Travis County Commissioners Court
April 19, 2005
Item 23
23. A. Receive report on vision, interest statements and proposal statements from the southwest Travis County growth dialog; and b. Consider and take appropriate action on strategy for official county responses and implementation.
>> good afternoon, joe gieselman with t.n.r., and [indiscernible] southwest corridor dialogue. The -- what you have in your backup are reports that have been adopted by the committee that was appointed by the Commissioners court. And today is somewhat of a status report to kind of walk through some major principles behind the proposals and what -- what the committee has come to terms with. We are still in process, but what you have is probably 90% of what you should expect from the group. There were some tweaking going on right now, some dialogue. Between staff and committee members, but this is somewhat the charter that that the staff would use, be it ordinances or capital improvements and such things. With that I think it's important for you to understand what the committee has come up with, first, before -- before give us direction on how to proceed.
>> good afternoon, Commissioners.
>> good afternoon.
>> thank you for this opportunity to speak with you about this process. We are into our 8th month.
>> joe lossard?
>> sorry, joe lassard, project manager or facilitator, along with other names that people like to use once in a while.
>> traffic.
>> anyway, we are into the 8th month of this 8 month process, we are headed to the finish line here at the end of this month. Trying to wrap up a report that will send you recommendations. What you have received I understand in the packets is an interim status report on what the -- what the advisory panel of the southwest Travis County growth dialogue has done. They have held 18 meetings at this point. They have three more to go. They have added one for this Thursday, which was not -- the status report did not identify these additions, they have added one more meeting this week, so we have two more meetings before the end of the month, then they would like to do an informal process after they have finished the report to go back out to the southwest Travis County -- to sort of present back to the community their recommendations. They -- two of the meetings that they have held to this point have been open houses or public meetings wherein the community was end violated to come in and meet with them and present their recommendations and ideas and have taken into consideration in their recommendation. They have also taken into consideration the recommendations from the hamilton pool road forum so they have tried to be as inclusive as they can in this process. The panel is made up of 16 members. You appointed them back in September if I recall. And one of the first pieces of work they did was the adoption of a vision statement for the area. That's on page 3 of report are that you have received. This really was a consensus vision statement received unanimous vote for all of the members. Identifying that in 20 years southwest Travis County will be a thriving community known for its economic diversity and for its stewardship initiatives to conserve the area's historic hill country character, natural beauty and environmental quality. It goes on from there, but I won't recount all of it. The first paragraph really captures the general sense and feeling of what the community is interested in for southwest Travis County. Another important piece of work they did is on page 4, which identifies a series of interests. The process that we are using is based upon what is called interest based bargaining. And it's a process used in negotiations, I believe that originally came out of labor negotiations and it's particularly a good process to use when you have very adamantly opposed divergent points of view on how negotiations are to proceed. And basically into this process, rather than coming in with each side having a proposal, they make counter proposals to each other, hopefully find some middle ground, this process starts with an identification of the key issues that all of the participants are interested in addressing and it allows them to have a conversation about what we would like to do jointly if possible, be more general in the goals and aims in the process. That's what this page 4 identifies. There are interest statements that are related to public infrastructure, environment, urban sprawl, development orientation in the hill country, diverse -- having a diverse economic base, reserving -- preserving property values and then regulations. The items that are on this page that are have actually turned out to be general guidelines applying to the other interest statements. From those interest statements the panel brainstormed all of the ideas they could come up with under each of those interest statements that they believe would help them address those. Every individual in the pap necessarily was able to bring forward any idea they had. There are 16 panel members, also as many alternate members, as well as community members who have been attending. Generally during the discussion sessions we have allowed anyone to participate that wished to. The formal panel members are important in that when we come to adopting an item, only they are allowed to vote or an alternate if they are filling in for a formal voting member can vote. So each evident proposes laid out on pages 5 through 14 fall under the interest statements identified. So they are grouped to show you what items have been identified to address each of the issues. All of these have been adopted, on the first two pages, bottom of the page 1, going on to page 2, I have identified for you the adoption of the general categories. Generally a great deal of consensus and unanimity on most of these items. As you might expect, the environmental quality recommendations had a -- didn't pass by as large of a majority as the other items. Had a vote of 10 members in favor of it, two opposed and four abstaining. I think it's important to note the abstention votes on this one because a number of of the members felt really strongly about a number of items recommended, but they had one or two items, so rather than voting against the whole package, they abstained. That item in particular the vote is interested. Also 7 b, water and wastewater utility services, you will note it passed with a vote of 11-5 and I believe the -- those who voted defense it voted against it because of one item in the package that had to do with the use of impervious cover and -- and calculating these impervious cover in particular for -- for [indiscernible] roof runoff, generally speaking most of the items in that category had a great deal of consensus and some agreement on a particular items, votes opposed to it. I知 not going to go through all of the items, you've had the report, I知 sure that you will want to take some time to review it on your own. In terms of the recommendations. Page 15 a of the document shows you a map of the area,
>>
>> [one moment, please, for change in captioners.]
>>
>> the balance of hamilton pool road headed west to the county boundary has been identified as an area that they would like to see an area to have the hill country flavor. The historic vistas, the sense of rural area versus being a highly -- higher speed, highly developed area in terms of the -- of the traffic flow. There are other roads that they have identified for the same, bee creek, brimly ranch road, so forth, a list of those that have been identified for that in the recommendations.
>> judge, would you just do that one more time in terms of related to hamilton pool road, what was related -- fine related to improvements and expansion or not fine. It's about as tight as it gets, it's extraordinarily dangerous for just a bikist or somebody trying to make a left-hand turn.
>> really good point and clarification to make. In every instance the panel supported the idea that safety is the number one criteria. That whenever there's a safety issue, it needs to be corrected.
>> okay. Okay. From farm-to-market road 12 to 71, they have identified in particular that that area should have a very strong emphasis or a stronger emphasis for being traffic -- dealing with traffic generation or traffic congestion issues in particular. They understand it would be allowed to -- widened to allow traffic to flow, people can get about their business in terms of errands or getting to work. They also understand from 12 to the west as an area that should also retain the character, the development of the roadway itself should be what they called a -- a hill country roadway. They have identified a new classification that they would like that area to have. They understand again safety is the primary issue. But they also think that the sense and character of the road should be reflective of the hill country as opposed to just moving traffic. The staff is working with the advisory panel to identify those things that can be accommodated on that part of the road that still allows traffic and safety to work properly. Also retains a little more of the character of the hill country. I wish that I could be more specific about that, that's sort of a work in progress.
>> I was just concerned with the word safety. I知 talking about things strictly related to safety could be accommodated with the appropriate asthetics and yada yada.
>> absolutely, absolutely. The other roads that they have identified as potential hill country roadways are bee creek, the rhymer's peacock road, proposed road, ro road, old ferry road, pale face and crumbly ranch road on page 12 under items 7.3 on your report. They have also identified some locations where they think it's important that the community focus their commercial development, that there are areas that are seen as primarily, if we can condense the number of developments in this area into key locations that are identified on the map, one is a town center, it's on 71. Between the -- between the river cliff road and the boundary of the county, it's off to the left there, far left on 71. Far western portion of 71, it's a little light yellow area that's been identified. Moving back to the east on 71, you will see an area that's been identified for local commercial area, again these are colored dot areas, father is an area called neighborhood service areas, there's a scaling effect here. The neighborhood services would be a very small commercial cluster, the local would be sort of intermediate commercial cluster, then the town center would be much more like a -- envisioned more like a small hill country town, maybe a little square and shops and -- and parking available and so forth so that there's more density in terms of commercial development. Also an area identified as multi-family development if possible. You will also see a couple of commercial areas identified on hamilton pool road. One local area and one neighborhood area that's been identified. These are all areas again that the concept is to pull commercial areas to these locations or incent them to locate versus spread all along 71 or hamilton pool road so it doesn't take on a commercial feeling but retains the hill country character as best as possible. There are listing on pages 15 and 16. The last page of the report identifies some guidelines for identifying open space, that might be acquired in the area. If I can refer back to the map again on page 15 a, you will notice a little, not little extra, a fairly large red box in the lower left-hand column that talks about targeting open space, preservation, ranch land conservation, that box would encompass approximately 6,000 acres. They have identified approximately 10% of the study area, the study area is about 59,000 acres, that about 10% of that area ought to be preserved for open space, which would -- which is defined by the group as actively used or passive recreation use. You would have access to it. Preserve land which might be for wildlife or end dangered species and then lastly, ranch land conservation, which there are some very large historic ranches out in this area. There are a small number of property owners who own very lacialg amounts of acreage and the concept would be that if we could develop a preservation program that would also preserve some of the ris rick ranch -- historic ranch preservation out there that would be appropriate as well. The total would be 6,000 acres, again 10% of the area.
>> one quick question judge to orient myself on 71, where between the dots would we kind hazy hills, pedernales, where the e.m.s. Station is, trying to figure out if that's between the blue and green or it is either the blue or the green or if it's off the map here? Do you know what I知 talking about? That's actually kind of a neighborhood service area already that preexists and I知 just wondering if that lines up with that?
>> [indiscernible]
>> [inaudible - no mic]
>> heading further, west, christie?
>> yes.
>> heading further?
>> I知 wondering is the blue dot wloas to where that kind of -- close to where that kind of commerce area already preexists.
>> it's really concept only the blue dot. Likely it will occur wherever there's a major intersection of the arterials. That right now is yet to be designated. But what I think the sense that they were trying to describe here is we don't want commercial development spread all along 71. We want to concentrate it in one place. That place would be wherever probably rhymer ranch road and 71 tie together.
>> which is pretty close to where you are talking about.
>> that's where I知 trying to get. I absolutely agree with you, there already preexists a kind of commercial corridor there around where hazy hills, the e.m.s. Station there and there's yet like a second one kind of sort of near cypress ranch of just kind of an area there where it's almost like three lanes not two lanes. I was just out there like a week and a half ago driving 71. I知 trying to get my bearing here. Are we talking about more of that or overlaying on what already is there and saying it ought to coalesce around things that are already happening along 71, so we don't get the sprawl thing.
>> I think the panel acknowledges that there are things that have happened up there and that it would coalesce. The dots are not -- they are all the same size, they are not intended to denote a size, just to give a concept the general location.
>> okay. Then we have a little bit of stuff happening over there by the pace bend road, simply that's just where the turnoff is to Briarcliff all of that kind of stuff.
>> the last thing that i'll mention, two items i'll mention is the location for the rhymer's peacock road is a proposed location, really it's to be adjusted and identified as staff works with the actual or more appropriate location on the map. The last item is that please note that the area to be preserved is not on the map. The -- the panel has taken pains to make sure they haven't identified any particular targeted properties. That it is more or less as we go, might go forward in trying to acquire property that we understand that rather than -- picking the specific location or the specific properties, the concept is what's more important and trying to assemble a program as we go through time that funding might be available to how it would be addressed. It's off to the side, it's not on the map so no one feels like we are targeting their property. We think a more practical way of dealing with it is to identify the goal and try to develop a program that will go out and achieve it.
>> can that be in multiple locations? Like with the bcp, macro sites or a cumulative need to --
>> I think there's been some conservation about having two general areas. The two areas would be -- while they may not be amakesing the property, but at least interconnected adjacent as best as problem. There would be some amassing, but more than one or two, locations.
>> [indiscernible] I know last week you were prepared to take to the plan the part -- the potential part -- park ramifications to the area. Did you get a chance to bring that up.
>> not yet. We will do that very soon.
>> but you haven't yet. But we did say that it's -- it's for public --
>> we are in the process doing that. We have not gone public yet.
>> you have not gone public.
>> have not.
>> > because we have some partners that we need to consult first.
>> I thought we were -- I thought last week we said that -- that's fine.
>> we are getting very close, though.
>> but that would be -- that would be the kind of anchorage that we would use as open space preservation, that would go towards that.
>> that's correct.
>> the panel is now in the process of -- of having a dialogue with staff from -- from Travis County staff and lcra and the last two meetings will focus on that discussion so that the staff has been aunt to get clarification and -- an opportunity to get clarification and more information, discuss in more detail what they meant by some of these recommendations and then also hopefully next week be in a position to adopt a final report. And our task over the next few days here is to come up with a draft to begin editing and reviewing it, begin focusing on wrapping up the process at the end of this month.
>> judge, I知 sorry, go ahead, Gerald.
>> joe, what -- has the panel talked about as far as how you generate the money to secure the preservation property, is that through bond, is that through -- I mean obviously what you would like to have is people voluntarily, you know, prepare land for -- this is what we're going to do with it. Has that been talked about a great deal?
>> no. We really haven't gotten into implementation discussion. We have gotten more in terms of what the community would like to see in the area. Get the conceptual plan first. One of the topics I think we will be taking up will be the affordability question.
>> in terms of the box that says current subdivision application, is that everything that is on our radar screen before the freezing occurred?
>> as of that date, 2-17.
>> do we need to have that updated at whatever point? I see an make moving forward? That would be extraordinarily important for us to have everything at the appropriate moment in time when we said we are in the 90-daytime out to know what's out there. It either a plat or preliminary plan that was already in the works.
>> very good. The staff [indiscernible]
>> so after the next three meetings, of the -- of the -- in terms of specific recommendations, how would that [indiscernible] differ from this one?
>> it will be reorganized for one thing. This -- this organization of the paper is along the line of this interest. You will notice as you go through this document there are items that appear through more than one interest. The pap necessarily is thinking about oring along more topical areas like water quality, open space, affordability, so on, so forth, there will be somewhat of a reorganization, they will also have the opportunity from a final adoption to do any edits and reconsideration or additions or deletions if they wish. So we are now at sort of the point where they are getting clarification and tweaking the document so it can be a final. But I think joe is correct that we probably are at the 80 to 90% sense of comfort about what is here. It certainly gives you a accepts of what their direction is. And -- and again I think that -- from this document we will be preparing the final report.
>> and so -- so specifically, what is the Commissioners court expected to do with the final document?
>> well --
>> besides read it many, many times.
>> well, I知 sure it's pretty exciting reading. But at this point the concept was that staff would -- would -- when the county actually formally receives it, the staff would review it, put together a conceptual response to it, some recommendations, some of these items are simply budget items that you might want to bring up during your budget process. Other items might be new programs that you need to consider and give staff direction on whether or not you want them to proceed now or at what point you might want them to proceed with -- with a -- designing and bringing back implementation recommendation. There is some work here also that you may continue to want to work with lcra on. Some of these recommendations clearly I think they would have a role in implementing. Really I think it comes back to the Commissioners court for clarification and identification and what direction you would like to take with it. And but I think the staff had -- had identified that they would at least go through sort of a -- take a first look at it, identify which items were budget versus programmatic and so forth.
>> so will there be a list of recommended partners with resources?
>> I think the -- the report itself will not have that. I expect that that would be -- again some of the work that would need to be continued on how to implement. I think the panel is expecting the respective staffs to work on and come up with a recommendation for you to look at and consider.
>>
>> [one moment, please, for change in captioners.]
>>
>> ...cap toward that versus total wouldn't, I don't think they've gotten that specific.
>> I would appreciate a stronger statement in that regard because I would hate for somebody to say, well, don't piecemeal this together and kind of fragment us towards 6,000 as opposed to what I thought I heard you saying as you wanted to try to get tonight large clumps, and that really is not consistent with what we're talking about her.
>> I think your statement is also -- it would be.
>> hopefully the hope space would be acquired within the geographic boundaries in the map on 15-a?
>> yes.
>> so now, in terms of public partners, who has been represented on the study group? Is it lcra and the county, Travis County?
>> yes.
>> no other public entity?
>> no, it really has been the two entities. We've had some attendance from some of the city managers, from representatives from txdot, from I think one of the school districts sent representatives to one of the meetings, but in terms of the actual ongoing participation, it really has been Travis County and lcra.
>> is all of this outside the city of Austin?
>> yes, this area is entirely outside of any corporate area as well as any e.t.j. Of any other city or town.
>> okay. Yes, sir.
>> just a couple questions I need to ask as soon as you are finished.
>> this is a good time.
>> I just want to know as far as inclusiveness. I really don't want to run into a [inaudible] that happened before the Commissioners court when we dealt with [inaudible] on some of the -- maybe some of the project or similar areas out there in southwest Travis County. In terms of players in this process and the status report, in terms of players such as maybe engineers, attorneys, homeowners, the [inaudible] and everybody else, have they had a role in this process as far as this report is, as far as where it is right now? So that's the question I知 asking. What inclusiveness have we had other than what I知 hearing as far as those other role players, or was that part of what you are trying to get to and generate in filing the report as far as this growth corridor.
>> yes, there are -- there are four interest group classifications that were identified and we solicit input for people to fill positions on the panel from each of those four groups. One group, the smaller property owners or the residences of the area.
>> right, I understand that.
>> the second were large poerpbs. The third were what we termed economic interests. There's one economic interest --
>> who was the economic interest?
>> we have three individuals to represented the economic interests. One was a real estate attorney and then we had two development engineers. Who are on the panel. They did not represent specific organizations, but they represented the industry. And then we also have three individuals who are -- had an environmental or conservation orientation. In terms of the proceeding, I think one of the issues that is being discussed among staff is the development of a group you have folks who work with the staff and perhaps with the advisory panel, if you so deem, to look at what ordinances might be drafted for the -- for the recommendations on water quality and the subdivision process. That -- I think that's still a discussion staff is having. That would bring in rica and the home builders and whoever was mentioned previously.
>> restate that last statement.
>> those two organizations have not been brought formally into the process, but there's been some discussion about forming a subcommittee that would bring them into the process and to assist in either reviewing draft recommendations that the staff puts together or working with the staff to identify what items ought to be into recommendations to you for implementation in either water quality ordinances or subdivision ordinances.
>> so at some future date this information will be shared with them? Those that have not been in the process? See, what I知 trying to prevent from happening, if I may say so, is that I don't want to run into a [indecernible] that I think we experienced last time. I heard some things that at a period that people weren't included or were excluded and they didn't know what the heck was going on. Have a way of knowing what was going on. There was testimony that was made that, that really weren't happening because of maybe not being included it was a period that things didn't come out that way as afar as what they could really see actually took place. I知 basically trying to say, well if this is the case in this situation that wasn't the case in the other, and I just want to make sure that all the i's are dotted and the t's crossed in this process to make sure that doesn't occur again and I知 just trying to reiterate with staff that it doesn't come forth from the Commissioners court have these folks been notified and I know that the property owners and all these other folk I just want to make sure that this process is bonafide to make me feel comfortable.
>> the Commissioners court set the charter for this group and gave them instructions on how to conduct their business. They have done that and they have brought back the report. They did conduct public hearings or public meetings along the way. Now if you're asking us to include additional people on the committee, that's a different issue. If you, you appointed this group. Rico isn't specifically on this, specifically appointed to this group. We are now moving toward this Commissioners court as the forum for considering the report from this group. I suspect that when we have discussions on implementing this recommendatin under these proposals you will get input from people who are not sitting on this committee, who are not appointed by the comissioners court to sit on this committee--that would include some of those groups you just mentioned. But they asked this group to go out and solicit rico to involve, I mean, this is, this is the county's process.
>> I don't want yo to misunderstand or misinterpret what I知 saying. I知 saying before it comes back before the Commissioners court as far as I知 concerned, I want to make sure everyone knows everything that's going on. Now whatever mechanism yo use to let folks know that, well, apply it. I知 not talking about your specific processes as far as what you're doing but I just want to make sure in my mind that everyone is informed enough to where ever we go with this thing they are apprised of it and there aren't any surprises, so, and what I experienced last time it appeared there were surprises and I知 just trying to get away from that surprise element it seems. That's the statement and testimony that I知 making to you and joe lessard. I don't want that to reoccur that why I知 trying to be proactive instead of reactive--that's what happened before. That's what I知 thinking.
>> Commissioner, can I speak to that?
>> yes.
>> at this point in time I don't see that occurring because we haven't received direction from y'all's draft any new roles, any updates of the interim rules or anything like that. At this point rules aren't on the table and they won't be until you give us some idea where to go.
>> some of the things we're discussing before are some of the same things we discussed before. I just wanted to make sure we're prepared and headed in that direction. My whole purpose is inclusiveness.
>> we will make sure those two organizations are -- and anyone else will get a copy of the report so they are aware of the report. The panel has some discussion this last week about what their role might continue. You asked the question, they had an opinion that they might continue in some format where they could oversee or at least interact with the implementation process that you might direct staff to take on. And the idea of having a subcommittee that would provide advice and comment to the staff and drafting anything you wish to have drafted was one -- and we called it a technical committee, that they would also like to have some either involvement with or have them come back, that process be underneath the advisory panel as sort of an overall community group that would work with that group. And a second group was large landowners. As I said earlier, there's a very small group of individuals or families that own very large holdings in this area, and in particular if you draft any regulations or make any changes in the subdivision or water quality ordinances, they will be -- since they have the largest holdings, they will be impacted the most. So the committee felt that it was appropriate for them to approach the large landowners, explain the process in the recommendation and have a dialogue with them so that they in particular just like the interests that you've identified aren't surprised by anything and have all the information firsthand about what the recommendations are.
>> thank you.
>> so is it anticipated that the recommendations will be put in priority order? Or is the thought that they are all equally important?
>> we haven't had a discussion. I can certainly ask them if they would like to indicate somehow those items they feel most important to give you a priority if that would be your desire.
>> it seems to me that those that require an investment of additional resources probably would take a lot longer to implement than those that might be implemented immediately without additional resources. I see on here county, city. What does city refer to?
>> I would have to go back and look at the specific language in terms of the city reference.
>> that's based on the answer I got a few minutes ago. County, lcra.
>> I think there was a reference -- if I remember, there is a reference under water quality where they talk about the regulations that you and the city of Austin jointly adopted. There's that reference. I can't off the top of my read recall what reference we have in here on city.
>> the joint subdivision review office?
>> yes. There's a reference under the environmental items on page 10 of using the definition for critical environmental features that's in that joint -- those joint ordinances. It wasn't intended to be a recommendation that you implement something jointly in addition with the city, but that you -- back to what you have already adopted for that definition of c.e.s.
>> okay. I've got here something dated -- I guess it was dated February 9th, then March 31st. I have another one dated April 8th. Can I discard everything except the April 8th?
>> the April 8, 2005, status report is realty interim document.
>> that's the only one I need?
>> yes.
>> the other ones I can discard.
>> yes. Each of the individual subdocuments have different dates based when they were adopted, but the status report that had the attachments is dated April 8th and that's the key document at this point.
>> okay. So today what we're asked to do is to be fully informed to read this material at the next few opportunities and to await delivery of a final document after the third meeting. That's what I hear today?
>> yes, sir.
>> and the hope is that county staff will get with the lcra staff?
>> if you direct us to do so. I mean part of what we're looking for is some direction from the court is what do you want to do, what do you want us to do with this. We're standing ready to do a lot of things, but we haven't heard from the court that you want us to do anything.
>> judge, I think that what we have got to do is finish this process. We've got to get this to t.n.r., let t.n.r. -- t.n.r. Obviously can bounce some things off of lcra. I mean we only have so much to do with lcra, although I think we have a good working relationship with them. But we always set out to have t.n.r. Look at what came out of all this and to surmise what we could do with it from a t.n.r. Standpoint, what we could implement, what were the most important things for us to do, which quite honestly will come into play with interim guidelines when that process comes back to us in another six weeks. But, you know, I certainly always felt like that t.n.r. Is the one that's going to come back, they have been very attentive and very involved in this process, and I知 confident that what joe and his camp is going to bring back to us is going to be, you know, here are the things that we can do; now what do you all -- some of these things take a lot of dough. Some don't take much at all. What are we willing to do? How are we willing to go to the people in this community and say if 6,000 acres of open space is what you want, pay for it. Do we do a bond? How do we get buy-in with that? And if this community is willing to do that, I mean the city of Austin certainly has examples of taking bond proposals to the public, the prop 2 land that was passed in '98. You know -- that's right. So those are the things that I think we're going to find once t.n.r. Brings us this back. Now, if you feel like that we need to make -- joe, I certainly have a decent pipeline into lcra. If you think that there are areas where you need lcra's attention out of this let me know and I知 more than happy to broker --
>> I certainly believe as Commissioner Davis said in inclusiveness and that would start with the county attorney. Tom has been in this process all along and I expect your direction in this would include the county attorney's office. But I do see it that the lcra has a role in implementing these proposals. That both staffs should be working simultaneously on a review and recommendations to the respective boards that have been coordinated among the staffs. At some point, though, we're going to need some direction from the court on orders of magnitude. I guess maybe a poor choice of words, but you will be entering into a fairly heated debate as you witness on the interim rules about such things as water quality. And there's a spectrum, I mean a continuum on just how much you can do and how far you want to go with it. And I think that is before we start going in to writing up something and making recommendation, we need to get some pretty good feedback on that from the court because we will -- there will be clashes of values when we go there. And the property rights that say nothing to the environmental on the other side that says we would like impervious cover limits of x, y or z. And so I think that the court -- I want to make sure that the court is prepared for that debate. Whether it's on affordability, on to what extent Travis County should engage in water quality regulations, at what level that is what's on the horizon. And so this is not something the staff should be sent off to in the closet to develop, to come back and to see if, you know, this is what you want. This is probably a dialogue that we need to have through some iterations to make sure we're in sync with what it is you want us to deliver.
>> we have day after tomorrow an item on our work session which is called discuss regional water quality plan for edwards aquifer and contributing zone. Would you please clarify for me and everyone else that's listening out there how do I mesh together today's item, I知 staying on topic, with what is to come in two days in terms of the document we're talking about now and process. Is this going to overlay with that other process? Supersede that other process? Stand alone from that other process? Or are these two things consistent or inconsistent with each other?
>> that's a good question. There's two separate issues. The regional plan was primarily for the edwards aquifer and contributing zones. So its scope and study area is finite to a geographic area. That study is southwest Travis County outside the e.t.j.s and corporate limits. The first thing you have is two different areas of Travis County.
>> part of our study area does include the edwards aquifer.
>> I was getting there, tom. In that regard, there is overlap. You will see recommendations coming in the regional plan that are fairly straightforward and strong on water quality protection. All right, the question will be asked do you want to use those same standards within the overlap area, will that become your model for any other water quality standards you might use outside the edwards area. So I think one thing you will have got in Thursday's session is at least some sroe cab you are larry that will pertain to this discussion as well. What are things of bluffs. What about impervious cover? What are some of these terms that we throw about? And what do they mean? What is the significance of them? That's what I hope you will gather from Thursday, and as we discuss this as well so that when we come to make public policy, we will first know why we are doing it, what geographic areas it applies to and what out comes we want to achieve by the ordinances that we adopt in Travis County. These are all questions of public policy, really.
>> here's what would also be very helpful for me come Thursday. To have a lineup of the players of who is involved in southwest dialogue and then tell me -- so we'll know this for Thursday, who are all the players who have been involved with on the water quality thing so I can see where there are joint stakeholders and where there are people of the same interests, although they may be different people, and where there may be some folks that are very specific to one but not the other and vice versa. I just need to know who all the official players are at the table, knowing that, of course, there are always more people than that at the table. Out I need to know the lineups from this today in terms of the score card and who are those folks that have been intimately involved with all these other so that I can line everybody up.
>> the next meeting of the panel is this week.
>> this Thursday at the county facility on hamilton pool road at 4:00.
>> the next two meets will be when?
>> well, the panel consideration meeting is this Thursday and then the following Thursday the 28th. So the 21st and the 28th, both times at 4:00. This week on hamilton pool road and the following week at the Bee Caves city hall. And then on may 19th, if we can work out the logistics, the panel has requested an open house for them to explain back to the community the work they've done and the recommended location for that was the -- I think it was the Bee Caves elementary school on hamilton pool road.
>> so we'll get a final report late may, early June?
>> I think you'll probably get it in the first week or two of may. Early may.
>> by may 15th. Lcra has a policy regarding acquisition open space.
>> I really can't speak to what their policies are at this point. We can ascertain that.
>> and I think 6,000 acres is a whole lot. You got two people -- two partners acquiring it, it gets got three, it's even smaller. But I think if the panel spent 10 months looking at this, I mean in my view the way you get implementation is to make the recommendations as specific as possible. After that, joe, it seems to me that we need to get with lcra and see from the staff's perspective where lcra is coming from. If I were on the panel, I would -- something I thought lcra ought to do, I would recommend lcra ought to do it. Stuff that I thought Travis County ought to do, I would recommend that. Stuff I thought the two should do together, i'd recommend that. At some point if we are looking at a county ordinance, what we're saying is that when you indicate to us that you are planning to file a subdivision, we will hand you a set of rules. -- a subdivision approval.
>> that's right.
>> and some if not all of these recommendations would be incorporated into those rules. And so I see -- I don't know that we can give staff, county staff direction until after we see the finished product, right? General recommendations right here look like real good ideas to me. But when it comes to implementation, a whole lot of these require not only a rule and rule-making process, but resources.
>> judge, can I add to that they also require that the county have legal authority to do it. Which is very much in flux right now. And if we're lucky, we won't know what that is until the last day of the legislative session and they don't call a special. Put this at the end of may two weeks before our time out on preliminary plans expires. So, you know, the idea that we're facing a June 15th deadline on the time out on preliminary plans, it's going to take time to draft any sort of rule, plus the fact the law is in flux, giving us an extremely small window on coming up with a set of rules.
>> yeah, the time of our decision, it seems to me, compels us to prioritize addressing that issue and coming up with rules but I do think -- we did promise to do that, right? I mean it seems to me that we would first turn our attention to dealing with those, and to the extent we can incorporate recommendations in this report between now and when we have to get that done, then we ought to do it.
>> i'll just throw out a number. Put a price tag on something. When you start talking that you have 6,000 acres and it's $10,000 an acre which is -- that's $60 million. And if it's 15,000 an acre, which I知 just using some numbers that are consistent with acquisition of habitat, you are at 90. If it's more than that, it's more than that. So we're talking low end 60 million. We need some other partners here.
>> partners with resources.
>> well, yeah.
>> sh130 was 90 million bucks and that required a two cent tax increase and a $10 million increase in debt service for the next 20 years.
>> what do we do -- what if we focus on interim rules, whatever work we need to do on those in may? Look forward to delivery of the final report by mid-may. And I think that by may 15th we really ought to know how we collaborate with lcra and identify whatever partners we think we need for the implementation stage, and i'll bet that by that time we will know specifically what Travis County needs to do to do our share. So we would be in a much better position to give staff directions. The other thing is that some of those recommendations may well impact the rest of the county. I think we ought to look at them. If it's real good for one side of the county, the question is why isn't it good for all the county. At least some residents will ask that. And so on a lot of the good stuff that is amenable, it would seem to me maybe that ought to be the standard for us county-wide. And some other stuff though is probably particular to this area.
>> i've got the joes here, we're about 2600 -- well, minus 53 -- acres short on getting to our goals on the balcones canyonlands. My question as well would be within this area that you have designated, is there any overlap with the acquisition area for the b.c.p. That there may be some things that we'll count first related to the b.c.n. Terms of proper management there that would not be inconsistent with that land also be open space and [inaudible] like can we make our money and mandated responsibilities work for two equally good public purposes related to open space and preserves? We do certainly have hamilton pool is in there towards the [inaudible]. We've got specific macro size, but we're getting close to being --
>> there is no formal overlap with the axis area, however, we have two sort of grandfathered areas, west cape and hamilton pool preserve. There is land within this study area that you have mapped and that we've been looking at that does have suitable habitat. It's not, frankly, you know, as high quality as habitat is in the actual targeted acquisition area at this time, but it could be that, you know, -- we've had this discussion before, whether we look to have another macro site created out there to finish up or have a supplemental to the 30,000. However, the court and fish and wildlife want to proceed -- we're having to look at it, in fact, we've been looking at it a couple years before this process started.
>> okay. Anything else today? Anybody else here on this item like to give comments? If so, please come forward. Anything else?
>> judge, I would like to bring up one thing. Web when you all adopted the time out on preliminary plans, the idea was go ahead and do it on a temporary basis, post the takings impact assessment, come back in 30 days areadopt. 30 days is now up so if y'all still want to do that, that would be on next week's agenda. I just wanted to give you all a head's up so that when I file the agenda request, you all know what that's about.
>> I guess the other thing for me the mindful of the process we went through on the interim rules. Here there were new stakeholders in the process that were not involved in this southwest growth dialogue. I知 just kind of thinking out loud how you would have us olve everyone so there is an opportunity for people to comment on what we do and we get their ideas. The staff is fully capable of developing a set of rules. But we know when we bring those rules to you there will be any number of interests who will want to make that you are goals known to the court, want to influence the makeup of that final ordinance. So you may be giving some thought to what type of technical committee or stakeholder committee we're going to -- what type of process you would have us go through on any draft document so that there is ample opportunity for people to have a chance to look at it, to comment in some orderly fashion and no one is surprised, but we also get the process adopted because this time around, I mean we are now under 90 dayss suspension. I expect when we get to next time we will actually have some type of ordinance that we will adopt as being a new rule. And that will -- that won't be an easy process. I expect there will be a lot of debate going on as we move through that draft ordinance.
>> do you expect the final document to be about this length?
>> I expect it to be similar in scope, yes.
>> 15, 20 pages?
>> yes.
>> what if we sent a copy of that to all of the stakeholders who participated in the rule-making process last time?
>> I think that's fine, but I think the document is fairly general in nature. The type of people you had show up were responding to legal language of an ordinance. That's what will get their attention.
>> so what I have in mind is purely after delivery of the panel's report, we should have a draft of the new ordinance. There's no way to get around, I think, having a couple of public meetings, then a public meeting, public hearing, during which comments are received before we take final action. I mean the good thing this time is that those interested in the [inaudible] last time gave us e-mail addresses, addresses, those who were rented there as a -- represented as an organization or organized group, we have the names and addresses of the representatives. We made reference to the panel's work anyway. Several times during that discussion. They may as well see the product.
>> there's not a problem, but that in and of itself probably will not spark any action on their part. They will review the document and they will understand the general tenets, but they will want something to get their hands on and that will be more of an ordinance.
>> joe, I think what sending them the report will do will give them some indication of why any rules are being proposed at all because I think that's what happened last time. All they got was the legal language and they wondered where this came from. If you look in that report, the interesting thing to me is the three things that were in the I terim rules, con truction phase, water quality controls, permanent water quality controls based on the lcra rules and buffers, were all approved by almost unanimous votes by this work group. So it shows there is some support, some broad supported for what we're doing at least within this advisory group that we've got.
>> there was another study group at at least -- or at least one more studying. Where sit? Terms of -- where is it in terms of recommendations?
>> the hamilton pool group I think is the one you are probably referring to, and I think joe, perhaps, you can help me out on that.
>> they will finish their process formally this month. They actually have made a report. They came and presented that to the advisory panel and the advisory panel specifically spent last Thursday going through that report to see whether or not there was anything that we might have missed in our process. So we're trying to fold their recommendations, at least the context of how we're drafting the report, into ours. Their orientation was to come up with a series of recommendations. Ours was more focused, trying to be more specific that would move toward implementation. So we're trying to be inclusive of what they've recommended. But they've gone on to look at some other things like design guidelines and so forth, and so they are continuing to function, but not on -- I don't believe they are drafting another or additional broad recommendations. They have that report and I知 sure that could be made available to you.
>> okay. Anything else? Anybody else? Thank you very much.
>> thanks.
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Last Modified:
Wednesday, April 20, 2005 10:34 AM