. It's not even close. The arboretum is probably the most accessible suburban location of any portion of the Austin region currently with the intersection of mopac and 360 and 183 all coming together at that confluence. And there are -- I don't know the exact numbers, but there are probably five or six times as many people within a five mile radius of that intersection as there are of this intersection. This is an important intersection and this is an appropriate location for commercial development. Commercial development that would support the needs of the neighborhood as I've stated to you before, which is woefully underserved currently and will become more kurnd served as additional single-family develops in the area. And if I might just add to that, there's been some discussion about this development alone en gendering development further away, and I'm not sure I quite understand the term auto -- what is it.

>>Spelman: cat ta lit tick.

>> Although I understand the intent of the term. But in order to have additional development further out, you're going to have to have some very significant things that aren't currently there, like utilities. Water and wastewater service in huge quantities and an ex-hauft active roadway network and those things aren't going to happen. The way -- you know, sure, there is stuff still in the pipeline that will be developed, both single-family and in commercial development in the barton springs contributing zone, but, I mean, the development controls that are in place now and the intent of this Council and others is not to allow development further out. And if you don't en gender development by providing the support utility infrastructure, then it's not going to happen. So, I mean, you could put a shopping center at the edge of the City and if there's no infrastructure to support development further out, you're not going to get additional shopping centers further out.

>>Spelman: let me ask a hypothetical question. Suppose exactly the same development as is suggested here were not at the corner of William cannon and mopac, but at the corner of slaughter and mopac. Physically we could find the space to put it here. If we moved this many thousands of square feet out a couple of miles, would your answer to that first question be any different?

>> well, if you were to a developer proposing that development and this is what I do for a living is develop a feasibility analysis, I would probably not come back with a positive answer for your proposed development because there's not sufficient density within a five mile radius of that intersection to support this intensity of development from a retail perspective particularly. I mean, it's -- you're getting further and further away from the concentration of population and where developers want to be is where population is concentrated. And this really is smart growth in the sense that you've got communities out there that are underserved, they're driving all over Austin for jobs and for retail services and now you're offering to put both of those things in proximity to their communities, which is what they want. [Applause].

>>Spelman: you should run for office, Charles.

>>Lewis: raise your price. You heard the approval.

>>Spelman: you've been pauk talking about five mile radius and I've also heard you talk about three mile radius and I think you were talking about three mile when you were doing your market projections earlier. When do you use three, when do you use five and what's appropriate for this site?

>> it's really probably -- well, let me back up for a second. Typically in a shopping center analysis you would use a one to two mile radius for a neighborhood shopping center that serves -- etcetera got a blockbuster video, a small grocery store, cleaners, that type of thing, one to two miles. When you start getting a larger -- when you have a larger site and you have a larger retail development, we call that community serving as opposed to just neighborhood serving. And that typically uses a three mile and sometimes a five mile radius. And either one can be -- I mean, a three mile radius is certainly sufficient. A five mile radius gives you an additional picture. Typically they are done on one, three and five mile radiuses. It's just a con generation convention.

>>Spelman: and if I were talking about five mile radius, I might be talking about a regional shopping center such as the highland mall, barton square, or would I not want to do that either?

>> it depends again on the infrastructure of the roadway, that the roadway net works, you know, if there's a list developed roadway network and less dense population, you would have a large are market area that a regional mall would serve.

>>Spelman: so if somebody from the arboretum had come to you 15 years ago and said Charles, help us -- maybe they did actually. Help us figure out what kind of market we're going to have for the arboretum, you would have drawn a 10 mile radius.

>> Right.

>>Spelman: and if you drew a 10 mile radius around this point, you're going to get a lot of undeveloped land.

>> Mostly undeveloped land.

>>Spelman: so if you wanted to put the kind of shops that you put in the arboretum that are regional draws and try to turn this into a regional center, they would have to go through a long period where they weren't getting the people they wanted because there wasn't enough rooftops to support it.

>> You wouldn't get the tenants in there. They do their demographic analysis and they say we're not interested.

>>Spelman: okay. Saks fifth avenue is not going to be moving into this site.

>> No.

>>Spelman: sorry. I'd like to ask staff a question, if I could. Actually, I would like to ask george zapalac a question. I think he's the most likely person to have an answer for me. It's been suggested that happen once this thing gets built, ats is going to look at it, growth projections are going to go through the roof and immediately they're going to say we need to build the rest of mopac. Can you tell us how they're going to create the growth projections and how they're going to use those to determine what additional work on the infrastructure of the roadways needs to be done.

>> I think I would need some help from Luther on that.

>> Excuse me. I can give you a general idea of how that's done. Ats works with its member jurisdictions to arrive at projections and actually it's the policy advisory committee that approves the population projections. But in providing population projections for ats to work with, we do use as one of the several factors, growth rates in area or sub areas. There's some -- there's some areas for which projections are made, traffic service zones, and those projections are made for both population and employment. One of the several factors that go into the projection for each of those traffic zones is the rate of growth, but we also use other factors which include development restrictions relative to environment, relative to specific ordinances, relative to how much land is there that is actually developable. So the rate of growth in that general area is one of several factors. Overriding all of that then is some policy decisions or policy preferences that affect how each of these other factors are used in the rate of growth or the type of growth that occurs so that if we have policies that, for example, prefer growth to occur and we have incentives for growth to occur in the desired development zone, that's a factor that has an affect over just the raw impact of these various attributes that the traffic serial zones have. Then there are also the issue with control totals so that in terms of what the overall growth of the region is, there's only a certain amount of growth that each of those traffic serial zones can capture. And even if there are great or sizeable growth inducement factors, there's some cap associated with how much population can be distributed into each one of them relative to the total growth that the region can accommodate.

>>Spelman: we're not going to be putting 10 story apartment buildings on traffic serial zones in the neighborhood, for example.

>> That's reasonable.

>>Spelman: okay. One of the arguments made is if ats is going to be taking our policy preferences into account, on the other hand, we are allowing a relatively dense development to be built on this corner, then our policy preference or our stated preference is really reflecting what it is that we're really acting on. Could you address that or is that really not up your alley?

>> I think it's too detailed to be reflected in the gross projections that are used by ats. Each of these traffic serial zones, although they have individual components, is how they all act together. So what specifically happens in one area, unless it's a major departure from the sort of development that would normally occur is not a factor.

>>Spelman: so if there were read as a blip, I think correctly as a blip, rather than a major policy shift, then it probably wouldn't matter.

>> It wouldn't make a noticeable difference. Pell spell something you didn't mention that factored in that that surprised me is the level of traffic, the intersection effectiveness, whether we're talking c, d, f, intersections.

>> What I was talking about is strictly the population and employment growth that is the generation of traffic, not how the traffic is accommodated or the street network's ability to accommodate the traffic, just the raw generation of demand through employment and population projections.

>>Spelman: okay. So is traffic -- is a signal intersection effectively taken into account? let me rephrase that. That was a stupid way to put it. If traffic is flowing well as opposed to flowing poorly, that sna a factor in ats' decision making?

>> not in terms of the employment or population projections.

>>Spelman: I understand that, but in terms of the decision making in terms of whether to, for example, widen mopac.

>> You're out of my area of expertise.

>>Spelman: fair enough. George, do you want to come back on that?

>> once the population and employment forecasts have been done, then traffic trips are generate and assigned to the roadway network and constraints are built into the network based on the capacity of the roadway. And as an area becomes congested and that traffic is diverted to other routes because it can no longer squeeze through the constrained network.

>>Spelman: I guess my question was -- I think you're starting to answer the question now. Through no fault of your own or through my own fault not phrasing it very well at this time of day, I guess the question I was really getting at is if the applicant is going to be spending 650,000 dollars to try and try and make right what's being made wrong with increasing the number of trips, so increasing the number of trips, but then you improve the effectiveness of the roadway so that it's no longer a problem for people and the traffic flows as smoothly as it did before. If that's not taken into account by ats as all, and what is twaen into account by ats is growth and population growth and employment, then we may very well have put ourselves in the position where ats would recommend large increases in roadway infrastructure even though they're no longer necessary. Does that make sense?

>> well, the ats plan or model does not take into account the very detailed geometry of the intersection, like the turn lanes, the signal timing. It's more a gross level. And so it would tell you that based upon typical carrying capacity of a road, this road would need to be x number of lanes wide. There are things that you can do in terms of just improving the geometry design of an intersection to make it function better and you could in some cases perhaps stave off the need for making major new roadway investments, but that's not the sort of thing that would typically be looked at in ats study, that would be done at a more detailed level.

>>Spelman: that would be something that would be done on a case by case basis and people have to make the case to ats that we don't need a larger roadway and here's why.

>> Correct. It would be done in the analysis of the individual facility needs. For example, if text dotted perceived a node need for upgrading mopac and they would do a detailed facility design and those sorts of things would be taken into account at that stage.

>>Spelman: last question. You have a choice at any given lot as to whether you're going to increase population by putting in residences or whether you're going to be increasing employment by putting in commercial buildings. Which of those two is going to be more persuasive or which of those two is going to have the larger traffic generation impact from ats's projection point of view.

>> It's going to be commercial.

>>Spelman: okay. 3,000 Job are going to account for more than 3,000 people?

>> in general, yes. There are, rveg, a lot of complicated things that enter into the analysis, looking at the directional split, the time of day, the traffic will be occurring and that sort of thing. So you can't just make a very simple statement that one is going to be necessarily worse than the other, but typically in terms of trip generation, the work trips generate more traffic than the home trips.

>>Spelman: but that level of detail is something that ats can take into account, but that has to be something on a case by case baits.

>> That is taken into account in the modeling, yes.

>>Spelman: so if the trips are coming, instead of going in in the morning and coming back in the evening, if it were the other way around and therefore not contributing enough to peak hour traffic, peak traffic levels, that would be taken into account by the growth projections?

>> yes, that's correct.

>>Spelman: okay. Thanks.

>>Mayor Watson: I'll entertain a motion. Did you decide you didn't have enough?

>> Council Member Slusher had a question and I wanted to answer it.

>>Mayor Watson: good, you're right. Yes, the project will include the additional impervious cover associated with the turn lanes.

>>Slusher: that's in the calculations already.

>> I don't believe that it currently is specifically addressed in the calculations. It amounts to about 12,000 square feet of impervious cover based on what we were calculating, about a quarter acre. So that would have to be added to it, but even with that we're reducing the overall impervious cover with the project by about between 10 and 11 acres, so it's -- there's about a quarter acre impact from the turn lanes.

>>Slusher: so that would be how much impervious cover.

>> About 12,000 square feet.

>>Slusher: but percentagewise, what would it take it up from to?

>> it might bring it up to around -- it's currently at 51.8% of the development tract. That's the impervious cover currently. It would bring it up to maybe 52. It wouldn't be huge.

>>Slusher: it's fairly small?

>> yeah.

>>Slusher: Mayor, I wanted to ask Charles if he would come back up.

>> Yes, sir?

>>Slusher: I'm look at an article called the incredible southwest from august, september 96. I wanted to ask you a couple of questions about it. It has to do with the demand in the area. You're quoted as saying -- first of all, you didn't say this, but the article says that in southwest Austin here mopac, loop 360 and u.s. 290 Cross one another like strands in a fat braid. And --.

>> I definitely didn't say that. [Laughter].

>>Slusher: that's the lead. And then very soon after that it quotes you saying, I've long believed that this con con influence ens of shopping that we see in the golden triangle, the arboretum area in northwest Austin. Now, you go on to say you may not see the intensity of activity of the golden triangle, which is an area with a larger population and has received the most attention, but you will see the same kinds of development and I think we'll see a lot more to come in the next five years. Now, so take that back to the discussion over demand and is this project -- is this project going to meet demand that would otherwise be met by worse projects or is this just going to be part of a huge sprouting of projects in the southwest?

>> let me make a couple of points. First of all, the article refers to the intersection of 290 and mopac.

>>Slusher: it says mopac, lup 360 and 290. It and it also talks about the roadways weaving in from the east. And it talks about the whole area of southwest Austin.

>> Well, that area like the arboretum area, is unique in the sense that its roadway network provides that confluence article arterials all in one location. It's a very unusual situation where you have three arterials. Usually at an intersection you have two arterials, not three. And the fact that there are three coming together at that intersection makes it particularly accessible to a much larger area. And it is that accessibility that provides opportunities for regional shopping center opportunities. If there were enough land and if it was possible to build a regional mall at that precise location, I think it would have been done. I don't think that it can be done. I don't think that there's enough land left in that area in order to build a mall, but that's a mall type of location. William cannon is not. It is further to the south, it is not served in the same way by the roadway network that this intersection to the north that is referred to in this article is.

>>Slusher: the intersection of, let's see, mopac, loop 360 and 290, where do those -- that's a fairly wide area because you've got --.

>>Mayor Watson: there's a microphone laying right there.

>> You can see on the map that that intersection is here. That's the intersection that --.

>>Slusher: you have to go up the hill to get to 290 from where 360 and mopac connect and then you can get off there and go up to --.

>> Right. The map doesn't go far enough to the north to show all of that. And a lot of that land, we're talking about potential here. We're not talking about --.

>>Mayor Watson: it's working.

>> We're talking about potential development, not -- there's a difference between demand and effective demand, if you're familiar with the term. There may be demand for something, but it can't be affected because there is no supply. And the fact that there is -- the fact that there are constraints to development within this area means that that demand may go unmet, so while that may be the ideal location for regional retail, it may not be able to develop there more than it has already because there's no more land that is available for development.

>>Slusher: so would you spring over then to this area and others or just this area? what's your -- and this was three years ago, so what's your analysis on what we're going to get in this area? do you see where I'm driving?

>> I'm not sure where you're going.

>>Slusher: the applicants have been saying that this is going to meet demand in the large portion, very large portion of the demand for retail in the area. And therefore we have other projects that are grandfathered and that this project is better than those because of its mitigation. So what I'm trying to figure out, and this is very key to me, if this really does meet demand in the area it means that this project, rather than some of those, is going to be built. Or does it mean that this is just one in a flood which is -- I'm sorry. I didn't realize I said anything funny.

>> You didn't. I just got lost here. Distracted.

>>Slusher: or that is this just one in a series of flood of projects which seems to me what this article is saying.

>> Well, again, I refer you to the point of the article made reference to a location that is not this location.

>>Slusher: well, it talks about all of southwest Austin, though.

>> If I recall correctly, it talks about the intersection of 290, mopac and loop 360.

>>Slusher: so you're saying that that one for various reasons won't be able to happen, so is this -- does it jump then to other areas or just not happen?

>> well, it doesn't -- you're not going to get regional mall type -- it's not just the demographics, but it's also the arterial network that drives the decision making by a major retail tenants. And they will go where all of the number of components are available. It's not just the house tops, it's not just the rooftops, it's the access, it's the land price, it's any number of factors. People currently in that area are driving a very long way in order to have their retail needs met because the area grossly underserved. This particular development will address a lot of that need. It won't address all of it, but it will address a lot of it and it will address it very well.

>>Slusher: so do you think that means some of these other grandfathered projects will be -- either won't get built or be much less likely to be built?

>> I don't know about specific other grandfathered projects to which you're referring, so I don't know if I can say this one is better or worse than the one that we're talking about.

>>Slusher: thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: Council Member Spelman?

>>Spelman: before I make a motion, one very short thing. I'd like to review the bidding on where the pud stands right now. I have noticed, I think, a few changes from the previous version of the pud description when it was introduced by the applicant. I would like to nail some of that stuff down. The last time that you introduced this, there was an impervious cover on the development tract of 51.7%, was it, around 52%.

>> That's correct.

>>Spelman: and did I hear you say 50% just a few minutes ago?

>> we're willing to and would agree to a reduction of 50%.

>>Spelman: okay. Did I correctly hear you say that there was going to be mandatory phasing so that you could check the effectiveness of water quality controls?

>> yes, Councilman, that's correct.

>>Spelman: did I hear you say there's going to be a 65,000 square foot cap on any one office user.

>> Right, business and professional office, office user.

>>Spelman: you've got general office and medical office. Neither one of those?

>> I think it's both actually, the medical office is included.

>>Spelman: mandatory green builders standards, you said that.

>> Yes, sir.

>>Spelman: and you would pay 100 percent of the roadway improvements necessary to make whole the damage done by the increased traffic.

>> That's right, all the improvements identified in the tia we would fund 100%, yes, sir.

>>Spelman: did I hear you say anything about a cap on retail space occupied by any one user. That hasn't been part of the current proposal.

>>Spelman: I'm ready for a motion, Mayor.

>>Mayor Watson: Council Member Spelman?

>>Spelman: we have just pass pased on only first reading, it's true but we have passed on first reading a mitigation policy which we were careful to craft in such a way that it would not apply to projects where there were extremely big box retailers. And I realize 100,000 square feet is an extremely big box, but it's a less box than it was a few years ago. Now we have supermarkets that are 100,000 square feet. So that was that level up to which in putting that mitigation policy together our staff felt was going to be small enough that it was not going to be a regional draw. So I'd like to add one additional caveat to the forum pud proposal. I would move approval of this on second and third reading with the addition of 100,000 square foot cap on retail space that could be occupied by one one user. This would prevent -- reduce the capacity of the managers of the forum pud by putting in an extremely big box that might be a regional draw that might be might create some of the effects that the opponents are concerned about.

>>Mayor Watson: motion has been made by Council Member Spelman, seconded by Council Member Garcia. With -- I'm assuming part of that motion are all the items that you just walked through with the applicant's representative? is that correct, Council Member Spelman?

>> those items that you walked through with us that I said we had agreed to, some of those were not actually made part of the reading motion, so you might --.

>>Mayor Watson: that's why I wanted to be clear. I want to make sure we had it all out there now. Let me walk through and make sure we've got it. 50% Impervious cover, mandatory phasing, a cap on any single office user, mandatory green builder standards, 100% of the cost of roadway improvements identified in the tia will be paid by the applicant and a thousand square footed cap on retail space used by any one user.

>>Spelman: that was 100,000.

>>Mayor Watson: what did I say?

>>Spelman: you said a thousand. [Laughter].

>>Mayor Watson: he just nodded. [Laughter]. Do you want me to negotiate this or do you want to?

>> I was nodding because I'm following. I thought. Or so I thought.

>>Mayor Watson: I misspoke. So -- and you're in agreement on all those items?

>> well, the last item that was part of the condition I would need to confer with my client on that, but the others that were addressed, yes, we were in agreement on that.

>>Mayor Watson: motion has been made and -- is that your second, Council Member Garcia? all right. Discussion? Council Member Spelman?

>>Spelman: I'll go quick. I think there are three issues here. Traffic issue, there's a water quality issue that is happening on this site, these three tracts, and then there's long run growth affects. I think the record is real clear on two of these and not clear on the third one. The one that's clear on is traffic and water quality. I think it's clear that if you spend 650,000 dollars, if you've done the tia that these guys have done, it's clear that traffic will be better after this is developed than it is right now. It also would be better after this is developed with the traffic improvements than it would have been under s.o.s. Had it all been single-family housing because somebody would have to pay for those traffic improvements, but it would not be the developer of that single-family housing. That means we would have to do it and that means it's money we would have to spend on these intersections that we wouldn't be able to spend elsewhere in the City: I'll ask you in a second, John. Water quality on this site is -- I think may appear at first to be more controversial, but I think it's still a fairly clear case. We're talking about a much complicated trade offs here. The bottom line is we have less impervious cover with this project than we would have had under s.o.s. And we are trading off tracts which are less critical could water quality for those that are more critical to water quality. We have four feet of dirt underneath the tract that they want to develop on and there's going to be little recharge going through there. The tracts that they're trading off are those which have very little dirt and have very porous limestone and I have vouch for the porosity of that lime tone because I've been down there among and got dirty proving to myself how deep those holes were. Water does run through that aquifer. Mud does too and I kplekted a whole bunch of it. And I think it's real clear -- the last pointed is about clustering. And I believe lauren's point and I believe tom's point about clustering. I believed it for a long time and this is why I was in favor of the staff putting together in form of mitigation policy because clustering is going to be better in the long run for water quality. Those two are easy. Here is the hard one. Here is the hard one is long run growth effects. I think the argument that Bill bunch made, I think the argument is Kirkpatrick made about these effects, about a spiralling, a positive feedback loop associated with putting more retail space and more commercial space over the aquifer in this area are possibly true. I think they're very likely not true and I want to check it out. So here's what I did to check it out. I used to be in my pis spent youth an urban economics unit. So I took a look at my textbooks that I had running around. Both of them said something. I ri read my copy of the book on growth management and it's probably the best book ever Written on growth management or so I hear from my friends and I read that. I talked with two professors from the regional planning program at u.t., who are the two smarted evident people on the subject that I know in town and everything I found confirms what I have heard from development community that retailers, people who are building commercial property, they count the rooftops, they figure out how much money the people inside that kerl have, they evaluate the competition and that's how they make they're sighting decisions. And that suggests that residents proceeds commercial and if you want to control growth, have you to control residence and if you you want to control residences, you have to control where the roads go, you have to control where the sewers go and where the schools go. We don't have the control over the elementary schools, but we do have a lot of control over the roads and sewer lines. That's critical stauchbd we have a handle on that and we're going to have an effect on that. That suggests the only fly in this ointment that I am certain of that and that is we need to be sure we're having them look at affects on traffic for this particular development, take a very careful look at the traffic improvements that are being made for by the developer in this case before they make any hasty decisions and I think wrong decisions about whether we need to widen mopac. I think it's less likely if this project is built than it would under an s.o.s. Project. If I thought that were not true, I wouldn't vote for it, but I don't think -- I think it is true. [Applause].

>>Mayor Watson: further discussions? Mayor Pro Tem?

>>Goodman: well, I had a comment as I'm sure everybody did, but before that could I ask Bill a question about the language? are we getting into legal difficulties when you cap the 100,000 square feet to a user? wouldn't it be -- does it change it to say single use so that there's no implication, it is a personal or person oriented thing or ownership? the reason I ask is because in other contexts where it's been tried to save guard some of the agreements and restrictive covenants and components, sometimes it's been tried to nail down by user, by owner, by management, and we were always told by legal in those cases we couldn't do that.

>>.

>>Spelman: if you have a suggestion for other way -- I was trying to mimic the language in our mitigation ordinance.

>>Spelman:.

>>Goodman: I didn't know. It struck me --.

>>Mayor Watson: let's talk about it. The goal being that's sproesed by Council Member Spelman is that you're trying to avoid any single use, retail or building -- or office, any single use, whoever the user might be at any given point in time to a certain cap on square footage. With that being clearly stated in the motion, we could let legal make sure that that gets done in the way that we -- we can craft the language, but I know it's good you pointed that out so we can make sure that is a clear statement. I said that accurately, didn't I?

>>Spelman: could you repeat it one last time?

>>Mayor Watson: I'm not sure. That the dwoel is -- of having -- goal of having a cap is that at no time whoever the user may be can the use exceed a certain number of square feet. So it's not so much tied to that user, it is tied to a use in a given point in time. Okay? other discussion? Council Member Slusher?

>>Slusher: thank you, Mayor. I didn't even raise my hand. [Laughter].

>>Mayor Watson: maybe I am getting where I can --.

>>Slusher: one thing I wanted to make sure of was the legal strengths of the applicant's guarantee that they will go in stages and if it's shown that they're plooting, that they're not meeting the standards, that then they won't continue with the development. [One moment, please]

>> so we do have that language.

>>Mayor Watson: other questions or discussion? Mr. Joseph, if you would come forward, there was a question that was asked about conditions on the motion. And the one was about the cap on retail space, use, by any one users with the understanding of what that means as we have now discussed it.

>> Yes, one clarification. That is it was my understanding that the intent was that it would be limited to 100,000 square foot under a roof. And the user was used the first time. Our retail is more than 100,000 square feet, so of course we are for the going to limit our entire retail to 100,000 square feet. We are talking about 100,000 square foot under roof.

>>Spelman: my intention, Mayor, was not to change the total retail that you were -- that you are including in your p.u.d. At all.

>> It was just a limitation on the amount under one roof.

>>Mayor Watson: by any --

>> by any one user at one given point in time, whomever that user may be.

>> Right. With that clarification, we can accept the conditions.

>>Mayor Watson: any further discussion?

>>Slusher: Mayor I think it's pretty important that we get this nailed down.

>>Mayor Watson: okay. The public hearing has been closed. We are at a point now where the Council is involved in discussion. If anybody heres me -- if anybody hears me calling out any more discussion, I am referring to the Council.

>>Slusher: I need to discuss this with the City attorney briefly, on the mike, though. Okay. Construction of the second phase will be authorized only after the forum has demonstrated the water quality control effectiveness for the first phase. So how do we determine the effectiveness of the -- who has the authority do that?

>> Mr. Murphy --.

>> Pat, what would be helpful is if you or Alice could talk about how you would enforce this. If Council were to pass this, phasing was going to be involved based on measurement, how would the documents be constructed or where would the safeguards be in our process.

>> The only thing that comes to mind, I am going to let -- I might ask lauren a question -- would be some sort of plan perhaps for monitoring of the system that would require some sort of sampling and monitoring to show that it's not only functioning properly, as a system, but that it actually is resulting in the treatment levels that it's designed to treat to. I don't know if that's something that they could agree with here tonight, but we could work out a monitoring agreement.

>> And then before subsequent phases were approved, someone -- there would be a document, something tied to the project plans that would trigger looking at that data before our next phase was approved.

>> Right. I will let lauren -- we would assess a report before we would approve any subsequent phase is what I envision.

>> The step in your process that would not be approved is the site plan. We could bring site plans and have you review them for up to 35 acres of impervious cover, once that 35 acres is exhausted, we cannot bring you a site plan for approval until we have submitted to you a demonstration that our water quality controls are effective and I could have designed the monitoring plan, but it made more sense to say that we would agree with the City as to exactly what that plan would look like and that you would have the authority to say it's a good plan, and you would have the authority to say we met it before you signed off on the 3030 by the next acre or square foot of impervious cover.

>> So the successful meeting of those measurements is the sole discretion of the City.

>> Exactly.

>>Slusher: Mr. Joseph do you agree with that.

>> That's the plan we submitted to the Council some time ago and staff as well. We do agree with that.

>>Slusher: okay. Ms. City attorney, by the language here, is that -- does this language get to that where the Council a few years from now, when this is 30% complete, will have the authority to enforce that?

>> if you are concerned about that, we can just add a provision in the ordinance that clarifies that.

>>Slusher: now or --

>> we could add a provision that says exactly what Dr. Ross just explained.

>> We will accept that. Jeff says he thinks it already says that.

>>Mayor Watson: are there other --.

>>Slusher: how about this. After the forum planned unit development will occur in two phases. Construction of the second phase will be authorized only after the forum has demonstrated the water quality effective phones the first phase, comma, effectiveness solely at the discretion of the City of Austin. I think that's what ms. Roth said.

>> I think that would be an item under staff's discretion when they review that site. I don't have a problem with that.

>> That's okay.

>> That's fine.

>>Slusher: okay.

>>Mayor Watson: point out --.

>>Slusher: that would be at the end of -- exhibit g, heading project phasing based on demonstrated water quality control, effectiveness into the first -- end of the first paragraph.

>>Mayor Watson: please state it again.

>>Slusher: the forum planned unit development will occur in two phases, that's the next to the last sentence of that paragraph. Last sentence. Construction of the second phase will be authorized only after the forum has demonstrated the water quality control effectiveness for the first phase with the effective effectiveness to be judged solely at the discretion of the City. I think.

>>Mayor Watson: do you have a problem --.

>>Slusher: judged solely at the discretion of the City.

>>Mayor Watson: Council Member Spelman was that a friendly amendment? Council Member Garcia was it a friendly amendment?

>>Garcia: yes.

>>Mayor Watson: that will be added to the main position. Any further discussion?

>>Goodman: yeah, Mayor.

>>Goodman: Mayor Pro Tem?

>>Goodman: there's still a couple of things to say. Along with all of the other brand new all kind of offers, mitigation larchdz, engineering, the green building, all of that, is also a voluntary compliance with our m.b.e. W.b.e. Ordinance requirements, even though obviously they don't have to. I think that that's the first time that I ever remember anyone doing that, too. But along with that, I just wanted to say one thing, if that's all right.

>>Mayor Watson: sure. You have the floor.

>>Goodman: about intensive use. I know a lot of people seem to think that intensive use is only non-residential use. But here lately I think that it's become fairly obvious that that is not the case. That that's a fairly simplistic way to look at it. Even though it's also fairly simplistic for me to -- from the first have thought this was better than s.o.s. Because of the clearer improvement in impervious cover, 60%70.5 is fairly easy to understand. Then 314 acres untouched. But I really think that what Dr. Ross said was something we are going to have to take to heart and find ways to accomplish, which is we have to do better than s.o.s.. We have to do better quickly. Because land is being developed. And in our search for innovative ways to -- to acquire or protect larger areas of the aquifer, this is one of the mechanisms that's open to us because we simply don't have enough money to buy everything and keep it from being developed. But the intensive use that I see is not simply retail or office. It is houses. And if we left this to develop as houses, that means more families, more cars, more schools, more kids, but in essence more disrupted aquifer land and the risk is from the people presence and what they bring. So that ultimately I think it would still be pretty green everywhere over the aquifer, too, even if it was from an aerial view. It would be green just like all of our neighborhoods are. Every square inch or every 15% of every square inch would have something on it. And that I don't think anybody would dispute is not going to protect the aquifer and the springs. So the sprawl that is part of so many residences is also a magnet for development. Because you have a lot of houses and a lot of people who need to have somewhere to go buy things ork or send their kids to school. So the magnet for development is maybe not so easy as we thought before, because it's people who require those kind of services. And if not at low pack and William cannon that is a pretty disrupted spot already, with s.o.s. Engineering, which also doesn't happen often, usually it's just zero discharge because people have a hard time figuring out how to do it, then there are undeveloped commercial use properties around and I think that those folks will then say here's more justification for our development of the commercial areas that we have. For me those areas are in much more dynamic for the aquifer spots than this because there won't be the kind of mitigation that Dr. Ross can do here on those. So ... I also want to thank katherine bramley and Mr. Bramley and all of the people that they got to work hard on this because it probably was something that maybe you will look back on fondly, but are glad that it's over for the moment. And I want to also thank all of the neighborhoods because you all haved diligently and it's an amazing -- amazing thing to have stayed with it for two and a half years, we all appreciate what kind of commitment that took. Thanks, Mayor.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you, one other thing that I will point out, Council, on page 2 of three of the ordinance, at line 21, it says sites within the parcells may comply with note 27 of exhibit b. That should be note 24 of exhibit b. When the time comes to vote, I am sure you all were worried about that wondering if I was going to clear it up [laughter].

>>Lewis: should be what? should be note what?

>>Mayor Watson: should be note 24. And I just wanted to make sure that we were completely accurate on that.

>>Lewis: it says note 24.

>>Mayor Watson: motion has been made and seconded. Any further discussion? Council Member Griffith?

>>Griffith: Mayor, thank you. Again, the two questions that have been on my screen all these months that we have talked about and debated the p.u.d. Have been one and two, what's best for the environment, what's best for the neighborhood. I think one of the things that unifies everybody in this room is a deep commitment to the edward's aquifer and barton creek and barton springs. We also have learned that s.o.s. May not be the whole answer, but certainly an invaluable tool. We have also learned, I believe, that we can't buy enough of the land to preserve and protect the aquifer and the springs and the creek. Another tool that we are going to use is mitigation. And the mitigation policy that we are looking at and also the forum p.u.d. Project, both recognize something that I think is extremely important. And that is that not nearly all of the land in the barton springs zone is created equal. It varies vastly from flat and dry to great gaping holes that go slap straight down into the aquifer. It has steep slopes covered with woods, it has meadows, the vast -- a vast range of types of land. And the mitigation policy and this project recognize that there's some land you should stay absolutely off of. And there's others that you can build on more intensely. The thing that caused me the most heart burn was the fact that I don't have a lot of confidence in most structural controls. And when it first started out it was totally dependent on structural controls. I had a very hard time with that. But now that the proposal has sort of a test case, you start out building a fraction of it, then you collect the runoff and see how the pollution is and then take another look at it, that has given me a lot of comfort. Also of all of the environmental features I have ever seen in Travis County, blowing sink has got to be among the top three. The opportunity to save that piece of land forever is a very powerful attraction. So from an environmental sense, this is -- this is I think the way to go. And in terms of the neighborhood, I have visited with the neighborhood folks and they tell me that the developer has agreed to things that no other developer would even consider. They are getting a vegetative buffers, they are getting no service stations, convenience stores or fast food restaurants, they are getting no vehicular access through the neighborhoods, they are getting hike and bike trails throughout the development, they are getting sidewalks, high architectural standards, neighborhood review of the site plans, generous landscaping and the $650,000 of traffic improvements. For those reasons, I think that environmentally it's better, and in terms of neighborhoods it's better, so I will be supporting this motion. [Applause]

>>Mayor Watson: Council Member Slusher?

>>Slusher: well, the first thing I want to point out, bill bunch said something earlier on about how they were hick towns in virginia that are trying to run off home depots. I visited my hometown where I lived 12 years, roanoke, virginia, they were having a battle trying to keep a home depot from locating there. But I am not going to let that affect my vote.

>> Councilmember, just listening to you talk, nobody would suggest that you are a hick. [Laughter].

>>Slusher: I am glad to hear that. I actually picked that up a little further south. [Laughter]. So I would say that things are -- that wasn't below the line, though. Maybe -- we may need to have another retreat after this. [Laughter].

>>Slusher: I would just say back in the old days when it was always the developers against the environmentalists, it was a lot -- things sure were a lot clearer back then. And certainly not the case. I think probably a lot of the people on each side of this discussion think it's real clear and I think there's probably quite a few that realize that it's not. And I certainly don't think it is clear. I am not sure really what the best thing to do is. I don't know if the other members of the Council are either. That's what I meant when I said this is a -- I said earlier about the mitigation policy that it's a discussion among environmentalists and people who want to protect the environment about what's the best way to do that. I think that's even more true in this case. I know there's some people that have been on the same side of things, are divided on this, people that have worked together a long time, so I hope we can -- we can have that spirit that we are just having a disagreement on what's the best way to achieve the same goal. I hope that holds. Judging from the calls to my office, it probably owe overall, I think, we are having a real civil discussion, I've had it from both sides, though. I've had people say some fairly unpleasant things about my -- what my motivations might be and assuming what my conclusion is going to be. But to me it comes down to there's actually like I said a lot of uncertainty, it's unclear what the right thing to do for the aquifer, for the city is. At least it's unclear to me. I wanted to say about the -- about the applicants, the developers, I think they have done a really good job of being innovative, and of trying to meet people's concerns and being very creative about doing so. But to me it comes down to that -- this is just too big to put in this area. Although some of the traffic, according to the traffic impact analysis, a couple of the intersections will improve slightly, I think that's only done by putting more cars on the road and adding more lanes, so that's not really improvement because there's more traffic in that intersection and other ones in the area. And it doesn't meet what our mitigation policy proposal that's been developed by the staff. With the lack of clarity on that, I just have to stick with the s.o.s. Ordinance and vote no. [Applause]

>>Mayor Watson: Council Member Lewis?

>>Lewis: thank you, Mayor. With the people that's going to be around here about 2045 with me, they will probably be saying I am sure glad those people that's providing you guys passed this thing tonight. Saying I am sure glad they saved that place out there, you know? at least we can still have this blowing sink tract, we would be talking about it like people talk about the barton springs and zilker park now. So I -- I look at it like if you -- whatever your baseline is, if you are trying to go above that, that's one thing. But so -- I have to take the advice or projections from the experts, especially on the water quality issue. If they said it's better to leave it un -- undeveloped than it is to develop 15% of it, so I will have to go along with that. But like I said, about 2044, you guys that's around here with me, you know, you will be talking about it, I am sure. So thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: motion made and seconded, there being no further discussion, all those in favor say aye. Opposed no. A vote of 6 ayes, one no, Council Member Slusher voting no, the motion passes on item no. 14. [Applause] [cheering].

>>Mayor Watson: thank you all very much for being here tonight. Council, we have, if you will recall, we recessed a special called meeting of the City Council. There is no further business to come before the City Council at this regular scheduled meeting, so I will entertain a motion to adjourn the regular scheduled meeting and immediately thereafter we will reconvene the special meeting. Motion made by Council Member Garcia, seconded by.

>>Griffith: to adjourn the regular meeting, all those in favor ". Opposed no. Motion carries, we are adjourned from the regular meeting. I call back to order the special meeting of the Austin City Council. Hey, folks! folks clam car wash, convenience store development, which we thought was very questionable in terms of traffic safety, but also it resides right on bee creek, which feeds the wild basin, we have tonight with us some of the founders of wild basin who were pretty concerned about that. Frankly we couldn't find anybody to pick up the gauntlet, make any effort, trying to make that a more sense I didn't believe situation.

>>Garcia: one of the things people told us when we started talking about this tract is what we need to look at the issue of developing a lake Austin comprehensive plan. That might be something that you all -- [applause] -- get involved in.

>> You kind of rang the bell on that one.

>>Garcia: that I think is one of the things that we are going to bring up so that we can form a group to look at that issue. But those of you that live outside of the City can work cooperatively, that's one way to do it.

>> The only other thing I guess that everybody has sort of expressed a concern to me -- [buzzer sounding] -- is simply that these projects are not approved so quickly that we don't have time to actually respond or even have a conversation.

>>Mayor Watson: the City will try to facilitate a meeting.

>> Thank you very much.

>>Mayor Watson:

>>Slusher: I am confused. The City has more powers than -- inside of the City than in the etj. Would you be in favor of your neighborhood being annexed to bring it under those --

>> we would definitely be in favor of discussing that. But there are 19 neighborhoods, all with board, so that's a question that has not been answered fully yet. The strip annexation that I believe was in place, they gave us the hill country roadway ordinance that had substantial setback, height restrictions, a lot of neat things that are now gone because we are etj instead of limited use. Quite a few members of our group worked personally on those ordinances.

>>Mayor Watson: you are not here speaking against the annexation?

>> yes, we are. Absolutely we are.

>>Mayor Watson: so outside -- you live outside the City limits, but yet you oppose the city annexing someone who volunteers to become part of the City and would add tax base to the City?

>> well, in the sense that if that includes an increase in the density of the roof tops that are involved there, then -- I may be totally confused.

>>Mayor Watson: this is about annexation.

>> That is not involved in any way in kind of variances --.

>>Mayor Watson: we are not deciding anything right now, other than whether or not we are going to go along with the wish of someone who is asking to be voluntarily annexed. And as Council Member Slusher just pointed out, the City has better control of development inside the City than it does when it's in the etj and counties have extremely limited control when they are the ones that are in a situation to have -- I am a little confused about why you will be here opposing an annexation.

>> Forgive my naiete, you will have to accept that because I am naive in the process. My understanding is that annex involves a pilot project with septic systems that are pretty substantial in nature that are in the lake Austin watershed.

>>Mayor Watson: it would allow for the potential for one -- the first large scale cluster of systems for decentralized wastewater. Whereas currently what you have is a bunch of -- all of the houses are set up on septic systems. Frankly many people believe it would provide for greater environmental protection to do it that way. You are right, that would be one of the things that would probably be able to be done to assure greater environmental protection. Another idea is that the people that are asking to be annexed under this set of circumstances when they are requesting to come into the tax base of the City, they are giving up all of the rights they have to be a part of what some legislation that allowed for the creation of specific zone type of things, they basically said they want to comply with current rules and regulations of the City. And there's -- they have made a proposal that arguably, at some point it will be brought forward, but then the current code. Certainly it would be much better than what they could do under the legislation that takes them outside of our -- even our control, the City's control in the extra territorial jurisdiction. Don't sell yourself short. Maybe you want to do is at next week's hear, between now and next week look at whether or not you are really against this annexation and maybe come back Mexico week at the second hearing, which we are required to have by law, let us know whether or not you really are against it.

>> Thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you.

>>Slusher: do you wish that you were back at the dentist? [laughter].

>> You have to learn sometime.

>> Susan morey, is neil lacy here. Ms. Moray you will have up to six minutes if you need it.

>> Thank you. I have two things to address, one is a response to the question that you just asked jeff, I haven't been at the dentist today, so I will try and be as brief as possible. But to the point, I brought a map and I don't know if this is too much glare on it to see, but you can see the City limits.

>>Mayor Watson: yes.

>> And this whole area that bee cave road goes through, which is not City limits. I personally, as president of the briton springs canyon land neighborhood association would love to talk to my neighborhood members and the rest of the bee cave road alliance about annexing this whole area, getting the environmental protection and zoning protection that we currently don't have, and protecting what we do have. A lot of the development that's going on right now is two to seven acres lots. The concern that I have and a lot of the other people have is the proposed density of the balance four pad. As Dr. -- Bahlfour pad. If water quality degradation begins at 4% impervious cover and they are proposing 24%, bahl four is proposing to come in at 28%. Since we were not ever notified before they went to Planning Commission or City Council before, they inadvertently did not notify bee cafe road alliance, we have been left out of the loop up until this point. We would love to be able to try and sit down with them and do some negotiation and ask them to come in and meet this 15% impervious cover.

>>Mayor Watson: as I have just indicated, we will facilitate some sort of meeting.

>> Right. Then overall the map that I did of the lake Austin watershed, can I put that up or hold it up where you can see it.

>>Mayor Watson: if you would like to, yeah. You can put it over there on that easezel and grab that -- easel and grab that microphone. There's one right there.

>> What this map shows is proposed subdivisions in the lake Austin watershed that are in the works right now. It's color coded. These are the ones for an 11 year period from '84 to '94, all based on information we got from development review. These two are from '95 and '96. The next sheet shows '97 and '98 and then just January of '99. These are all pending projects out in the watershed. And what we are asking is beyond just an annexation and p.u.d. Approval and development and certain impervious cover issues, if we could try and slow down just a bit the approval of various projects and do a watershed study and really do an overview rather than a piecemeal look at things, I think there's so much in the works in the drinking water protection zone that by the time smart growth starts to beism men understand that area there's not going to be anything left to reduce density on. As far as annexation goes, I think it's premature to make an an sexization deal there with what's following, the level of impervious cover is greater than our current code allows, I would say let's annex the whole area where we could implement the hill country roadway ordinance, have zoning and water quality protection at 15 to 20%, rather than 28,.

>>Mayor Watson: I am concerned that there may be some confusion about some code provisions. You are entitled to another two minutes, I don't want to interrupt you, go ahead and finish your two minutes, but I think it's going to be important because we are talking about whether or not we are going to annex somebody. Annex an area. If we don't annex them, we have less control. In fact if we don't annex them and we lose in a case that is currently in the Texas supreme court, we don't even have any etj control.

>> What's I am saying annex all of the way out to bee caves.

>>Mayor Watson: okay.

>> You have 1400 houses in my neighborhood right there.

>>Mayor Watson: okay.

>> And in that essence then we could enforce the current codes that the City has. Which are much less density than what this project would proposal.

>>Mayor Watson: I think you maybe mistaken.

>> Okay. Well I have just looked at the handout that they have, but it's saying keeping ate at 28%, I know we are only talking annexation right now, but if annexation occurs, the subdivision plans are right there waiting to go through development and review for the first phase of it. And I am asking if prior to that we would either do an annexation on the whole area that's not going to grant p.u.d. Status and grant greater impervious cover than we would allow by our current codes because it is the drinking water protection zone. The landowner -- the developer make said he could still do this pilot project and chruszered development on one acre lots, that it would still be feasible at that size, he could make current code at one house per two acres, only do one acre lots and do 222 of them, rather than 500 proposed with the annexation deal of the p.u.d.. And I know we are talking annexation, but it seems that that stuff is all just sequential.

>>Mayor Watson: I might explain philosophy, I think it's a philosophy shared by the Council. This Council has worked very hard, even though we -- the city of Austin has annexed quite a bit of land and quite a number of people in the past couple of years that we don't just say we are going to jump out there and annex a bunch of land and a bunch of folks right now because we are trying to figure out what we want to do in the future. Instead this Council, I believe, has demonstrated that it uses annexation as a planning tool. In fact the City of Austin is supporting legislation in the legislature that would -- that would basically require cities to create three year planning processes so that you would engage in a three year plan as opposed to what you suggest, which is just to say well we want to go ahead and grab this now in hopes that we will be able to do some things. Frankly I think the Council would consider that to be an inappropriate use of annexation. I hear your concern. That is one of the difficulties. But what we are considering now is someone who stepped up and voluntarily said we want to be annexed, we want to lose our right, if we -- even if there's a victory in the supreme court on their behalf about these special zones that we happen to disagree with, but that would actually them -- take them out of the control of our etj, it would still be there, but we lose controls. They are saying they want to come into compliance with current code, actually do better than current code. That's the issue. I hear your concern about long-term planning. I think we all share that, but we need to use annexation in a way where we are doing planning and not just as a tool to grab and then do planning.

>> He is the annexation totally separate from the p.u.d. Approval?

>>Mayor Watson: let me -- it is. Mr. Murphy, if you will come -- I'm sorry. Could you address some of the issues that are -- that are being brought up with regard to the impervious cover and some of the things that have been said in that regard?

>> this p.u.d. Proposal does not reflect an increase in density. What it does is it matches the current densities allowed under the watershed regulations. For cluster single family development we allow one unit per acre of net site area. This project has 450 single family units on it, which is a match with our current code as far as the number of units. There is no decrease, there is no increase. What we gain with this p.u.d. Is where we otherwise would not have a specific impervious cover limit on the single family, we have an agreement to keep to it a specific amount of 28%. One of the issues with our code is that it assumes impervious cover for single family subdivisions based on lot size. And once it is put on the ground, there is no way to regulate how much is actually built. In going into this p.u.d. And the recommendation and the reason that I recommended it to you, is because here we are able to make sure that we have a cap on exactly how much impervious cover they can build. On a lot by lot basis, there will be a restriction on the overall amount. So rather than getting 30, 35, 40% of impervious cover, which could happen in a tradition subdivision because under their building permits they would be allowed 45% impervious cover per lot under a normal sf 2 category for the property, these are being held to an amount that would yield overall only 28%. So that is the reason that we are supporting it. It is not a decrease in the amount of density, nor is it an increase, it is exactly the same density that we would allow if this came in under a traditional subdivision approval. So they are smaller lots because they are cluster lots. They are smaller as well because they are not onsite septic for each individual lot which would give you the one acre lots. So although it may have the appearance of being dense, it is dense in clusters with green space around them.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you, ms. Morey, one other thing real quickly. This isn't a debate, one thing real quickly, then your time will expire.

>> Okay. I just wanted to clarify the difference that we are discussing, which is sf 1 versus sf 2, that's a dig distinction because that's the difference in the one house per two acres, the house one house per acre.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you. Doug kent. Doug kent? are you Mr. Kent?

>> I am opposed to the annexation.

>>Mayor Watson: do you live in the City?

>> no, I don't. Annexation through all of the consequences it might follow might lead to the destruction of what might be the last and greatest opportunity to preserve high quality land in the hill country immediately west of Austin. As you know, the hill country immediately west of Austin is just a stone's throw away, is a City treasure, a land of gorgeous vistas. And abundant wildlife and a watershed that drains to drinking water for its residents. It's been a weekend recreational retreat for Austinites for decades. The area is currently as you know under tremendous development pressure with alarmingly little planning to lend wisdom to the pattern of growth and I would suggest that annexing one small bed of it isn't going to make it very well --.

>>Mayor Watson: how does not annexing it make it better?

>> let me just finish my time.

>>Mayor Watson: please help me with how not annexing it makes it better.

>> I will get to that.

>> Okay.

>> Annexation of the balfour property from what I understand may not be feasible for this City and will probably in terms of being able to provide the services that it's obligated to provide and will probably lead to a string of zoning variance requests to make the property suitable for development. Including the requests we have discussed about the septic system, which in my opinion it consists of an experimental septic system on lake Austin just upstream from where we draw water. Not a place where I want to see an experimental septic system going in. So I would like to ask you folks to have the wisdom to moderate the growth in this area until proper planning can be performed and until we have an adequate opportunity to attempt to preserve this land. That's the end of my statement. Now I will respond to your question.

>>Mayor Watson: you say that you are opposed did annexation because right now we have the last chance to preserve the land west of town. My question to you is why are you opposed to it? tell me what about us saying we are not going to annex it makes it where we are going to have that chance to preserve it as opposed to by annexing it?

>> the bahlfour property is -- con joins another property called wolf ranch. And joins wolf ranch to lake Austin. Those two properties combined would make -- just a fantastic park. Preserved land. Okay? and my understanding is that annexation, if the annexation goes forward, it will be impossible for -- virtually impossible for us to prevent the development of the balfour property and to create this natural corridor for wildlife. And that I -- I think that other folks can speak better to why this is such a good opportunity, there are a variety of perspectives from the point of view of the state and nature conserveancy and so on.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you. Susan mcMartin. Susan mcMartin? she signed up against. Kim mcMartin? signed up against. Jean steigel. Jean steigel. Signed up against. Loretta ewant? loretta ewant signed up -- I'm sorry? is that you? all right. I will believe you if you tell me it is. Loretta you were signed up against, thank you, ma'am. Lucille stegman signed up against, do you wish to speak? thank you. Gary Robertson, gary Robertson, signed up against. Pam mengan, not speaking, but against. Don gardner, against. Joan elgis against. Ray goodrich, do you wish to speak?

>> I know it's late so I will be very quick.

>>Mayor Watson: that's all right.

>> The first point that I would make to you is to show you a map, if I could. These other maps that you have, but --.

>>Mayor Watson: why don't you try to take it over there so you can use a microphone. We need to have you use a microphone. Could you hand that microphone to him right over there.

>> If I could, I just want to point out the approximate location of this development is going to be here. All of this area that you see surrounded by pink border, the balcones canyon land preserve. I am opposed this this annexation because I feel that annexation is inevidentably going to lead to development of these tracts.

>>Mayor Watson: as opposed to not annexing.

>> Right. I know you are frowning and you think that annexation is going to lead to better control.

>>Mayor Watson: well, I have yet to see what -- if you say we are for the going to annex, maybe in one of these so-called water quality protection zones, that somehow that turns it into parkland.

>> No, you can put it down, I think they understand where it is. I will be back. -- I will go back. I understand the point that you are trying to make, which is that if there is some limited purpose annexation, that there will be some controls over how the land is used. To me this looks inappropriate because of the distance that this tract is going to be from the rest of the City of Austin. Other than the strip along the lake. You say, too, that the -- these landowners are volunteering to have their -- to be voluntarily annexed by the City. Who else is out there that's volunteering? there's no residents out there. This is a land owner and a developer from new york who are in this to make money.

>>Mayor Watson: would you volunteer to be annexed?

>> would I volunteer to be annexed? no, I would not.

>>Mayor Watson: they are volunteering to be part of the tax base of the City of Austin.

>> Right. I am in an area that's already been fully developed. This land has not. The only purpose for the annexization is to develop. Are you here, Mr. Mayor, I feel like I am talking directly to you since you are the one that's --.

>>Mayor Watson: all right.

>> Since you are talking back to me.

>> A lot of folks do from time to time.

>> That they are doing it for any other reason other than for development purposes?

>>Mayor Watson: I will tell you that they do want to develop this land and if they are not annexed, I have seen no indication that they are going to say, whoa, we didn't get annexed, so what we are going to do is not develop the land. So to the contrary if they are not annexed, they can develop this land in a completely different way and if the City of Austin loses a lawsuit it currently has in the Texas supreme court, they can use it in a way where we don't even have controls that we currently have in our etj. So it's -- nobody has been able to show me any indication that if the City were to say we are not going to annex you that they are going to say, well, my goodness, let's make parkland out of it. Because you are right people do want to make money off of this. What I do believe is true is that there are people that want to make money off property that many times say, we want to try to do it in the most responsible way possible. One of those things we would like to do is be annexed and there will be other things we do, as Mr. Murphy just outlined. I think you may have some of that working here. The difficulty that I am having with those that are opposing the annexation is that you are assuming that annexization means development and that non-annexation means somehow it won't be developed. I think that's an improper assumption.

>> All I can say is that if it is annexed [buzzer sounding].

>>Mayor Watson: go ahead, finish your thought.

>> If it is annexed you are going to have an experimental septic system out there draining into lake Austin. You know, it's kind of shocking to me, maybe this is a bit of heresy, but everyone tonight has been so concerned about the barton springs aquifer, the water that flows down the creek and into a swimming hole. I don't know about anybody here in this room, but I have never drunk outs of barton creek, I have never drunk outs of barton springs, I drink out of lake Austin, I am more interested in protecting the quality of that water.

>>Mayor Watson: you understand what we would like to see happen is the City of Austin be in a position that we could do some things about the protection of that water. And without annexation, we lose a lot of those abilities and what you might end up with is a development that is just on septic fields.

>> Well, there's some sort of disjointment, there's --.

>>Mayor Watson: yeah, I have recognized that.

>> There's some disjointment.

>>.

>>Mayor Watson: I apologize, there is disjointment, you are right. Well, thank you very much, I appreciate your being here. John volenvolente. He signed up against, jim isham. He signed up against. Paul dell piero, do you wish to speak or be shown in opposition?

>> what is the developer [inaudible].

>>Mayor Watson: I -- I couldn't speak for the developer right now. I couldn't speak for the developer. It may be that the developer wants to be part of the City of Austin because there would be services provided such as police, fire, things of the nature that some people want when they move near an urban area and abutt an urban area. Maybe the developer believes it will be easier to market if insurance rates in that area for fire protection are lower than outside that area because you are going to have professional firefighters as opposed to to volunteer fire departments. There could be any number of reasons for that to occur.

>> In my neighborhood [inaudible].

>>Mayor Watson: well, that may be. But there are different things that drive different people.

>> One other question. [Inaudible].

>>Mayor Watson: we will have hearings on the p.u.d.. We will have hearings on the p.u.d.. This is a question of whether or not to allow for a voluntary annexation. Do you live in the City? would you volunteer to be annexed?

>> [inaudible].

>>Mayor Watson: okay. Do you wish to speak? carlos ortiz. Carlos ortiz. Mr. Ortiz signed up against. Richard golembeck. He didn't sign up for or against. Dennis l. Hill. Dennis hill? Mr. Hill signed up against. Peg farrier. Signed up against. Steven suconzyk, signed up against. Ellis morgan, ellis morgan signed up against. Patricia wade. Patricia wade signed up against zoning expansion. Sharon Williams. Sharon Williams signed up against. John Williams, John Williams signed up against. Bill downing, Bill downing signed up against. Phillip Roberts. Do you wish to speak or just be shown in opposition? all right, you will be shown in opposition, thank you, sir. John hoffman is not speaking but against.

>> [Inaudible].

>> Please come forward.

>> Being naive with the whole process as well, could you tell me about the supreme court case and the etj or where I could find that out.

>>Mayor Watson: sure, let me give you a brief description, a few years back the Texas legislature passed some legislation, it was called senate Bill 1017 is what many people refer to it. What it said is if you have large enough, you have a large enough tract of land, large enough bit of property, that you can declare what is referred to as a water quality protection zone. These water quality protection zones as they are called say that -- really just by filing and saying you promise that you are going to protect water equally, you then have done a couple of things: one, you condition be annexed by the city in whom -- in whose etj you exist for 20 years; and the City can't exert any sort of water quality controls, even though you are in their etj. Instead they can utilize -- that's right. Good point the City attorney just pointed out it's bigger than water quality. Any subdivision regulations. You basically lose your control in the etj. They are self regulating. Very well put. The City of Austin filed a lawsuit saying that those were unconstitutional. We filed that in Travis County district court. We prevailed. Others filed a lawsuit, the other side, filed a lawsuit in hays county. They prevailed there. Those cases have been consolidated in the Texas supreme court. So the issue is going to be decided by the Texas supreme court, whether or not the creation of those zones, the legislation that created those zones is constitutional. It under this set of circumstances, if they agree to annexization, they are annexed, then they are voluntarily surrendering their right to be a part of one of those zones. So what then occurs is the city of Austin has subdivision control. It has water quality control. Whereas it may not have that. So that's part of the disconnect that is occurring here. One of the things that concerns me is the misunderstanding. There are different levels of ability to control the kind of things that obviously a lot of people are concerned about. One level is inside the City limits of the City of Austin. Once inside the City limits, you have controls, you have certainly controls. If you are outside the City limits but you are if the extra material torl jurisdiction the -- extra territory torl jurisdiction, then there's a third category, which would be if those zones are declared constitutional, the City has no control. And so what we are here discussing tonight is whether to go forward with a voluntary annexization that would maybe have some warts on it because there will be some development, but it would be more controlled than the zones, more controlled than the etj, and so that's one of the concerns that I have. I am glad that you asked that question. I hope that helped. Christina hoffman is not speaking but against. Ann fabre against. Ann fabre? connie astrachen, against. Chris davis, against. Dee schrade, against. Pat senate, pat senate? okay.

>> Based on what you have said tonight, I think I probably would be in favor of annexization, I no longer live in the great City of Austin, but I did up until about a year ago, I voted for every single one of you. Where will these kids go to school?

>>Mayor Watson: I don't know the answer to that question.

>> The other thing that has been most confusing and frustrating to us is how will we be notified? I know you said that you will let us know, but I am very concerned about the commercial zoning they want variances on, I know the people, I live in lake point now, the people out there are also concerned, how can we effect some kind of input on that? when the p.u.d. Comes up?

>>Mayor Watson: on this specific item? what came we do to help with that.

>> I want to help have an opinion or have my voice heard as it's developed.

>> There are a number of action items that will come before Council. One of those would be the actual p.u.d. Zoning. During those public hearings, you will -- a certain surrounding area by law gets noticed and of course these are advertised, go to planning commission, come here. But beyond that, the first gentleman that spoke asked about just setting up a meeting in your neighborhood, you could talk through some of the issues, we will facilitate that and get that done so that you not only have the chance to speak at the public hearing, but in a private setting out in your neighborhood, you have a chance to just talk through the issues.

>> Thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: Garcia whispered in my ear he believes that the kids would be in the eanes independent school district here. He says that's correct. Penny hall, penny hall? ms. Hall signed up against. Those are all of the people that have signed up or that I have cards for. Is there anyone else that wishes to be heard at this public hearing on the limited purpose an nextization of the balfour p.u.d.? yes, sir?

>> [inaudible].

>>Mayor Watson: please come forward.

>> You brought up the issue of fire and police, I was curious would that fall under the jurisdiction?

>>Mayor Watson: under limited purpose you don't do that immediately, but at some point you would then go to full -- after five years you go to full purpose, at that point you did provide those kinds of services.

>> Given the fact that it's -- it's a -- so far out, away from the City, is that -- even in five years that could present a problem --.

>>Mayor Watson: let me tell you, we will not go -- that's another part of what I was talking about with ms. Moray. In all of the annexizations that the City Council has done, that this Council has done, before we ever did the annexizations we were in a position where we planned it so that we will be able to provide services and not allow for a diminution of services inside the City of Austin. And one of the things we take into account is where property is located. Part of what this limited purpose annexization would allow us to do would be able to over this period of time plan and place fire stations, e.m.s. Stations, and -- in such a place where we would be able to provide those services in a way. That frankly is one of the things that -- one of the reasons you use limited purpose annexization.

>> Okay. Thank you.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you. Anyone else that wishes to be heard at this public hearing?

>> I have a question. Come forward.

>> When you say 28% impervious cover, does that include the building foundations?

>>Mayor Watson: yes, that's part of what's included in impervious cover calculations.

>> Okay.

>>Mayor Watson: yeah.

>> Okay. Thanks.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you. There being no one else -- Mr. Murphy did I say something wrong?

>> you did fine.

>>Mayor Watson: thank you.

>> Excellent.

>>Mayor Watson: there being no one else wishing to be heard I will entertain a motion to close. Moved by Council Member Garcia, seconded by Council Member Spelman. Any discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no., motion carries, with Council Member Griffith shown voting aye. If you will come forward, even though we have closed the public hearing, remind everybody what the schedule is.

>>Garcia: I have a brief question.

>>Mayor Watson: Council Member Garcia.

>>Garcia: the waiver of the three year provision, they are waiving that particular provision, does that work for or against the City?

>> the waiver works for the city because it leaves open the option to annex it for full purposes when it is -- when we best can.

>>Garcia: they are waiving, we are not waiving anything.

>> That's right.

>>Mayor Watson: schedule again briefly.

>> The schedule is for the second public hearing to be on the 15th next week, 6:00 p.m. Here at City Council chambers, first reading scheduled for may the 6th and then the earliest that second and third, final reading can occur would be june the 10th. The entire annexization has to be completed by july 29th to meet statutory requirements.

>>Mayor Watson: for planning preparation purposes, I may back off on this at the time, but why don't you plan on at the second public hearing as part of the description we are required by law to provide at the beginning of the public hearing, which you did earlier tonight, a description of this -- this cluster system that we are talking about for wastewater, being referred to as the experimental system.

>> We will do that.

>> Okay.

>>Mayor Watson: there being no further business to come before the City Council at this special called meeting, I will entertain a motion to add jourch, made by the Mayor pro tem, seconded by Council Member Garcia. Any discussion? hearing none, all those in favor say aye. Opposed say no. Motion carries, we are adjourned, thank you all very much.

End of Council Session Closed Caption Log