Tag: Whisper

Hours 1:00 – 1:42, 3/5/24

by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

Items 15-16:  Burying power lines

All new developments have to bury their power lines.  

In other words, this is bad:

whereas this is good:

There’s a lot of reasons why this is good practice:

Ok, great.

Whisper South and Whisper South Industrial are here:

Whisper South has requested skipping burying their electrical lines.  Staff denied the request. So they appealed to City Council.  

City Council agreed with staff, and denied the request as well. 

Good job, Council!

…

Items 17-18:  The Neighborhood Commission 

Maybe the Neighborhood Commission is my arch-nemesis?  I disagree so hard with them that steam is coming out my ears.

They sent Council two resolutions, on Occupancy Restrictions and Purpose Built Student Housing.

  1. Occupancy Restrictions

Back in April 2022, Council voted to loosen occupancy restrictions from a max of 2 unrelated people in a house, to a max of 3 unrelated people in a house. Unfortunately, the code wasn’t updated for another 18 months. By this point, Max Baker was off Council and Matthew Mendoza was on it.

Matthew was in a panic over the idea of 3 unrelated people living together. He tried to get everyone to vote against it, and it failed, and then tried one more time. He clutched his pearls so hard that he’s probably infertile now.

It finally passed, officially, in October. So it has been in effect for six months. But in a sore loser move, a subcommittee was put together “to study the issue further”.

The Neighborhood Commission is pissed off.

They want the rule to revert to a max of two unrelated people.

Listen: a cap of two unrelated people is batshit crazy.  They clearly hate students, but banning students effectively bans poor people as well. (I really don’t care if that’s accidental or on purpose.) This prevents poor people from pooling their resources and being able to afford the rent in a quiet neighborhood.  That’s super gross!   

Who actually thinks City Council should be in the business of policing who is married?  Why are we micro-managing people’s private lives this way?! 

Usually people will say “It’s about parking!” or “It’s about noise!” or “It’s about wild parties!”  But there are other mechanisms for dealing with noise and parties.  (Namely code enforcement and rental registries for landlords.)

What about the extra cars, parking on the street? Listen: your desire to keep street spots empty is less important than other people’s right to affordable housing. I don’t know why we allow “empty street spots” to be a weapon that existing home owners can wield against renters. Home owners do not have a right to keep street spots empty.

But let me be fair: surely the neighborhood commission gave thoughtful reasons, right?

Unless I’m missing something, they’re saying that three friends living together is causing all this:

  • Rising costs of home ownership
  • Impact on residents remaining in their homes
  • Impact of landlords attempting to put 3 unrelated students in a home
  • Negative impact on the neighborhood

Wow. That is high on blame and short on details. If something is going on, spell it out explicitly, because right now it looks unhinged. (Also home prices are currently falling.)

What does Council do?

Remember the subcommittee that was formed? It hasn’t met yet, mostly because it doesn’t have a purpose.

Jane Hughson calls for the subcommittee to meet within 30 days.  The subcommittee is Matthew Mendoza, Mark Gleason, and Alyssa Garza.

Shall they meet?

Yes, they must meet!! Jane, Matthew, Mark
No, it’s over, this is dumb: Alyssa, Shane, Jude

So the informal vote fails. They do not need to meet.

But wait! There’s more from the Neighborhood Commission!

  1. They hate Purpose Built Student Housing and rent-by-the-bedroom leases. 

There is an argument that RBB leases are predatory. (I don’t exactly agree, but we’ll talk about this extensively in the Bonus P&Z section.) But for now, it’s safe to say that the Neighborhood Commission is not upset because students are being exploited.

The Neighborhood Commission is saying this:

They do not want student housing complexes. I think this is clear.

So let’s summarize: they do not want students renting houses in neighborhoods. They also do not want apartment complexes to cater to students.

This is just delusional. Look, we have a university! With a lot of students! They are entitled to live in this town!

If students are throwing obnoxious parties, then we need to properly fund Code Enforcement to shut those down. If you have a problem with rentals, hold landlords accountable. This commission thinks that shutting off the actual supply of housing – this human right that we all deserve – will somehow lead to different behavior by students.

What does Council do?

It’s a little perplexing. Jane Hughson moves to postpone the discussion.

Her explanation is that they didn’t put Rent by the Bedroom (RBB) on the agenda, and so legally Council cannot discuss it. She wants to put both RBB and Purpose Built Student Housing on the agenda, so that Council can have the appropriate discussion.

But this is just wrong. Look at the agenda:

Rent by the bedroom is actually right there, on the agenda! How did no one correct her? They literally read that blurb out loud at 1:30:56, here.

(I mean, I truly don’t care. Let’s postpone. It’s not urgent.)

….

Council or city staff: if you’re reading this, I do have one practical suggestion:  

If you’re going to regulate RBB leases, you should require that leases include an option to rent by semester, for a modest surcharge.   Students need some flexibility to be able to take internships, or graduate in December, or move home for the summer.

Since the complexes are profiting off of being quasi-dorms, they should provide this benefit specific to students, like a dorm would.

Hour 1.5-4:00, 7/5/22

by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

Hour 1:30 – Annexing and Rezoning 

Item 21: This is a proposal for 470 houses, way out past the outlet mall and past the Trace development.  This is sprawl.  In general, I do not like isolated subdivisions plopped down in the middle of nowhere.  It requires way more mileage of pipes and wires to get them hooked up to the city, it causes more wear and tear on the roads than closer developments, it works against having a functional public transit, and so on. It takes a toll.

It’s that little red pin dropped way at the bottom.

Saul Gonzalez asks my favorite question: Will this pay for itself? 

This is a really important question.  Approving a development costs the city a lot of money. Much is shared by the developer, who hopes to turn a profit, but not all.  Like I said above, a new development needs water lines, wastewater service, electric lines, emergency services, access to city services and facilities, and contributes to wear and tear on streets and infrastructure.

So developments cost the city money. Developments also bring in tax revenue. So will the tax revenue eventually cover the costs? And this bit is crucial: will it cover the lifecycle of the streets/power lines/pipes, as they age and need repairs in 20 years? Have we accounted for this in our budgeting? (Usually not. But we should.)

So that is important question #1: Will this pay for itself, not just costs incurred during the immediate build but also estimating life cycle repairs to infrastructure?

Here is important question #2: When is the estimated time of completion, and what is our predicted housing deficit at that time? 

We have mountains of housing that has been approved, but not built. The city staff need to continuously be explaining to council (and P&Z) what our current housing deficit is, and what it is predicted to be in the future, as different developments are built and more people move to town. (Ideally broken out by affordability.)

Important question #3 is: Is this environmentally responsible? Is it on the aquifer? Is it suburban sprawl? Does it incorporate duplexes and 4-plexes and 8-plexes throughout the single-family region? How much driving will residents be required to do?  

This one isn’t the worst, insofar as it’s not in the aquifer. But I still resent far-flung communities, and I resent that it’s uniformly going to be single-family. 

(We can’t mandate duplexes and townhomes and things like that. This came up at P&Z. We used to be able to, when we had PDDs, and then we threw them away for mysterious reasons.)

Important question #4: Is it mixed income? Is it near amenities?

We have very little meaningfully mixed income housing in San Marcos. Even when new builds like La Cima include multi-family, they segregate it from the single family portion. That’s not great. It is much better for everyone when there is a wide diversity of income levels in a neighborhood, kids attending schools together, different social classes forging connections and co-mingling their lives.

Similarly, developments get built without thinking about where people will shop for groceries, or go for dinner, or whatever. The idea is that the free market will save the day, and you won’t have a food desert. Then you get a food desert, because the free market does not save the day. (Fortunately, city code guarantees access to parks and some public spaces. Because the free market will not save the day.)

So Council should always ask those four questions, in order to evaluate a proposal. As is, we do not have the answers to any of these questions.

Listen: I actually think really highly of city staff. I think they work hard, and I’ve particularly thought that the interim city manager, Stephanie Reyes, seems to be doing a great job. However, on developments, they’re trapped by their forms. The form for the information they put together for P&Z and Council probably hasn’t been updated in at least 15 years. The form needs to be massively revised to provide P&Z and Council with the answers to these four questions.

To recap:

  1. Will it pay for itself, over the lifespan of the infrastructure? (Denser development will score better.)
  2. When is it estimated to be built, and what is the forecasted housing deficit at that point?
  3. Are we looking at sprawl? Is this on the aquifer? Is it uniformly single-family homes?
  4. Is it meaningfully mixed income? Is it near existing amenities?

Answers: who knows, who knows, yes, and no.

….

But wait! There’s more! Back to that red pin at the bottom of the map, above.

One final thing that makes this particular tract unpleasant is that it contains the Hays Electrical Power Plant.  A rural neighbor shows up and describes what happens when the boilers are cleaned: for 3-4 days, it sounds like you’re living next to an airport, 24/7.

Is it bad for your health to live very close to an industrial power plant? In my quick look at what counts as environmental health risk factors, I’m seeing things like this: “presence of hazardous waste sites and facilities (landfills, incinerators, Superfund sites)” but I’m not seeing power plants in those kinds of lists. So I’m tentatively thinking it’s a nuisance and not a health hazard. 

Here’s what does not count as evidence: the fact that the state of Texas allows it, and there are examples of neighborhoods next to power plants in Austin and Seguin. 

Overall, I still don’t like the subdivision. 

The vote:
Yes: Mayor Hughson, Shane Scott, Mark Gleason
No: Alyssa Garza, Max Baker

Abstain: Saul Gonzalez, wanting to find out more about the health risks.

But then Saul switches to “yes” in order to bring it back for a second reading. He is clear that he’s just doing this to get more information, and not because he’s made his decision.

…

Items 23-27: Several items about Whisper Tract, the ginormous development going in on the east side of 35, up north across from Blanco Vista.

One has gone back and forth to P&Z and to a committee, about zoning one part Light Industrial, right near the Saddlebrook mobile home community. The problem is that while we notify the owners of property, we don’t notify the renters. And mobile home residents generally don’t own the land under their home, so they weren’t notified. We’re being jerks here.

Council carves out some bad-neighbor exceptions to light industrial, and passes it. The other Whisper items all pass, too. Whisper is huge.

…

Item 28: There’s a little patch of land west of I-35, between I-35 and Blanco Vista that gets re-zoned. It’s at this red pin:

This is right near the apartment complexes tucked in that same little tract of land.  It had been General Commercial, and now it will be CD-4.

CD-4 is fairly dense – picture apartments or townhomes. You’re allowed to put some corner stores in.  It’s pretty reasonable for that location. 

Item 39:

Suppose you’re driving up from Seguin, on 123.

This is the intersection of 123 and Beback Inn Road, which is a really great name for a road.  That red house on your left is the Full Moon Saloon.  That giant expanse of empty flat space on your right, starting at the light, is the topic for Item 39.

It’s too early to really answer the four questions above, but that’s certainly way out in the middle of farm land. And the presentation claims it will be “predominantly single family with some commercial.”

Council decided to put together a committee to work with the developer.  Max Baker, Shane Scott, and Mark Gleason will be on it.  Those three make for a highly combustible group, and Max is outnumbered. We shall see how this goes.

Hour 1, 4/5/22

by The San Marxist, posted in Hour summaries

Citizen Comment: Spearkers from SMRF, landlords want to end the 90 day eviction delay, and people worked hard to properly get community input on the proposed new rec center name, “The Paulina Espinoza Community Hall”.

Whisper PDD

The Whisper PDD is an absolutely gigantic development that’s going in on the northeast side of 35, sort of across from Blanco Vista and Five Mile Dam.  My take is that no one paid any attention to it when it was passed, maybe circa 2015.  It was a long way from town, a long way in the future, and generally felt a little fuzzy and distant.

Max Baker hates it.  I don’t know enough about whether or not to hate it, but I will say this: when it comes to developers, we act like we’re terribly lucky if a developer would deign to build here. In reality, the city holds all the power, and developers need us more than we need them. Developers are a dime a dozen, and we don’t owe anything to a random out-of-town developer.  (Occasionally we have a local developer. I think Trace is local.  Local developers do seem to care a little more, presumably in a don’t-shit-where-you-eat kind of way.)

Max Baker goes off-topic to make a point about lobbying – he asks the developer which councilmembers he’s talked to, and the developer demurs (which does feel shady), and then Max accuses various councilmembers of having been the recipient. It’s aggressive and feels like it comes out of nowhere. This was the first time of the evening that I thought, “Max, what are you doing?” But given the topic, I assume Max was still angry from the lobbying workshop a few hours earlier.

(What was the actual issue at hand? The developer wants to rezone part of the property Light Industrial. He was denied at P&Z because the tract ran adjacent to Saddlebrook, a mobile home community up that way. He’s proposing to cut the area back so that it’s not adjacent any more.)

In the end, this detail gets kicked to committee and back to P&Z.