Travis County Commssioners Court
March 16, 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 20
Number 20 is to consider and take appropriate action on the requirements of house bills 1445 and 1204 for city of Austin and Travis County to establish a single office for subdivision review in the extra territorial jurisdiction, including: a. Deloitte-touche consulting phase I report on the subdivision review process; b. Additional steps necessary for legal compliance; c. Feasibility of invoking legally required arbitration; and d. Any other appropriate remedial steps. Mr. Gieselman?
>> yes. You asked at the last -- last week for me to do four things. One is to draft a letter to the city of Austin expressing our intent with regard to compliance with our interlocal agreement. In your backup you have the draft -- draft letter. Second thing that you asked us to do is to survey other Texas counties and find out how they have complied with the law. And there's a survey about 1/3rd of the counties that we were able to contact in the -- between last week and this week. There was about 30 some odd counties that are subject to the law, we were able to contact 10 of those. And so we have some idea of how other Texas counties are doing with house bill 1445 and 1204. Finally, also you asked me to meet with the stakeholders, I have done that. And I have basically what they would -- their position with regard to our city and the county's future action with regard to 1445. The last item that you asked me to do is contact the Travis County legislative delegation. I was not able to complete that directive of the court. So I have not done anything on that last directive. Let me step back through these. The draft letter to the city of Austin we basically say that there are a few things that we have not completed with regard to the full filament of our interlocal agreement. And that we need to pursue the com please of those items -- com please of those items completion of those items. We suggested in the letter that we divide up our responsibilities by functional areas. That the city of Austin would take exclusive review, substantive review and inspection and charge associated fees over everything within the near term annexation areas. Within the areas of the e.t.j. Beyond the near term annexation, we would divide that up by function. The city would have exclusive jurisdiction over utilities, environment, airport, and storm water quality. And charge the associated fees with the substantive reviews, inspection for that component of work. On the other hand, with the functional areas of transportation and drainage, Travis County would be the exclusive review over substantive subdivision reviews, inspection, and the associated fees with those functions. When we asked the city council, this is the letter from the mayor, on behalf of the Commissioners court, excuse me, on letter from judge Biscoe on behalf of the Commissioners court to mayor wynn and the city council members, to engage in high level discussions to get this resolved. In the final scheme if we have unable to resolve these discussions, we as a county would be willing to enter into binding arbitration to have the conflict resolved. That is the conflict of the letter to the city council.
>> did you have a date? Did you give them a date, judge?
>> I did not give them a date, no. There's no date in the draft letter.
>> they have been off. They do have this on their Thursday, the day after tomorrow, the council meeting. It's scheduled for executive session. And that was going to be one of my suggestions as -- is that whatever we do, it gets faxed over to the city council members with original copies to be mailed. But with the mail situation, it's not going to get their in -- to get there in time for the executive session.
>> 30 days.
>> what about can he say about -- did we say about April 23rd, April 25th is that a Friday? Who is our calendar keeper?
>> melissa I think.
>> pardon me?
>> April 30th is a Friday.
>> 30th.
>> April 30 is a Friday. We say are prepared to submit but feel but are duty bound to submit to binding arbitration should our efforts fail instead of are prepared. I believe we are dually bound based on the law right or legally bound, but April 30th, '04, but are convinced that we are legally bound to submit to binding arbitration should our efforts fail. It not like we are just unilaterally deciding. We believe we are legally bound.
>> they have a different set of meeting dates than we do. So that would --
>> legally obligated.
>> back my old legal days there, joe.
>> tom you caught that thing up in the address. It's city of Austin.
>> we chatted with the stakeholders, just the -- is this the revision that stakeholders recommend?
>> I think it's -- they would represent that in December they submitted to both the city and county their own draft version of chapter 30. Their position today is that they would prefer that we would adopt that version of chapter 30, which closely resembles the option 2, that are documented in this letter.
>> would you like to give comments? Don't say I told you so, either.
>> actually, judge, I don't -- I’m really just here as a resource. Joe reported the results of the meeting. We did meet with him. We had a fall back position, which I believe was option 3, which was to establish an arbitrary physical boundary, but -- that we understand andism these and -- sympathize and agree with the fact that the court could not accept that, given that that would leave property within the two-mile e.t.j., That the city has no intention of annexing, that the court would have responsibilities for. Our position from -- from the very beginning, from the time we went to the legislature has been that entity that has responsibility for ongoing maintenance and -- and -- and ownership for the facility, are the ones that need to have on oversight responsibility in the case of transportation and drainage. According to the court. [indiscernible]
>> the -- the revision that joe describe add few minutes ago -- described a few minutes ago we believe is close to what you all recommended.
>> that's correct.
>> you believe it is too.
>> that's correct.
>> joe, are we giving in to any particular area that would hamper our ability to build roads in any sort of way? I mean is there anything in here that the city can come back and tell us, oops, I mean, you need roads, but your runoff is ours and what -- is there anything I need to be aware of that's attached to something that's going to create that kind of a situation?
>> we have both comited to a single code, chapter 30. So at this point no matter who executes that code or basic -- we are basically on the same sheet of music. There are requirements in the environmental section too that do apply to roads. But at this point, it's not a matter of the standard that we use, it's a matter of who reviews to make sure that we are complying with the standard. And for environmental, we are saying that the city of Austin would review the subdivisions to make sure that they comply with the portions of chapter 30 that are relative to the environment. By the same token, design of the roads and what not, but it will be the county's responsibility to make sure that those subdivisions are carried out, they actually implement the portions of chapter 30 dealing with transportation as we both agree. To answer your question there is nothing in this letter that would change. It's just a matter of who does it, who charges the fees to do it. If we have disagreements over the fundamentals in chapter 30, that means going back to the drafting board and debating those criteria. If we disagree with any road standard that's incumbent on us to tell the city that we want to change chapter 30 to change the standard of how roads are built. But at this point, I believe we are in agreement with what chapter 30 says. Both on the environment and on transportation.
>> so let me just so we're clear on that, trying to get off this medication or not being able to build roads in this town, so I don't want this to create that situation. So I’m banking on you, joe, I mean to take care of us there [laughter]
>> I also think that the statesman article last week was extraordinarily helpful in getting folks attention over there. I visited one of our counter parts over there on the elected side, they were not -- it was not crystallized in terms of the seriousness of the impasse and what was going on until they read about it in the paper. And they are very focused and are looking forward to a discussion on this this Thursday.
>> with regard to that, this letter does call for high level discussions. It may be a good idea for the court to appoint certain members among it to be the representatives from the court in discussions with the elected officials of the city of Austin.
>> can we do that later?
>> that's fine.
>> with the changes recommended today, I move approval of the letter.
>> second.
>> the city authorize the county judge to sign on behalf of the Commissioners court. Do we want to have the whole court sign it?
>> up to you.
>> I’m happy to take accountability for the words.
>> why don't we do that. That may send a high level sit down if all five of us sign. Let's try to get that done.
>> judge, that friendly to fax it over to the --
>> yes, ma'am.
>> originals to follow.
>> if we get -- I guess we ought to try to get that done, change made by noon tomorrow.
>> I will have it --
>> we can get the signatures, get it to them tomorrow early afternoon, maybe hand deliver it.
>> they are not allowed to take hand delivered stuff anymore.
>> do we have to know that? [laughter] we will fax it, Commissioner.
>> all in favor? That passes by unanimous vote.
>> thank you, judge.
>> thank you, joseph.
Last Modified: Wednesday, March 24, 2004 1:40 PM