SRCC EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES
TUESDAY, April 5, 2022 7:00 PM
Zoom Teleconference
MINUTES
Only members may vote. As an officer, you should be a member. Please confirm by emailing membership@srccatx.org, and we’ll let you know.
CALL TO ORDER/APPROVAL OF MINUTES
1. 7:00 Executive Meeting Welcome
Presenter throughout: Wendy Todd, President, unless otherwise noted (5 min)
The meeting was called to order at 7:00pm.
2. 7:05 Membership report & voting. Reminder that SRCC current dues status is required to participate in SRCC business and actions such as voting and making motions. (5 min)
3. 7:10 Approve minutes from March 2022 Executive Committee Meeting (5 min)
Meeting dates in 2022: GM Apr 19; EC May 3; GM May 17; EC Jun 7; GM Jun 21; EC Aug 2; GM Aug 16; EC Sept 6; GM Sept 20; EC Oct 4; GM Oct 18; GM Nov 15; EC Dec 6
Mark Thompson/Russell Fraser made the motion to approve the minutes – no comments or corrections – approved as posted.
4. 7:15 Treasurer’s Report. All reports available upon request to the Treasurer @ treasurer@srccatx.org
Presenter: Will Andrews, Treasurer (5 min)
No report was made.
5. 7:20 Standing Committee check-ins on events/goals/issues.
Presenters: Committee Chairs: 1) Planning and Zoning; 2) Historic Preservation; 3) Finance; 4) Mobility; 5) Public Safety; 6) Parks and Environment; 7) Schools; and 8) Communications (put up signs, contact Mary) (10 min)
The Chair asked that for future meetings if a committee has more than a 1-minute report to alert the officers when reviewing the draft agenda so that they can allow appropriate time on the agenda.
- Planning and Zoning – the developers of 305 S. Congress / Statesman PUD are not waiting for the SCWAB plan to be put in place before applying for a PUD, since it has taken so long. There is still not much info available about the plan. Russell plans to attend the upcoming Council meeting and state that we need to see the details of the plan. Planning & Zoning is also tracking the VMU-2 plan that appears to be contentious.
- Historic Preservation – concern with losing a 4-plex on Alta Vista and being replaced with a 3-story single family home, as this is likely decreasing affordability. Houses older than 45 years old in the Sherwood Oaks area have been getting demolished without appropriate historic review.
- Finance – nothing to report.
- Mobility – tomorrow there will be a SOCO Orange Line working group meeting. There was a meeting on the Blue Line, and there are biologists to review the plan to ensure there is no damage to the bat colony. There is some anti-displacement money in the project to help people who might otherwise get priced out due to increased housing costs related to proximity to the line. There was a meeting by homeowners who would be near the Travis Heights rail station, and are concerned about the impacts.
- Public Safety – still doing neighborhood watch patrols and recruiting others. A member reported that there were 3 cars stolen in their neighborhood last week.
- Parks and Environment – had a good turnout for a couple of workday events at the Blunn Creek Preserve.
- Schools – the mask mandate has been lifted, though a lot of students are still wearing masks. The number of cases has not risen significantly. Starting to do more in-person events, and planning “graduation” celebrations.
- Communications – Dan F. met with Dan G. to discuss the impending transfer to Google Workspace from the legacy G Suite. SRCC is not eligible for the non-profit status and the associated no-cost license. Will need to ask for approval for the expenditure from the Finance Committee.
6. 7:30 Check-ins on events/goals/issues
Presenters: Committee Chairs/Representatives: 9) Norwood; 10) GSRC NPCT; 11) EROC, NPCT; 12) ANC; 13) SCC; 14) South Central Waterfront; 15) St. Edward’s; 16) S. Central Affordable CDC; 17) Ad-hoc Land Development Code Revision. (10 min)
- Norwood – nothing to report
- GRSC NPCT – 2 new signatures were added to the valid petition opposing the rezoning of 200 Academy, by the owners of Hotel Magdalena and Music Lane. There have been no offers of negotiation by the developer of 200 Academy.
- EROC NPCT – nothing to report
- ANC – had a meeting on March 23. Greg Meszaros, former Austin Water Director, came and explained what happened with the boil water notice. Passed the resolution about rewilding Zilker Park. Had an APD community engagement officer present, who suggested that NA’s have their sector reps come talk at their meetings. Update on Austin Strategic Mobility Plan – appears to be a street rezoning plan where many streets could be widened; concern that this is a stealth way to move forward CodeNext by designating residential streets in a way that allows for more intense development inside neighborhoods.
- SCC- meeting this Saturday, in person at 10am but Betty will not be able to attend. Please contact Betty if you would like to attend.
- South Central Waterfront – 305 S Congress is going to Council without a posted PUD amendment draft. It appears that Council sees that it meets Code, but is not “Superior”. The next advisory board meeting is on April 18th.
- St. Edward’s – the fireworks previously rescheduled to April 22 have now been canceled. The new St. Edward’s President would like to meet with SRCC.
- S. Central Affordable CDC – have not met, nothing to report.
- Ad-hoc Land Development Code Revision – the code effort had been stalled while a legal challenge was being settled. The decision was made that homeowners have petition rights against the bulk rezoning of nearby properties, which has halted the revision of the LDC. There are concerns about the approval of PUDs which puts pressure on the nearby homeowners, as well as enforcing the requirement to build affordable housing instead of allowing fee-in-lieu. There was a question about possibly incorporating this committee into Planning and Zoning. It was stated that this committee is concerned with extra capacity being added. Were this to remain an ad-hoc committee, it was suggested that it have a new name that better reflects the purpose, and a few sentences about what the committee does.
NEW BUSINESS
7. 7:40 Nominations for Upcoming SRCC Annual Elections SRCC annual elections will be held on April 19, 2022. Several officers will be running for re-election, but there will be vacancies including Representative to the South Central Waterfront Advisory Board (this could be filled prior to the annual election) and President.
Presenter: Dan Fredine, Chair, Ad Hoc Nominating Committee (10 min)
In general, we have candidates for officer positions. Were able to find AC candidates for Area 2 and Area 4. Still have vacancies for Area 1 and Area 7 coordinators. Still working on discussions with potential candidates for SCWAB Rep and Planning and Zoning Chair.
8. 7:50 Meeting Location Should SRCC return to an in-person meeting format or continue to videoconference via Zoom? Open forum (10 min)
There is a fair amount of interest in starting to meet in person, though a concern would be if it resulted in decreased turnout. Though there have been several people asking about getting back together in person, almost everyone has requested that we continue to have a Zoom option. There was consideration for holding some meetings in person that were more busy, or meetings with significant presenters. There was consideration for still holding the EC meetings via Zoom.
We’re not necessarily trying to make a change right now, just considering options.
There was some concern about the difficulty of hybrid meetings. It was suggested that we do the General Membership meetings on Zoom, since they are open to the general public and the Zoom meetings have resulted in good turnout. It was suggested that we have at least some EC meetings in person.
There was a suggestion about meeting once or twice a year in person for a social event, and having other meetings virtually. Another option was to separate the business of SRCC (Zoom meetings) from the social events (in-person).
It was suggested that we could meet indoors at the Church (possibly masked).
Mary would like to get some yard signs that we can put out. She was thinking of something similar to the most recent signs we had made, but take out the meeting location, and add a QR code or more prominent website info. Would like to get them mocked up and made prior to the fall. Also, since we don’t have coordinators in Area 1 and Area 7, we will need more volunteers to distribute newsletters.
9. 8:10 ANNOUNCEMENTS
Little Stacy park AIPP artist Talbot is looking for people to contribute small items (less than 5”) to get embedded in the foundation of the sculpture (he would also like a description of the item emailed to him). Wendy will send out an email with details.
Airport Environmental Assessment: Learn more about the Environmental Assessment and upcoming airport improvement projects at SpeakUpAustin.Org/AUS-EA. The project website also has the full Environmental Assessment document available for review and a comment box for the public to provide their comments.
They are accepting comments until April 7. There have been very few comments to date, and it would be useful to provide input.
Meeting was adjourned at 8:10pm.
The neighborhood ListServe is on the Groups.io platform. Find everything you need to know about SouthRiverAustin group here: https://groups.io/g/SouthRiverAustin
The next SRCC General Membership meeting is Tuesday, April 19, 2022
The next SRCC Executive Committee meeting is Tuesday, May 3, 2022
*Frequently used acronyms: ACF: Austin Community Fund; ANC: Austin Neighborhood Council (https://www.atxanc.org/); BoA: Board of Adjustment; SF: Single Family zoning category; FLUM: Future Land Use Map; GSRC NPCT: Greater South River City Neighborhood Planning Contact Team; NCCD: Neighborhood Conservation Combining District; NHPA: National Historic Preservation Act; PC: Planning Commission; PUD: Planned Unit Development; SCC: South Central Coalition of NAs; ZAP: Zoning and Platting
Agenda Prepared by Noah Balch, vicepresident@srccatx.org
