Travis County Commissioners Court
April 3, 2007
Item 32
32. Consider and take appropriate action on request to join alliance for public transportation. Good morning, or good afternoon, rather.
>> good afternoon.
>> good afternoon, judge Biscoe, Commissioners, my name is john langmore, I'm here today as a representative of the alliance for public transportation. I'm on the executive committee and chairing the membership committee of that organization. And I thought that I might just take a second to -- to talk to you about what I consider a very important organization. I hope that you will as well. It was actually started in -- in February of 2006 when -- when two mayors, mayor wynn and mayor calman from Leander called together a pretty diverse group of a -- of sifks of courses that -- of civic organizations that had a vested interest in transportation and public transportation in particular. Just a sampling of those 22 organizations and it's diversity, some of them were the greater Austin chamber of commerce, the urban league, the hill country conservancy, the count Austin alliance, the university of Texas, envision central Texas, to mention just a few. The group came together, although they decided there were a lot of organizations that had advocacy as public transportation as part of their mission, none focus odd that singularly, felt that public transportation has risen to a point of significance in the region that it really justified a group focusing exclusively on public transportation. This is modeled after something that was done in denver. So after -- after a while discussing what we should do, in whether or not the group was justified, eventually we reached a decision we should form a 501 c 3, we did that in late 2006 and the purpose of the group is really just to promote as stated in our literature, do you all have a copy of that by the way. Sorry this thing lists the board of directors and the purpose. Okay. It's to promote public transportation that improves regional quality of life, the board and the membership is in fact regional, economic development again a number of organizations interested in the economic development of the region are involved, affordability, our chairman is actually frank fernandez who chairs --
>> community partnership.
>> thank you exactly. The community partnership for --
>> [indiscernible] so of course the environment so I'm here today in hopes that -- that Travis County would be amenable to a request that you join the alliance for public transportation as a member and we have a formula that we put forth for all public organizations that were asking to be members and we've got one that applies to Travis County and I can mention that to you and how we have come to that and what it adds up to in terms of -- of support, but I'm also happy to answer any questions about the organization, what we are doing. We have got a number of events scheduled that I'm happy to go through that would sort of give you a sense of the type of public involvement that we are working towards and so I'm happy to answer any questions. I want to make sure that I hit on what you all are, what he would like to know before making these investments.
>> how many news stand members do you have today, what would the money be used for?
>> okay. Dues paying members today, I know glen just gave me a list and it is -- it is downtown Austin alliance, the greater Austin chamber of commerce, the cities of Leander, elgin, buda, the university of Texas and then a number of individuals in businesses. The type of event that we are working on judge, the ones that we currently have planned include working on a regional vision and -- and for public transportation, we are working closely with campo and envision central Texas on forming that regional vision. Our role will be primarily to engage the public in that regional vision for public transportation. We -- we also are going to --
>> that's what the money would be used for?
>> yes, in part. Staff is a big part of it by the way. We currently don't have any staff to help keep us organized, help facilitate it. Thus far it's all being done through volunteer work. Glen
>> [indiscernible] served as interim staff really through about the first of the year. Now just volunteer with the organization and so -- so staffing is in large part what it will go towards whatever contributions we make towards those events and we intend to engage the public on a dialogue regarding the potential street car and we would do that with -- with the downtown Austin neighborhood association, downtown Austin alliance, again that's an engagement of the public process. We are -- we want to engage the business community as well in an area where they probably haven't been as engaged as they should be. We have a major employer's summit that gerinomo rodriguez is spearheading, we are going to do that in August. We have already had one lunch common that we co-sponsored like the urban land institute, it was a tod transit oriented development, affordability luncheon with a panel discussion. It was a very well attended, very well received event. A community mapping luncheon planned. Then we are going to serve as the local host for the transit initiatives conference which is really a national conference that we are going to hold here in Austin and we will be the local host for that event. So those are the type of things that we are working on, judge. Primarily it would be to support some permanent staff and then whatever monetary contributions that we have to make towards these initiatives.
>> you mentioned street car earlier.
>> yes.
>> and I know we had -- we had -- a little bit ago we had a couple of folks in the work session, representatives in the work session that came down and talked to us about public transit. We also mentioned the street car scenario, h.d.r., some other person that was really hired by the city of Austin, capital metro I guess was involved in -- in it to some degree. Of course I did some follow-up. I requested capital metro, you mentioned outreach. Basically I'm making these comments to you, that the outreach involved in -- in the community on the -- on the east side come from robert mueller airport and then all the way down to -- to I guess the -- down to speedway to some degree coming down manor road. With the street care scenario, of course there were several neighborhood associations that I wanted to make sewer that capital metro got involved with to -- to let them know exactly what this all entailed and how it may impact them. Of course that -- I did some follow-up on that. I sent a letter to -- to -- to the -- to the chair of the executive director, gillian?
>> yeah, fred gillian the president.
>> of course they have done this outreach stuff and then you mentioned transit oriented development and I didn't hear you mention -- maybe just missed it, but I didn't hear you mention capital metro and -- as one of the contributors, if this is an outreach thing, with public transit, I didn't hear capital metro's name mentioned.
>> you actually -- thank you for prompting me to make an excellent point that I did not make earlier. We have -- we have taken a conscious decision to not accept any money from the public transit authority primarily because we want to be able to act independently. We want to represent the community in its desires with respect to public transportation and that may sometimes, you know, we may have to push capital metro in a direction that they might not naturally go. So -- so although they are ex-officio member of the board, which is a non-voting member of the board, we have again as I mentioned made a conscious decision not to accept any of their money so that we don't have any undue pressure on us to act in -- in the agency's best interests as opposed to the best interests of -- I would never suggest that they would different vermg, but if they did, we would certainly want to be to advocate on behalf of the community. That's really the reason why. One last point and then I couldn't agree more in terms of the significance of engaging the significance on east side of i-35, the critical aspect of that. We intend to do that.
>> well, I guess if you were around in dr that time, I was wondering -- why -- how long have you been in existence?
>> technically we were formed in October of 2006.
>> 2006. Well, that's what kind of strikes me kind of surprising here I am asking for outreach and -- into a community that needed to be educated on -- on those neighborhood associations, for example, and the people along the manor road corridor as it comes out of old robert mueller airport. Basic route of -- of the street car. Why -- why you weren't recommended to provide that outreach. For the educational aspect of letting folks know about -- about that type of public transit. So I'm hearing this today. I'm saying oh, wait a minute. I have already asked these -- fred gillian and folks are supposed to go ahead and make sure that they end up doing that. The latest that I have heard they have gone through the process. I haven't got the full results of those meetings that they have held with those folks. But I can -- I could -- I do understand a need to educate a person in this community. I think that it's pretty important, in my opinion, to do that -- to do that if they are going to be aware of the significance of the transit will make and also what kind of impact hearing from the community pro and con I guess on the transit itself. So I can really see that need. But I'm just -- I don't know where he-- I was wondering where have you been all of this time when I really needed you the most
>> [laughter]
>> Commissioner, I apologize we are late but we are here now. We are here to help. I do want to explain one thing about confident problem that's created -- kind of the problem that's created. The agency kind of depends on having to go after federal money and follow federal rules on their outreach. As a consequence when you tell them to go out and do something, they look at the usual planning process, usual planning cycles. What we are hoping to be able to do is reach into the community and have a less constrained conversation that really gets more at the heart of what the community wants to talk about when they want to talk about it. So from here on I hope that we can -- I hope that you don't say that again in your six months or a year from now.
>> it's just one of the things that are going to come up. You know, if you look at the -- t.o.d., basically you are looking at the situation from downtown all the way to elgin. With that type of situation, there's a lot of folks involved in that area. All of this stuff like that. My point is -- I'm just glad to know that you are around because maybe -- when I get the results -- I tell you what when I get the results from that study of those hearings for the community, whoever conducted them, then I would like to share that information with you to see if it is the type of responses that run with the -- with the type of responses that a neighborhood or groups may have when they get back, that process.
>> it's exactly the type of the role that we would like to play with -- with the county and with the Commissioners you know in particular as it would impact their precinct. And I should just mention that -- that there is a lot of time left to engage the community with respect to the street car. We are still at a fairly preliminary stage of that whole initiative. So there's not only a lot of need in terms of needing to engage the public more than they have been to date. We still have some time. I wish it was moving faster.
>> the result right now from those folks that conducted the meeting, been waiting to hear from you.
>> I would like forward to you sharing them with us.
>> two observations, a recommendation, we will ask if there's a motion. Seems to me that we belong to more than our share of transportation groups in addition to having transportation staff. I think the challenge that I see is eliminating duplication. Secondly is that we are a dues paying member of -- of many groups and to be honest, I am not sure that we can get -- we can see a return on the investment for a -- for a lot of it. My recommendation is that you continue your work and when you come upon a project that Travis County is interested in and can help with, then let us know. How we can help. Including monetary contribution of some sort is appropriate. Of course we reserve to say yea or nay. Otherwise I think that we should try to work together. There's certainly enough transportation issues to work with. But I mean I guess at some point we really will have a lot more transportation groups than transportation projects. I say that as a person who attended more than his share of transportation meetings and seeing probably less than my share of -- of successful transportation projects. But it's kind of like you mentioned it a few minutes ago, at some point Travis County should become engaged and then at that point the question is what remains to -- to be done and basically how do we accomplish it? What role can we play?
>> even if I could just respond, quickly to that.
>> if there's a motion I'm ready for it, go ahead.
>> you know, I really do think that this is -- we are at sort ever of a critical juncture with respect to public transportation. The capital metro rail line is -- is due to start in the third quarter of 2008 that runs from Leander into the convention center. Currently there's no -- no means of really distributing those passengers which I think will -- will hurt although not mortally the performance of the initial rail line. So I really think that -- we need to think about how are we going to -- to connect the people that ride the rail line in to their ultimate destinations which are, you know, the state office complex, university of Texas, ultimately out to mueller as well. I think that the community needs to get focused on public transportation because we are becoming about something much larger than just a bus system, which is sort of the way we operated in the past. And while I completely appreciate your concern about a return on your investment, I guess my plea in response to that would be if we don't -- if groups like Travis County and the city of Austin choose not to become members, it's -- it makes it much more difficult for us to really get off dead center without dedicated staff --
>> unless you become more project oriented. People are aware of transportation, but right now transportation is no toll roads. There's another specific project that we may need help on. Transportation in general is too general. We have enough transportation in general organizations.
>> although none focus on public transportation that's --
>> they all claim to.
>> let me throw out an alternative perspective here. I have felt a large need in the community for what amounts to a transportation policy road show, the ability to go out into neighborhoods at the neighborhood's request on the neighborhood's terms and discuss the -- the prioritizing and the triage of transportation as it relates to public transit. One example in my next of the woods is there's a -- there's a sizable portion of my precinct that does not want through roads because it will seriously affect their quality of life and their property values. There's also a sizable portion that does not want light rail going through their neighborhood, either. Because of their experience with freight. Then there's a sizable overlap between those two. Well, you don't have a through road and you don't have light rail, what do you do at burnet and anderson? When we have a mixed use overlay and multiple family retail residential. So we are, I think, in desperate need of a -- of a -- of a group like yours that isn't burdened by being in the pocket, as it were, of a transportation provider. I think that -- that this is something really needed. I hear what the judge is saying and perhaps -- perhaps it's just premature at this point. But how much are you asking for?
>> in our -- yeah, our formula is -- is $60, $66 per thousand. Which comes out to $11,000.
>> excluding the city's --
>> we don't double dip the city of Austin. We apply a formula for them. So we have excluded that population.
>> so it's $11,000 annually?
>> yes.
>> and I think that -- that the amount of money that has been expended by this community in consulting fees alone just trying to figure out the answers to many of these questions far exceeds that 11,000.
>> no question.
>> so I would advocate that this is the organization that could provide that transportation policy road show on the terms of the actual constituents rather than the service providers or the governmental entities that would be required to pony up the money. But I think the conversation to a great degree has been about transportation generally, but specifically about public transit has been driven predominantly by the money. If you have money in place, we talk about your program. If you don't have money in place, your program doesn't get talked about, regardless of how merittous it is. I would advocate for such an organization that could get beyond that to a true -- triage and prioritizing with community -- what the community is asking for.
>> and as I -- is there a motion to approve --
>> that's a motion to approve the request.
>> seconded by Commissioner Davis. Any discussion of the motion?
>> yes.
>> okay. How much money is he will again putting into this, john?
>> I don't remember but they would be the same 66ed per thousand, so it's, you know, I don't know maybe five to 800, less than a thousand.
>> Leander?
>> again the same formula, so it was -- somewhere around 1500.
>> let me suggest that you all get -- I'm going to ask for another week on this if we are going to really vote on this. We already have a motion and a second. I think we need to have those numbers. It's brit clear to me you -- pretty clear to me what you are doing is putting money to go outs and promote the trolley. That's -- that's what the grass roots effort promises to shape the transit system, all over the place about the charlie betts, a.p.d., this is a promotion of something -- of a trolley car that we don't know is even accepted, number one. And, john, you said something about how do you get the people from the convention center to their final destinations? Wasn't that part of the whole program when this community signed off on $100 million to do that? What it was going to be, it was going to be express buses.
>> and there are --
>> so this trolley is not something that's needed to get these people up and down. I said it last week, I will say it again. We have spent, we have watched $1,700,000,000 spent on capital metro alone in the last 21 years, we got less than 3% of the people that use the service. Now I wish that we had 33%. We are about to do something here with the county to determine whether or not because one of the things that I clearly want to find out in our parking is what exactly would it take us to get you out of your car. Now, I would be willing to bet each of you guys right now that -- that I don't -- I mean, short of picking up somebody's, all of their parking, people aren't going to give up their parking. I mean, these are just a few of the e-mails that we have got and the basic theme is -- I don't -- I don't being what you do, I want -- I don't care what you do, I want my car. It just sounds so odd that we would have an organization that comes along, has to explain and educate people about the need for public transportation. My god, I mean we don't -- this community is smart. This community has the opportunity to use those things. To come in and fund something that I think quite frankly, I guess I'm inpressed that capital metro is not putting some
>> [indiscernible] with it. I mean but to give the organization money when I know that the central theme behind this thing is going to be something that I personally am just so adamantly opposed to --
>> just in response to that, we are a 501 c 3 so we cannot advocate by law.
>> you and I both know the difference between advocacy and education.
>> education is important, if you remember in the chamber's take on transportation, 73% of the people said that they felt we ought to have a a multi-modal system of transportation. That was the one that I think that drove up -- the one thing that drove up the results in terms of what people felt we should be considering in this community and --
>> why only 3% of the people use it if 73% of the people say that that's something they ought to do?
>> because they live more than one quarter of a mile away from the bus stop.
>> that is if you took 100% of the people that live within 100 yards of the bus stop, you would still only have probably 2 or 3% of the people. It's not like anybody is -- has to put a gun to somebody's head or is out saying do you know that there's a bus that goes right down in front of your house?
>> that's why I'm saying I think there is a need in the community for a conversation not -- not just to go out and give a powerpoint advocating rail. I hear what you are saying. It's really more about a dialogue to find out if 73% of the public say in the chamber of commerce's survey that they want a multi-modal public transit system to go out and find out what the impediments are according to the people, to having that goal met.
>> Commissioner, let me just say, you know this, all of us know it, 73% of the people make said that they are for alternative modes of transportation, know nothing about the statistics about how many dollars have been spent on alternative modes of transportation and people elect not to use them. If 37% of the people knew that there were -- john, what -- you are right.
>> if you allow the true education to take place, let people know that what you have just told me is -- is inferring that -- that perhaps you ought to try to use it, the 62% of the people that went and voted for -- for the commuter rail, you and I both know that 95% of the people will never get on that.
>> what I would say Commissioner, you and I have had this conversation many times now, I respect your opinions I hope you respect mine. Because we clearly disagree on the place of public transportation in the region in dealing with the transportation and the place making aspects of handling our growth. With that being said, this is one of the most diverse groups I have ever seen come together on any single issue in this region. And -- and it would seem -- it would seem at least short sighted to deny them the chance to go out and engage the public on something that they all consider to be very important. I've never seen a group that's as diverse as this one. I mean, if you look at the founders were the Austin area urban league, Austin cycling association, Austin metro trails and green ways, boma, capital -- capital city african-american chamber of commerce, clean water action, city of Austin, city of Leander, citizens of advisory group for saltillo, community partnership for the homeless, downtown Austin alliance, greater Austin chamber of commerce, greater Austin hispanic chamber of commerce, highland neighborhood association, hill country conservancy, mayor, students, government advisory council, oak hill association of neighborhoods, orange jackets university democrats, seton family of hovments, strategic partnerships, inc.
>> what's the point of that now.
>> just that there's a very diverse group of organizations that consider this very important that want to --
>> this group will educate the public about public transportation.
>> absolutely.
>> all in favor of the motion?
>> judge, I didn't get this open for discussion --
>> we have a whole lot of items to discuss this afternoon. Either the court will vote to do this or not. All in favor of the motion? Show Commissioners Gomez, Eckhardt and Davis voting in favor. Voting against Commissioner Daugherty, county judge Biscoe. Motion passes. What's the source of founding for the 11,000? Funding. Commissioner Eckhardt? Reserve?
>> I cannot answer that at this time.
>> then you don't have your money yet, john. We have to identify a source of funding. We will have this matter back on next week for that.
>> okay.
>> thank you very much for your patience.
>> happy to do it. Thank you all for your attention.
>> thank you.
>> [one moment please for change in captioners]
The Closed Caption log for this Commissioners Court agenda item is provided by Travis County Internet Services. Since this file is derived from the Closed Captions created during live cablecasts, there are occasional spelling and grammatical errors. This Closed Caption log is not an official record the Commissioners Court Meeting and cannot be relied on for official purposes. For official records please contact the County Clerk at (512) 854-4722.
Last Modified:
Tuesday, April 3, 2007, 9:34 PM