Travis County Commssioners Court
September 2, 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.
Citizens Communication
Citizens communication is first, we do have four residents who have signed in. First is mr. Thomas bryan. This gives residents an opportunity to address the court on any matter not on the agenda up to three minutes. Good morning.
>> good morning.
>> good morning, ladies and gentlemen. My name is thomas bryant. I live on brodie lane, south of slaughter just outside of the city of Austin limits. I'm here to speak to you this morning in an attempt to elevate has so far has been a several month-long effort on my part to get brodie lane restored to its original condition before the disastrous what's turned into a year-long water line project known as the olympic heights water line outside my bedroom and still unfinished that has effectively rendered my residence, my home, uninhabitable. I say uninhabitable because everybody morning beginning at sunup (noises) rattles through my own. Every time an 18 wheeler goes over the patch jobs on brodie lane. There have been 11 cross cuts through brodie lane. Four of them outside my bedroom. I understand the project to me which has been abandoned has no plans to resurface brodie lane. I have been speaking with the county representatives in transportation, the city representatives in the utility department in an attempt to convince them to resurface brodie lane. Because no matter what the patches are, inevitably when the trucks hit them -- (noise) every few minutes from sunup -- sunup to sunset. How would you like to live with that? I -- I am coming to you and I plan to go to the city council and be in front of you quite often in the hope that's something will be done -- in the hopes that something will be done for me and for my neighbors to put brodie lane back to where our residences and homes are habitable. Outside of that, if it doesn't happen, I only see a couple of other solutions. And one is sell my house and move. And being unable to do that, to talk to an attorney. Which I hate to do. Thank you very much.
>> thank you.
>> multiple multi-
>> quick question, what hundred block is this, can you give us a cross street so I have a reference point?
>> it's the intersection of kelly wood and brodie. But the cross cuts start where the city limit ends and end at shady hollow at the intersection of brodie and squirrel hollow.
>> so this is the county section of the road.
>> the county section, yes. It's a city project, the city water works project, but the county has some sort of hands in the pot there. And I'm -- I'm trying to play tennis ball and speak to both parties and eventually get something done.
>> tom, have you talked to -- I don't think you have talked to bob in my office, have you?
>> I have.
>> have you?
>> yes.
>> and we can't get anything accomplished with -- with transportation natural resources?
>> not yet. I mean, I'm not giving up working with bob and joe and the city. Mcgill and webber. But, you know, you folks have a lot of things on your plate and I'm just going to have to keep working until it's time to give up.
>> I will make sure that I talk to bob on this issue.
>> [indiscernible]
>> well, [multiple voices]
>> this is the first that i've heard of this.
>> how long did it take --
>> it's almost a year now. It was supposed to be four months, it's a year. Brodie, there hasn't been any work on it for several months now. Brodie lane looks like a waste land. You have seen the photographs of roak and the roads in iraq, the signs are knocked down, the drainage fences are still up, and the shoulder is nothing but a mud bath.
>> well, you are right the trucks every time I'm out there I can't believe how many 18 wheelers and whatever have to use brodie lane, which is another you were and problem that we have.
>> no matter what kind of a patch you put on those cross cuts it's going to be destroyed in a short time.
>> thanks.
>> as far as you know, the work is still underway but they haven't been real active?
>> I know that the project hasn't been accepted yet. But I understand that even with acceptance there's no -- going to be no resurfacing of the road.
>> okay.
>> thank you, tom. Andy pickus and rabina jackson.
>> good morning.
>> good morning.
>> good morning.
>> here you go.
>> good morning judge and Commissioners, I'm rabina jackson, president of group solutions rjw, here this morning representing the chamber of commerce as chair of the local issues committee. I'm here with a very difficult position. We are speaking before friends that we respect and we are asking you to take a harder look at a budget that I'm sure that you have looked at a whole lot already. First of all, I would like to express my appreciation. We recognize that this county is in an enviable position and that you set aside reserves during a time when things were flush that allow to us have a wonderful tax rating and so those things don't happen by chance. We applaud that. As you know, the community is in a very difficult position. Business is suffering and commercial revenues are down and our residential community is being asked to shoulder a higher percentage of the tax burden and it's from that position that we come to you today. We are asking that you make additional difficult decisions and that you not increase the tax rate -- pardon me, in fiscal year '04. We are also asking and we oppose that for the reasons just mentioned. We recognize that there is an exodus outside of Austin. I think our state demographer said outside of Austin and Travis County that we lost 10,000 residents last year to other communities, other cities, other counties and our tax revenue is falling. So it's from that position that we oppose any tax increases in fiscal year '04. We also ask that you study and compare the county's budget with other staffing levels in other comparable Texas counties in cost savings and looking in for potential cost savings. Even though our county is in good financial shape, our burden represents about 16% of the overall tax rate so we are asking that you look at that with an eye toward reducing that overall tax rate. Third, we ask that the county take a multi-year budget look. We suspect that internally that happens, but when we represent the budget we didn't see that, it was less informal than formal. It would be helpful to look at expenses coming up over the long-term rather than just a single year budget. So again we thank you for what you are doing. We would we we we recognize that -- we recognize what you have done in the past. We recognize that the county is in the enviable position. We ask that you look at those recommendations in the light that they were presented based on this very tough economy and very difficult positions our residents are in. With that, I would be happy to entertain any questions and I have sandy who is here with me to help address questions.
>> ms. Hinges.
>> I have -- I'm handy hinges, nothing else to add, here in support of our volunteers for the chamber.
>> thank you all very much.
>> I have a owe I have a comment or two. Rabina or sandy either one. I was -- an article that I read as I was leaving town last Tuesday where I noticed that there is a taxing authority in this community that has I think in excess of [indiscernible] in reserves, that is capital metro. Even though we are the recipient of [indiscernible] money in this community, everybody understands I suppose what the build greater Austin program is [papers shuffling - audio interference] where we I guess should be happy that we get moneys coming our direction, had your board considered taking this same sort of approach with going to that tacking authority and asking -- asking if they all might consider doing a few things different with that agency. I don't know another taxing authority in this community that has those kind of funds in reserves and build on them each year. I have talked with a number of business folks in this community and I asked people -- first of all, I asked our state senator do you, can you tell me another taxing authority that -- that is able to tax their full amount and yet only spend .75 of that penny sales tax that they generate to run their operation? I mean, I'm not sure that I know another taxing authority in the united states that I have ever heard of where you can tax the full amount and yet only use .67, .75 or whatever they are using as somewhere in that area. Has your board ever considered going and asking exactly hey what's up with this?
>> I can't speak to the board but I can say that local issues has not taken up that issue. Sandy, can you speak to the board?
>> we have not received that direction from our board, but our transportation committee has looked at the work that capital metro has been doing to this point they haven't gone ahead and recommended a position that way because those funds are coming back in the community for transportation projects, so we feel like that's a correct use of those funds.
>> but we would love to hear from you and whatever you want to get on the agenda let me know. The other thing is a capital metro budget is a good example of multi-year budgeting, which is one of the goals that you have listed here. And it is a partner with other entities in this community to address transportation. Its mission. That is its mission. It doesn't have other missions that it has to deal with. We would love to have you come over and converse with our board.
>> thank you very much.
>> thank you.
>> ms. Jackson I had one quick question. You correctly stated that we are 16% of the overall tax bill, school district 60, city of Austin 20. Did you deliver similar advice to those boards saying that you opposed any increase in their property tax rates this year.
>> we did -- I'm not sure if the chamber looked at the city -- pardon me the school board.
>> we actually had chamber representatives on their committee that helped them find their budget cuts, so we were very involved in that process. That was done through our education workforce development council. I don't believe they -- I don't recall what their final position was on the actual tax rate level, but we helped identify many millions of dollars in cuts that they came up with --
>> the city's tax rate is going up.
>> right.
>> the effective rate. Aisd adopted a higher rate than this year, I was just wondering if the advice about don't increase taxes was also delivered to those two bodies.
>> rabina can talk to our position on the city.
>> no. That was not delivered. The committee did look very, very, very hard at the recommendations of both of -- both entities, the budgets of both entities. I think the reason looking at the discussion and deliberation on the committee the idea with the county budget was that the committee would like or did not have the information based on the single-year budget as well as committee members felt that there were opportunities for additional looking at efficiencies and economies of scale. And so it was not with -- with being done lightly or not without a lot of deliberation. But those are the two things that drove the recommendation that the county really seek not to increase tax -- the tax rate at all this year. And again it was that recommendation was made for '04.
>> did you have any discussions or places where you feel that we are duplicative with any other entity or we could get economies of scale, do you have any suggestions or programs that you all think are inappropriate and give any input other than just from --
>> that is a very fair question. We came into the process really late with regards to looking at the budget. One of the things that we have recommended is that the chamber take a longer view of the budget and be prepared to make those kind of recommendations or at least work with you on those recommendations. That's very fair. We appreciate that. And so in visiting with chamber leadership wes suggested that we not come into the process so late this year so that we are able to do a better job of working with you on that.
>> I would like to see a side by side comparison as to what all of the entities address. The homestead exemptions, the mandates that we have that perhaps other entities do not have. And then the tax rate how it has evolved through the years.
>> we would, too, Commissioner. Part of the reason of wanting to start earlier next year is to have the opportunity to work with you to ferret out that kind of information.
>> I would love to see a side by side comparison.
>> yes. Those were the kinds of questions that came up that we were not able to answer and we would like very much to have that kind of information.
>> do you think that Travis County is different -- I mean obviously your fourth point here about evaluating the programs in comparison to other urban counties, sound to me like maybe you all have done that.
>> no.
>> you haven't done it?
>> no. We are hoping that that is done.
>> we have heard anecdotal comments about it. We want to take a better look at that, encourage you to do that as well. Part of our position was not to say as rabina indicated we came in late in the process. We don't have specific recommendation that's we hope to have for you next year. But to give you some ideas as to where our membership was thinking, are they doing this, looking at that, doing these things. We recognize that you are looking at some of these, others we are not assure about. We are not saying that you are not doing any of this.
>> without a doubt.
>> our intention is to express to you what our membership feels like they think that the county should be doing and if we can take back some and say look they are doing these, this is what they have found out, this is wonderful, we will be happy to further educate them. Because we recognize there is a lack of understanding of what the county does do for the citizens.
>> thank you.
>> I would also like to speak to that. Since sitting in the meeting or in this room, we've had county staff say we've got some other input that we would like to share. We would love to have that. So I think the general thrust in terms of holding the line on the budget and looking at multiple years are relevant and there's information that we need that would help us in the process so we appreciate your offering to continue to educate us.
>> I know our nearest urban county is Williamson county, they just aadopted their tax rate last week. I bet a lot of people would be surprised to find out that the taxes on the same home in travis versus Williamson county, it is more expensive for that home in Williamson county and that is especially so if you are 65 or older. And I just encourage people that rather than thinking, well, it's cheaper up there, the answer is not anymore since they passed their bonds.
>> that's right.
>> not since their bond election passed.
>> so when we look at these four recommendations, should we look at these as four broad areas that you are interested in getting more information on.
>> yes.
>> thank you very much.
>> thank you all.
>> susan spitaro.
>> susan county auditor. [inaudible - no mic] I really didn't get their four recommendations until very late on Friday. And had a chance to look at it over the weekend. I do think that since it is in print that it really does, some of those need to be addressed and I share the desire with the chamber, I don't mind working with them and giving them some better data on what the county is doing. But I would like to address some of these because it is a document and it did come out in writing and the chamber is an organization that is respected in this community. First of all, I think that everyone should look at efficiencies and I think Travis County does do that, I think that's an ongoing process, certainly nothing unfair about that recommendation. Duplicative funds, if that really means funds, the funds that Travis County what are set up by law under the state of Texas. If that means duplicate services I think a real fair question is what is duplicate services? I have kind of been around long enough where people have talked about metro government and economies of scale and those type of things and it's an area that interests me and that I have spent a lot of time on. I i think that that word it's thrown out there very casually. Duplicative means we run a park and they run the same park. We have law enforcement, they have law enforcement in the same place. If we have law enforcements in the county and the city has law enforcement in the city that is not a duplicative effort. That is a different effort of a similar type. And I have not seen duplicative efforts. What we do and the city does exactly the same things. The other -- the other statement in the first bullet point is that we should balance the budget based on anticipated revenues as other levels of government and businesses are doing. This one kind of sparked my interest because as you know by statute I'm the one that makes the revenue estimate for Travis County. And I would -- I was somewhat surprised at that because the reality is we have been very, very close to making revenue estimate that comes in. And I just kind of would like to tell you that for the -- in fy '03, for instance, we were 1.6% over, we came in over what we estimated. We contemplating this year that we would come in at .052 more than we estimated. So we are in a deficit from the revenue side. In other words the revenue that we estimated coming in has in fact come in. We have taken a very conservative stance on things that are difficult to predict. There's a predictability in all of this. And I think that we have done that. On the expenditure side, you have done a very good job of budgeting those expenditures and one of the things that's always in the statement from the bond raters is the strict control that we have over budgeted expenditures because you can -- when you are in a deficit, there are two parts of that. One is the revenue doesn't come in that you thought would come in, the other is that you would spend more than you thought that you would. We have not done either of those things, revenue has come in the way we thought it would and expenditures have been controlled the way we thought that they would. For that reason, Travis County has been in a very enviable position of not having a deficit. So I would suggest that we don't model ourselves after other levels of government. And businesses that in fact -- businesses who have gone out of business because of financial management and governments that are in a deficit position because you have really managed not to be in that deficit position. And I think that's the -- exactly the right thing to do. The coordination consolidation of services with the city of Austin, other jurisdictions is a cost savings measures. Again I look at this just as an accountant. We see that on the expenditure side, I have to tell you that I don't believe that we are saving money with consolidated services. I think Travis County can administer most services at a less cost than a consolidated services. And I think that is something that we probably need to do in in-depth study on because I think that's the way it's going to fall out. I do know that every time we do consolidations in the 9/11 is a good example, that is when we look at our dispatchers compared to the city's, we have to raise their salaries. We looked at salaries of district judges a couple of weeks ago and saw that the city attorney was at 22% higher salary than the district judge. The police monitor is at a significant percentage more than the sheriff of Travis County that runs the entire correctional facilities and law enforcement. So it's difficult to see that a consolidation saves us money. One of the increases in Travis County's budget this year is any e.m.s. Where the city of Austin is proposing a 2% increase for their people. As everyone knows Travis County employees are not getting an increase. So I think that one has to be careful, the rhetoric sounds good, but I think really a person needs to put numbers to it and actually analyze pro forma statements when consolidations are considered. I would be very happy to work with the chamber on any kind of information or plans like that. The multi-tier budgeting approach, I -- multi-year budgeting approach, I think that's no doubt that you have done that. That's how you are in the position that you are now. The downturn was not a surprise. It's deeper and longer than anyone thought. I think that's a surprise. But we all knew it was coming. The chief appraiser serves all of the governments in this area. He certainly knew property values were going down. And we planned on it. And I think that you did a good job doing that and I think that perhaps you need to put it in writing the multi-year approach because if it isn't apparent to other organizations it is sure apparent to me when I sit here on an annual basis and see what you are doing. Evaluating county programs and staphing levels as compared to other urban counties. I think that's interesting because we are different from any other urban counties I think that has not been clearly articulated in the press or analysis that has been done. First of all, as you know I said a couple of weeks ago, one big difference with Travis County is a huge amount of tax exempt property that we have in Travis County. 77% of the general fund revenue comes from property taxes. It is our primary source of income. So when you have tax exempt property in the choice locations in the center of Austin, that obviously shifts that burden to the other businesses and residences that are there. But on the other hand that's one of the reasons that people live here because they like that part of Austin. But one of my staff called the chief appraiser to try to get a feel for that and he said very conservatively that he felt that at least 20% of our property was exempt, that's a huge amount. So the other 80% has to pick up the difference. That's one difference between Travis County and other urban counties. The next differs is that we have more road miles than any other urban county. The road are an interesting thing because we passed two years ago people who live here passed the largest bond issue that we have ever had on roads. Okay. That has generated about $10 million a year in debt service. So it's important to see that that was there. The other thing is the other urban counties have hospital districts, we do not and we have the highest exemptions. So I think that you really can't do a casual look. A person has to sit and look at all of these issues in more depth. Again, I would say I think that you all have done a good job in really hard times of keeping us together and keeping a solid financial base.
>> thank you.
>> I think it would make sense for us to generate a written response to these areas.
>> absolutely.
>> most of this -- I think we do earth formally or informally every year. But to the outsiders I may not be obvious that we do. The other thing if you compare to us the city of Austin and the other urban counties, there are a whole lot of facts that I think the average taxpayer would be interested in seeing. So maybe we ought to take the time to generate that. Most of these chores, you take the time to do it, it does involve a substantial amount of time, you share that --
>> unfortunately.
>> -- folk kind of forget it overnight. But if we do this this time, maybe we can get a little friendly media coverage, make sure that we help get out the word and if people have questions as a result of this, they ought to put them to us.
>> we need to publish it ourselves somewhere constantly.
>> I would be glad to help on that.
>> great.
>> have we had the opportunity to go, susan, you to go before the chamber board? And discuss these sort of things like you have done today?
>> I will be glad to do that. I talked to them before the meeting. I didn't get this until the last minute either/or I would have called them. Had I seen it earlier that might have happened. But as they said this is an ongoing process this they want to look at, I will be glad to come talk to the chamber or work with them on committees looking at these things. I think everyone in the community has the same interests.
>> sure.
>> christian went a few days ago, maybe a couple of weeks ago.
>> susan has the perspective of always being on the new york bond rating trip and certainly could be helpful on passing on insight from the bond rating firms of what it takes to be a triple a county and they are extraordinarily interested in multi-year planning. Again those are conversation that's don't get passed on and susan would be in an excellent position to -- [multiple voices]
>> susan, I mean, I really do find myself between a rock and a hard spot with -- with this subject matter because I -- you know, I do think that -- that most of this community would like to see us have a smaller budget. In the -- it is interesting that we have around a 20% exemption of taxable properties in Travis County and yet we still have $60 billion worth of appraised value. That is what we are fortunate with. In this community.
>> that's right.
>> even when you take out 20%, you have still got unbelievable amounts of money, which is the reason why the county has been able to -- to do the kind of things that we have done. You know, when we talk about revenues have come in, we have been fairly accurate with that. I think that people like the chamber, what they are asking and what people on the street are asking is is that we know that we have 65 and over exemptions that we have, you know, other exemptions that perhaps other communities don't have. But we also realize that we are in such a property-rich area, which is the reason why aisd is a property rich school district and 62% of our children are on the free lunch program. Now, that would be -- that would seem odd that you would go how in the world can you have these two things that exist and seem so contradicting. So I think we are always going to have to be somewhat mindful that we are blessed with having a community that has a lot of property values in it. Even though 20% of it is exempt. I think that's the reason that we get asked a lot about why can't you -- why can't you live -- [indiscernible]
>> we may be exceeding census communication.
>> I'm sorry.
>> that's all right.
>> we are exceeding it, we will take it up at a different time.
>> the other thing is that you will have a budget workshop, I will just sit in the audience if you have some questions.
>> we have a little lull after markup while we are waiting on the year ending balance. It seems to me that it would be the appropriate time to produce a written response and share that with others, too.
>> the chamber is interested in what we do and -- [multiple voices]
>> anybody else for citizens communication whether you signed in or not. Then the consent items are next.
Last Modified: Wednesday, September 3, 2003 7:52 AM