Public Notice: Happy New Year?

Well, this has been one hell of a year, but as we shut the book on 2020, even as we sink to new lows in economic health and hospital bed availability, there are ample reasons to be optimistic about 2021.

First is the housecleaning in the White House, of course. Joe Biden may not have been my first choice – probably wasn't a lot of people's first choice – but at least he's a genuine and decent human being, which really isn't something anyone ever claims about The Donald.

Second is COVID-19, of course. And while we've had too many deaths and closings, at least there's light at the end of the lockdown tunnel, and folks are starting to make plans for real-life events and celebrations in the second half of the year. If only everyone can stay alive and sane until then. To that end, stimulus money and local relief initiatives have eased the burden on most of those hardest hit.

Local politics (as is so often the case at the Chronicle) are where things get interesting. As I wrote last week, the outgoing City Council did a fine job on the twin crises of the year – police oversight and the plague – but was often paralyzed by toxic factionalism when the topic turned to anything else. The incoming Council will be absent its most antagonistic firebrand (for better and worse) in Jimmy Flannigan, so maybe the rest of the pack can learn to work better together and concentrate on hating on his replacement, Mackenzie Kelly, the first Republican on the dais since the ever-hateable Don Zim­merman. Just kidding; I'm sure everyone will get along swimmingly. The new Council's first meeting will be next week (Wed., Jan. 6), and thus far the interregnum has been marked with talk of reconciliation and of a kinder, gentler climate in the (still-virtual) Council chambers. But then someone asked, "Who's going to be mayor pro tem?" and the knives have already started to come out (read more here). So, we shall see. I remain hopeful.

Speaking of predicting Council factions: I also wrote last week that Council Member-elect Vanessa Fuentes had "cited Pio Renteria and Ann Kitchen as members she'll likely find common ground with" – but that reference to Renteria was based on my faulty memory of our endorsement interview; Fuentes did not in fact say that about him but only about CM Kitchen. Read into that what you may, but my sincere apologies to CM Fuentes for the error.

And then there's the Austin ISD Board of Trustees, which will have four new members in the new year (two were already sworn in last week; two are still waiting because their races went to run-offs). Here the dynamic is much clearer: It was an activist slate that swept all four seats that were up for election in November – in three disparate districts and a citywide at-large race – and they'll be expecting to make some changes regarding the district's school closure plan, and equity in general, where the existing board showed perhaps too much deference to the administration and business interests that tend to put their fingers on the scale.

So ... yeah. There's some optimism for 2021. It can't be any worse, right?