Turning Point
Relations on the Mend
By Jenny Staff, Fri., Feb. 19, 1999
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S.O.S. Chair Robin Rather |
When the council they helped elect voted 7-0 on the preliminary approval, the S.O.S. leaders made no secret of their anger. Rumors flew, including one that had S.O.S. fielding an opponent -- from the environmental left -- to run against Mayor Pro Tem Jackie Goodman when she makes her re-election bid this spring. Though Rather says this rumor is untrue, it was probably given credence by coalition consultant Mark Yznaga, who when asked by the political newsletter In Fact if support of the Forum would hurt the environmental council in this year's election, answered along the lines of, "What environmental council?" (And it wouldn't be the first time environmentalists were split in their support of Goodman. When she first ran for council in 1993, Bunch recruited his own candidate, businessman Mark Tschurr, to oppose her.)
S.O.S. is back on the council's team now, according to all of its leaders (a group not always in lock-step agreement with one another). "We got a slow start on the year," admitted Bunch of S.O.S.'s relations with the council. "We've resolved to do better." Rather characterizes the bad blood between S.O.S. and City Council as a sensitive area, due to the fact that "many if not all members of the S.O.S. board were shocked and very deeply disappointed in the original vote on the Forum PUD."
Mitigating Factors
Born of the Forum PUD debate, the so-called mitigation policy is the city staff's effort, in conjunction with both environmentalists and developers, to create baseline standards for land mitigation. The idea behind mitigation is that developers could exceed impervious cover limits if they set aside other environmentally sensitive tracts for conservation. While councilmembers so far appear to favor the idea, S.O.S. leaders remain unconvinced that the proposal is sound. If adopted, it would be the first ever substantive amendment to the S.O.S. ordinance (excluding the interim ordinance necessitated by the 1997 repeal of SB 1704). The public will get a chance to comment on the draft policy at a public hearing, tentatively scheduled for March 11.
As currently written, the draft policy has two options. The first, the "administrative process," is designed to be a conservative standard, according to Mike Heitz, director of the city's Drainage Utility Department. He says the draft proposal is designed to be "something that everybody that looks at it could clearly say is better than what the current code is." Projects that met these specifications could be approved by city staff, without council input or oversight; projects that exceeded them would require approval by the council -- Option Two. Though simple in concept, the administrative process depends on a series of direct and inverse relationships (as effective impervious cover increases, development site impervious cover decreases; as mitigation acreage increases, development site impervious cover increases). For each of these relationships, as in the S.O.S. ordinance, there are different standards for the Barton Springs Recharge Zone, the Barton Creek Contributing Zone, and the Non-Barton Creek Contributing Zone.
Option One would cap all impervious cover at 50%, with a maximum of 150,000 square feet per tract (the draft does not specify tract size), and 100,000 square feet per individual tenant. The mitigation land must be at least as environmentally sensitive as the land to be developed, and within two miles of the tract to be developed; the more sensitive the mitigation tract, the less of it the developer has to provide. And impervious cover could be increased above S.O.S. standards only in the 1999 Austin city limits, within the Barton Springs zone.
The mitigation policy would codify at least the concept raised by the Forum, if not that project's exact specifications. At the Forum, Brownlee and her attorneys have asked for up to 60% impervious cover, 10% more than the policy allows. But according to attorney Jeff Howard, city staffers (whose support for the project has been unwavering) always intended the Forum to be a second-tier project; one that would have to go before the council for approval.
Neither S.O.S. nor the development community has endorsed the draft; not surprisingly, each group objects to a different piece of the policy. S.O.S. Chair Rather says she fears that the two-tiered approval system will encourage the type of one-off deals with big developers that S.O.S. aimed to stop. She calls the policy the "luxury sedan of 'get around the [S.O.S.] ordinance' vehicles." Attorney Howard says that while his team favors the two-tiered system, some developers are said to be uncomfortable with the draft policy's impervious cover limits.
Even Lauren Ross, who's pushing the Forum mitigation plan, isn't convinced the city should be pursuing a formal policy on the matter: "This community has debated transfer of development rights for many, many years. I don't know that we're ready to codify a [transfer] standard, which is what the mitigation policy is. It makes me nervous to pull away the council review process. The mitigation policy has been challenging for the city, because it's in the context of the Forum. It felt to me that most of the people were in the room either to try to get the Forum passed, or to try to stop it."
City Manager Jesus Garza, however, says the dissent is a sign that things are going swimmingly: "Either side doesn't believe we are the good guys. That means we've done our job," he told the council. But Robin Rather said that characterization "scares me beyond belief. You can't have the attitude that if no one likes it, it's a win. In Austin, it is possible to satisfy developers, neighborhoods, and environmentalists at the same time. It's not only possible, it's necessary. It's dangerous to start thinking it's not."
Bunch remains suspicious of the policy because of its origins: "What bothers me is that the whole effort was not motivated by 'how can we increase protection,' [but by], 'How do we dodge S.O.S. and increase development in the Barton Creek zone?'"
Now that it's come up, though, some council watchers say that mitigation is an idea that should have been tried a long time ago. Why hasn't it? "Because it sounds like a sellout," said one. Daryl Slusher agrees, musing on what would have happened if "I woke up one day and said, 'I've got this idea -- you'll be able to build more than S.O.S. allows on certain tracts, and you just buy over here -- it's mitigation!' What do you think S.O.S.'s reaction would have been?"
A February 10 memo from S.O.S. to the council argues that the policy will allow large-scale projects to be built in the Water Quality Protection Zone, "which will directly compete with Desired Development Zone development for investment funds." The memo states that absent a consensus, a mitigation policy "is not desirable" until the city adopts "a neighborhood and land-use/watershed protection plan" for the Barton Springs zone.
Speaking of Land Use...
The land use issue is a prime example of one way the Alliance is changing with the times. S.O.S. was about water quality from the start, but it was also about protecting a sentimental favorite natural feature, Barton Springs, and its surrounding natural environment, from casual degradation by those who would make a quick dollar. Their arguments lately have been veering even more toward land use and other bigger-picture issues than just water quality. Robin Rather says that's no accident. "That's a very conscious and strategic decision on our part," she said. "One misconception about S.O.S. is that it's totally anti-growth. [But we're able] to say yes -- to CSC, to downtown revitalization, to a meaningful Desired Development Zone."
In the Forum case, for example, an early S.O.S. opposition memo ("A Short List of Reasons to Oppose the Forum PUD") contained not one argument based solely on water quality, but instead talked about the development as a generator of unacceptable traffic and as a magnet for other growth and infrastructure construction. All of these could adversely affect water quality, S.O.S. argues, and several councilmembers have stated they would withhold approval of the Forum if they believe the land use is inappropriate (read: too big) for the chosen neighborhood.
All parties -- the Forum developer, S.O.S., City Council -- insist they're open to talking things over with the others, but nobody seems to be taking the initiative necessary to work out a compromise. That's probably because both sides in this battle are still fighting to win. Because Slusher has indicated he won't support the plan without substantial changes, he seems to have been largely written off as a "no" vote. Mayor Pro Tem Jackie Goodman seems firm in her support of the project, and Councilmember Spelman has insisted that the vote wait until the adoption of the mitigation policy. The rest of the council has not made much of their position. Their silence could be read as a good sign for the Forum supporters, but because the project requires an ordinance change and therefore the affirmative votes of six councilmembers, it will only take one defector to join Slusher in sinking the cause.
Changing Times
The sometimes inflammatory Bunch has mellowed some since he called the Austin Chamber of Commerce the developers' "anti-S.O.S. mouthpiece" in the June 24, 1992, issue of the Chronicle. (So, presumably, has the Chamber, but that's another story.) And the choice of high-tech professional Rather as the S.O.S. chair says they want to build bridges with the business community instead of burning them. Still, it's easy to overlook just how much consensus the old enemies have achieved. The long list of bond and downtown projects that have been moved through the political assembly line in the last year would not have been possible without a good deal of compromise, and faith that the other side would play fair. Nevertheless, S.O.S. members have pulled back slightly from their constant discussions with the Chamber and other business types, and each side has complained of being used by the other for PR purposes.
Both Bunch and Ross have some truth on their side of the Forum debate: It's true, as Bunch insists, that this community has decided it does not want big developments on the aquifer, polluting and otherwise generally degrading Austin's environment and quality of life. It's also true that some of that is going to happen anyway, as the projects that have continued to spring up since the passage of S.O.S. demonstrate. Looking at the South end of MoPac these days -- with apartment complexes and chain restaurants cropping up left and right -- you wouldn't guess that that part of Austin is the focus of one of the most restrictive water quality ordinances in the country.
Even if S.O.S. "wins" the Forum battle, its victory may be short-lived. Landowner Brownlee is 64 and at a point in her life where she would like to make a return on the sweat and tears her family invested in the land. Truth be told, the land will be developed, possibly under its existing single-family zoning. That could also mean kissing the Blowing Sink tract goodbye, too, as residential developers have been eyeing the Dawson family-owned property. But Ross winces at the thought. "I can't imagine single-family residential on the Blowing Sink tract," she says. "It's too painful for me, too nonsensical."
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