Citizen Comment
You guys, the hits keep coming and they don’t stop coming. This week we had a full 2.5 hours of citizen comments. By the numbers:
53 speakers total! (Many spoke on multiple topics)
AI Data Center:
- 3 in favor. (Two developers and the Chamber of Commerce)
- 32 opposed
Flock Cameras for SMPD
- 9 speakers in favor
- 23 opposed.
I’m saving all the specific arguments until we get to these items. Stay tuned.
Also, one guy on one other topic: That fence at the river is super ugly.
It’s a really interesting meeting.
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But first, the parade of little items.
Items 1-2: Every four months we get a budget updates. This is for January-March of 2025:
They spend about 30 seconds on this topic.
Also we have our money invested places:
No one does much with the quarterly investment report either:
Great.
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Item 3: Sidewalks presentation!
We have a program to fix small gaps and issues in the sidewalks around town. (We’ve seen this before, in July 2024, in December 2023, in November 2022, and in May 2022.)
Here’s the type of thing they do:
Great! Here’s the game plan:
So who gets new sidewalks?
Are YOU getting new sidewalks? Maybe!
Here’s the actual map where you can zoom into your favorite sidewalk and see what’s up.
More info here, if you’re so inclined.
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Item 25-26: Banning Street Parking
Last fall, we saw that Riverside Drive killed its street parking. They were sick of people parking in front of their houses and walking over to the river. Now you need a resident permit to park there on weekends.
This pink part of Rio Vista neighborhood wants to join the fun:
They don’t want rivergoers to park on their streets, either.
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These guys live by one of the Spring Lake trail heads:
They also don’t like hikers parking in front of their houses. They want to require parking permits, too.
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You know me: I’m a world-class scold on this topic. I did not like it when they did this in Blanco Gardens, I didn’t like it on Riverside, and I don’t like it now. I think this is all bullshit.
It’s a privilege to live walking distance from a major park. You’re very lucky! But the street does not belong to you. People should get to park there.
That said: it is super gross when park visitors leave trash behind in people’s yards! But surely there’s a better solution than quasi-privatization of public streets.
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Anyway, Council approves both the Rio Vista streets and the Panarama streets:
It’s two different votes, but they both went the same way.
So now only residents get to park on those streets.
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Item 26-27: CDBG money.
CDBG stands for Community Development Block Grant. This is money from HUD for local projects. This year we have $750K to distribute.
There are some rules:
Council has priorities, and they also had a survey and public outreach to see which categories to focus on.
The committee waded through a bunch of recommendations, and is recommending these amounts:
There’s some explanation that goes with these amounts:
- Salvation Army, Southside, and Texas Rio Grande Legal Aid are all getting other funding from the city.
- Thorpe Lane just needs a little more funding to add to last year’s funding. They got $650K last year.
- Long Street and Cuatehtemoc Hall are just too expensive for this particular fund, and Cuatehtemoc is getting some other city funding.
- Calaboose is getting roof repairs instead of a new roof, and the city is paying for that instead.
- City Home Repair/Rehab will cover 4-5 houses.
The vote:
The San Marxist 