Travis County Commissioners Court
October 23, 2007
Citizens Communication
>> let's do citizens communication next designed to give residents an opportunity to address the court on any matter not on the agenda for up to three minutes, mary layman signed in. On are you here on the landfill matter or something else? Yes. Followed by pamela
>> [indiscernible]
>> my name is mary layman, I wanted to thank you for this opportunity to speak. My point is that governments are going in the wrong direction, just allowing ever greater accumulation of waste. That is avoiding solving a problem. The only way that you can solve the problem of greater waste in limited facilities is to reduce the accumulation by better recycling laws, in europe they take the people who -- the people who brought containers to the grocery store, they take them back. We have a very limited recycling program and it's -- I think that citizens of this county and this town would be very grateful if you would direct your attention to better recycling. They do their best on down on 9th street, but they need help. It's not solved by -- by just allowing more and more trash accumulation. It's -- it's temporary and we all know it. Thank you.
>> thank you.
>> thank you, ms. Layman.
>> [ applause ]
>> pamela luclil, are you here on the b.f.i. Matter?
>> yes.
>> then please have a seat and we'll call that item up real soon. Citizens communication is for any item not on the agenda. We will be to that item real soon. Just a few minutes here. Gus pena.
>> good morning, judge, Commissioners, gus pena. Native of east Austin, east fifth street. The gap widens between the haves and have nots. Senior citizens barely making their ends meet, foreclosure. Forget about keep Austin weird the number one title for Austin, keep Austin affordable for the people who live here in Austin. Affordable housing I think that I brought this up to y'all and the city council at the legislature when we met with them the last 15 years. What is the true definition of affordable housing? It is not $100,000. People cannot afford that. You need to make it affordable. When you have a finance corporation meeting, I think harvey Davis is doing a darned good job. I said darned those of you listening to me, but it is a good job of keeping affordable housing, but make sure if you have any developers development, get that affordable housing to keep it affordable, not $100,000, that's not affordable. Gangs, gangs are increasing their membership. In 1994 we met with special agent byron sage and john
>> [indiscernible] atf d.e.a. Ferl united states marshal's office, united states attorney's office himself to help combat crime and help a.p.d. We brought in federal resources, we need to do it again. We need the f.b.i.'s help, we need the federal boys in on it because we just need help for a.p.d. Officers are too short on personnel for all of their sectors or whatever they call them now. Believe me, you read an article in the paper this past Monday or Sunday, gangs are on the increase. You are not getting a full straight information from -- from anybody here in the county or the city. But you had better darned well know that they are trying to capture the hearts and minds and consciouses of our children. Home boys I'm not scared of you. I will bring in my former i.r.s. Investigator buddies we will go after you if we have to, but we are not going to -- you are not going to take over our kids. I urge johnston high school, volunteer talents and efforts to mentor our johnston high school students. If we don't make academic improvements our school is scheduled foreclosure next year. We have a game I think it's November the 2nd. This is probably our last and only last game we have -- we have had to forfeit because of no pass, no play. We need help out there to keep our students on target, on task to graduate. We need help. Alumni, thousands of you all, attorneys, business owners, regular people, we need help to mentor, tutor our kids. I graduated from johnston. We have about 10 mentors, we need help out there. From the bar, also help from -- last issue. I'm not hearing support, I didn't come over here to speak for or against them. But, you know, landfills, tank farms, are not acceptable. Please do something to help these people that live around that area because we grew up in a tank farm in front of us on east fifth street. We need help for these people. We do not need the -- the environment to be compromised for the health of the people, for the -- for the kids, thank you very much.
>> thank you.
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Last Modified:
Wednesday, October 24, 2007, 18:30 AM