Naked City

The City Council should take a pass on a proposed settlement with Lowe's Home Improvement Warehouse until weightier budget matters are resolved, Council Member Daryl Slusher said Monday as he sought to delay discussion and action on the tentative agreement posted on today's (Thursday) agenda. Slusher also seeks to postpone a vote, likewise citing budget concerns, on a council resolution condemning the federal USA PATRIOT Act while allowing for deliberation and public input (see p.20).

The home-improvement giant wants to lay stakes across 30 acres of environmentally sensitive property on Brodie Lane in Southwest Austin. The city and Lowe's had wrangled over the size and scope of the development until reaching a tentative compromise that would include Lowe's acquisition of 52 acres of as-yet-unspecified property to be set aside for conservation -- and to mitigate the Lowe's project's own lack of compliance with the impervious cover limits of the Save Our Springs Ordinance.

That mitigation gesture is not enough to quell opposition from those who argue that big-box stores simply don't belong over the aquifer, period. Another fear is that the council might be willing to cut a deal with Lowe's while still holding Wal-Mart at bay in its bid to build a Supercenter atop aquifer turf further south, at MoPac and Slaughter Lane. (Also south, but not over the aquifer, neighbors have begun to mobilize against another Wal-Mart Supercenter planned for I-35 and Slaughter.) Lowe's foes were caught off guard last week when the retailer's representatives, including former Mayor Bruce Todd, laid out the terms of Lowe's proposed agreement -- as if the deal were already cooked -- before the Travis Co. Commissioners Court. The county is not itself a party to the proposed agreement; commissioners approved Lowe's preliminary plat but made that approval contingent on either a final settlement between the city and Lowe's or a court ruling favoring Lowe's.

"So we are heading for another raucous public debate over a development agreement," Slusher said in a three-page statement. The council member laid out the terms of the proposed agreement (40% impervious cover, SOS water-quality controls, Green Building standards, and -- attractive for the cash-strapped city -- early annexation) while reminding his audience that Lowe's has followed the tried-and-true developer strategy of getting support from the Lege for added leverage in negotiations. (Todd and other Lowe's reps have claimed that an amendment passed in the spring session means that Lowe's concessions are more than Austin can require by law.)

"It is unfortunate that companies and developers put the council and the aquifer in such a position," Slusher noted, "but that is the reality."