The stormy night brought us some much needed rain to the area. Hopefully nobody experienced any damage from the winds. It doesn't appear we got any of the threatened hail. We did get about an inch of beneficial rain and some nice cool mornings. There was some damage from the storms last week.City Council had a special meeting April 8th. Here is a link to that agenda. Here is a link to the council packet - more info here.
3) A proposal was accepted and awarded to G. Creek Construction for $352,584 for improvement of the Lower Restroom at City Park. The award included addition of a trail to the restroom. Unanimous.
The packet included a sheet on the solicitation process. One council member questioned that, he must not have read the packet.
4) A HOT Funding request was granted to the Lakeway Resort and Spa for $20,000 to fund 50% of a Google Pay Per Click campaign. These funds are available to all the local Hotel's and businesses that can meet the state requirements for the money.
Unanimous
5) An access agreement was granted to the Williams property next to the Bee Creek Sports Complex - this was to give secondary access to the property.
Unanimous
6) The ordinance calling the May 4, 2019 election was amended because of updates on early voting dates and places.
Unanimous
The regular meeting was closed at this point and a work session was started to receive a report on the citywide facility needs assessment. Here is a link to the video. For the needs assessment go to Item 7-8. This is an attempt to determine what is needed to keep the city services going in the long term. Discussions on remodeling the old Justice Center for expansion of Courts and use by BDS. Also discussion on enlarging the City Hall complex and Public Works complex along with other facility improvements. These projects are estimated to cost about $1M per year.
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City Council met in regular session on April 15th. Here is a link to the video. Here is a link to the agenda and here is a link to the council packet with more info.
On item 4, Code "Compliance" is moving forward, the Solid Waste and Recycling Contract will eventually get signed and the Police Station had a hiccup.
5) The Police Station is pretty much done, there was an IT issue and the move in date has been moved until next week.
***** There have been questions on social media about the blue lights around the city. Our police force does an outstanding job of protecting our citizens! With all the attacks from the media going on, we partnered with the Lowe's in Bee Cave (Stephanie Samuels was the manager then) to furnish LED blue bulbs to citizens to use in yard lights and porch lights to show support for the police. It was a GREAT success and you can still see the results. If you want to join in, order some blue lights (LED works best) and show your support!
*****
Items 6-7 were postponed.
8) SUP was granted to Lake Travis ISD for Portable buildings at their main campus for the Lake Travis Educational Development Center. Approved unanimously.
9) SUP was granted for a Short Term Rental at 219 Corinthian Dr. This locations permit was pulled a little over a year ago for violations (noise and parking). They have made required corrections, waited the mandatory year and have now been granted a SUP. Approved unanimously.
10) SUP was granted for a STR at 1300 Sparrow Lane. Approved unanimously.
11) SUP was requested for a convenience store by Quick Trip at RR 620 and Debba Dr. Although this was approved unanimously by ZAPCO, council decided to delay for 60 days to do a Traffic Study and look at repairs on the city's portion of the street. This will all be redone with the 620 road project. The complaints were mostly about county facilities and those residents are not in the City.
12) SUP was granted for a Medical Office for the property in front of the Middle School on Bee Creek road. Restrictions were applied to the SUP for type of facilities.
***** I posted a question in a previous blog as to why a SUP is required for a medical facility next to a school. This was prompted a few years ago because of a proposed facility next to Lakeway Elementary. That facility was Recovery Ways - a drug+ rehab facility that would have brought in folks that council felt was not in the citizens and neighbors best interest. That issue eventually went to court and was one of two cases I am aware of that the city did not win. Because the BDS Director was new and most of the ZAPCO membership is new, that issue was not addressed at ZAPCO.
*****
13) The PUD amendment was withdrawn.
14) Enlarged the Comprehensive Plan Steering Committee to appoint two new council members and appoint Massa and Trecker as resident members.
21) Executive Session - A committee will be formed to audit all the existing PUD agreements.
22) Executive Session - Kilgore v.s. Lakeway - Motion to direct the city attorney to formalize a settlement agreement with the following terms:
1. City will not appeal
2. City will not pay fees to Sandra Cox
3. Affirmation that Kilgore was justified in bringing his suit and the city wrongfully opposed it
4. The city will pay $1 in lieu of paying attorney fees.
Vote was 3-2, Mastrangelo, Smith and Higginbothem for and Massa and Trecker against. Although I disagree with this I will only say that I think this sets a precedence that leaves elected officials at risk when named in lawsuits while performing their duties.
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I attended the Wildlife Advisory Committee meeting April 11th. Warren Bluntzer (Consultant) gave a presentation including data from 2 surveys about the appropriate herd size for Lakeway. Per the two surveys, the herd size has increased from about 1 deer to 6-7 acres to 1 deer per 5-6 acres. The suggested size would be somewhere above 1 deer per 8-9 acres.
The meeting was attended by the committee members, about 6-8 CAFA members and myself. Maybe one other attendee. After the presentation, the CAFA members argued the data collection process and felt like they were not being heard.
There were also discussions on other wildlife issues including skunks, coyotes and other animals.
They also discussed signs and deterrents to deer crossing the roads.
The meeting lasted about 2 hours and no decisions were made.
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The 2019 values have been posted on the Travis County Appraisal District web site. Check out how much yours have increased. Remember, this is the value your taxes are based on, if it goes up 5% you can expect your taxes to go up 5% - just sayin. Their website is http://propaccess.traviscad.org/clientdb/?cid=1
In case you haven't noticed, Live Oak Golf course is getting a face lift. They have currently killed off the grass in preparation for renew the fairways and greens. I'm told some of the cart paths will also be fixed. Here is a link to what it looks like now on 15.
Signs, signs and signs. Do you think candidates for elected offices should follow the ordinances or should they be exempt? Some of them must feel they are exempt. Signs can only be put on PRIVATE property with permission of the owner. No signs should be on pubic right of way, period. The top two violators are Mr. Kilgore and Ms. Butler. Her are a couple of examples, certainly not all inclusive. There are many more examples.
Here is an example on interior streets. I was told this morning that the signs are down on Maul Hill except for 1. All these were in the right of way - no idea if they blew down or were removed.
I'm told there is a blow up on Next Door about the purchase of the Police Facility property. Let me give an overview about this property:
During the process of developing a plan for the facility five locations were being looked at. Requirements were central location, size and access. There were only 5 locations that met these requirements. We settled on the current parcel and purchased it from Legends. It was part of the land under contract with the Lakeway MUD. We paid $950K for the property that was appraised by an independent appraiser at $1.4M. This was a prime part of the parcel if you look at the full 82 acres. Legends closed on that parcel and another that was split out of the total parcel to allow the city to go ahead with the project. We got about a $500K discount. These purchases are complex, don't be misled by people that have PART of the picture.
It's a beautiful day and I'm getting ready to enjoy it. I hope everyone has a wonderful Easter weekend. Thanks to everyone for all the support. If you have questions or comments, I'm always listening.
If you need aerial pictures, please consider Sky Pictures - I would appreciate it!
If you want to be added (or removed) from my email list, send a note to lakeway@bain.us and I'll get it done!
Joe Bain
lakeway@bain.us
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