City Council Special Called Meeting Transcript – 11/17/2020 Title: City of Austin Channel: 6 - COAUS Recorded On: 11/17/2020 6:00:00 AM Original Air Date: 11/17/2020 Transcript Generated by SnapStream ================================== Please note that the following transcript is for reference purposes and does not constitute the official record of actions taken during the meeting. For the official record of actions of the meeting, please refer to the Approved Minutes. [12:03:46 PM] >> Today, everybody ready? We'll go ahead and get started. Today is Tuesday, November 17th, 2020. This is the -- the city council special called meeting set to begin at noon today. Via vivid conference. There was an initial [indiscernible] Which had us approve the candidacy results. We had a [indiscernible] The runoff election. Two things and we'll handle those two things. We have a quorum present of the council. So I call this meeting to order. We are meeting virtually as allowed by the governor's emergency declaration and the related suspension of [12:04:48 PM] the open meetings statutes. As you know under state law, only two councilmembers are necessary for a quorum to canvass an election. Although we have another item on the agenda, so our regular quorum and members are necessary to take that action. Now we're going to take up item no. 1 to approve the resolution canvassing the results of the November 3rd, 2020 election. General and special elections. In the general election, the returns of the election show that in district 2 race, there were 5,084 votes for [indiscernible] And 5,000 [indiscernible] With Ramos, 14,933 votes for Vanessa Fuentes, for Alex with [12:05:51 PM] Vanessa Fuentes receiving the most votes. In district 4, 11,629 notes for Greg Casar. 4310 votes for [indiscernible], and 1466 votes for [indiscernible] [Poor audio quality]. With Greg Casar receiving the majority of all votes cast for city council member district 4. In the district 6 race, 14,278 votes for Jimmy Flannigan. 11,866 votes for Mackenzie Kelly, 6806 for Jennifer, and 2600 votes for Dee Morrison. The highest number of votes but neither receiving a majority of all votes cast [12:06:52 PM] for council member number 6. For district 7, 14,000 [indiscernible]. For Leslie pool, so Leslie pool pool is the majority of all votes cast for council member district 7. District 10 race there were 7,599 votes, for Thomas, 15,620 votes for Alison alter, 1364 votes for [indiscernible] 47 votes for [indiscernible] 390 votes for Tristan, 8295 votes for [indiscernible] [Indiscernible] 9 for Jennifer beer den. Engine -- and jennifervirden, Alison alter and Jennifer Virden receiving the highest number of votes but neither receiving the majority for city council [12:07:52 PM] number 10. In the special elections, the return of the election shown 242,457 votes for, 176,166 votes against proposition a. And 276,257 votes for [indiscernible] Defense proposition B. Before we take a motion, is there anyone registered to speak. >> No, mayor. >> Mayor Adler: There being none, I will entertain a motion to approve the resolution, it's in the backup, canvassing and accepting the returns for the November 3rd, 2020 general and special elections, the current Vanessa Fuentes and Greg Casar elected, Leslie pool district 7 is electedment [12:08:53 PM] runoff between Jimmy Flannigan and Mackenzie Kelly is necessary for district 6 and then declaring a runoff election between Alison alter and Jennifer Virden is necessary for district 10 and declaring proposition a and proposition B were both adopted. Is there a motion? Mayor pro tem makes the motion. Is there a second to that motion? Councilmember Renteria seconds the motion. Any discussion? Of the motion made and seconded? Hearing none, those in favor please raise your hand. It was unanimous on the dais with all councilmembers in attendance. That motion -- that motion -- and the resolution passes. Approved. Now we will take up item no. Two. To approve an ordinance ordering a runoff election [12:09:54 PM] in the city of Austin to be held December 15th, 2020 for the purpose of election of city council members for district 6 and district 10. Before we take up this motion, is there any one signed up to speak? >> No, mayor. >> Mayor Adler: There being none, I will now entertain a motion that we approve the ordinance ordering a runoff election to be held with the city of Austin on December 15th, 2020, for the purpose of the election of city council members in district 6 and district 10. Motion? Councilmember pool makes the motion. And councilmember Flannigan seconds that motion. Is there any discussion? >> Mayor? >> Council -- >> [Indiscernible] Speak first. >> Before we take the vote, I want to let you know that we are still currently [12:10:54 PM] working on trying to lockdown a couple additional polling locations. And I hope to have a final word tomorrow. But I need to start to get the -- the publication ready for the statesman. So my plan is if we can get these locations locked down this week, I will email out everybody the additional locations, we will publish them in the newspaper and then come back to council probably on the work session to have you formally adopt and approve the additional locations. We -- we are still working on them. You know, we've had the discussions before about how difficult polling locations for the November -- or the December runoff are in a good year. And throwing in covid in [12:11:54 PM] rising numbers, it has been even more difficult than in a normal election year. But we are committed to try to get as many locations in our districts as we can. >> >> Mayor Adler: Thank you for that, I know it's been difficult. It looks like the lions location got taken off the list in district 10. Why did that happen, do you know? >> There were -- they were not available for -- for early voting. We have them as an election day site. And that was the word that I got from the facility. Okay, councilmember alter? >> Alter: Thank you. I guess that I would ask if [12:12:54 PM] you could continue to identify an alternative, I was under the impression until five minutes before this meeting that lions was on the list. The old southern portion of my -- the whole southern portion of my district that is north of the river is not covered by any polling location. I know that you are working on the northern section and where that overlaps with district 6, but this huge swath is not covered by the locations. I understand the challenges that you are having, but to learn five minutes before that it was taken off doesn't provide a lot of opportunity for us to help you identify additional sites. And I recognize that it's challenging under covid. But I would like to I guess provide direction to continue to identify those sites and if they need to be brought back to us on Tuesday then to do that. [12:13:58 PM] >> I ask reach out to lions again and see if we can convince them to be an early voting site. But we do have them for election day. >> You can also check back with that and see if they can, because it's a wide geographic barrier. In there's an alternate site for that area if they [indiscernible] Might be able to do it [indiscernible] Find the site [indiscernible] As well. [Poor audio quality] >> Again, I want to be clear that I wasn't talking about, you know, it has to be done specific site. But we do need some sites in the area. To cover people if we don't want anyone coming on election day to vote with the pandemic. >> Okay, councilmember [12:15:04 PM] Flannigan. >> Thanks for your continued hard work on this. For the media or members that may be recording on these locations, I don't want anyone to be confused that revised exhibit a is just the document from Travis county. There's no placeholder relating to voting locations and voters still have to vote in the counties of their residence. I know you are working on wilco. There will be Williamson county locations. Just because you live in Williamson county doesn't mean you don't have to Voigt -- to vote in therunoff. The runoff applies to you. >> The current Williamson county locations are in the original exhibit. They may not be in the updated one because we just got that from Travis county a few minutes ago. This is a complete moving target. That gives me heartburn and indigestion and I will admit [12:16:05 PM] is the worst two weeks of the year for me. So I appreciate your patience and I would encourage you with development to consider polling locations as a community benefit. Because it is so difficult when we get into these outer areas where the city doesn't have a lot of -- of rec centers and libraries and things like that. So ... >> I think the mayor went off screen. So I -- so just -- councilmember Flannigan, do you want to go next? >> Flannigan: I just wanted to be clear because the agenda notes the backup as a revised exhibit a which [12:17:05 PM] in normal times means it replaces the original exhibit a. What I am hearing you say, Jeanette, it doesn't replace exhibit a it is in addition to the original exhibit a? >> Yeah, we will get that updated. We literally got it like five minutes ago before we were logging in for the meeting, so I think we just didn't quite catch that it wasn't a complete, revised exhibit. >> Thank you. >> Casar: Councilmember alter? >> Alter: Thank you, Jeanette, I want to appreciate the difficulty of the task in front of you and we'll make, you know, just to echo what Jimmy just said to make a -- sort of a friendly amendment to the motion that's on the table to -- to -- to -- I believe we have a motion on the table to -- to do the combined backup for exhibit a. And then, you know, if lions [12:18:06 PM] is not going to work, we have the [indiscernible] Library that was used in the past. While it may not be able to be used as an early voting location, when you had the whole presidential election, perhaps it could serve in this capacity. It's not that much smaller than lions and that might be an alternative to consider. So I appreciate you continuing to look for these locations and understand the pressure that you have to get things published, but I think we want to make this as easy as possible so we are not crowding up on election day. Thank you. >> Uh-huh. >> Casar: Mayor, are you back? Looks like he's still off. Any further discussion on the item? I think there was a motion and a second. I don't think we need to wait on the mayor to pass. Seems like something pretty universally agreed upon. All in favor? >> [Indiscernible]. [12:19:08 PM] >> Casar: Is that you Steve? >> Mayor Adler: You still can't see me but I vote with the ayes. >> Casar: Good. Looks like it passes unanimously with mayor pro tem Garza off the dais, I don't see anyone else off the dais. Passes unanimously with 10 votes on and mayor pro tem off. >> Mayor Adler: I think that's all the business that we have to take care of at this meeting. So unless anybody has anything else, we will stand adjourned here at 12:19. Meeting is adjourned. [End of meeting].