City Council Notebook
It's a Valentine's Day Massacre at City Council.
By Wells Dunbar, 1:21PM, Wed. Feb. 13, 2008
Agenda highlights for the Thursday, Feb. 14 meeting
Item 2: Resolving Austin won't participate in the South Texas nuke expansion, i.e., the Meeker-mentum murderer.
Item 3: Setting May 10's City Council and charter elections. Hmm, maybe the Democrats will have a presidential nominee by them?
Items 5-7: Loving Long long time: providing parking, right-of-ways, and establishing the Austin Music Memorial at the Long Center.
Item 21: Prohibiting imitation of APD uniforms. Well hey, the new uniforms and badges are already imitating the LAPD, so …
Items 22-31: Your new FEMA floodplain buyouts.
Item 35: Speaking of government boondoggles, Item 35 gives $108,777 for West Bouldin Creek wastewater work ("for a total contract amount not to exceed $1,323,517") to a local arm of war-profiteers Kellogg, Brown and Root. Lovely!
Items 36-43: Lowering the speed limit on a whole shitload of residential streets. Making your children safer – provided they're not snatched outta the back of your Jeep.
Items 52, 53: Setting a public hearing and presentation on single member districts – council has until May March 6 to set SMDs for an election.
Item 54: Council crafts guidelines for Green Water Treatment Plant's request for development proposals. As long as it doesn't block any traffic by City Hall.
Item 56: Changing the African American Cultural Arts District to the African American Cultural Heritage District. How many people know we have an African American Cultural Arts District?
Item 57: Naming Austin's new sister city: Antalya, Turkey.
Item 63: Update on the 51st Street reclaimed water tower – looks like they're going with the plainer (and cheaper) "composite" tank design, and saying sayonara to the spire.
Item 64: Presentation of the "phase one report" of the Downtown Austin Plan. Apparently, we (or more accurately, ROMA Design Group) could not drag this mo-fo out any longer if we tried.
Item 66: Executive session talks "related to the implementation of the current City Manager's compensation and benefits resolution," i.e., "If we give you more money, Toby, will you leave?"
Item 75: Action on Toby's golden handshake.
Item 76: 2pm briefing on the city's Webberville tract. Garbage dump! Garbage dump!
Item 84: Second and third readings on zoning for the Henry Colley House.
Items 85-94: Zoning includes VMU opts for Rosedale Neighborhood (85), Windsor Road (91), and North Loop (93) neighborhoods.
Items 97, 98: 6pm public hearing for CWS to plea reconsideration of their denied waterfront overlay variances. How's "no" sound, again?
