Travis County Commssioners Court
March 2, 2004
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 34
34 is to receive the filing with the Travis County Commissioners court a petition for the creation of the Lake Travis community library district and instruct staff to review the petition and all related issues and take appropriate action. And we do have several residents here on this item.
>> judge, I know these ladies have been very involved in getting together all the necessary information for the library district. I know that this has a little more history that Gerald Daugherty, precinct 3 Commissioner, but they have had very informative meeting with me and I think that they have covered all the bases, so to speak. And I'm delighted that are here to answer any questions. Who would like to be the spokesperson this morning?
>> judge Biscoe, Commissioners, dan pederson would have been here to address you, but the city of Austin has a water emergency and dan could not be here, and he asked me to speak on our behalf in his place. My name is nancy pensak. I've been a volunteer for 19 years in the Lake Travis community library. I'm one of the candidates for the board of the proposed Lake Travis library district. When the community library opened in 1985, it served a population of about 5,000. And shared space in the Lake Travis high school library. Currently the population is over 22,000 and the Lake Travis community library is still sharing space with the high school library and it's funded only by private donations. , the proposed Lake Travis library district will enable the citizens of the Lake Travis independent school district to have a full-service library in our area. A one-quarter percent local sales tax will allow the Lake Travis community library to build its own building with ample parking, have an up to date book collection, e-mail and internet access and good children's programs. A library district provides a method to create local funding in non-urban areas such as ours where there are small cities, but they are not able to support full-service libraries on their own. The proposed Lake Travis library district is endorsed by the Lake Travis community library board, the Lake Travis independent school district school board, the village of Briarcliff board of alderman, the city of Lakeway city council, the Lake Travis independent school district librarian, the Lake Travis high school pta and the Lake Travis middle school eta. I'd like to thank judge Biscoe and each of the Commissioners for hearing our presentation, and we ask for your favorable action on our petition. I would like to introduce at this time jean johnson, who is our librarian at Lake Travis high school community library. After ms. Johnson speaks, all of us, we'd be happy to answer any questions that you might have. Thank you.
>> ms. Johnson?
>> thank you for having our petition on your agenda today. I am the librarian at Lake Travis community library, and I think what we're trying to provide are services that most people just take for granted in their community. They're there, they expect them. And we have had a real struggle to try and provide those services for the people of Lake Travis. As nancy mentioned, this is like -- we'd like to provide additional performing, lit literacy, performing for children. We'd like to extend our hours. The computer e-mail access, which becomes even more important with people being able to check for -- if they have jury duty or if -- you know, different types of things that communities just ordinarily would have available. The problem we're getting into at Lake Travis is our school is increasingly stressed by robin hood financial constraints, and we are unable really to adequately fund things that we've done in the past. Many of the services we've provided have come from the school budget. And we are unable to do that any more. I had a budget meeting yesterday. My funds for library books at the high school library next year for 1500 students will be $2,750, so we're in desire straits, and this is really about the only way we'll be able to provide services. Dire straits.
>> my name is carol white. I would just like to talk about the wonderful experience of collecting signature on halloween night. All the time we were collecting signature we were able to -- young couples and adults were just anxious to sign, but on halloween night I was going door to door, and this happened twice, and it just kind of thrilled my heart. I could not believe it. I went to the door, knocked on the door, and in one case a woman answered and she said my mother is ill, would you come in because I know she would want to sign this. I went into her sick room. She was on oxygen, in a wheelchair. She said yes, she says I think a library is so important. Another house the same thing, I asked a gentleman, he says -- and he signed it right away and he says, but you've got to come in the back room.
>> I said oh, no, no, I'm not going to bother her if she's ill. She just got home from the hospital he said why yesterday. And she has really been a supporter of the library. Would you please come back here into the house and have her sign this. So as you can see, I think she was just tickled to death and a strong supporter. It's almost like people on their -- thank goodness they didn't die, but almost on their dying breath, they wanted to sign this petition. So this is how strongly people in our community feel for a library. They really want it. Thank you.
>> we have several requirements, the first is to fmally receive the petition and the second one is to direct the petition to appropriate county staff. To determine whether at least five percent of the number of voters in the territory of the proposed district who voted in the most recent gubernatorial election signed the petition. And I move that we do both of those.
>> second.
>> the other thing that we should be mindful of is that there is a 62-day requirement, so we have to call the election 62 days before may 15th if we plan to have it then, right, tamara?
>> that leaves March ninth as the day for action. And we did ask the county staff to go ahead and start verifying compliance with the law a few days ago. And so we are hopeful -- we're confident that we will be able to get this done by March ninth. Any more discussion of the motion?
>> judge, let me say that also am delighted that the district sponsors and all those involved -- and may is a good time to do this. I'm sure there will be other things until the ballot in may and it will helpful to you all because I understand there to be a little cost savings for y'all to have this thing versus having had it in February, which I know was the original time that y'all wanted to have it. So I think that that's fortunate that the majority or a larger number of your community people would most likely be at the may election versus not as many would have been at the February. Thanks for doing this.
>> i'd also like to say thank you to not giving up. This is the second time around for this issue to come forward. And unlike last time, what we have here is a united front by the city of Lakeway, by the city of Briarcliff. Village of the hills has never claimed to have a library, so you don't need to get their permission. And bee cave. And I'm delighted to see that rather than something that could have been very divisive out in the area, that you have pulled it together and I wish you the best of luck.
>> all in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. By those present. Did I indicate earlier that Commissioner Davis -- when Commissioner Davis left? We have indicate the his absence on any votes? Thank you very much. We'll have this back on the court's agenda next week.
>> thank you.
>> thank you very much.
Last Modified: Wednesday, March 2, 2004 9:13 AM