Mobility Committee Meeting Transcript –3/2/2016 Title: ATXN 24/7 Recording Channel: 6 - ATXN Recorded On: 3/2/2016 6:00:00 AM Original Air Date: 3/2/2016 Transcript Generated by SnapStream ================================== [3:06:24 PM] >> Kitchen: Okay. Are we ready to get started? Okay. I'm going to call this mobility committee meeting to order at 3:06. So the first item is approval of the minutes. Do I have a motion? Councilmember Gallo moves. Councilmember Zimmerman -- >> Zimmerman: I have an amendment to the minutes. >> Kitchen: Okay. Go right ahead. >> Zimmerman: I don't think this is correct. Can I ask who said that I was not present for the minutes vote? Because it says here in the minutes that I was present, then it says I was not present for a vote on the minutes. I don't think that's correct. Can I ask who prepared the minutes? Did you -- >> I can go back and take a look. [Inaudible]. [Off mic]. >> Kitchen: If it's your memory that you were present, then we can just strike this. >> Zimmerman: Yeah. I think that sentence needs to be struck. >> Kitchen: All right. Let's do that. Let's strike the sentence. >> Zimmerman: So I second the motion as amended to strike the statement councilmember Zimmerman wasn't present for the vote. The rest looks correct. >> Kitchen: Okay. All in favor? Minutes pass. >> Zimmerman: And councilmember Gallo, in fact, is not on the dais. Is she not joining us today? No, Garza, I'm sorry. >> Kitchen: She's not joining us today. She has a sick child. I think she's going to be watching us. >> [Off mic] >> Kitchen: She said she'd be watching us but she's not present today. Our first item -- we don't have any citizens communication so our first item is our briefing on the sidewalk master plan. And just so -- just for everyone's information, we are expecting other councilmembers to join us about 4 o'clock for our items number 5 and 6. [3:08:26 PM] So go right ahead. >> Good afternoon. My name is Howard Lazarus, director of your public works department. Our purpose here today is to provide an update on the revision of the sidewalk master plan, which includes the Ada transition plan update. So while we're waiting for that to come up on the screen, I would be remiss if I did not mention a couple of people who are here with me. One is John Eastman, who's our project manager, and but for John's efforts, the leading edge and innovative approaches that you're going to see in this plan wouldn't be here. Also, he's joined by Brian wells from mwm who's the consultant who's helped us as well. The sidewalk master plan has been in place since 2009, and over the last seven years it's served us very well in allocating limited resources to meet our most compelling needs. It's given us an approach that is both defensible to our public, as well as equitable in how we spend the dollars that we have. Our agenda for today really is to give you a little of the general background, to talk about the conditions that exist, and then go into a little bit of detail on the update. I want to be mindful of the time that we have today, knowing that you have other items on the agenda, and save as much time for discussion as I can. I'm going to start, though, by comparison to another city, and that's with los Angeles. Los Angeles is currently finalizing an agreement to spend $1.4 billion over the next 30 years for maintenance alone for their sidewalks. There was a class action lawsuit filed under Americans with disabilities act that alleged the city didn't maintain its sidewalks in a condition who was usable by people who rely on wheelchairs, scooters, and other assistive devices to get around. That $1.4 million comes out to a total of $46 million a year just in maintenance. [3:10:28 PM] Unlike Los Angeles, Austin does have a plan to address sidewalk repair, and it's one of the if you cities in the country that also accepts maintenance responsibility for its sidewalks. And we do have an act of maintenance and rehabilitation program. There's a 2014 report that states only 13% of the 82 cities in that study actual pay for the full cost of sidewalk maintenance, and Austin is one of those. That being said, it's always difficult to find funding for both maintenance and construction of sidewalks. The goal of our program is to ensure that walking is a viable mode of transportation, that we update the right-of- way with compliance sidewalks, and then we also help to contribute towards quality of life factors that involve reducing air pollution and traffic congestion by making Austin a far more walkable city. What you see in front of you is a map that shows the missing walks by council district. And there are some really interesting facts that you can see here, as well as things that underlie the data. Essentially, as you look at it, about half the street frontages in Austin are missing sidewalks, but where sidewalks do exist, they tend to be on both sides of the street. That means about 40% of the streets have no sidewalk on either side. What you see is that the green areas where the sidewalks are largely absent -- I'm sorry, the green sidewalks is where the sidewalks exist, and the purple are where they're absent, and you can see that most of the purple areas are in parts of town where subdivisions were built, really over the last 50 years without sidewalks. >> Kitchen: Mr. Lazarus? >> Have your. >> Kitchen: Could you go back to that slide? When you say percentage, that's percentage of what? A percentage of the total across the whole city? Is that what the percentage is? >> The percent is the [3:12:28 PM] percent of missing sidewalks of the city total. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> So as you look at district 1, it represents 5% of the missing sidewalks. When you go down to district 10, it's 20% of the missing sidewalks. >> Kitchen: Okay. Okay. >> Gallo: And I'm sorry, remind me once again, that means if it's missing, it's missing on both sides or it doesn't of at least one side? >> It's missing on at least one side. >> Gallo: On at least one side. So you might, if you had sidewalks on one side but not on the other, it would be considered just as missing as not having sidewalks on either side? >> It's based on the total frontage, it's a distance calculation, so you'd count both sides of the sidewalk. That's where the distance comes from. Correct? >> Gallo: So do we have anything that shows -- I mean, to me in the -- obviously, the difficulty in funding all the side way -- sidewalk needs is there. Do we have -- do we have any documentation that shows where we don't have any sidewalk at all on either side? I mean, if you have sidewalks on one side of the streets, that's not as good as both sides, about the it's certainly better than not having a sidewalk on either side of the street. >> We do. We have the existing sidewalk network mapped and cataloged. So we do know where there's sidewalk missing on either one side or both sides. >> Gallo: And so if you bring this information and just did it for absent completely, would you be able to do that? >> We would. >> Gallo: We would? Okay. Terrific. Thank you. >> Kitchen: Yeah. That would be interesting to see. >> So as I said, the current network exists of about 2400 miles. We estimate a service life of about 75 years, and really a replacement cost of just under half a million dollars a mile. That number includes a lot of thingat are thrown into the MIX. There are some areas are sidewalks are far more [3:14:29 PM] expensive because of grade. There are areas where they're not quite as expensive. So if we were to look at an annual repair need 362 miles, it comes out to about $15 million a year. If you look at the absent sidewalks, which is another 2387 miles, the cost to put that in is about a billion and a half dollars to cover all the missing sidewalks, both sides of the street, citywide. And that really is intended to give you a feel for what the magnitude of the total -- the total condition is. Not too long ago, we ascent copy of the peer cities report to council, and we posted that as well on the city's website. That does, in fact, give us a feel for where we are, compared to other cities of similar size, and we've also also, in this update, are going to do a prioritization map update to see where the missing sidewalks are, and use it by prioritization using the metrics in the plan. One of the things that was missing from the previous master plan is, we had no way to assess the condition of a sidewalk, even if it was there, so we're going to add that in. Then we're about also going to talk about funding and performance goals because the master plan, without an execution approach, really doesn't help you very much. There's a Thomas Edison quote that we started using around the department that vision without execution is hallucination, so we want to make sure that we're just hallucinating. One outlier here is Nashville. It was subject to an Ada lawsuit in 2000, and since that time, they've implemented a 20% rule where 20% cost of the paving projects is dedicated to sidewalk improvements. Austin city code requires us [3:16:30 PM] to spend up to 20% of a capital improvement project on sidewalks, but it doesn't address ongoing maintenance and paving. We have started to address sidewalk condition in our maintenance program because there are changes in department of justice and federal highway rules that certain activities that used to be considered maintenance are now considered enhancements, and you're required to address occur, and ramps as part of those. You will see that in the budget. There was some in this year's budget, and you will see it addressed as we go through the budget process for fiscal year 17. What's interesting about Minneapolis is that it's a much smaller area. The sidewalk network is pretty much completely built out so they spend basically all their money on repair. >> Kitchen: What's the situation with Houston there? Looks like it was all new construction, pretty much? >> John? Do you know? >> John Eastman. Yeah. So for Houston, they're one of the cities that falls into that majority that does not accept responsibility for maintenance. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> So they have a very limited capital improvement budget and on a relative scale are really just not investing in sidewalks in any significant way. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Thank you. There are two aspects to our sidewalk prioritization. One is pedestrian tractor score which is the places people want to go, the other aspect is pedestrian safety score which addresses accident history, health, status, demographics, and the street type. What we have taken out of the prioritization scheme, there used to be a fiscal availability score. We've taken that out and reallocated those scoring points to these two categories. So that's really the update of what exists. [3:18:31 PM] What's new in the master plan is the implementation of a condition rating system. I've mentioned to council before that we have about seven categories of assets that we're responsible for. We want the put them all in an a through F rating scheme. Right now we have good data on our pavements and bridges, but as we come to you each year with a service plan, we want to show you how we're improving the overall condition. So what you see here is -- we've divided a through F into two categories, functionally acceptable, largely compliant with minor issues, and functionally deficient. Our goal is to get through 80% of existing sidewalks are either rated a or B. So when you look at where we are now, only 20% of our sidewalks are functionally acceptable. That addresses cross slope grade, as well as obstacles. What is interesting about that number is, if we were to get rid of the vegetation and other obstacles, we could raise that 20% number to 40% with not a lot of expenditures. And one of the things that we are doing is an outreach campaign -- we will work with Austin code as well -- to address those areas where pedestrian mobility is blocked by something like an overgrown sidewalk. >> Kitchen: And when you say an outreach campaign, do you mean in response to the neighbor concerns, or just going around looking for places that if it that criteria? >> It will be both. We're also in the process of creating a public service announcement as well, and that will air on channel 6. So it's a very low-cost way to basically double the amount of functionally acceptable sidewalks. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> So when you look at -- I mentioned this before -- when you look at the estimated annual budget, to [3:20:32 PM] get to the percent of functionally acceptable that we had talked about, it's a 15-million-dollar-per-year expenditure over ten years to get the high priority areas in the city 95% would be functionally acceptable. One of the things that, as I mentioned also earlier, funding is a challenge. In the past we've really relied on two main funding sources. Primarily on bonds, voter-improved, recaptainization, and over the last couple of years we have started addressing the problem with transportation user fee, again primarily because of the requirements when we do an overlay to address curb and gutter compliance. There are some other opportunities to look at, some assessments for commercial, multifamily driveways, some residential driveway assessment, and enforcement fees, so if someone is cited, those monies would go into a fund to pay for sidewalk improvements, as to where now it goes into a general fund. It's a left pocket, right pocket discussion to dedicate funds because money is coming in. John is the expert on these. I ask if we have some questions, let's wait until the end so I can get through the rest of this. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Next slide talks about completing priority sidewalks within a quarter mile of all schools, bus, parks within six years. So those are basically the high and very high priority locations in the master plan. You can see that to get there, the $42 million here year expenditure for six years. It is a very big problem, and it requires a fairly large commitment to get there. Funding options, same discussion, through primarily voter approved debt for bonds in the past. There's a sidewalk fee in lieu where a developer can put money into a fund. We took over management of that a couple years ago, and we have been more successful [3:22:32 PM] in supplementing ongoing sidewalk projects with the sidewalk fee in lieu, and we do now have a good accounting of where those funds are. The challenges that they have to be used in the service area where they're contributed, and sometimes they'll wait there for a while until we can tie it into a larger project. Same kind of other innovative thoughts with some sort of incentive or cost matching program, we have done some sidewalks in the neighborhood partnering program but that's not the main intent of that program. There are some ideas with the improvement districts and the same thing with potentially driveway assessments. One thing that wasn't shown on those two charts also is the idea if some of the areas really do pose a health and safety risk, the opportunity is none voter approved debt. Schedules shows where we are. Even though this presentation has been deferred a couple of times, we have been busy with our outreach efforts, we've been through many committees, and we will continue to do that as we go through the next couple months to bring this to the full council towards the end of June. And then just as a summary, what we've talked about is a repair and rehabilitation requirement, $15 million a year. If that were to be funded solely from the transportation user fee, that, by itself, is a 30% increase. That fee right now runs around eight dollars per month per single-family house, so that's a hit to the household budget. New sidewalks, if we do the 67 miles per year, that's a $252 million total, if it were to be included in the six-year bond program. Total expenditures to get to the goals I mentioned is about 57 million a year. As pint of comparison, the 2006 bond program had no money in it for sidewalks so over the last several years we've increased to where we are spending somewhere between 9 and $12 million per year. The Ada compliance plan that's part of the master plan started out at a [3:24:33 PM] $5 million a year amount, then bumped up to 9 million. All we're doing now is essentially addressing Ada compliance, and we're at a rate, as John tells me, where we're only funding sufficient amounts of dollars to keep up with the amount of substandard streets that are annexed into the street annually, so we're basically treading water. So, with that, hopefully we can have a lively and spirited discussion on what we've talked about. I look forward, with some help, to fielding the questions that you have. >> Kitchen: Okay. Questions? Do you want to start? You can start. >> Gallo: So I'm going to go back -- the pages aren't numbered. I'm going to go back to the page that says new sidewalk goals with the blue chart -- there it is. Okay. And if that were limited to one side of the street, how would that adjust that figure? >> What I had said before, about 40% of the streets have no sidewalks, there's probably about 10% that have sidewalks on one side. So that number is calculated about high and very high priority locations, both sides. If we were to go to one side of the street, it would probably be a little bit more than half of that total. >> Gallo: Okay. And then if we took this and it was -- the choice was bonds, do you have any idea if we were looking at the 75 million per year -- I'm assuming it would be several -- it would be times several years if it were a bond? I mean, would it be a bond just for one year, or would it be a bond -- >> Oh, no, there's no way we could do that much work in one year. One is, the resources to do it probably don't exist, and the second is, it would be extremely disruptive around the city to try and do that [3:26:34 PM] all at one time. So it's really planned as a six-year program. >> Gallo: So the 57 million per year would actually be a six-year program, but the one per year would be done over six years? >> There's two components. One is 15 million a year just to repair existing sidewalks, and that's -- you could probably consider that an ongoing requirement for the foreseeable future. That addresses existing work. The $42 million is for new sidewalks, and that -- again, that would start to address the $1.4 billion of missing sidewalks around the city. So it's a pretty big bite of the apple. >> Gallo: Okay. Now I'm a little confused because we're talking about the 42 million per year times six, would be the 252 million. >> Correct. >> Gallo: But what I think I'm hearing you say is that you couldn't actually do the work for the $42 million in one year. >> No, I could. >> Gallo: Oh, you could. >> I couldn't do $252 million in one year. I'm sorry. >> Gallo: No, no, I was confused. Thank you. So approximately how much would that add to the tax bill, average tax bill? >> You know, I don't know. >> Gallo: You don't know? >> We could see -- if Mr. Canally is sitting out there, I can go talk to him and we can get that number to you pretty quickly. >> Gallo: All right. Okay. Thank you. >> Kitchen: I have a question. Going back to the slide about the priority sidewalks -- let's go back -- the map. There. Wait. >> The first one? >> Kitchen: No, the map that we were just looking at a minute ago that shows the walks within a quarter mile of -- there. That one. Okay. So -- and that relates to the 42 million. So the 42 million relates to the priority sidewalks, and I'm just wanting to make sure I'm understanding. That's within a quarter mile of all identified schools, bus stops, and parks. >> That's correct. [3:28:37 PM] >> Kitchen: Okay. So -- all right. And is this map showing us the status, then, of where -- where they're missing? >> The map is showing you the location of the high and very high priority missing sidewalk locations. >> Kitchen: Okay. Okay. What would be very helpful to me is -- you probably have a map. >> Uh-huh. >> Kitchen: -- Like this, is for each school to see what the status is for each school, missing sidewalks. And I know that -- I know that in my district, we went through that process to some extent when we were talking about quarter-cent because we did go and see some of the schools and talk to some of the schools. So do you have -- I'm sure you have some background information somewhere that -- that gives us the details for each school? Is that right? >> We can do that. >> Kitchen: Okay. Okay. Do you -- I don't have a sense of the totals because this is like -- what I would like to have is a breakdown of the 42 million by schools, by bus stops, and by parks. If that would be -- that would be helpful. And then by district. Would that be possible? >> We provided early on, when council was first seated, we gave district maps that showed the condition of all these assets. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> We can dredge those up again and update them. So we do have those by district that should be pretty quick turnaround. >> Kitchen: Uh-huh. >> We have the data that shows the locations because that's how they are -- you know, they're determined to be high or very high priority. >> Kitchen: Right. Uh-huh. >> It's a mapping exercise. The data is there, it's just figuring out -- >> Kitchen: If it's not too much trouble, it just would be helpful. I know it would be helpful for me to understand, for my [3:30:38 PM] district -- I'm not sure if other districts want to get into that detail, but I know that as part of the quarter- cent process, it was very helpful for us, the information that you all provided. And then we used that to go and talk to our -- the schools in the district. Signed that would be -- that would be helpful for me as I continue to work with the schools in the district. >> You know, I think we certainly have done that at the elementary school level. We've worked on the safe routes at school program with advisory groups at each school, as well as the principals. I may need a little more effort to address the middle school and high school level because the first one was dealt in conjunction with staffing and crossing guards. I'm not saying we can't do it; the data is there, we just need to -- you know, sometimes producing hard copy maps is a little labor intensive process. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> But we can do it. >> Kitchen: Okay. Well, it may be if you just want to give me summaries first -- I don't want you to have to -- I also don't want you to have to create district maps for everyone if it's not in interest for other districts, so -- >> Okay. >> Kitchen: So then the other question, in terms of priority, just a little bit more granular information, is the priority the same for all schools? It's not -- is it just a quarter mile of any school? Is that the way the priority works? >> Generally that's true. >> Kitchen: Okay. Then the same for bus stops, quarter mile of any bus stop or any park? >> That's correct. >> Kitchen: Okay. Okay. Then the other question would be, is there funding -- I don't know enough about the safe routes to school program, but is there potential for funding through safe routes to school? >> Are you talking about through things like federal grants? >> Kitchen: Yeah. >> There are. And we've received some grants in the past, so we can continue to pursue federal funding as well. I don't think it's a lot of money out there, but we can pursue it. And we have. >> Kitchen: Okay. Yeah, I know we have before. I'm just curious if there's -- when we're [3:32:39 PM] considering, you know, whatever the number is, if it's 42 million or whatever number, I'm just wondering if -- what's on the horizon for us, from the standpoint of the potential for federal dollars through safe routes to school, if that -- you know, if that's -- if that has any -- you know, what's the scope, I guess, or the order of magnitude? Is there potential for a lot of money or not a lot of money, or is this just too hard to get, or those kinds of things. >> I don't think there's a lot of money out there. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> But one of the things we have started to look at that's maybe a little creative is, we've been trying to, through boss biking and walking, see if there's a correlation between obesity, absenteeism and grade performance based upon people -- kids who use active transportation. Because if we can prove that, I think it does open up -- if we can prove a correlation, I think it opens up the opportunity for health related funding. So we've worked with the transportation actively on that, as well as the health department. We tried an experiment over at hart elementary school with some mixed results, but I think we're excited to build on that and see if we can pursue that. >> Kitchen: Okay. Okay. That would be helpful, just as we're thinking about the scope of potential funding that's out there. Okay. Let's see. Were there other questions? Yes, councilmember Zimmerman. >> Zimmerman: Thanks. I just have one question on your slide with the identified schools. >> Okay. >> Zimmerman: Did we include -- is that all the school districts? There's like six, six school districts, I believe, right, in the city? >> We support seven school districts. >> Zimmerman: Seven school districts? >> With the child safety program, so it includes all the schools that we cover. >> Zimmerman: Where does that leave the charter schools and some private schools as well, on UT there? Are those bundled in? >> Yeah, we do include charter schools. >> Zimmerman: Include charter schools too. >> We do. >> Zimmerman: Okay. Interesting. I appreciate that. >> You're welcome. >> Kitchen: Okay. Other questions? [3:34:39 PM] Well, I have another one. This has to do with the fee in lieu that you mentioned before. So I know I'm familiar with some challenges we've had related to development fees and using the dollars for streets that are nearby. Tell me again about -- I know you mentioned it, but tell us again how fee in lieu is working with regard to sidewalks. >> So code is pretty prescriptive about when fee in lieu has to be accepted. The language is, the director, which in that part of the code, refers to the director of development services now. >> Kitchen: Uh-huh. >> Essentially if there's an extraordinary cost or if the network is not connected, it essentially says the director shall accept. Doesn't it give any latitude. There are areas where you may, and generally when I've spoken to, you know, Greg Guernsey and Al Rodney, I don't like fee in lieu because we don't get good value. Most of the places where fee in Louis allowed, it puts an inordinate burden on the city. That's where the gaps come from. As the land code is written, that's something that needs to be addressed. Fee in lieu also has to be used within the area where it's generated, not at that exact location but within a certain distance. So the challenge with that is the only way to really leverage to say monies is to tie it in with another sidewalk effort that we're doing. We've been more successful with that over the last couple of years, but generally it's not a lot of money so it helps to just kind of piggyback it on other things. >> Kitchen: Well, at this point in time do you have any funds that would see fee in lieu that you've not been able to spend? >> We do. We have some funds sitting in the account, so to speak, that we have not yet been able to employ. [3:36:40 PM] >> Kitchen: Can you give me an order of magnitude of how much that it? >> I can't right now, but I will follow up. >> Kitchen: Okay. Okay. And are those funds that -- that you expect to be able to use at some point in the future, or are they concerns that they just may be there, and because of the way the requirements are written, you may have difficulty using them? >> My understanding is those funds are held for ten years, and if they're not used, then we've basically got to give them back, and we don't like to give money back, so -- >> Kitchen: Right, I know. >> So we tried to incorporate them into work that we have ongoing. >> Kitchen: Okay. Well, I just wanted to understand the extent to which there are dollars that we haven't been able to use and the extent to which it could be an issue for us because if there's something that we need to do to address our fee in lieu requirements, then that would -- you know, to make it easier to use the funds, then that would be something that I'd want to highlight. >> We can -- you know, if the council -- if the committee and the council desires, we can give a report as to where the funds are and what the status is. We have worked and are working with Mr. Guernsey and his staff to identify all those funds. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> All the fiscal that's floating around to try to get it maybe a little bit under control a little bit better and be able to use those funds. >> Kitchen: Okay. Well, then my last question would just be, just because I don't -- I'm trying to remind myself, fee in lieu is, instead of building the sidewalk, to what extent are developments required to build a sidewalk? Is it just -- >> That's a hard question to answer. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Because it deals with the type of site plan that's required. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> So I'd rather give you a well thought-out answer and one that I get a chance the run through development services. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Rather than do it kind of on the fly here. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> But I've looked through those parts of the code, and I'd much rather be able to [3:38:41 PM] give you a well-reasoned answer to that. >> Kitchen: That's fine. That would be helpful to me if you could provide us! Some of the things about when it is required. Okay. >> If I could, one of the challenges with fee in lieu is it's basically sidewalk crux cost, which is somewhere between four and five dollars a foot. The challenge is, if you do sidewalks as part of a development, things like your traffic control or oversight, some of the other things are included. If you do sidewalks separately, the cost of safety, what works on safety, essentially, are separate, and that's what runs the cost up of doing it separately. So it really is more efficient to do it as part of the development, even if temporarily it creates a little bit of a disconnected network. >> Kitchen: Okay. Thank you. Okay. Any other -- anybody else have any other questions? No? Okay. Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> Kitchen: We -- I did look at my list wrong. We do have one person on citizen communication, so we're going to go back to that before we take the next item. And that was Heyden walker. >> Thank you, councilmembers. I'm Heyden walker. I appreciate you going back to do this real quick. I'll try to make it fast. I'm the vice chair of Austin's pedestrian advisory council and I'm here just representing myself, but I did want to tell you that we have a lot of presentations about the sidewalk master plan and a lot of things that are going on. And we have a lot of robust discussions about creating a really good pedestrian transit network. And as it came up in discussion, there are a lot of chronic health issues that occur when we have a city that's not walkable. I'm of the personal opinion that we've spent a lot of years spending huge amounts of money on infrastructure for cars, and that I think it's time that we really look at our sidewalks and our bike facilities. [3:40:42 PM] I currently ride the 803. I'm lucky to live near a transit corridor, and it's a daily reminder on my way in to work and on my way home how important it is to have that safe network, and how scary it can feel to cross some of our big streets. And then I heard schools come up, which I think is really important, that we have safe ways for our children to get to school. The other thing I wanted to mention is that I'm hearing a lot of talk about I-35. I believe that until we have the main lanes of I-35 depressed through downtown, there's not really going to be a safe way for people to cross that corridor. You probably know from the work that's been done on visions, you're aware that 17% of the fatalities in this city happen in the I-35 corridor. And I really think we have a very walkable neighborhood downtown and a very walkable neighborhood in east Austin, and being able to connect those with safe, walkable facilities will be really important in our future. So thank you for your time. I appreciate it. >> Kitchen: Thank you. I also want to acknowledge Deanne Johnson. Thank you for being here. She's chair of the urban transportation commission. We want her to be able to participate. You're welcome to come up here at any point if you'd like. She's shaking her head. Okay. Our next item is number 4. We have a staff briefing on the strategic mobility plan. >> Good afternoon, councilmembers. My name is unique bodet, I'm with the transportation department, and the presentation is pulled up. I'm pleased to being here this afternoon to give the committee an update on the creation of an updated transportation plan for the city of Austin, the Austin strategic mobility plan. We are beginning this plan because imagine Austin, our comprehensive plan, [3:42:42 PM] envisions a better mobility future, one that provides for innovation, choices, and new strategies. The agenda for this presentation, it's not in your backup, but it should be on the screen. Next slide. It's me to advance. Here you go. There's a lot of information. I'm going to walk through it pretty high level and pretty quickly, and we welcome questions at the end or at any time during the presentation. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> I'm going to define what a strategic mobility plan is and the goals to the plan, its relationship to other plans that we have, both regionally and locally, public engagement around the plan, how it will affect transportation improvements, street impact fees as a tool to implement the plan, one of many tools that we hope to create. The budget for the impact -- impact fee program development, as well as the development of the plan, and then next steps. So what is a strategic mobility plan? It's a plan that's going to update and replace our current plan, which is the 1995 Austin metropolitan area transportation plan, which is adopted by ordinance and attached to imagine Austin. The new plan will expand the imagine Austin vision into actionable goals and transportation ordinance of imagine Austin. Most important, it will pull current plans into one comprehensive vision and imply an integrated approach to planning for all modes of our transportation network. The approach to transportation, the approach it will take, is transportation and access and mobility as essential to quality of life for all residents. So said another way, transportation is not only about getting from a to B. That's a big part of it in an efficient manner, but it's what happens in between as we build our network. The plan will add performance measures that will track the city's progress and ensure accountability. It will consider technological advances that are shaping 21st century [3:44:45 PM] transportation networks. It will identify ways to improve efficiencies in our existing system, manage demand, and strategically add capacity in all modes. And you all had a taste of that when we went through the quarter-cent process of what we can do with our signal system and other improvements. And finally, it will provide base data for the creation of a city of Austin street impact fee program, which I'll go into in more detail later in the presentation. What time frame will it cover? We're looking ten years plus. It will identify strategies in the form of programs and projects, and Jeff Tomlin was here as an advisor to staff and council several months ago. We plan to pull him in in the tail end of this process to help us. He's really good at applying strategies to visions and goals, and so that will be part of the process. It will include network and programming planning that will be done through a safety lens. So really looking through that vision zero lens and the task force recommendations that have been developed, and of course consider all modes for maximum capacity. It's a planning document so it's going to include maps and it's going to include tables focused to what our existing network is, and what our future street network can be and should be for implementing our imagine Austin goals and it should be updated every five years. So what is the relationship to other plans? For regional planning, by updated and defining our city's transportation needs, we will maximize our roll as a campo member and position the city to take advantage of funding opportunities as they arrive -- as they arise. In other words, our plan will better ensure our community's priorities are reflected in not only calls for funding opportunities, but also when campo updates its plan for the 2045 plan, this plan is timed [3:46:45 PM] strategically to be completed when that planning process becomes robust. So we will have a very clear, updated vision on how regional roadways affect our community goals, and we can better position ourselves to be -- have input and shape the campo 2045 plan. What's the relationship to local planning? Seen here at the bottom are multiple infrastructure plans that the city has. They're small, but it's the watershed protection master plan, the park long range plan for land, facilities, and programs, the long range capital improvement plan, the neighborhood housing community development plan, et cetera. So the strategic mobility plan will sit in company with a suite of more specific plans that help guide the departments who deliver those services for the city. Said another way, imagine Austin is the hundred thousand foot view, the strategic mobility plan will be the 50,000 foot view to be specific on what things we need to do, what things we should be funding, and the tradeoffs. The timing is right to embark on this update. We have an updated comprehensive plan. We're updating our planned development code so land use planning and transportation planning is going to be done together and highly coordinated. Many U.S. Cities have completed or are in the process of completing their transportation plans, making sharing knowledge, and approaches an advantage right now, so Seattle, D.C., Boston, San Antonio are all -- have just completed or are in process. There's a focus on demand management locally and nationally. We can't just focus on the supply end. We've got to also focus on the demand side. That will be a big focus of this plan. And new technologies have never been stronger as we realize what we can do with innovation and technology for efficiencies in our transportation system. As always, there's always a need to coordinate and collaborate with other partner agencies. Currently capital metro has [3:48:47 PM] two very important planning processes going on, their update to their service plan, and project connect central corridor, we're highly coordinated with them, transit planning will be a big part of the integrated mode planning that we're doing with our locally focused plan. There's other efforts going on. Pretty soon, in this preliminary planning process, we will have a nice visual of how all of those planning processes relate to each other, timing, deliverables, and all of those things, we hope to have that within the next several weeks. >> Kitchen: Yes. I want to thank you for that. >> Sure. Ô> Kitchen: And let me just emphasize again, we've had a request from councilmember Houston, and I think she pointed out what was useful for all of us, is to have a very simple graphic that -- that we can understand all these processes that are going on. And one of the with reasons it will be helpful, I also had a constituent ask me about it, because a lot of these planning processes have the opportunity for feedback, and actually are built off of feedback, and so I've had folks be a little bit confused about, okay, so there's a campo plan I should give feedback on, and then there's connections 2025, and now we're getting -- anyway, so I'm sure you all understand. >> Yeah. >> Kitchen: So it would be helpful for us -- >> Absolutely. >> Kitchen: -- To have this one page or graphic that we could say, okay, this is just a high level view so people can keep in their minds what the different processes that are going on and -- so as you all are putting that together, you might also think about -- you might also think about if -- you know, put your councilmember hat on, what will help us, and also put your constituent hat on, you know, someone in the public that's going -- >> Sure. >> Kitchen: -- What are all these things I'm being asked to comment on? >> Sure. Absolutely. >> Kitchen: Just something simple is good, you know, simple and easy to read. We don't -- >> Easy to understand. Thanks for the details on that. >> Kitchen: Yeah. >> And we'll contact your [3:50:48 PM] office if there's any other questions. >> Kitchen: Okay. Thank you. >> Oh, and finally on this slide, data- driven planning is our motto, so the timing is right in that the planning process will be data driven, and capabilities of the city to collect and analyze data for planning has never been better so we're really excited to embark on this effort. This slide shows the components of the plan, very high level. We'll start with telling Austin's mobility story, focusing on existing state of the network, and then we'll cover community priorities and a new community mobility vision will be combined through public engagement, which is starting now with the recently passed council resolution to have a community conversation around mobility. We're really seeing that as a launching point. We don't want to duplicate. We want to be efficient with people's time. And so that's a really great timing as a start -- as this plan starts. The plan will provide, as I said, a data-driven technical analysis of our network and potential scenarios to best meet targets as identified about you -- targets for mobility system as identified through imagine Austin, public engagement, and transportation planning methods. So there's some technical modeling and things that will also happen behind the scenes with this plan. The main element of the plan, the main deliverable seen in Orange will be the identification of strategies, programs, and projects needed to create a safe and efficient 21st century transportation system. Also included will be a recommended project prioritization process, and a discussion of implementation strategies including funding opportunities and funding strategies. Lastly, the plan will include an update to our street network table which will also result in new cross-sections that will allow us to update our transportation criteria manual, which guides the design of our streets. So this is really a big overhaul and a big u-turn as to how we're bringing best [3:52:49 PM] practices into how -- into our transportation future. So let's focus a bit on the current plan and what will be different in the new plan in the next two slides. Our current plan is the amatp. It was adopted in '95. As I said, it had minor updates in 2001 and 2004. The plan includes a policy councilman that's outdated, we'll be updating that, and it will include a street table and Mann that defines the existing and future conditions of only arterial roadway network, so things like widths and -- line widths and configurations. With guidance from our comprehensive plan and from our new strategic mobility plan, that table will be updated to reflect future conditions that best help us meet our imagine Austin goals. This is what the table looks like. I don't expect you to see it but as you see, it's very data-driven, and its role in transportation improvements is that this table is used to inform the transportation improvements that are obtained through the development review process, both through requirements of the land development code and through incentives that are noted in the code for transportation improvements. It also guides the city as we queue up our capital programs for our investments in the transportation network. One key difference is that currently, this table only includes our arterial roadways. We're going to update it to include all roadways in our system because all roadways roadways -- play a role in moving people and goods throughout our community. The second difference to the new roadway table will be considering not only getting from a to B and the function of the road from a strictly mobility standpoint, but also considering the context by which the road runs through, and also different modes that can be accommodated on the street to make the street work as hard as it can work. So looking at capacity, increasing capacity through the addition of modes and also looking at increasing [3:54:50 PM] choices for folks to get around. So big difference. And it will be completed. It's already started. This work has started with codenext because it was essential to looking at form-based code, so we have a head start on it, but it can't be complete until we understand how all of these roads work together when we do the planning. So once the visioning and the goals and objectives and the modeling and scenario planning is done with the plan, we'll be able to populate this table for a final product. Switching to one engagement, as I noted, we're starting now with the public conversation, and in the resolution, we were directed to look at past processes, which is really important because we've gotten a lot of good information over the last five years on mobility. So we'll be looking at a way to look at themes coming out of past mobility project public engagement processes, but then also asking for new information. Now, what will be different with this plan, one, we want on your ideas on public engagement. It doesn't have to be now. It can be throughout this preliminary planning phase. But a lot of the things that you see on this screen are things that you're used to and the community is used to having a project website, having a project oversight committee, having open houses in symposiums, town hall meetings, to get community engagement. Mobile outreach, the go Boston plan, has buses and small vehicles that go actually into communities street by street to get information, and it's works really well for them. I learned at that at a conference, and it really sparked interest for us at the transportation department. And then engaging with the quality of life initiatives is a way to have a new conversation because transportation affects us every day. It's so important to our quality of life. It's time. It's money. It's all of those things. It affects our health. And so really looking at, is there a way to engage through those initiatives to enhance public engagement and the things that we're hearing from the community and the things that are [3:56:52 PM] important. Large overview of the process, we're getting the word out now. We'll be going through procurement. Then we'll start looking at visioning and goals based on the public input that we've had through this initial process, and more that we will do with the project. Then we'll hibernate for a few months and do some technical planning. We'll have touchpoints with you all as we build the scope of the project, on how we'll be engaging in that technical part of the project. And of course we'll end up with draft recommendations to the committee, relevant boards and commissions, and to council through a Normal plan adoption process. Public engagement is shown at the bottom. We want to have touchpoints at any time. It's an open studio, anybody who wants to see how we're doing is welcome to ask about it and engage with it throughout the process. So I wanted to stop here for a second and just show how this effort is going to result in improving our transportation network. We talked about planning, how does that affect our everyday transportation? There's three efforts going on right now. We're starting the strategic mobility plan. Codenext is under way. And it is our land use regulatory tool. And what it does is it references, as I said, the street network table as development review land use review comes through the city. It's going to rely on that table to be able to ask and negotiate with developers and land owners on what improvements they'll make to the transportation system. The street network table will live in the straight quick strategic mobilityplan and be adopted by ordinance. They have a strong connection. Street impact fees is a tool that we'll be developing as another funding mechanism. The city has a role in investing in our transportation system, but impact fees are a way to [3:58:53 PM] fund the capacity related to growth, specifically. It's a tool that other cities have used. Fort Worth uses it, and other cities. Impact fees, we'll be developing those concurrently -- >> Back up for just a minute. >> Sure. >> Kitchen: If you can back up to the -- okay. So the street network table and the connection to codenext -- you know, one of the issues that comes up as part of the development process is the cumulative impact of development on infrastructure. >> Mmhmm. >> Kitchen: We've seen it a lot with our concerns around flooding, for example. But we've also seen it with our concerns about the capacity of a particular street to handle the additional carloads and things like that. And so the question has been, are we looking at cumulative impacts of development on a piece of infrastructure or street, for example, as opposed to one development at a time. So that particular issue -- my guess is that that would come up as part of codenext discussions, perhaps. And perhaps the street network table would impact that? I'm trying to get -- >> Yes. >> Kitchen: How do we make sure that cumulative impacts on infrastructure becomes part of the process? >> You're exactly right. It is being discussed, that specific issue, through codenext. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> And looking at the development service department is coordinating heavily with our department, with Austin transportation, on looking at some more eminent amendments that can help with that. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Because the whole codenext process is still under way. And looking at how we can fix it in a more long-term solutions as well. And then there's also things that we will be doing with the strategic mobility plan that speak to fixing that problem. We look forward to coming back with more specifics on those two [4:00:54 PM] things, both either through codenext briefings, and through the strategic mobility plan briefings. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> So impact fees are defined by the local government code, chapter 395, as a charge or assessment imposed to generate revenue for funding or recouping the cost of capital improvements or facility expansions attributable to new development. We've been using impact fees in Austin since 1991 for water/wastewater. The local government code allows us to use them for roadway improvements, drainage, and water/wastewater. It's important to note that the impact fees can only be used towards capacity-related costs. And, again, impact fees allow cities to recover infrastructure costs for future development. And they're subject to rough proportionality, meaning they have to be fairly assessed. So, being fairly assessed means that the fee calculation needs to consider these things as per the local government code looking at a ten-year horizon, making sure they are proportional share of capacity for growth, and that they're based in an adopted capital improvement plan based on future land use projections. And the fee calculation is required to be updated every five years. There's also checks and balances that the local government code puts in, having licensed professionals prepare all of the moving parts that come up with how the fee is assessed. Public hearings are required specific to those assumptions, and the capital improvement plan that results. And then an oversight committee is required. There is one right now for the water/wastewater impact fees. And so we'll look at how we'll create that oversight committee. Finally, almost done. $2 million was approved in atd's fy16 budget for this portfolio [4:02:55 PM] of deliverables that we'll help implement the Austin strategic mobility plan. Deliverables are the policy document and the street network table that are adopted together as ordinance. Cross section that will allow us to then move forward with amendments to our transportation criteria manual. We are starting some revisions to the transportation criteria manual concurrently so that when we're finished with this plan and the roadway table is complete, we'll be ready to move forward with the cross section amendments. And, of course, public engagement is part of that 2 million for both of these processes which are going to be and will need to be robust. The three deliverables there required by the local government code to create a street impact fee program is what's the main lion's share of the cost there. What will you all see next? June 23rd we're targeted to be at council with procurement of consultant assistants for both of these projects. And that's all I've got. >> Kitchen: Mmhmm. >> Wrapping it up. Thank you for your attention this afternoon. >> Kitchen: Thank you very much. Questions? Does anybody have any questions? Go ahead, mmhmm. >> Zimmerman: Just a quick question. Is there any light you could shed on how we got into the last rail election? We spent, you know, quite a bit of money on that in the community. Quite a bit of discussion, quite a bit of, you know, public meetings, feedback, what have you. The council, I believe, voted unanimously to put the rail issue on the ballot, and it was overwhelmingly rejected by voters. In my district, 6, it was very, very lopsided defeat. So I'm trying to square that cognitively with how we say we [4:04:58 PM] do community outreach, and we bring something the community wants. So is there any light you can shed on that? And to make sure we don't do the same thing again, say we're getting community input and then bring something that people overwhelmingly reject. >> Robert spillar, you're right in saying council set a policy to pursue rail in the previous election. It is what it is. We lost the election. And so we're moving forward. We still believe that -- >> Zimmerman: I'm sorry. It sounds like the city council did that in a vacuum. They just decided to put rail on the ballot. I don't think that's -- >> Council was part of the discussions with the region and the partnership with cap metro looking at how to meet the needs of our central core employment facilities. As you know, many regional players from Round Rock and Georgetown to the head of campo at the time, who was from Hayes county participated in those regional listening session, and the regional planning through project connect. And we believed, and made the recommendation to council, that there was reason to pursue the possibility of rail. What we do know is that employment and residential development, or population, has been growing over the last ten years. I have looked at some recent Numbers that suggest over the last 8 to 10 years we've increased in population, as well as in employment by as much as 25%, councilmember. And we're not building new roads, especially down into our core employment areas of downtown. We have room to maybe add a lane in each direction on our mayor highways, but not a way to get those major Numbers of new employers into the places where the market's delivering those efforts. [4:06:58 PM] That's why we recommended a higher, more efficient manner to move people in and out. And so I think I stand by those recommendations. And clearly the voters were not ready to pay for that. You know, I think that there's been some questioning, did they actually vote against rail, or was it really the funding and affordability issue. We won't know. We don't know that answer. That's the answer. Yes, council did get recommendation from staff to move forward with an investment that proposed to provide a higher level of efficiency. >> Kitchen: Okay. Any other questions on the strategic mobility plan? Okay. Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> Kitchen: We're now going to move on to -- and thank you to the staff. This is a huge effort, and I really appreciate putting together an organized way for us to understand how you're proceeding. Thank you. Our next agenda item is item number 5, which is our staff briefing on financial options. And, again, this is the component that we talked about at council and at our previous mobility committee meeting to consider what kind of financial options are available to us as we go down the road to think about transportation -- options for transportation projects. So this is related to the ordinance that we passed where we set in motion the process for starting to identify major transportation projects more near-term and what our funding options were. So, thank you for being here with us. >> Yes. >> Kitchen: We appreciate your time today. >> Certainly. Greg Canale, financial services. Today, I think I'm going to walk you through some kind of high-level -- a high-level picture of how we have typically funded our mobility improvements. A little bit of a look back, a little bit of an education about [4:08:59 PM] how it works in advance of the work that lies ahead for us to come back to council with more detailed, concrete answers. We're in the process of ramping up our modeling for both our debt side and also doing some studies that are going to help us fill out our options as we continue to respond to council's resolution on evaluating mobility improvement and options. So, we're going to look at debt financing. And I know at the last mobility committee, Mr. Goode talked a little bit about this as well, kind of from a big picture. I'm going to drill down a little bit, and talk high-level some other financing tools that haven't been mentioned today already. So, just as a sense of history, we always think it's important to look back at where we've been. This is a chart I think some of you have seen before. It was presented in your orientation, I think. Back to 1998, we had about $1.5 billion of general obligation bonds, and 638 million of that has been for transportation. So it's a good chunk of the voted bonds that we have taken to the citizens that have been for transportation and mobility, which certainly adds up over the years. When we do our citizen surveys, certainly transportation and mobility are typically one of the highest-ranked needs and priorities of our citizens. This is just a chart looking back at all those bond elections, the different propositions that we've had over time. Just going back to 1998, showing them again by their different categories. So, just for a little education, again, it really is a primer to the work that lies ahead. And I think many of you have seen this as part of the budget. So this is kind of a get you ready for your upcoming budget season. You might not be looking forward to that, but it's coming up soon. The city's tax rate is 45.89 [4:11:02 PM] cents per hundred dollars valuation. And our tax-free -- that is one of the tax rates of the overlapping tax rate in the jurisdictions with Travis county, ACC, iasd, we're about 20% of the overall tax rate for the community. Our tax rate has two pieces to it. Our o&m tax rate is 35 cents. That is the rate -- the funds generated from that go into our general fund to pay for our public safety, our library, our public health, and other general fund services. And the other piece is for our debt service, 10.6 scents. 10.6 cents.it's adopted each year by the council. The debt rate has to be set each year at the level necessary to fund the principal and interest payments on the debt we've already issued. We can't have a sinking fund for our debt. We set the rate at what we owe. It is really one of the first obligations of the city, is to pay off our bond holders when we go to the market. We always do that. As a result of that, we have the highest credit ratings from all three rating agencies, moody's, S&P, and Fitch. And you've heard this term before, it's about the city's full faith and credit to meet its obligations. So, there are three types of general obligation debt that we pay from that debt service tax rate, and from the revenue Jen -- generated. They are public improvement bonds, voted bonds we take to the voters from the chart I showed you before. We also have certification of obligation. These are when we buy real property, off-bond cycle needs, they happen often. We have examples, we built fire stations from the certificates of obligation as a need to meet our annexation requirements. And then we have contractual obligations. These are short-term debt to help us cash flow the need from police cars, fire trucks, from [4:13:02 PM] kind of high-cost capital needs instead of using our cash each year. We can spread them over a closer life of the asset. We have about 1.3 billion outstanding in general obligation debt. Again, they're for multi-years. We issue our bonds once a year in August. You had that opportunity this past August to approve our bond sales. Again, they're backed with a revenue pledge of the ad valorem tax rate. So, I'll just pause on this one and talk for a moment. This is really a profile of our current debt service requirements showing you both the principal and interest on it. I think what this illustrates is we do a good job of trying to pay off our principal. We pay off about 60% in ten years, helping lower interest costs over time. As you can see, somewhere out about fy -- fiscal year '18 or '19, our debt profile payments are going to start coming back down. The reason is, while we still have $195 million in bonds to sell for the four active bond programs that we have, that will be the last year that we sell them. Again, just as a reminder, when we were back with you at budget, when we have a bond election, we do not sell -- if you have a bond election for a million dollars, we don't turn around the next day and sell all that million dollars at once. Or say $100 million. We spread it out over the life of the bond, the project, or the projects to match up our cash flow. We don't want to issue debt and sit on it for five years as we go through spending patterns. And also, it helps us smooth out our tax rate so our tax rate isn't jumping up and down each year. And we've been fairly successful at being able to accomplish that. In fact, our debt service tax rate has actually come down significantly over the last decade. Again, we see our debt service peaking at about 117 million. [4:15:04 PM] It's at 117 million right now, and it would peak at about 139 million in fy20. So, our exercise -- go ahead. >> Zimmerman: When you said it peaks, that presumes there's going to be no more bonds approved, right? >> Again, this is our current debt profile. >> Zimmerman: If we didn't borrow any more money, this is what it's going to look like. >> From a financial perspective this is what it would look like. >> Zimmerman: Thank you. >> There's other impacts of not borrowing money. We would have -- one of the models that we'll be coming back on in more detail is looking at our constant tax rate as that debt starts -- as we stop selling new debt from old bond programs, how we could layer in, certainly council has talked about the need for additional investments. You heard today from Howard about the sidewalks. Certainly throughout the city, the work that cpo does on the long range master plan, all the work that we have, we will start layering in and modeling in under different tax rate assumptions and other assumptions about our growth what could occur as we layer on potentially new debt, as that old debt maps away. And ideally, that's how you want to to work. You want to make sure that you're matching the timing and the sequencing of both your bond elections, as well as your timing of when you sell the debt. So, again, you can try to keep to a smooth debt profile. Our capacity is determined by a variety of factors. There's obviously our tax rate itself. The annual process that you as a city council must go through to set the policies for the city were mandated by state law. And we also have financial measures that we look at constantly, as well as working with our rating agencies. So our state law limits the city's tax rate to $2.50 per hundred dollars valuation. That's our entire tax rate, both our operations and maintenance [4:17:05 PM] tax rate and our debt service. Obviously, we are well below that threshold. The city and the city council has adopted as part of your budget financial policies related to our debt. We have one key one related to our net debt. And our net debt is all about standing debt that we still owe that is pledged and paid by the tax rate itself to our assessed valuation. So that's a good metric. The assessed valuation is the value of all the properties in the city of Austin, which is now well over $100 billion. Our financial policy calls for that metric to be less than 2%. Currently, we are at 1.2% for our gross net to av, it is slightly lower for our net. There's just a distinction there between how some of that debt is paid. And our debt cap is about $1,496 per person. Again, it's also an annual process we go through when we meet in advance of selling our debt on the market. We must receive a rating. We work with all the three mayor rating agency, moody's, fits, and S&P. That's a rigorous process. We walk them through -- give them an overview of the overall Austin economy, which typically is an easy conversation to have with them. We talk about our tax base. We talk about the management structure of the city as well as the city council and what they have done during the budget processes, and their commitment to ensuring that our debt is being paid off. And then overall debt levers and ratios. What we'll be doing -- and I'm kind of jumping a little bit -- but when we come back -- again, we're looking to come back early to mid-april with some really robust Numbers. What you'll see is we'll take this slide and really expand it into all the answers about the assumptions and these financial policies, and modeling out different assumptions about different sizes of bond ca [4:19:07 PM] capacity, and the impacts they would have on our debt per cap capita, our debt to assessed valuation. We will provide comparisons to how we rate both nationally as Texas cities in our tax rate and our debt to av and debt per capita, just to give a context to the conversation. So, again, this is just kind of a primer. We're going to expand upon this. We're working on the modeling of all of this right now, and we expect to be back in April. So, another tool -- moving away from our debt financing -- is a tool you're familiar with. We've been through the process on a couple regards of looking at tax increment financing. You have been doing that to approve budgets for existing tifs we have, as well as creating a new homestead preservation district. Tifs are a popular financing tool for economic development. It's allowed in Texas state code under different statutes. Typically the city has used chapter 311. Most recently, the council aadopted homestead preservation under 373a. The idea is you set aside property revenues due to growth occurring in one zone because of an economic development activity that required public investments. So just to dig on that a little bit more, I think we've talked about this -- I believe at the housing committee, but perhaps not at the full council back in the last spring. The theory behind the tax increment finance is that you have an underutilized property land that with some investments, it would grow at a typical rate. But with advanced investments, you would have an incremental growth in av above and beyond what you would have had if you had not made those investments. So the idea is to help capture those investments. And there's policy rationale for [4:21:08 PM] undertaking a tif to help engender economic development, and even within the economic development itself, for the city to achieve policy goals such as housing and other efforts that we have done with our projects as well. What's key to tax increment financing is the analysis of what's referred to as the "But for" analysis. The idea being, but for the public investment, the increment, the increase in revenue, would not have occurred. But there's really gradients of when that is and when that isn't. Certainly, there's ideas where the existing tax base -- a tif is created, and the captured value is all because of the investment that occurred. So, basically, if not for, or but for that investment, the tax base would not have grown at all. And this chart lays out the different impacts on the tax rate, where they are. I think Mueller would really, kind of, stand at the top of that. We took 700 acres of vacant land, put about $65 million, in the end, we'll have $5 billion of av when the project is complete at the end of the decade. So, again, the "But for" scenario is very clear. We have not used this for transportation planning -- for transportation. It has been used, again, at Mueller, to help build out the infrastructure at Mueller, including the street network. It's been part of the cost modeling of that project. >> Kitchen: Is it part of building sidewalks, and the roads and stuff through Mueller? >> Obviously, the majority of the money for Mueller is coming from the developer. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Is coming from well over $200 million of the investment in Mueller is coming from the developer and land sales to the property owners and builders. Our share of that is about 65 million. But that all goes into the model, of which the backbone, the infrastructure is built, the roads, the sidewalks, and the storm drains. [4:23:08 PM] >> Kitchen: Can that be used for maintenance, too, on sidewalks, going forward? >> We have used our tifs -- operating tifs are more challenging. >> Kitchen: Mmhmm. >> Because once you get into an operating mode, and you have your tif, and you get into issues where, for example, if the av does not perform, you might be left with a hole. We have used our chapter 311 tifs -- and I can show you this on the next slide -- both on Mueller, Seaholm and waller creek. We have issued debt. They're created as a mechanism to support the debt. We were able to model out the increased value over time and match it. The city has not had a practice -- we don't have a practice of doing operating tifs. Again, the chapter 373a was created by this council back in December for the first homestead preservation district. So, again, it's a tool. I think it had been discussed as one of the options as we look at, certainly, the corridor improvement plans that rob and his team have worked on. And I think that is part of the effort of what you had directed us to do back in February, was to look at different options. So this is one of the key ones. >> Kitchen: So, for example, the question was raised about whether we could use a tif on burnet road, or maybe Lamar, something like that, if it made sense to use that to pay for transportation improvements going forward. >> Certainly. And in fact, we have on this week's council agenda a study. When we enter into these, we need to make sure we understand what the implications are from both an economic impact perspective, from a tax rate perspective. So, for example, on the corridors, you're correct. There are seven corridor studies [4:25:08 PM] that rob and his team have completed. And the idea is we want to look at the economic impact of, if those improvements are done, will they, in themselves, have a more positive impact on the values along the corridors than would have happened but for these investments. And so we will look at land planning. We look at the zoning. We look at the entitlements. And most importantly, it's a market-based study. We're going to look at the market demand for different types of real estate activity, multifamily, office, and retail, and overall citywide context about absorption. Just because it can come to Austin, can it come there -- is there a demand for it in that area. We try to be fairly conservative about that. We've done these analyses over time. They have not always led to the creation of a tif. Sometimes they just lead to an understanding about what the improvements will have. And we think that in itself is a value looking at the study, especially given all the work that's been happening with the corridors, not just from a mobility perspective, but the other aspects of planning about housing, transit, and jobs. So it's a key component to help the prioritization of the many mobility projects that have been identified, but still would need to be prioritized. >> Kitchen: Go ahead. >> Gallo: Thank you. Can you go back to the previous slide, please? >> Sure. >> Gallo: So on the Seaholm tif, I believe that the council just -- there was a percentage of it that was allocated to affordable housing, but I believe the council now as allocated 100% of it to affordable housing. Is that correct? >> Certainly, councilmember. So, that's a different side of our -- so Seaholm itself is under -- it's a tif. The entire property that is being redeveloped, there's three partial properties, the old power plant, the condominium, [4:27:12 PM] and the mixed-use office. All of that property value that is being captured now -- that is now on the tax rolls that for years was not -- we are using that property tax revenue to pay off the debt. It's about $20 million in debt that we issued. To pay for the streets within that area. I think you may be referring to another action that council took at green. The green treatment plant redevelopment. That, in essence, is, in essence, is a classic land sale. We sold the land to the developer. We sold that for proceeds. We're using those proceeds, from a cash perspective, to help build out the infrastructure, but no tif mechanism was needed to make that project work. What council did approve back in December was, because all 100% of that -- all the property tax revenue was coming into the city under previous resolution dating to 2000, 40% of that tax revenue was going into the housing trust fund. In December, council increased that percentage from 40% to 100%, so now all of the property tax revenue from the green, as well as other properties that were formerly city-owned properties are now going into the housing trust. >> Gallo: Okay, thank you for the clarification. When you talk about Mueller, Seaholm, and waller creek, being able to use those tifs as a mechanism to finance the public improvement, as we talk about the substantial transportation and public works needs that we have in our community, I just want to always be clear of where we still have resources available to be able to fund to those. >> Right. And, again, I think we do. In some of these him economic developments, we looked at multifaceted in. Mueller, the $65 million helped with the infrastructure, but as part of the overall package, we got 25% affordable housing at some deep rates. It's usually -- there's a framework we put together, trying to look at multiple [4:29:13 PM] aspects. >> Gallo: So, if we were to look at -- I mean, I would say all of us probably say, when we talk to our constituents, the number 1 issue is traffic. And so how are we able -- or perhaps you already have this information with the transportation department -- how are we able to understand where -- and I know one of the first graphs talked about the bond funding and the percentage, and the dollars that transportation got. But where are we able to get an accumulative sense of where funding has gone with transportation as far as percentage over the last ten years? Because I think the perception out there is that we're not spending this much on transportation and traffic mobility as we are in other areas of funding from the city. So that deals specifically with bond. But then you layer into that tifs, and you layer into that general fund. >> Right. >> Gallo: How can we get something that really shows us, compared to other areas like parks, and libraries, and health and human services where our spending is on transportation as a percentage? >> Certainly, councilmember. I think we can attempt to work on that. On one level, we're looking at bonds, multiyear funding. That's a somewhat easier exercise. But I think we have, certainly, operating budgets that we can go back and, kind of, do a cross-walk between where we spent our operating budget. It's about $3.8 billion if we take out the utilities, we can look at mapping that out. From a bond perspective, we spent. We have used other debt instruments for mobility. But, in fact, Mr. Spillar and Mr. Goode, seven or eight years ago negotiated with txdot to help use pass-through financing with txdot to get the flyovers built at mopac and 290, two gap. I guess that's how you would call them, major gaps in the system. We partnered with txdot. [4:31:14 PM] And our partnering was issuing the debt, of which we've been paid back those funds. So we have utilized those less frequently, obviously, than our voters approve bonds. But I think we can certainly -- we'll get with rob and Howard, and see if we can put together, kind of, a compendium of all our spending. >> That would be really helpful, because the perception is that we haven't been spending on transportation in the same percentage -- or increasing the spending in the same ways that we're spending in other areas. And it would be really helpful -- because the pieces for transportation and public works spending comes from so many different places. It would be very helpful to have a sense of what the correct answer to that question is. >> I think we can give it a good go. >> Kitchen: One thing that might help with that -- it's not completely what you're talking about, but one thing that might help with that is the information that the staff put together in terms of what's committed for spending during this year, 2016. We had -- we talked about that in January, where we had a press conference and kind of laid out some of the projects for this year, for 2016. Now that's not everything, because it's not historical. But it was also just thinking in terms of identifying the projects by district that were slated to be spent -- or to break ground this year. So that information is available. And so we can ask the staff to dust that off and make sure that you've got that. And they also made a map for us. But, again, it's not everything. But it might be a piece of what you're looking for. >> Gallo: And I think that would be helpful, too. But I think, kind of, where I'm trying to get is, we recently took a vote to commit to a 3% increase in health and human services. And so my sense from the public is that there is a concern that we're not increasing the funding [4:33:15 PM] to -- that we're leaving transportation out of the total pie. Its percentage is decreasing. But it's such a complicated picture, because the funding sources come from so many talked about during the budget process -- to figure out ways to increase the budget dollars to transportation and public works for the infrastructure that we're falling behind on, it would be helpful to know, kind of, where it is in the balancing between the other departments we're spending on. >> Certainly, councilmember. >> Gallo: Okay, thank you. >> Just finishing up on the public improvement districts. The city currently has two -- actually, I believe three -- I left one off this slide, I apologize -- three operating improvement districts. One is the downtown public improvement district, there's the south congress and an east 6th street public improvement district. These are different than the infrastructure or developer pids that have been popping up over the last several months that you had to deal with. Pids are an opportunity -- I don't know how strongly they can be used for the actual infrastructure, but depend on the types of improvements that are made, sometimes there are o&m costs associated with those, especially if you're getting into great streets, for example. And so this would be an opportunity to -- if the owners or the property owners in a corridor, for example, since I think that is kind of one of the topics that we'll be delving into a little bit more over the upcoming months, if there is -- if property owners are going to benefit from these districts, it's going to help their business, they can choose on their own just like the downtown pid, it is an assessment that they get together. It requires 50% of the land owners to sign on. They can assess themselves. It's an assessment that they [4:35:16 PM] vote in themselves. And then that comes to council. So, again, it is a tool. We don't see it as a tool that can significantly offset any -- for example, bond costs. But it is a tool that we would have. And, again, any studies that we have would help us -- not unlike with a tif, when you're looking at a pid, you want to understand the base economics of the area you're looking at before you make any decisions about any of those value capture or increment capture regimes. >> These two pids that you give examples for -- >> There's three, I apologize. >> Are they used in any way to fund traffic or transportation infrastructure? >> The downtown pid, I'm probably not the expert on that. I know it's part of the downtown Austin alliance, and there's a service plan. Each of these requires a service plan. I think typically they are used for, obviously, daa's work, they use stuff on safety, on beautyification. Not necessarily with the south congress pid and east 6th street. East 6th is really for, kind of, a maintenance. And that's typically how they're used around the country. Part of the effort we're going to look at is, kind of, some more case studies to see if they have been used more extensively. I don't want to say that they are going to really take a dent out of any of those large Numbers that Mr. Lazarus showed you earlier. >> Mayor Adler: Can you have overlapping pids? In other words, can you have -- >> I believe -- mayor, let me -- I believe we can. In fact, I'm pretty confident that east 6th street and the downtown pid are overlapping, but I'd have to confirm that with Michael Knox, so. So, looking ahead, again, on [4:37:20 PM] tomorrow's council agenda we talked about it at work session briefly yesterday. There is a contract approval before you to conduct economic impact analysis of the corridor improvements along the seven corridors, five of which have been completed. I think two have been initiated. We're going to work jointly with rob and his team, and our consultants, if approved, to look at that. And, again, they're very beneficial studies. They help really look at it from multiple perspectives, from an economic perspective, from a land planning perspective, from a prioritization perspective. They're very -- just going through the process itself has been very beneficial for the city. And then most importantly, and the most work, and we've initiated, is to begin or continue, I should say, our debt capacity scenarios. And going back to some of those charts, I will probably overload you with charts and graphs here within four to six weeks with lots of lines and Numbers, and circles, and so this was just kind of -- this was the ease into it part of it. It'll come back, and I think it'll help you frame some of the policy discussions that you have in front of you. >> Kitchen: Okay. So what you're talking about in terms of when information comes back to us, that would include an understanding of what kind of capacity we might have for bond in 2016, or after that. And what kind of impact that might have on the tax rate. >> Yes, councilmember. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Typically, we won't look at just one year. We're going to run multiple scenarios and look out over a chunk of time. Our typical, kind of, planning cycle from a capital budget perspective. And then we will bring back not only, again, the metrics I mentioned about debt to assessed valuation, and debt per capita andur comparisons, but most importantly we're going to look [4:39:20 PM] at the tax rate impact and tax bill impact. We know that both of those sometimes are important metrics for you to have. >> Kitchen: Okay. All right. Thank you very much. Is there any more questions? Okay. We're going to -- thank you. We appreciate you being with us this afternoon. We have our last item is staff briefing. And this is a followup to the resolution that we passed related to the -- our public conversation process, and also the universe of transportation projects that we can use to have our public conversation about in terms of transportation projects and potential funding. Thank you. >> Good afternoon. Mike, capital planning officer for the city of Austin. And I wanted to do a couple things in this briefing. I wanted to provide a little more context to the discussion of the universe of needs that we had a couple weeks ago at your prior mobility committee meeting, and then also talk a little bit about the public conversation that we're going to be launching pretty soon, and talk about the general strategy. So a little bit about the context of the universe of needs. You had asked us to come back and talk about those wide range of mobility needs that we have in the city. The basis for developing that was the rolling needs assessment out of the long-range cip strategic plan. As you may recall from a briefing you received early last year, the long-range cip strategic plan takes a longer planning horizon. It's about ten years plus, compared to the five-year cip plan. It gives us space to look at unfunded needs, whether it's mobility, whether it's parks, drainage, etc., across all of our asset categories. We can look for opportunities for more strategic opportunities for investment. We can also look at how we're meeting our basic drivers about capital renewal, rebillitating [4:41:21 PM] or replacing things in the asset networks, and meeting service demands as a city. We are growing and we have a lot of service demands in that regard. So, the other thing I want to mention is that we are going to come out -- the timing is interesting. We are going to be coming out with the newest version of the long-range cip strategic plan to your planning commission tomorrow evening, to the comprehensive planning committee, who will consider that. The planning commission, by charter, does a recommendation back to the city manager on capital improvement priorities that help to implement the comprehensive plan, as per city charter. They use this plan as the basis for that review, analysis, and recommendation. >> Kitchen: So, the long-range cip plan includes transportation but also other infrastructure needs, right? >> Yes. >> Kitchen: Okay. So that process is happening simultaneously, is that what you were saying? >> Yes. So the review of the draft plan will be occurring with the planning commission beginning pretty much tomorrow. It will be occurring through April. And they typically come back with their recommendation in that April timeframe. >> Kitchen: Does that come back to the council, the long-range cip? >> By charter it's supposed to go back to the city manager, but typically that is passed on to council. The planning commission indicated they wanted to make sure the council received that this year. >> Kitchen: That means, when would council receive that? >> You would receive their recommendation probably the beginning of may. >> Kitchen: Okay. Thank you. >> Mmhmm. So, again, to back up a little bit and provide context, the reason we're doing the long-range plan right now is, this is part of our full capital planning cycle we have at the city. As I mentioned, this takes more of a long-range planning horizon, ten plus years of unfunded needs, helping to inform the development of our five-year cip plan, which brings in more of the funding [4:43:22 PM] constraints, looks at appropriations and spending plans over the next five years. And that helps to establish the basis for the development of the capital budget as part of the budget process. A little bit about the needs development process. And so as I mentioned, the rolling needs assessment helps to capture all of these various needs and priorities that we get from the various city departments. And so those come through from a lot of different perspectives. They come through the mobility-related plans. I'll talk specifically in the mobility context from here forward. But from specific master plans the departments had. You heard a bit of the sidewalk master plan. We have other master plans that relate back to mobility priority needs. You heard a bit about the amatp. So we gather those needs that departments identify out of those plans. Also, those technical assessments of need. Typically when we talk about that, that's going to do more with the capital renewal needs, as I mentioned, addressing the existing infrastructure networks, as well as some of the new capacity we may need to address service demands. They can also come from other areas. Needs are identified from 311 calls for service, both transportation and public works, as well as other department receive those. And they compile needs related to those. There's a lot of public engagement associated with a lot of the plans we have that are related back to mobility. We have small area master plans that the city undertakes. And those have extensive public engagement processes related to them, as well as feedback from the boards and commissions that your departments go and work with to hear about priorities and needs from the community. So, again, we kind of capture all of this in the long-range cip straight quick plan. It's a three to four month process where we work with departments in submitting their unfunded capital improvement needs. And there's really, kind of, two key categories of needs we get. One is the ongoing - - what we call ongoing programs for capital improvement. [4:45:22 PM] Those are those ongoing programs that typically relate back to addressing the systems that we have and service demands. We always need funding for those, and those are ongoing. And so when you're talking about general government and bond programs, that bond program becomes just the next installment of funding for a lot of the ongoing programs. And so examples of ongoing programs related back to mobility, public works has street reconstruction program, sidewalks program. You have in transportation local area traffic management and those types of programs. These things are the ongoing needs we have at the city. They help to inform the development of the five-year cip plan. Also, we do get needs from other related mobility plans as well. Our departments work to bring and identify these needs that they would like to see Teed up as part of the rolling needs assessment when we're taking that longer- term look. I have some of the plans related here. You've already heard about some of those plans already. Also, we look to receive some of those needs from the asmp, the strategic mobility plan that you also heard from transportation, in the future. You've seen this slide. This slide was also presented by assistant city manager Goode at your last meeting. I wanted to talk about this in the context of the rolling needs assessment we have and the long-range cip strategic plan. In the needs assessment, you will have just unfunded needs for projects that have not been identified yet, and that need a lot of additional project development to them. But you will also have needs associated with the next phase of projects. So it could be a project that went through design and now there's a need identified for the construction phase. It could be a larger program. It could be like a corridor program where there might be multiple needs associated with it, and it's going to need several installments of funding over time. When we look at the bond program funding as well as the other funding sources, that becomes that next installment of funding. And they have a pipeline of projects going into development, [4:47:23 PM] design, and then construction. So we're trying to also time the cycle of funding and funding options to address that project cycle as well. So, again, this was presented to you previously. To reframe the conversation on the universe of needs, some of the key areas that are noted in the rolling needs assessment are those regional mobility needs, investment, regional mobility and safety, addressing congestion, major roadways, throughout the region. Also, looking at the city as the regional hub and center that it is. We also talked about corridor mobility. You heard about some of the studies that have occurred for some of our key corridors around the city, and looking at ways to improve mobility in those key corridors, as well as other corridors around the city. And then some of the other mobility needs -- and, again, I mentioned that relates to a lot of our ongoing programs we have for mobility that I've already mentioned. So, with regional mobility, again, the needs are identified from various sources. And so, you know about some of the regional plans that tee up these regional needs. The campo plan, other partnerships plans from txdot, cap metro, our other regional partners we work with to address regional mobility. When we're looking at the total mobility investment being made in the region, it's not just the city of Austin. It's going to be those investments made by our partners. Each of us look to leverage those funding sources as we can amongst each other. Also, a lot of these plans go through multiple public processes as well. And we're going to try to -- as we launch the public conversation, and as you directed in the resolution, we're going to try to talk a little bit about some of the other plans and the public input processes those have gone through. Staff is working on identifying the historical processes right now. And as I mentioned, just to address the regional network of roadways and assets, kind of across our city but also that tie into O areas of the [4:49:24 PM] region as well. We had talked a little bit last time about the I-35 corridor development program. You've heard from txdot in that regard. So we are including that as part of our total universe of needs. And, again, you heard about that previously. But there are also regional mobility needs as well. We're looking at some of the other plans to make sure we're talking about those and articulating those as part of the public conversation going forward. We talked about corridor mobility. And, again, corridors -- a lot of our capital improvement needs tend to converge around key centers and corridors in the city. So the corridors are really kind of -- they tend to be a catch-all for some of the capital renewal needs that we have in the city, addressing our service demands -- as you know, a lot of the growth and development is occurring along the corridors, as well as some of the strategic investments that you've heard about a little bit today from some of the planning processes related to the corridors. So, a lot of these different needs -- processes, and prioritization processes funnel into what we actually see in the rolling needs assessment. And so, a couple of key issues that come up as part of the needs identification, particularly when we're talking about corridors. It could be safety enhancements. It could be improvements to intersections. It could be improvements to multiple modes of transportation like sidewalks, bikeways, streetscapes, and connections to transit. I know you've had those conversations. This is where we catch a lot of those things. A lot of consideration about coordinating not just within the city, our mobility investments with some of the other categories of investment we have. For example, coordinating drainage, water, and mobility infrastructure is a key consideration when we're doing our project and program development. But then not just within the city, but then also outside with our partners as well, as I mentioned. It's important for all of us to work well together and to leverage those investments in. We're working in the same area [4:51:25 PM] and region. So, you had seen a little bit about this also at the last meeting. I wanted to bring this to your attention again. Out of the corridor studies that have been done, have been identified roughly about $120 million in short and medium-term needs and about $700 million in long-term needs. And those are for some of the corridor studies and reports that have been done. >> Kitchen: Let me ask a question. So for these corridors, are any of them in the cip now? >> In the long-range cip, yes. And then there are going to be some improvements related to those corridors in the five-year cip plan. I'm not sure they're going to be specifically out of the corridor studies, but improvements related to those corridors are in there. There's going to be recommendations coming out of those studies, but there's also basic meat and potatoes projects identified to go into those corridors as well, which is a good time to mention that one of the things we do in the long-range cip strategic plan is try to map the plans and recommendations coming out. We geospatially map them with basic needs we have, and look for opportunities to coordinate them. If we know we're going to do basic infrastructure improvements we need to, and they're already programmed, we should be looking to leverage those to do some of the other strategic investments that may come out of those studies going forward. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> And then -- >> Kitchen: We have a question. >> Gallo: Can you go back to the previous slide, please? The 50 million design -- that one. It's future corridor development, loop 360, 50 million design and construction. Is that for what is going on now with the process of the survey, what txdot is doing now, or is this money that is potentially funding for the plan that comes out as the result of what they're doing with public [4:53:26 PM] engagement? >> I may get atd to speak a little bit more to that, but just in general on this one, because I'm not sure I spoke to that one very clearly, is that these are some other corridors where some of those needs have been identified. There's basic needs, as well as other strategic needs. If you want to speak more to it. >> Yes, councilmember, thank you for that question. This is not in reference to the work that you see going on now, the tweaking of the intersection that's going on now. This is a very coarse estimate, figuring with would participate in a series of grade separations along the corridor. Just rough order of magnitude, we figure a grade separation at diamond runs about 25 million, when you build it all. So, this would assume two grade separations. I think what that does illustrate is when the city steps in to participating in big infrastructure, big roadways, that the cost -- costs are pretty large compared to what we've been used to. Obviously, the highway intersection costs more than a sidewalk, or a lane- widening. So, that's what that was about. >> Gallo: So help me -- so that would be the city's willingness to participate in the cost of the improvements on 360 -- >> That's just the initial estimate, yes. >> Gallo: An estimate. >> Just as a placeholder. >> Gallo: Where would that money come from? >> We don't have that funding right now. It would be new funding, either through some kind of funding discussion that we're having now. >> Gallo: Okay. All right. And the spicewood springs rode at 1 million? There's several roads with the same name, so which portion of spicewood springs is that? >> I'd have to check on that to make sure. >> Gallo: Okay, all right. >> Kitchen: Did you have a question, councilmember Zimmerman? >> Zimmerman: I did, because the 360 -- and this is a really important point that people don't understand. There's some complexities on who has jurisdiction, who owns the roads. So, txdot is really the authority, all right, on loop 360. So, we don't go in and do loop [4:55:28 PM] 360 projects. It's actually txdot, right, that does the engineering of the projects. We would contribute -- >> Like I-35, we would contribute to their -- >> Zimmerman: So these are partnerships with txdot. And txdot -- the interesting thing, though, we're still trying to get an answer on this. We leveraged txdot money, right, when we contribute to the project that they're already, kind of, supervising. So, it's very useful, very helpful, and maybe it's an art not a science, but it would help us to know how that leveraging process works. If we put in 10%, do they put in 90, or is it 20% and 80%, 50/50? >> So, councilmember, from my experience, every deal is different. You heard about the pass-through financing investment. We actually made a little money on that investment, and we're reinvesting in other state roads through the safety intersections right now. So it really just depends on the project. I will tell you that statewide funding is limited. You've heard that from the governor all the way to the senators. And I think increasingly in the coming years, the state, like the federal government, is going to look for local participation. And so that actually may be part of the way that projects get funded, is the state announces they have a certain amount of funding, and depending on the city, or local participation, they raise that project in priority or lower that. The argument we've always made -- because we always get the question, why should we fund or help fund statewide projects -- well, the reason is because most of the drivers on the statewide projects really are commuters coming to and from their work here in Austin. And so it really is -- it's a way that we can help prioritize the state's investments. >> And I think also it helps, perhaps, put us a little bit higher on the list, all other things being equal. And I think that's really important. It's very competitive. [4:57:30 PM] >> Absolutely. I-35 is a good example. We put some early money in to get that new concept started, and it really has paid back 40-fold from that original investment, so. >> Kitchen: Go ahead. >> Gallo: I don't see Cesar Chavez on here at all. And so I'm curious if there are discussions if part of the Seaholm tif -- I mean, we're talking about a lot of additional traffic that's going to -- >> Actually, I think you're about to see that on one of the slides. >> Gallo: Excuse me. >> No worries. I've been informed by Mr. Lazarus, I believe the spicewood springs road pertains to the roadway segment between loop 360 and Mesa. >> Gallo: Oh, music to my ears. Thank you. So I do have a question, then. Is that just a portion of the cost to do that, or is that -- would that be the total cost to do that? >> What's noted is the preliminary engineering. It's just for that phase. >> Gallo: Okay, thank you. >> Kitchen: I have one question that I haven't asked before, or at least I haven't thought to ask before. And that relates to manchac. I don't think I've ever seen that on a list for corridor studies. And maybe it doesn't need it, but I know that some questions have been raised, particularly about the far south portion of it. So, has that been on y'all's radar screen? >> So, councilmember, manchaca road is one of those roads that some of it is the city's ownership, and some is state right of way ownership. That is not unlike parts of Lamar and parts of palmer lane and burnet road and stuff. And really, when you look around at the roads that don't really function as urban roadways anymore, often it's because they're old state roads that have, you know, just sort of been there over time. And so there is not a plan for [4:59:36 PM] manchaca, although I think that or slotter could all be contemplated as we >> Brodie is up there simply because at the direction of council, the previous council, we were asked to look at traffic solutions. Now, I would tell you that there is a plan for Brodie. It is certainly not the same level of coreler plan like -- corridor plan like burnet or Lamar is, because we're not looking at mass development. We're just looking at fixing some of the traffic issues there. So that's how that one is coming out. >> Kitchen: Cause. Thank you. >> -- Okay, thank you. >> As I mentioned, in the other mobility needs category a lot of this pertains to the ongoing programs we need and the rolling needs assessment and I've already talked about a lot of these. It will also include, those -- some of those strategic programs and projects that have been identified by the departments, that tie back to maybe that particular ongoing program. So, for example, strategic sidewalk investments related to the sidewalks master plan versus the, you know, filling in the sidewalk gaps across the city. So there is -- are strategic components that are even ongoing programs so I definitely want to make that note with you as well. And then some of the other mobility -- there's Cesar Chavez. Strategic programs. The great streets program, and this really goes to more of the place making and putting in various amenities. You've seen some of the great streets around the downtown area. The great streets program does include streets like the Cesar Chavez promenade extension, so we identify those in the rolling needs assessment as well. We also have some needs that are identified out of our small area master plans and other plans related to imagine Austin, and just as an example, the colony park loop road, which is an infrastructure improvement related to the colony park development. And then some of our partnership projects, so, for example, east 51st street and also our neighborhood partnering program, where we work with an innovative programs [5:01:36 PM] public works to get things done with the local scale. We have all of those things that funnel into the rolling needs assessment. >> Kitchen: And I'm going to go back to Cesar Chavez because I'm not understanding. What is a promenade extension? >> So I believe that's the extension that actually goes in front of where the Seaholm area is right now, the Seaholm development right now. I believe that's coming out this way. I don't know if we have anybody who has more information about the Cesar Chavez. >> Good afternoon again. So the promenade ends basically right whereabout San Antonio street comes in. One of the projects in there is to extend the promenade down to where it would join into the eagle pass new central library towards where it would join into the hike and bike trail. So we're building a really large new structure there. I want to make sure that there's a way to get there by foot. >> Kitchen: And so -- >> Gallo: , That's wonderful, because I think that obviously makes this very walkable, bikeable, but once again, I don't know, and I can't pull the -- do we have Greg -- I can't pull the total number of residential units that's getting ready to hit the section over here. And so I guess what I was looking more to is what street improvements are in the plan for this -- this street that's in front of us that is already totally gridlocked. >> Like the actual street itself? [Laughter] >> Kitchen: Yes. >> Gallo: I'm just saying -- >> That's where the cars go, on the street. [Laughter] >> Gallo: Sometimes, if they behave. >> Right. >> Gallo: So I guess I see a very large residential component that is getting ready to hit, and I see a street that we already have issues with gridlock traffic on, and so I'm just curious in all of this future planning, I don't see anything that is talking about the street in front of us and -- >> Council member, we have not planned for additional capacity on Cesar Chavez. There's several impediments. [5:03:37 PM] The Lamar bridge is an historic bridge which limits the height of cars that can go through there, and so we're at the outer edge with that arch span bridge. And then also the properties on either side of the curbs are in many places parkland. And so we've not pursued that. That said, of course the whole second street district grid is being added to the network, and so that should add some more capacity within the grid to pass back and forth on this side of the railroad line, if you will, and into the neighborhood. And so that should help reduce some of that demand and need for travel. I think many of those new residential units, and this is certainly up for debate, are being developed with the idea that people will not be owning multiple cars for each residence, that they may own one or two, and also with the idea that new mobility services will take up some of that slack. But clearly you're absolutely right, you know, we are continuing to build residential as well as employment in our central core, and, you know, we still have the same street grid we had 50, 60 years ago. There are no new roadway pipelines coming into downtown. >> Gallo: Oh, okay, so the reason -- >> The express lines will help, and the other thing I will tell you is that our downtown demand is very peak oriented, and so there's space in between. I think we will see our peaks start to spread so that people take advantage of the off-peak period for their trips. >> Gallo: Okay. So what I'm seeing with no information here is basically reflective to there really isn't -- >> That's correct. >> -- A plan for that -- >> There is no plan. Cesar Chavez, I would assume, or would argue it's current build-out now. There are some things we can do with operations, but without a policy shift in [5:05:39 PM] direction to convert parkland or other lands to new capacity, we're kind of at -- at the limit. >> Gallo: Thank you. >> Okay. Also, as per the resolution, you had asked us to go back and looking at some of other mobility planning issues and process's associated with those. We have a lot of needs that have been identified by the departments that do these planning initiatives. Obviously you've heard about some of those here, so we've gathered some of that rough estimate of need related to some of those plans and we're estimating about 500 million associated with that, and also as we go back and scrub those plans, so to speak, to look for the prior priorities, recommendations and public process that comes out of them. So just a summary of the universe of needs. Again, you've seen this previously. It's roughly about $5 billion, including the regional mobility, corridor mobility, some of the other mobility needs, and as I mentioned going back and looking at some of those mobility strategic plans that I had mentioned as well. So a little bit about the public conversation. Council also directed us in the resolution to go out and have a public conversation about mobility priorities and needs with the community, and as part of that discussion to engage a large and diverse population. And so we have a relatively short amount of time since we need to come back for mobility committee June 8, as you know. We have a relatively short amount of time to cover a lot of ground. And so a couple of things about the strategy that we're going to be looking for is developing the content on this over the next couple of weeks is going to be really critical, and then the concept is that we would develop the right context description of those needs and priorities and be able to ask effective questions and get effective input and then be able to push that out through various means. And you know about some of the different ways of public input. You directed in the resolution conversation core. We are looking to do a [5:07:41 PM] couple of citywide public meetings. We are -- we'll also be doing public hearings at a lot of the boards and commissions that you directed us to go talk to, planning commission, bond oversight commission, et cetera. We will have on-line resources as well, speak up Austin. We will have web sites set up with the information and survey tools ready to go. We're also going to be sending folks out into high traffic areas, and so one of the things we're doing right now, as a matter of fact, is getting out to your offices to talk more specifically about how we do that and make sure that we're reaching your stakeholder groups and your districts effectively. I know we've had those conversations already. We'll continue to coordinate with your offices to make sure that we're deploying our strategy and our assets effectively to cover as much ground as we can. And that's pretty much from my end, if you have any other questions. >> Kitchen: Questions? Council member Zimmerman? >> Zimmerman: Thank you. Could you go back to slide 4? Slide 4 on your presentation. And I want to highlight a Austin metropolitan area transportation plan, amatp. I did actually Google that here and I found on the city of Austin web site 2025, Austin metropolitan area transportation plan. I clicked on that. I looked through some of the documents. There was about 27 pages of road improvements and various things, but I was fascinated to see that it had not been updated since August of 2004. And so it doesn't say down here 2025, if that's the planning referring to, but that's the one I found, and there was some pretty cool stuff in there that I would have loved to have ten years% ago. >> Council member, yes, that is, as was mentioned in one of the previous presentations by me, that is the plan that is outdated and needs to be updated, [5:09:42 PM] that at the moniker of being 2025 was the projection year of where we would get. Those have typically been aspirational plans, and clearly over the last 30 years it was originally written in '95 or whatever, you know, policies change, funding opportunities come up, and so again, it is our guide but not necessarily what we've achieved. >> Zimmerman: Well, I bring it up in the context of the big election, again, that we had on rail, because I saw some other plans or some other project connect maps and plans that looked nothing like what I saw in the amatp. In fact, the project connect, I did look through some of the materials and it -- the road expansion projects, like on ranch road 620, those improvements that appeared in this plan, they were absent from the project connect maps and plans that I saw. >> Zimmerman: So the amatp really is our transportation plan for our city, and I would argue that it's mostly about roads. The project connect was a high-capacity transit plan, and so it specifically honed in on high-capacity transit. And as you know, both council and capital metro boards adopted that plan -- >> Zimmerman: And then the voters overwhelmingly rejected it. So could we not use that as a public request to go back to the road plan? Because I think if we -- I show my constituents the road plan, they go, yeah, that kind of makes sense. >> Well, council member, as we said, we are going to be revising the amatp and that's part of the strategic mobility plan, and look forward to taking that side of the elements in. Again, you know, I would just remind you that the policies that have been driven have been driven by previous councils and the direction we've received [5:11:43 PM] over the years. And so, you know, yes, where we find transportation eight years ago when the current management -- administration started was a city that had not built major infrastructure in many years. And so, you know, I would tell you that between us and our partners we have a lot of transportation under construction, major highways have been initiated in the last eight years and so forth. >> Zimmerman: A final question on the public input process, the third bullet point down there, 311 calls for service. But I see public engagement for approved mobility-related plans. And that interested me too because -- >> Kitchen: Are you looking at the last page? >> Zimmerman: No, page 4 again, same -- >> Kitchen: Oh, okay. >> Zimmerman: The same -- see the bullet point, public input processes? And the second point says public engagement for -- >> Kitchen: Oh, I see. I gotcha. >> Yes. >> Zimmerman: What caught my attention -- what caught my attention there was the word "Approved." And why that's interesting to me is it seems like it's what we do is, you know, somehow a plan will be cooked up and then we take that out to the public. And I said, well, wait a minute, you know, if the idea is to go out to get the public input to produce the plan, then this kind of implies that, well, there's already been a plan approved and now we're going out and saying, hey, what do you think of this? >> Kitchen: I think that this may refer to -- tell me if I'm wrong, I think this may refer to as part of this process looking at plans that the council has already approved and what public engagement was done before those plans were approved. >> Right, so for instance -- >> Kitchen: If I'm saying that correctly. That's all that means. >> Right. So for instance the corridor plans that have been approved by council, we want to tab those public involvement findings or input that we receive so [5:13:43 PM] that we're not going out to the public and asking them the same question again. Certainly we want to present that in test to make sure we're still on base with those kinds of things. The sidewalk master plan, those things. >> Kitchen: Or an example might be the south Lamar corridor improvement plan, which actually I don't think the council has approved yet. >> Haven't approved that yet. It's on its way towards council. >> But that went through a whole public input process, and so as part of what we're doing now with our public -- public conversation, that information that was gathered as part of that process would be information, some of it at least would be information that would be useful for us now. So I think that's what that refers to. >> And council member, if I could just reiterate one thing to make sure it's clear, you know, the list of projects and the range of budgets that we showed there, those are just the starting points for discussion with the public. That is not our list of recommended projects. It's to give you a feel for what -- the size of the need. It's the rolling assessment needs. And I would tell you there's no way for us, as best we try, to be 100% complete in those needs. There's -- I will tell you no matter how much we spend there are needs beyond what we have to spend on mobility. >> (Indiscernible). Sorry. Just to give some context to that too, I think you heard a little bit about this in the conversation that Mr. Lazarus had with you, is there's a difference between needs and projects. And there has to be that process of the project development. But a lot of the needs that have been identified, right, we want to tie back into the prior public processes because that gives the context for how some of those priorities were identified in the first place that are coming out of those plans. >> Kitchen: But that does raise the question. If you could bring up the last slide. Council member Zimmerman, I think that does raise the question about the -- and I know this is -- this is what you all are figuring out right now, is how we go through this public conversation process now in such a way that we're not presenting them something and saying this is it, you [5:15:45 PM] know, so that we have a real -- and I assume that that's what you were concerned about, right, council member Zimmerman? Okay. So I know this can be challenging, and that's going to center around how you can present information about a universe of projects but present that in such a way that it's not -- it's not perceived as this is what we're going to do and you just tell us what you think about it. >> Right. >> Kitchen: So I know you all are trying to think about that right now. >> Absolutely. So one of the -- the key -- and I failed to mention it as part of our strategy, is were we know this is the next part of the conversation in regards to mobility. There was conversation prior to this. There are some conversations happening parallel to this, cap metro, connections 25. And then also there will be conversations happening after this, like the strategic mobility plan that you heard we briefed you on. We know that and we're working with the departments and our public information office to develop those connections. We know that we have a certain scope and task here, but we know that that needs to connect with the other processes that are occurring. So right, it's not the only thing. This is a -- the next chapter in the conversation, but we will be talking about how the dots connect with some of these other processes and some of these other plans going forward. >> Kitchen: Well, I know it would be helpful from my perspective. I think perhaps one of the things you all are talk about is the survey, and so I'd be - - I would like to work with you all when you all distill that down to what those questions are, because I think that perhaps I can be helpful to provide some feedback on that. So I think that that -- I think for us to -- for the -- as you know and as you all are also trying to do is the information we get back in order to act on it is going to have to be helpful for us in certain ways, and so I'd like to invite my fellow council members to give you that [5:17:46 PM] kind of input. And I know, you're going to talk to all the council members, right? >> That's exactly light. -- Exactly right. >> All right. >> We've talked to you already, and the mayor. >> Kitchen: All right. Are there any other questions? Other questions, other comments? Thank you very much for pulling this together for us. So -- and I think we're ready to -- well, let me just see -- >> Do you have an extra copy of that powerpoint? >> I'll get you one. >> Kitchen: Okay, our last item on the agenda is discussion of future agenda items. Do you all have anything you want to bring up right now? I mean, you can certainly bring it to my attention later if you'd like, but do you have anything you want to bring up right now? >> No. >> Kitchen: No? Okay. I believe we're adjourned. Thank you all very much. That was very helpful information that everyone put together for us. We really appreciate the time. Time. Adjourned at 5:18 p.m.