Travis County Commissioners Court
Tuesday, August 10, 2010,
Item 3
>> item no. 3 is to approve a proclamation acknowledging the collaborative efforts of the national association of realtors, the national housing conference, the texas association of realtors and the austin board of realtors in sponsoring the austin regional workforce housing forum and certification course on august 12 and 13, 2010 that will encourage dialogue as well as public and private support that will revitalize the issue of workforce housing in central texas. We have with us today, earl herston and john horton, board chair. And they brought a little backup. Have a seat there. Should i read the proclamation? It reads: whereas home ownership is an integral part of the american dream, whereas the complex issue of adequate housing stock and affordability is a concern of government and private employers in central texas; whereas the current economic climate mandates that the public, private and not for profit sectors seek innovative measures to assist employees in pursuing the american dream; whereas the national association of realtors and the national housing coalition collaborated to reignite the discussion of workforce housing in major cities in the united states; whereas travis county and the city of austin are one of the most desired places in this country to live; whereas the local hosts, the texas association of realtors and the austin board of realtors are the vanguard in protecting private property rights and homeowners and whereas realtors seek to be an innovative or invaluable resource to their community and central texans wishing to obtain the american dream, now therefore be it resolved that the travis county commissioners court acknowledges the efforts of the national association of realtors, the national housing conference, the texas association of realtors and the austin board of realtors, in sponsoring the austin regional workforce housing forum and certification course on august 12th and 13th, between, which will encourage dialogue as well as public and private support that will revitalize the issue of workforce housing and the -- in central texas. And i move approval.
>> second.
>> good morning.
>> good morning.
>> good morning. Thank you for letting us attend today and providing us this proclamation. It's really important to the austin board of realtors along with our state, national counterparts to do what we can to try to provide affordable housing for employees of both the public and private sectors. In real estate, we have a saying that says drive until you qualify, which means that to get affordable housing, you have got to go further and further away from the city center which from a lot of employees means further and further away from their place of employment. Because austin is such a desirable place to live, the value of homes are going to continue to go up. Hopefully it will go up at a steady affordable pace and have a good rate of appreciation. But it's going to take more than the market to provide affordable housing. So we need the private-public partnership to be creative with density and other options to keep the price of homes affordable for our employees. So -- so we would -- we would welcome any help that we can get from the county and thank you for recognizing the efforts that we have made.
>> let's look together and work on a good tax relief problem
>> [laughter] i think that in itself makes a lot i think -- brings affordability to a lot of houses in there, we have really got to re-evaluate our taxing situation. That's a big part of a lot of things.
>> oh, it is, absolutely.
>> and, you know, it's very critical. I know that we look at that very seriously from the commissioners court even though we -- even though we are looking at other innovative things. I think tax relief in -- where you can bring about affordability and some of the houses i think is very, very paramount. Senior citizens and a lot of other folks out there who -- who cannot afford some of the escalating costs, you have the working poor. I think it should be a total effort in my mind, from you and anyone else that can help us bring some kind of tax relief to bring about some affordability as far as the housing stock here and -- and central part of the city. And within -- within the hub of -- of all of these things. So i appreciate what you are doing. As far as the -- as far as the subject matter of affordability.
>> you are welcome.
>> thank you.
>> thank you.
>> mr. Reeferseed anything on this item?
>> yes i want to thank -- also i'm in favor of this effort. I wanted to throw in the fact that -- that another city i lived in that is oakland, california, the whole california bay, san francisco bay area, they are trapped in what they have -- they have a decades long i think kind of nightmare situation where they got in the habit of -- of setting, trying to set these limits and come up with these numbers and the end result being that they've got a huge financial nightmare of -- of budget -- that messes up their budget, year after year, of trying to keep track of this -- of paying money to housing that's always going up, but then going down, people are also poor, it's really expensive to live there. It just gets to be nightmarish really quickly. I know all of us have our hearts in the right place. I'm totally in favor of tax reform and in every case. But tax reduction. But -- but i just trying to throw in a note of caution from my experience in living in the san francisco bay area. You can -- it can get out of hand thank you.
>> and i would like to make a quick comment. I'm so appreciative of your collaborative efforts on this particular issue of affordable housing. You are absolutely right. We are -- we are locked in what appears to be a death spiral of drive until you qualify. Of course folks who are driving until they qualify, are not also considering the additional transportation costs that weigh very, very heavily on them. I would very much appreciate y'all's collaboration with us on transportation funding issues as well. Currently we are on seriously underfunded in transportation. Additionally, if we continue to build further and further out, our affordable stock will also contribute to what is already an unsustainable growth pattern. We really need to address that. Additionally, i would very much like your collaboration on incompatible use. As you well know, because there is no land use authority outside of the city limits, which also means there's no land use authority in the etj of these cities as well. We could build the most lovely affordable housing as possible, then a very incompatible use can go in immediately adjacent to that. I would very much like your collaboration through this next legislative session to solve that issue.
>> all in favor? That passes by unanimous vote.
>> thank you very much.
>> we will see you all thursday morning, won't we?
>> yes, we will.
>> okay.
>> the bad thing is that -- we require that you --
>> take them with you. Lease call up item no. 7 next, then we will call up 14.
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, August 10, 2010, 2010 1:30 PM
