Climate, Water, Environment, and Parks Committee (CWEPC) Meeting Transcript – 7/30/2025 Title: ATXN-1 (24hr) Channel: 1 - ATXN-1 Recorded On: 7/30/2025 6:00:00AM Original Air Date: 7/30/2025 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. [9:31:34 AM] I am Ryan alter, chair of the climate, water, environment and parks committee. Thank you all for being here. It is 931 on Wednesday, July 30th. We are at city hall and the boards and commissions room, and I believe we will begin with some public testimony. So. >> Good morning. We'll have Roy Whaley first and then Elizabeth Mcgreevy will be second. >> Good morning, Mr. Whaley. >> How do you all. And good morning. >> 91%. >> Yes. And I wasn't going to mention that because even though it's fantastic, we still have to watch our water. And guess why I decided to come this morning. This is a broad canvas y'all are painting on. I'm very glad to see Austin water is here. I'm [9:32:34 AM] see Austin water is here. I'm also on the state Sierra club water committee and we talk about these things. I'm going to be asking that we have Shea do a presentation sometime this fall to that committee, because I talk about our reuse program frequently, always because we've got the water and we need to keep it and reuse it. You know, I don't know if you remember, but I have said this many times, if we have a dollar and then we can spend it and get $0.80 of it back and use it again, we would all do that. We can do that with our water. It may mean that we have to talk to some of our developer friends and their representatives to make that more possible, because I know that's been the pushback. Is it slightly more expensive, perhaps. Is it the right thing [9:33:34 AM] perhaps. Is it the right thing to do? Definitely. We have the resource. Let's reuse it so that we don't have our lake get down to 43% of capacity. Again, when I say lake Travis, that's not our only water supply. It's combined with Buchanan. Both are full right now. But look at the damage. And I don't want to lean on this too hard because I have a lot of sympathy for the people. But look at the damage that it took for us to get the water. We don't want to take that damage and use it to keep rose bushes alive. And I like roses. I like all the plants, but that's not what we need to be doing. We need to use our water wisely, just the same way that in this economic environment, we all have to use our dollars wisely. And you all have been tasked with a very tough one on the city budget. [9:34:35 AM] tough one on the city budget. This is something you can do. Of course, we've got parks people here. And what can be more important than parks? Just talking with the young person, young lady, about decker lake in that area. Roy Guerrero is my favorite park. The only thing that keeps it from rivaling zilker is it doesn't have Barton springs, but we have to keep. Funding without selling out. If we have to find a way to support our park system without selling it to the highest bidder. And I will quit now, because there. >> Thank you. >> Hi. My name is Elizabeth Mcgreevy. I'm in page Alice's district and my comments are directed at the Austin water Austin wildlands management plan. I am the author of wanton [9:35:36 AM] plan. I am the author of wanton mountain Cedars dead and alive then, and the program director of project bedrock. Our multidisciplinary team is developing a holistic decision making tool to help Texas cars, country landowners, manage their lands more effectively. Our team includes experts from A&M, the meadows center, Bamberger ranch, native American ecologists, soil biologists, regenerative ranchers, foresters, hydrologists, and cardiology specialists. The Austin wildlands management plan focuses on reducing wildfire risk. This single goal focus is problematic because our city not only faces wildfires, it also we must also contend with droughts and flash floods. The plan is more so problematic because their primary strategy relies on frequent prescribed burns to reduce woody vegetation cover. While this strategy may temporarily lower fire risk, it simultaneously increases [9:36:36 AM] simultaneously increases vulnerability, vulnerability to droughts and floods, more so for the hill country side of Austin due to its shallow soils and steeper terrain. Attempting to justify reducing vegetation, woody vegetation. The plan suggests that this region was meaning the hill country was historically mostly grass. It was not. Although the blackland prairie was reported to be more open, the hill country side of Austin was very well wooded. As reported throughout the 1800s. Austin wildlife wildland stance is not surprising, seeing as the plan was written by fire bosses who prefer grass cover over tree cover. Regardless of context. The plan goes on to claim that reducing woody vegetation from the hill country side of Austin enhances spring quantity and quality. This is pure propaganda that is based on thoroughly debunked 1990s rhetoric. For instance, rain interception by [9:37:39 AM] instance, rain interception by hill country junipers was determined to have been grossly miscalculated. Texas A&M discovered actual spring flows did not come close to hydrologic models, and the water infiltration and movement under junipers and oaks is significantly greater than under nearby grass, and this is again on top of the Karst country, not the blackland prairie. I'm speaking of a holistic land management plan would incorporate strategies to manage for wildfires, droughts and flash floods. More effective methods would include improving soil quality, managing stormwater, opening sinkholes and caves. I mean, that's that's a huge thing there. And yet Austin water has been fighting that and always keeping the ground covered. Thank you. Perfect timing. >> Okay. >> Next we'll have Craig nazer and Kayla Reese. >> Hello, Craig. Nacer, Sierra [9:38:46 AM] >> Hello, Craig. Nacer, Sierra club, my conservation chair, the state chapter, and I spent a lot of time this spring going down to the state capitol, and we were able to defeat a bill proposed by a former city council member that would prevent the protection of any ash juniper anywhere in the hill country of any size. That and Elizabeth Mcgreevy just talked about that. The ash juniper is a keystone species of the hill country and is part of what's supposed to be in most areas. I agree with everything she said. In fact, she was a big help on that ability to defeat that bill. What's really troubling me is climate change. We're not doing enough. I just drive down here, heard how, you know, our president is undoing EPA's any ability to control CO2. We have [9:39:46 AM] ability to control CO2. We have to do something, though. We're not going to get help from anywhere else. And what we do have at the city has and we need to increase that is, we have land and we have to make this use land efficiently as possible. There are many problems I have with the management plan. You'll hear about too many to speak about in my three minutes, but we need a bigger discussion on that. We need to curtail a lot of the mowing and weed eating we see in a lot of that land. Not all of it, but a lot of it. One of the things is that's all done with two cycle gas engines that they can't replace with batteries because they can't recharge them quick enough to efficiently do it. I mean, there are problems. Also, the thing about opening up caves for water infiltration, I was on for a while. I was in the working group of the joint sustainability committee, and I tried to put something through to that. But, you know, we're told, well, there's we can [9:40:46 AM] told, well, there's we can hardly get anything done now. How are we going to do it? The way to do this is for the city to spend some money, to hire some ftes about people who know what this is and can fight for it within the city structure, because someone like me really struggles to get through sometimes to part or to some of these other city organizations that they don't really have to listen to me. It's me, to you, to them. You see what I'm talking about. So I really think we have to look at this. I think we need more money for climate change. I know you got a tough budget. I understand that, but we really have to do something and we have to up our game now. So anyway, thank you. That's all I really have to say without going a lot of detail. So thank you very much. Oh, one other thing. Yeah, there are other speakers who wanted to speak who didn't get to stand up to be heard because this this venue is limited. So we have a lot of input we want to give to you, [9:41:47 AM] input we want to give to you, let's put it that way. And we're struggling a little bit and we want something done. So I'm just here to tell you that. Thanks for listening to me. >> Good morning. I'm Kayla Reese, I'm the advocacy manager with Austin parks foundation, and I'm just here to speak about item four, which is the update on additional park funding sources. We know that this memo was a result of a resolution to look at the growing shortfall for adequate, adequate funding for our parks. We all know that the parks department, and especially parks maintenance, is chronically underfunded. And we also know that we can't just keep doing what we've been doing because that's how we got here. There's a deficit in the parks department from what they can provide and what park users expect and the best practice levels of maintenance, we need to find new ways of funding to close the gap. And this memo is a great start. I want to highlight that there are very few short term options, including a park fee on utility [9:42:49 AM] including a park fee on utility bills that should be explored. I also know that we're looking at a tree that could be explored. There isn't one single magic bullet in this resolution of like, this is the fix. We need to look at more than one source, and we need to look at short term and long term at the same time. We need to think long term and put real effort into those long term solutions. There is no funding support. I also just want to highlight that there is no funding to support this resolution. So all of the continued need for research does not come with any funding. So that will be put on top of the already full plates of our parks department staff. So when we're looking at how do we really get more funding for parks, we need to look at it holistically long term, short term, explore all the options. And this memo is a really great place to start. There's a lot of research that supports a lot of options in there. It just really highlights the need for more funding, which we all know and have known. [9:43:50 AM] we all know and have known. That's not new information, but this gives us some really good basis of information to go from. We should look at a fee, a tree with a robust parks aspect, significant bond funding, a parks district or lgc, and utilizing partners like the Austin parks foundation and all the other nonprofits that exist in the city that want to just support our parks. We really appreciate all the work that went into this memo, and we really appreciate you all looking at these needed funding sources. Thank you. >> And we have one more, Nico Howard. And we do have one more individual who would like to speak if that's okay. >> Yeah. So committee members we had normally our rules state five. We did have a sixth person sign up today. Our agenda is pretty light. So if there's no objection I was going to say let's have that sixth person join us. All right. No objection. Let's do it. [9:44:51 AM] objection. Let's do it. >> Okay. And, Ted Eubanks, you'll be the sixth person. >> Thank you. I'm Nico Howard, and I've been studying since the early 1900s with studying scientific studies of water cycles, studying local caves, supporting land preservation and much, much of the local climate effects we see are directly the result of land management practices. So we very much should be collecting data to evaluate how effective they are and what adaptive management is necessary to ensure that citizens funds are well spent and future generations won't have to clean up the mess. As we make pioneers and ranchers since the 1800s conducted massive deforestation of the area and made tremendous land modifications to keep water at the surface, they plugged very large sinkhole basins, and I know about many of them. About 10% of the recharge zone, some hundreds of acres in drainage area that are like huge bathtubs to make stock ponds for livestock. Later developments [9:45:51 AM] livestock. Later developments built over many of the known caves and the city filled in caves on nearly all the parks. On the western side, most city parks and open space in the western side contain caves filled with trash and fill that prevent them from supporting wildlife from taking recharge, reducing flooding. The upland caves with large drainage basins are especially important since they can recharge all of the runoff generated in the area. All the studies I've reviewed and participated in show that trees greatly help recharge water into the aquifer and greatly reduce floods. A mature forest channeled surface water into the swollen groundwater. They cool peak summer heat, temperatures. Their cool, moist environment reduces wildfire risk. They clean the water and air, sequester carbon and attract rainfall. A recent study shows that rural force in Travis and hays county absorb about 96% of the particulate air pollution. Trees reduce erosion and when we remove the sediment, [9:46:52 AM] and when we remove the sediment, fills our water supply. Reservoirs for new wildfire protection plan, scientists should look at what vegetation management practices are associated with wildfires in Austin in the past to assess the risks and not just assume that trees are fuels. What monitoring for air quality, temperature runoff, evapotranspiration, recharge, carbon sequestration, and erosion is being done in conjunction with our land management. The best strategy used worldwide in sustaining water quality and water supply involves preserving areas near source area. The 2022 hill country alliance report notes that Austin and the rest of central Texas aren't keeping up with population growth to preserve land for sustaining our water supply. Once impervious cover exceeds about 15%, enhanced by deforestation, the water supply is not sustainable. A fiscally responsible action by the city of Austin is to invest in green space annually in the areas that feed Austin's water [9:47:54 AM] areas that feed Austin's water supply. Thank you very much. >> Thanks for adding me on. My name is Ted Eubanks. I live in district ten. I've worked in parks and rec for about 40 years, and I finally had time to read through this lengthy document on additional funding I want to quickly address, not the ideas, the concepts, because I think there are some good ideas and concepts. They're not comprehensive, but a great place to start. I want to talk about appendix one, the survey, which means what did we hear from the people, the voter? And unfortunately it is statistically bankrupt. There's really nothing we can do with it. I've done many of these surveys, and I will just point out where the flaws are real quickly. There are many. There are coverage errors. There are [9:48:57 AM] are coverage errors. There are sampling errors. There are non-response errors is a big deal when you have 600 and some odd respondents and they only only 300 answer a question. It's either a problem with the survey or a problem with the instrument, the survey instrument, their measurement errors. But let me give you an example. According to this document, 81% of the respondents were non-hispanic white. Now remember the parity issue equity issue that's floating over parks. We talk about it all the time. I think, you know what the non-hispanic white population of Austin actually is, it's 47%. So that's a significant error on the part of this survey. Asian 8.9% is what we have. We have 6% responding. Hispanic, 32.5% is our population, 11% respondents. The lowest response from any [9:50:01 AM] The lowest response from any district is the mayor pro tem, and she has 60% hispanic population. African American population. We have 6.9%, 2% responded. And that that reflects six people. Six people look at zip codes, look at district representation, look at income, where most of it's 100,000 and over. Please, let's give sufficient funding and time to parks to do this right. Thank you. >> Thank you very much. I appreciate you coming to testify and sharing your thoughts with that committee. We will move to item number one, which is approval of the minutes. Our last meeting. Is there a motion to approve the minutes? Vice chair Ellis, seconded by council member duchen. Any objection to approving the minutes? Seeing [9:51:01 AM] approving the minutes? Seeing none, the minutes are approved. With that, we will move on to item number two, which is a briefing on Austin waters wildland conservation program. >> Good morning. Council members. Excuse me. Shay Olson, director of Austin water. Thank you for having us here today to present on the wildlands conservation division and their work. As you know, Austin waters mission is to provide safe, reliable, high quality and affordable water services. And central to that mission is the wide wise stewardship of our water resources. This team of dedicated staff manage that water from the moment it hits the ground, through our system, to our customers and ultimately back downstream. So today you'll be hearing from Sherri Cole and Justin bates on the work that we [9:52:03 AM] Justin bates on the work that we do to manage the city of Austin's wildlands. It's unusual for a city's water utility to also be its largest land manager, but over 25 years, we've been committed to protecting the city's wildlands not just to protect water quality, but to preserve some of Austin's most unique and environmentally sensitive places while mitigating responsible development in our community. So we lead the stewardship of these lands. But the effort to protect and manage our wildlands has always been a city wide collaboration, grounded in deep partnership across city departments. So with that, I'll turn it over to Sherri Cole. >> Good morning. We're really happy to be here this morning to talk about one of my favorite subjects, the wildland conservation division. I'm the environmental resource officer for Austin water. So I was just going to start with a little context of where the wildland conservation. Conservation [9:53:04 AM] conservation. Conservation division sits in our in Austin water, in our environmental resource office, we have the largest group is the wildland conservation division. And the lands that we manage for these in the wildlands are managed under the goals of two different programs, the water quality protection lands and the balcones canyonlands preserve. And Justin's going to talk more about both of those programs. We also have Kimberly Harvey, who is the balcones canyonlands conservation plan officer, and she helps administer the permit, which we hold along with Travis county. We jointly hold that permit. She, uniquely, is paid. Half her salary is paid by Travis county, and she also supports our guidance committee, the balcones canyonlands conservation plan coordinating committee. Another mouthful and council member. Ellis is our new representative for that, for the city of Austin. And then commissioner Brigid Shea is the representative for Travis [9:54:04 AM] representative for Travis county. We also have another unique aspect of Austin water is the center for environmental research at Hornsby bend. And that is, you know, as you know, a leading biosolid recycling facility for the utility. But also we have a center for research there. We have about three miles along the Colorado river. It's open to the public, which is kind of unique for our water utility sites. We have a lot of programs with local universities, just long term research going on there. And then we also work on climate change, trying to look at climate change impacts to our wildlands. Also looking at climate ready Austin water across the board. Our system planning group also does a lot with climate change, as you know, with the water forward plan and looking to our water supply for the future. So we coordinate a lot of that work with them. I think sometimes the wildlands speak best for [9:55:06 AM] wildlands speak best for themselves. These are some representative areas on our wildlands that we manage. A lot of people moved to Austin for the barbecue and the music, but also, I think some of our beautiful local places, our creeks and streams, our beautiful vistas, some of the oak savanna habitats that we have. The ashe juniper woodland, which was mentioned, is our predominant habitat for the golden cheeked warbler. And it's the land that how we manage the land on the balcones canyonlands preserve. The majority of that is for the golden cheeked warbler, and managed in this way to maintain ash juniper woodland. I don't know where I should point the clicker. The underground ecosystems. A lot of people don't know. We have these vast Karst ecosystems under our area that we also protect six endangered cave invertebrates and a lot of species of concern that occur in these caves. And [9:56:08 AM] that occur in these caves. And by protecting them, you're also protecting the water supply. The beautiful wildflowers that we have in the spring. And then, most importantly, I believe our water source, the water quality and water quantity of water for the Austin area. So Austin really is a biodiversity hotspot. Some of that is because of the cave system. Karst is just the name for the limestone ecosystem, and that's a hotspot because they're isolated. A lot of the species have been isolated there, but we also sit between two ecoregions. In Texas, the hill country has the Edwards plateau along the balcones escarpment, which comes through Austin, and then to our east, the blackland prairie habitat, which is also an important prairie habitat. A lot of that area has been farmed, and so there's not a lot of that habitat type left in the cities, kind of looking east towards trying to protect some of that. [9:57:08 AM] trying to protect some of that. Austin's also very popular with humans and the area. Our population has practically doubled every 20 to 25 years. I moved here in 1970, so I've seen a lot of that change in our town, so that makes it more challenging to try to protect these open spaces and more important as well. Back in the late 80s, up until about the late 90s, there was a lot of conflict between the environmental community and the development community in Austin. Part of that was because of the listing of two endangered birds and six endangered cave invertebrates, and part of that was from Barton springs. People wanted to be sure we protected the iconic Barton springs, and there was a lot of development going on in Barton springs area. So our local leaders and a lot of local environmental activists and land managers and developers came together with two programs that helped meet the goal of [9:58:08 AM] that helped meet the goal of protecting those wild spaces, while also allowing for and permitting development. And Justin's going to talk more about that. So it's really been a unique gift to Austin to have these wild spaces on this map. The dark green areas are areas that we own and manage in fee simple. And then the lighter green kind of lime green down to the south are conservation easements where the city of Austin purchases the development rights and the landowner can keep ranching or whatever they're doing with the land, as long as they protect water quality. And we monitor that, and we have provisions in that easement that protect them. The other lands that are just outlined in dark green are our partners in the balcones canyonlands preserve predominantly. So most of these lands have been purchased with citizen approved general obligation bonds. And that's been over this almost 30 year period. They always are of high [9:59:10 AM] period. They always are of high margin of approval for the water quality protection lands or for the balcones canyonlands preserve. Those are the two programs I mentioned that they're managed under. And these we were up to about 49,000 acres. When you include the conservation easements. So we're pushing for 50, Justin and I. So and then the these lands back in early 2000 were deliberately placed in Austin water to steward them into the future. So now I'm going to turn it over to Justin. >> Hi, everyone. Justin bates I'm the division manager with the wildland conservation division. And so as Sherri said, this is an incredible gift that we have these 49,000 acres of protected land. And today we manage those under the goals of two different programs. The first is the balcones canyonlands preserve. So when that development was stretching out into the hill country, and some of the species that you see [10:00:11 AM] some of the species that you see here were listed as endangered back in the 90s, it really restricted growth. And so the city and the county came together and said, how can we protect what's special about this place, while also continuing to support the growth and development of our city? And so Austin and Travis county came together with some other partners, and we became one of the first multi-species, multi-agency habitat conservation plans in the country, which in, in short, was an agreement with U.S. Fish and wildlife service, where we said we will set aside and protect a certain amount of land in perpetuity of prime habitat for these endangered species, and in return, the city and the county have a streamlined endangered species act compliance mechanism. And so that, you know, today, the balcones canyonlands preserve, these are lands north and west of town, and they protect some of our favorite places Barton creek, bull creek, mount Bonnell. And [10:01:13 AM] bull creek, mount Bonnell. And they have the added benefit of also being in our lake Travis and lake Austin watershed. So protecting our water supply. Here's a map that you see here altogether between the city and the county, we have about 33,000 acres of protected land. When we were issued this, an incidental take permit. We have a habitat conservation plan. And that plan sets goals for where we protect land, for what configuration that land is in, we want to try and minimize the amount of edges to provide the highest quality habitat. It also calls out 62 specific caves that the city and the county are going to protect. To protect that important, those important Karst ecosystems and some unique species that live in those that are found nowhere else. But at the same time, you know, one of the benefits to the city of this program is that it really facilitates development. [10:02:14 AM] really facilitates development. So since this incidental take permit was issued, it has had an incredible impact on the development of our city. Over 1500 landowner developer projects, over 400 infrastructure projects, and all of the areas in purple there have benefited from this streamlined mechanism. So you can, you know, a lot of neighborhoods and other infrastructure that have been able to, you know, grow and be built because the city and the county committed to set land aside, looking south and west, the other some of the other lands that we manage, we manage under the goals of the water quality protection lands program. And here we're trying to protect the quality and the quantity of the water recharging the Barton springs segment of the Edwards aquifer and ultimately bubbling up there at Barton springs pool. Today, we actively manage over a quarter of the Barton springs Edwards aquifer recharge zone, and we use a variety of tools. But one [10:03:16 AM] use a variety of tools. But one of our big tools on the water quality protection lands is prescribed fire to mimic a natural fire cycle on about 7000 acres of savanna and grassland. So these are the lands stretching south and west. The original goal was to protect 100,000 acres over the Barton springs zone, and today we have over 12,000 acres that we, the city, owns and manages outright and then over 22,000 acres in conservation easements where we have purchased the development rights from private landowners. So I'm going to talk for a few minutes about what that work actually looks like. So we have a team of about 30 at the wildland conservation division. And one of the most important tasks that we have as land managers is to understand the lands that we're we're managing. And so today, you're really we're trying to build that baseline of understanding of how our lands are doing to understand some of the threats [10:04:17 AM] understand some of the threats that are coming down the road and how we might best adapt to them. That looks like a bunch of different things. So we just got through the spring nesting season for the golden cheeked warbler that you see up here. And some of our biologists are out in the field every day monitoring golden cheeked warbler populations on intensive study plots. So we understand how that population is doing as kind of an indicator of the overall health of the lands that we manage. We do the same thing with our cursed species. We do faunal surveys. So we actually send folks underground into these caves to monitor populations of some of our endangered Karst invertebrates. We count the cave crickets that come out of the caves that are kind of the connection between the aboveground ecosystem and underground. They bring nutrients back underground. And so we monitor those populations to understand again, what is the health of the system that we're managing, and what are some of the threats. Some of that work identifies threats like a great [10:05:20 AM] identifies threats like a great success story we have is tawny crazy ants. So we were able to fund research, working with partners at UT to understand this invasive ant species that really wreaks havoc on our local ecosystems. And working with this UT researcher, they were able to understand actually a way to inoculate these colonies of tawny crazy ants with a microsporidium that then causes those colonies to collapse, and so thereby protecting our native systems. And right now they're actually doing research on whether they can use a similar mechanism to attack red imported fire ants. So there might be an opportunity to treat them with a viral pathogen that would reduce their numbers, because they also can really impact species underground. One of the big research projects that we're working on right now is a partnership with U.S. Forest service. A lot of our understanding of wildfire risk [10:06:21 AM] understanding of wildfire risk in Austin is based on a Baylor study that occurred in the mid 2000. We're replicating that study now with experts from us forest service. And what we're trying to do is to actually quantify, you know, when you look out your window and you see some of that winter storm damage and you hear from your constituents and our community members that there's concern about wildfire risk, we're trying to actually go out, measure the fuel loading and the characteristics to understand how that has has changed since that initial study back in the mid 2000. So with 25,000 plus acres that we manage directly, they have 170 miles of boundary. We have a small group of rangers that walks those multiple times of year. So walking over 300 plus miles. And so there's a lot of work just walking the boundaries. We're constantly discovering places where folks have cut the fence, have, you know, come out and started a [10:07:21 AM] know, come out and started a campfire, have dumped their lawn debris over the over the back gate, and lots of other things in between poaching other things like that. So there's a lot of work just maintaining those boundaries so we can protect these protected lands. With that. A lot of our our cip budget. So our five year capital plan focuses a lot on maintaining fences. And, you know, just trying to protect those boundaries is the most efficient and effective way of managing so many miles. We also, you know, for those conservation easements that I mentioned, we are going out annually to monitor each of those private landowners compliance with the terms of that agreement, to make sure that they're maintaining that level of impervious cover. As you heard from some of the speakers, these are as much as they look beautiful and pristine and natural. They're not the all of the lands that we manage were touched by people either in the [10:08:23 AM] touched by people either in the past or currently, and so many of them are either fully surrounded by development or development is coming around them. So we do a lot of work to try and build on the health and resilience of these systems, like I talked about with the water quality protection lands there. We have about 7000 acres that we maintain in a savanna, which is about 40% woody cover. And so we each year we do about 1300 plus acres of prescribed fire to maintain that system. That's about 7000 of the 12,000 acres that that we manage directly. Then, you know, looking at the 18,000 acres of woodlands that we manage, we've got a variety of strategies there to try and increase canopy cover, to try and restore some of those degraded landscapes and again, bring more resilience and longevity to these systems. And then lastly, you know, these are [10:09:25 AM] then lastly, you know, these are conservation lands. First and foremost, we're not our great partners at the parks department. We're we're trying to maintain these for their natural functions. But it's critical as public servants that we get folks out on these lands and make sure that our communities are engaged with the work that we're doing. So over the last year, we've had about 264 volunteer workdays, tons of opportunities to get folks out on the land and actually helping to put plants in the ground or collect seed or count golden cheek warblers or other things like that. We've had over 65 guided hikes where we've been able to get people out, and all told, we benefit from over 5000 volunteer hours a year. So being able to leverage our city resources with some incredible volunteer support, and then we have a ton of partnerships, everything from partnerships with our other land managing agencies and first responders when it comes to prescribed fire [10:10:26 AM] when it comes to prescribed fire or wildfire response to, you know, education partners who we help do teacher training and things like that. So really critical to get folks out and enjoying it. And then I'll wrap up by just spending a few minutes to talk about some of the challenges that we see moving forward and some of the opportunities. So, you know, with with the wet weather we've been having, maybe we haven't heard a lot about wildfire lately, but it's starting to be hot again. And so this is the time of year when, when we're talking about this and taking it seriously, the thing that I always tell people is that that research that that our program did back in the mid 2000 with Baylor university really showed us that we're lucky in that as much as you might see those big wildfires out west on the news, we are not California. We're not the mountain west. Fundamentally, you know, in recent history, we have had much different weather. It's been [10:11:27 AM] different weather. It's been wetter here. We have different vegetation, our juniper oak woodlands under most conditions are highly resistant to fire, to especially to really large scale catastrophic fire. And, you know, we have less wind here too. So we have fewer times of year when all of the factors line up for catastrophic outcomes. The challenge, though, as we saw with winter storm mora and Yuri and droughts that we've been going through, is that conditions are changing and we are having impacts because of those changing conditions. And some projections show that Austin will climatically look a lot more like Laredo in 60 years than it does today. And so, you know, really, as managers and stewards of all these lands, we're really trying to, again, first and foremost, quantify these changing risks and mitigate where we can and [10:12:28 AM] mitigate where we can and understand those kind of ecosystem processes and stressors so that we can best support resilient natural systems, that we can maintain biodiversity, you know, the benefit of the lands that we manage is they have incredible biodiversity and that if you've got a lot of species in a small area as the climate change, there will be a few of them that that can make it through. We're also working on renewing that incidental take permit that I was talking about. Thankfully, we just got confirmation. So that permit was a 30 year permit that runs through next may. And we just got confirmation from U.S. Fish and wildlife service that that permit and our kind of take authority will remain in effect as we work through the renewal process. So we just penned an interlocal agreement with Travis county to bring on some consultant support to help [10:13:28 AM] some consultant support to help with that permit renewal process. And we've been coordinating with U.S. Fish and wildlife service to make sure that we meet all of the requirements of that permit renewal, which includes things like evaluating new species that have been listed since the time of our permit, looking at climate change impacts, and making sure that we're up to date with current fish and wildlife service regulations. And then lastly, you know, as sherry laid out, we have this incredible, you know, unique gift of 49,000 acres of protected land. But the work is still not complete, you know, for the bcp, for the balcones canyonlands preserve, ten out of the 62 caves that were required to protect remain unprotected. And we and in addition to that, we also could benefit from additional acquisitions to fill in some of the gaps and to help with kind of the configuration [10:14:29 AM] with kind of the configuration and size of our preserve system, so that we better meet the goals that were laid out in our habitat conservation plan on the water quality protection lands. We're about a third of the way to that 100,000 acre goal of protection. And, you know, significant development. If you've driven out 290 recently, that development continues to March out. And as you all well know, legislation legislative changes have reduced that regulatory protection that we used to benefit from. And, you know, lastly, I think as the city continues to grow, the opportunities to acquire land in these areas are dwindling and the prices continue to increase. So there's still still work to be done to protect these very special places. >> And with that. >> Thank you very much for having us. I'm open to questions if you have any. [10:15:30 AM] if you have any. >> Great. Thank you. Members. Any questions? We'll just go this way. Councilmember duchen. >> All right. Thank you chair. I just had two questions quickly. One is, you know, we heard different testimony this morning about opinions and facts on the prescribed burns. It sounds like there's a disconnect. And I've heard some of this in prior conversations with different people. I want to understand it sounds like the vast majority of the prescribed burns that you all are engaging in are on grassland and not in. More forested areas. Is that correct? >> That's correct. >> Okay, yeah. Because it sounds like there was a different assumption earlier. Yeah. >> So we don't use prescribed fire as a primary tool in our woodlands. And so again, of the 25 roughly thousand acres that we manage, about 18,000 of those are woodland where we don't really use prescribed fire as a [10:16:31 AM] really use prescribed fire as a primary tool. And then 7000 are savanna grasslands. And there over the 25 years of our program, we have, you know, it is a dynamic system. And so our work, even though we're working every year, we've effectively maintained that 40% canopy cover, woody plant cover that you see in in a savanna where you've got pockets of trees, grass, brush, that sort of thing. >> And the strategies you're using in the wooded areas are shaded fuel breaks and dressing ladder fuels. And that's correct okay. Yeah. All right. Thank you. Second question and last question is you talked about the desire for acquisitions to advance the acreage. This is something that actually came in a conversation this morning elsewhere, assuming there was the budget for that or bond money or whatever we would resources, what would be the operating expense associated with managing that land? [10:17:33 AM] with managing that land? >> So, you know, I think there have been some studies on kind of the per acre cost, and we've done some of that work ourselves. You know, one of the benefits of conservation lands, largely when we acquire a property, our initial first investment would be fencing that property, which is not inexpensive, but relatively in the scheme of things. You know, I think our costs are $13 a linear foot for fencing material, plus some, some other components. So, you know, that's generally the first investment. We, you know, with our existing staff, most of the time that gets lumped into one of our staff, you know, areas that we're patrolling. So there's some a little bit of additional patrol costs. But it's relatively you know, adding property for us is oftentimes relatively marginal in terms of cost because we are trying to maintain those existing natural systems. [10:18:35 AM] systems. >> I'd be curious if down the line it's possible to get some specific numbers for what that looks like. Yeah. Relative to, as you say, where you're able to create an efficiency by connecting to property already owned, the capital that you might need for the fencing versus ongoing patrolling. It might be great to get some data at some point around that. >> And I will just add that a lot of the times when we're acquiring property, we're trying to inquire, say, an inholding that if it were to be developed, would actually create more boundary, would create more, you know, again, wildland urban interface. And so by acquiring some of those inholdings kind of trying to make more, you know, kind of smoother edges, it actually in many ways reduces some of the challenges and management challenges that. >> We absolutely want to know that incorporate into that, too. Okay. Thank you very much. >> Can I jump in? Yes I'm sorry. That's okay. My question dovetails really nicely into that question about the cost of ongoing maintenance. I'm going to tackle it from a different [10:19:38 AM] to tackle it from a different approach, which is how much money do we have to be able to buy new land? And my follow up question will be how do we decide what is water quality protection land versus bcp land as we go through this permit update versus when should parks buy it and turn it into parkland? How does the city determine that question? >> Well, I'll mention that we are hopeful to have some additional money in the 2026 bond, or we're going to put forward that 100 million for the water quality protection lands and 50 million for the bcp was the original goal. I know there's been a lot of conversations about that whole bond package and how things are going to have to be balanced out, but we're working with our partners in watershed and parks also to try to see ways where we could potentially get a parcel that could have multiple uses, perhaps something that could be park land. Usually, if a decision is that it's going to be parkland, that we would just [10:20:38 AM] be parkland, that we would just be working with parks on that, and maybe if it had habitat, we would help with the management of the habitat, but they would manage it as a park for the two programs. The areas that we're looking are are overlapping, but not not totally. The Barton springs zone is where the water quality protection lands program has been focused for protecting Barton springs. It also therefore protects the groundwater going into that area of hays county and southwest Travis county. The bcp has certain specific goals for where those lands need to be acquired, but there is some overlap in the middle and we were actually able to a couple years ago, put a conservation easement on Barton creek habitat preserve, which is managed by the nature conservancy. So it was a win win to protect that land for in perpetuity, but also still being managed as a part of the balcones canyonlands preserve. So each parcel that we look at, you know, as Justin said, [10:21:38 AM] you know, as Justin said, opportunities are getting less and less. Conservation easements is also a priority, I believe just because the reduced costs of having to manage that land. But those opportunities are becoming less frequent because there's less people that are have had a ranch, you know, in their family for years and want to do that. So we will be looking at that as an option for the future funding. We also, in the water forward plan, had a component of looking to protect our water supply up in the lake Travis and lake Buchanan watersheds. And so we're working now to start develop that program that will be in Justin's group and trying to probably focus on conservation easement or land management strategies, things other than buying the land in fee. Simple, because we're already spread from like cedar Leander, cedar park area down to Kyle. So getting up even further might be challenging. >> That's interesting. Do we own [10:22:39 AM] >> That's interesting. Do we own any land that is that far out right now near lake Buchanan. >> We have lime creek, which is up near. It's right on the edge of Williamson county. And then we have lands that go all the way down close to Buda and Kyle. >> Fascinating. I know I've been to some that are south of Austin right now that that are amazing to see in real time. So it sounds like the dollars so far are already allocated anything from was it 2018? There was a bond that had water quality protection land listed as well as parkland acquisition, I believe. >> Yes, we had some 2 million for water quality protection land program and we have spent all that money successfully. >> So all right, well, we'll see if voters want to give you any more. >> Thank you. Yes. >> I had a question generally about, you know, obviously, I know that water quality protection and drinking water protection are things that happen mostly in central and west Austin. Can you talk to me a little bit about habitat [10:23:40 AM] a little bit about habitat preservation on the east side? Obviously all the fish and wildlife regulations would apply, but is there any comprehensive planning to try to help protect species that are, you know, habitating, you know, depending on which season they are, to try to make sure that the east side is also getting some protection for their natural resources. >> Yeah, we're just beginning the planning on that. Travis county is a little bit ahead of us. They hired a consultant to help them look at the new species that are being listed. The monarch butterfly. There's three species of bumblebees. There's also the Texas fatmucket, which occurs in onion creek on the east side of the creek from I-35 to the river. So we'll be looking at that as a part of the balcones canyonlands permit renewal, and seeing whether it makes sense to put those species in there. They're certainly those species on on our property as well, not the Texas fatmucket, but some of the other ones. And so we'll be looking at whether we can, you [10:24:41 AM] looking at whether we can, you know, what that would look like if we added them to the permit. Travis county has had money to they've had a good program on with their parkland, like our parks folks do, of trying to balance parkland throughout the city and throughout the county. And they have some money for parkland acquisition on the east side, about 100 million. And they're trying to look at conservation of those species with that acquisition as well. In addition to park. >> So I'm supportive of the idea of making sure that there is a plan to help with the species on the east side. I just wasn't sure if west and east of the balcones escarpment, if they make sense to try to work together, or if they just have to be different because there's different species and different ecosystems. >> Yeah. You know, I was just going to add that our programs are, you know, again, focused on the west side because of biological and geological hydrological reasons. But we have been working with other partners, you know, talking with pard, talking with watershed. And I think having those same defined goals for east side, [10:25:43 AM] defined goals for east side, whether it's, you know, trying to restore blackland prairie, there are certainly opportunities to build off our existing programs and kind of balance our conservation portfolio so that we're protecting all of those really special ecosystems that we have here in Austin. >> Okay. I'll stay tuned to see how that conversation unfolds. But I'm fascinated by the idea of being able to kind of subdivide. If we do find land and we're able to purchase it, that it could be park land and then also have habitat preservation. I think that's really important. And I think there could be some great educational opportunities to kind of say, hey, you can't go in here or you can't go in here during golden cheeked warbler nesting season. But here's all the, you know, signs and pictures and literature to kind of better understand the habitats around us. So. Sure. >> Thank you. Sounds good. >> Councilmember Siegel. >> Thank you chair. Thank you all for this presentation. I just want to clarify who's responsible for some of the work, like wildflower mitigation or invasive invasive species management. Oak wilt. Oak wilt [10:26:44 AM] management. Oak wilt. Oak wilt management. Is that Austin water personnel? >> Yeah, that's our team at the wildland conservation division. We're you know a lot of that work. So when we're doing say wildfire mitigation, we're working closely with AFD. But we're using our operating dollars and staff to manage some of those projects. And you know, sometimes it's our staff doing that work directly. Other times it's contractors that we're overseeing. >> And have you partnered with the Austin civilian conservation corps in any of this work? >> Yes, we have, we have, and we look forward to continuing that collaboration. You know, they're a great group and great opportunities to get our next generation of stewards into the workforce. >> Great. Thank you. And then I also want to ask about the 100,000 acre goal for water quality protection lands. If you could kind of share how that goal was developed, who was involved with creating the goal, why that number was chosen? You know, and really, from a city investment point of view, why that's a valuable investment. [10:27:44 AM] that's a valuable investment. >> I think the goal there was was largely looking at impervious cover over the recharge and contributing zone, with the understanding that in areas where you, you know, go beyond 10% impervious cover, that's where you begin to see negative water quality impacts. And so I think there was some initial work done and jump in if I'm missing anything here, but some initial work done to understand what development had already occurred, to understand where the city had kind of that regulatory protection, save our springs ordinance, that sort of thing. And then to do some rough math of, okay, how many acres would be the big audacious goal that could, you know, keep us close to that 10%? We just ran some numbers and, you know, between 1998 and 2024, there's been about 24, 23, 24,000 acres of development over the recharge and contributing zone. And you can see where our protected [10:28:46 AM] can see where our protected lands sit as kind of those, you know, holes in that pattern of development. So I think that's largely what that goal was around, was how to maintain a low amount of impervious cover to make sure that that water is getting underground. >> So is it fair to say it's more of a, you know, aspirational, symbolic goal? It's not necessarily like driven by a specific calculation. >> Yeah. I mean, I think you see other places where, you know, you think about Jacob's well and the Wimberley valley, where development has occurred and really stressed that underground water supply. But it's it the math is not a direct, you know, 1 to 1 ratio. >> That's fair. Thank you. And then my last question is kind of gets at something councilmember Ellis was getting at is about with some of these lands, especially the ones that the city owns in fee simple can we stack uses. And just to kind of be somewhat transparent, like I'm interested in figuring out how we can, you know, farm food locally, potentially on city owned lands. Or another idea is [10:29:47 AM] owned lands. Or another idea is how can we maybe install solar panel arrays on city land to generate local renewable electricity? So how possible is it to stack uses on some of these city lands? >> We have been working with a cross-departmental group at the city to talk about those things. How could we help with the food plan? How could we help with more renewable energy? For some of the wild lands, the uses might not be compatible, but certainly like covered parking for staff with solar panels or something. On park land, we have about 3000 acres of the bcp that's managed by the parks department that Justin mentioned mount Bonnell, Barton creek, bull creek, Malone. And so those were parks first. But they also have habitat for the species that we're trying to protect. So they manage the land and oversee, you know, the uses. And then we help with the habitat management. So there there [10:30:48 AM] management. So there there certainly might be opportunities. The food plan is one of the more challenging, I think, to try to make that happen because those lands are also have been, you know, highly desirable for development and just competing with that cost factor is challenging. But Travis county actually just passed when I was at commissioners court last week, a conservation easement to protect a farm. So that's another approach that it's the first time they've done that, that the city might look at for farmland protection. >> Thank you. >> All right. Well, thank you all so much for that. And sorry you had to wait a month to give it to us. >> But that's okay. >> With that, we will move on to agenda item number three. And this is a briefing on Austin water Austin's water management strategy implementation update. >> Just in case you need to come [10:31:49 AM] >> Just in case you need to come on. Here to see. >> Well good morning again. Council members shay Ralston Austin water director. We're pleased to present to you the first quarterly water management strategy implementation report. The development of this report was an outcome of council's approval of our water forward 2024 plan, which has, as you know, a number of water supply strategies to serve our community over the next 100 years. And because there are so many strategies and they're in a lot of different areas of work, it you all felt and we agreed that it was important to consolidate that work into a quarterly report where our community could see the advances [10:32:51 AM] community could see the advances that we're making in meeting the goals of the plan. So one of the big conversations that we had last fall was around water conservation. And how do we drive down our gallons per capita per day? And as as we discussed quite a bit that that water conservation goal is something that Austin water drives that the city staff drive, but that it is up to our customers to achieve. And so we really need a way where we can communicate with all of our stakeholders about our progress in meeting these goals, so that everyone can see their part to play and really engage with us to achieve these very ambitious goals. So this is this is q1, January to March of 2025. We have obviously already finished Q2. So we are in the process of updating the Q, updating the quarterly report for Q2, but we're going to show you this [10:33:51 AM] we're going to show you this report. This is in our conservation division. Manager Kevin kluge is going to walk through this presentation. And we would just invite your feedback on it. There aren't a lot of examples out there of other water utilities doing this kind of reporting. And so we have we have created what we hope is going to be a good framework for having these conversations on a regular basis. But we welcome your feedback so we can continue to make tweaks and adjustments in the way we present this information so that it can be meaningful to, to everyone. So with that, Kevin, if you'd like to make some opening remarks, please do. >> Sure I will, and I'll make sure. So good afternoon. I'm Kevin Crittenden, assistant director at Austin water. In addition to what Jay has mentioned already, you know, obviously, the recent rainfalls, you know, certainly in neighboring Kerr county. And then, you know, in our upper watershed have certainly given us a temporary reprieve and given us a little bit of an opportunity to breathe. But in [10:34:52 AM] opportunity to breathe. But in the in the context of 100 year water supply planning, you know, this is in fact a marathon and not a sprint. And so we continue to work on trying to build a sustainable water future for our community. And a big part of that is shay mentioned, I think is awareness and understanding. And so really, this is sort of our first opportunity to share this quarterly report. We have shared the report with resource management commission with our water and wastewater commission. So we are getting it out there. And as shay said, we do invite input. I will just give you a little bit of a, a warning that the framework of this presentation really is the body of the report. And so we're going to try to move through it fairly quickly. So if we're going too fast, please kind of slow us down. Or if you have questions along the way, our goal is really to kind of highlight it. And as you can imagine, there's a lot of things in it, but we'll address what we can. So with that, I'll turn it over to Kevin. [10:35:52 AM] over to Kevin. >> All right. Good morning city council members. As was mentioned my name is Kevin Kelly, water conservation division manager. And after a great introduction by shay Kevin, I'll jump right into it. This report is a pretty substantial report when considering that it's in a slideshow format. So we are just going to go through the highlights of each one of these main sections. As you see here on the contents, the main sections include water conservation, water loss reduction, reclaimed water and on site water reuse, conservation, outreach, and the gpc and water supply updates for each of these first four main sections. It includes updates in text, updates in metrics, quantitative metrics, and then updates to milestones. So the first one jump ahead and we're happy to go back to any of these slides as was mentioned. But [10:36:54 AM] slides as was mentioned. But I'll give a highlights of each one of these sections. Water conservation. For the first three months of the year January February. March. Water conservation division really focused on the irrigation inspections that were started in October. These are inspections of all new irrigation systems that go in for homes and new and existing homes. We really leaned also into commercial irrigation by sending several staff members for training, for auditing, as well as funding several audits for private companies. And then our water wise landscape and rain scape applications really increased in the first quarter of the year compared to q1 of 2020 for in addition, our mighty water leak alerts really increased in q1 also, that was largely driven by the mighty water system that was built out essentially in 2024. So we're [10:37:56 AM] essentially in 2024. So we're really starting to gain a lot more traction and benefits from that mighty water system. As I mentioned, each one of these sections has some highlights and some metrics in terms of charts and figures that I'll move through, but happy to come back to in each section also includes milestones that were in the water forward plan and the water conservation plan. These were milestones essentially saying in 2025, we're going to do this. So we have slides indicating the progress of each one of those milestones for each section. The second main section, water loss reduction updates. We had a number of inspections, I'm sorry, operational improvements. A lot of the recommendations from the black and Veatch report from last year, in 2024 were were improvements to operational [10:39:00 AM] were improvements to operational scope of works and procedures. And we're leaning into those working on those. In addition, we increased our budget in the 2630 fiscal year, 26 to 30 budget, $18 million for service line replacements. This is an increase from 8 million in the previous budget. And then also, as I mentioned, I didn't mention, but you see up there on the bullet there, the last bullet there, we calculated our 2024 infrastructure leakage index, and it came out as a calculation of 5.4, which is an increase over the 2023. This is something we never want to see, but we want to bring that forward and bring your attention to it, because it really illustrates some of the recommendations that came out of the black and Veatch report. In terms of data, a lot of that increase was due to better data. So sometimes when you're really [10:40:01 AM] So sometimes when you're really leaning into working on the data, the initial result goes back before it can go forward. So as I mentioned, we are really leaning into the water loss activities in this year. Again we have some metrics, charts and figures on what we're doing, milestones a lot of these milestones are the operational improvements, standard operating procedures and so forth that we are working with staff to improve our water loss reduction activities. The third section, reclaimed water and on site water reuse updates. In terms of reclaimed water, we added a number of reclaimed customers in the first three months of 2025. We continue discussions with large water users on convincing them, working with them to convert over to reclaimed water [10:41:03 AM] convert over to reclaimed water for cooling towers and irrigation systems. That continues to be a work in progress, but work we are undertaking. And I wanted to note that in the metrics, you may see that there's no expansion of reclaimed system noted in the metrics. However, we are working on five projects to expand our reclaimed system. They're in process, part of the complete the core project, so we hope to have those checked off in a future quarterly report on site water reuse updates. The highlights, really, as you note on that first bullet there, we completed a feasibility study to subsidize affordable housing projects for on site water reuse activities. Subsequent to this first quarter, the council approved this additional subsidy so that that continues to move forward. Unfortunately, as you [10:42:03 AM] forward. Unfortunately, as you see in some of the metrics, you'll note that there were no additional subsidies for on site water reuse. But that doesn't mean work is going on. As I mentioned, similar to the expansion of systems, staff are working with developers to utilize these subsidies for on site water reuse, and there were three on site water reuse permits approved in the first three quarters of the year. So work is going on with on site water reuse and developers are starting to utilize on site water reuse. Again. More metrics and then milestones both for reclaimed, decentralized and on site water reuse, water conservation, outreach. Outreach is always very important. Reaching out to our customers [10:43:04 AM] Reaching out to our customers and developers in the first three months of the year, conservation outreach really focused on winter preparedness and wastewater averaging, which helps folks reduce water during that wastewater averaging period. And check. Be prepared for leaks that might come about from winter weather in the last month of the quarter. March. The conservation outreach really shifted and focused on the landscaping rebates that we have. Just mentioned here. During the first three months of the year, we had over 15 million impressions. And this is 15 million views in a sense, not 15 million people. But our messages were viewed 15 million times over those three months. Most of those were from print and radio media, but it also included [10:44:05 AM] media, but it also included social media and visits to the conservation website. Water loss and gcd. This was a topic that was raised last November when we came before you with for the water conservation plan and the water plan and directive from the mayor to include in our quarterly reports categorical water use and gps chart. You see here. Before you attempts to answer some of that, a brief orientation of this chart time passes from left to right from 2018 to 2025. So you see historical data. Each one of those vertical bars is a quarter, and the strata on each one of those vertical bars is the per person water use from each one of those categories. So you have single family on the bottom, and then multifamily and commercial industrial. And at [10:45:06 AM] commercial industrial. And at the top is the non-revenue water, largely made up of water loss. So you'll see that in q1 it's generally lower water use. Q2 goes up. Q3, which is the summer, is always the highest, and then q4 in the winter also goes back down. The first quarter of 2025. You'll see on the far right there is actually very similar to the first quarter of 2024. There's not a lot of variation usually in the first quarter, but there can be as you go throughout the year. >> Can you remind us what the goal was? That was in the plan for. The gallons per capita daily? >> The five year goal was 119. So you see that in calendar year 2024, the average gpc was was 130. We'll see in future quarterly reports what those [10:46:06 AM] quarterly reports what those numbers are. With all the rain. I do expect that that per person water use to go down, but we'll have to see just how much. The quarterly report also includes a second gpc chart. If you didn't get enough of the first chart, this one provides the same data, but just in a slightly different non stacked way. So your eye can go more quickly across through time. And it illustrates where we went into stage one and stage two. Again the gold bar at the top is the average annual gpc. >> And just on that briefly the stage one. Stage two refers to the stage of drought we're in, correct? >> Yes. >> Could you remind us what stage two drought means? >> Stage two drought is when we go into stage two, when the combined storage of lake Buchanan and lake Travis reached 900,000 acre feet, a little under half, 45% or so. We've been in stage two since August of 2023. The last main section I [10:47:08 AM] of 2023. The last main section I want to touch on here. Water supply strategies. These were are included in the water forward plan. The three water supply strategies that really fit this time frame include aquifer storage and recovery. And in the first three months of this year, we completed a desktop analysis to identify favorable locations. A lot of work has been done on asr since that first quarter, but those will be in future reports. Secondly, work is being done on the Wall Street long water supply reservoir. Looking at the feasibility of its use as an off channel reservoir to supplement Austin's water supply. And then finally, we also been working on indirect potable reuse strategy, working to do the project design and technical specifications for [10:48:11 AM] and technical specifications for indirect potable reuse. And then just moving forward, as was mentioned by shay and Kevin, this goal or I'm sorry, this report really is the first of its kind. We're looking to be transparent and accountable in these reports, and we're happy to work with stakeholders. In any feedback from council members to adjust both our report and our efforts as necessary to meet the goals that were that are in the water forward plan and the water conservation plan. And with that, we'll be happy to take any questions you have. >> Sounds good. I'll go this. Way first. >> Okay. Just had a couple quick questions, I guess. Page 12 of the presentation talks about spending $80 million a year on service line replacements. And if you know, we've we've heard in other settings that there's a lot of leaky pipes out there. And if you could just give us [10:49:11 AM] And if you could just give us context of why that's the right number or whether we should be spending more. >> Well, one of the things that black and Veatch report noted is that our mainline replacements, we're doing pretty good at replacing the larger main lines at a. Sufficient rate to address the leaks. But the service lines, the lines, the smaller lines coming off those main lines is where they identified area that we really need to step up our game on replacing those service lines. And that's why we are increasing the budget in this next five year cip budget from 18, from 8 to 18 million. >> And is that enough? Yeah. >> Go ahead. Yeah. I'll add a little bit more context to that. Kevin's being very modest about our main replacement program. That's the renewing Austin program that you may have heard about. And that has replaced poor performing pipes in neighborhoods across Austin since the early 20 tens. And we reduced our main break rate. So you think of the mains as being [10:50:12 AM] you think of the mains as being the pipes that are in the street. Our main break rate from above industry average to better than optimized for a water utility. So there was an independent city auditor's report on that work that validated that. And so we're very proud of our accomplishments on the main replacement program. In the 1980s, there was a popular in the water industry service line material. So that's the line that goes from the main to a customer's meter called polybutylene. And over the course of time, that material has not held up. And we have a lot of it. And so we've been prioritizing getting that service line material out of our system for some time. And the black and Veatch report really validated the need to step up what we're doing in that. And so we're we're using a number of different tools in our toolbox. We have we have on call contractors that we have them go [10:51:13 AM] contractors that we have them go out and do service line replacement. We have our own internal construction crew that does service line replacements, our own crews that are out repairing broken service lines. We are prioritizing, instead of putting a clamp on it, pull that service line and replace it right there on the spot. Because if it breaks, if it breaks twice, it's not going to stop breaking. So we're we're looking at all the different ways that we can leverage our resources to get those service lines out of our system, on our this $18 million of cip funding. We're using that to target specific neighborhoods, particularly the ones that are at higher pressure because they tend to have higher break rates in that as that material ages and becomes more brittle. And so that's an increase in funding cip funding. But it's not it is one of the tools in our toolbox that we're using to really prioritize this service line replacement program. >> Great. Thank you. And yeah, just curious if we should be [10:52:14 AM] just curious if we should be doing more. So I guess continue to inform us, please. And then my other question is more technical. It's related to page 21. And I think overall on the workforce development piece, Austin water is supporting the infrastructure academy, which we really appreciate. And so in this it lists a goal of developing an operator training certification program for on site reuse systems. And we'd love to know more about that certification program and how it might be marketed to contractors, or whether this would be something we would develop internally to have Austin water employees do it. >> We can. It's in very early stages. We have been working through looking at different partners and vendors to try to develop the curriculum, and we'll get you some more information on the specifics of that. >> Okay. Thanks so much. >> Councilmember. >> Sure. Thank you. I have a question about the slide on page 24, with all the beautiful colors all stacked on top of each other, I see that the colors break down into single [10:53:15 AM] colors break down into single family and multifamily. Is there a way to do this with missing middle styles of housing? So we've changed our code recently to make sure that under I think it's four units or three units gets residential review, the missing middle is going through site plan lite, and then your multifamily is doing a full site plan analysis. So the reason I'm asking is not because you have control over land use, but because I'm curious as we look at water usage, electricity usage, you know, fees to build certain types of housing that we have a better picture across the board of how energy efficient are some of the policies that council is moving towards? Is that something that you think could be analyzed, or would it have to be crunched with new numbers and therefore mess up the previous calculations? >> So let me just say let let let us go back and look at it. I mean, my initial thinking is like in the context of like this graphic, you wouldn't be able to see it just from an optics perspective. But certainly we do, in coordination with the esd [10:54:15 AM] do, in coordination with the esd and other initiatives, we have developed some tracking tools that help us focus more on missing middle development. So we can certainly look at that and see how we can increase our understanding of that phenomenon in this kind of a context. So let us work on it. >> That would be helpful. I know there may be some information that isn't available because it depends on how it's metered. You know, each single family home has its own meter and its own bill for the address. Apartments like where I live, you know, we get kind of this big lump sum for all the units and then they divide it by square footage. But I'm just curious, you know, I want to conserve water and I want my neighbors to conserve water. And I hope that the repairs are less costly and some development styles. So I'd just love to know more information about that. >> Well, look at it. >> And then my only other question would kind of be on the same lines of council member Siegel but do you think some of the data about leakages is happening because we are doing more monitoring, or is it an issue of just aging infrastructure and the numbers really are going up? I know [10:55:16 AM] really are going up? I know there was one a few years back. I think it was bull creek was there was some leak that had been going on for a long time. Can you talk to me about are the numbers going up because we're better at collecting data or is it aging infrastructure or both? >> I think, and I'll let Kevin weigh in on this as well. But the what we found in 24 when we made improvements to our calculations following the evaluation from the black and Veatch report, some of that was metering improvements at the plants, and that improved our accuracy of knowing how much water we're putting into the system. And the result of that was we're actually putting more water into the system than we had calculated in 2023 and previous years. And so that is a. An accounting issue, if you will, rather than an increase in actual water loss. But I do think that we also saw an increase in actual water loss that was more modest. And so as [10:56:17 AM] that was more modest. And so as we continue to move forward and our data collection gets better and we make investments in improving the way we're monitoring and capturing all of that data, then we'll begin to see what knobs we have to turn more effectively. >> Yeah, I would agree. It is a combination of both better data, getting better measurements as well as probably increase maybe through the polybutylene pipes or other leaks. But that drive towards better data will be essential as the only way to move forward, even though sometimes it seems to set you back a little bit with the numbers. >> That's good to know, and I'm certainly hearing from homeowners on the other side saying they appreciate if they're on army to be able to get that notification ahead of time, that something could be wrong. That way they don't end up with a bill that is much higher than they're anticipating. So I think that is definitely working. I'm just more curious about what's happening before it gets to the ultimate client. [10:57:18 AM] ultimate client. >> I had a leak at my house that I found through my army data. >> System works. >> Yes, the system works. And please let your you know, if your constituents reach out to you about high bills, please let them know we have a leak adjustment available to them as well. If they show us that they have repaired their leak. >> We'll put it in our next newsletter. Thanks. >> Thank you. Chair, I just want to follow up on council member Ellis's question and comments regarding water leaks. First, regarding the high bills. And am I is there anything we can do for multifamily? I mean, for properties that get a single kind of distributed water bill, it would be hard to pinpoint. I know that's something that we've struggled with. Any ideas about how you approach that, other than just telling everybody to go check for leaks? Does that make sense? >> It it does. And I'm I think one of the, one of the things that we are working on with our commercial multifamily customers is making sure that they are [10:58:18 AM] is making sure that they are watching their portal and paying attention to those alerts. I, I think Randy Jenkins is in the audience, and she may have more information on on this, but I think what we see often is not necessarily that it's a leak in an individual unit so much as it is an on premise leak, you know, in their irrigation system or their fire line or, you know, some other element of that. You want to add to that, Randy, and introduce yourself. >> Sure. Hi. Good morning everyone. Randy Jenkins, assistant director at Austin water. Yes. To add on to what shay saying, yes, there is not currently an administrative adjustment process for commercial entities. Which multifamily does roll up under that area of commercial billing accounts. And so we've looked at it and you know, it's that fine line of balancing between, you know, wanting to provide the individuals that live and reside [10:59:18 AM] individuals that live and reside at those units some bill relief, but also wanting to make sure that the owners that are responsible to maintain that infrastructure are doing their part. So it's a balancing act, and we are working on a lot of communication and outreach to all of those multifamily and commercial businesses to make sure, as shay mentioned, that they're leveraging their portal and paying attention to their water use. >> Okay. I'll follow up independently about how to get information to reach out to multifamily properties. We'd love to have that that information. I want to turn to the leak, the reduction metrics, the leaks that are, I think, on slide 13, I'm curious, is there any kind of understanding regarding how many like what is the nature of the leaks that are of the of the mains that you're discovering that are problematic? And when I say that, I mean purely anecdotally, we have a mobility project over where I'm at in my district. We [11:00:21 AM] where I'm at in my district. We probably had six breaks in the main or system out there over the last probably year or so. Some of them turn into geysers that we're seeing, like across, you know, major arteries. And so I'm curious how much is it related to other project construction as opposed to just stumbling on a leak or somebody discovering it, looking at their data? Is there any kind of breakdown regarding how that works, or do you have insight into that? >> We do look at the sources of the water loss, and we have we have a nice pie chart that shows sort of our estimation of where all the, the major sources. Certainly construction in the right of way is a big one. So we have we have a couple of teams that it's their responsibility to go out and do line locates. So anyone working in the right of way is required, requested to contact us to come out and [11:01:22 AM] contact us to come out and locate our infrastructure so they don't hit it. And still sometimes they do hit it because buried infrastructure can be hard to find. Also, you know, some of our infrastructure that's that's high performing that is not had a problem once construction happens in that area and destabilizes the backfill around it, that can that can cause sort of the ongoing problems that you're talking about. And so we one of the ways that we manage that is we have a, we have a performance metric for how fast we get on site for a priority one leak, which is, which is visible water. And so, you know, our goal is to is to get out there very quickly. And we monitor our performance in that area and then we stay on site, obviously, until that leak is repaired, we turn into 24 over seven operations, leverage additional crews or our construction crews or our on call contractors as needed, depending on the complexity of the break, to resolve it as quickly as we can. So it's in every tool in the toolbox kind of kind of approach [11:02:22 AM] toolbox kind of kind of approach to making sure that we're finding and fixing those main breaks as quickly as possible. >> Okay. Thank you. I'm just trying to figure out if there's any opportunity it sounds like you're doing. It's encouraging to hear you're doing an admirable job of trying to get good data around where these different leaks are occurring, because it does seem I mean, I think there's been some degree of frustration because every time there is a leak happens with these associated with these projects, you're talking about potentially hundreds or thousands of customers not having having either decreased pressure or no water whatsoever until it gets restored. So if there is a way to address other departments that could be getting in as, as the course in the course of their work, dpw or whoever else that's doing cip projects, I'd be useful to see if there's a way to avoid having some of those leaks that might be resulting from not work that you all are directly doing, but other departments that might not. Somebody may not have the right information, etc. [11:03:23 AM] right information, etc. >> We do work closely during the design and construction phase with other city projects and Kevin's. Another part of Kevin's team is responsible for that coordination to make sure that they know what infrastructure is in the is in the limits of their construction. And then, you know, protect it appropriately. We make sure the inspect the dsd inspector on the construction site or the cds inspector knows what infrastructure we have out there, and we coordinate with them to protect it during construction. So things do still happen in construction, but we are doing that work both on the front end during design, all the way through construction to and we leverage you know a big you'll see in council actions request for council action a number of projects where we are leveraging pipe replacement through those projects. So you know, if tpw is going to rebuild a street, we want to replace the infrastructure that's underneath [11:04:25 AM] infrastructure that's underneath it. And so we do a lot of that. That's our most cost effective way to get pipe replaced. And so we really try to leverage those opportunities. >> No that's encouraging also. And I know they're doing that with telecom stuff also at the same time thanks for explaining. That last question is just regarding the conservation efforts. My understanding is, you know, and obviously your data bears out that those efforts have kind of plateaued. And I'm assuming all the low hanging fruit has been plucked. So I'm wondering the conversation I keep hearing is education is kind of the least expensive and most effective way to encourage future conservation. I don't know, to the extent that that's already been tapped out, or if there's further work that we can do there. I'm just curious if you've got any other things in the pipeline regarding how do we move the needle in a way that we, you know, the data looks pretty stubborn in the sense that it's struggled to move in the last few years. Any other programs coming online that education or otherwise, that [11:05:26 AM] education or otherwise, that might help us outside of what's listed in the report? >> Yes, we are not alone. Certainly across Texas and seeing water demand sort of harden plateau, as you said. And that is concerning. We've set very ambitious goals. We've set metrics within our conservation team on how we're going to achieve that reduction. And part of that is an a, an additional additional investments in education and outreach. And luckily, we already called Randy up to the table so she can talk a little bit about what we're doing with that. >> Absolutely. Thank you shay. So we are planning to increase our our marketing efforts around water conservation. You know, that's that's our biggest hit all year long. It's everything that we do is focused on water conservation. Even our our wastewater averaging message is really about conserving water in the wintertime so that you can reduce your wastewater bill. And [11:06:27 AM] reduce your wastewater bill. And so everything that is central to all of our messaging. However, in light of these ambitious goals and certainly, you know, knowing that we are reaching people, you know, as you see, you saw in the presentation this morning, we are getting increase in impressions quarter over quarter and month over month. So we are reaching people, but we really are needing to move the dial on changing behaviors. And so that we are increasing our marketing and outreach dollars for the next fiscal year, which you will see in the city of Austin budget that's presented and you'll work to approve in the coming weeks. So we are we are looking forward to that and bringing on some consultants that can help us think about new ways to reach people. That way. We're we're hitting all of our customers where they are an additional way that we're thinking about increasing education out in the community is a potential defensive driver type course where we would anyone that we are seeing that aren't following our current watering schedule or practices, they would come through an [11:07:28 AM] they would come through an education course to teach them about why it's important. So things like that are on the horizon, and we look forward to bringing that forward to you in the coming months. >> I was at an event the other weekend, and there was a really cool trailer that was used for education, but the I'm drawing a blank here that Colorado, Colorado. Thank you. >> The mobile river. >> And obviously invited them to come to city hall and park it out front and educate us also. >> But yeah, we, the city and Austin water are sponsors of that and help develop that mobile river. >> You know. And so one thing that they've got in there is a is a tool that folks can use to understand where their, the majority of their water use consumption comes from. And obviously lawns are a big part of that. Any and I hear this all the time also from constituents complaining about scofflaws in their neighborhoods. And I'm assuming that's a big driver, particularly among single family usage that bears out in the [11:08:29 AM] usage that bears out in the data. Setting aside education in terms of incentivizing or disincentivizing certain behavior. Is that something you all are looking at? Also, in terms of how to better monitor and enforce for people that are ignoring our restrictions? >> Yes, we have quite a robust enforcement team, and Kevin and Kevin can talk a little bit about that. >> Certainly in terms of enforcing, we do have patrol staff that go out, but as you imagine, it's a big city. There are a few staff members. So while we do find single family customers who are watering outside the watering schedule, there's still a lot of work to do. One of the things we are focusing on now, first of all, is some landscape transformation strategy for new homes for new austinites. We're including the inspections of new irrigation systems, and there were a number of local amendments in the last [11:09:29 AM] of local amendments in the last plumbing code that will lower water use for new single family homes. But I'd also like to mention that one of the things that council member alter brought up last November was using our mighty water system to notify customers when they are out watering outside of the regular schedule. And while this doesn't happen in q1, but it has happened in Q2, we have started Amy or Randy staff public information office has started to pilot some of those notifications out to customers to let them know that they might check their irrigation system and make sure that it's not running when they're not intending it to. We're hoping that that will have a more substantial effect on reaching out to customers and changing their behavior. >> Yeah, yeah. Thank you Kevin. That's fabulous. I'm glad you mentioned it. I was kind of [11:10:31 AM] mentioned it. I was kind of eager thinking, yes, I want I want to share that in addition to just notifying customers through through our portal about when they might be watering on off days. And we've also performed some initial outreach. You know, we've had a very rainy June and July, and so we've used that opportunity to send out advanced notices about, hey, either it just rain or or rain's in the forecast. Adjust your irrigation schedule accordingly. If we just got substantial rain, you know you don't need your irrigation systems running. So as another way to dial it down. And we've actually received a lot of replies through those messages thanking us for that. That that was a good reminder. So we're we're trying, you know, to turn all the dials in that way and leverage leverage that platform. >> Okay. Thanks so much for all your good work. Thanks, chairman. >> Thank you very much. I just have a couple questions myself. No conversation in July would be complete if we didn't talk a [11:11:31 AM] complete if we didn't talk a little bit about the budget. So I'm curious, you guys have a proposed rate increase. It's primarily on the wastewater side, but to some degree the water side. When we talked to Austin energy about their rate increase. One of the features or kind of how it seems to be working is that lower rates are not fully cost recovered, and the higher the lower usage, you're not fully cost recovering. And for the higher usage you are so kind of your higher users are are subsidizing your lower users. Is that the same situation with the water utility? >> So I think we can probably respond offline a little more completely. But what I can say is that in 2024, we did a comprehensive cost of service study, and we updated our rate structure to make sure that we are achieving cost recovery in each of our rate classes. And in [11:12:32 AM] each of our rate classes. And in the residential rate, we have a tiered structure that is much, you know, affordability is a really important part of obviously of our rate design. And so it's much more affordable in tier one and tier two for our average customer use and then becomes much more expensive the more water you use. And we got a lot of community feedback. We had a really robust public involvement committee that helped us develop that rate design so that we could balance affordability and cost recovery and make sure that we're that we're achieving achieving full cost recovery while prioritizing affordability. And we are also phasing in the residential rate increase over time. So last year, the rate increase that we had achieved, the full rate increase for the all of the customer classes except single family and multifamily [11:13:34 AM] family and multifamily residential, which are being phased in. >> And, you know, I think education is great. It has it's purpose and benefits. But the thing that really moves the needle with people is that monthly bill. When they say, oh my gosh, I'm paying $200 for water so that I can have this beautiful green lawn. Maybe I need to have a little less, you know, and so I would love to continue to explore ways that we can, through financial incentives, change behavior, because education, unfortunately, will only go so much. And we're going to have to educate people monthly as they look at their bill that. >> That's right. And, you know, I see that this is maybe a theme. I've said this several times already today, but sort of every tool in the toolbox, turning every knob that we have, you know, we want to do all we're going to, we are going to do all of the things and incentivize and disincentivize people with every tool that we have. [11:14:35 AM] have. >> The only other question I have is as it relates to there's a reference in here about code changes and how that might impact irrigated space or other efficiencies within a home. Can you just talk briefly about what those changes are when they're being rolled out? >> Back in April, the council approved the technical codes, one of those being the uniform plumbing code. And in that there were three new local amendments that Austin water included in there and went through the mechanical and plumbing board last year and then to council, the first one required pressure regulating components and new irrigation systems. So pressure regulating heads or valves bringing pressure down because pressure is a great waster of water when it comes to irrigation system. The second amendment that we added restricted for new homes. The area of automatic irrigation [11:15:38 AM] area of automatic irrigation systems to 50% of the landscape area, you know, essentially front yard or backyard. You can have an automatic irrigation system. We found in talking with other water utilities that this was a very significant way to save water. As you might imagine, with landscape irrigation. And then the third one that we included required new homes that had a clothes washer on a wall exterior wall or perpendicular to that exterior wall to include plumbing that would divert water from a clothes washer to an outside stub out so that future homeowners could use that. Clothes. Washing water in an outside irrigation system. So those are the three that were added, and we're working with stakeholders, particularly builders, landscapers, irrigators, to determine the [11:16:39 AM] irrigators, to determine the best way to implement those going forward. So it's not going to be immediate, but we're working with them. How to roll that out. >> Great. Well thank you guys so much. Appreciate all your hard work. I know you're doing a lot and look forward to our next quarter update to see what's happening. >> Thank you very much. >> You got it. With our last 15 minutes or so, we'd love to invite our friends at the parks and recreation department to discuss what are we officially calling this? The. Sorry, I got to scroll down here. I'm in my Austin water. Additional park funding sources aptly named. For July. >> Do we have focus on the consultants going to hop on it? >> Yeah, I think this is just a opportunity for us to ask about a briefing. I don't know if y'all have a presentation or not. I don't I don't expect one, [11:17:40 AM] not. I don't I don't expect one, but really wanted to give the committee an opportunity to ask questions about the report that pfm did for you all around those additional funding ideas. >> Sure. Thank you. And we don't have a presentation. We do have a representative from one of the consultant teams on. I have some opening remarks, and then we can certainly engage and answer any questions. >> You might have. So I'll kick us off with, first of all, I guess saying good morning, council members. I'm Sarah and I am honored to serve as the director of Austin parks and recreation. And we are pleased here to be here this morning to discuss and update regarding this exploration of additional funding sources for the department. As you know, this resolution tasked us in the city manager with exploring additional funding sources for parks management, land acquisition, amenities, facilities and maintenance. And as directed, we convened a team of city Austin representatives and several agencies and engaged an outside consultant team. We engaged two consulting firms, the trust for public land and pfm group consulting, and between February and June of 2025, the team worked to identify potential sustainable [11:18:41 AM] identify potential sustainable additional revenue sources to help close the department's growing funding gap and strengthen its long term financial footing. This work consisted of three phases a benchmarking test, best practices, conducting a fiscal economic landscape analysis, and recommending funding options. Not surprisingly, the study identified Austin parks and recreation significant reliance on our annual general fund transfer as a key challenge. Further, the report found that this dependency is expected to grow unless the department reduces costs or finds new revenue sources compared to peer cities analyzed in the study. Austin parks received less support from non-general fund sources and generate significantly less revenue despite having high expenditures. The study highlighted that Austin parks and recreational opportunities and amenities contribute meaningfully to the city's economy, boosting tourism, reducing health care costs, enhancing property values, and supporting environmental resilience. However, Austin parks and recreation only generates generated $15.9 million in revenue in fiscal year 24, while its operating expenses far exceeded that, creating a large and growing funding gap. To reduce [11:19:42 AM] funding gap. To reduce dependance on the general fund. The report. The report proposes a menu of short and long term options for a city to further explore and consider. Each of these options provides opportunity for deeper discussion and analysis, and each could present opportunities but also challenges within our local context. The short term options recommended include a new parks and recreation fee. The consultants estimated that a $1 monthly utility bill fee could generate $5.4 million annually. Consideration of drainage utility funding. Given that parks contribute to stormwater management, there could be justification for partial support from the city's drainage fees. If these fees were increased. Continued to expand partnerships, and build on formalizing partnerships like those with Austin parks foundation to free up resources and leverage community support. Looking to enhance cost recovery? The report proposes an analysis of fees to include more overhead and adjustment of rental charges for high demand facilities, continue advocating for bond funding for capital needs, of course, to address the large and growing deferred maintenance needs in the department. To address these [11:20:43 AM] department. To address these without increasing operating budget. And of course, according to the report, we could also explore service level adjustments if revenue doesn't increase, our Austin parks and recreation may need to prioritize core services and reduce offerings. Other long term options presented include exploring a city county parks district. For example, the team proposed the idea of considering a regional park district with Travis county or a local government corporation to create a dedicated sustainable revenue stream. Property tax strategies. The report highlights that some cities dedicate a portion of property taxes to parks, and of course, council is currently discussing this through a broader tree. And finally, the consultant team suggests continued state level advocacy and that we work towards legislative changes allowing for expanded taxation authority or pursue the creation of independent parks districts. So the consultant report makes clear something that I think all of us in this room believe that parks aren't just nice to have. Rather, they're essential to our city's health, economy and environment. But to keep delivering on those benefits, we need to invest more sustainably in the system that supports [11:21:44 AM] in the system that supports them. And we'll need a combination of strategies, including policy shifts, new revenue tools, deeper partnerships and community support. And with that, and I guess before I end, I do want to express my appreciation to the city team partners, including the folks at law and finance services who supported this work. And I want to especially thank the parks team for doing this in a pretty quick way. And it was ably led by Alyssa, who's our division manager for their. I want to thank them for their great work. So I'm joined here by Lisa and our assistant director doctor, and we're happy to answer any questions. >> Very good. Well I will, I think turn it over to the vice chair who has led on this issue for a long time. So, vice chair, I. >> Think I've been around long enough to remember these ideas coming forward. I know that a lot of this stemmed from conversations around parkland dedication fees, and we know that, you know, we had one formula that the city had been operating with for a number of years, and then the state legislature came up with a different formula. So we're all kind of adjusting into what is [11:22:44 AM] kind of adjusting into what is the new future of potential funding sources for the parks department. Have any conversations with the county begun? Just kind of testing the waters of do they have an appetite for trying to do something like a parks district? I know we're discussing the idea of a parks maintenance fee, so I'm trying to figure out, you know, which route could actually get us the most impact for parks maintenance. >> We have officially initiated those discussions. I think the idea of this report is to get that out there. I know that there's some outside groups who have had those discussions, but I'm not aware of kind of where they are. I don't know if you all know of it. >> And we are aware that park advocate groups have had some preliminary discussions from our understanding about this process. It's going to take sufficient time through the legislation, probably multiple sessions. So it's something that we are considering as a mid to long term approach in order to [11:23:47 AM] long term approach in order to be able to establish a park district in central Texas. >> So would it take further legislative action at the state level to allow us or can you talk me through some of those logistical discussions? >> We are not at our level. We are not there yet. So that if that is something that the city has the interest to pursue, that would be the next step that we will reach out to the Travis county and also be able to explore the steps. >> Okay, I know the report itself does mention a couple of different other case studies that have that have utilized this. Is there any understanding or information in the report about timeline to your knowledge? >> I, the one that we are aware is comal county. And it is my understanding that that took several sessions in order to come into fruition. And then there was additional amendments in order to make it work for [11:24:49 AM] in order to make it work for them. >> Okay. And then I'll switch over to the topic of a maintenance fee, which is the one that most people have been talking about more commonly lately. You know, $5.4 million for each dollar on the utility bill. If we were to try to get to a point of this, you know, exceeding the maintenance levels we had back in 2014, how how many dollars would that end up being? >> As part of the study, we actually took a broader look to see what is that we are missing. And obviously the needs for the department are significant. We are we are estimating that what we need is upwards of 30 million for the department to be able to get to a point that we will be competitive with the cities that [11:25:50 AM] competitive with the cities that we looked at that are highly, highly ranked with, from the trust for public lands. Now, we also understand that this is not going to happen overnight and actually cannot happen overnight. So even if we are to get to day 30 million, that's not reasonable. And it's going to be we have plenty of constraints that we will not be able to efficiently and effectively utilize this kind of funding. So. I also personally think that it's going to be it's not going to be a one solution that satisfies everything, but it's going to be a number of solutions that incrementally will get us there. Does that answer your question? >> It does. It's helpful. And I just want to flag, you know, the level of detailed information that I think is going to be coming your way, probably from me and other people is going to be really important in this [11:26:51 AM] be really important in this conversation. I know that there's discussion around different formats of cost of service fees, and we want to make sure we're completely in line with, you know what? What is the cost that that is actually being implemented right now through general fund? What could be a cost of service fee, whether that is your department or any other department. But we're going to be getting into the nitty gritty of, you know, who's responsible for what, which fees are being applied where. I don't know that I want to increase fees on people renting facilities that the city owns. I think those are the ones that should be available to the most people in the public. I don't want this to become a situation where only the folks with extra dollars to spend get to utilize our city park spaces, and I know that's something that the parks department cares a lot about to make sure these spaces are available and accessible to everyone. But I know we've done work with the clean community fee over the years where we created, you know, a, a survey and analysis that is still utilized about creek cleanups [11:27:52 AM] utilized about creek cleanups and wanting to make sure that we can show our homework and let folks know what it is that the dollars are being spent on. I don't think a park maintenance fee is going to hit the level. You know, I don't I don't think council would set that fee at a level that is going to fully encompass the actual cost to the department, but there are ways to set fees where we are recovering portions of the dollars that are actually needed to be able to do this. And so I want to pursue both the conversation about a parks maintenance fee and a parks district, just to see what those details are. I know the district is going to be a heavier lift, but I know that, you know, there's been great success in partnerships between the city and the county in this conversation. They're the only ones that have the authority to be able to even pursue this district. So we'd want to make sure they're on board. But there's tons of families all over town that, you know, they don't necessarily pay attention to, whether it's a city park or a county park, because to them, a park is a park, and I'm fine with that. I want people to be able to go wherever it is they [11:28:52 AM] able to go wherever it is they want to, to spend their their time off. But I think that level of detail is something we're going to have to drill down into very soon to understand what what really is maintenance, you know, which what is grounds maintenance, what is fixing fencing and replacing light bulbs, what is trash pickup and things like that. So we're going to need that level of detail to really understand what our best pathway forward is. And so I hope as the next phases of this analysis and reporting come through, that we can drill down into that. So we have a clearer picture for everybody of what the need is. You know, I would love for the parks department to have a bigger slice of the general fund, but when two thirds of it is going to public safety and we're still having conversations about the need to increase funding for public safety, we're just in a tight spot and we have to make sure that we are properly maintaining the land that we own and making sure that everybody who comes to visit our parks has clean and accessible spaces to be able to do that. [11:29:54 AM] do that. >> All right, before I pass along, I'll just double on that. I think if you look at any successful park system across the country, you know, Minneapolis, Chicago, some of the great systems that the thing that always seems to be in common is they do have this sustainable funding source that's in some form of a district. And I think long term that is what is going to be required for us to meet the needs and, and really the expectations of the community, but also recognize the political realities of such a district. And so it is a longer term project. While we still explore these short term options. And then the last thing I will just kind of preview for the group here. You know, one thing we're looking at, it's referenced in this report are fees related to large events. And, you know, of course, our largest event that [11:30:54 AM] course, our largest event that we have is acl. And so I've been exploring even before this report came out, the per ticket fee that is assessed by the parks department and how we could potentially adjust that fee to bring more revenue to the parks department. Right. I know one of the conversations has always been, well, if you do that, it just goes to the general fund and we use it for anything. And so we're looking at a way to not only raise additional dollars, but capture those dollars for the parks department. So looking forward to working with you on that. But, you know, I think as councilmember Ellis mentioned and, you know, highlighted by the various options, there's no one solution. And you've said that as well. And so I'm hopeful that we can build this puzzle, put all the pieces together, and ultimately have a beautiful park system that we I know we all want. So yeah, I'll leave it there. Any last words? Anything. Okay. >> We appreciate it. >> Well, with that then one minute after. That's our that's [11:31:56 AM] minute after. That's our that's a new record for us here. I will adjourn the climate. Thank you. Climate water, environment and parks committee, thank you all so much.