Tag: LIHTC

Hours 3:21 – 5:07, 11/19/24

by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

Item 10:  LIHTC Housing (LIHTC = Low Income Housing Tax Credits)

Back in May, we approved this LIHTC Complex:

It’s for senior citizens. Right around the corner from Target.

How affordable will these units be? The developer agreed to set aside a certain number of affordable units:

AMI means the Austin Area Median Income. So 30% AMI means your family’s yearly income is 30% of the median Austin income. But the Austin median income is $86K, whereas the San Marcos median household income is $47K.

So the categories are a little weird. Those 188 units at 51-60% AMI? That’s low income for Austin, but pretty normal for San Marcos.

….

The developer is back, and wants permission to change some things.  First, they want to loosen the ranges of incomes:

So he wants to take the 188 units for families earning $63-$75K, and spread them out for incomes earning $63K-$100K.

Side note: You can live in an apartment intended for a higher income than yours. However, you would not get a fully reduced rent:

The guy also changed his mind on BBQ grills and picnic tables, due to space concerns.  He wants to swap them out for two horseshoe pits.

Jane, Alyssa, and Amanda are all not happy about this. 

The developer says he’s got a market study. There’s just not demand for the under 60% AMI group! If he can extend to the 80% range, he’ll be able to find more residents. 

Jane is open to this, but she doesn’t like the unspecified numbers.  She proposes this:

0-30% AMI: 34 units
51-60% AMI: 86 units
61-80 % AMI: 102 units

Her reasoning goes like this: Seniors get a yearly 3% cost of living increase on Social Security. If you were earning 60% AMI and you get that bump, you could get priced out. Suddenly you’re making 61% of the AMI.  You don’t qualify for your apartment anymore. If there’s not a tier above you, you have to pay market rate, or move.

Alyssa and Amanda call bullshit on the whole market study.  (ME TOO.)  It just doesn’t pass the sniff test that San Marcos has run out of families earning less than $75K, and you have to subsidize families earning up to $100K.  Our median household income is $47K, for pete’s sake! 

The developer does not have the actual market study on hand, to show council.

Amanda calls him out on this: Does this market study even reflect the people we’re trying to help? We don’t know, because we haven’t seen it.

The vote on Jane’s amendment: (86 units under 60%, 102 units under 80%)

Yes:  Jane Hughson, Saul Gonzales, Mark Gleason
No:  Alyssa Garza, Amanda Rodriguez

But!! It takes four votes to pass.  Since Matthew and Shane are absent, this fails. 

The developer pleads that it’s not a complete blank check! The subsidized apartments still have to average out to 60%! 

The final vote:

Should the developer get to split up the Under 60% category however he wants?

Sorry, dude! 

…

Item 7:  We’re down to the final dregs of Covid money.

Last time, we discussed this funding:

Alyssa Garza basically chewed everyone out for never, ever prioritizing rental assistance. I mean, she was nice about it. But she has said this one million times.

And lo! They made it work! New funding plan:

Staff thinks we can give this rental assistance out with fewer strings attached than CDBG money.   This is very good, too.

…

Item 12:  Getting ticketed at the Lion’s Club.

Paid Parking is coming next summer to the City Park parking lot.  (Ie the Lions Club parking lot.)  Instead of paying someone to write tickets, they want to use cameras and mail the tickets out.  

Some extra details:

  • The lot will free for San Marcos residents, but you have to go online and sign up somehow.
  • If you pay within 14 days, you get a discount.

Council asks good questions:

Amanda: How does the 14 days work? From the day of the ticket? What if they’ve got some situation and their mail isn’t coming promptly?
Answer: We could change that. What about if it’s 14 days from when the ticket arrives at the house?
Amanda: ?? How would you know?  Let’s just make it 30 days.

Saul: Is there a warrant if this isn’t paid?
Answer: San Marcos parking tickets are a civil offense, so no.  Hays County, though: those are criminal offenses. They’ll getcha.

Amanda: What happens if someone’s car breaks down?
Answer: There is an appeals process.

Amanda: What’s the resident registry process like?
Answer: It’s online.  We are also going to do some library outreach to help people sign up. 

Alyssa: I can’t actually find the appeals process online. 
Answer: Yep.  We’re going to put the link on the actual citation that you get in the mail.

The vote: 5-0

…

Item 13: NEW FIRE TRUCK!

We’re getting an ERV010 Star Side Mount Pumper Truck with a 500-gallon tank and 1500 GPM pump.

I’m guessing that it looks something like this: 

…

Item 14:  Five Mile Dam

If you know the youth soccer league, you know that it all happens at Five Mile Dam:

image source

Which is located here:

The soccer fields opened in 2010.  They’re owned by the county, but maintained by the city.  So the city pays for the lighting, playground, sprinklers, etc.

This photo makes it look like maybe the sprinklers aren’t working? Idk.

Surge Soccer uses the fields for free.  (Surge used to be called SMAYSO, changed their name, missed their opportunity to call themselves Smoccer.)  This helps keep prices cheap for San Marcos families. Surge is good about this.

…

Hays County is selling us the Five Mile Dam parks. But Hays County doesn’t actually care about the soccer fields.

What Hays County cares about are these two other parks:

  1. Dudley Johnson Park:

2. Randall Wade Vetter Park:

Let’s zoom in on that sign:

Yep! That’s the right place!

Those are here:

At least, that’s my best guess.

So these three properties are a package deal. You want the soccer fields? You have to take Dudley Johnson and Randall Wade Vetter.

How much is Hays charging us? 

Zero! It’s free!   Wow, they must really want to get rid of those parks. 

The last dam report was in 2016, and at that point, the dam was in good condition.   And the county will help with maintenance on the parks for the next year.

Is this good for us? 

Yes. We want those soccer fields, or else Surge Soccer won’t stay cheap for local kids.

The danger is that Kyle or some private company would buy the fields.  They can make a lot of money renting them out.  But it would end Surge soccer.  Or at least, the affordable, community-focused version of Surge. 

Soccer is the biggest youth sport in San Marcos, by far. It’s important to secure these fields. 

Council votes unanimously for this deal.

….

Item 16: Blanco Vista Water Tower

Same neighborhood as Five Mile Dam! They’re getting a water tower, as part of all this ARWA stuff.  There is $50K in the ARWA budget set aside to paint the water towers. 

How would we like to paint it?

Here’s what our other towers look like:

Here’s what some neighbors do:

Here’s what some fancier cities do:

We could either keep it simple, or pay $100K+ to go all out. 

Council: keep it simple. 

…

Item 17:  The Deer

Deer are a big problem.  Mostly they cause a lot of car crashes, but they can also get impaled on your fences. (Ewwwwww.)  

A speaker came from Texas Parks & Wildlife, and talked to the neighborhood commission.  Basically, the first step is to get people to stop feeding the deer.  

Should we ban feeding the deer?

  • Pros: deer are a big problem.  
  • Cons: have you seen how cute they are, with their big eyes and fluffy tails???

The Neighborhood Commission decides on an education campaign, instead of an outright ban, because of all those people who love the big-eyed-fluffy-tailed-deer.

What does Council think?

MARK GLEASON HAS VERY STRONG FEELINGS! 

  • First, even if you ban feeding, it won’t help.  Too much available food.
  • Deer have no natural predators.
  • You must hunt! Open up the parks to hunting!
  • We could make a whole weekend of it! Have drawn hunts! 

This is a thing – see here and here.  And Texas does allow hunting at its state parks.

The problem is that Mark is bringing a huge energy here – It must be discussed! It works! Cutting people off. It’s the only thing that works! – and everyone is a little taken aback. 

Jane: They’ve been hunting on my land for 20 years, and it doesn’t keep the deer away.

Mark: IT WORKS! You just need to hunt a few. After a few generations, the mothers keep their babies away!

Alyssa: I dunno, doesn’t work on my dad’s ranch either.

Eventually Jane shushes him, and everyone goes back to talking about corn. 

 Don’t feed the deer, everyone, but really don’t feed them corn.

…

Item 18: Animal Shelter Vacancy

We finally got it filled.  The new person talks about how much they love animals, and how they’ve fostered and volunteered before. 

(I still have a lingering weird feeling about the other person who was jerked around by Council for months, but this person seems fine.)

Bonus! Even more 3 pm workshops! 11/19/24

by The San Marxist, posted in 3 pm Workshops

Workshop #2: LIHTC projects: This stands for Low Income Housing Tax Credits.

There are two kinds:

  • Developers can get tax credits from the state
  • Sometimes they get tax credits from both the city and the state.

Both kinds have to get approved by Council.

Backstory:

Blue are the developments that get just state tax breaks. Green gets both state and local:

This past spring we approved five developments (2 blue, 3 green) and Mark Gleason panicked that we were being too generous. We can’t help this many people! It’s fiscally irresponsible!

Hence this workshop! Let’s find out if we can afford to help vulnerable residents. (Spoiler: we can.)

More Background:

San Marcos is booming!

So we’ll end up somewhere between the purple and the orange, most likely.

You can look at it this way:

The blue parts are our new sprawl.

San Marcos has a good employment rate, but high poverty rate:

This means that our jobs are not good jobs. The cure for this is raising the minimum wage. (Raising the minimum wage does not cause inflation. Paying a living wage turns a bad job into a good one!)

Anyway!

Here’s where the jobs are:

This is fascinating:

In other words:

  • Only 6700 of us actually live and work in San Marcos
  • 18K of us live in San Marcos, but we work outside of town.
  • 28K people commute into San Marcos, but live elsewhere.

In my humble opinion, this is two things:

  • people who live here can’t find good jobs here, and
  • the University has good jobs, but parents who work for Tx state are scared of SMCISD for problematic reasons. (I have lots of opinions on that. Support SMCISD!)

Anyway, those are my own conclusions. City staff did not lob those accusations.

…

So are LIHTC projects breaking our budget?

The city gets both sales tax and property tax.

When it comes to property tax, there’s a lot of tax-exempt property:

So some LIHTC projects don’t pay city taxes, but neither does city land, Texas State land, SMCISD, County land, Churches, Housing Authority, and others.

(One difference is that most of those are nonprofits. LIHTC developments aren’t necessarily nonprofits.)

So how bad is the dent in our budget??

Not very bad!

You are allowed to ask for a lump sum payout. (Payment In Lieu of Taxes = PILOT). So we do this sometimes:

LIHTC apartments are still full of people, so you still have some fire and SMPD costs. But not particularly different than any other apartment complex.

In general, apartments are much cheaper infrastructure for the city than single family housing.

This is a great illustration of why:

I want to love this graphic, but I can’t. The scale is all off.

  • A 3-4 story apartment building is about 20-30 units per acre. The diagram on the left should be 7-10 acres.
  • Single Family (ND-3/CD-3) are things like town homes and smaller lots – at most 10 units per acre. So that middle diagram is 20 acres big.
  • Single Family (SF-6/SF-4.5) are big traditional lots – at most 7 houses per acre. So that right hand diagram is over 28 acres big. That’s three times as big as the one on the left!

Fixed it:

(I am so smug and insufferable. It’s a miracle you all put up with me.)

Anyway: there are also some city costs for things like libraries and transit. Same as for any residents.

…

How much need is there in San Marcos?

More than elsewhere:

…

Onto the state requirements for their tax credits.

The state organization is TDHCA. (Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs.)

They care about:

  • Location. You can’t put your low income housing in a crappy location.
  • Clustering – you can’t put them too close together
  • Flood plain – nope
  • They must have at least 15 hours each week of an after-school learning center
  • They must supply a shuttle if they’re not on a bus route
  • Free support services, a mix of amenities
  • ADA apartments

How cheap are these apartments?

First off, “AMI” is Area Median Income. We’re in the Austin Metropolitan area, so we use Austin incomes, even though San Marcos incomes are roughly half of Austin’s. (San Marcos median household income is $47K, whereas Austin median household income is $86K.)

Here’s the key feature:

The state also monitors the complexes:

San Marcos does not get those reports, currently. It would be nice if we did.

…

If you’ll recall, we did a big Housing Needs Assessment back in 2019, and came up with a housing plan to work on housing affordability. This is great! And…. council then buried it six feet underground.

Housing affordability has not been a major priority of this council for the past five years. (Except Alyssa Garza.) In the budget we passed in October – two months ago! – our Strategic Plan Goals were:

None of those are affordable housing.

Council did not care until this election cycle, when it became clear that you could lose your election if you didn’t hear the clamor for affordable housing. It was suddenly the #1 issue.

Anyway: We’re finally doing it, five years late. The first step is updating the data for the Housing Needs Assessment, which is almost ten years out of date.

Listen: this workshop was fascinating, and councilmembers asked good questions. I’m not doing it justice. But it was a 5 hour meeting and a 2 hour workshop, and your poor little marxist is tired.

Hours 0:00 – 1:32, 7/2/24

by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

First off: it was Laurie Moyer’s last meeting, after 36 years with the city. Mostly she’s done engineering-ish things, but also some City Manager-ish things. She took all these great City Hall photos on her road trip last year. Congrats to her!

Citizen comment:

  • Two people – Noah Brock and Annie Donovan – talked about the latest iteration of SMART/Axis hijinks. I’ll save their comments for that section.
  • Two people called for a resolution for a ceasefire in Gaza.
  • The San Marcos Civics Club, and how Council passively assumes they can’t solve city problems
  • Mano Amiga’s petition to repeal Civil Service. I’ll save these details for later, too.
  • Finally, the killing of Malachi Williams by the SMPD officer on April 11th. (Discussed previously here, here, and here.)

To recap, the family of Malachi Williams has been asking for:
1. Release the name and badge ID number of the officer that killed Malachi Williams
2. The officer should be placed on leave while the investigation is ongoing.
3. The family should be able to view all officer and storefront footage, with a lawyer present.

Malachi’s grandfather spoke eloquently. This has happened before. But then the City Manager Stephanie Reyes spoke, which is new.

Here’s what Stephanie Reyes says:
– Video material is available for the family to view along with their attorney. It’s at the Hays District Attorney’s office.
– The DA says that neither the family nor their attorney has reached out to view the footage.
– The DA is waiting to discuss how much of the video the family can watch.
– Because this has been so awful, Chief Standridge is putting together an SMPD Crisis Communication Policy for future incidents.
– the DA Kelly Higgins weighed in on the policy. He has concerns about any public release of video while the investigation is ongoing. He wants videos to be withheld until after a grand jury has reviewed the matter.
– the DA knows that the family needs answers. State code authorizes the DA to let the family watch the video. He’s open to conversation with the family.

(I would like a universal policy that applies to all situations. When an officer is killed by a civilian, how quickly does the family see the videos?)

Next Malachi Williams’ grandfather speaks again, which is usually not allowed. “What we have been offered has not had much substance to it. We have not had a fair offer. There’s been an offer, but it’s not fair.”

Alyssa Garza asks, “Was the family offered the entire videos? All the body camera footage?”

Chief Standridge comes up. “The DA and I are offering the family all the body cam footage. But we are not offering the store’s videos. The DA has not agreed to release that. The DA and I will let them see still photos from the store. But the DA has not agreed to store footage.”

After that, the grandfather has a lot of questions and frustration. Council was not really allowed to respond, legally. They redirect him to the DA. He’s already interacted with the DA and is entirely fed up with him.

It ends in a tense place.

…

Item 23: Another LIHTC project! 

LIHTC projects are low-income apartment complexes which don’t pay local property taxes. We’ve seen two others recently here. (LIHTC stands for Low Income Housing Tax Credits.)

Where’s this one?

And here’s a close up:

They’re planning on having 304 units.  How affordable will these be?  

In other words, this is 46 units for low-income community members, and 258 for regular community members.  (The median income in San Marcos is $47,394 a year, so 85% of these units are regular old market rate apartments.)

Okay, fine. How much is this costing us?

The estimated loss in tax revenue is $3 million over 15 years, or $200K per year.  They’re softening that by giving us a one-time $400K payment. 

What other services are there going to be? 

[Technical note: There’s some mucking about with the number of 3-bedroom apartments. This complex only has half as many as the city San Marcos requires for LIHTC developments. However, there’s a letter from the Housing Authority about the different waitlists for 1, 2, and 3-bedroom apartments, and 3 bedroom apartments are not in demand as much as 1 and 2, so it’s fine.]

Jane Hughson has some questions:
– Did this area flood in 2015?
Answer: yep. But the buildings weren’t TOO badly damaged.
– Will the complex provide residential shuttles?
Answer: nope. It’s right on a bus line.
– Will the units have individual washer and dryer units?
Answer: yep. 
– Will they have education, services, and after-school tutoring?
Answer: yep.

Alyssa: I’ve heard complaints about restrictions and racially biased access to facilities.  How do you make sure that doesn’t happen?
Answer: We partner with Asset Living. They staff everything and report to us monthly. If something isn’t getting used, we ask them to advertise it.

[I am extremely curious about the complaints of racially-biased access to facilities.] 

The vote: Passes 7-0.

However: Council is going to have big conversation about LIHTC projects in general, at the end of this meeting. Stay tuned.

….

Items 23-24: Kissing Tree 

Kissing Tree is the senior community, way down on Hunter Road and Centerpoint.

Kissing Tree is a TIRZ.  This means they pay taxes, but the taxes don’t go to the city’s General Fund.   Instead they get funneled to side projects that benefit Kissing Tree – mostly building out the public roads and utilities that run through Kissing Tree.  It’s not wasted money, but it doesn’t go to libraries, parks, firefighters, etc.  

Costs have gone up and the assessed value of Kissing Tree has gone up, so they’re re-jiggering all the TIRZ numbers:

This is probably all fine! Before we had estimated that we were sending $32 million over to the Kissing Tree for roads and pumps and parks, and now we’re sending $46 million over. 

Over 15 years, we’re keeping $5 million and giving $46 million back.

Let’s compare this to the LIHTC Project above! In that one, we’re keeping $400K and sending $3 million back.

So to be stark about it:

  1. The LIHTC project is giving us 13% of their estimated property taxes and using the rest to subsidize rents on low-income apartments.
  2. Kissing Tree is giving us 10% of their estimated property taxes taxes, and using the rest on local roads and utilities.

Guess which project makes Mark Gleason uncomfortable? The big reveal later on will not surprise you at all.

….

Item 2: SMART Terminal/Axis Logistics

The SMART/Axis people want San Marcos to annex about 7.5 acres of land for a road and right-of-way. 

Quick backstory (Read more here.)

In January 2023, Council signed a development agreement with SMART/Axis people.  Back then, these agreements happened in one single council meeting, and barely anyone had to be notified.  So Council approved a gigantic fucking 2000 acre industrial park without public input and barely any details, and everyone got super angry about it.

2000 acres is very big:

Like, REALLY big:

The people who live out this way were absolutely livid.  But the development agreement was already signed.

The next step of the process was for SMART/Axis to apply for a zoning change to Heavy Industrial and get annexed into the city.  

What they could have done was meet with the neighborhoods nearby, provide details of the project, build relationships and be good neighbors.  Instead, they met with the neighborhoods and generally acted like supercilious pricks who couldn’t be bothered.  The surrounding community got more and more furious, and launched a major activist campaign against the project. 

Eventually SMART/Axis withdrew their zoning and annexation request. That was last summer. Since then, it’s been quiet.

Here’s my best guess: SMART/Axis didn’t want to share any details because they didn’t have any yet. They literally want free reign to do whatever they want on this land.  They came off as supercilious pricks because they are supercilious pricks.  They assumed San Marcos is a backwater rural town that will fawn over fancy business men and give them whatever they want, in hopes of some dollar bill scraps. City Council was happy to play their role!

…

That brings us to today – should San Marcos annex some land and build a road along the side of the land?  

First off: Nothing happens today. We are just picking dates for the public hearing and final vote.

However, let’s do some speculation!  This is brought to you by Noah Brock and Annie Donovan, during Citizen Comment. (They spearheaded the public campaign against SMART/Axis last year.) 

Here’s the case that Noah and Annie are building:

  • Is this a major change or a minor change? If it’s a major change, the development agreement needs to be amended. That’s a much bigger deal. (The city is saying this is a minor change.)
  • Originally, the roads lined up with the end of Quail Run. That was the edge of the whole project. But since then, the developer has bought more property, and asked Caldwell County to move some roads over.
  • It seems clear that they’re expanding the project beyond the development agreement, and this new land is right next to a residential area. 
  • This new ROW annexation is consistent with a bigger, changing project.

The basic problem is that SMART/Axis people are super secretive and seem to want to walk all over us.  Maybe they’re sweet little bunnies at heart, or maybe they want to do some toxic battery mining or who knows what.  They act like shitty neighbors every time they have a chance to right the narrative.

…

Today’s vote was just to set the dates, and here they are:

  • Public hearing will be on August 5th
  • Final vote will be on August 20th

….

Item 25: Dunbar is getting some new pipes!

We’re spending $6 million on water and wastewater improvements here:

If you go here and scroll to Dunbar Water and Wastewater Improvements, you can keep an eye on the project. 

Supposedly will be done by August 2026.  So at least two years of dug up streets and annoying construction, but with a worthwhile payoff. 

…

Item 27:  Installing sports lighting on six soccer fields at Five Mile Dam.

This money was authorized awhile ago, this is just the contract to make it happen.  It’s about $1.3 million.

Hours 1:32 – 2:23, 7/2/24

by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

Item 28: Petition to repeal the Police Officer’s Civil Service Law

This was very hard to follow. Here’s my best guess:

Backstory:
In 2022, Mano Amiga organized a petition to repeal and renegotiate the city contract with the PD union. (“Meet and Confer” is the contract process.) They were successful! But then the city sandbagged the renegotiation process. There were some small but meaningful changes, and some cosmetic changes, and then the new contract was signed.

This time: Mano Amiga organized a different petition, to repeal Civil Service.  

So what is Civil Service? It’s a State of Texas thing. It’s the basic “framework for the hiring, promotion and discipline of police officers and fire fighters”. So when the city negotiates the contract with the police union (SMPOA), everyone starts with Civil Service, and then negotiates on top of that. 

However, cities don’t have to start with Civil Service.  You can repeal it and start some other way. So this is what Mano Amiga wants to do. (I don’t know what their strategy or end game is here. I’m sure they’d explain when they launch a public campaign, though.)

Here’s how you repeal Civil Service. It’s long and confusing:

And what happened is that the city rejected the petition. Mano Amiga submitted a petition with 850 signatures, which is enough to adopt Civil Service (per Part B), but not enough to repeal Civil Service (per part E).

Mano Amiga is angry because they say the city waited until the last minute to tell them their petition wasn’t valid.  But they vowed to fire it up again, and get enough signatures for the next cycle.

…

Item 29:  Funding for low-income housing. (LIHTC tax credits) 

Mayor Hughson and Mark Gleason had a conversation.  Mark went to Jane and said, “We’re spending all this money on LIHTC Housing, and it’s not just this year. It’s not just the next 15 years. It’s decades and decades to come! This is fiscally irresponsible!” Are we being too helpful to poor people?!?

Jane thought he had a good point. We need money for core services! What if the LIHTC tax credits are ruining everything? It’s worth taking a look at.

Hoo boy. Okay, we have to unpack this. Here’s our plan:

  1. How much money are we spending on low-income housing?
  2. Is this a lot, or a little?
  3. How much more low-income housing do we need?
  4. What did Council have to say?
  5. What are we doing next?

Here we go!

1. How much money are we spending on low-income housing?

In 2022, we started requiring LIHTC applications to include a tax estimate. The first application that includes this is in February 2024. So let’s start there.

  1. February 2024: Existing LIHTC housing in Blanco Gardens reapply for state funding.
    Cost to city: $0.  Not asking for local tax exemptions.
    Units provided: 40 of 54 units are Section 8 housing.
  2. March 2024: Fake affordable housing near the high school
    Cost: $0. Not asking for local tax exemptions.
    Units provided: 0 for low-income residents.
  3. May 2024: Behind Target, by the railroad tracks
    Estimated tax credit: $7,262,589 over 18 years. (I’m going to scale this to $6,052,158 over 15 years.)
    Units provided: 34 low income units
  4. May 2024: By Centerpoint, on the railroad tracks
    Estimated tax credit: $4,000,000 over 15 years
    One time rebate: $400K
    Units provided: 55 low income units
  5. July 2024: Earlier in this very meeting, on Aquarena Springs
    Estimated tax revenue: $3,207,000 over 15 years
    One time rebate: $400K
    Units provided: 46 low income units

Summary: Three developments have applied for tax credits for the city. The total cost is $13,259,157.5 over 15 years, for 135 low-income apartments in those three developments.

This works out to $883K per year. Per apartment, we are knocking $550 off of the monthly rent.

Next question!

2. Is $883K in tax credits a lot, or a little?

Kinda both? Here’s some context from our yearly General Fund budget:

Yearly General Fund budget:
– The total General Fund budget is $109 million this year.
– SMPD get $24.5 million
– Fire Dept gets $17.6 million
– Economic Development gets $2.9 million
– Library gets $2.1 million
– Animal Shelter gets $1.6 million
– Parks Department get $850K [Parks Dept gets $6.8 million. I misread the budget at first! Sorry about that.]
– Social services get $550K.
– The arts get $85K

I just grabbed a few useful categories. You can read all you want here.

So we are spending more on the LIHTC projects than we are on the arts or social services. Those combined are about 0.5% of the yearly budget.

We are spending much less on LIHTC projects than we do on SMPD, the Fire Department, and economic development. Those three categories combined are about 41.2% of the yearly budget.

My guess is that LIHTC projects come out of the $2.9 million for economic development. That money is supposed to create jobs. The thing that bothers Mark Gleason is that LIHTC projects don’t create jobs the way Buccee’s creates jobs. (Kissing Tree also doesn’t create jobs the way Buccee’s creates jobs. Kissing Tree is more like a LIHTC project in this way.)

Next! The three LIHTC projects just kind of came up spontaneously during the last couple meetings, and took everyone by surprise. What are some similar comparisons?

The other things that Council approved at this meeting alone:*
– $46 million over 15 years on roads and utilities in Kissing Tree. That works out to $3 million per year.
– $6 million on water and wastewater for Dunbar over 2 years. That works out to $3 million per year.
– $1.3 million on lighting for soccer fields at Five Mile Dam.
– $330K to update the Airport Master Plan
– $430K in a wastewater treatment agreement with McCoy’s
– $125K with Titan Utilities
– Two different Utilities trucks totalling $660K
– Energy management contract for $135K
– $480K for lawns and beds of city buildings
– $439K for Hull Street Stormwater improvements
– $215K on tree removal from the storm
– $432K on health care contracts

So those are the kinds of amounts we spend all the time, and Mark Gleason does not clutch his pearls.

Look, $883K is a fair amount of money! It is worth planning in advance and being intentional with how we spend it, so that we can best serve our community. Right now we’re approving projects on an ad hoc basis, and so there is room for improvement.

However: Kissing Tree is not put under a microscope. There are never any 5 or 10 year updates for Development Agreements where we give tax credits to private companies. SMPD’s budget is not put under a microscope.

It is always, always the programs that help poor and vulnerable people that make Council say, “I dunno, they might be wasting this shiny nickel we’re giving them. Let’s do a deep dive!”

…………..

Next!

3. How much more low-income housing do we need?

We don’t know! In 2018, we undertook a giant housing affordability project.

As of 2017, this was the housing need in San Marcos:

In 2019, Council killed the whole thing off. Years of effort and nothing was ever adopted to help create affordable housing.

In 2023, city staff gave Council a workshop on housing, and recommended that Council resume this project. As far as I know, they have not done this.

Bottom line: in 2017, we had a shortfall of 4233 rental units for all households earning under $35K.  This whole conversation is about 135 apartments. We need a lot more affordable housing than that.

LIHTC projects really are too expensive to be the only way we build affordable housing. (Fortunately, there are cheaper things that San Marcos could do! Like allowing ADUs and duplexes everywhere. But I digress.)

….

4. What did Council have to say?

Jane Hughson:
– We are not receiving enough tax dollars to support the services (library, police and fire, etc) going to these projects.
– We need the housing, though.
– Are these San Marcos residents? Or outsiders? I’m frustrated with outsiders.

Shane: How much sales tax revenue do they bring in?
Jane: The people would be paying sales tax either way.

Jude:
– We should update the formula for the proportion of 1,2, and 3 bedroom units that we require.
– We should require cash back, and make a formula for the cash back amount they owe us
– But LIHTC projects are still good, they increase housing!

Stephanie Reyes: I’d like to get a demographer to look at how much low income housing we need.

Saul: These LIHTC projects make taxes are higher on everyone else!! We should have a moratorium on LIHTC projects.

Matthew: Can a development be half-LIHTC?
Answer: not really.

Jane: Other cities give density bonuses and have inclusive housing incentives.  Can we do that?
Answer: We already offer these. Since 2018. But we can’t get anyone to take us up on them.
Jane: Not to say I told you so, but we could have done this on Lindsey Street.

Mark Gleason: I have so much budget angst. It’s not just this year – we’re giving away tax dollars for decades to come! It’s not just 15 years. It’s 20! And 30! Decades to come!

[Mark! No. That last bit is nonsense. Nothing automatically extends more than 15 years. Everything will be renegotiated at the end of the contract. Stop hyperventilating.]

More Mark: We have to diversify the economy here!  We need more data! I cannot approve any more of these without data!

Alyssa, speaking the truth: Can we do this conversation more productively? Instead of focusing on revenue loss, let’s focus on maximizing benefit to community members. 

Jane: I just want clarity on how much we’re spending. And also, how can we bring in more jobs?

Shane: The housing waitlist is like a year long. Doesn’t that establish residency?

…

5. What are we doing next?

In the end, they decide that the housing committee will look closely at the housing policy, and then they’ll hold a workshop.  They’re particularly concerned with:

  • How many total LIHTC projects do we have, and what’s the estimated taxes on all of them?
  • How many low income projects do our peer cities have, per capita?
  • Can we re-evaluate how many 1,2,3-bedroom apartments are required?
  • Can we formalize the rebate formula? Can we require rebates?
  • Can we do a needs assessment survey?
  • Rebate money should not go to the general fund. Can it be used in an intentional way?

Alyssa requests that our DEI Coordinator be present at the committee meeting. This is a very smart idea. She also recommends this resource for background reading.

…

Look: There is nothing wrong with those actual bullet points. It is good to review our LIHTC policy and see how it can be improved. 

But the whole vibe is, “ACK! We’re spending so much money on poor people housing!” and it sets my teeth on edge.

If Council were serious about housing affordability, they would dust off the Housing Action Plan, update it, and implement it.  Instead, we get Mark Gleason huffing over $13 million dollars to poor people, while sweetly handing Kissing Tree $46 million without blinking.

* NOTE: I updated this list because I forgot about the Consent Agenda. Originally I pulled amounts from the most recent few meetings, but I realized there were way more examples than I originally thought.

Hours 0:00 – 1:36, 5/21/24

by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

Citizen Comment: much briefer than last time, but hitting most of the same points:

  • Seven people spoke about Malachi Williams and calling for a ceasefire resolution in Gaza.
  • Max Baker attended the UniverCity class that the city offers, and is calling for increased transparency.
  • Noah Brock spoke about the SMART/Axis right of way annexation again. (The whole agenda item ended up getting postponed until July 2nd.)

…

Item 1: Area Plans

The city is diving into its first Area Plan, which was going to be the Dunbar-Heritage neighborhood. Discussed before, here.

Here was the boundary:

The very first thing that happened is that P&Z declared that this was a terrible idea. It needs to be split into two separate area plans, Dunbar and Heritage. Council agreed.

(Why? Historically, Heritage has always gotten all the resources and city attention, and Dunbar gets neglected. So we’re trying to stop doing that. This way each neighborhood can determine their own priorities and character.)

So tonight, we have new boundaries for two separate area plans:

All done! Splitsville.

(Now to write the actual area plans.)
…

Item 16:

This warehouse place – Elliot Electric Supply – is off Wonderworld:

They’ve been operating since the 90s.  

There were townhomes built here: 

They were built in 2019.

Elliot Electric is in the yellow box below, and you can see the townhomes right across the street:

Here’s the problem: the developer who sold the townhomes did not disclose to the buyers how noisy the warehouse business is. The homeowners get woken up every night around 3 am, with delivery trucks, forklifts beeping when they back up, loud music playing, and so on. 

In April, the warehouse guy came to P&Z for a permit to expand his warehouse.  A bunch of condo owners showed up with a number of complaints.

The branch manager came across as a very sympathetic guy who had not been told that the neighbors had all these complaints, but was willing to work with them.   He gave them his personal phone number and agreed to a fence to block the noise:

It also runs along Dutton Drive, which seems like the important part.

Ultimately, P&Z felt like the business has seniority, since they’d been operating this way for about two decades before the townhomes were built.   So they approved the permit.

…

Sidebar: So what went wrong? How did we get here?

The townhomes were approved by this same P&Z, in this meeting.  There was no mention of noise nearby.  Probably the city staff weren’t aware and P&Z wasn’t informed.

If staff had known about the noise, they probably would have recommended a deed restriction, where the developer had to inform potential buyers about noises next door. But that did not happen.

I don’t think anyone was being a jerk here. But it would still be good to figure out a way for everyone to get some sleep at night, without wrecking this guy’s business model.

….

This brings us to Tuesday’s meeting: the condo association is appealing the P&Z decision to council. They want quiet hours.

There’s two problems.

First, San Marcos already has a noise ordinance. It’s just a matter of getting someone out to document it.

Second, it’s not really the local employees that are playing loud music, driving forklifts, etc at 3 am. It’s delivery drivers from Austin and San Antonio. They have keys to the place, let themselves in, unload the delivery, and head out.

Also, if they get the permit for the extra warehouse, it will (supposedly) help block some of the noise.

Council ends up circling in on some extra requirements:

  • Apparently there are noise-cancelling and white noise forklift add-ons, for the back up beep. Elliot Electric will put these on.
  • There will be conspicuous signs about how overnight workers need to keep it quiet

The vote: Should Elliot Electric keep their permit, with these extra requirements?

Yes: everyone
No: no one

The actual solution here is to build relationships. The condo owners should use the branch manager’s personal cell phone number to let him know when they’re getting woken up. But they should be nice about it, and assume he’s doing the best he can. (And he should do the best he can.)

…

Items 17-18: Two LIHTC projects.

LIHTC sounds for Low Income Housing Tax Credits. There are two separate projects being proposed.

The last time we saw a LIHTC project was here:

These were fake-affordable housing. But it was free for the city – they were going to the state for tax breaks.

Whereas these next two are not free for San Marcos, so they’d better be more legit. (Which they are!)

The first one is on McCarty, here:

between Hunter and I-35.

This one is supposed to be a retirement community, so it’s all 1 and 2 bedrooms.

Here’s the affordability part:

The important part is that first row: 34 units will be reserved for people earning under 30% of the Area Mean Income, or AMI. (We’re part of Austin metro, so we use Austin household income levels. It’s not ideal, but we can’t change that.)

Technical note: See in the first row where it says $0-$35,040 as the income range? That’s misleading, because that’s based on a family of 4, but these apartments are reserved for seniors. For one person, the 30% income cut-off is $24,550, and for two people, the 30% cut-off is $28,050. (Full AMI chart here.) You should also ignore the $58,401-$70,080 for the remaining 188 apartments. For one or two seniors, the income cut-off in this bracket is $40,900 or $46,750, respectively.

Point being: those 34 apartments are legitimately reserved for people without much money. This is good!

In addition, there are services for all residents:

I mean, fine. These are fine.

The property tax estimate for 18 years is $7,262,589, which works out to about $400K per year. So that’s the contribution of San Marcos to this project: about $400K per year.

The second LIHTC project is here:

Out between Centerpoint and Posey Road.

Here’s the affordability:

These are 1, 2, and 3 bedroom units. Here the income ranges do make sense, because there will probably be families living here. So there will be 55 units reserved for the lowest income bracket.

Great!

Services:

More services than the first place, but the location is worse. You don’t have Target and everything around the corner.

The property tax estimate is $4,000,000 for 15 years, or $266K per year.

I don’t totally understand how these things work, because:

  • This is cheaper per year than the first place – $266K vs $400K
  • There are more low-income units here – 55 vs 34

And in addition, this second place is offering us a cash-back offer. So clearly I’m missing something about why all this makes sense.

For the cash-back offer, Council has a choice:

  1. They’ll pay us $36,666 per year for 15 years, so we’d get $550K total.
  2. Or, they’ll pay us $400K up front.

Council goes with the lump sum payout. Especially in lieu of the 3 pm workshop, where our budget took a beating.

Side note #1: Note that both projects are both along the railroad tracks. Poor people get to live along railroad tracks.

You know how it went. Someone said, “What can we do with this land, along the tracks? No one with money would live here. Maybe we get some poor-people tax credits and make some affordable housing?”

(I loathe wealth segregation so much.)

Side note #2: Both these complexes are reserving 15% of their units for people earning under 30% of the AMI. That’s because the city of San Marcos fixed 15% as the requirement for LIHTC applications.

We used to require that you set aside 25% of your units. But we didn’t get as many applications, and so we changed it to 15%. I don’t know how I feel about this.

But look. This chart is from 2017:

So seven years ago, we had a shortfall of 4233 rental units for all households earning under $35K. We have not updated these numbers since then.

These two LIHTC projects will yield 89 units. That’s a drop in the bucket.

This Council is not serious about housing affordability. If they were, they would start by dusting off the Housing Action Plan (which was deep-sixed in 2019) and updating it. They would listen to the research about what it takes to increase the affordable housing stock. (This is going to come up when we get to Tiny Homes, at the end of the meeting.)

In fact, city staff gave a workshop on the Housing Action Plan last July. But since then … <crickets>. It is up to Council to put things on the agenda and actually make them happen, and they are not doing that.

Hours 0:00 – 1:44, 3/19/24

by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

Citizen Comment period:

People spoke on:

  • the proposed student housing on Lindsey street (much, much more to come)
  • San Marcos Civics Club, inviting Councilmembers to drop in.
  • In favor of turning the Mitchell Center into an African-American History museum, overseen by the Calaboose board. (This is an item on the Executive Session agenda, so I don’t have any other info on it.)
  • Five people spoke in favor of a council resolution calling for ceasefire in Gaza. (Discussed a bit last time.)

Items 1-3: Financial reports.  All about Q3 2023, which is last June-September.

How did last summer go?

We came in under-budget and over-revenue.  Great.

They also went through the special funds: Electric, Water/Wastewater, Stormwater, Resource Recovery, Airport, and Hotel Tax.  It all seemed like normal fluctuations to me, but knock yourself out if you’re curious to know more.

The auditors gave us a clean bill of health for 2023. You’re welcome to read that, too.

…

Item 16: We’re knee-deep in next year’s budget. I haven’t watched ANY of the budget planning sessions, because they’re dull as rocks, and I say this as someone who finds council meetings riveting.

I think this is the key part of the Budget Policy Statement:

What does “Eviction Services” mean? We’re helping the tenant and not the landlord, right? We’re not the baddies, are we?

In part A, “Mental Health Diversion” sounds promising. None of this got any discussion at Tuesday’s meeting, though.

I’m not sure what distinguishes As, Bs, and Cs. Funding level? Different departments? Urgency?

…

Item 17: The city bought Quail Creek back in 2022.

We bought it, but it wasn’t inside city limits. So now we’re annexing it. 

Google maps tells me that it looks like this:

Nothing I enjoy better than the derelict remains of former wealth, as it returns to the common good!

….

Item 18: LIHTC projects are low income housing complexes, where the developer gets some tax breaks in exchange for building affordable housing.  (We talked about LIHTC projects last month.)

These guys want to build affordable housing right behind the high school:

Great!  

How affordable is “affordable”?  

What this means is that there are 348 apartments, and all of them will be priced so that they are affordable for people making $58,401 – $70,080.  

What does “51-60% AMI” mean?

AMI stands for “Area Median Income”. In other words, the AMI is the middle income in the town. So then “51-61% of AMI” means these apartments are for people earning roughly half of the middle income, or a little more. On the poor side of the AMI though, for sure.

Hopefully you’re thinking, “Wait, what? How is $58K-$70K on the poor side, for San Marcos!?”

It’s not! Here’s where the hocus-pocus comes in. San Marcos is part of the Greater Austin-Round Rock Metro statistical area. The median income for a family of four in Austin is $122K. And therefore 51-60% of that gives you $58,401 – $70,080.

Now! What about down in San Marcos? Well, our median income is $47,394.   In San Marcos, 50-61% of $47,394 would be $24,170-$28,436.

People earning $58K-$70K in San Marcos are above the median income. These households are on the richer half of San Marcos. Not actually rich, but relatively well off for San Marcos.   It’s completely absurd to call this apartment complex “affordable” or “low-income”.  These are regular, market rate apartments for regular, old San Martians. 

But here’s the thing: they’re not applying for tax breaks from the city. They’re only applying to state tax breaks. So this isn’t costing the city anything. 

Still, they’re getting tax breaks from the state. Are they at least providing services that go above and beyond?

Eh, not really. Pretty bog-standard. 

City Council is happy with this because we’re not giving away any money. So they give it a thumb’s up.

Look, as far as San Marcos goes, this is fine. It’s housing.

But they’re still jerks! They’re diverting funding that would otherwise subsidize actual low-income housing. They’re getting a subsidy, without helping the people it’s supposed to help. It’s not technically illegal – we’re within the Austin MSA, so officially our median income is $122k. Just kinda shitty of them.

Hours 0:00 – 1:00, 2/20/24

by The San Marxist, posted in Uncategorized

Citizen Comment:

Almost everyone speaking was local small business owners who are salty about Buc-ee’s asking for a $3.2 million rebate.  They observe that, collectively, they create a lot of jobs, and yet none of them have been offered a proportional rebate.

I can understand their frustration! Much to discuss. Stay tuned.

Item 1: The Dunbar and Heritage District Area Plan

You’ve heard about VisionSMTX literally for years. (Discussed here, here, here, here, here, and here.) We’re neck-deep in getting it approved. 

There’s a side-hustle to VisionSMTX, which are the Area Plans. What this means is that a neighborhood get to decide what makes it special, and then enshrine that special magic spark into the city code.  This can be done well – “preserve these historical structures! More sidewalks!” – or it can be done poorly – “Create obstacles that keep poor people out! Micromanage everyone’s business!”

The first Area Plan is up! Here’s the boundary:

It’s a combined region that’s supposed to cover both the Historic District and the Dunbar neighborhood.

At P&Z, they recommended two big changes:

  • Split Dunbar and the Historic District into two separate Area Plans
  • Hold off until the Comp Plan is approved.

Splitting the two neighborhoods is a very good idea, given the historical legacy: one of these neighborhoods traditionally got all the resources, and the other was generally short-changed.  Making Dunbar the focus of its own plan seems healthy to me.

Council is also on board with both of these changes. So these new split Area Plans will now go back to the residents for revising.

…

Item 15: LIHTC Housing

LIHTC stands for Low Income Housing Tax Credits.  Apartment complexes can apply for tax breaks if they provide low-income housing and access to social services. 

Usually these are new complexes being built.  But this time, it’s an existing complex:

These are the River View apartments, in Blanco Gardens.

One note: River View apartments is directly across from the stupid Woods apartments, which is now called Redpoint, as though they can escape my anger by changing their name.

Presumably “River View Apartments” was so named, because it used to have a view of the river, before The Woods was built, and they should probably rename themselves “Apartment View Apartments” now. But that would be too grim.

Anyway: there’s 54 units, of which 40 are Section 8 housing. They were bought by a new owner two years ago who wants to use LIHTC funding to renovate them.

Council asks good questions!

Mayor Hughson: Will anyone be displaced by the renovations?
Answer: Temporarily, yes, but no one will lose their housing.  We’ll cover moving costs to a different unit or to a hotel during renovations. This is a HUD requirement.

Mark Gleason:  Why is it so vacant right now?
Answer: It’s 30% vacant, because the units were in such bad shape that we weren’t allowed to rent them until we fixed them up.  We’re about to get approval from HUD to start renting them.

Saul Gonzales: Are there enough washers and dryers? And are they priced affordably?
Answer: We’re required to have 1 set per 10 apartments, and we’ve got 6 sets, so we’re good.  On the pricing, we’ll blandly demur. 

Alyssa Garza: Are the wraparound services old or new?  What mechanism do you have to make sure you’re not just going to under-advertise and phase out services due to low participation?
Answer: They’re new.  HUD requires us to replace services that we phase out.

Council isn’t spending any money here. They’re just voting on whether to support the owner’s LIHTC application to the state. It’s basically just a vote of confidence.

The vote:

CLICKERS!!

Hour 1+, 1/4/22

by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

Some of the citizen comments:
– In favor of a committee for animal services. (Which is on the agenda tonight. Spoiler: it passes.)
– Problems with SMPD: Namely, Chief Stapp’s complicity in the negligence during the Biden Bus emergency calls, and how we continue to employ him. We need SMPD oversight by external community members, instead of recycling the same individuals to guard the henhouse, so to speak.

Public Hearings:

1. There’s going to be a gas station at the corner of 123 and Clovis Barker. Eventually. This is just before you get to the McCarty overpass, heading south.

2. Renewing some low income tax credits for a housing complex (Champion’s Crossing), right at the entrance to Blanco Vista, at Yarrington Road. It’s been there for a long time, 156 apartments.


Max Baker points out that the income percentiles are based on Austin median income, not San Marcos median income. According to this, Austin median income for a family of 4 is $99K. And hooboy, those are not San Marcos numbers at all. Having apartments priced to be affordable at 40% of the median Austin income is just a regular San Marcos market rate, and yet the city is subsidizing this.

It passes unanimously. Baker basically holds his nose and votes to grandfather it in, but points out that new projects need to clear a higher bar.

3. Transportation Master Plan
Mostly they hashed these details out at the last meeting; see here. Mayor Hughson raised one last issue for discussion: reduction of driving lanes on Sessom and Craddock.

Shane Scott and Mark Gleason come out against this. Scott is pro-speed bumps in order to calm traffic, although the engineer says that Craddock and Sessom are busier thoroughfares than what you’d normally stick a speedbump on. Gleason points out that there already is a crushed granite path on Craddock, from Bishop to Old RR 12.

(Does it really extend all the way to Bishop? In my memory, the crushed granite path starts out strong on the Old 12, and then dribbles to extinction somewhere along the way. Google maps agrees with me! I win. The existing path appears to end at Ramona street, and then turn into a sidewalk till Archie, and then it peters out.)

Gleason also makes an impassioned plea to future growth. Won’t the ghost residents of tomorrow resent our bike lanes? Max Baker points out that they might also prefer the bike lanes.

Mayor Hughson asks the engineer, Richard Reynosa, some of the key questions: how much does it cost to put the bike lanes in? how reversible is the decision? what are the traffic studies showing?

Reynosa says: It’s just the cost of striping. It can easily be un-striped. The traffic studies show that these streets can handle being reduced to one lane. He points out that Sessom already has been reduced to one lane for the past year, due to construction, and will continue to be reduced for the next year.

Gleason makes another semi-nonsensical plea – what will we do in the case of natural disasters? If there is a tornado or a fire, aren’t we courting danger by reducing these roads to one lane? (Nobody responded with the obvious response: Bro, we’re just re-striping the lanes. Cars can drive over stripes, especially to flee a forest fire.) Whenever Gleason stops making sense, I start to wonder who is whispering in his ear.

Gleason makes a motion to keep Sessom and Craddock as they are.

Max Baker makes the appropriate arguments in favor: bike lanes can actually reduce the number of cars on the road. Traffic congestion is often due to speeding, and not the sheer quantity of cars on the road. Craddock in particular is like a 1950’s drag-racing avenue, just yearning to be sped down, with its wide unfettered lanes. It needs to be calmed.

Jane Hughson is persuaded mostly because this is such a cheap, easily reversible investment. Why not try it out and see how it does?

In the end, Gleason’s amendment fails:
Yes: Gleason, Scott, Gonzalez
No: Garza, Baker, Prather, Hughson

The vote on the entire transportation plan passes.
Yes: Everyone besides Shane Scott and Saul Gonzalez.
No: Those two.

Honestly, Saul Gonzalez plays his cards so close to the vest that it’s impossible to know what his game is. What didn’t he like? I have no idea!