City Council Work Session Transcript – 03/06/2018 Title: ATXN 24/7 Recording Channel: 6 - ATXN Recorded On: 3/6/2018 6:00:00 AM Original Air Date: 3/6/2018 Transcript Generated by SnapStream ================================== [9:10:28 AM] Mayor Adler: All right, it's March 6, 2018. It is 9:10. We are in a work session here in the boards and commissions room. We have a quorum present. I've talked to the mayor pro tem. I think we're going to try to do is the two briefings first. I'm going to need to leave a little before 11, be back a little after noon. So after the two briefings, then go to the pulled items, which I may miss. And then you all will go into executive session and start that. You won't wait. You will do the executive session and I'll join you just as quickly as I can and get back. So with that said, we're going to start with the framework for the redevelopment of city land. And on the agenda we have the codenext briefing, but John Mickey is ill and Greg Guernsey is ill, so with the two of them out we're going to hold on the codenext briefing. It's not going to happen today. Manager? >> Mayor and councilmembers. I just wanted to put a little context for this briefing that we're having today. We're going to have staff walk through the framework [9:12:28 AM] for redevelopment of city land and this is really an effort to both describe some of the past efforts of redevelopment that has been successful, but more importantly establish a framework or guidelines for us to follow or consider as policymakers going forward. And so it's not the intention -- the intention today is not to dive into the details of any specific sites, but to really get from staff the overarching goals and guidelines that we're hoping to establish at the council. So with that I'll pass it out to staff. >> Thank you, city manager. Greg canally, deputy cfo. I'm joined by Lorraine Rizer from real estate and Christy from the economic development department. As the city manager said we're really here today to talk about a framework for our redevelopment of city land. I think we've had lots of conversations as a body as we sit in front of you, also some of the sites that have come up. There have been various resolutions passed related to city use land. And at a core they're looking at optimizing the land, but at the same time considering specific uses to address the policy issues that have been discussed. Specifically around affordable housing and creative space as well as looking at parks and partnerships. Really we're looking today is to provide that framework that the city manager mentioned and also to have some feedback from the council on that. So with that, Lorraine and I are just going to kind of walk through these slides, kind of have a conversation with you about what we have here. >> In the late 1990s the city of Austin was dying downtown. And we wanted to reactivate it. And so we decided to use our city owned assets to reactivate downtown. And we did that by using specifically five properties. The first one that we experimented with was the pole yard and what we wanted [9:14:29 AM] to do is bring people to live downtown, to make downtown a 24-hour activated hear. So we took an old Austin energy yard and converted it into residential units and we also achieved affordable housing and it was a very successful development. It was successful well beyond our imagination. So then we went -- our next site was the ali site. It was a site that we had bought just land banked, and we converted that site into a residential site as well. Also we had an opportunity to take -- we needed a new city hall and so we used the two tracts on either side, which we did a long-term 99-year lease, and used that money to build city hall. Over the course of time from the late '90s to now as Lorraine mentioned, at the core of the discussion back then was looking at revitalize r.lizing especially this -- reslightly R. Vitallizing especially this part of downtown. And we moved on to not only looking at revitalization, but also looking at revitalization and place-making. And from that some several large projects kind of came out of it. The first one that we all know about is Mueller redevelopment. Actually we have a few slides to walk through on that, just to walk through some history there. The grown redevelopment at Seaholm. And obviously we're now doing a fantastic project, colony park, over 200 acres in northeast Austin. As we move forward over time adding different elements of the way we can look at using our city-owned land, not just for pure revitalization but getting into place making and also adding components of some of the social good that we know, we have the opportunity to address. Some of the lessons that we've learned from some of our past experiences that we [9:16:33 AM] can be more successful if we do more upfront planning and visioning with our sites to meet the needs or the policy objectives of council. We want to start using a more competitive processes to, one, allow more opportunities for developers for non-profits and for-profit developers. Also we want to get the city more of a risk-taking business and we can be more of the long-term patient capital by using our land asset. Also, the complexities of the developments that we have before us are more complex and so we want to take more time to plan and vision. And also we want to look at should we lease or sell sites and make recommendations about that. >> So with that I think it would be valuable to just have a kind of quick pause and walk through the effort that the city and the community have gone through overrule in the Mueller redevelopment project. I don't know that we've spent an enormous amount of time with this council walking through this, but we think it's valuable. Obviously we don't have a lot of 700-acre tracts to redevelop, but I think the lessons learned from the process that we went through and the outcomes are really valuable regardless of the size of the tracts that we have. So just as kind of big context, this was the former airport, 700-acre airport that opened in 1930. And as the city moved to the now airport at Bergstrom, the planning in the late 90s, the redevelopment process of this was really put on the table. And it became -- the goal from the beginning was a mixed use community, model urban development. I think some of the key things we got from that was key community involvement from really the git-go and leading to competitive processes through the rfq and reform process that led [9:18:35 AM] to this massive redevelopment process we have in place. To show some of the history, condensing the work into one slide, really the conversations started way back in the mid 80s when kind of the idea of a newer airport sparked up with some community visioning. Really when the decision was made to go out to Bergstrom in the mid '90s the planning effort for Mueller really keyed up and I think it was a great time because nationally there was other example projects up at staple ton and Denver to look at opportunities. An advisory group was set up. There was a master plan developed and then a commission was established as we moved forward in the competitive process of redeveloping that 700 acres. A long, rigorous process, but I think that process led to a really good result and we ended up in 2004 with a master development agreement that is still a project that is actively managed, successful project. Our economic development department oversees that day-to-day with Christine and Pam Hefner and Jill Fagan really working that and making sure that project remains a success. Just some highlights around the deal around Mueller. It's a 310-million-dollar effort and what set it up is to leverage the value of the land and the risk of the development was transferred to the developer. The city commitment was set at $62 million in tax increment financing debt. You have to remember that was 700 acres of debt. There was no infrastructure, no water lines. There was nothing out there to really activate. It has a separate credit outside of the general fund credit. And I think what's really remarkable is that amount was set in 2004, 62 million. 14 years later we've never had to change that number because the way we is the R. Set up the deal to leverage the land value. And that was all used to leverage the backbone infrastructure. Because of that the city and the community was able to [9:20:35 AM] invest, have the master developer invest. Obviously a lot of housing units and affordable housing, 25 percent of all the units, both multi-family and single-family are affordable. Right now we're actually exceeding the goal. It's about 26% compared to the 25% goal. But over time not only are we getting housing, we're going to end up with 140 acres of parkland and it's a true mixed use effort out there. Affordable housing I think deserves just a special mention the way that -- and really going back in time to the folks who set that up. The idea again of the -- it was not a direct subsidy of the housing, but it was put within the master development as the dirt was transferred. It occurs both on the rental side and on the foresale side. On the foresale side, original -- on the for sale side, originally the mfi was set at 80%, but there's been a new program to take it up to 120%. And the way this affordability is set up, there's a Mueller foundation, a 501(c)3 was set up, so that as qualified homeowners are getting to an affordable home, there's an appreciation cap so that when they sell out the appreciation above a certain amount, above two percent, goes back in that can then subsidize the affordable housing to keep it permanent. There were some issues I think with the appraisal district, but they have been worked out and in order to keep this housing affordable. And there were some opportunities actually where some of the affordability was actually deepened through some tax credit projects. I think that's a picture of wildflower terrace out there. So really successful program from our housing, from achieving really key priority goal from our affordable housing. So again, a big project, but the lessons we think can play forward as we move forward on potentially other investments. One of the things we've looked at over the last year [9:22:38 AM] is best practice. We were included, invited to a peer city summit about a year ago. It was hosted in city with a variety of cities, only nine cities were included and they specifically only wanted Austin to join to talk about our experience. It was really a fantastic day and a half that we had. Some of the walkaways from this discussion were first move forward on funding some of these social good initiatives, the economic growth was a required prerequisite, which I think is foundational in our new strategic plan talking about economic uplift is necessary to generate revenue to help invest in things that we need to accomplish. We also know that leveraging city assets can really be used to deliver on policy objectives. And the way to do that is maximizing value from developers in a competitive process and then leveraging that value to accomplish policy objectives such as housing or creative space. And we saw some really neat examples that I'll show you here. Something that we learned that I think on a go- forward base we think is really exciting is the idea of having development team and non-profits teams join together on the front end to accomplish an outcome. We know that the developers can bring capital to a project, but we know that -- especially in Austin, our non-profits can bring a tremendous amount of expertise about how to deliver specific things for our community, especially around affordable housing and our creative industries. The idea of looking at a specific anchor, whether that's a university or a specific creative hub that could help anchor a value in any redevelopment. Other things we looked at is certainly rearranging with and engaging with the community, and this idea that Lorraine mentioned, leases versus selling over time. One of the key things we walked away from was creating reset valuations so [9:24:38 AM] that when we enter into transactions that over the course in 15, 20 years the city has the ability to look at resets if there is value above and beyond what we projected or that people sitting around the table 20 years from now I should say can look at those values and reset them. And then most importantly looking at a portfolio, a strategic portfolio view. Just some quick projects that we saw when we were up there. Again the scale I think doesn't always translate exactly to Austin, but I think some of the examples of the process and practices. Here in Brooklyn there's a cultural district. They took a former parking garage -- sorry, surface parking lot and turned it into really a giant -- a large multi-family development, of which 76 of the units are affordable. What's really neat about this because it's in a cultural district there's 50,000 square feet for cultural uses for the Brooklyn academy of music, the museum of contemporary African arts and a public library. So really mixing this idea of creative space and affordable housing in a district. It was really a district plan. In the bronx there's a conversion of an old juvenile detention facility. And they actually be going to achieve 100% affordable housing on that site because some of the site has market rate retail or market rate office. And then in lower Manhattan in the site of an old market they've moved the market actually -- it's a really neat market. They've moved it across the street and they're going to end up in a 1.65 million square foot development. 1,000 units overall at 50% affordable. That tower in that picture is already up. I think it's about 195 units units. 175 units and 95 are affordable, with 50% achieving an affordable goal. The way they were able to achieve that moving forward was looking at the value of the land and using the value of the land to reinvest in [9:26:41 AM] that site to achieve policy objectives. So the illustrative way of looking at this, if you have a site that's worth $20 million free and clear, you then look at that free and clear value and have an opportunity to reinvest that in the infrastructure and buying affordable housing and buying parkland and other policy objectives. We think that's a model again that can work on a site specific, but can also work across a portfolio. And what we wanted to just kind of also mention the idea of an economic development corporation. The city council has passed a resolution related to looking at economic development corporations. We sent a memo out back in I think in December talking about how economic development corporations could play a role not only in this, but also as we work on our incentive policy. So we want to just touch on it briefly here. And when economic development and David Culligan are back here at the end of April you will hear even more about it. But certainly looking at the idea of the role that they can play. They are a tool that can get socially beneficial real estate and development projects done in partnership. And then because of the way they can be incorporated, the powers they have, they can carry out these development-related transactions in typically a more agile way and they can also act as a development arm and have the ability to look at really negotiating capital from a different lens. From a municipalities perspective, from the city of Austin perspective, as we continue this discussion over the next couple of months, the idea, the benefits are you do have an independent eat the time that can be an extension of the municipality that can really set up the powers and the entity ends up shouldering the transaction risk not the city, which I think has some interesting I think financial considerations as we continue to look at that. And then finally there's -- over the course of time there's continuity and consistency as you engage [9:28:42 AM] with the market as I think there's also a value in that. It was a good lesson as we learned from these other peer cities about the economic development corporations. They have acted as a catalyst and a partnership with the municipality in moving forward some of those objectives that they had. >> So we looked through the city inventory and we have identified some sites that we feel are ready to start the process and move forward on. And those five sites are Mccullough place, Justin lane, home depot/crisisser, and the winnebago site. We have identified some longer-term sites. Some of the reason why these are longer-term, because maybe there's no utilities out there or we may have to relocate city operations out of the sites they're in to better locations in order to free up some of these sites for development so they're on a secondary list. >> Just to add to that, I think some San Francisco these sites we have counsel direction and input on related -- I think there's been a recent resolution regarding Home Depot and Chrysler, look at that as a mixed use development, looking at affordable housing options for that site as well. That's why we believe these are on the initial list, so we can continue to explore figuring -- moving those forward. >> So we want to talk about the framework and the process. We want to go through to develop these projects. And so the first step we want to do is start doing some land planning and come up with some different scenarios on that -- on the property. So first we would land plan at highest and best use, have an appraisal done and come up with the value and that plays into the model that Greg just showed you, [9:30:42 AM] the model that's down below here, is that way we figure out how much value do we have that we can use to apply toward council's goals and objectives. So once we have established that and we -- at that same time we'll also do an environmental site assessment to make sure that the site is clean and ready to be put to its best use, and then -- and also during this initial phase we need to look at some of these sites, have been purchased with utility money or bond money, and we need to have bond council and our city council -- I mean, city attorneys look at how we separate and diffuse the debt on those -- some of these properties. And that's key for us being able to move forward. Then the next step, we want to come up with a strategic plan, and then we go back in and work with a land planner and the community, and we would come up with a plan of these are the objective -- city council objectives that we think we can obtain from this track and we want to play with different scenarios. And then we want to go out and look in that -- in the community and see what are the community objectives? Because it's important that whatever we do with these tracts it fits in with that neighborhood and that community as well as the city as a whole. And then we'll fill in this qualifying value model and be able to show exactly what different types of benefits we can get from the tracts. Then we will -- staff will come back with an initial recommendation of the -- each site and give city council a briefing. And then we would like to go through a competitive process. Perhaps an rfi, which is a request for interest, where we would go out and test the market and see is there an actual interest to do -- [9:32:43 AM] to provide these community benefits on this tract and see how much interest there is. Or -- and then go to an rfp, which is a request for proposal, or some tracts may be that we are ready to just go out for a request for a proposal. And so one of the things that the recommendations could hold and I just wanted to talk about with you is some of the recommendations could be just plain sell it or do a long-term lease to have money to do the objectives. A good example of that in the -- the last time we did that is that when we wanted to build an Asian community center, no -- we did not have a parcel that met that need for that purpose so city council directed -- and city manager directed me to go find a tract and there was a little piece of tract that we -- right next to the spring development that we identified. We were able to sell that for enough money to buy the piece of land that the Asian community center is on now, and so sometimes we'll need to do that to get the tract to meet some of the goals you guys want us to achieve with the properties. >> Another thing I mention, too, in terms of looking at the staff recommendation as we go through this rubric down to recommendations, on all of our processes, especially the existing -- the ones we've had on Mueller and the downtown ones and now colony park it, truly is an interdepartmental effort. Economic development acts as the overall coordinator of all of this, but it's real estate, law, finance, housing is a really key component to the team that gets built, public works, transportation department, planning department. So there's many, many folks around the city that will be invested and involved in moving these through because we think it's important because they have their own key lens as [9:34:43 AM] they're bringing forward their role and their connections to the community as well, which we think that's really valuable and that's something that we would continue and certainly enhance as we look at specific recommendations for sites that we're building upon, all the work that our departments have done as well. >> So, finally, what we're recommending today is that we take these five parcels and we are in various stages on these five parcels, and move forward and take initial steps, doing the appraise, coming up with some various plans, and bringing that back to council in June 2018. >> Mayor Adler: Council? >> A couple of questions. So -- and it's really probably wrapped up into one question. I'm curious about what -- you mentioned best uses, analysis around best uses, but I'm curious about which uses will be considered because I think the council has set a number of different policy directives over time, you know, all the way from affordable housing to cultural or actually arts centers to veterans center. So there's a range, and there may be others that I'm just not remembering, but how are you going to -- I would -- first off, I would want to be sure that all of those were analyzed and that the decision about which use to analyze would be something that the council would have the ability to weigh in on. In other words, I wouldn't want you to go down the whole track of analyzing for certain uses, assuming that's what the council -- that was the scope of what [9:36:44 AM] the council wanted you to look at. Does that make incidence I guess the question in all that is, what is the scope at this point in time you are intending to look at for each of these sites? >> Let me get -- give you an example of a site that we're pretty far along on, and so you can get an idea of what we're thinking. So one of the sites we've been asked to do something on probably well over ten years now is the Justin lane site. And there's been lots of neighborhood meetings and a lot of input over time. So basically what we did is -- is we went through and we did a -- different land-planning scenarios to see what all could we fit, affordable housing, creative space, parceled, we also had several meetings with the neighborhood, and we looked at all the ifcs, items from council where they requested us to look at different things. So we had different scenarios drafted up to look and see how could we get the best fit. And then we realized -- and then we looked at transportation because also that's on Todd zoning so it's right there next to a train station. So we looked at how could we put all those things together? And looking at everything, what about we realized is that we think we can get an expansion of the train station by working with capital metro, get the parkland that the neighborhood wants so bad, we also think we can convert -- that already has a warehouse on it so we think with the less financial burden we can actually change that to creative space. And so we looked at -- so we've looked at all these different scenarios, how can you put it into land. And we also looked at the price of the land and said how much could this site absnore -- [9:38:47 AM] absorb. We've come up with exciting recommendations and that's what we want to bring forward and recommend. >> Kitchen: I guess my question is really of these five -- it sounds like that one has already been through an analysis. Have all of these five already been through that? So which ones have not been I guess is the question? >> Well, I can -- they've been through different stages. Like Mccullough place and [indiscernible] We have a current appraisal, we have an environmental -- >> Kitchen: I'm sorry, I guess I'm not being specific. I'm wanting to understand where there's still an open possibility to talk about the uses? >> Council, I think all of them. >> All of them. >> We are -- the idea of taking this kind of mixed -- starting with land planning, appraisals, taking the council direction that exists on some of these sites, and looking at them all and looking at the dials, how we can turn dials around to see -- and playing with the scenarios and then bringing those back for discussion. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> That is really what we're looking -- this is not a jump to going out on the street. Like we did, again, on Mueller, you go through long -- there will be many discussions, not only -- but each site. The thought is to go through it in a rigorous way that can play out different scenarios, taking in council's overall strategic plan, as well as some of the direction that exists about each of these sites, with some fundamentals of what the market can do and fundamentals of what our financial position can do and fundamentals about the site itself. >> Kitchen: Okay. Last question. So I guess I'm still not being clear. So -- okay. So then what is the list of uses that are being considered? I mean you obviously have -- obviously -- >> Okay. >> Mayor Adler: Are you talking about the uses to establish what the market value of the property is? >> Kitchen: No. I'm sorry. >> Mayor Adler: Or the uses of the property should we decide not to sell it and use the money to achieve? [9:40:49 AM] >> Kitchen: No. >> Mayor Adler: The point is to sell the property to raise money to achieve objects. I can't tell what you're -- >> Kitchen: Use the property. What we've said is that the council has certain things we're trying to achieve so there's a scope of things that we're trying to achieve. For example, we've talked about affordable housing. We've talked about creative space. I just want to know what that list is. Affordable housing, creative space. Is there anything else that we're looking at? >> Affordable housing, creative space, parks. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Green space on there, I think -- >> Kitchen: Urban farms. >> For example, urban farms, and collaboration space for nonprofits. I think there have been four general areas that we've heard from. I think we -- as we play the scenarios as an objective, financially, we would look at trying to accomplish those without having to come up with funds to pay for those, to let the site generate the value to accomplish those. That may not be possible for every site and that's where we can look across the portfolio. So that's where I think we would have those kind of generally four buckets, looking at market rate as well, overall kind of a mixed-use analysis to see from a pure economic perspective what can be captured, and then start playing with that economic tool to see what we can accomplish from each of those four different policy objectives. >> We're also looking at transportation, how do we increase mobility in that area by using our land. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Mayor Adler: Councilmember Garza and then mayor pro tem. >> Garza: I know staff has a lot going on. I totally understand that. But I guess I'm a little frustrated. I mean, the questions that councilmember kitchen just asked point trite my frustration, in that I thought we were -- I thought this presentation was going to have that criteria. Some of these sites, like you said, ten years. [9:42:50 AM] Winnebago I believe came up -- was it our first year on council? So about three and a half years ago? Maybe two. And we still have these, you know, vacant pieces of property and no criteria exactly on what to do with them. And facing rightfully so significant pressure from the community, asking how we can help with affordable housing, how we can help with creative spaces. And I feel we have so many opportunities to be able to do that and we're not able to give the community answers, and I'm frustrated that I don't understand -- like I said, I totally understand staff has a lot on their plate, but this just seems very -- like there's a lot of unknowns still, and I would like that criteria sooner than June, and I've had these -- this discussion with Elaine and Greg, and so maybe a way to do it and if you need a council resolution, you know, if this is something that the council is open to, if we're doing rfis or rfqs or whatever, align them with our strategic outcomes. I can see if it's an rfq and say -- whatever project it is, you want to put creative space, an urban farm, you want affordable housing, show us how this aligns with our strategic outcomes. Show us how this meets that. I understand that puts us in a position where we could be -- politics gets involved, one group fighting against another group. I mean, it happens unfortunately with our procurement all the time. Staff brings us a recommendation and we say, no, we want this instead. But we still need some kind of process, and we need it soon because we have immense needs and rightfully so pressure from the community to do something to help with [9:44:50 AM] those, whether it be creative, whether it be economic development, whether it be really looking at the land and seeing there's nothing we can put there, let's sell it, and then we can use that money and go put affordable housing somewhere else. And so I don't really have a question. I just really want us to come up with this criteria, please, as quickly as possible. I know that, you know, the one in district 2 there is a nonprofit that's really interested and they've been for a while but they're just waiting to see what the city -- and I think it could be a good place for that or maybe it's not, maybe we sell it and use that is for affordable housing somewhere. But if we can get some expedesy on this, that would be pressured. >> Mayor Adler: Mayor pro tem. >> Tovo: Thank you very much for your work and your mention. I know you've done a lot of work on this issue outside of today that's not necessarily reflected in the presentation. I'm sitting here with with some of the resolutions I've sponsored on this issue over the last several years and I guess I'd like to suggest we take a slightly different approach. I also see another way in -- I see heart attack Wei, the one who got families and children's task force report, that was the first I had heard of Ryan drive but at that time the suggestion that made in into the task force report was Ryan drive be analyzed to create family friendly housing and I followed up with a resolution to do that and we had another resolution related to it and I know councilmember pool has now taken up that issue and I'm excited about that appearing on the list of possibilities. I think we've offered a lot of directive to the city manager over the last several years, including over the last several years about looking at tracts that are good possibilities for affordable housing. And I -- and long before I [9:46:51 AM] came on council, you know, those were suggestions that were in all of our housing reports, use city- owned land for affordable housing. We've all been, I think, have received the people's plan from some community members, and they've suggested, again, that we use city-owned land to create affordable housing. So I'm really ready, and I would welcome -- I welcome this conversation. How can we move a project forward? I appreciate what you're saying about developing criteria and whatnot but it seems to me -- I mean, I'm really ready to pick a tract and say let's not analyze every use, let's create some affordable housing on it. Maybe it's win bag gosh though I think councilmember Garza you might want to weigh in, I think there's other ideas about what could happen on winnebago but maybe we could really get that discussion focused on which of those two possibilities, urban farm or housing, is better for winnebago. It was on our council agenda to sell it at one point and now we've slowed down that sale to look at it, I sponsored the resolution because I thought it was a great tract for the city to hang on to potentially for live-work space. I want to use it for one of those purposes. Ryan drive, as I said, it sounds like that is ready to maybe get some more analysis and move forward, but, again, I'm just -- I'm really ready for us to break ground on a project or -- and I understand lots of design work and lots of analysis and lots of financial analysis comes before that, but we just have a lot of resolutions saying please look at city-owned tracts and -- so what would you suggest as a next step for us to actually get one of those projects very focused? And I guess just to be clear, so I'm really suggesting that we not look at some of these tracts for any purpose. I think let's zero our sites in on a few and give the staff the directive they need to move forward [9:48:52 AM] with an affordable housing -- with affordable housing or some mixed-use housing on one of those tracts or two or three. And then I have a slew of other questions related to other resolutions that I think are part of this presentation. >> So, mayor pro tem, appreciate the -- we appreciate the comments, and we agree there's been a lot of discussion about what to do with specific sites. What we've laid out today is framework with actually how to move forward on that. This does not go watch and study. We're ready on these sites, trod March them through a process. I think fundamentally is how to get to that result of accomplishing affordable housing on a site or accomplishing a creative use on a site. What we've laid out here is a plan to do that from trying to capture the value of a site to accomplish that. We know, as we go through this upcoming budget, as we've stalked about the strategic outcomes, there are a lot of demands on our financial resources, so this framework we've laid out here we believe provides an opportunities to have a site pay for itself, to help pay for those desired outcomes. And in light of that we'd have to start looking at potentially other funding sources to help move a project forward in terms of helping with infrastructure, helping with site development, with our -- with -- with nonprofit partners. We are here -- after the discussions over the last several -- certainly over the last several months with some of these resolutions was to take these and start marching forward. >> Tovo: So maybe it would be helpful if we just talked about some examples. For example, for Justin lane, do you need council action to move forward with the plan? I know you have previous council directive do you need further council directive for the staff to move forward with whatever is necessary to get to the point where you could issue an rfi or rfq on that [9:50:53 AM] parcel? >> Councilmember, it depends on how much input you guys want. We're ready to move forward. We have several plans. If the whole council wants to weigh in, then we need to have council weigh in. If not, then we're ready to issue. >> Tovo: So the standing counselor directive on that tract was to analyze it -- it's been a while since I looked at the resolution that I had brought forward but it was to look at it for affordable housing, parkland, and a super sustainable development that could illustrate -- that could be a good model project for us in terms of water reuse and sustainable energy use. So maybe it would be helpful to circulate that and see if there are council opinions that we should go in a different direction. It seems like that's still consistent with what y'all have been talking about, councilmember pool, but you're in the best position to know. >> Mayor Adler: We have Jimmy that wants to talk too. >> Pool: Do you want me to answer her question? >> Mayor Adler: Okay. Answer briefly and then -- but directly, yes. >> Pool: Okay. The last piece you mentioned about water is -- I'm not sure what that is, but I will say that since being elected back in '15 and even before I was working with the neighborhoods to try to embrace the project and move it forward. And I think maybe the answer to some of the questions here today is if it's in your district and you care about it, take the lead. And then we've done countless neighborhood outreach meetings. We've had -- in fact we had one on Saturday. Surveys. We have a website that's a page devoted to -- we call it Ryan drive by Justin lane is easier for people to locate on the maps. Take the lead. You had been working on winnebago and it's in district 2, maybe the two of you join forces and move it forward. I think that might be the [9:52:53 AM] piece that staff can't say but that we have entire authority and ability to do. And my staff has been terrific in segmenting time to work on that as well as all the other things that we work on. The Ryan drive, Justin lane project for the last 3-plus years I think I know you have. I'm trying to get really clear on does staff need council directive to actually move that project to the point where it's breaking ground? Do you need any further directive on that project? Or are you, like, moving forward the place where you're going to is issue a request for proposal. >> Pool: As far as I know what's going to happen, once staff and the neighbors and my office have something to offer, we will bring it to council for council to review. Is that correct? That's something we were thinking about doing sometime this year, I don't remember exactly the month, either, like, June or September or something like that. >> Mayor Adler: Let's go ahead and see where other people are on the dais as well. Mr. Flannigan. >> Flannigan: I have more of a simple question and then a comment I always have to make about the map. On page 17, which cuts off almost all of my district, including all of Williamson county. Can you just give me a high level of how six of the five were selected in these longer-term sites, generally what your criteria was that these were your opportunity. Sites. >> Councilmember, part of it is because all but one of these sites are vacant and because the market around them is hot enough that we can generate enough income to meet the goals. And so there's a couple of other sites on the longer-term that I think could move up quickly and I think that one of those sites is one that I talked to you about and I've been working with your staff on. >> Flannigan: Yeah. >> So that is one that we certainly could look at moving forward. [9:54:54 AM] We're looking at the financial part of it right now before I could commit to putting that up. >> Flannigan: Sure. I'm not asking to prioritize the one that's in my district. I'm more thinking about what are the ones that aren't on this map that maybe the council would have preferred more focus on. That's the criteria I'm looking for. Why the 12? Not that I want to see move from yellow to green, but what was 13, 14, 15, that maybe we would have preferred more focus on, just out of curiosity? >> Most of the properties that are left are, like, single-family lots or portions of lots that we're not sure that really are developable. We wanted to choose the types of developments that could make big impact on -- by getting large numbers out there to show that this process is a winner and that it could get council goals met sooner. >> Flannigan: Is it fair for know look at these 12 and assume generally that they're the only substantial tracts for which these types of ideas are valid? >> Yes. >> Flannigan: Okay. That's very informative. Also if there are parts of the community where the market isn't hot I think the community would like to know that too. [ Laughter ] >> Mayor Adler: So I think that was a really good question to ask because I think -- because the -- I join with my colleagues, this is a recurring theme that's come up from the first day we were here and before that going back three years ago. How can we maximize use of the property that we already own? Because we have a little more lower basis in being able to actually make uses happen. But there is a perception in the community that we have lots of these, and the question is where are this and how can we use them? And we got -- when we first came in we said tell us all the properties we can use and we got back at that point a log of everything the city owned including small easements and spike [9:56:55 AM] strips and it was a document that was really hard to be able to use because it was thousands of tracts. But if what we're saying is these are the big tracts we have, I think there might be some tracts that Austin energy might own that I'm not sure are on this list that might be good to put here. Even if we say we can't use those tracts because they're to be designated for an Austin energy -- the fact that they're not on here has someone then look at this list and say, wait a second, I know this isn't complete because Austin energy has a big tract or somebody else might have a big tract. If we can come up with the universe of what that is so we can say to the community this is the universe of things that we could use I think that would be really, really helpful. I also think as part of the analysis I look at the chart, the graph that you have on page 14, which I think is really important. It's only half, I think, of what we need to take a look at, but that chart on 14 says we have an sectors it's worth a certain amount of money. If we take that asset, which is worth a certain amount of money, how is it best to use that asset? If we just look at the financial side of it then whatever it's worth, then the question -- if we want to do affordable housing, the question is how do we use that property to deliver the -- either the greatest number or the best quality or best meet the affordable housing goals that we have? And one to do it would be to take that property, sell it and raise money for that, another would be to put it on the property itself. We know putting it on the property itself has advantages because we have low basis on the property but on any of these pieces of property I would need to seat scenario of -- see the question is of if we sold it what could we get for it or if we try to leverage that tract itself. The exception I would make on that or addition is there are some tracts that because of their location it's not a tract that you could sell. The Justin lane tract, for [9:58:56 AM] example, there are certain park opportunities, certain locationial opportunities. So I think that becomes part of the conversation that we need to have. But I think we need that data point as well in order to be able to evaluate the options that we have. >> Mayor, I think that's exactly how we laid out this framework, to kind of generate scenarios. The scenario on the free and clear to the scenario to accomplishing those goals on-site. And that's kind of using all those inputs, the existing council inputs, to move those forward. That is why we laid this out like that. >> Mayor Adler: All right. Thank you. Ms. Houston. >> Houston: Thank you, mayor. I just have a question on slide 4. It's because I don't have the history and y'all gave a wonderful history of some of the things you've done with city property and how it's benefited affordable housing. Can you explain to me why we did not do any affordable housing in Seaholm? Because you indicated that the pole yard has some affordability. So what happened with that piece of property? >> Councilmember, I don't have all the history on that. I know that at one point that project was originally slated for multi-family that had affordable housing in it and then when it converted to condos it did not. I think that is for us a lesson learned on how that deal was structured, is to -- one of the reasons we do that look-back is to see how can we improve upon those things. I think looking at the pole yard you've got affordable housing, Mueller has 25%. I think that point about Seaholm is well-taken and well understood by staff. >> Houston: Thank you. I'm happy to hear you all acknowledge that the look-back did help. One last question on page 13, under the Brooklyn cultural district, there are 379 units. Is it only 76 of those are affordable and at what [10:00:56 AM] level of affordability? Some of them are percentages, so 100 or 50% but this says 76 affordable units. What level is that? >> We can drill down and get those details on how each of those deals are structured, absolutely. >> Houston: Okay. Appreciate that. >> Mayor Adler: Yes, councilmember alter. >> Alter: Thank you. In this analysis or -- to what extent are we also considering our needs as a city for office space? We've had conversations about how we're paying rent for spaces and that over time costs us more than if we owned it. We've seen the state decide to make a lot of investments so that they would own their office space rather than lease it because it's not fiscally the smartest thing to be doing, to be leasing that space in a lot of situations. And I don't know if any of these spaces are the right place for city offices, but I'm wondering how that fits into this equation and how we're thinking about things. >> Want me to answer that? Councilmember, as you're aware, we passed about a year ago the planning department center, and so once that's constructed that will free up one Texas center and so we'll start moving people out of leased space at that point in time. We're also looking at an Austin energy headquarters, which will free up that site. So we are looking at different ways of trying to create office space for the city and avoid leasing property. >> Just to add to that, I think we have looked at some of these sites for what could be used. Certainly these new types of transactions that we're doing, it is -- they are easier to transact when it's currently not on city land. I think some of the interplay between our existing city facilities and redevelopment [10:02:57 AM] opportunities actually came from our original -- we started looking at our strategic facility plan to see how we could both consolidate, we realize we have a lot of service centers, we have a lot of different points -- as we look at consolidation it actually allows for opportunities for redevelopment. I think one of the sites on here there is a council resolution on is 411 which I can cone, an existing building where our building services department is located. To pick up and move that takes time and planning. It may no longer be the best use for fourth and chicone anymore. There is a high entity play between our facilities. If we look at an opportunity and redevelopment that we can accomplish city-owned space we are certainly going to look at that. I think that will be part of our mix. Mostly from a financial perspective as well as and location to see where folks are located. >> Alter: Thank you. And then on Mueller, I feel also some lessons learned on Mueller where we might have done things better. I know generally it's looked on as a great development but I think there are some questions about, you know, the -- where the -- how the city might have benefited even more from Mueller in terms of the game that was had, how much went to the developer, how much went to the city in how we structure things. So I think a critical eye towards Mueller as well would be perhaps useful. >> Agreed. In fact part of the mda, there is a look- back provision on the master development agreement, when it closes out, for us to look back at the financial -- look back at the financial conditions of the project over time, and the city would play a part in that, any financial changes. So I think we have that -- we have that baked into the deal. When it gets to the end. I think one of our lessons learned on that one, because it's so big, what we learned from our peer city, is putting a reset in earlier to maybe look at as market conditions are ahead of where we thought there [10:04:58 AM] were, is there an ability to do a reset prior to the end of the project. I think that would be something I would say on Mueller, back in early 2000s, the anticipation of that -- there was a lot of questioning from the market about the city going out and doing that project at that time, in the early 2000s. Folks thought it was a little over our skis to be out doing that project in the early 2000s. >> Alter: Okay. Thank you. >> Renteria: Mayor. >> Mayor Adler: Councilmember Renteria. Then councilmember pool. >> Renteria: Yeah. It was different times back then, and there was a lot of questions about that development. But I also want you to -- I want to -- if you could just explain to us, I know we were talking about the 411 chicone building, and you were mentioning that and there have been some proposals about going into a 40-year lease type program with developers and having them build the units, affordable units, and we build 50/50. Can you elaborate a little more about how that would work? >> Yes, councilmember. So, again, that would be using the value of the land. So what we do is we're actually building a model now that we can plug in different areas of the city and we can look at -- so you look at, okay, let's say rent a$1,000 and now we want to buy it down to $500, we capitalize that $500 difference and then we deduct that from the value of the land. So we say this is how many -- so we have a formula that we are using to calculate how many units of affordability can we get for a long-term by using the value of our land. So we would lower the purchase price in order to get 50% affordable, we would lower rot purchase price a little bit to get that affordability. >> Renteria: And we would also end up still owning [10:07:00 AM] the land? >> Right. And just a good example and I should have mentioned this earlier, both amli and post properties are long-term leases. So in 70 years the city gets to redo that deal. And I heard yesterday that the poll yard, west avenue lots, that they're looking at redeveloping that site because when they did it they didn't put as many units as they thought they could because they weren't sure that downtown residential would be successful and they were leery and so now they're thinking they can get double the units on the site so there may be a chance for council to get a reset. And on ali and west avenue lots we get a percentage of the gross income after they reach a certain level so we've been getting nice checks from amli for a while now. >> Renteria: Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: You answered a question before I didn't know if you had -- two questions other than the question that you answered, and then councilmember Garza. >> Pool: Thank you. Thanks so much. I did want to tell everybody if you are interested in all of the work that has been done thus far on the Ryan drive/justin lane site -- and my grateful thanks to the staff for everything that they have done to help us move this forward. And it's these folks sitting here and sue Edwards who are no longer on staff, but the web page that my staff has put together that this blog is on is d7atx.com and if you look under community news you'll see a January 23, 2018 article, planning starts for future of city-owned site in crestview, and there are a number of links to the surveys, which were done both in English and Spanish to get input from the neighborhoods. And it's not just the crestview neighborhood that we're including this. We're including the neighborhoods adjacent, including on east side of Lamar, which is in [10:09:01 AM] district 4. So this has taken a long time, and a lot of that is because people have busy lives, our staff are doing a lot of other things besides this work, and I really want to get the best possible project in the very end, and that means bringing everybody together. I'm not -- I would not be willing just to plop down something on there that I wanted. I want to make sure I hear from everybody and that we kind of work it all together. The last piece I will tell you is Ms. Ricer mentioned creative space and open space parkland and the transit oriented, this is a tod site so there are requirements already baked in plus we're working on getting access to the train station at crestview station, but the other piece she forgot to mention is the affordable housing piece, which we are also working on and we have talked to some of the nonprofit builders and of course they have -- they have formulas and calculations that they need to meet and I'm hoping that when we get it all together this site will work. Then the last thing I will say is it's only 5 acres. I mean, that's the other thing. We're really working with a very small palette and hoping to put as much as possible on there and have it be a success for that park. >> Mayor Adler: Councilmember Garza. >> Garza: Yeah. I just wanted to respond about, you know, why this isn't moving -- or why they're not moving forward. Councilmember pool mentioned taking the lead. I want to be clear this is not for lack of taking a lead. The nonprofit that's interested in win bag gosh -- winnebago, it's been over a year and a half that staff is aware of that nonprofit. I have asked for several meetings simply because, you know, I don't want to say, yes, let's give it to that nonprofit, that there need to be a process. So they have also been waiting for that process, knowing there should be some kind of process and cite but they have also been waiting. I've exchanged emails and [10:11:02 AM] texts with city staff asking about what's the status of winnebago. As mayor pro tem mentioned she had a resolution about this. So this is not for lack of taking a lead. And that's why I really hope we can get this criteria, whatever it is, as soon as possible. Second, I'm concerned if this is going to -- I don't want this to did he involve into a the district gets to choose what goes there. We -- as I said in the beginning we have huge challenges in this city. On one hand we have to advocate for the -- the best we can for our districts but on the other hand we have city-wide issues we need to address. I know for a fact this tract - - the neighborhood closest to to it is going to want what every single neighborhood close to a piece of property is going to want, parkland. Every single person or neighborhood is going to want parkland or to keep it vacant. And we cannot -- as much as we need -- you know, neighborhood input is important, there's some huge challenges that we face and we need to be able to address those and think as city -- of those as city-wide issues. I don't think that I own winnebago tract. I want to be part of the conversation. But at the same time it's important that we look at this as a city-wide issue and city-wide problems and I want to do what's best for our city as a whole. Then my question is, what is coming back to us in June? Here are the rfp responses we got for the five tracts? Is it the specific criteria? What is the next step, for example, for winnebago? What happens in June with the winnebago tract? [10:13:03 AM] >> Winnebago, what we were wanting to bring back to you is scenarios of whack be -- what can be done on the tract and the value if we would just do a long-term lease on it or sell it, and then get council feedback on the different scenarios and get some direction on which direction they want us to follow through on. >> Garza: And for anybody who is likely watching, can you explain the legalities of how -- if we sell, why is it selling versus leasing? It's my understanding if you sell it has to be at market value. Is that right? What are the constraints that we face as a city if we sell versus -- I believe there are some city properties we lease for like a dollar. Can you talk about those two things? >> Yes. If we sell land under 272 of local government code we have to sell at market value. There's a few ways that we may not have to, but very limited. Under leasing, you're right, for nonprofits, so basically that process is we will have the property valued and see what the market lease is and then we'll have the nonprofit to provide this amount of community benefit for the property. So -- then we work with the client department. So for instance we have red cross, and so we have red cross provide us a list of all the measurements that they're going to -- and community benefits they're going to do and once a year we go in and have the client department, like the health department go in and audit them and say are they meeting all those community benefits. Same thing with Austin pets alive for being out on town lake, they have to service so many animals, we have a [10:15:04 AM] women's shelter why they have to provide so many beds. We have lots of instances where nonprofits are in city-owned facilities. >> Garza: As long as there's a connection between you said the community benefit it could leased at a lower than market rate? >> That is correct. >> Garza: Okay. Yeah, I'll just -- the quicker we can get some criteria. I will say with that specific site the idea of affordable housing, it's not -- there's no transit close to that, and that concerns me. But, again, you know, I understand there's all kind of options, but, you know, in June I would really like to see some movement on what we could do there, like I said. I know one interested -- I'm sure there will be others interested, too, as they become aware of this conversation. Ms. Kitchen. >> Kitchen: I think that would be helpful and maybe -- maybe we can find some time to sit down and go over the properties that didn't make this list. Just because, like, the earlier conversation, I'd really like to understand what's in south Austin. And I understand what you're saying, that it appears that there aren't any larger sites, but there may be some smaller sites that make sense for a few things that -- you know, that we're concerned about. So if we could find some time. And I know you sent out a list like the mayor described, but I just need some help going over that so perhaps we could have a meeting where we could talk through the sites that are in south Austin. >> And, councilmembers, I'm really excited to tell you that we finally have a mapping system that we want and we're about to roll it out and we're going to roll out a beta to you and your staff first to get input to say is this giving you the information -- you want? Can you sort with it? [10:17:05 AM] Can you pull up the information you want? What information you want. It's very exciting news. I'm so excited you guys will finally have a tool that you've been asking for. >> Kitchen: Okay. You're going to come show me how to use it? [ Laughter ] >> Yes, we are. Ctm will be setting up appointments to train you. >> Mayor Adler: Mr. Flannigan. >> Flannigan: I just wanted to support councilmember Garza's comments. I really believe exactly the same thing, that be it's not about districts being controlled by their councilmembers, we've got to work on these things as a team. I just wanted to reiterate my support for that. >> Mayor Adler: Mr. Casar. >> Casar: And I know we haven't talked about the product - - the Home Depot tract specifically in this meeting yet since we kind of moved around so many of the tracts. I wanted to thank everyone on staff and on the council for their support just in November, sort of freeing up that property for this sort of work and then really it was just in the last few weeks we passed a resolution on the municipal court, the new municipal court locations so really it's just in the last few weeks that that tract has been moved over from being a municipal court option to being sort of an option for this broader sort of community development. But unlike the -- there's some similarities but also dissimilarities in that it's over 20 acres, over six city blocks, and in a historic block in a -- where it's about 30 blocks in the neighborhood so it would be a significant transformational project in an area that I just want to commit to everybody that we will -- I think that in those sorts of situations I think it will be really important to get a lot of community buy-in but at the same time to keep everyone informed, as councilmember pool just brought up, on how those meetings go because it obviously is not my decision. It's a community decision and a full council decision. And I promise to work with really deliberate haste so that doesn't take so long and to councilmember [10:19:06 AM] Garza's point, if you just ask folks on the street what would you like there, of course it's, you know, all -- all parkland, of course. But I think that there can a real educational process that we can use to really get folks to understand that they need the full council to pass it and that these are the big needs that the full council would need to see met for an rfp to go out and I'm interested in whether rfps can have some flexibility such that we say, well, if we go from 300 units to 400 units, what additional benefits could we get on the parkland? Or if we do -- add this retail or this office, what other benefits could we get sort of through that rfp process with the private sector so that those trade-offs -- so we don't have to fake all in on the front end but as we've seen with our facilities be a little more dynamic. Anyway, I just wanted to make that pitch and pledge to y'all, that I will keep you updated as we do that work. It is also the only city property jumping forward to the next briefing that is right in the heart of one of the red Zones on the gentrification map of dynamically significant amounts of gentrification right now, and so I see that also as an urging for why it needs to happen quickly but why it's also not an easy one. >> Mayor Adler: Mayor pro tem and then Ms. Houston. >> Tovo: So I'm still -- I'm a little confused about what's coming back in June, too, but I want to comment that I think it also sounds to me like these five tracts are at slightly different stages. You know, as you pointed out that resolution passed relatively recently and that was a large-scale project so what comes back in June for that project may be a little different. Mr. Canally, you look -- >> Exactly. I was going to say part of what we're doing in June, it's a progress of where we are on each of these and they are on different tracts. I think clearly the work that's occurred on Justin lane/ryan drive has accelerated. The one on Home Depot is just initiating. [10:21:07 AM] >> Tovo: Right. >> I think what we would strive to do is -- and I want to reiterate something that we believe is really important looking on slide 19, again, as we work on, again, looking on this rubric to come up with opportunities and recommendations, is that we do think there's a value in coming back to the full council and having that discussion. These are big issues and it's our past practice. Regardless of the size our past practice has been to come and talk about Mylar, talk about green, talk about colony park. So we think that is a best practice that the city of Austin has had over the years and we want want to repeat that for all of these sites. We know that creates more time, but we think it's valuable. So I think we would look at any site that can be ready for that briefing, a specific site that is ready to be briefed on for here's a recommendation, we would come back. But I think in general I think what we're hearing and understanding so is just a better sense of communicating where we are on all of these efforts and I think that's where we get to this project report on where we are on this overall effort and then as individual efforts are coming forward for briefings on action items or prebriefings before we go out on the street for rfps. So kind of a kind of two-way street. We believe it's valuable to make sure that we're working the sites site by site but also there's an overarching -- seeing how these are overarching from a portfolio executive that's where a 6-month report would be valuable. >> Tovo: Just to sum what you I said before and then I do have some specific questions, my question is in seeing us move forward on each of these, regardless of where they are. I share councilmember Garza's interest in seeing something move forward with winnebago that gets us to some decision points or whatnot, as well as the other tracts, acknowledge og, as I mentioned, that they are all in different states but at the moment I think it's very important [10:23:07 AM] to move them forward. I wanted to touch base on a couple -- two different things, but they both respond to the resolutions that we passed on October 16th so they are related to real estate. I apologize I know we've got a lot on our agenda but the one resolution we had asked for a report at a work session in February 2017 and so this I think is the report so with your indulgence I'm going to ask for an update on the status of our creating of -- of our having a strategic facilities -- our city's strategic facilities governance team work with our other local entities to identify opportunities for real estate portfolio work. That's one. Two is if we could get an update on the sales on the tracts of land we purchased from aisd. I think there were a couple. And one I believe was a high potential for affordable housing. Then I wanted to talk about boam road. Back in I think it was 2014 we had asked -- I had brought a resolution asking for the staff to identify three tracts of land that would be appropriate for family friendly housing other than Ryan drive because the staff had just done that work and boam road popped up as a possibility. So boam road is one I've heard the community talk about, again, aisd lands we purchased, any possibilities within there? Could you give us an update on the strategic planning? I think it might be helpful to provide staff -- if we could spend a minute or two talking about the Mccullough site. We may as well acknowledge the elephant in the room, that's one of the tracts that was sited as a possibility for a potential soccer stadium partnership and I think we should talk about it while we're all here together. If we have time. >> Councilmember, let me go ahead and address the boam road tract. I don't remember the date offhand, but our council passed a resolution for me to do a 50-year lease with skill point, as a skill [10:25:09 AM] point headquarters. It's the same land. So that's some of the issues that we're having, is we have multiple things on the site. But, councilmember, the good news is that -- well, that's one of the issues we're having with some of the nonprofits and lessons learned. Is with skill point, I didn't actually sign the lease. Even though council had directed me. We created a lease but we said -- I said to them show me your money, show me that you can build it because I didn't want them to have control of the site for 50 years and not have the ability. So it's now recently come that skill point has acknowledged that they cannot build their education center there and that they're no longer interested in that site so that is now able to come back into our portfolio. So that was one of our lessons learned. And I don't know if you remember back the time with vision village and that site. That was another site where we gave it to a nonprofit and they weren't able to do the task. And in fact they did things that weren't legal in that tract and ended up in prison over the nonprofit -- the head of the nonprofit ended up in prison. And so we've got -- so the lessons learned, that's just two that working with some of the nonprofits we just need to make sure that they have the ability to carry the project to fruition and they have the financial and expertise to do that. And that's why we talk about paring them with a developer, so that way we can actually get these projects built because we keep tying up -- we've tied up assets for long periods of time and not been able to move forward on it. >> Tovo: Thank you for that information about boam road and for that approach. I think that's really helpful. >> Then talk about the family friendly, so you know that I have met -- I meet with nonprofits all [10:27:10 AM] the time, probably weekly, and I've sat down for instance with foundation communities and we went through every property in our inventory. When they ran their model for the tax credits, we really didn't have a property that was available that they could use. So I have sat down with them. I've sat down with a lot of nonprofits. Most of the time it's a 2-prong approach. They really find a site they think is exciting but since they can't get, like, tax credits or other financing then they come to me and say, okay, how can you fund this, too, to build it? And I usually send them over to housing or economic development or somewhere else, but I don't have that ability. I only have the ability to do the land. So that's the issue, it's not that we haven't offered and met, but it's they want the money and the land. And so that's why the tracts with the family friendly. And then the third thing you brought up -- >> Tovo: And I appreciate and I'm aware that you do that and I think that's really -- I think that then puts it back on us. And I guess then that would be helpful for -- as a decision point for us in June or whenever, you know, we can't -- depths have a nonprofit that believes they have the funding to build a family friendly housing on this site. It would require substantial city funding. There may be will on the council to do that, to explore options to make that work. I sure would vote for that, if we could figure out a way to help build some of that necessary housing on city-owned property. So if you could kind of help us figure out what -- you know, again what input you need from us to move forward with that because I think we've got a lot of strong will to do it. Then the third thing was aid properties that we had purchased. >> Yes, great. So we've been going back and forth but actually we have a closing date set for [10:29:11 AM] April 12. >> Tovo: Great. I guess because we're not closed we probably can't -- >> That's correct. >> Tovo: Okay. And then my last question was the strategic -- the status of the strategic planning and really this came out of the rfp for aid because as some of you know we were -- we had set a goal at the joint subcommittee of coming up with a project that we could start on that year. And by start on I don't mean like build it but start moving toward a project that the county, city and aid would participate in, and the idea was and I think our staff and the aisd staff had done some good work identifying potential tracts, and then the aid board decided to do an rfp for some of their us. >> Properties and I think that brought up at least one of the tracts we were considering. So it seemed clear we needed a different way of interacting with our partners, especially if we're going team up and work on creating affordable housing orb other community needs on publicly owned tract. That was a substance of the resolution, asking to see if any of those partners are interested in a more formal relationship in terms of how we use our real estate assets. >> And then lastly you talked about Mccullough place. Just to understand that, one of the things we've been working on the last year and has taken us a while is to see if council -- capital metro would move the rail station to that tract. And we now have it in writing that they would allow us to move it. We'd have to of course fund it, but that's some of the things, the background/legwork that we're trying to enhance our tracts to be able to get the maximum amount of benefits on the tract, and we've done environmental, we've had an appraisal down. So we are moving forward but, again, now we have it that -- you know, the soccer issue, you know, is that a council prefers soccer or do they prefer something else? [10:31:12 AM] So we get that -- as things change, the dynamics change. >> Tovo: I think it probably -- again, I don't know that we have the capacity to talk about it here today but I think we should talk Mccullough, especially if you're moving forward with it. It seems like we should schedule time either today or at our next work to talk about that, hear the rationale for housing before we think about it for soccer or to do both of those things together because they're -- you know, that's kind of a pressing conversation, and we don't want to foreclose an opportunity but it seems like an opportunity time to talk about both. >> We have the data. Good news. Ms. Houston. >> Houston: Thank you. A couple of things. When we're talking about city-owned property and that it would be used for parkland, that's really not the need for any city-owned property in district 1. We need employment. We need creative spaces, and we need amenities. We've got plenty of parkland. And so I just wanted to be clear. That may be for some parts of the community but that's not why we would need to be looking at, you know, use of city-owned land in district 1. And the other thing I want to say is that when I look back on -- slide 7 regarding how long the development process took for the Mueller development, you have it stopping at 2004. But the buildings didn't even start getting built until a long time after that and then they went into the phase where they built the most expensive units first. So the affordable units kind of took a back seat until they got the -- they weren't even market rate. These are luxury homes on the ground. And so it takes a long time, and we've explained that conversation to the people in colony park so it's not something that happens overnight. This is a long-term kind of [10:33:13 AM] a relationship and agreement with the master developer. But Ms. Mcgunfire has been sitting here all this time and I just wanted to ask you did you have anything to share because they've been focusing on one thing and not the economic development piece. >> I think it's infused in everything that Greg canally and Elaine Reiser have been saying. What we do -- there isn't anything that we do that isn't interdepartmental and holistic in terms of how we redevelop city-owned property. What we do is have a certain lens of how to get community benefits and get the marketplace to really leverage the marketplace in the smoking hot market of Austin to get the community benefits that we need. That's the lens that we do. But we're kind of ecomenicial as to what the community benefits would be. I appreciate the shout out there but staff's support to them and everything that they are doing is the tip of the spear. We're kind of the work Erbes. We appreciate being here and we're going to be helping to implement this, but our lens is definitely helping counter-leverage our real estate assets in this marketplace to get as much community benefits, off-load risk to the private developer, not us, and look at this way to have all these different properties have the maximum amount of community benefits and thinking more holistically in a portfolio approach. So that's what we're hoping to do, and it is interdepartmental and not so much a specific type of real estate product. Just like we're doing with colony park, small and large. Thank you so much, councilmember. [10:35:16 AM] >> Mayor Adler: Councilmember kitchen. >> Kitchen: Just the last quick thing. On the boam road property, it sounds to me like there's still work to be done in terms of considering the use. I would just suggest also looking at that property with regard to creative spaces. And that -- because there are a lot of creative spaces in that part of the city right now that are the -- are the ones that are at risk of going -- of losing their space or have already lost their space. And it's also the kind of use that can be -- if the place is big enough that can be considered in combination with housing. So I'm just hoping that you're also looking at that space for the creative space uses we've talked about. >> Absolutely. In fact the resolution that we passed about that is something -- again, we have a resolution about both site-specific resolutions and we also have these kind of broad policy resolutions. So the objective of this framework is to take these efforts through both of those, come up with option oz, come back and present and move forward in a very diligent way. Because they are -- sometimes they are going to be the odds with each other. Sometimes the market won't be able to accomplish the community benefits. We might have to find a way to incentify those in another realm. So this is great. This is exciting. Because we have -- this is exactly what we needed, this feedback to move forward. One clear thing I think we will get on -- work on updating the map. We have -- we did look at it from what -- almost from a parcel size, which could go through a model like this, knowing there's other parcel that's wouldn't but we could easily go back to the list and get that back to full council as well as visit with you and any of the districts is we would look forward to doing that. >> Mayor Adler: I just saw the consultant leave on strategic planning and I don't know if he's leaving but that may abthe next [10:37:16 AM] thing that we get to so I just say that out loud because he walked out of the room. Does anybody else have anything else on the real estate issue? >> Tovo: Just one last thing. >> Mayor Adler: Go ahead. >> Tovo: Again, I really wanted to thank you for the work. One of the tracts on here, hope south, I think was a fabulous purchase on behalf of the city so I appreciate your keen work and keeping your eyes out for good opportunity. >> Thank you. >> Mayor Adler: Okay. All right. So as we talked about this morning, why -- I appreciate the indulgence that I can be here for the displacement discussion. So I think that gets us then to the pulled items. As soon as the pulled items are discussed, executive session, to go through those items. I'll join you hopefully in the middle of that and then we'll do the displacement task force right after that executive session. >> Kitchen: I have a question. I think it's item 36, the item that was added as an emergency item for us. I didn't put it down as pulled because I don't know the proper setting to have that conversation, if that's an executive session conversation or if we need to pull it or -- >> Tovo: That the municipal? >> Kitchen: Yeah, municipal. >> Tovo: I think that is -- >> Mayor Adler: It's going to be discussed in executive session. >> Kitchen: Thank you. >> Renteria: Mayor, are we going to hear the -- >> [Off mic] >> Mayor Adler: Then you should hear from the team because the team is not going to be able to stay. >> Renteria: Mayor, I didn't hear what you said about the gentrification study update. >> Mayor Adler: It's going to go next because apparently we lose the team this morning. So I won't be able to participate in that. >> Renteria: Okay. >> Thank you, mayor, council, Joe pantalion, interim assistant city manager. Next item is briefing on the gentrification, displacement study, mapping initiative. It is in progress and we're giving a brief update. I'll introduce Mandy with our neighborhood housing [10:39:17 AM] and community development department to provide some introductions to the UT staff working on this and just provide a bit more context as well. >> Sure. Mandy deman, I wanted to give a little background and remind you all this was a city-council initiated study funded as part of the budget process in September of 2017. Neighborhood housing community development manages the contract and has been working closely with the UT team, and part of their statement of work included a check-in to city council, and as they will also mention they've been working closely with anti-displacement and gentrification task force. Those two projects actually aligned fairly well. I wanted to introduce Heather white, a professor at UT law and Jake [indiscernible] An assistant professor at community regional planning and they are two-thirds of the team who has been working on this. The other third, Liz Mylar, an associate professor of community regional planning is actually on sabbatical in New Orleans. So she's been working on the project but won't be joining us today. I'm going to pass it over to -- >> [Indiscernible] >> There is, to Heather and Jake >> I also want to acknowledge we've got a team of three talented grad students working very hard for us, one of whom is Alex radkey right here. So just a little bit just to -- I know you've all seen this but just to remind you all this is -- this effort was originally proposed by councilmember pool, and we have been working on it in Ernest since the late summer but we got official city council approval in October. And our completion deadline is the end of August. So there's really three pieces to this study, and the first one is the most fully developed at this point. I'll show that to you in a minute, but this is a neighborhood change analysis in effect taking all the census tracts that lie inside the city of Austin and clarifying them [10:41:19 AM] as gentrifying or not gentrifying and if gentrifying what stage of gentrifying? This is largely complete, although we await your feedback on this. The second piece, which we'll probably talk about the least is what we call neighborhood drill-downs, where we pick two neighborhoods and look at them in a more intensive, holistic way. The reason we're not going to talk about it a ton is just that Alex in fact is hard at work pulling all that data together. We'll have a lot more to say in a couple months. And then the third major piece, which Heather Wei will speak to towards the end is having a suite of policies, well targeted to the particular legal context of Texas and useful in Austin that we can provide more detail on. So just, you know, want to be conscious of not inundating you with endless technical details but just a few things worth mentioning here. We looked at almost all the tracts that are either entirely or partially inside the city limits. A census tract is an area that the census creates. It's about two to will thousand people living within it, so you can kind of think of it as a neighborhood. We did exclude somewhat you might think of as oddball camps, the UT campus, west campus neighborhood, camp may berry, the airport. We decided to compare tracts to the entire 5-county metropolitan area, and if you're curious about that I can explain why. >> Pool: I think you should go ahead and explain why. >> Okay. If you only look at the city of Austin, then, as one tract is above average, the mathematically all the other tracts become below average and that might [10:43:19 AM] obscure the extent to which an other expanding area of the city is becoming more and more gentrified over time. So it's common in our world that we think of housing and labor markets as regional in scope. So we just believe that the best practice was to -- we're not analyzing all five counties, but we're benchmarking what's going on in the city against the five counties. And what I'm going to show you is -- it's -- unfortunately, when we work at the tract level and working with census data you get it in as five- year data, which I realize doesn't capture some of the latest trends you're all aware of in your own districts, but we are working with the latest data that we have, which is 2012 through 2016. And just one thing to mention right now is that we are deliberately setting this up so that as new census data rolls in year by year after our team has ridden off into the sunset and city staff are owning this data, we've set it up so up so it will be easy to swap in new census data and produce a new set of maps to track how this changes over time. We intend for this to be a long-term tool the city can use. We think it would be take somewhere on the order of ten hours of city staff time to do that upped each year. So -- update each year. There's three stages tots mapping piece of this. And the first stage is to identify three -- excuse me, to identify tracts that are vulnerable according to five criteria. Now, I meant to mention earlier this whole method that we're implementing here is based on something that was developed by professor Lisa bates of Portland state university. [10:45:20 AM] In this instance we are using the same four vulnerability criteria that she used, but we're adding a fifth, and that fifth is child poverty. And we added that with input from city staff in our early stages. So if you look at this map, these are -- the green tracts are the ones that meet at least three out of these five vulnerability criteria, and so these are the tracts that according to our analysis could be gentrifying, not necessarily. That brings me to the next phase, which is -- so some tracts have vulnerable people living in them right now. And then some, not all of the tracts that have vulnerable people living in them right now, are experiencing demographic change, have experienced a large -- >> Kitchen: I'm sorry. Could I ask a question. I hate to interrupt. >> Councilmember kitchen. >> Kitchen: I'm sorry. I wasn't sure who was chairing. >> Pool: I've got it. >> Kitchen: Okay. Can I go ahead and ask a question then? What were -- what are considered vulnerability? The reason I'm asking, I had questions from the commission on seniors on whether seniors were considered part of the vulnerable population. Can you tell us what the vulnerability criteria is? >> Sure. I should mention that tomorrow I will be making a similar presentation to the aging commission. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> The commission on aging. The four criteria are percentage of people who are people of color in the tract. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Child poverty, like I mentioned. I have to remember all these. The percentage of households living in the tract earning below 80% of the median family income. The percentage of people who lack a college or higher level of education. And then finally the percentage of renters in the tract. [10:47:21 AM] We also -- >> Kitchen: Okay. We can -- I'll let you get through it. I would like to have a discussion of why we didn't include seniors. >> I can briefly address that right now if you'd like. >> Kitchen: If you want to. Let me ask the chair. >> Pool: Go ahead and answer. >> Kitchen: Okay. Go ahead. >> We mapped the -- we also received direction about looking at the share of the population that is 65 or higher, and if -- unfortunately, I don't have that map with me today. I should have included it. But it pretty much looks like the opposite of all the other vulnerability factors. In other words, the tracts that have the highest percentage of elderly people in Austin are overwhelmingly the whitest, the higher -- the ones with highest home ownership rates, et cetera, with the lowest child poverty rates. >> Kitchen: Well, you'll have a conversation with the commission on seniors tomorrow. That's a high level. That doesn't get at the seniors that are being pushed out because they're on fixed income because they can no longer stay in their homes and are just as vulnerable. So that's what my concern is. >> Well, with this project there's both a play space aspect to it but there is also -- we will be presenting all sorts of tools that can reach vulnerable populations wherever they are. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Councilmember kitchen, we are doing a deeper dive and that's what Alex is working on, a framework to do that and seniors are absolutely part of that -- >> Kitchen: Of the deeper dive. >> Of the deeper dive. But the quantitative data, the city-wide numbers we're getting just don't get at the vulnerable neighborhoods, but we do recognize that seniors in our community are some of our most vulnerable members of our community and subject to displacement and that is part of the deeper dive analysis. >> Kitchen: Thank you. >> One more thing I'll say, of course a couple of the other factors I mentioned would encompass a lot of vulnerable seniors, for example, the low-income factor that is -- that is in the [10:49:21 AM] vulnerability analysis. And so then the third filter, after you look at where are vulnerable populations concentrated and then you look at where has the demographic change happened over time, and the last thing you look at -- that we looked at is to what extent is -- are home values picking up? And so that's what we're showing here, classified under three different basically appreciated means that the home values have already increased for quite -- they increased quite some time ago, accelerating means it's really happening right now, and adjacent are tracts where it hasn't happened yet but they're physically adjacent to ones where it is. So that's where we think things could go next. So when you put that all together, according the scheme that professor Lisa bates came up with, this is the map that we get. And when you -- so the canary yellow at the top, susceptible, those are tracts that, you know, it would be reasonable to expect would be next to get hit with major real estate increases but where it hasn't happened yet. And on up through these later and later phases, on up to late, and then continued lost tracts are ones where this process has already happened but there may be residual vulnerable populations that you can say are still under pressure because of the gentrification that's occurred. >> Pool: Doctor, before you go any further on the maps I just wanted to ask, because it's hard to orient without having them be a little larger to see where the streets are for those -- the boundary lines, is this available in electronic form so that we can zoom in and see like where 183 is, for example, and so forth? >> We -- this summer is when we are going to create [10:51:26 AM] a web-driven interface that will allow you to pan over the number of the tract. We've assigned names to the tracts, but what we do have is -- it's tiny, and I didn't want to put it up, but just a list, which I'd be -- you know, I'm happy to go over with anyone individually. >> Pool: Great. And so if anybody wants to drill down to that level, then they're available to come to you or Dr. Wei to come in and have a one on one. >> We're also more than happy to circulate this, this spreadsheet, which we've tried to make somewhat easier to read. >> Pool: Thanks. >> Flannigan: Chair. >> Pool: Yes, councilmember Flannigan. >> Flannigan: Very quickly on the map, from the previous slide it looked like all the full purpose areas were being included but on this slide there's a difference between the study area and the city limits. So are there some tracts that are not being included in this analysis? >> We included every single tract that was either entirely within the city limits or partially within the city limits, including of course the ones in hays and Williamson counties. The only tracts we removed from the analysis were -- there's one tract for the UT campus, two for west campus, which we view as a -- in its own universe. We removed camp may berry and we removed the airport. >> Flannigan: Look at two maps to see where I'm seeing a discrepancy and help me. The significant change map, one prior, all the gray areas. Then when you go two maps down to the neighborhood topology map, some of those gray areas went away. >> We will look at that. It's not our -- if they went away that was an error that we will fix. >> Flannigan: Okay. And it's important as I look at just the Williamson county part where some of the most lowest income of those tracts are not in [10:53:29 AM] this study area, but they're grayed in the other map so I want to make sure we're not -- and they're more recently annexed which may explain some of that discrepancy but I want to make sure we've daylited that. >> We'll make a point of fixing that. >> Pool: Just to jump on that I think that's another reason why us having the availability of the map -- [ no audio ] I'm going to turn the gavel over to the mayor pro tem. Not that I had a gavel. [ Laughter ] >> Tovo: I apologize. Please continue through your presentation. >> Just to show you the two neighborhoods we selected as drill-down neighborhoods, we selected on one hand montopolis and on the other hand St. John's Coronado hills, two different parts of town, two different council districts, and also varying stages of gentrification. So we just thought that those would be good cases for us to look more intensively -- look at a -- in a more granular way, look within those places who are the different vulnerable subpopulations within them, what are -- and what does that say about the kinds of tools that would be effective or not effective in these places. Like I said that analysis is ongoing. >> Kitchen: Can I ask a quick question? >> Tovo: Councilmember kitchen. I'm not sure what their time constraints are. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Tovo: So I think then we should let them proceed through their presentation and ask questions after. >> Kitchen: The question I had was just the types here. The wording susceptible early type one, type two, and late, can you tell me again what those mean? >> At this point I'm going to zoom ahead to a slide that I have -- here we go. >> Kitchen: If you're getting to that, that's fine. >> Well, these are slides that I had just -- keeping in reserve but that I wasn't going to -- just in the interest of time I wasn't going to show [10:55:29 AM] because of the level of detail involved, but this is the schema that comes directly from the Lisa bates study. I know that's a lot of information to absorb just looking at that quickly. >> Kitchen: That's fine. I just wanted to have the definition somewhere. >> Is it okay if I move on? Okay. Now I'm going to turn it over to Heather Wei for the policy piece. >> Just a couple of minutes on this and the phase two, one of the things we're working on this spring and summer is a deeper dive into the policy strategies that could be used to reduce or mitigate displacement of vulnerable populations from neighborhoods that are undergoing gentrification and to do that with also improving our understanding as a city of how different tools work by type of neighborhood and where it is in that gentrification process, the early stage versus the late stage, in terms of what kind of policies benefit which populations, in terms of renters versus homeowners versus seniors and so forth. And we're doing that just a quick overview, what we're doing this semesters in this regards is first we have our team of graduate students who are working on developing a set of four case studies, of gentrifying neighborhoods, neighborhoods that have been confronting gentrification and have been deploying a range of strategies around the country and to help inform our understanding of what tools and what context. We have a list of 80 different strategies and we're narrowing that down to 12 to 15 policy strategies that we're working to take just a deeper dive on in terms of looking at how those tools have been used in different areas, how they could be used in Austin, and we're doing that through just sort -- to jump ahead, through -- in part through what we're developing as a policy strategy matrix to help you as policymakers make informed decision and understanding more in depth how these different policy tools work. And we're doing that by -- [10:57:31 AM] across all these five strategies here, looking at these five criteria for each of the policy strategies. So as I mentioned before, looking at which tools work best in which types of neighborhoods by the stage of gentrification, and looking at what's the financial cost to city for household benefited for a particular strategy to the extent that could be determined readily and the length of the impact, some tools work best, they maybe have a five-year impact, may may have a XCIX year impact so understanding that impact we're getting from the different strategies, as I mentioned before the target population that benefits from these and scalability and resources required to implement these tools. So here's an example of what the matrix we anticipate looking like, just two example tools. I through in some of these numbers. Don't rely on them now. This is an example of what we're working on. For example, land banking, breaking that down to understand more how that works. And that is it for strategies. Anything . >> That's it for us. Other than your questions, of course. >> Tovo: Great, thank you so much. Questions? Councilmember Houston? >> Houston: Thank you so much for coming. On that last slide, potentially samples of quality strategy matrix, you might have said this when I stepped out. What is Eli? >> Extremely low income, it's one of the hud definitions of -- it's the families below 30% of the median family income. >> And the Eli? >> 50%. >> Very low income. So two more acronyms. >> Yes, exactly. >> My apoloies for the acronyms. >> Houston: Thanks. >> Tovo: Other questions? [10:59:32 AM] Councilmember Casar? >> Casar: This is really useful. I look forward to thilling how we keep working on the policy strategies for each area. I also thought that it was really instructive, the conversation with councilmember kitchen on the fact that there is certainly oftentimes we can have displacement with the broader idea -- with the idea of gentrify occasion, that there are certainly people in more affluent areas that have real housing pressures on them than if they have to sell their home and they don't have another option nearby and maybe no longer live in their neighborhood that gentrification is also a concept placed on low income and people of color as we try to develop a shared language on these issues. So I think this is helpful. I look forward to continuing to work on it. >> Tovo: I wanted to find out if there's criteria we should be looking at. What we should look at and recommend specific policies. Give you a framework so we can decide what is working best. If there's other criteria you're missing and you'd like us to look at. >> So far what you put together does and really with what you have now, sends a strong message that oftentime where is the gentrification is about to happen is ahead of where the political conversation might be. Because we're always trying to catch up. I remember councilmember Renteria saying some parts of the northern district is where we were at 10 or 20 years ago. We have to get ahead of that. Sometimes the maps are helpful to we can make investments now so we're not always 5 or 10 or 20 years behind, while [11:01:34 AM] recognizing we're trying to get people of color or lower income people back who are already late or lost and not lose sight of the fact there's prevention we can do. >> Tovo: Absolutely. Councilmember Houston? >> Houston: Thank you, don't have the number for the slide. But it's neighborhood topography. You talk about St. Johns and Coronado hills. I want to thank you for comparing those. That's a neighborhood, very different, very, very different. It will be interesting to see how that shakes out in your conversation and in your analysis. I don't know if this is possible. But we talk about loss of wealth, after World War II, we were all told to buy some property and you could use that property to leverage kids going to school, go to college, leverage for your next house, leverage for so many things. So what I'm seeing in the displacement of families is they have lost that capacity. They don't have land anymore. I don't know how that would even be framed because that is something that's happened to families who have been in parts of my town, this town for generations. And they've used that property to leverage for education betterment and all kinds of things and now they can't afford to live there, let alone pass that on to their surviving children when they die. So that's a concern to my elders. When we talk about the elderly, that's one of the concerns that my elders express is once they die, their kids cannot afford to live in their home. Because the property taxes are going to go up so high. That may be something you can't touch but it's very important in the area. >> Tovo: Councilmember alter? >> Alter: Thank you. I would like to ask that when [11:03:34 AM] you provide us the policy matrix, you also include things that we shouldn't do. So there are things that we can do that encourage us. But there are other things like putting big developments in susceptible areas that may not be the best things for us to be doing. It would be important for us to have those things called out as well. >> The one thing we have started to call out in the list is the things that the legislature has been doing as well. I think that's important to call out as deplorable and all of the tools have been taken away from us, we haven't yet looked at what you're pointing at. >> There's a lot of things when he can do in zoning that can exacerbate this. And we don't usually have a conversation about how that economic process plays out and how that feeds into gentrification of areas particularly when theyf ear at different stages, those actions might be different. I just -- I'd like that to be part of the conversation. Because those are things that are also in our control that we as policy makers can pay attention to. >> Tovo: Councilmember Garza? >> Garza: I know there's a range of circumstances for families. I'm curious about -- if this is beyond your scope, I can understand. There's a lot to thank you stae here. Are there any plans to have maybe -- and I don't know how you do this, frankly, but a survey of people who have moved out, so I mean like I know families that lived in east Austin but now live in Kyle. And so it -- it would be nice to know what we could have done differently. What caused them to leave? And I guess the obvious is property taxes, they could sell their house for, you know, $600,000 in east Austin and go buy an amazing house in Kyle for [11:05:35 AM] $350,000 and it's paid for. It would be -- is there any scope involve in here to address? Because rightfully so, a lot of our policies are geared to certain mfis, but we're losing our middle class too. And I wonder if, you know, we're going to have a giant affordable housing bond coming up. But my district is one that's we're really middle class in addition to low income as well. But because we're concentrating so much on lower mfis, which is important, and the people who can can can afford to live here and then they're going to leave, I guess I would like to see some focus on that middle and what we can be doing like Miller is doing 120 mfi units. What in this study could we find out what's affecting those middle-class families? For moving? And many of those are families. So we're losing families. Our -- the core of our city has decreased in population, which is crazy. And so if there's a way to -- you asked for what else we can do with them? I know there's a way for that. But to be able to focus on that middle range. >> You're calling out several things that I think are important to highlight. One is the importance of really understanding how families are impacted by rising housing prices. And to do that and not just in a quantitative way. Like this is what when he eve done. We showed you the overarching numbers and there are nuances - when you take a deeper dive to individual neighborhoods and talk to families. We in this scope of our research don't have the funding and [11:07:36 AM] resources capacity to do those one-on-one focus groups and surveys and reaching out for us. We think that's essential, the anti-displacement task force that's been meeting is clearing for that information. There are two other cities that have followed this same methodology we're using from Portland, Denver, and Minneapolis are in the midst of several kinds of processes. And Minneapolis went out and did focus groups and not even surveys, but held conversations with community members to help understand more what's the change they're going in and why people move and we rely on research in this field that we're drawing from different reports and stuff that's been done. But we don't have the benefit of that awesome specific analysis. >> I will say councilmember Garza, it's important to remember there are parallel efforts that are occurring. As Heather mentioned, we have the anti-displacement task force. They're looking at how they're going to build on the drill down work, interviews, more case studies, supportive information. In addition, Dr. Eric tang with UT has looked at -- I don't think we've seen the report yet. But the African-American diaspora to kind of northern Travis county, why folks are living -- so follow-up surveys on why folks left the city of Austin? Was it directly related to affordability. Were there other reasons. >> Tovo: Councilmember Casar? >> Casar: Two last points one in the census tracks you identify as gentrified in some stage having some profile of the folks being gentrified out would be interesting knowing for example in some of councilmember Garza's district, higher levels of [11:09:39 AM] homeownership and mine, much lower levels of homeownership. This is what we're talking about, not to erase all of the people not in the median situation, but a general profile of what it is y'all are seeing. Secondly I would be interested not only when we have the policy framework, what we should or shouldn't be doing in gentrifying tracts but what city policies can help or hurt. Because obviously, if you're in the adjacent even if it's great out, the policies that we decide for those areas can obviously have an impact on the gentrifying track. So I think any -- any citywide or even policies related to nongentrified tracks that have an impact I think should be in consideration. >> If I could just talk to councilmember Casar's first point -- our intention is with that kind of clickable map that will have more like the summer but the idea would be you can pan over and not only would it put up information about what stage it's in, but it might also give you quick demographic statistics. >> Casar: Yeah, you said this hits the mark. >> Thank you. >> Tovo: I have a couple of quick questions. What I heard about the policy strategies you'll be forwarding to us is that they will be -- there will be some strategies that look at different populations from renters to seniors to others. Will they also be targeted to different levels of areas that are experiencing gentrification? Or will they be targeted in se susceptible areas or areas where we might have more opportunities. >> There are more early [11:11:41 AM] opportunities in early stage gentrification. That's easier. It's much harder to address the issues late stage. Our policies are going to make a diverse array of policies to hit on the different stages and we'll start to call out for the policies when they're most effective. >> As she mentioned, easier in the early stages, but later stage, density bonus becomes more feasible in later stage areas. >> Tovo: I appreciate, too, you're looking at policies that could exacerbate these as well. That's what councilmember alter said also. Any other questions before we -- councilmember kitchen? >> Kitchen: Just a quick question. I think I'm reading this right. I want to make sure that the stages, susceptible, early type 1, type 2. I'm not sure dynamic and late. Does dynamic mean it's in the middle of the changes and late means the changes have already happened. Is that the thinking there? And susceptible, in the early type I or type II is where it's beginning in the process. How would you characterize that? >> Continued loss is the category where basically the tract is no longer deemed a gentrifying tract because it's already happened. So late, the ones that are gentrified. Dynamic, right in the middle. >> Kitchen: So continued loss is the one that it's already happened. Okay, thank you. Not sure I can see the difference in the blues on those. Maybe the on-line map might tell me that. >> And the spread sheet that I referenced earlier, it wouldn't be a pretty map. You can very clearly see each neighborhood with the name [11:13:41 AM] assigned to it and what categories we put them in. >> Tovo: Do I understand it's your intent to send that out to us? >> We certainly -- whatever you like, we'll send it out. >> Tovo: That would be great. That would be really useful. Councilmember Renteria? Will. >> Renteria: I heard you were mentioning the red and blue, there's an opportunity for density bonus. Will you be coming back and letting us know where all of the other places where we could provide a density bonus that we can provide affordable -- >> We're not going to able to do that in terms of analyzing density programs. But that will be part of the policy framework as Heather mentioned it will be kind of a matrix. We'll look at different strategies whether it's early stage and late stage and density bonuses may be a strategy, the late stage, the dark red areas; so density bonuses, I haven't seen the matrix yet, but I assume the density bonuses will be in there. >> Tovo: Furtherever questions or comments? >> This may be beyond your scope too. But is there going to be any analysis of what affects people to pay higher housing costs, is there an ability to get a fair wage? And I know it's impossible to compare city-to-city. But is there any analysis of when we're talking about the different policies like cities that -- and I know a lot of these cities -- I'm kind of thinking at this point, sorry -- a lot of cities who implemented minimum wage laws that can, we can't, are fairly new. And if there's studies in [11:15:42 AM] connection between cities that have implemented a minimum wage higher than the federal and the ability for the working class families to not be displaced? >> You hit it right on the affordable housing prices. Two things; the cost of housing and gentrification is part of the crisis as well as in folks' incomes and not keeping one the cost of housing. One of the reasons we do hope to explore the policy strategies we're looking into are the income side. What can we -- what legally can we be doing as a city at a higher level? We don't have the capacity to take a deep dive into economic policies and such. But at least calling out, at least a couple of the policies within the mix get on the income side of the equation. So you're going to look at economic development. Cities that provided some kind of instance. But in return, a company that provided jobs, low barriers of entry to a higher -- >> I don't know where we're getting on that. We have it on our list to look into. And focuses on the specific strategies, the strategies you can deploy on a neighborhood scale to have an impact on displacement and to allow people to stay in that neighborhood. I don't know where we're going. If you have thoughts on where we should go on that and recognizing the limited scope in terms of where we can go on that. We welcome that. But -- >> If along the way in the research, you click on a link, feel free to send it to mow. Wages alone with barriers to -- low barriers to entry things. >> Tovo: Thank you so much. Before you conclude, I want to see if you have a right to stay policy is among the policy strategies you're considering. It's on the agenda. I didn't want to miss the [11:17:42 AM] opportunity to ask about that if you've seen the useful strategies in other areas. >> Yes, we have. Portland in particular one that we mentioned, northeast Portland, that's essential part of their strategy. It's making our -- we have this -- >> I was going to mention, San Francisco had one all the way back in the 1960s, I believe, because of this particular African-Americans who were displaced from urban renewal areas. So, yeah, an important set of policies for us to look at. >> Tovo: I want to ask you to send on the 80. How do you winnow it down? >> We do have a fuller list to present. We just don't have the capacity to do a deep dive to 80 policies. It would be overwhelming at the end of the day. So we have the five members of our team have voted for -- I know it's -- especially for top ten. But no one stuck to that yet. But we're using that process to window down things from literature we've been reading to things we've done in the case study analysis. >> Tovo: Great, we have access to that list of 80. >> We'll provide that list. >> Tovo: At a later time? >> Yeah. >> What we're trying to avoid is likee said, a list of let's say 80 that are all presented as co-equal. Because often the reaction to that is people throwing up their hands and it becomes just another laundry list that's not tied to the specifics of the actual conditions going on here. So, we're trying to avoid that by doing a deeper dive on a smaller subset of them. >> Tovo: Makes sense, thank you. >> If I understand or remember correctly, you'll be presenting kind of a draft of those the matrices to the anti-gentrification task force. I know it's not scheduled to [11:19:45 AM] September. That's what the task force is working on. >> Tovo: Thank you. This is exciting. We are glad you came to update us. That gets us to the pulled items. The first one, the office of performance management item, the strategic plan. Councilmember Casar, you pulled this. >> Casar: Thank you, the staff can reiterate it if they'd like. But I asked walking in if they feel like it's important for us to move forward on pretty significant document on Thursday. They can probably say this more accurately than me, but generally I think the census is like for us to move quickly and potentially on Thursday so that -- because of the budget process, work that has to be done on the back end. So I'm happy for us to have that discussion. I just want to primarily get a sense of if we're moving forward on Thursday -- people comfortable moving forward on Thursday or something, some sets of amendments that I brought up in several of the sessions that aren't reflected here. I'm not griping but the stuff supposed to put it in the document the best they can. I wanted to bring forward -- put some of that on the table now but didn't want to get too far ahead if people weren't comfortable moving forward. I would be comfortable if it's understood that this is a living document that's going to need a lot of edits. They haven't been televised, not public or transparent. If I'm finding three or four things I have trouble with, with this right now, folks who know about things I don't know may know about changes here on Thursday. So that's to say I'm talking about some amendments but if other people have concerns, I won't. >> Tovo: You raised a couple of questions. One is, what's the general sense of whether we should move forward Thursday. If we have moving forward Thursday, is everybody in the [11:21:46 AM] same place thinking about this as a living document that would be amended later in addition to Thursday as well. And then you have specific amendments to propose. So why don't we sort of start with the first two global questions. What are general thoughts about moving forward Thursday. Councilmember kitchen? >> Kitchen: I would be okay if we considered a living document. My concern is that I talked to you guys about this the other day. I wanted to be sure that we had a feedback loop from our boards and commissions. So I know there's effort to reach out to them. They've given us feedback. But I understood they didn't get the last document. I don't wanted to slow down the progress. But I wanted to be feed back from them. So I just wanted to make sure that we would do that somehow. >> Tovo: So we would adopt it as a working draft with the understanding that we're going to get feedback from those boards and commissions? >> Kitchen: Maybe something formal. Maybe we adopt it and take it to the boards and commissions, the relative ones. And walk through it or something. Not sure what is the right process. I'd look to you guys to think about what the right process is. >> We were to take the matrices to them. We received a certain amount of feedback. We gave them an official timeline and we extended that deadline. The vast majority of the responses from those that participated revolved around the data segmented entries. They're implementation side of things as opposed to the planned sort of strategies. They increased the departments [11:23:47 AM] and the determine breaking down the silos. But they also expressed appreciation of candor of the statements and the extent of equity. I realize I didn't introduce Nies so I'm the chief of -- >> You didn't get the final strategies. Not that you were directed to do it. You haven't had that phase yet. >> Lit me add to that. >> All of the people who gave feedback made sure they had it, by person or e-mail. Have a link to the latest document. They were able to provide it that way and we invited folks to sign up to get e-mail alerts so some did that earlier in the process so they've been able to get e-mail alerts throughout the process. Finally, one strategy as part of the government that works that speaks to enhanced collaboration and communication between council, staff, the community, and that talks about information sharing and stuff like that. So overall, I think this plan provides a really great framework for which we can approach these conversations and ongoing work plans and things like that with the boards of commissions. So I wouldn't -- this is definitely a living document. This is something that we've always described as being adaptive, not chiseled in stone. As we move forward in using it, physically using the documents -- the contents of it, allows us to collect data and other information to be able to make judgment calls on the success or failure of certain strategies or metrics, things like that. So we have the ability just going forward. So it's really at this point, the biggest need is the challenge of developing a budget under a draft document. And also a challenge of providing that clarity and clear focus to the organization so [11:25:47 AM] that we can do everything we can to better serve the community. So if we're giving that clear direction, that clarity, that focus, then we're also able to start collecting that data, that information to better drive decisions and we're making a staff and also providing the supportive information that you need as councilmembers to make the big policy dele cigses going forward, not only as part of the budget conversations but long term for years to come. >> So we're still on the topic of whether or not we'll be ready to take it up on Thursday. Councilmember Garza would you like to speak to that? Then councilmember pool? >> Garza: I was curious what your amendments were without getting too in the weeds. I'd be happy to not take it up if there were concerns. >> Tovo: Can we hold on that and still deal with the big question? Councilmember pool, is your light on to talk about the big question of timing? Totally the big question. But it includes the question of I don't know how to respond to that. Not knowing that, I don't have a way to answer like I anticipated we would move forward on Thursday. Part of it is we've never done budget this way. I think we need to continue to move forward with kind of the time frame and the dates that we talked about and established on our calendars and stay alert for the additional feedback that should inevitably and hopefully come back to us along the way. I don't think we have room in our schedule. Having said that, I don't know what councilmember Casar has to offer. I want to say, I was impressed with the work that our staff [11:27:49 AM] did. It was completely new. Approach for us to take. They shepherded us through a complicated multi- layer process from the beginning. I'm onboard 100% in continuing to move forward with trying to wrestle the budget through this framework lens or whatever kind of analogy we want to give it. But I think this process is a good one and I want to continue with it. >> Tovo: Any other comments on the question of timing? I want to say I share the assessment our work was great and vigorous but it didn't necessarily include a lot of feedback and we didn't have a lot of public attendees at the session. I think we'll hear feedback. For example, I just got a list of with some suggested edits from the community ending homelessness organization looking at the metrics that relate to homelessness. We'll get suggestions from people. I'm comfortable moving forward on Thursday with understanding that the -- maybe on first reading or something. Maybe it would make us all feel more comfortable with it being a working draft. I understand it's not an ordinance. Whatever the language is appropriate for coming back to revisiting a periodic point so it's not -- we're sending a clear message to people that it's not a static document and if they're not looking at it this week but they look at it in two weeks and have a suggestion about the metrics, they'll have an opportunity to come back. Councilmember Casar, take us there your amendments and answer the question that councilmember Garza raised. >> Casar: I feel good about moving through this on Thursday. Yesterday opening it up, I found five things I wanted to change. There are so many people in the community that would have information that would spur me to want to vote for other amendments that will make this even better. [11:29:50 AM] But I think the document reflects a lot of what it is that was worked on. My five changes that I plan on bringing are things that I mentioned in the past sessions because the only reason I noticed them was because I looked up my notes and saw what changes were incorporated, which ones weren't. One of them has to do with measuring recap neighborhoods which was -- the number of neighborhoods that have high concentrations of folks of color and high concentrations of poverty. While that's okay to measure, if we had to pick certain things to measure, I brought up I think it's the wrong one to measure because it's not related to the biggest problems that we face because those neighborhoods are the ones we just saw in the last presentation are gentrified, almost every single one of those. That would better measure segregation and those that are walled off. Recap neighborhoods is probably our metric. We're not trying to reduce the number of neighborhoods with folks of color and we're trying to figure out how to keep the folks of color in the city and integrate more neighborhoods, either integration or fewer folks of color should be in the measurement. I brought up all five of these in the last session, I think. I know it's hard to come up with the metrics. I have something here that says you will develop a metric in the future. I would like to add something around longitudinal mobility. I've seen a lot of research that measures economic mobility, not really proxies for it, but measures mobility. So putting it in there is something that just -- that's something we have to figure out for Thursday. I saw you had a list of things we might be able do develop. Interested in adding that there. [11:31:55 AM] One of them, on displacement, I was thinking how do we measure regional versus inside the city levels of low income people, not just about you have it listed in here, it's not just about displacement of people, but also people who are locked out from living in the city who have jobs here. I'll post a warning. My concern is not only low income folks who live here today and tomorrow and also outside of the city but also the growing trend -- the growing trend of lower income folks living in the region as opposed to the city, whether they were displaced or not, they being locked out of the city -- future generations locked out of the city. Never having lived in here is something I want to think about measuring. That's the third one. And the other two were in the safety section. I recommended including use of metrics on use of force and metrics on the use of reduction incarceration. But reducing incarceration rates wasn't. So I would like to include that. Rethe ext in the overall numbers, people incarcerated either the jail or went through booking or whatever on percentage and number and finally how do we develop a strategy about using evidence-based strategies to prevent incidents of harm and crime. And I just didn't see any of that in the strategy session, how is it that we're looking at workforce development or child care or affordable housing or other options so that when we are choosing how to allocate specific pot of resources,ing how do we look at a variety of evidence-based strategies to determine which one is going to give us the most bang for our buck in crime reduction. Is it hiring another police officer? [11:33:55 AM] Is it gun buyback programs? Or is it child care, like these are I think all strategies that have been studied to reduce threats to public safety. I didn't see any of that explicitly called out. And I think we tried to craft some of that language in a few sessions but haven't gotten there yet. I will write specific language for those. But I don't think it's anything new for this group because I think we mentioned it in prior sessions. Just in looking through -- I'm going to try to write them up as amendments, but looking at the comments by the homeless organization, what they've done is look carefully at the metrics that are currently cited in the strategic plan and have laid bios out next to the community of the didn't the continuum of care system of performance measures at the federal government uses. So there's a lot of correspondence with what's in here and the federal metrics, and those are kind of the metrics that our community has adopted to measure how effectively we're working to end homelessness. Number one, the person experiencing homelessness. The point in time count, they're recommending using the metric. But in addition to the point in time measure, the system performance measure from the continuum of care performance pressures which is the annual count of sheltered homeless persons in the hmii system. So they typically present that information from both of those places, the point in time count and the annual count of sheltered people. We should probably do the same. There are points. [11:35:57 AM] They're extremely consistent with what's here. But it's now that we've had some of the groups in the community who are really looking at this current will I in terms of how they're currently measuring homelessness and return to homelessness and other things, I think we need to incorporate that feedback to be so we're all using the same measures. So that brings me back to looking at this and the amendments and whatnot. Wondering whether we could offer preliminary approval on Thursday and maybe revisit it again at another meeting if there are amendments thrown to us. I'll throw it out for conversation since it's not first reading. >> You corrected on an ordinance, it's no first,f second, third meeting. You're accepting the recommendation about the strategic plan. You can postpone it or you can accept it and suggest that you might make changes to it later. >> Tovo: Okay. Councilmember Houston. >> Thank you again for the hard work that you all have been doing. I am ready to move forward with it. I think it give us a better, clearer direction than we've had in the last three years about how people and departments are aligning their work with what the strategic priorities are. So if there are tweaks, that'd be okay. I'd like to know where we can get the metrics. Where would they find the data to be able to plug into the amendments that you're planning to make. I'm ready to go and so staff is ready to go. >> Tovo: Just to answer the question you raised; I have to look at it closely, but I believe all of what they're suggesting is information that's currently being tracked in our hma system by our public health and by the housing provider. [11:37:59 AM] It's all readily available, it's just not necessarily -- again, it's very consistent. I think the suggestions are very consistent with what you've offered. They've just offered some tweets about information readily available to help amplify how well we're hitting some of the meted Ricks. Councilmember alter? >> Alter: Thank you. I think it's going to be a package of this when it's put together when it goes out to the community in a final form. One of the things that we had talked about through the process was communicating that there's other data collected by the city. These are just some of the data we highlighted for a particular metrics. So to the extent that it's metrics that we're talking about, that people are most concerned about nothing in this precludes us from using or presenting the other data. I think we've worked hard on this process. Without knowing who's going to show up on Thursday and bringing the concerns they're going to bring, I wish I could say I'm 100% to go forward on Thursday. I feel this is ready to move forward. It is a living document. I welcome people coming in with new ideas and new thoughts and there's nothing to preclude us in adding more metrics. We were trying to get this a manageable amount of metrics so we would be able to have some snapshots. So I'm ready to move forward -- at the same time, I welcome the feedback and think we can make [11:39:59 AM] this the living document it's intended to be. If we find through the budget process it's not serving our interests, I'm expecting we're going to say, hey, we've got to go back and do it. That's part of this being this living document. Because we're going to find some things that don't work once we try to apply it in the budget, we're going to have to come back and look at it. >> Tovo: Okay. Other thoughts? Moving on to the next pulled item. Councilmember Flannigan, you pulled it. >> Flannigan: I wanted to better understand the intent. Some of the language gives me pause. I'm trying to understand what we're trying to accomplish with this. And whether or not it's narrow or broad in scope. Some of it seems to just talk about how people get access to affordable units and some of the sub bullets talk about homeownership and rental assistance. So I want to get a sense of is this a narrow scope, we've had this debate before, whether things are narrow or broad. >> Tovo: I appreciate the question. This has been unusual process. My staff member who worked on it probablying worked on it for more than a year and we have three different versions of the resolution. Welanded on an extremely general broad one for particular reasons. And if we want to talk more, we'll have to talk about it in executive session. At this point, there's a lot of interest in having some kind of right to stay or right to return, I should say, right to policy here in the city of Austin. It was a recommendation that came through in the inequities task force. It is a good strategy for the city to consider there are questions of what we need is our [11:42:02 AM] city legal to go look at it, look at state law carefully, see what are the parameters that we can do here in the city of Austin in the state of Texas. So the language is intentionally broad. It speaks to homeowners and the options for those groups would be different depending on what we find -- what we determine is legally possible in most feasible here. It will also be informed by the study we just heard. So these policies have to be informed by a body of data so the gentrification study that is ongoing that we just heard a presentation about will be the data and the evidence that we use to craft our policy, probably. That will be the most relevant and timely body of data. I will say we went back and forth to have a stake holder process at this point and opted to take that session out, knowing that we absolutely wanted stakeholders to come inened a talk about what that policy looks like, but it was more productive and more respectful of their time to do that after we understood better what the legal parameters are after which we don't have to craft that policy. We don't have to brainstorm about policy options that aren't going to be legally possible for us. I hope that answers your question and then I would ask the city attorney to talk about that very question about narrow versus broad and why you kind of opted for specific bullet points to give you a sense of where we might go, but generally a broad take at it. >> Might be valuable to put it as an executive session so I can ask more specific questions. I would like to hear more thought here. >> Assistant city attorney. The resolution will direct the manager to propose a policy, two policies, actually, one is based on generational ties to the city. The second will be related to the house hold size. And then staff will do analysis of operational legal issues related to those proposals. [11:44:04 AM] We talk about right of return or stay or house hold size, we're triggering fair housing act issues and our obligation to have fair housing. If we analyze a proposal related to right of return or house hold size, we have to make sure we're not discriminating. That we're making sure that we can give reasonable accommodations for individuals with disabilities where required. But we also when it comes to affirmative fair housing, ensuring that we are promoting integration, we are not essentially resegregating and that we are making -- we're ensuring fair housing choice. Because at the end of the day, that's the ultimate piece of the puzzle for fair housing standpoint is making sure that the people still have housing choice. >> Yeah, I would like to talk about these details in executive session in some point. >> Tovo: Should when he do it Thursday? I'll leave it to our legal team to say whether it's better to do that today or Thursday. Thursday? >> Thursday will work. >> Tovo: Any other questions? Yeah, councilmember Garza? >> Garza: With regards to the promoting integration, I guess I -- the second -- let's see, the first bullet. Why are we concentrating on census tracks versus -- like for example you might be in a track that's not in extreme gentrification, but you could be gentrified. So why are we concentrating on >> I don't know. Does that make sense? >> Yes. So from, when we're talking about the generational ties, the idea that people have been displaced because of gentrification or other issues, we need to look at it to ensure that we are using, just as U.T. Was talking about the data they were generating at a census [11:46:05 AM] level to help us understand the demographics of that census tract and how it's changed, those things will come into consideration when we are analyzing where whether the policy will comply with the law. >> So there's a state law that could possibly guide -- I mean, I guess I'm also confused about the fair housing part. Because fair housing applies to protected classes, and generational ties, I don't believe, are a protected class. >> A concern would be disparate impact on protected classes. You can have the effect of discriminating. That's what we have to be very mindful of whenever we craft a policy for this preference policy. >> Maybe it is an executive session kind of question, because I still don't understand the apply to census tracts that are experiencing high levels of rapid development. If there's specific state law that will help me understand that, that would be helpful to understand what that state law is. I don't understand how we would be applying a policy of how or who we allow to come back to Austin or to stay in Austin to the census tract as opposed to the variety of circumstances people are in that create the displacement. >> So I can give an example using something that the city of San Francisco did a few years ago. They had a seniors development. And they sent a preference policy to hud wanting to use the district, and within a half mile of the development to give them a preference over certain percentage of the units. And hud responded that because of the demographics they were concerned that they are going to continue segregating the city. And so the city of San Francisco had to look differently at it. We're just making sure we are staying with that and looking at [11:48:06 AM] the demographics and making sure we don't have a policy that has a disparate impact. Another example is the city of New York that is currently in litigation over their preference policy. The city of New York is very segregated. They have a preference policy. If you live in the area, the district, then 50% of the units go to individuals who already live in the district. The individuals who sued the city are claiming that that has a disparate impact and it also is continuing the pattern of segregation. So those are all the things that we would be looking at whenever a policy moves forward. >> Okay. I see that side of it. I guess I was thinking more of the side, say, for example, a census tract not high on the gentrification map or whatever and a family, let's say an affordable housing unit comes in there you wouldn't have -- that would be promoting integration. If we have a policy that says -- I honestly -- this is very interesting and I'm excited to see what happens with it. You know, some policy that says the first people get preference if they're the fourth generation of austinite but they had to leave but now with this development they could come back in. That would be a different scenario because that would be promoting integration. >> That's a possibility. The way the resolution is crafted is to intentionally be broad so we can look at all the options when it comes to, particularly, the generational ties. The bullet points that are in the resolution are essentially things that council would be wanting staff to look at and to take into consideration when crafting a policy. So it would be broad where that might be the type of policy staff recommends. >> Okay. This is my last comment, I swear. I guess it's just the way it's worded. It says the proposed policy must [11:50:08 AM] be designed to further if city's obligation to affirm fair housing and should apply to census tracts that are experiencing high levels. So that sounds to me -- that's where you get in trouble if you're applying this policy to census tracts that are experiencing high gentrification are likely the lower income. I still don't understand that bullet point. But I'll pass the mic. >> Tovo: Maybe we can talk about that on Thursday in executive session. Council member kitchen. >> Kitchen: I have similar concerns, and particularly if we're intending this to be broad I might want to add another bullet point because I would want to just see what kind of options there are along the lines of what council member Garza is talking about. I'm thinking, for example, you know if there's a senior housing put in a particular part of town and it's affordable senior housing and seniors are at risk for displacement, you know, what would be the possibilities of favoring seniors that already live around there? Now, I understand the case that you just mentioned but I would want that studied so it came back to us. In other words, I wouldn't want us to limit what we could do to particular census tracts. I would want us to also look at vulnerable people. So no matter where they live and just see what our options are. At the end of the day we may decide that's not what we're going for but I want to understand what our options are. I'll look at this language. I'm understanding that mayor pro tem is thinking of this as a broad question to ask all of our options so I would be thinking that that would not negate what's here but just add to the scope. >> Tovo: Yes. I should say I think one of the versions that we considered with law had no bullet points and was even more general. And, you know, I'll go back and try to reflect on that particular bullet point. [11:52:08 AM] It's my memory of it that it is in there not to preclude looking at other areas but that we absolutely want them to consider a policy that does look to those census tracts. And so, again, it wasn't meant to exclude other forms of analysis. It was just that when that policy comes back we want that to absolutely be in consideration. >> Maybe it just needs some language tweaking or maybe an additional bullet in addition to that one. >> Tovo: And I should say, really, thank you. When I mentioned my staff member has been looking at it, she has been looking at it closely with Trish and I know you have worked on this very hard over the last six months or so. And so there are some good examples from other cities. I hope -- I really feel after looking at all the examples that we can craft a policy that works for Austin and I think it would be a great addition. It's not really a question of whether we can, it's just what that looks like and how it works here in the city of Austin and for Thursday I'll go ahead and make copies of one of the analyses done by the U.T. Law clinic that Heather represents, but it was done by her associate looking at preference policies for families with children. I thought that was a very interesting analysis that is of relevance to our conversation. And the analysis, I should say, concludes that policies favoring families with children are, indeed, well within our legal ability. Council member pool. >> Pool: I have a quick question. We don't talk so much about census tracts. Is this language because this has to do with federal laws and that's a terminology or metric they use in order to manage the entire country? >> I think of this tract as being useful for us because of the level of data that is done on a census tract level. [11:54:10 AM] That's the kind of data and information that we need to work on a policy. So the census tract gives us that framework and that level of information that we may not have on what we consider a neighborhood level versus a census tract. >> Pool: I think that's because that's how the federal government breaks down the data. They get it to that granular level. The census tract conversation that I remember first having was when council member Renteria and Casar were working on the homestead. I had to reorient my head to where is that because those boundaries are different from some of the other arbitrary boundaries we have in the community. Thanks. >> Tovo: Other questions at this point? Or thoughts? All right. Thank you very much. Moving on to our last pulled item. That is the zoning issue that -- council member Flanigan said he no longer needs to talk about that. So, council member pool. >> Pool: I have one thing. I just wanted to draw everybody's attention -- I did not pull item 13 but this is the March for our lives fee waiver. This is the students, as a result of the abhorrent shooting that happened in parkland at the high school in Florida. You may be aware that our Austin students are participating in a national March for our lives on March 24. And that's across the nation communities are gathering to demand that our kids' lives and safety are a priority and that we end mass shootings and violence in our schools. So I just wanted to let everybody know this is going to be a fairly big deal in Austin. Austin students and their parents and all those who support sensible gun control legislation will gather Saturday, March 24 at noon at our city hall public plaza and March along Cesar Chavez up to congress avenue and then up to the capitol grounds for a rally. The fee waiver item helps cover [11:56:12 AM] some of the associated permit costs for this event. I wanted to thank those who contributed already. Of course I have been limited by our requirements, but I wanted to make note of this for everyone who may wish to donate, but I haven't been able to talk to you. The fiscal note is in our back up. We're going to update it to reflect removing the Austin transportation department fees. My staff has worked with atd to minimize those costs. We are back down to $2,740 for the police department. We have taken out $1450, and that's $500 from my waiver fund, council member alter's. So we have a little bit more than half. And so we have $1,310 left. So I thank everybody who has already participating and I think this is an issue that matters to all of us. If there's a way we could help pay for all of the fees I think that would be really helpful, or at least get it down to something a little more manageable. These students and their parents are not the usual group that comes to Austin to March. So just wanted to give everybody a heads up on that. >> Tovo: Thank you. And now there are lots of lights. Council member kitchen. Yours went off. >> Kitchen: I didn't see my name here but you did get mine down? >> Yes. >> I'll find out how much we can do for ours but at least a couple hundred dollars. >> Tovo: This is almost like an auction. Council member Flanigan. >> I'm also planning and on Thursday I will do the same. >> Tovo: Casar and Flanigan. >> Renteria -- >> And Houston. >> This is what I was hoping [11:58:14 AM] would happen. >> Tovo: Super. >> Thank you, everybody. The moms and students are really grateful. >> Tovo: Council member Garza. >> I know that this agenda is very manageable and I'm hoping that I think sometimes when we have agendas like this we take longer to do things and we take longer breaks. And I have a child care issue. So if we can be done by 5:00, that would be wonderful. Thank you. >> Tovo: That's a good challenge. We'll be so efficient on Friday that we wrap up. >> We have challenged mayor Adler to do that because he managed to get our meeting done in 20 minutes. 20 minutes. That's right. >> Tovo: Did you have your light on about something else? Just as a heads up, I do have some -- I'm looking carefully at the water utility item. I know we were all briefed. I have -- I may possibly be making one amendment to those rates that I'll propose on Thursday. We're still working through that information, just as a heads up. Council member Casar. >> Casar: On trying to save time for Thursday, I will make sure by tomorrow morning to have posted wording for those outcome issues. And I haven't talked to anybody privately about them so please come and talk to me if you have questions. Maybe we can hammer the language out with anybody who has concerns so it goes fast. >> Tovo: Council member pool, did you intend to have your light on still? Great. We are going into executive session now. The council will go into closed session to take up three items pursuant to 551.074 the government code, the city council will discuss personnel items related to E 4, the appointment of judges to the city of Austin municipal court. Pursuant to section 551.071 of the. >> Government code the city council will discuss legal matters related to E 2, the office of the city auditor's audit report city policies related to homelessness. Item E 3, Casaday versus city of Austin et all, gn18000923 in the 459th judicial district court of Travis county, Texas. E 1 has been withdrawn. Are there any objections into going into executive session on the items announced? Seeing and hearing none the Council will now go into executive session. When we return it will just be to conclude the meeting. [3:08:15 PM] (Mayor Adler) All right we are out of closed session. In closed session we discussed personnel matters related to items: E4, and legal matters related to items: E2 and E3. It is 3:08 p.m. and this meeting., work session is adjourned.