Travis County Commssioners Court
February 18, 2003
The Closed Caption log for this Commissioners Court agenda item is provided by Travis County Internet Services. Since this file is derived from the Closed Captions created during live cablecasts, there are occasional spelling and grammatical errors. This Closed Caption log is not an official record the Commissioners Court Meeting and cannot be relied on for official purposes. For official records please contact the County Clerk at (512) 854-4722.
Item 10
Now let's go quickly to 10 a and b. 10 b is to consider major policy issues regarding Travis County and city of Austin subdivision regulations, any amendments to those regulations and take appropriate action.
>> good afternoon. As you know, the last session of the legislature passed house bill 1455. Subsequent to that Travis County and the city of Austin entered into an interlocal agreement that chose one of the four options available in the bill. And that was to create a single office. And since that time we have used the single office to review subdivision plats in the e t.j. It also requires that we have a consistent and -- [ inaudible ] regulations for reviewing subdivision plats. In the last year we have worked with the city staff and the stakeholders to go over the differences between the county regulations and the city regulations. We have before you today -- [ inaudible ] of that issue. One are the issues that we have agreed to, and that was part a. We are bringing forward to you today items that the city and the county are agreeable to changing its code so that they are consistent between the two. Tom nichols, who has drafted our amendment to the subdivision regulations that will require a public hearing before we adopt those changes. Part b are major policy issues that the city and county staff are coming forward with a recommendation that which will need the concurrence of the city council and the commissioners court. These are the issues and heretofore we've had some difficulty with. And they are of such a nature that we believe they have to be agreed to at the highest level. And [ inaudible ] we'll review those issues with you today. So first let's go to the items that we agree to and tom will brief you on what those are.
>> so we ought to be looking at memo a?
>> that's correct.
>> okay.
>> memo a -- and I do -- I do have the actual draft. I did not get these to tnr able to include in your packet, but I can give y'all those know along with a the impact assessment under the property rights preservation act.
>> can you leave copies for commissioner Davis.
>> i've got his copies here.
>> I'm going to get more copies.
>> here are commissioner Davis' copies.
>> as joe said, the code amendments address the part of house bill 1445 that said the city and the county need to have consistent subdivision regulations. So with respect to these issues that are outlined in joe's memo a, generally for each issue you're going to have either the county amending its regulations to conform to the city's, the city's amending its regulations to conform to the county or something in between where there's sort of a meshing of the two. The way most of these code amendments came about is when the county staff, the city staff and the stakeholder representatives, the real estate council of Austin, the Texas capital area builders association, started tackling this part of the house bill 1445 requirement in August, all of the issues that surfaced fell into one of two categories. There was transportation or road issues, and then there were drainage or floodplain issues. And the larger working group the city and county broke into two subcommittees. There was one subcommittee on the county and road issues and one subcommittee on the drainage/floodplain issues. So that was part of the process where the various differences between the city and the county regulations came to light. And I will say one thing we added to the process was obviously the city and county regulations have both been around for a long time. In some cases those regulations were not as clear as they could have been. And there was always the issue of even if the city and the county meant to do the same thing, is the wording different? So the process in some cases was not the county adopting the city or the city adopting the county, there was always work done to improve the regulations and make them more understandable, and perhaps try to reflect any interpretations or practices the city and the county had adopted over team. So there's an element of that here. So we're really going beyond just the simple requirement of being consistent between city and the county. The code amendments is obviously the easier part of this whole equation. The major policy issues generate a lot more discussion, and I think it's going to be a more labor intensive process to try to reach consensus on those. These code amendments are fairly technical. That does not mean that they are 100% agreed to by all the parties. We do have -- we worked hard on getting draft language. We've had that circulated. As I said, there's not 100% agreement on it. I think it's to the point where we can propose it, but there still will be some issues we need to try to resolve before this language is adopted. And with that i'll try to go through these case by case and tell you with respect to each issue whether I think there's substantial agreement or whether there are still outstanding issues. On the connection of local street issues, that's an area where the county is basically changing our language to conform to the city. I don't think there are any outstanding issues there or at least none that i've heard of recently. On dual access, the -- that's really an area where the city is adopting a requirement that's in the county regs that's not currently in the city regs. I think that's one of those areas where we were trying to make the language clearer, but there are some issues there that we're not in 100% agreement on yet. The stakeholder representatives have made some comments on that, and so I think there's going to be some issues there we have to resolve.
>> this is dual access to a residential subdivision.
>> right.
>> okay.
>> the joint use driveway standards, this is an area where the city is simply adopting the county requirements, so there's really nothing y'all would be called on to do on this one. Access to major arterials and right-of-way reservation. The way I would classify these requirements is there's something -- they're something the city had in their regulations a lot of time. The reason the county didn't have anything similar to that is before senate bill 873 it's not something we could have required. So the thrust here is really for the county to change its regulations to match what's in the city requirements. And general again, may not we're we're able to did that is because senate bill 873 passed. I don't think there is any substantial issue on these. I think the county is simply adopting the city language almost verbatim. At least as close as we can. I know a lot of these issues it's going to be impossible to have verbatim language because both the city and the county in their regulations, we sort of adopt internal housekeeping measures. For example, the city regulations will call on a certain decision to be made by the director of development, review and watershed protection or the director of transportation planning and sustainability, whereas the county regulations, we'll call them the executive manager of tnr because we're set up differently. You can't always have the language be 100% the same. So there's only going to be minor variations, but our intent in this regard is to just take the substance of the city language verbatim without any changes and simply incorporate it into the county regulations. The roadway geometry issue, those are fairly technical changes. I don't think anything earth shaking there. I don't think there are any outstanding issues. Drainage and floodplain is one of those areas where we have tried to improve on the language that's in both the existing city and county regulations. I think there are a couple of outstanding issues here. You will have to address, so this is one of those areas that will need work. But I would also characterize this as one of those issues where given the county's new authority under senate bill 873, this is probably an area where you can describe the county as expanding into some areas we didn't necessarily have statutory authority to do before, but again, the bottom line mainly here is for the county to take the existing city code provisions and incorporate them into county regulations. And then finally, there's parkland dedication policy. I'm not sure this one going to be ready to proceed with this package of rules. We're still working with the city on language there. We don't really have what I would consider -- we're not as close to agreement with the city on the ordinance language as we are on some of these other issues. So I'm not sure that one can proceed at the same time these other ones do, but we'll do our best to try to get it all done together.
>> on this very last one ays that there may be instances where the fiscal would goo the municipality and not the coun and you also mean vice versa?
>> yeah. I think, you kw, really one of the benefits that's come out of house bill 1445 is just better coordination between the city and the county. And more communication. And I think there will probably be a greater willingness on each side. It's hard to say. In this case the fiscal ought to go to the county for these reasons, where on another subdivision it might go to the city for a different set of reasons. Every subdivision is different than the last one. I've never seen two subdivision plats that were exactly alike. And again, no matter how close you get the language and how you think you've covered every base, there's always going to be some subdivision is going to throw you some small curve. And the only way to handle those issues is really good coordination between the city and the county.
>> because my thought was is the northeast, east and south met troy park, it would be very hard for the city to make an agreement that they're going to invest in a brand new park when the county, who includes the city of Austin fax pairs, have already made that major investment. And it is probably best to leverage it on the county side as opposed to the city side.
>> again, the language isn't 100% final, but the basic idea there is between the city and the county, who's going to be the main provider of park services. And right now we're just looking at who has the closest park. Park. Between the city and the county, who has the closest park to that subdivision? Logic and common sense tells you that's where the people in that subdivision are going to go for their recreation opportunities. And so that's who the park services provider will be. Because if the closest park is a county park, it would be the county either taking the parkland dedication or accepting the in lieu fees. If the closest park is a city park, it would be the city.
>> next comment is really one for all of these things. And this is comments that i've heard back from the development community. And that is that you can -- even though you agree on language, this is what it's going to be. How do we avoid a different interpretation of the same language by the culture at the city of Austin versus the culture at tnr. Because that can recreate the ping ponging back and forth. The language is the same, but the interpretation is different. How do we resolve that.
>> we have attempted to address that in the house bill 1445 interlocal between the city and the county. And if you'll recall when that was adopted, one of the features in the interlocal is what we're calling dispute resolution or an elevation process where there is a differing interpretation between the city and the county staff that either the city staff, the county staff or the subdivision applicant can elevate that to the next tier in the management level to try to get a resolution, a uniform interpretation. If it's not resolved at that level, it goes up yet another level, all the way up to the assistant city manager, executive manager of tnr level.
>> and how long does that process take?
>> I would have to look at the 1445 interlocal to see what time frames we put in there. Obviously boat the city and the county are under statutory mandates to make decisions on plat approval by a certain date. You know, generally in the case of the case county, the applicant frequently waives that deadline because they would rather the county take enough time and do an adequate review and resolve the issues rather than to get an approval with -- disapproval within the 60-day county deadline. The city does something similar. They basically get comments back to the applicant before their 30-day deadline is up, but they pretty much routinely deny the plat application based on any deficiencies they found in that -- in the review within that 30 days. Because I think both the city and the county are under the requirement that if you don't approve it within the 30-day deadline for the city, the 60-day deadline for the county then the plat is approved as a matter of law.
>> and how do we treat variances? Because it always seems to me that that was one of the biggest differences that we had in terms of the culture is variance is not a great word when you're dealing with the city of Austin, whereas we -- I don't want to say we routinely, but we have a process of meeting variances. If you meet trks it's not that big a deal. So I'm trying to see how we work out those kinds of things too because sometimes asking for things over here at the county is no big deal. Asking for the exact same thing over at the city gives you a black mark on your little permanent school record over there that may come up in other developments.
>> yeah.
>> and I'm just trying to make sure that -- we're doing what we want to do and there are no unintended consequences there.
>> it's not addressed in these code amendments because strictly speaking it's not something house bill 1445 mandated that we do in terms of the single office or consistent and consolidated regulations. I think it's fair to say everybody realizes that as a policy issue it's certainly in the spirit of where the legislature wanted us to head with house fwil 1445, so it is on the list of major policy issues that joe is going to talk to you about. But the variance issue is not addressed in these code amendments. These code amendments are the absolute minimum we have to do to comply with house bill 1445, and the variance issue doesn't fall in that category.
>> it kind of came up because of the joint use driveway standards in terms of if we had some variance issues with regard to driveway where we had to build a thick driveway. Oh, my goodness, it looks like a road, but it wasn't a road, just a thick driveway. I'm trying to get around those. And the final thing related to this connectivity thing, some of the most contentious plats we've brought to the commissioner's courts had to do with people not understanding that plats connect and people thinking the subdivision ends. And there's not going to be an extension or a connection. And it may make total logical sense, but people aren't necessarily understanding that, especially if there's five, 10, 15, 20 years between the connectivity. How do we be sure that there is awareness that connectivity is not only a possibility, a probability, but it will happen? I'm just thinking of that whole thing that we had related to river place and westminster and glen lake related to people not understanding that these things were supposed to happen,, but the decisions to connect will not happen on the same time frame.
>> I would think that the county moving toward the city language will help in that regard because the city -- I think my personal experience is connectivity is basically handled case by case, but there were two different starting points. The city regulations says there shall be connectivity. Frequently it's waived or varied. The county regulations starts out there shall not be connectivity, but sometimes it's required. But sometimes we're shifting to a regulation that says you don't necessarily have to have connectivity to say that you ought to expect this. This is where you start from. You start from the assumption that subdivisions will connect. Now, in some indications it's not a good thing, so we don't require it 100% of the time, but you start out assuming there will be connectivity.
>> did we pick up additional authority, like in the drainage and floodplains area, we trace it to an implied grant by the state in house bill 1445?
>> I think we would be able to trace it to an express grant in senate bill 873. The bottom line on senate bill 873 that is -- in terms of just pure subdivision authority, the urban counties now have the same subdivision authority as the cities do. So anything a city can do under their chapter 212 of the local government code, an urban county can now do under senate bill 873.
>> so as long as we have the same drainage and floodplain issues --
>> it a broad -- senate bill 873 is basically the county can do whatever is in the interest of public health, safety and welfare, which is a very, very broad grant.
>> if the length of a road, part of the things that is part of the roadway geometry discussion or is that on another list because we've also had some issues about how long a road can be. And certainly in terms of some of the very challenging geology that's over on the western part of Travis County, there are no other options to get to certain pieces of property. And plowing straight ahead because of either habitat or the creeks, the watersheds, etcetera. So it's the length of a street is part of it or not?
>> that's come up under the dual access provision. That's one of the issues that's not resolved, I think. There are some questions -- I think my thrust has been to compile house bill 1445, you're basically just taking an existing city regulation, an existing county regulation and making them similar. You can work on that language and improve it and clarify things, and everybody can agree on that, then great, that's a bonus. If everybody is not in 100% agreement on what improvements to that language need to be made, then the default is sort of just stick with the language that's there. And the county adopts the city language verbatim or the city adopt the county language verbatim, again with the sort of inherent limitations on that. Just stick on the language as close as you can make it to what's there today. And literally just bring -- make the regulations consistent. Even if there are some better interpretations that can't be agreed on.
>> okay.
>> now, on the other issues, this is really where push came to shove. And like on the variances ant the waivers. We understood that in spite of how we may agree, what happens if the planning commission grants a waiver or a variance? Well, that macon flikt with something we've already approved with the plat that came to the court. So we had to deal with this issue on variances and waivers. What we are recommending to boats the city council and the commissioner's court is that we divvy up that authority based on the basic business function and annexation. We believe that if the city is going to annex an area within three years, the county has less of a stake in what happens in that subdivision because it will be totally within their control within a short period of time. So what we said is where the city has an area to be annexed in three years, they grant all the variances and waivers. They have final authority on the waivers. Now, if it's an area that they do not expect to annex within three years or they don't have an agreement to annex in three years, they were going to difficult I have it up based on who has the higher business function. In the areas of utilities, the county doesn't have utilities. We don't have water, we don't have wastewater, we don't have electricity. So if there's a waiver or a variance dealing with utilities, then the city would be able to grant those and have final authority over the entire e t.j. Now, when it comes to roads and drainage, the county's business function as a hierarchy. It is the county that maintains the road system. For years and years and years until the city annexes it. So the county would have the final authority to grant that waiver or a variance as it relates to highway roys and drainage. So that's how we kind of split the baby, so to speak. And that is our recommendation to the court, so that first annexations, [ inaudible ]. That is the way we took what was an issue and tried to come to some agreement. We had a similar -- we have similar ways of dealing with all the other issues. And briefly, she is going to walk us through what those issues are.
>> hi. There are seven other policy issues in addition to the waiver and variance issue that were a little bit more imlikted than modifying our codes. The first one is the transportation plan. Back when the county aowe adopted its between back back in 1997, the Austin area metropolitan transportation plan and the campo plan were the same. Soins sins that time the -- since that time the city's removed five road segments from the campo plan and down graded five other segments. Well, the commissioner courts adopted the campo plan to get funding for transportation projects, and we used that to look for guidance on our cfp projects. And we recommend that we follow one plan. And that's one policy issue that we have outstanding.
>> let me just add on that, we said one plan. Now, ideally we would prefer if the city brought their issues to campo and said, on these roads that we deleted, we want you to seriously look at those, and the city brings their case to campo. Campo may agree or disagree on those recommendations, but whatever the outcome, we should end up with one plan that the city and county both use for the purposes of subdivision review within the e t.j. So those will be difficult issues. Primarily they're dealing with roadways in the western part of the county. They're issues that affect water quality, they're issues that are related to growth management. So those issues are the type of policy issues that if the court, campo and the city of Austin will have to resolve at the highest level.
>> take it to a higher level as -- kick it to a higher level as emeril would say. It says that members of campo must qualify for plant to qualify for several fund. Could that be kicked up a higher notch at campo, and that is the insentence that the campo plan is the controlling document, and if you don't adopt that plan, you don't get the federal funds. We may already have the clout related to that very issue that it doesn't need to get bounced back and forth between Travis County and the city of Austin. There is a higher authority here and it's called campo. And if you want the monies, there are strings attached to it. It's just that nobody's ever played hardball on what it actually says there.
>> commissioner, I think that would boil down to looking at the federal law and saying, what does adopt the plan mean for purposes of the federal law? Because obviously the thrust of campo and the federal law is that you can't get any federal money for road projects unless you quote, unquote, adopt the mpo's plan. And i've got the city of Austin people here, so I don't want to put words in their mouth, but I'm guessing that the city would take the position that they do adopt the campo plan, so they are eligible for federal money. But for purposes of subdivision regulation, they have something different. And that adopting the campo plan does not necessarily mean implementing the campo plan through subdivision regulation, that it's two different things. And I think what you're suggesting is maybe we ought to look at that issue and see if that's valid legally.
>> I don't know the answer to that.
>> it would be campo's decision certainly.
>> remove five from campo and down grade five? Just to show that not all city roads or plans or road plans are part of campo?
>> well, let me just give you an example: if someone came in with a development within which one of those roads was located --
>> freight bake barker, for example.
>> sh 45 southwest.
>> and it's currently in the campo plan and it's not in the city of Austin plan. Someone would come to the county with that plat. We would see you need to set aside the right-of-way and build a portion of freight barker. You took that same plan to the city, it would not be in the plan, it would not be required. We're then in direct conflict with each other on what we're requiring the developer to do on that roadway. So we already have conflict on the roads that are different in the two plans. Otherwise on the 99% of the other roadways, the campo plan and the city plan are the same. There won't be conflict with regard to platting. But it is important because we get a lot of the right-of-way on the transportation system during the platting process.
>> well, if we keep it as a request for waiver or variance, wouldn't your previous analysis apply, and we would look at the road and drainage issue? Unless the city came in and said we would annex this area within three years, in which case we would -- the city would make the call? I guess, you know -- think about that because. As to these, though, those were outstanding issues still.
>> yes, sir.
>> and we'll continue to negotiate to try to achieve resolution of some sort?
>> the staffs have a recommendation to you. It not done until the city and council agrees to it and the commissioners court agrees to it. And so we have tried at the staff level to come up with a single recommendation that we hope both governing bodies would agree to.
>> one quick question about the other variance waiver deal. Within three years annexation, city no, county --
>> on a business function.
>> what about I don't know? Is that the same as no?
>> no. We don't have an I don't know.
>> either you annex them in three years or there's not affirmation of that, the answer is no.
>> then you drop down to business function. On drainage county, on roadways county. On water quality, city. On utilities city. So in every case where there is an issue to be resolved, one or the other has the business function that will make that call. Which should send it out into no man's land.
>> and after three year's annexation?
>> that's the first test. The first test is in an area likely to be annexed in three years. And so all our decisions are deferred to the city for variances and waivers of all variety.
>> that's what I'm asking. If the answer is not yes within three years, the answer is no. I don't know is ruled out. Or is I don't know still in the equation?
>> there is no I don't know.
>> is it yes or no?
>> that's right.
>> so isn't the city required to tell in advance, three years in advance where they are or are not putting on their annexation wish list?
>> there is an annexation plan. There are a finite number of agreements that call for annexation for that three-year period of time. All new limited purpose annexation has a three-year clock on it. The only ambiguity right now are in old limited purpose annex areas where there is no time clock. I believe that's the only area where there might be an I don't know. You can answer the question.
>> thanks, joe. I just wanted to add one, I guess, wrinkle in what joe is saying about near term annexation areas. And the city was interested in including within those areas that all development decisions would be deferred to the city. What we refer to as near-term annexation areas. , which would include everything from the three-year annexation plan. And anything that we're going to limited purpose annex under the normal set of circumstances, but there are some areas that we've had discussion about, and I think we are still discussing exactly what to do about that. And I'm not sure that the county staff is in agreement with us, but there are areas in which we have annexation agreements, we've annexed the area for a limited purpose with an agreement with the landowner and agreed to postpone the conversion from limited purpose annexation to full purpose for a period that's longer than three years, and constituent would also like to include those areas within the city staff -- the city staff would like to include those areas within the number of areas that are subject to city regulations.
>> I'm sorry, these are areas that are what now?
>> well, an example I would give is something called wild horse ranch. Ranch, which is a pud that we've annexed for limited purposes, and I'm sure you're all familiar with it because sh 130 runs through a portion of it. And we annexed it for limited purposes under a letter agreement with the developer and agreed in that letter agreement not to convert it to full purpose annexation until they commence final platting. And I just wanted to make you aware of that, that that's something we would like to have considered as a part of the -- hear hea.
>> with limited annexation there is a limited annexation agreement that documents the understanding?
>> yes. I think some people would point out to you that we have different limited purpose annexation area agreements. Some of them do not specifically require that the city full purpose annex the area within x period of time, they'll say the city will not full purpose annex it before a certain date has passed. So I think technically thinking it might be said that the city is not legally obligated to convert it to full purpose, but that has been our practice in the ones that we've entered into, for example, avery ranch.
>> let me say one thing. We looked at a map of all of these areas that the city has these type of agreements on it. There's not that many of them. And so -- and three of them are in Williamson county, not Travis County. Our guiding principle was that we don't want infrastructure out there not being maintained. After about three to five years, any new subdivision streets need maintenance, and the maintenance, as you know, the roads deteriorate very quickly if they're not maintained for five years. But in those areas where the city doesn't have a three-year clock, and there are very few of them, we would expect to work out some agreement on who's going to maintain those roads. The county may very well agree to maintain it because there are so few of them, and that's not a problem of for us. We're doing it right now. On the other hand, if it goes out for an extended period of time, we may ask the city to contribute financially toward the maintenance of those roads, but we're not deadlocked against the idea of other areas when the city has intent of annexing by allowing them to have exclusive jurisdiction over the platting process. As long as it doesn't get out of hand and there's a whole bunch of infrastructure that stays out there for an extended period of time, that's our responsibility, the county's, to maintain. So in that regard, we're -- [ inaudible ].
>> and that applies for 1445 because?
>> well, 1445 just said that one or the other, but not both. We're trying to do that with variances and waivers by saying here's the white line. It's the city's or the county's. So we're saying --
>> you're assuming in these situations we'll be able to reach an agreement?
>> that's right. On wild horse ranch we may very well agree, city, that's yours. When the developer comes in, go see the city. For a variance or waiver. We think we can come to see final agreement on all of those areas.
>> the next policy issue is the preliminary plan expiration date. At the city of Austin, preliminary plans expire three years -- after three years in the drinking water protection zone, and after five years in the desired development zone, while at the county if you do a preliminary plan and you final plat any piece of that preliminary plan within two years, your plan doesn't expire. That's a pretty big derchs between the city's philosophy and ours on that. If we were to adopt the city's -- if we were to adopt the city's requirement, add the city's requirement, we feel that we would be more likely to review the same plan multiple times when not much has changed, if anything has changed. And given that the economic cycle often exceeds five years, we would like to have an opportunity for a preliminary plan to try to be built as the developer goes to the economic cycle. So what we're proposing is that in the -- that we go to change our expiration date to five years in the drinking water protection zone and 12 years in the desired development zone, giving developers a greater opportunity to get his development built under one preliminary plan.
>> let me just add right here, this is an area where the city and the county staff did not come to full agreement. This is a county staff recommendation that we have a clock of 12 years and five years in the water quality zone. The city staff was not quite ready to go there yet, but we believe it's a reasonable -- the county staff believe it's a reasonable proposal.
>> okay. The next issue was variance and waivers, which we discussed. The outcome of that issue has a big impact on the regulations and some of these other policy issues. So we can come back at the end if you would like. So the next issue was sidewalks, a.d.a. Sidewalks. As you're aware, we've had a lot of at times to do some streets accepted if there are a.d.a. Issues inside the right-of-way. And as joe has said, unaccepted streets rapidly deteriorate after two to three years, and plus there's a safety hazard if county sheriffs can't regulate because we haven't adopted -- accepted the streets. The Texas department of licensing and regulation will grant some preconstruction longitudinal variances, but they don't really grant slope variances, cross slopes. That's where we have a challenge with the hill country. In certain areas of the city of Austin they require sidewalks on both sides of the street. And, for example, in the desired development zone they require them on both sides of the street or if there's a pedestrian generate he, for example, a pool. So what we propose, what we recommend is that the city amend their code to allow for some variance cite so that we can have a bigger say if we find when we review construction plans we're not going to be able to accept the streets because of topography, but we also recommend that we keep an ongoing dialogue to keep this resolved with the tdlr and with the development community and all the other vary just stakeholders. There is an issue that we all face. [one moment, please, for change in captioners]
>> > the next issue is consolidation of -- of fees, reviews and inspections. Well, as a part of the single office, we have started to work on consolidating our subdivision review for plats. Construction plans are still reviewed by both entities separatedly. And so are the inspections. What we would propose is that -- is that each -- that we adopt a strategy to where the -- whoever -- whoever grants the waivers and variances would ultimately be the ones doing the reviewing and inspecting and that we set up a -- you know, a fee based on cost of service. Now, this would be something that we would need to, you know, adopt a strategy. It's not something that we could go out and do tomorrow. It would have a fiscal impact, it would have a staffing impact, we would need to work it out over time to where, you know, reviews shifted and the -- whoever is granting the variance or the waiver would be the one that ended up doing the reviews.
>> I do the work, you -- due the work, you get the fee.
>> absolutely.
>> I'm glad we reached agreement on that. There is agreement on that?
>> not that we have.
>> it's kind of a significant staffing impact and this is one of those things we can agree to it on paper, but to bring it about is probably a whole budget cycle. We have got staff, we have got staff, we both collect fees, we are talking about streamlining our operations. Someone is going to have to give up something on this one. And so I guess we are in agreement -- we are agreeing in principle that we should work toward a single inspection by one or the other and a fee based on cost of service. My guess is that the county will have to staff up to do this. It value to change its fees. To recoup the additional staffing. The city may have to do just the opposite and some business areas but not in others. So that's why this is still something institutionally will have to -- we will have to work out through our fy '04 budget cycle, but first of all, it's got to be agreed to by both the city and county before we even go there.
>> why couldn't you have an interlocal agreement kind of a situation. I mean, if the city is obviously staffed up, that they comply with, you know, what they are really inspecting is what our -- what our rules and regulations state. I mean, if they do it, will they get paid for it? But kind of like what we do, what people are asking us to do now with restaurant inspections, I mean, if the city does it, but they may do it for incorporated areas that are compliant with county rules and regulations, it would make sense to me to pay the people to do it, but you are just out inspecting what our rules are. That may keep us from having to -- you know, to staff, staff up, and allow them to -- to keep some of theirs.
>> well, I would like to respond to that. I think that would be consistent with house bill 1445 and requirements for consistent regulations. One of the issues that, the stakeholders are here also, they may have some comments on this. But one of the issue that's we have discussed is the review of applications by both city and county staff for the same subject matter and that's really what -- what joe is raising the issue of. Should we have both city and county staff reviewing the same subject matter, if we agree as a matter of principle that -- say the county will cover certain areas and the city will address the rest of them and vice versa. One -- I guess that I would like to say, maybe I'm -- maybe I'm taking this further than I had expected to, but the city, I think, as it -- has appreciated the ability to work with the county staff in the last few months and I think that I'm not exaggerating when I say the city staff has felt like we have resolved a lot of issues that might have become conflicts simply because we started working a lot more closely together. I think that speaks in favor of review of subdivision applications by both the city and the county staff on all issues. But we've had these discussions about whether -- well, I don't think the stakeholders would prefer that there simply be one review of each particular issue, that would either be assigned to the city or the county. In a way that all goes back to this variance and waiver issue which may be where it all started. We should be reviewing subject matter when the variance authority is assigned to the county for -- for our issue that's the county is going to be maintaining or to the city for -- for issues that the city is going to be maintaining. I'm not sure that was perfectly clear, but -- but anyway, who is going to be doing the review is -- is I guess still a matter of discussion. For the city.
>> well, I'm confused, I know -- I don't know why this is difficult. You set out and you establish, okay, this is an area where the county is responsible for regulating this subdivision or whatever we have established that's beyond the -- the annexation boundary or whatever. And am I understanding, david, to think that the city still thinks that even though they are out, that they still need to review? And my question would be, well, why are you spending the money to review when it's really outside the purview of the city. Then when it gets time to come in, say, okay, well, I mean we're -- we've done all of our markups, we are fine, this is what we are looking at, if there is an agreement that, you know, you all inspected or whatever, so I don't -- I don't -- somewhere I'm not getting the connect here unless you are assuming that no, we still want to review everything and to have opinion on that and I would say that that's probably where, you know, I'm going to have the biggest problem. Now, I'm just going to say, david, that's not -- if you just -- if you got some idle time on your hands, you want to put people through the process, see how sharp they are,. [ whistles ], go do it's, it's really not going to have any effect on us because we have the authority to do that, I mean, given that we get down and iron this stuff out.
>> well, I -- I understand that it's -- that's a position that a lot of have taken. I think when you look at -- at our suggestion on the variances and waivers, one of the reasons that the city felt comfortable with the concept or the city staff at least felt comfortable with the concept of assigning the authority to grant a variance for all transportation and road issues to the county, was based on the assumption that a recommendation on whether or not to grant that variance would come from the joint office, the single office, which is staffed by both city and county employees. And so that the city employees would have some input on what the recommendation was. That -- that of necessity requires a city review, also. Now, if you want to call that a city review or a review by the single office, I think that may be a matter of semantics, but under those circumstances the city staff would have had an opportunity to make comments on -- on the request for a variance.
>> but david we are --
>> let me just add something to that. There are really perhaps several elements to this. Whether or not the city and county both review for transportation purposes what should be charging one fee as if they were one review. So there should be no duplication and what we -- in what we charge the development community for review. If one or the other wants to take on an extra view, it seems to me it ought to be at the public cost and not at the private cost since it is kind of a duplicate review. So there's an issue of economics and charges. Now, on the -- in the e.t.j. The whole notion of e.t.j. Came about on the municipal annexation act. They got e.t.j. Because of the expectation that the city would be annexing the area within the rising of the general plan, which is typically about 20 years. If you look at the history of annexation, the city does have a legitimate stake in any portion of that e.t.j. They will be annexing probably closer to the city a larger portion in 20 years than you will in three years. So it's not like they don't have any stake at all in the review of those subdivisions. And it just gets more important the closer it is to annexation. So that's why in one way I can understand the city's desire to have an eye on the development review in the e.t.j. It's not quite as strong as the city or the county's stake because we maintain that infrastructure. But nonetheless it is there. And I think what we are trying to do in all of this is walk a -- a fine line between a -- between moving out of the -- of not having any authority, the county doesn't want to give up its authority, and I would think the city does either. We are trying to negotiate except there is -- there is not a duplication and there's not a conflict in those reviews. We are not having a -- to totally give up each other's authority.
>> getting back to the variances and waivers in terms of what we are looking at, the city decides on waivers and variances related to the utility, water quality and environmental standards. The county related to transportation standards. What if it has to do with water quality and environmental standards on a transportation issue. Who -- who -- because we have already seen this where even county proposed projects, ya kick in a water quality standard that the city may want because two feet of the project happens to be in the city of Austin, it can double and triple the cost of our projects and I think on some of those things we've had the attitude of, well, if that's what you want, you need to be paying for that as opposed to trying to impose this on the county side of the ledger. So who -- who rules on that one when it is a truly -- truly a transportation issue, but it involves issues of water quality and environmental standards?
>> the city does.
>> are we prepared to on double and triple the cost of some the projects in the e.t.j.
>> that's it is policy question, that's why it's coming to you.
>> that's the million dollar question, we mean that in more than one way.
>> these are not easy tradeoffs. What we are saying, in all of this, if you want consolidated coverage, there is a price for that. What we are saying is that on roadways, we wouldn't very well be asking for cross-sections of roadways that are larger than what the city may want. That's an additional cost. But on the other hand, we may end up having to pay a higher price to meet water quality standards of the city.
>> was there an easy, fast answer to the question what are the other urban counties doing? They don't have as much unincorporated area as travis and Austin, but what are they doing?
>> judge, I don't think they are doing very much. We are probably at the front of the line.
>> judge, my understanding -- the one urban area I do know about is san antonio and bexar county. My understanding is they haven't reached house bill 14145 interlocal agreement yet. 1445 interlocal agreement yet. We are much farther ahead of then.
>> we think what you have just described will comply with 1445?
>> oh, I think it not only complies with the letter of the law, it would comply with the spirit of the law. Some of these are difficult issues.
>> you have said that three times, that makes me really nervous, joe.
>> well, but the other deal is if we don't do it, we could be made to do it. And isn't that going to hurt more?
>> we are made to do something else.
>> or something else. And the thing is that the whole idea the whole spirit behind it was to avoid duplication. We need to come to that point.
>> I can tell you that a lot of philosophical, not just philosophical, but policy issues that have driven 1445 are real, and they are in part because of the policy diffces between the two government entities. There is no doubt that the city of Austin is stronger -- has stronger water quality regulations than the county. Quite frankly when it comes to [inaudible] development the county has stronger feelings about more runways, larger runways. There have been conflicts between those policy positions. We are at that fork in the road. Where we have to come to some agreement. And 1445 has been the platform whereby we get the two policy bodies together to come to agreement.
>> if we give the waiver a variance, the proposal full effect, this [inaudible], if it's a city of Austin deal, we say let's [inaudible] digs. If it's ours on the transportation scheme, we let them do ours. I understand the developers don't want to go to both of us, right if.
>> right.
>> I guess I'm wondering why should both of us work on it when the goal is to have one of us do it. It makes -- it makes all the sense in the world. I don't know that it makes sense to have the division structured, implemented and then continue to do both of them. Seem to me that you have -- that add to your cost and work against efficiency.
>> [inaudible - no mic]
>> one of the things about the single office and the division of various waiver authority and the idea of also dividing the review, is our interlocal agreement specifically created the sing dwell office for the purpose of us -- single office for the purpose of us working together. It's our feeling if we move in a different direction such as this, it would mean that we would need to amend our interlocal agreement. That's our feeling at this point that we currently have with the county. Actually a more business reason, for the city to stay involved in the city approved variance project, would be that we are still reviewing for water quality as it's proposed because the maintenance requirements for water quality control stays with the city. So as the proposal that -- that commissioner daugherty brought up and the stakeholders brought up, if you aren't going to be dealing with variances you should be dealing with the review, we are still going to be looking at water quality. The city would still be reviewing that alication even if it was a transportation variance that was coming to you guys at the county. So there's still going to be overlap in review as related to the water quality versus other regulations. Hopefully that helps.
>> don't we end up in the same --
>> potentially we do end up with conflicts between roads and drainage and roads and water quality, drainage and water quality. That's one of the reasons that the single office concepts is one staff likes, it's because we actually get together and we resolve these conflicts instead of giving those conflicts to the developer, the applicant, to say, here you've got a conflict, go work it out. The whole purpose of the single office that is we would work out that conflict in the single office before we brought that -- gave the comments of the review to the applicants.
>> what if no agreement is reached, would it then be brought to the court or the council?
>> the interlocal that we have with the county between the city and county says it will be resolved. If necessary, it will be resolved at mr. Gieselman's level and our city manager's office. But in a rare case where that might not happen, where we might not get resolution, it would come to either you or council depending on what area of the e.t.j. We were talking about. Joe and I were talking this morning there haven't been any conflict on elevated so far since we created the single office. Frankly there weren't that many conflicts that occurred before, as far as number. Just a handful. So it's our feeling that we can work those out internally.
>> I guess getting back to the heart of our conflict, I have become convinced that the voters want local transportation and they want good water quality. It's incumbent upon us to deliver on both of those. There's probably going to be a higher price for accomplishing that. That means that the county may have to become more aggressive on water quality issues. But in the past what we may have experienced are tradeoffs. When the county is trying to maintain its focus on good transportation, at the expense of water quality. And vice versa. The city's focused on water quality perhaps at the expense of transportation. What we are trying to say, we have to accomplish both. That means designing roadways that meet higher water quality standards. That is sometimes putting roadways where the city may not have wanted to us put a roadway. We will design it in such a way that we will accomplish the water quality goals. But in the absence of this agreement, and we are talking about 1445, but really it's much broader than that, we will continue to knock heads and in this case the developer will be in the middle. But sometimes it will be our c.i.p. Projects or state highways or something else. All we are trying to do is broker our policy differences now with 1445. Scbi have to say this can only be resolved at the highest levels. Coming to you in terms of differences in our transportation plan, or differences in waivers and variances, but underneath it all is really differences in policy and it's that policy that has to be resolved.
>> when we talk about taking it to the highest level, there are huge differences between how the two governments operate. I mean, literally you can get something on this commissioners court agenda, if not within a week, certainly within two weeks. Just depends on whether the backup is there, get the things into the judge's office, we move on. The last I heard over at the council it could be six to eight weeks to get on a city council agenda, and there's a process that needs to be respected related to needing to go through necessary board and commissions. So how do we resolve that in terms of the we can be ready to -- to give our opinion on something, but it just doesn't work that boy over there. I do that with all due respect. They do things a different way over there. We meet 52 weeks out of the year. They don't. I mean, how do we resolve those kinds of things and still respect the fact that they are allowed to do things their way, and we are allowed to do things our way.
>> I'm not sure there's any way of avoiding the different process that's the city goes through by nature of the government that they are and county by virtue of the government that we are. But if you start with policies and regulations that are different, no matter what process you embark on, you are going to arrive at a different place. What we are trying to do is make sure that city council and the commissioners court adopt policies and regulations that at least start at the same level. And have the same objective and the same end. Irregardless of what board and commission that you may go through to -- to end up having that accomplished.
>> we have been working with the joint city county subcommittee, there was no the a meeting unfortunately this month. But -- but it's been rescheduled for I forget the date. But a couple of weeks from now. So we had thought that we would be going to them with this discussion before we came to you today. But the idea was to work with them and have them be your representatives who then come to you and work with us to figure out how to recommend or what to recommend to the various boards and commissions. So --
>> but I thought that since that meeting did not take place, they were -- at the last meeting they were ready to come to the commissioners court. Some of those issues need to be resolved here --
>> go ahead.
>> excuse me. As far as the amendment, I guess it's on your agenda at 10 a, we are in agreement on those and there's some very minor things that I think were made to be worked out, but as county staff and the city staff, we have worked through those and are planning to have those on the city council agenda on March the 6th for the approval. The corresponding amendments. And so I think that's -- that may be what you are referring to, commissioner. We did present to the subcommittee a set of amendments that both the city and county could adopt that would bring the -- the respective regulations, make them consistent.
>> I kind of understood at that meeting that we wanted to bring issues to the court to -- so we could give direction. And then we would -- then we would to go the city since they were set for March the 6th. Then maybe we can have some issues on our agenda pretty soon.
>> one thing that I would like to point out is that you know these backup memos focus on the city of Austin and our interlocal there. We have entered into the interlocal, we have entered into single offices with city of Pflugerville the city of Lakeway. So one thing that you all need to consider when we go changing our regulations or looking at policy changes is are we proposing this for all of the incorporated areas including other e.t.j.'s, if we are we need to start working closer with Pflugerville and Lakeway on these proposed changes.
>> 1445 is going to be a way of life. It didn't stop, just bringing into consistency the existing code. Every time the city proposes a new regulation or the county proposes a new regulation, we have to be of one mind. Which means the city and the county really have to start working much closer together on development regulations in the e.t.j. From here on. We have to be thinking alike, when it's -- whether it's water quality, [inaudible] development or ever. Because this is -- or whatever. This is a fact of life, this is going to be our future, unless we want to get out of the business altogether.
>> well, I -- before I get overly aggressive with that, people know that I have a tendency to do this, being that is the precinct 3 commissioner, precinct 3 is western Travis County, I know that there are some issues here that I'm not toll dillydally with. For the precinct 3 commissioner. I think that water quality is used to stop roadways. I think that sidewalks on both sides with no cross streets are designed to be hinderances. I think that there are a number of things in this stuff that we have to deal with that I have to deal with that I'm not pleased that I have got to play in that arena. There is another way to do this and all of us hate to do it, all of us hate to do it with legislation. That's -- that's everything from 1704, I mean, all that cost is a ka jillion dollars to do it. It takes time. There is some practical things that we need to be, you know, getting down, you know, to brass tacks over. And I think it needs to be sooner than later, because I don't think that we have the time to go through 20 board and commissions with the city. And -- and with all of the council people and how they most likely are going to feel about it. I mean, maybe I could be wrong, but I mean I have been in this community for 34 years, I have watched the antics that I consider to be harmful to this community, with regards to moving forward and moving on. And I -- and I think that we are at the point where 1445 may be the last of or may be the least of our worries if we don't get -- hide behind, yes, I mean all of the low hanging fruit stuff is done. These six or seven things that we've got here are -- are situations where they are deal killers. And I'm not going to play this game where, you know, somebody says, well let's have a -- you know, a baby ruth and you break it this side is this long, this side is this long and the city of Austin gets, now they are the same -- now they are the same size. I'm not going to play that. I mean that's not -- that's not what I think this community wants. I know it's not what precinct 3 wants. I'm willing to sit down and work, I mean, if somebody is really honestly willing to work with -- with this stuff, but -- but I for one want to move along with this and if we can't get there, do I think that we can build a road and do something with water? Yes, I think we can go to the moon, I think that we can cure diseases we have never cured, I think that we can do a lot of things in this world. We can build a road, we can build subdivisions, we can continue to grow in this community and still have the quality of life that all of us want. So probably needed to say that. It's no the that the council has ever -- not that the council has ever doubted exactly how I felt about these things, but this is already -- has already taken longer than I wanted it to take. I don't think that we are any closer to these six or seven issues here than we have ever been. Maybe we can have joint meeting places. So what? I mean, you know, if you stick, you know, six people in a room, you say, okay we have got one spot that you go through, three people from this team, three people from this team, pretty soon you know you really don't -- we haven't accomplished anything. Maybe we have just paid one fee to it. But still I mean we are making it so difficult and that's the reason that we are here. [one moment please for change in captioners]
>> water quality standards, gated communities, don't get me started on those and the campo versus the Austin plan. I've got the tire marks on my back related to some of these things. I want to see us get there, but that doesn't mean that we just say fine, whatever, somebody else, because there were some very deliberate reasons why we had a differing viewpoint about some of these things and they made sense. So I'm for let's get things that make sense, but I'm just not going to roll over on some of these things and say fine, y'all do it, it's just one less thing that I have to deal with on my plate, even though those folks are no longer in my precinct, I still care greatly about what's going on in western Travis County because they did used to be part of my precinct. And I had to deal with those issues and I know exactly what kind of ping ponging that they've been going through.
>> I'm just thinking of some of the projects that we got into out in del valle. I mean, we didn't know about the water quality project. Gosh, maybe we want to do things, but we need to do them -- we need to know that they're coming.
>> I think personally the whole idea that wf at least -- that we have at least been doing in a single office is make sure you're fully educated on what the issues are and not just be voting based on a county -- strictly a county perspective: so at least you have that information. It's still based our proposal would be your decision to make, if that variance is assigned to you or that authority is, it's your decision to make and the city would abide by your decision. So we're not going to get in the middle of that. But I think it's a good thing from the perspective at leave of having a full understanding of all the requirements that relate to this the decision you're making rather than just having only a county or only a city perspective.
>> but keep in mind what we all have to do helps everybody. I think that's the goal of this or what the question was. So that we don't -- included as part of your planning and not be caught later that oh, I didn't know I had to do that, and it delays the project and it costs a lot more money.
>> understood.
>> let's see if anybody else has come down on this item and wishes to give comments.
>> r.
>> harry savio is passing out to you the stakeholder's position on this policy issue. I'm not going to read this, but I'm going to go over some of the highlights and give a little bit of the background and some of the positions that we think can make this thing very simplistic in nature. As you can see from the discussion today we're not much closer in our perspective than we were a year ago. When hb 1445 was adopted, subdivisions in the e t.j. Had two jurisdictional controls. There was the county and the city. The 1445 was adopted specifically to require that we have one set of regulations. One review entity and approval entity and one set of regulations. Not what's being proposed in terms of regulations mirroring each other and then going through this joint office. It's not necessarily a joint office. Your staff will still be over here, the city staff will still be over there and you head the nail on the head when you were talking about the issues. We're still stuck in the middle. We're looking for resolution. The agreement unfortunately adopted just prior to April 1st of 2002 between the county and the city did not eliminate the dual regulation, rather it attempted to eliminate the inconsistencies. We applaud that, but it doesn't get to the root of the matter. We still have two separate rules and regulations. There by we don't believe it met the spirit or the intent of house bill 1445. And being the authors of the original 1445, we should know what was originally intended on that. In the packet that was passed out an attorney's general opinion that was rendered on June 24th that basically says that the option that the city and the county have chosen to go down does require in fact a single unified set of regulations and a single approval. And we'd like to see that happen. For background purposes, this was supposed to have been implemented as of April 1st, 2002. We all know that. The ball was in place in September one of 2001. I know the county was working and I know the city was discussing, but we didn't get together as a group until August of 2002, four months after the supposed adoption of the interlocal agreement. There were several issues that were discussed here today. There were 14 major issues that were raises reyes, and we actually raised that when the group got further along and it went up to about 21 major issues. Some of which have come very close to resolution and some of which we are still miles apart on. They are options that have been put out there, and the range of options as proposed, we do not feel they adequately follow the requirements of house bill 1445 or the single set of rules and single reviewing authority. If you go to page 4 on our proposal, -- [ inaudible ] the area that is in the city's annexation plan for three years currently becomes the city's review responsibility. The assumption there is that the city is going to make good on that, they're going to annex within three years. The risk to a developer is they go through, they develop under the city's rules and regulations and if the city doesn't annex, the city doesn't annex and the risk to the county is they continue to maintain city infrastructure or city design infrastructure. Anything outside that area would go just as what mr. Gieselman had indicated, which is basically that the the utility becomes the provider, the water quality becomes the city and everything else is related to the county. And it's pure black and white. You don't have to change the rules and regulations right now. You just go with this division right here and you live with the current rules and regulations you have. We can continue working on coming closer with the other rules and regulations that are inconsistent, but you don't have to do it. Fundamentally as Karen had pointed out, the governments are two separate, distinct. They operate entirely differently. And our fear is once again you get us into this system where there's the rules and regulations over here and the rules and regulations over the county, and while they say the same thing, they're going to be interpreted differently and you saw it's going to rise to joe and his staff and rise ultimately to toby and her stuff and the ultimate approving body would be the county as you joint pointed out, which can hear things in two weeks and in the city you have to go through how many boards and commissions before the council has that discussion. So here we are again, we haven't discussed the fundamental issue of house bill 1445. With that I'm going to turn it over to allen.
>> thank you. My name is allen heywood. I'm on the executive committee of the real estate council of Austin and I'm ooms the co-chair of their legislative review committee. Today I'm here as a spokesman for all the stakeholders from the development community that's been involved in this process. I think the fundamental issue that we have here, as you can see, is the issue of dual review. Because there is -- the one thought is that the single office is something that you submit the application to. You go through some sort of dual review with two sets of regulations, however inconsistent they may be, and then you come out the other end with the single recommendation. And you have the elevation process where you resolve those disputes. Our view is that the single office is not a dispute resolution mechanism. It rather is a single review mechanism. If you're going to have a single office, you get a single review. The only reason to have dual reviews in my view is an opportunity to have a difference of opinion about the subject matter that's being reviewed. Abuse otherwise you don't need to have two reviews. And therefore our proposal basically took the variances and waiver considerations that joe had put out and took it basically one step further than that and said, isn't it as simple as joe said, it's one or the other, but not both? So let's divide it up based on your business function and where the city has the primary authority and interest, which is water quality, you let the city control. But where the county has the primary authority and the maintenance responsibility, which is transportation, streets, flooding, drainage, it ought to be the county that has the authority. And therefore we ought to be able to admit schmidt an application, have it reviewed by the county for transportation and drainage and flood issues that were reviewed by the city as to water quality. And you've got one review, you've got one authority, you have one approval. If a variance is necessary and it's under the county's input, you go through the county process and the county grants the variance. If the variance is necessary to constituent process, you go through the city's process. And it's relatively simple, it's relatively straightforward. It's not nearly as complicated as I think people have been trying to make it over the last 10 months. And as ken says, it can be done without anyone changing any of their ordinances if you don't want to. On the other hand, we applaud the effort to make them more consistent. And before we go any further, i'll just commend the county staff for having been in innumerable meetings that a lot of us have been in over the last six months. And y'all ought to be commended for having committed the significant amount of very limited resources in your personnel towards this effort. And we certainly don't want to disparage that. The other comment is we have made a lot of progress. I mean, for the first time in my 25 years of being in this business, we've got the city and the county actually talking to each other. I mean, that is a major step. And they are beginning to learn from each other, but as you can tell, the major fundamental issues are far from being resolved, and my concern is that they aren't going to be able to be resolved in a timely way to be able to get us where we need to go and implement the purpose of 1445, which again was to try to have a single application, a single set of regulations that you complied with, a single review, a single decision, and not have the dual regulations. And the proposal that we've got, we think would accomplish that. Obviously there are some difficult decisions to be made in there, but I think from our point of view, we would be encouraging the county to continue to represent its constituents on a wider basis than even the city does and not necessarily give up that authority and that responsibility.
>> I men. -- amen.
>> so today we need to schedule a public hearing? Under a?
>> that's right.
>> so what's your response to the public hearing in question?
>> well, in terms of going to the public hearing, we've got some issues that we have have with what's being proposed in terms of the wholesale adoption with the city and county regulations, which wearing my hat as citizens of the county, I would question whether those are good policy decisions or not. It obviously addresses one of the issues of 1445 and at least you eliminate some of the inconsistencies, but I'm not sure that it's the best way to resolve those by merely adopting the city wholesale. It's kind of my personal view of that. But in terms of going ahead with those, I think there is a lot to be gained by that and eliminating some of the inconsistencies, but those are a relatively small amount of and will only address a relatively small amount of the real issues that are out there, which are these bigger policy issues. And those are the ones that need to be focused on. So in terms of going ahead with the public hearing to change the county green book that we've worked on, I mean, that's fine to go ahead with those, but that's not going to get to the real meat of the issue. And we need to do that timely if we can.
>> so you think the big issues really are in b?
>> yes, sir.
>> for the commissioners court and the city council can get together and they've got the issues raised there?
>> yes, sir.
>> what city members are on the --
>> the mayor, jackie and danny.
>> and gerald and i. My understanding is that we were ready for the council and the court to take some action. To resolve some of these issues because -- [ inaudible ]
>> wasn't that all the things that there was relative agreement were there. That's the a part. That doesn't mean the b part.
>> so I think we need to take some action so that the issues can -- so the other discussion can keep rolling.
>> pat or david? Pat, what feedback have y'all gotten from the last time -- last meeting we had that we were here and both of you were here? Where do you think we are with the council people?
>>
>> we thought we were going to come back with these policy issues and start working through them. We know that that's going to take longer than the time they have to try to apiece the legislature. We also, though, have I think told the joint subcommittee, and i'll repeat it now, that we believe that with the code amendments that our codes are consistent. And once those are adopted and hopefully very quickly March 6 the council -- I don't know what date you're sit setting here, that was our hope was to get that done. And that would make our codes consistent. How we treat variances, waivers, all of those other things, were things that we were planning on working through with the joint subcommittee, with the idea of resolving those one by one to try to come to closure on them. We recognize that those policy issues are a big part of the whole issue of 1445 and what its intent was. But those are big issues. The roadway plan alone may take, what, a year to work through? I'm not sure. But it's a big, big issue and it's going to take a lot of time. So we're planning on coming back. Y'all are meeting again --
>> March.
>> I can't remember the day.
>> three weeks or so, right? So we were going to come to you then and start working through these policy issues. The last time we met with you, we talked about setting up a schedule and starting to work through those, if you recall.
>> are we required to report back to the legislature any kind of progress that we have made?
>> I think that's up to the legislature.
>> the issue has come up that -- especially with 873 and 1445 as to what kind of progress is made with legislation. And although we haven't been requested to do so, I wouldn't be surprised if we were asked.
>> I suspect we'll have an opportunity to address that.
>> they kind of would like for us to address some of these things ourselves.
>> I would add that the joint subcommittee, the members, we are supporting. You all can certainly help us decide how you want to go toward and how you want to address that and work with the city's subcommittee members to set the agenda. We support you and we'll be there for you, depending on how you want to go forward.
>> what about the public hearg, joe?
>> I think we met the legal requirements for that. We were thinking 30 days.
>> the public hearing is really more a matter of practice for this court on your subdivision regulations and amendments to those regulations you followed. The legal requirements you need to keep in mind are, one, you've got to adopt -- you've got to publish a newspaper notice saying that you're proposing amendments so that you put the public on notice. And I think the purpose of the hearing is to let people say, -- know they can come and comment on them. And of course your practice has been you schedule the public hearing on the date of the commissioner's court meeting at which you intend to act. So there's no hard and fast time period associated with the publishing of the newspaper notice. Theoretically you could authorize tnr to post that notice this week, say that your public hearing is going to be on the 25 the and come back and adopt these code amendments on the 25th. I don't know that people who are concerned with the content of these things would feel like they had enough time to absorb them and comment on them, but it would be legal if you did that. Now, the other issue you need to keep in mind is the county is subject to the private real property rights preservation act. We did do a takings impact analysis on these regulations, and there are a number of exemptions to that act. We think all of these code amendments come under one or the other of those exemptions. So you don't have to comply with that act in the past. You've done so as a matter of policy. Saying simply to avoid any challenge to your conclusion or the county attorney's conclusion that the regulations are exempt. If you do that, if you want to comply with the act as a matter of policy just as good business practice, you're supposed to have the notice out there for 30 days. So those are the two things you need to keep in mind in terms of a schedule for adopting these amendments. I say those are the two legal issues. There's one practical issue. There are outstanding issues between the county staff, the city staff and the stakeholders on some of these -- on these code amendments. I don't think it will take a lot of time to work those out. Obviously it is going to involve a few meetings to come down one way or the other on them.
>> one newspaper ad we think is sufficient?
>> yes, definitely.
>> I just wanted to add, we cancelled the February 21st meeting. There's no requirement to have a quorum or anything of that group. And the next meeting, as I understand, would be March 22nd in terms of getting together. And inthat's just too far out. I think you need to try to move together and move as quickly asable, and those that can attend, then sichly attend. I have to echo Margaret's comments. I very much would want to see us move forward with something that we embrace instead of have something get handed to us. With respect to the rules, if you have a set of consistent rules, then what it boils down to is really a matter of trust. And what's happening is one entity is not wanting to trust the other entity in terms of enforcing those rules. I think that's what it fundamentally boils down to. And we have seen dramatic improvement in terms of the communications between the staff. I have to echo what was said before by allen and applaud your staff in allowing the staff to come forward and spend the time that they have because they spend a lot of time as well as the city staff has spent a lot of time. I know that they're probably sick of seeing us in terms of meetings. Everybody else is here, but it's an issue that has to be resolved, and I think that our approach is is a very simplistic approach, albeit that it does take away some authority from the city. But if the rules and regulations are consistent, then they shouldn't need to have that authority if they trust the opinion of the county in terms of to adequately enforce those rules and regulations. So it gets back to the interpretation issue, which again gets back to the heart of bill 1445. You have two different interpretations and we're stuck in the middle in terms of catch 22.
>> the third weekend in March is not acceptable I think probably, joe. What would happen here, would you get your group, get pat and then you all go to the three council people and say, let's all come up with a couple of dates that we could do this and see what we can get on everybody's schedule?
>> we're talking about the joint subcommittee meeting?
>> yeah.
>> we're trying to see if we could get that meeting rerescheduled more quickly than we were able to, but so far my understanding -- and I wish I had the date for you, but it's I think the second week in March right now. Does that sound right?
>> yeah, it got changed. And then they tried to reschedule it, but we set other meetings. And so it's real hard to cancel a meeting and then reset it.
>> I will speak to our side and see if we can make this a priority to get some dates set.
>> okay.
>> and I guess the problem is trying to figure out a reasonable and realistic date for a public hearing in a. And if we don't have to do it in 30 days, setting it maybe on March 12th. Then the question is, if we modify the proposed amendments under a, which would they be ready for people who are interested in coming to the public hearing and giving us their views.
>> i've got them ready today to distribute publicly.
>> well, why don't we just deal with the a and b as best we can in two weeks? That's by March fifth? And we will already have had an ad posted for a public hearing on March 12th.
>> that's Wednesday.
>> March 11 its then. Is that Tuesday? March 11th. And my thinking is that if part of our strategy is to take our best shot at resolving a matter in making additional legislation unnecessary, let's go ahead and do it. If you wait until April, you're getting into a troublesome area. And my guess is that great focus will be on the state's budget and some of the other issues and they'll either vote them up or vote them down as best they can with limited time and consideration. If I were there and we had already mandated something, if the report was there was noncompliance statewide, I guess my information would be to try to send a message. Why would we take two weeks to try and do as best we can in a and b with an eye toward Tuesday of the third week having it posted on the court's agenda again for the public hearing and any kind of follow-up action that we need. Need? And if we make satisfactory progress to that point, we can take another week, which will get us to the 18th of March, but I would focus on three weeks from now myself. With an eye toward getting as much done as possible in two weeks.
>> and that is us taking care of our comments and our stance on this thing, not having to wait for the subcommittee. We're going to do our --
>> try to get this to work, but if it cannot, then we'll do the best we can and we'll meet with the members of the council individually. That won't keep the city and county staff from working out whatever you can work out. And you have representatives who are designated to assist. Cooperate, collaborate to the extent possible to try to get as much done as possible. And if we agree to an impasse by March 11th, we will just have that. Now, I won't be part of the delegation to deliver that message, but I think that it's the truth and that's what they ought to be told. But let's just move it to front burner for two weeks and try to get something done if possible. Authorize staff to go ahead and post the ad for the public hearing on Tuesday, March 11th as soon as possible. And my guess if I saw the ad, i'd pick up the phone and want a copy of what's proposed.
>> we'll include a contact number.
>> so we'll send you the draft we're working on right now. We anticipate that this may be changed by March fifth, so we'll keep your phone number and address, and if there is a revised document send you that. We can do that, right? And so I would assume what we have now and keep working, and if we have a revision by the fifth of March, then I would guess that's interested persons.
>> i'll second that, judge.
>> okay. And I figure thatmost of the pet would be working on this would be representatives of the interested people. So if we keep them closer also and help us disseminate whatever additional revision there are, that makes sense to me.
>> I'm going to restate the obvious and that is if we don't make sufficient progress, it may be dumped on us. The deadline is March 14th. So I have a feeling if there is not progress made, others may try and push the agenda forward in a different arena. A few blocks from here.
>> how's that sound? Makes sense to me.
>> can I ask one question, judge? And it's the issue anna raised about the geographic scope. The code amendments that are being changed apply county wide. We're not proposing to change that. But we do now have interlocals with Pflugerville and Lakeway that say we won't adopt any regulations in their e t.j. Unless they're acceptable to the city and to those two cities. I think the staff's thought on it was send Pflugerville and Lakeway a copy of what's proposed and ask them if they have any objection? If they don't, they may think they're great changes and they would apply in the Lakeway and Pflugerville e t.j. But if they say we don't like it or we want more time or whatever, then on March 11th these changes can be adopted, but only to apply outside the Pflugerville and Lakeway e t.j.'s. We've just got to somehow -- we're obligated under our interlocals with those two cities to coordinate changes to the regulations so we've either got to get them to agree to these changes or just say these changes don't apply in these two e t.j.'s.
>> but if we pick the changes that are good, that we planned to discuss at the public hearing on March fifth, why wouldn't we think they would be good for Lakeway or Pflugerville too?
>> from the staff perspective, I think that should be at least the starting point?
>> that's what I would let them know, though, and give them an opportunity to come down.
>> and if they do object, we can carve them out.
>> right. And then start trying to work on them with an interlocal with them.
>> we've got the interlocal. We've got to go through the same exercise as sitting down and comparing their code and the county code. Same song, second and third versus.
>> and then you've got a number of incorporated areas, more than Lakeway. You will have a grievance with them, but I would think that there's -- I think there are six incorporated areas in precinct 3, so i'll make sure our office let's everybody know and then come down and participate.
>> that's in the form of a motion, right? Immediate posting of the public hearing on March 11th, immediate communication with Lakeway, Pflugerville, any other cities that we need to, let them know what's going on, encourage the staff, city and county, to work with representatives, try to get the joint subcommittee to meet before March fifth if possible. On March fifth or shortly before, we get a status report and a memo from staff indicating where we are and if we think it makes sense, and under b, we need to clab rat official to official, city-county. We could try to do that one on one in preparation for the March fifth meeting. This is on the city council agenda when?
>> March sixth.
>> March sixth? So that would be good timing.
>> only part a is on council agenda at present. So we will have to talk about whether policy issues can be discussed at that meeting or not.
>> who makes that call?
>> I think we need to decide and look at the posting language and determine. David, help me with that question.
>> it would be an entirely different posting. And we'll have to go back and talk to the city manager's office about this.
>> a letter to the city manager from the Travis County commissioner's court.
>> that would be helpful. Describing the issues described in b be added to the city's March sixth agenda, and that's cc'd to members of the city council. With appropriate language urging urgency as you have become famous for, mr. Nichols. I can't believe we possibly left anything out of this motion. [ laughter ]
>> did we cover all of that?
>> yes.
>> I think that's what we're suggesting here. From where we are and where we need to go, I think that's all we can do with it. Any cautionary statements?
>> well, I will add one. I don't -- I think the policy issues are major issues that require -- would require an awful lot of discussion, and the amendment that we've already got in the hopper and they've been through everybody's process and have been agreed to by everybody --
>> they've also been unanimously --
>> have been approved by our zoning and platting commission.
>> well, we've been to the subcommittee to discuss it, so we anticipate that those can be passed on March the sixth. If there's going to be discussion about the major policy issues, I wouldn't venture to guess that the council would be ready to make any decision at that point.
>> I think my expectation is at least it has to be elevated to the city council at that point. I mean, we can't just -- I mean --
>> we will certainly ask them. And it's one thing if it comes up in the realm of discussion regarding the code amendments, but as far as posted for some sort of action, I'm not sure we're going to be able to get that done or action for the March sixth agenda on the policy issues. We're going to find out if we can.
>> make sure we hand deliver our letter tomorrow.
>> and you all want to sign it?
>> the county judge can sign it.
>> with the letter written here, whether we need to authorize a letter on behalf of the commissioners court signed by the county judge.
>> yes. That will work.
>> that way we get there.
>> the timing is first that I think we need to go ahead and move, if we can. And if there's a reason that we cannot, so be it. The other thing is that I do think that we go through a little soul searching, and if there are two or three or four major issues that all these minor things sort of turn on, we may as well go ahead and address those three or four major issues, it seems to me. And if it kind of boils down to eliminating a whole lot of duplication by authorizing one entity to make the call in certain circumstances, I know that. And the only thing is when you are given the power, certain responsibilities come with it. And the simplest thing to me is -- [ inaudible ] but it's also simple that unless you need two or three people doing it and one person doing it, that's what you get done. So let's think about that.
>> yes, sir.
>> any more discussion? All in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. Thank y'all very much. We appreciate it.
Last Modified: Wednesday, April 2, 2003 10:25 AM