Travis County Commissioners Court
March 29, 2005
Item 14
Number 14, consider and take appropriate action to consider flooding issues on walnut creek in northeast Travis County.
>> chuck, we've had a series of meetings, I guess, this has been going on for a while, but one of the last meetings that we've had we -- we made a lot of progress and the result of that meeting we tried to get as much information out to the -- to the community as possible. Very successful last meeting, in fact are, where we did get a stakeholders elected officials involved in this process. And that -- there was several letters, correspondents that I ended up sharing with the Commissioners court, also with john kuhl, also with the neighborhood association. As of yesterday, there was a -- a legislator that came in from u.s. Congressman mccall, so within that particular activity of trying to come to some type of a direction that we needed to go in with the several inputs, from -- from the varies interested parties, an example that we had, correspondence from -- from represent dawnna dukes, correspondence from mayor will wynn, correspondence from -- from of course mccall, u.s. Congressman mccall, u.s. Congressman lloyd doggett, our -- the representative, state representative also mike strama and also a letter then from tceq. Along with other correspondence that did filter and come out of it -- of that particular meeting that was had just recently, in February of -- of -- of -- came from the input from -- from john kuhl and others that participated in that meeting. So this is a pretty big involved process, I think, but the basis of having information laid out, exposure to the information laid out before all of these different entities and all the -- also the community itself is where we are this morning. I want to thank you all for having this thing on the agenda, to maybe get some kind of direction. With that, john, if you don't mind, did you get the latest powerpoint from u.s. Congressman mccall. I just wanted to put some added language into a water resource development act that's being looked at for moneys that -- that we basically try to -- john, I知 going to go ahead and turn it over to you. Thank you.
>> before he turns it over to you, what I have distributed are 12 pictures that [indiscernible] yesterday, Commissioner Davis office, they produced color copies, they do a pretty good job of depicting how bad the situation can get out there. In November, I went out and -- the -- the -- Thursday or Friday, Wednesday I guess before thanksgiving, in response to a call from the neighbors. The reason that I put this on the agenda is -- was a request from residents and a couple of e-mails from mr. Thorenson, I put it on the agenda because I think that the court as a whole needs to formally respond to this matter and try to figure out in what direction we should head. As I indicated in my memo yesterday, Commissioner Davis has -- has done quite a bit of work on this matter. A lot of meetings. I distributed a memo that he shared with me about three weeks ago. So a lot of effort has been put into it. The problem, though, is -- is that I don't think the residents have received from the Commissioners court an indication of formal indication from us as to what it is that we would like to do. So I thought that it would be a good idea for the whole court to be familiar with this problem, hopefully as familiar as Commissioner Davis and I have become. Look at the facts. Try to figure out what options are available. Choose what course of action we plan to take so the residents will know. And I think that's the situation now. And john did prepare a document yesterday and you are about to share that with us.
>> yes, sir, judge. John kuhl, environmental officer, t.n.r. I don't see the need to go through every piece of what I provided to you and I suspect that you would share that. But what I did want to do, just kind of as we set the -- the context here is to take you back to the last time that we did come to Commissioner Daugherty on this item and it was I believe October 19th, '04, it was in relationship to -- to the supplemental environmental projects that we received from tceq. And I guess this is one of those cases where I just sort of want to take you back to that time and -- and tell you that -- that in my opinion, I think it's shared certainly by the neighbors and staff members, that circumstances well on the ground circumstances have changed to certain degrees since I was before you last on this item. When I was here, what I discussed, there's a -- there's a chunk of money that we have been given about -- about $111,000 of which can be used for debris removal or erosion control measures along the creek. Okay? At the time that I last addressed the court, it -- it was my impression, based on reconnaissance, that there was a lot of debris that needed to be removed, a good chunk of that money could be spent in doing that. Well, one of the neighbors, christina kubeck, said I have some ideas on what needs to be done, come back out here. We walked the creek. She's a self appointed neighborhood brat and tour guide, she was excellent in taking us around. And we became clear that there was no way, $111,000 needed to be spent on debris removal. However we have known, I don't know, the first time I went out to some of these properties to see the erosion issues, but it was certainly probably even before the date that I have got on the cover memo, probably '01 or so. And there are significant problems there with erosion. Probably at least four or five residences, also flooding problems along the creek. So -- so what I had hoped to do was just lay that out and tell you that you authorized us to -- to expend those funds in a way that I think now is not appropriate because the money would be -- would be wasted. I mean, you could go out and polish trees with $111,000. You don't need to spend that amount of money on debris removal. It's been through the combination of additional floodings in November and actions by the homeowners themselves, it's largely a debris free creek. That's not 100% true. But it certainly doesn't need that amount of money. So where we have arrived now, through these meetings with -- with the Commissioner Davis put together is a fairly simple place, you know, it appears that there's -- there's two blinking red light options here. Whether or not we can use those moneys for them is another question. The options are, you will see that on the second page of the cover memo, basically buyout or extreme restorations. Costs are fairly analogous. The issue on the sep is that notified by tceq, we are not able to use that sep money for hydrologic or hydrology analysis, nor to use those funds for buyout.
>> we said that we would use the fund how, now, we mind me of that.
>> the language in the sep is something along the lines of debris removal and erosion control.
>> okay. John, can you just describe for us how bad the situation is?
>> yes. There are -- at least four residences that have had large chunks of earth get eroded. What's happened is that there's been upstream development and you know fairly severe flood event that have just caused large amounts of water to come through it at high rates. This is your basic, you know, clay loam eastern Travis County soil along stream banks that is fairly erodable in the first place. There also have been other engineering projects on the opposite side of the creek initiated and constructed through permitting with the city of Austin back in '70s and '80s and the neighbors can tell you more of details there. But what's happened that is in these four or five properties, severe, literal property losses occurred where chunks of land is washed into the creek and is threatening the stability in one case I mean there's literally a garage hanging in the air basically. In another case there's a swimming pool that's very close and another case patios, actually two more cases where patios are threatened and so it's -- it's one of these conundrums, situations that we find ourselves in sometimes where, you know, if you look at the fema grant opportunities and so forth, they have not had sufficient claims on flooding to, you know, be -- be available for those programs. They -- they certainly don't meet any sort of -- of true low income or what have you, you know, availability for funding and so it's just one of these tough places that we find ourselves in where there are not cookie cutter answers. So that's the reason why Commissioner Davis has -- and others have put together sort of a multi-agency, multi-disciplinary approach to the problem.
>>
>> [one moment please for change in captioners]
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>> ...there are some other options that y'all discussed in the meetings that you had. And what are they now?
>> well, you know, what needs to happen is first of all there's a triage of decision making. The first question is which major direction do you want to go in? Do you want to go in the direction of buyout or do you want to go into the direction of stream res toreization? And once you get to that branch on the decision making tree, if you would like to go in the buyout direction, we have discussed that option with the city of Austin -- the city of Austin staff does have a program in place for buyout. It's obviously focused in their city limits, it doesn't apply here, but they essentially take a value of the homes and apply 1.5 multiplied to it for such things as appraisals and demolition and so forth. Tear not cheap homes. They're probably 250,000-dollar homes if you look at tcad. We've not done appraisals or anything like that, but if you're looking at a buyout situation you're probably looking at a couple million dollars. Okay. That's that decision making branch. The other one is if you want to do stream res storeization -- restoreization. We feel and the city of Austin that before you launch into something you don't just go build a couple of things and hope it works. You need to do a pretty detailed, site specific and high drolic analysis and figure out what the aggravating factors are, model the stream and come up with an engineering design for that restoreation. A couple come to mind. You do it right.
>> it appears to me if the homes are dangerously close to being swept into the creek, it seems to me that would be the first step that we want to address. I知 not unfamiliar with this. The colorado river is really eroding very badly and people's property is falling into the river out in garfield. And what I知 concerned about is the road, caldwell lane, that may be affected pretty soon. So it's not like we can do something to the stream or to the waterway immediately. I think it's going to be addressing people's lives first. And if they're dangerously close to falling in the creek, I think we need to address that. And if we don't have the money on hand, then let's try to see if it can be -- it can qualify for a bond election, because this is a county-wide issue that needs to be addressed. Both east of i-35 in 4 and 1.
>> that is where the majority of these --
>> that is what you described. So I think it's serious enough that I think we ought to go ahead and figure out how much it's going to take and let's put it on the ballot.
>> if that's what we wind up doing with the situation, Margaret, down in your precinct, we didn't have the solution and the money right at hand, but we started to work away at the problem. That seems like a pool of money that will do good work. And then as projects are ready to be pulled in, those are the ones that get cued up first. What to I don't want to have happen is what happened in the mid '70's related to boggy creek through east Austin. And that was I think the worst flood control project ever invented. You talk about taking a beautiful creek and turning it into a concrete waterway, kind of like the river in la where they shoot all the futureistic movies. And i've seen beautiful restoreiations, like the beautiful shoal creek where they've shored it up and you still have a natural creek. Txdot did the same thing on parts of 2222. They've got one gigantic piece of impervious cover and you don't have anything that even resembles a natural waterway. I知 hoping to blend the best, learned from what works in our area, but I think all of us -- I know i've got some areas up off of gil -- gill land creek, we've got lots of creeks. And walnut is famous for this. I can remember when I was a tv chick doing things on walnut creek in the city of Austin. This is a watershed that has a lot of problems. And it needs to get the attention.
>> I think it should be done holistically and let's not waste any time.
>> and I thank my colleagues for opening it up toward that idea. And of course these are some of the things that were discussed in the meeting was initially looking at the buyout options, trying to give them a priority concern. This was the most immediate thing that I think we should do, but of course as you mentioned before, the process -- go through tcad and see what the appraised value is of those particular properties and look at those properties that are in danger and in harm's way presently. And, of course, I have no problem with that, even if it did go to a bond election. But my whole point is if the voters do not -- if it's going to a bond election, decide not to approve this situation, then what's the next step. So there was a sequence of event that I wanted to make sure happened to ensure that those persons are guaranteed a possibility to be taken out of harm's way. So again, I知 looking at all these opportunities, but I think there ought to be a contingent plan whereby if plan a doesn't work, then plan b will go into effect. So to make sure that these things are rectified and taken care of as we go through the process. Those are some other concerns that we have, and hopefully the agencies, according to the backup and according to the current funding that we have, will be entertained and properly put in place. And I know that that's a very significant suggestion of buyout from representative strong, but also congressman mccaul who is basically working with congressman lloyd doggett. So all of these things can take place in the interim, but right now we have an immediate -- a dangerous situation in my mind that exists right now. They're under siege because of uncontrollable erosion problems in walnut creek. So I would like to move this forward as far as addressing and taking care of the problem. As far as what we need to do, as far as the direction.
>> if we identify homes that are most precarious, ones that we ought to include in a buyout, is this a permanent solution or what's more to be done?
>> well, it certainly does -- it's not quite over once you do a buyout. You've got to, first of all, manage the land, mow it, keep it in a state that doesn't end up causing problems with the neighbors, but I think that's probably the extend of it. -- the extent of it the other option is the city of Austin owns land that I think is sort of -- I think in terms of their asset organization, probably on the parks side. They don't really use it for a park at this time. But we've had discussions with them about potentially having them look at managing this. I don't think they're readily going to jump on that bandwagon, but we can certainly ask those questions. But the long time maintenance of the land is certainly something that we have to take responsibility for if we buy them out. That's something that we certainly do in timber creek and other places.
>> [inaudible - no mic].
>> if we go the buyout route, then we need a plan really. Right? So we need to identify homes that we think would be covered, figure out what the total cost would be, determine whether there's any additional remediation or restoreiation or activities that need to be done. Then you've got to look at the funding. Then we figure out whether there are partners. And if partners cannot get the money fast enough, then maybe we can work out a deal where they advance it and they reimburse us whatever their share would be, if there's a share. The other thing about the plan is we need to give the advisory committee a plan because it needs to make sense to them too, for them to recommend that it be included in the bond package. So at some point we have to ask ourselves how long will it take us to put together a plan, albeit sketchy, that's sufficient to give to the advisory committee for their consideration. Is that a matter we can take care of in a couple of weeks or a couple of days?
>> he seems to be looking at you, joe. [ laughter ]
>> [inaudible - no mic] it's imperative that they educate the public on the need to approve it.
>> I think you're asking joe to do a -- which spec house of -- that kind of line item detail, that would not happen in two weeks. I知 looking more from the satellite viewpoint, looking down and saying generally how many houses do we think may be in here. We need a place to start. I see this as a phase one of what will be a phase with two and three and four, kind of like we prioritize understand timber creek, which ones were the most important. And maybe it's a blending of i'll call it a tool box to be able to do different kind of strategies as they mature and are brought forward. We never run out of flood control projects out there.
>> I was going to defer to joe's expert judgment on what to put together to give to the committee.
>> in in there a candidate project already. Our match of what's coming out of the onion creek study. I understood it will take us four years to get there and quite a bit of analysis. Appeared what we have plugged in as the request for funding is merely the 35% match to the corps of engineers money, which may become available in 2008. So that's -- we have not plugged in any on the money for the county to buy 100% of properties in a buyout program. To answer your question, I can't do that what we have in there thus far. It's merely matching money to put ourselves into a position of grabbing the federal dollars. I understood that we were also asking the corps of engineers through the u.s. Congressmen to initiate a corps of engineers study on walnut creek, which would have the same outcome. Would that outcome be a buyout program or a structural improvement? Probably would not come within the term of this bond election because it will take that long for the corps to process this thing through, get congress to approve the project, so it's a matter of timing. We have right now in our bond program matching money for the onion creek, and there's also money in there for the buyout at Lake Travis, the graveyard point. We do not have any other buyout program currently in there.
>> the idea is to supplement that amount with some other amount? I mean, that's why I think we have to do some analysis, put together some sort of plan. But I think we informally contact potential partners and try to get a commitment from them. If it takes us advancing 100% with the understanding that at some point they will try to reimburse us, whatever share they commit to, I can live with that, but time is of the essence, so I知 not suggesting we wait. I知 trying to recall the nature of this problem, and the flooding gets severe after a real heavy rain that I知 thinking it's bigger than the four or five homes. If some remediation is not done --
>> I guess that's where I知 sinking, I guess at this -- what I知 seeking, I guess at this point, is some guidance. You expose yourself on buyouts, maybe four units here, another on the colorado, but once you start paying 100% for buyouts, there is a lot of properties out there that are similarly suffering erosion. We have not gone there as far as the county. We've always waited for a presidential declaration to match the federal money or gone after corps of engineers. So this would be a first. We do firsts all the time, but just so we understand that that's where we're going.
>> how do we understand the jurisdictional partners here? While this is in the unincorporated part of Travis County, what responsibility, if any, does the city of Austin have because of their water, wastewater, utility services? And certainly you look at the walnut watershed map, parts of that go in terms of what's up creek, and is certainly in the city of Austin. So I知 just wondering who else could be likely partners to work on this? How close is this to the Austin city limit line in term of at some point being in their corporate city limits?
>> the line is at cameron road, the old pioneer crossing road is inside the city of Austin. Everything south that have is in the unincorporated area. I don't have on clue on when they might annex this area.
>> don't you try to work with the partners who attended that meeting? There was a room full of officials there, right?
>> that's kind of what I thought we were developing partnerships so that we could --
>> to me it's a shared responsibility.
>> that's a good point because the city of Austin, we have two representatives from the city of Austin during that time and some of those same discussion points that were brought up as far as them -- the city having a shared responsibility, because when contributing to the erosion problems in this particular area because there are within that jurisdictional configuration and of course the development upstream, impervious cover concern and things like that, those things were brought out. And of course, john, I think I need to ask you this question. Have you heard anything from the city of Austin, other than the officials that attended that meeting, up to this point?
>> well, we did receive the letter from mary will wynn.
>> other than the letter from mayor wynn.
>> other than that, no. But I think what was said during the course of the meeting was valid. While we recognize the fact that city limit runoff has contributed to this issue, they'll turn right around and remind you how much Travis County storm water they accept throughout their jurisdiction.
>> I知 not trying to get it's somebody else's problem. I知 talking about shared --
>> they're at the table and willing to help. I want to say we need to be careful about how we walk down that road. They have immense exaibts in-house for support and so forth. I think it's really just getting together and being creative is how we do this. In terms of the bond and so forth and the quick time line there, we can give you some rough numbers and we can advise you on how we're proceeding. I guess that's basically what you're asking.
>> we got to get mccaul's office involved. So the question would be what federal assistance would be available? City of Austin, if there's a way to make them feel guilty about that bypass, then I would start there. [ laughter ] and the state of Texas, it will take some time to work through this, but they're obvious potential partners that I think must be contacted. And I don't know that we can expect them to step forward voluntarily. We almost have to come up with a figure and say, we need your help on this. And when we put the plan together, I think in truth the question is if we resolve the immediate problems of the four or five homes, what else must be done? And it seems to me that some bank restoration would be required, but I知 not looking for an additional issue. And I visualize the erosion problem. It will not stop because we resolve is for four or five homes. In time it will be sear for the others -- serious for the others unless there is some remedy put in place. And it may take us some time to find out what the remedy might be, right, joe? So I can understand that partment.
>> perhaps on that specific issue, one of the things that is most imminent is getting the analysis done on that piece of it. And that not going to happen with state money. They've made that clear. I think if we do have it in place, the restoration plan and so forth, it's very likely that tceq would allow us to use those set monies to help with that. So that's our -- that's very likely for the restoration part of it. If you read the list of the typical supplemental environmental projects, that fits nicely into that list and definition. So it's just a matter of how do we get the nuts and bolts put together and find the money to do that from an engineering perspective. The city of Austin has a lot on their plate. That was sort of more my background, the various entities would step forward and help with that. Commissioner Sonleitner asked about what else are they doing to take care of their plans. And they have invested quite a bit in the process of doing their regional detention projects that are upstream. I think that will help abit, but it's not going to deal with this specific stretch of the creek, and that's going to remain, as you say, judge, until it's addressed by communicate.
>> in two months we're going to hit the 24-year anniversary of the memorial day floods in terms of the nightmare that was shoal creek, and they are still working on that project. And it started with buyout of some properties, but it doesn't matter what you're going to do, the water wanted to go straight ahead and didn't want to curve. But they had to take out certain bridges that were clogging things up. It included the lowering of northwest park to become kind of a detention area for the water to kind of hang out there before it went downstream. They have continued to work -- they're doing the beautiful restoration of the creek banks in the 24th street area and going further down. And we still have time when we have flooded out, the celtic store and our good friends at shoal creek is a alone. So it's still -- saloon. And it's an ongoing issue. I think it going to be one of those things where we have a tool box of things to take care of and it was multiple partners to make it happen. I want to make sure that people understand. Travis County I think has a role in this, and it's not like it's somebody else's problem. We need to get everybody to the table and everybody take their piece of it.
>> I think you see what direction we seem to be headed in. Now, is my understanding correct that residents would like to see us use this tceq money to assist with this problem? We seem to be headed towards some bank restoration buyout remedy. It's going to take a little time to put together, but let's hear from residents. If you would like to address us on this item today, please come forward. We've got four chairs available. If you would give us your name, we would be happy to get your comments.
>> hi, I知 christina kubex. I live in the walnut place neighborhood. I even have a bumper sticker on my car that says brats, but I知 not offended. Thank you for this opportunity. It has taken a very long time to actually get this issue on the table. And I知 very glued that it really is now. I agree with what y'all are saying about how it's not an either/or issue. Just buyout is not going to solve the problem. Maybe there's a few of the houses, maybe that's the best thing to do for some, but there are others that would benefit from a restoration type thing and could be just fine. It's the combination thing that needs to happen. As far as it needs to be a partnership, I think the city of Austin played a big role in the erosion of the creek, specifically in 1984 when the sewer line went in, I was there, I watched. I was 14. They put a gable in that is literally in the creek when the creek raises. They did it in July when the creek was a trickle and tried to change part of it or route it. I don't know what they were doing, but whatever it was, it was wrong. That along with the bypass channel that doesn't bypass anything, it actually comes back and circles around, they've played their hand in messing up the creek in our backyards. So I do believe that they should be responsible for their hand in what's going on. I have some pictures of the day of the occurrence. It's been a lot worse. The property around -- just before thanksgiving, in November, 10 feet fell off the back of this yard, and I have pictures of that. I have a picture of my wall, my last retainer wall, which broke away and moved about a foot , so my property is definitely shifting more towards the creek. I paid $1,500 to try to patch my wall back together, but I don't know how much that's actually going to hold. I have a picture of one the trees that keeps getting hit. You can see all the exposed roots. When that goes, another chunk of her land will go with it. I have a picture of -- it's hard to see, but I drew a red line. It's the edge of the kellys driveway, there's a cliff and I patched the photos together. When the water's high, it circles around. Over here is the bypass channel that sends water back towards it. You can actually see the way the water is coming back the wrong way instead of going downstream. And i've got another photograph I tried to patch together with a lot of my trees in the lower portion of my property underwater.
>> thank you.
>> I really don't have a wheel lot more to say, but thank you for really doing something about this issue. It's very important.
>> I知 marie and I live at 3612 quiet drive. And i've lived there -- this fall will be 29 years. I lived in this home through the memorial day flood. At that time they were building that sewer that you have talked of previously. And they had built a dam across our creek to keep it dry for them to put in the the piping and in one hour's time, I知 about -- my house has the largest yard and the smallest house, but in one hour's time the water was in my house. The dam broke and the water just went gushing down. My husband worked at night at that time, and he put his feet down on the floor, and he said hmm, I must have spilled a glass of water. By the time we could walk to the other side of the house and unplug all the electrical things, it was up around our ankles and we knew we should not be inside. That caused such a traumatic experience that any really heavy rain for those of us that were in that area that was prone to flood will come home from work -- and at that time I worked for the u.t. System offices in downtown Austin, and I will go home and put furniture, everything that was in our closet, and we would try to put it up high enough so that we didn't have to have the same kind of damage experience. We have been here to the court many times. This is just the most recent time. And I don't come every time. I really credit trek and some of the other neighborhood members for being here and really advocating, but it gets to laborious when you change Commissioners, you've made no decisions, we're still dealing with the same thing. The creek, the landfills, the abuse of corporations, it's all right here in our neighborhood. We have a plan, and I sent a letter to mr. Davis this week. For a year we've been working to prepare our home to sell because we have another piece of property where we would like to move. And because of the letter about the possible buyout, the indecision on what you plan to do, our realtor has recommended that we see a real estate attorney to find out what I can do next. You have put me in that position. You didn't mean to, but you didn't know how to listen. And engineers, computer markups, did not show that the dam would have done what it did. So it's been -- in one other letter that I wrote, I said it's like corporations and politicians wind up like snakes in mating time. And I still feel that way. Because it's taken 24 years for somebody to listen and do something that would work. Even on that city owned parkland, in the very beginning years when they were thinking of developing over there, they put pecan trees on pedestals. Do you know what that does to pecan trees? It's another way of getting rid of them. Because they have the kind of roots that have to have those feeder roots. I知 not highly educated. I worked with some engineers. And I think that you are learning about some things in this county that you've never been willing to look at in the same way thus far. And I thank you for that. But I am not getting any younger. This will be my 67th year. And I am healthy, so to speak. My blood pressure gives up when these kind of things are threatening my life-style. In 1982 in the memorial day flood, that was the year our home was paid for. Paid for! And so it has not been a process that has been happy, but our home has been a good place for kids to play in that big backyard, to roll in the grass in the front yard playing ball. To have all those pecan trees. But the creek, they can't play there. The grandkids, the creek is so polluted that pioneer farms some number of years ago quit letting their camping programs use the creek to swim or fish in. That's our creek. So it's been now long enough to see it did he degraded, the community. Whatever you can do for us in some way I feel we've earned. We've earned your sympathy. And it hasn't always been patient. I've gotten out of patience a lot of times. But what I知 saying, you -- what I知 saying you know is the truth. Thank you for going to the place where you will make a major decision, whether it's buyout or don't buyout or do something to the creek. But I want to know because I want to go on with my life and have a place to go, and I have a plan, but you need to pay me a fair price. Thank you.
>> thank you. Yes, sir?
>> yes, I知 michael magazinener, I live at 3624 quiet. The night of the flood in November, basically the retainer wall, as you see in the pictures there, might have dropped about two feet. That's not the way it is any more. It's basically a large, 25-foot crater that's in our backyard. We had to put up some structure of a fence and an electrical wire to keep my dogs in so they could stay inside the yard. Otherwise they were getting out, other dogs were coming in from the creek. Everyday I drive home I see this tree that's in the back of my house and that's the way I gauge and know that nothing has happened. And it's kind of painful to go to work and not know if you can come home and have a house to live in. And I also wanted to thaj the judge, judge Biscoe for coming out and looking at the damage that this has caused. My neighbors are the same. I have bar kelly on one side of me. He used to have an acre and a half, but now he's down to a half acre of land. He's the one where the creek has swollen at the end and basically losing his land. He loses trees all the time. It was pretty sad to see him losing his land and trees, but then it hit me, and I知 afraid probably dave is going to be next because the cracks are getting bigger. The staircase that was there on left before is probably going to be the next thing to go. After that the swimming pool. If the swimming pool goes, fortunately a swimming pool is a luxury items, but the swimming pool is going to take the house. It's going to be a domino effect, I know it. But I appreciate everything, and everything that Ron Davis, Commissioner Davis has done too. Thank you.
>> thank you.
>> I知 david thorson, I live at 3622 client drive next to the magners. I知 a 35 year resident of walnut place, i've lived in this particular home almost six years. This sounds like all death and destruction. It's a beautiful, beautiful neighborhood, beautiful creek. But in parts a very scary and nerve racking place to live now. The changes -- I grew up playing in that creek. The changes that have happened have happened for the most part very recently. And we are seeing a lot of destruction of trees. In an average flood now you may see a large pecan tree or elm tree floating down the creek. And-- one thing that was brought up earlier about where the city of Austin is located. The bottom of my property is walnut creek and it goes about halfway. The city of Austin greenbelt meets me there. They actually have part of that property there. I support using the tceq money to study whatever can make the best use of our funds as far as buyouts or the restorizization. I think it might be a combination of the two. Whichever makes the most expense financially, whatever makes the best use of funds, and also takes care of the people that are most affected and most in danger of losing their homes. I, like ms. Ingram, have a problem with disclosure. I知 a real estate agent. If I was to go and sell my home today, I would have an awful lot of disclosure to share with a potential buyer. And in no waco probably receive fair market value based on that information. I think it would probably scare most people, and I知 not even sure how I would compile all this there's been so many discussions back and forth and there's letters floating from different areas of our government to and from each other. I think that would be a real issue. John nelson, my neighbor to my left, at 3620, is self-employed as well. He was not able to be here today. Mildred sneed at 3628, I spoke with her yesterday and she sends her regards to the court and is unable to be here. She is a real estate agent and has a family in from california that needs a home right now and she needs to take care of them at this point. And the regional detention pond, speaking of that, I don't think that's going to solve our problems. I've watched before on the -- you become very attuned to weather and flooding, and I watch the radar and I see that there's no more rain upstream. And then sometimes our creek will almost clear out and then a whole new flood will come through. All I can figure is that's the detention ponds, but when it's raining and raining and raining and I知 trying to imagine that if we are already full and then that much more comes in through on top of it, the little surge that just tears at our properties. So far i've avoided the brunt of it, but I知 literally within feet of it. Mike's property probably fell off 10 to 15 feet deep by 60 to 70-foot wide and has dropped 10 to 15 feet in height. And mine is in imminent danger of doing the same. So I appreciate Commissioner Davis very much, all of your work. Judge Biscoe and all the other Commissioners for hearing our case. And we look forward to I think all of our neighbors are looking forward to working with y'all in whatever way that we can that can remedy the problem. Thank you very much.
>> thank you. Ms. English.
>> good morning. Trek english. I知 trying to find a way for I think if the city is not going to help with a buyout, they need to help with restoration. And the county maps, I have actually provided them, but nobody seemed to find those maps. In the early '80's when the walnut creek wastewater line was installed, the developer across the creek actually paid to have that wastewater line go behind his subdivision before it was joined back into the creek. That's when the city came in because they basically authorized that. It also authorized the pipe that used the water line to get into this channel, which was totally created by the city at that point. And it was poorly restored, because if you remember, in about '86, '87, we had a big crash in Austin and everybody went bankrupt, including the companies that were doing the wastewater line. So there was no recourse for the city to get most of what they had contracted finished. The company, which was espy houston at the time, did an assessment of that stretch of the creek, which was in bad shape, and they made recommendations to the city which should still be on file as to what needed to be done, especially after laying that side because of the damage it caused. And that was never done. I know because I was working with the engineer and he was telling me what they were recommending and what they were doing, but that was never -- that was never done. So you have this channel which was approved by the city for the developer to implement. He decided that he didn't want to do it, and so therefore he deeded all of the land and the project to the city of Austin. So the city took over the responsibility of building -- not sewer line. We're talking about putting in a channel in order for the development to get their permits. They said in order for us not to flood, putting detention ponds on our site would not help. This is what we recommend, and that's what we're willing to do. After awhile they said we don't want to do any more, but they said we'll give the money to the city to do it. And I have the blueprint of the channel that the -- the channel modification that they recommended. But we're talking about the '80's. The channel in the '80's would have probably worked. It won't work in 2000. The volume of water is so intense that now the water comes and it blue the berm that they built that was actually going to help mr. Kelly. Huge boulders. You cannot believe the size of the boulders. And the water was supposed to come and not enter his property and eat up all that land. And instead, it was supposed to go straight. It's not doing that. It it threw the huge boulders out of the path and the water started going even more into the bank and eating it up. And now if you come and see -- I actually sent a picture, a photograph. I was able to take a still, a still of the water flowing the wrong direction. You can actually see where the creek comes to a v in front of my house and -- it forksz. It should go this way. The water on this side is okay, but the water on this side comes back and jumps over the island and forms a huge cascade that runs into my property and eats it up. Of course, at the other end of the bypass where mr. Kelly lives, you have the exact same movement, except it taking it in reverse. So you have this one that's rotating around and it's just a question of time before it eats on all parts. Also, the city in the early '80's allowed the developer, allowed them to build what we used to called a levee. And that levee actually started putting the water more on our side. And if you go to chimney hills you will see where that is. That was all floodplain. That's where the water used to run. It would run right back towards walnut creek on the 290 bridge. It doesn't do that any more. It was pushed off to our property. So they need to hold some responsibility for what they created. Also, they have three neighborhoods, they have chimney hills which is everything city. That's a good tax base for them. They have reluctantly put them on a three-year type -- what is it? They're on a three-year annexation list. That was 15 years ago. And so they know that if they annexed us they would be possible for these problems on walnut creek and that's the only reason we've been removed time and time again. Even though we come up for annexation, we're removed because of this problem on the creek. So I do think that they have a responsibility to either help with that or to help with the restoration. And they own all the land across the street from us. They own a huge strip of land that was given for them, so they're responsible for some of it. I知 just giving you an idea of how you should go after them because at this point they do hold some responsibility and they do own part of the land that is part of this restoration or reinforcement. I don't know if that helps, but that's what I知 trying to do. I really want to thank you for the fact that you're actually taking time to help us with this matter because to see parts of land falling into the creek, if we don't do something, eventually there will be no choice. It won't be just restoration, it will be all buyout because everybody's is falling in. So thank you very much.
>> based on what i've seen, I知 thinking a motion would be appropriate that covers the following. One would be our touching base with tceq to find out exactly how we can use that $111,000 to assist with addressing this problem. Second would be putting together a need column, description for us to use in the future and with the advisory committee. Third would be putting together a combination buyout and bank restoration plan that would include funding that's needed, partners, and any other assistance. And I would call this an action plan. What I知 hearing from residents is the meeting and our sympathizing and discussing this issue, I don't know that i've been involved 29 years, but i've had a few discussions. But we have in mind an action plan. Joe, do you think you can have this ready in two weeks if it passes?
>> I second that motion.
>> it's one blert.
>> I second the motion. If the court decides to pass this, I would like -- those names that I read earlier of the other governmental entities that we've been involved with this process, that the door is still open for their involvement. I definitely don't want to take the chip off the table when we're moving in that direction. So if you would accept that as a friendly, that we continue to wrk with folks a at the city of Austin to get the most that we can achieve.
>> that's friendly. Are those potential partners listed in john kuhl's --
>> it's in the letter that you have from the elected officials. I read them off a little bit ago. And including the city of Austin. It's part of your backup. That same information, john kuhl rkts does have along with the neighborhood groups and it would be good to encourage them and also to get with them. So it's a part of the backup.
>> two weeks from today is April 12th, right?
>> uh-huh.
>> the residents would like to see this action plan before the court considers it on April 12th. And can we get it to residents before the 12th, which ought to be Friday, April 9th?
>> yes, sir.
>> and we can do it by e-mail to those who would leave ro their addresses today? I think we have about half of them or maybe all of them. Do we think we have all of the e-mail addresses for those.
>> I can visit with them and probably one or two cats will do it. That's what we've done in the past.
>> okay. Let's try to get them Friday before the Tuesday so we'll have the weekend, plus Monday to review that. And if they have comments, suggestions, etcetera, if they could just go with the staff by noon on that Monday. And of course they're free to come to court on Tuesday, April 12th. But if you give them to staff, it would be impossible to include them in the draft that we review on April 12th. If staff has an opportunity to consider them as of about noon on the 11th, the Monday.
>> judge, would this motion also include the amount of money necessary to address the buyout options that may be available for those -- is that a part of the overall plan to actually indicate the amount of money it would take?
>> I think an estimate would be appropriate.
>> okay. I want to make sure that we're clear because we may have buyout language there, but of course there's no money tied to that buyout plan. And of course, it's just words.
>> makes sense to me. It's the best we can do. We can refine the figures and staff's letter, but let's give it our best shot for April 12th and try to take action then. Grs.
>> judge? I need what was being asked of us, but I don't want anybody to leave this room thinking that that in two weeks we're going to tell you engineeringwise what to do with walnut creek. It's not that we don't want to do anything. I mean, it's just that this is -- you're looking down the barrel of a multi, multi, multito the eighth power million dollars. Even if the you took the little section where everybody's homes are. So I don't -- I mean, I -- I can look at the faces of our tnr and say, boy -- and I realize you want me to come to the table with something, but the most immediate thing is that go and ask seven people what they need for their homes. I mean, if that's what -- because then we either go to a congressman on or we go and say here is the issue. But we're not from an engineering standpoint going to get where we need to get. I mean, two weeks is certainly not enough time to come up and do this. And I think we all know that. I think the neighbors know that you can't engineeringwise come up with a solution. So I hope that people don't think that in two weeks we're going to come back and have tnr give us something and say here's what you do. And maybe that's not what is being asked. But I do think that the direction --
>> [inaudible - no mic].
>> I mean, it's a start, but all I知 hearing is we've been starting for 20 years. The last thing y'all want is --
>> it's the biggest one we've ever had.
>> if y'all are happy with that, I知 fine. I知 just saying that I think the most effective way to give somebody -- to get somebody to look at somebody and say, do you know what? I need to find a way to buy your property.
>> I知 hoping we can get to a needs assessment and some kind of analysis that is sufficient enough for the bond committee, along with everything else they will be considering, have that be a project description that is beyond, as we lovely call it now, put it on cocktail napkins. And I think they need to have some information that is fact based, analysis based to the best extent we can, knowing that these are not 25% engineering drawings. We don't have the luxury of that. But enough of them to go on and say, is this worthy of consideration and potential pot of money?
>> what I have in mind is an action plan. And if we can approve an action plan on April 12th, we will be way down the road toward a solution. The other thing is that residents know us well enough to know that on April 12th, somebody needs to come back and encourage us some more, right?
>> [inaudible - no mic].
>> joe, do you have any checks?
>> absolutely. This is not have any engineering in it. It will be based on the buyout of four parcells. That will be in two weeks.
>> and a summary of additional steps that need to be taken to comprehensively address this issue long-term. That would be the steps. It's kind of like the partner. I don't expect you to come back with names and commitments in two weeks, but at least we can make a telephone call. We can check with tceq and say can we use the money this way instead? They may say we need to thanks for making daybreak a part of your day that under advisement. They say say norks they may say yes, but we should get some sort of response. So as best as we can, we have that included in the report back that's in writing -- that's why I said let's do as much as we can between now and then.
>> judge, that's very appropriate, I think what you just said, because if you get a chance to look at the added language within the letter that we received from the united states congressman mccaul, there's very significant language in there where he does talk about an amount of money we can use in this particular project. That's something that I think still needs to be factored in. I think what we receive from our other elected officials, it still should be a point into this process. > I think we need to ask for a commitment. Any more discussion? All in favor of that motion? That passes by unanimous vote. Show the five members of the court individually getting ready to assist you.
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Last Modified:
Wednesday, March 30, 2005 12:50 PM