Another Texan in President's Cabinet

"Susan Combs, a former Texas legislator and statewide official, will be named acting assistant secretary of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Park Service, the Austin American-Statesman reported Thursday." The Texas Tribune

Georgetown Needs Open and Transparent City Government

The Texas Public Policy Foundation hosted a forum yesterday on the Texas Public Information Act that identified several serious short-comings of existing law.

A summary of the forum by the moderator, Ross Ramsey can be found here.

"Efforts to close loopholes in the state's open information laws fell short at the end of last year's legislative session. An interim committee intended to get a head start before the 2019 session hasn't met. Its members haven't even been named."

Contact Representative Terry Wilson and Senator Charles Schwertner to urge the Texas Senate and House leaders to appoint the interim committe.

IRS Abuse of Citizens Continues

The DOJ and IRS continue to stonewall and reverse prior agreements to keep True the Vote in court burning through their resources.

We need to tell our leaders in Washington D.C. that this behavior must stop and those responsibile must be removed.

Video update from Catherine Engelbrecht

More Costs Associated with Renewable Energy?

The City just posted the following information on nextdoor.com.

"Georgetown is one of 35 Champion Cities selected this week as finalists in the 2018 U.S. Mayors Challenge, a nationwide competition that encourages city leaders to develop innovative ideas that confront challenges facing their cities. Georgetown was selected as a finalist amongst more than 320 applications.

Georgetown’s innovative idea involves developing the “virtual power plant.” While Georgetown is the first and largest city in Texas to secure 100 percent of its purchased power from renewable sources, there are cost uncertainty and reliability concerns related to transporting that energy over long distances. The City of Georgetown hopes to be able to lease rooftop space on residential and commercial properties to install solar panels that will generate enough energy to offset the need to purchase power from outside sources in this completely renewable energy-powered city."

This is the first time we have been told that there will be a continuing need to purchase power from outside sources, even though the city owned electric company has racked up multi-million dollar bills with ERCOT for two different periods over the last two years to purchase power.

Now we find out that the city wants to install solar panels on residential and commercial buildings to offset the need to purchase power through ERCOT.

When are the citizens of Georgetown to have full transparency into the electric company? It looks like a change in state law is required so the the Open Records statues apply fully to municipally owned utilities.

More From Councilman Fought on Road Closure

"Closing Roads (the opposite of Connectivity)

When the City decides to build a road, or to insist that a Developer provide a road within a project, that road ought to serve a well-defined and understood purpose. When the City contemplates closing a road, there ought to be similar well-defined and understood purposes.

In my opinion, and given our recent experience with West Majestic Oak Lane, any proposal to close a road ought to be accompanied by at least the following:

1. Evidence that the connection which is proposed to be closed does not meet established safety standards;
2. Evidence that a reasonable range of alternatives, other than closing the road, have been explored to resolve the safety issue(s);
3. Analysis to support the contention that closure will resolve the safety issue(s);
4. Proof that the proposed road closure will not generate safety issues in other areas;
5. An analysis of the initial and long term costs of closure;
6. Comments from residents and businesses in the areas which might be affected by a closure;
7. An analysis of the impact on public safety (e.g., Police,Fire, and EMS) if the connection were closed;
8. An estimate of the impact of using the conditions in the proposed closure as a precedent for future closures;

When the City Council was recently asked to consider closing the connection between Woodland Park and Sun City at West Majestic Oak Lane, the City did not have a policy in place to evaluate the various factors being debated. The Council directed the Staff to develop a draft policy on road closures and to have that draft available not later than the Council Meeting on 10 July, 2018. I believe these 8 requirements should be part of a new road closure policy and I will argue in favor of including them."

Road Closure Policy Development

Councilman Steve Fought has shared his ideas on the development of a road closure policy for the City.

Wilco Building Custom Home for Employee at County Park

The County Commissioners just voted Tuesday to build an almost $400,000 custom home at a county park for a live-in employee who will pay no rent. What a sweet deal using taxpayer funds to build a 4 bedroom, 1900 Sq. Ft. home.

Here is a link with more information and a link to the commissioners court vote.

http://www.wilcoreport.com/382171-75-taxpayer-funded-custom-home/

Mayor Ross Defends Renewable Energy

The Texas Public Policy Foundation hosted their annual Policy Orientation February 7-9, 2018. One of the panels discussed the subsidies afforded the renewable energy industry. Mayor Ross was one of the panelists. He was joined by Donna Campbell of the Texas Senate, Lisa Linowes of The WindAction Group, and Bill Magness of ERCOT.

Set back and grab your popcorn!

Renewable Energy Subsidies

City Selling Three Downtown Properties

Recall that the City decided last year to proceed with building a new city hall west of downtown at a cost of $13M. A substantial portion of those funds are to come from the sale of existing downtown city owned properties. Here is the announcement for the sale of those properties.

The City of Georgetown is accepting proposals from potential buyers for three city-owned buildings. The buildings for sale are the historic post office at 113 E. Eighth St., the Municipal Court/City Council Chambers at 101 E. Seventh St., and the Visitors Center at 103 W. Seventh St. The Municipal Court and the Visitors Center buildings are located on the historic Square around the Williamson County Courthouse. The historic post office is located one block east of the Square and is currently home to City Hall.

In total, these buildings represent more than 25,000 square feet of commercial space in the nine-block core of downtown Georgetown. All three properties are zoned mixed-use downtown, which allows for a number of uses including office, retail, restaurant, hotel, or event facility.

While purchase price is one consideration, the goal of this process is to connect with buyers willing to provide the best overall proposal for of each property. Proposers must submit a business plan and timeline detailing the intended use of the site.

City Council Strategies

The following chart condenses the City Council's strategies as understood by the city staff.

What is strategy? Here is a general definition by Michael Porter, a strategy expert and professor at Harvard Business School. He emphasizes the need for strategy to define and communicate an organization's unique position, and says that it should determine how organizational resources, skills, and competencies should be combined to create competitive advantage.

It is difficult to make the connection between the core city government functions of public safety, transportation, recreation, libraries, water and sewer and drainage systems and the above strategies.

How does becoming a destination or enhancing our reputation as a "City of Innovation" advance and improve the core government functions?

Other strategies, such as lobbying the State legislature, are completely inappropriate, especially when it is contrary to the best interests of city residents.

Water Water, Do We Have Enough Water?

The city staff presented a 20 page analysis to the City County on Janyary 23, 2018 Water Resource Utilization. It focuses about 90% of the time on conservation with no discussion about recycling or increasing available supply to support the continued growth of Georgetown.

It appears that over 2016 to 2017 the city increased production/consumption of water while also decreasing consumption per person. The net increase was about 0.9B gallons for the year.

Currently the city has 55,670 acre feet of raw water available annually. This is equivalent to 18.1B gallons of water. With 2017 water consumption at 7.2B gallons, there would be about 12B gallons annually available for growth. If consumption continues to grow as the population increases at about 0.9B gallons per year, all the available water will be used in 13 to 15 years.

The issue is more complex than presented here, but, the city needs to do the analysis that includes drought years and treatment needs in addition to conservation to get a true picture of our water future.

Buidling Projects Sprouting Everywhere

Let us take a look at what is happening in and around Sun City. The Sun City Master Plan shows additional development along Ronald Reagan and also along CR 245 and Williams Drive to the west.

The addition of Neighborhoods 88 and 89 gives rise to the issue of "connectivity". With only a single road out to Ronald Reagan, connectivity for safety purposes will depend on the Madison project being built with connections to that development.

The Madison has its own problems with connectivity as shown in the following map with Shady Oaks in the lower right corner. Shady Oaks is not within the Georgetown city limits

Here is a link to the developer that partially shows the layout. Madison

I think the Madison project has been planned, at least the lots and streets have been layed out. There was a presentation around July 2016 that shows Madison connecting into Shady Oaks at three loacations, Oak Branch Drive, Roble Roja Drive and Twin Cedar Drive. So you would have Georgetown specified streets of 30-32 ft wide with curbs, gutters and sidewalks connecting to 22.5 ft wide streets in the County with no curbs, gutters or sidewalks. I wrote on my blog at the time that I thought that was a stupid idea as there are two main roads out of Madison, one to 195 and one to Ronald Reagan.

This looks like West Majestic Oaks all over again unless the city takes an action.

The City has all kinds of regulations about how neighborhoods are to be connected if they are within the City, however, they do not seem to address connectivity between City and County developments.

Stay tuned for more fireworks!

West Majestic Oaks Remains Open - For Now

It appears the City Council has kicked-the-can down the road for 6 months while a policy is developed for closing city streets. West Majestic Oaks remains open until the new policy is developed and approved. The policy will presumably have a process by which citizens can petition the City to close a street.

Based on prior experience, if anyone wants to have any input to the policy, they need to engage the City staff NOW! By the time the new policy comes to City Council for approval, it will be too late for actionable citizen input.

For those who are masochist, here is the link to the video of the January 23, 2018 City Council meeting.Video

AG Rules ISDs Cannot Use Public Funds for Electioneering

The Texas Attorney General has issued an opinion that school districts cannot provide District transportation to and from poling places for teachers and students.

He also ruled that it would likely be a criminal offense for an officer or employee of a school district to knowingly spend or authorize the spending of public funds for political advertising. A court would likely conclude that the use of public funds to link to an Internet website promoting a specific candidate or measure is itself a communication supporting or opposing a candidate or measure in violation of this provision. AG Opinion

Closure of West Majestic Oaks Heating Up!

The following was posted on the Nextdoor website this morning.

Donna Betts, Sun City27

West Majestic Oaks Closing to All Traffic EXCEPT EMERGENCY Vehicles

We in N-51 of Sun City knew that the safety of our neighborhood residents has been a Political Topic for a long time. We've been fighting "The Badlands" down Pedernales for over 4 years (about 3000 voters in "The Badlands" vs. 200 votes in N-51.) Well now, one week prior to the 2nd reading and vote to Close West Majestic Oaks to all traffic except Emergency Vehicles, thanks to Steve Fought, he's invited ALL OF SUN CITY to get into this fight by posting the item in the NRO Bulletin. The sad part of this posting is that he's asking the majority of Sun Citians (who believe that this is about an Exit into Woodland Park) to get involved in our Neighborhood quest to regain our safety from over 1666 vehicles a day, (at the last city traffic count!!) He doesn't mention that this traffic through our neighborhood is TWICE the maximum traffic limit according to UDC. This fight is NOT about Woodland Park!! This is fight is NOT about another EXIT from Sun City!! Some Sun City Residents are making this issue of their "RIGHT" to cut through our small neighborhood because the route is more CONVENIENT that the one they could take through Rocky Hollow (a drive of 60 additional SECONDS!) This issue is about the "Cut-Through" used by THOUSANDS of drivers through our neighborhood every day - and it's been outrageous since the opening of Randalls, as we predicted it would. Of course Steve Fought didn't mention N-51 and dangerous horrific traffic on our neighborhood streets! He didn't mention that West Majestic Oaks WOULD continue to be available for EMERGENCY VEHICLES if the Ordinance passes the 2nd reading. How did HE get access to email ALL of Sun City through the NRO newsletter? That's some kind of special treatment that doesn't seem fair!! A Sun City councilman who should be more concerned about the SAFETY of Sun City Residents brings in the Entire Sun City Community into an issue that doesn't even affect them!! He's doing everything he can to make sure that someone has to DIE in order for him to protect the citizens SAFETY rather than some residents' CONVENIENCE! Shame on you, Steve! And, yes, I'm using BOLD print because I'm MAD! Donna Betts N-51 Safety Committee

Governer Abbott Proposes Cap on Property Taxes

Launching a new round in a long-running fight in Texas, Gov. Greg Abbott on Tuesday unveiled a plan to curb soaring property taxes, calling for a 2.5 percent annual cap on revenue growth from property taxes in each taxing jurisdiction.

 Such a move is expected to face strong opposition from cities, counties and school districts, which in many areas have been raising taxes to cover expanding needs, especially in rapidly growing areas such as Fort Bend County and other parts of greater Houston.

It's a political battle that has huge financial impact for Texas property owners. Gov Abbott Tax Proposal

The Gov’s proposal to cap revenue growth from property taxes at 2.5 percent is a critical step in protecting taxpayers, homeowners, and small businesses.

West Majestic Oaks Lane Closure on Council Agenda

The City Council meets tomorrow evening and the following is on the agenda:


"First Reading of an Ordinance restricting vehicular traffic and closing the intersection of West Majestic Oak Lane and Apache Mountain Lane in the Sun City Subdivision, in the City of Georgetown, Texas -- Rachael Jonrowe, Councilmember District 6 (action required)"

A copy of the proposed ordinance is available at this site.

http://agendas.georgetown.org/CoverSheet.aspx?ItemID=19331&MeetingID=2364

Texas State Senator Bob Hall on Toll Roads

Texas Transportation Officials Defy Governor and Legislature in Attempt to Force Toll Road Expansion   When Governor Abbott, the adult in the room, said, “No new taxes or toll roads,” he was speaking for the people of Texas and meant what he said. Unfortunately, the leadership at the Regional Transportation Councils (RTC) and TxDOT are defiantly refusing to acknowledge or follow his very clear instructions. Instead, the RTC and TxDOT have embarked on a course with their 2017 update to the 2018 Uniform Transportation Plan (UTP), determined, at any cost, to maintain a revenue stream to fund unelected bureaucrats’ legal slush funds. With total disregard to the financial burden they will be placing on the working-class, the public outcry against expensive toll roads, and Governor Abbott’s clear statement of “no new taxes and no toll roads,” they have carefully crafted a plan specifically designed around the eternal perpetuation of toll roads. They are hoping to sell this ill-conceived plan using three tricks: creating fictional requirements, a funding shell game to give the appearance of a lack of money for major projects, and a name change.  These are: Fictional Requirement: They have created, without any basis in legislation or regulations, a purely fabricated requirement called "Guaranteed Speed." This new requirement was specifically selected to dictate an absolute necessity for all future major highway projects in Texas to be built as indefinite toll roads. Funding Shortage Myth: They are attempting to create a false belief that there is not enough money for major projects, like I-635 East, by first diverting funds to low priority projects in various RTC member district, (this get votes for their plan) and then creating multiple pockets of funds for questionable future projects in those districts. Thus, they create the illusion of insufficient funds for major projects. Name Change: They want to fool the public by simply removing the word “toll” from the title. "Toll-Road" will be discarded and replaced with "managed lanes."  Even a child knows that no matter what name you give a duck, it is still a duck. This is also true for taxes and tolls. Just changing the name from ‘toll road’ to ‘managed lane’ does not change the fact that it continues to be a “toll road” that ‘taxes’ people to use it. These shameful tactics are cleverly designed to extract three to four times as much money from taxpayers as it would (and should) cost them on a pay-as-you-go basis. If implemented, this scheme of managed lanes will not only be a violation of Governor Abbott’s promise, it will be counter to the clear message from the Texas Legislature in 2013, 2015, and 2017, and the people of Texas who have repeatedly, and loudly, said, “No more toll roads.” In fact, this change-in-name-only is a clear statement of the disdain that the RTC and TxDOT have for Governor Abbott, the Legislature, and the working people of Texas.  Let me be very clear. There will never be enough highway funding to satisfy the wants and needs of every-one.  We will always have shortfalls. Today's financial situation has been greatly exasperated by many years of underfunding and miss allocation of available funds. However, this is no excuse for continuing Texas on a path that causes the taxpayers to pay three to four times as much for highways as it would cost them by building the highways on a pay as you go basis. Another aspect that is not gaining a lot of attention is safety.  It is well known that as congestion increases, the accident rate rises.  Limiting the use of some lanes increases the congestion on the other lanes.  With the majority of traffic in the free lanes, the accidents will rise and the safety of all drivers will diminish.  If the commission goes forward with the plan being proposed by the RTC and TxDOT, their real message will be, “Governor we really don’t care what you, the Legislature, or the people say.  We are not going to consider any option that does not create a dedicated and unlimited revenue stream for our slush fund.” According to the current plan approved by the RTC members, I-635 East is being designed around being a toll road whose revenue will grow from an initial $10 million per year to almost $180 million. That is a 1700 per-cent increase. If just the other 15 projects currently on the books to be tolled have the same growth, TxDOT and RTC will be taking in $2.2 billion dollars in new taxes each year from the citizens. As previously stated, to help sell this concept, the RTC and TxDOT created a totally new requirement - "Guaranteed Speed." This is a totally contrived requirement to justify the toll lanes under the premise of managing the lane so wealthy drivers traverse congested areas at high speed, while the working class must contend with congestion — congestion that is exacerbated by the limited traffic allowed on to the "managed lane." It is interesting that as the legislature and the Governor were closing the door on toll roads, the concept of "managed lanes" was elevated to a critical requirement just in time to keep tolls on life support. To put it another way, the managed-lanes-guaranteed-speed requirement is like putting a cat costume on a duck so the children can have a house pet. A duck is still a duck. Unfortunately, the guaranteed-speed requirement is already being used in some areas like Austin where the fee ($8.00) can exceed over $1.00 per mile. A toll of $1.00 per mile is equivalent to raising the gasoline tax $25.00 per gallon. And, they want you to believe that these “managed lanes” are Cadillac-lanes to serve the wealthy. And, on top of it, the "guaranteed speed" is a meaningless guarantee. When asked what benefit the "guarantee" is to the driver who pays the exorbitant fee for the privilege of using the managed lane, and is unable to achieve the "guaranteed speed" promised, I was told that the drivers would receive a refund.  When questioned further what that would look like, they could not explain how that refund would be accomplished. What really has the RTC and TxDOT salivating over this new "managed-lane" scheme is the fact there is no limit to how much they can charge or when they can charge it. They can raise the fee at will. This puts all drivers at the mercy of the agencies. Working class people who try to live on a planned budget will no longer have any control over their transportation cost if they use the "managed-lanes."   Unfortunately, no one in leadership has made an honest evaluation of a plan to build highways on a pay-as-you-go basis so Texas gets more lane miles for less money. We do not have to keep going into deep debt; debt that will be left to our grandchildren to pay.  It is unfortunate that the proponents of tolling are so adamant that they refuse to even consider viable alternatives to tolling. But, the RTC and TxDOT have a solution for the working class. They recently expressed it in testimony before the Texas Transportation Commission that all drivers have a choice. They can choose to pay the tax and drive fast in the managed lane or they can choose to not pay and drive slow in the congested free lanes. Some choice this is for the single parent on a limited budget! Their choice is a bit more personal. They will have to choose between buying milk for their baby or getting home in time to hold the baby before bed time, which isn’t some-thing that the wealthy planners proposing this scheme have to worry about. There is an even more long-term penalty for the working class. At today’s average cost of $5.00 each direction, it will cost the family of a worker, over their working lifetime, in excess of $135,000 for the privilege of using the toll lane. That is like taking a home or a couple of college educations away from that family. Again, not something of concern to wealthy members of the RTC who voted for this ill-conceived scheme. So in summary, this "managed-lane" toll road scheme tax burden on the working class is multifaceted: choose between milk for the baby or a good night kiss, paying the cost of a home for less travel time, and facing a daily fee that could be equivalent to $25.00 per-gallon gasoline tax. There are viable alternate solutions, without tolling or managed lanes, to meet our highway transportation needs that are known to the RTCs and TxDOT. I pray that the RTCs and TxDOT will respect the Governor’s instruction, “No new taxes and no toll roads” and consider those alternatives instead.

Copyright © 2017 Senator Bob Hall, All rights reserved. Friends and Constituents of Senator Bob Hall

Thoughts on Affordable Housing

There are many facets of the affordable housing issue, but, the simple obvious one is that the cost of housing is unaffordable for many in the working class.

It is becoming clear, even to progressives/liberals, that a principle driver, if not the most important driver for housing costs is restrictive zoning laws.

Here is an excellent analysis of the zoning issue and its impact on housing prices, whether it be purchase prices or rental rates. Ilya Somin

The vast majority of voters quite rationally devote little time and effort to understanding policy issues. And the ways in which zoning inflates housing prices and destroys job opportunities are not immediately obvious to most ordinary people, especially those who do not know basic economics.

It seems clear that if the City Council wants to encourage more affordable housing in Georgetown, then zoning ordinances need to be relaxed. This would include relaxing height restrictions on multifamily housing, allowing reduced setbacks where appropriate, and such items as allowing "granny flats" to be built behind older homes on larger lots. Finally, creative solutions to parking are needed that do not restrict the size and locations of housing.

TMRS Heading in Wrong Direction?

The Texas Municipal Retirement System (TMRS), seems to continue to invest in higher risk investments that are not transparent. Even though the TMRS total return this year is meeting or surpassing expectations, it is not surprising given the dramatic increase in stock market values.

TMRS is the pension management organization that invests Georgetown employee's retirement funds.

A new research paper has just been published about the valuations and volatility of Private Equity funds. Naked Capitalism Here are the conclusions:

If this article’s conclusions are correct, future investors may have second thoughts about purchasing buyout funds instead of listed securities. Moreover, past buyout-fund investors may have been unfairly induced to place monies into these investment vehicles, in part through (1) faulty mark-to-market residual values, (2) improper year-to-year return estimates, or (3) inaccurate volatility calculations. Furthermore, many buyout fund return studies rely, by necessity, on residual value estimates of the fund GPs. If these estimates are inaccurate, the validity of these studies’ conclusions may be called into question.

TMRS has been steadily increasing their investment in Private Equity(PE). Their goal is 5%, or approximately $1.25B. They have $173.6M  invested in PE as of 6/30/2017with a goal of adding $600M this year. Even in this robust market environment, they are missing their PE investment performance goal by 1.25%.

Thus we see that even though respected industry analysts are finding shortcomings with the accounting by Private Equity funds, TMRS continues to increase their investments in said funds.

Where are the "adult overseers" for TMRS? The shortcomings in PE investments may be hidden by the robust stock market, but when the next market down turn occurs, the valuations of the PE funds will decline much more than the overall market, thus exposing the issues identified in the article above.