Mayor Pro Tem Kathie Tovo has competition in her re-election campaign for the District 9 seat on City Council. Danielle Skidmore, an engineer by trade and local transgender and LGBTQ advocate, filed her campaign treasurer appointment last week. The paperwork is the first step toward announcing an official bid for the Council seat. (Official filing doesn’t begin until late July.) Skidmore, who would be Austin’s first out transwoman to serve on City Council should she pull off the upset victory, oversees transportation design, drainage, hydrologic modeling, and more at K. Friese + Associates and also serves on the city’s LGBTQ Quality of Life Commission (she’s Tovo’s appointee). She’s named Alicia Roth Weigel, director of policy and advocacy at Wendy Davis’ nonprofit Deeds Not Words, as her campaign manager.
This article appears in March 16 • 2018.