City Council Notebook
What's up for Thursday?
By Wells Dunbar, 4:20PM, Wed. Feb. 27, 2008
Agenda highlights for the Thursday, Feb. 28 meeting
Items 2 & 3: Regulating heavy-duty truck idling. Only in Texas could this prove mildly controversial.
Item 9: "Authorize negotiation and execution of a 12-month lease with Perry Lorenz for ground space at 315 Sabine St., with four optional 12-month extensions, at an annual rental amount not to exceed $166,939.96, ratify payments made under a previous lease in the amount of $152,243.87, and authorize payment to Mr. Lorenz of $210,424.02 in hold-over rental charges accrued to date, for a total authorized amount not to exceed $1,197,367.69." You don't say! What, Toby not pay the light bill neither?
Item 15: $230,000 in legal fees to Denton, Navarro, Rocha & Berna for counsel in upcoming public safety negotiations. Against odds, could the Statesman find a way to bitch about these costs and the undue influence those eeeeeevil labor unions hold over us? If anyone could, it's Rich Oppel …
Item 16: $250,000 more to ROMA Design Group to transit plan-up their Downtown designs. I'll draw you a bus line for my light bill and some Kanye tickets!
Item 55: Identifying projects for the city's Webberville tract, or, Look! A Landfill!
Item 56: "A pilot program for LED (Light Emitting Diode) countdown crosswalk signals." Uhh …
Item 57: Levying fees on "animal traders" and adding "an animal processing fee." Again, uhh …
Item 58: Jennifer Kim's "neighborhood planning tool to utilize the affordable housing incentives for single-family development."
Item 60: Some real action: Betty "Knows Best" Dunkerley, Sheryl Cole and Brewster McCracken present a multi-part resolution "establishing criteria that must be met before Council considers a proposal to conduct a charter election on single member districts." Protective measure? Or poison pill? Debbie Russell ain't having it, yo.
Item 67: 10:30am presentation on evaluation and implementation of the Residential Design & Compatibility Standards, or "The McMansion Ordinance and the Damage Done."
Item 81: Presentation on single-member districts, featuring Democratic redistricting defendant J. Gerald Hebert as the map-man.
Items 89-111: A brief smattering (ha!) of zoning concerns.
Got something to say? The Chronicle welcomes opinion pieces on any topic from the community. Submit yours now at austinchronicle.com/opinion.
A note to readers: Bold and uncensored, The Austin Chronicle has been Austin’s independent news source for over 40 years, expressing the community’s political and environmental concerns and supporting its active cultural scene. Now more than ever, we need your support to continue supplying Austin with independent, free press. If real news is important to you, please consider making a donation of $5, $10 or whatever you can afford, to help keep our journalism on stands.
Maggie Q. Thompson, June 13, 2022
Austin Sanders, Aug. 13, 2021
Austin Sanders, Oct. 27, 2019
Richard Whittaker, Oct. 3, 2016
City Council, Development, Downtown, Single Member Districts, animal trading
