Last week, the Texas Parks & Wildlife Dept. became the second state agency
to officially oppose the addition of the Barton Springs Salamander to the
Endangered Species List. They join the Texas Natural Resource Conservation
Commission, which voted last month to intervene in the case known as Save
Our Springs Alliance and Dr. Mark Kirkpatrick vs. Bruce Babbitt. That suit,
filed last October and now pending in federal district court, is seeking
federal protection for the salamander… — R.B.
Former Assistant City Manager Byron Marshall, now a higher-up with the city of
Atlanta, is said to be negotiating a part-time consulting gig with the Austin
Revitalization Authority, the nonprofit board charged with breathing new life
into East 11th and 12th Streets. The ARA has gone for more than a year without
an executive director, so developer/lobbyist Cal Varner, who pretty much has
been calling the shots at ARA anyway, decided Marshall would be the ideal man
for the job, albeit in a consulting role. Neither Marhsall nor Varner returned
phone calls…
Consider that timing is everything in comedy and politics, and then consider
this: The day after Mayor Bruce Todd appointed Richard Moya to the board of the
badly frayed Austin Housing Authority, Moya’s name cropped up in a meaty Dallas Morning News story last Friday, Jan. 24, that outlined who’s who in
the Texas lottery. Moya, former Travis County Commissioner and aide to former
Gov. Ann Richards, was among the Austin folks (nearly all of them Democrats)
who made the list. Moya, along with former Texas Commerce head Cathy Bonner, is
employed by FIRSTeam, a subcontractor of GTECH, the lottery’s prime operator
under federal probe…
Chris Hearne, founder of Austin’s celebrated and now defunct Third
Coast magazine, as well as The Houston Press, is hunkered down in
Houston these days preparing to launch Sidewalk, an online city
entertainment guide. The ambitious effort is being bankrolled by Microsoft
Corp, which has chosen Houston and a dozen other U.S. cities as the initial
target sites …
Come gather ye people at the Mexican Consulate, Sixth & Brazos, at noon
Friday, Jan. 31, for a demonstration in support of the Zapatista Army’s efforts
to add indigenous rights to the Mexican Constitution. A follow-up rally is at
noon, Feb. 5, same place. — A.S.
10-4, Chief Watson
With a hesitant smile and restrained demeanor, Police Chief Elizabeth Watsonannounced her resignation at a press conference Wednesday. After five years of
duty, she leaves a police force desperately trying to close a shortfall of more
than 100 officers, and leaves a legacy of a department in self-doubt. Austin’s
first female police chief, Watson’s ambitious streamlining and focus on
community policing left her frequenly embroiled in controversy. The Austin
Police Association gave her a vote of no confidence last year, when response
times and crime were on the rise, and the size of the police force was
decreasing because of unplanned retirements.
But the spite of the opposition was equaled by the appreciation of supporters.
Watson focused on minority police advancement, and responded well to community
concerns, as with the creation of a citizens’ task force to deal with the 1995
Cedar Avenue “Valentine’s Day Massacre” in East Austin, and the creation of a
Chief’s Forum to improve neighborhood relations.
Shortly after the officer shortfall became hotly criticized last spring,
Watson began speaking with Justice Department officials about creating a new
position on officer leadership education. The Justice Department responded with
a $247,000 one-year fellowship, and Watson is scheduled to begin on March 1, at
an Austin-based office. Despite the timing, Watson says Austin’s bloody
politics did not provoke her job search. “I am not running from anything,” she
said. “It’s the ability to chart my own destiny. That’s what it’s about.” City
Manager Jesus Garza will put out an All Points Bulletin for a successor, and
the fate of Watson’s community-policing philosophy hangs in the balance. —
A.M.
FAIR, You Say?
Hardly. Last week, the Electric Utility Department released its analysis ofthe proposed rate reduction to Austin’s largest ratepayers, represented by the
Federation of Austin’s Industrial Ratepayers (FAIR). The results show that
Seton Hospital, Advanced Micro Devices, IBM, Texas Instruments, Applied
Materials, and Motorola could pay as low as 67% of the cost of production, if
the council approves the $4.2 million annual rate reduction today. What a
deal.
Four different formulas were used to derive the cost. Three were recommended
by the Electric Utility Commission in 1994, but were never implemented by EUD
Director John Moore. The fourth has been an EUD mainstay, and shows FAIR at 98%
cost-of-production. Even under that scenario FAIR is a liability, but staff
doesn’t want to lose the $24 million annual income from the Selfish Six in the
event of a competitive, deregulated market. The EUD wants that income to help
pay down the massive debt, and recommends the reduction. A majority of the
council seems to concur. As Councilmember Jackie Goodman notes, the only
relevant factor in an auction are the other guy’s prices, and the EUD’s
industrial rates are currently among the state’s highest. Under the proposal,
those rates will decrease from 4.5cents to 4.2cents per kilowatt hour.
Residents pay almost twice that, at 7.4cents.
Considering that the Selfish Six could be so far below the cost-of-production,
and that they’ve received three rate reductions in 10 years, and that the state
Lege isn’t even expected to deregulate the industry until at least 1999,
Councilmembers Beverly Griffith and Daryl Slusher oppose the deal. “This is
corporate welfare and the last time I checked, these people were slightly above
the poverty line,” says attorney W. Scott McCollough, who was hired by the city
to represent residential ratepayers. Interestingly, McCollough notes, the local
daily was given the cost-of-production results on Friday but, as of Wednesday,
had not reported on the findings. — A.M.
No Comment
One of the onlookers waiting outside the House chamber after Gov. George W.Bush’s State of the State speech on Tuesday was University of Texas Chancellor
William “Dollar Bill” Cunningham. Asked how the $655,422 he made last year by
exercising stock options granted to him by Freeport-McMoRan benefitted the
University of Texas, the ethically challenged head of the UT System, who has
never talked to the press about the issue, responded, “Call my office at your
convenience.”
After the question was posed several more times, he replied, “You are the only
one that cares about this issue.” Cunningham then was reminded that the local
daily had also weighed in on the subject, calling his financial windfall
“unseemly.” His response to the editorial: “That wasn’t fair.” —
R.B.
Political Roadkill
The long and winding road of egg-headed decisions and government bailout thatresulted in the Southwest Parkway will come to a head at 7pm, Monday, February
3 at Covington Elementary in Oak Hill. A public hearing will be held on
Councilmember Daryl Slusher’s proposal to close half of the oft-empty road,
which rolls out like a grey carpet to the opulent estates of a few hundred
homeowners, some in Freeport-McMoRan’s Lantana and Barton Creek Community
developments.
As a journalist with this paper, Slusher railed against Freeport and the
roadway, and against current Mayor Bruce Todd, who had an extensive hand in
creating it. Expect an old fashioned head-to-head between Slusher and Todd,
who’ve kept their mutual dislike relatively low-key since Slusher took office
last year. Slusher complains that as a Travis County Commissioner, Todd voted
for a $3.5 million loan to bail out the road, which had been initiated by
private developers. Slusher notes that Todd also voted to refinance the road
district’s bonds, taking the tag from $60 million to $230 million, courtesy of
Travis County taxpayers. Now, the city has to maintain much of the parkway,
which is often in disrepair because, ironically, the Edwards Aquifer underneath
is causing water damage to the asphalt. Moreover, Slusher notes that traffic
can get by just as quickly with three lanes as six, and that a smaller road may
result in less development, thus preserving the aquifer.
Todd, who did not return calls, is expected to rally an army of opposition,
and purposely chose Covington Middle School in Oak Hill, to ensure that enviros
would be outnumbered; funny thing is, few from Oak Hill actually use the
parkway. If anything, Monday’s head-butting session could be a good time to put
that new bike helmet to use. — A.M.
Mellow Yellow Bikes
Turns out there is such a thing as a free ride, thanks to the Jan. 25Bikes Not Bombs (BNB) release of 24 bright yellow “community bikes” at
Wheatsville Food Co-op for destination points all over Austin. The bikes are
hard to miss, since even their tires are painted yellow, and stickers
proclaiming, “Please don’t lock me up,” and “Free to ride, but not to keep,”
adorn every surface. Though BNB’s Yellow Bike Project coordinators Dave
Butler and John Thoms are basing their efforts on a similar and highly
successful program out of Portland, Oregon, they have concerns about the yellow
bikes’ viability in Austin, considering the recently passed mandatory helmet
ordinance. Riders “aren’t the owners of the bikes, so you can’t really expect
them to have a helmet on their person when they find them,” says Baker. So far
there have been no reports of yellow bike riders receiving tickets, but Baker
is not waiting for the inevitable. BNB has already called upon councilmember
Daryl Slusher, who is critical of the helmet ordinance, to help draft a waiver
of the helmet law for yellow bike riders.
The non-profit BNB’s primary concern now is getting more yellow bikes out on
the street. With only 24 released, Baker admits “they’re pretty tricky to find,
[but] we’ve been functioning on zero money, so far.” He credits volunteers and
donations of everything from bike parts to yellow paint for keeping the project
afloat. Portland’s project, which doesn’t have a helmet law to contend with,
maintains about 300 bikes on the street at any given time, but has lost twice
that number to vandalism and theft. Baker confirms that several of Austin’s
yellow bikes have already been stripped, but that all have been retrieved and
will be back in the fleet soon. — K.V.
Power Talk
Now that consumer and environmental groups are out of the pro-deregulationalliance with business interests, legislation that would loosen up the electric
utility monopoly may be in limbo. But the issue is still far from dead. Last
Wednesday, the day before negotiations broke off, the hot topic at the Austin
Area League of Women Voters’ annual State of the City powwow was,
appropriately, the future of the city’s Electric Utility Dept. (EUD).
Holding forth with varying opinions were Terrell Blodgett, urban management
professor at UT; W. Neal Kocurek, Electric Utility Commission member and Radian
executive; and Jim Marston, director of the Texas Environmental Defense Fund.
As Marston sees it, the city needs to pursue alternative power sources,
particularly in light of tougher air quality standards proposed by the
Environmental Protection Agency. Should those standards become law, Marston
added, Austin’s increased level of pollution no doubt will put the city in a
“non-attainment” category. Marston noted that polls indicate consumers are
willing to pay more money for cleaner sources of power, but in order to make
intelligent choices, “consumers need information on the kinds of emissions from
the various sources.”
Kocurek likewise stressed the importance of information. Advocating an
overhaul of the city’s EUD, he spoke in favor of an independent board that
would be free of day-to-day city control. The utility, he said, “needs to be
operated like a business…
We can’t make the same mistakes we’ve made with
Brackenridge Hospital.” Kocurek reiterated the ever-popular idea of reducing
the amount of utility money transferred annually to the city’s general fund.
Retaining some of the transfer would bolster the utility’s financial position
and provide more leverage for development and investment, Kocurek said. Even
with the changes, he added, the $550 million-a-year utility would still be a
small mom-and-pop business.
Picking up on the analogy, Blodgett declared, “We’re operating a mom-and-pop
store in a Walmart economy.” And he implied that some city councilmembers have
been na�ve in so readily embracing the idea of a separate board for the
utility, when there are still so many questions left to answer. Though the
creation of a truly independent board would require an amendment to the city
charter, Blodgett said, “The board proposed is so weak, it hardly requires an
amendment.” Blodgett pushed for an informed debate on the other choices, which
include regionalizing the utility, merging it with another utility, or selling
it outright.
Most of all, he warned, voters need to be informed about deregulation. “We
need an educational effort. We have to cut the transfer or increase taxes or
decrease services. We can’t go on the way we have.” — L.C.
This article appears in January 31 • 1997 and January 31 • 1997 (Cover).