More good words from Dr Milton Friedman:

Let's hope for some rain, some common sense in Washington DC, and for a drug free airport.

8/6/09

Had a nice evening in council chambers.

We had a discussion of allowing a property owner to put a driveway on their property. You may be wondering why someone needs permission from the government for this. The twist is that the driveway is not on the lot where their house is; it is on the lot they own across the street. You may still be asking why they need permission. In my opinion they don't, but our code does not allow a driveway on a lot without a primary dwelling. The property owner faced questions such as what is the purpose of the driveway. Their answer is that it helps them back their large vehicle into their garage. My answer would have been why do you care, it's my property? I can find no reasonable objection to allowing this property owner to use their property.

This was followed by a public meeting to discuss down-zoning property along Eisenhower drive from R-4 (multi-family) to R-1 (single family). If this were to pass the effect would be that multi family dwellings would be illegal on these lots. Currently under R-4 both single and multi family dwellings are permitted. Therefore passage of this proposal would add a restriction that was not present when these properties were purchased. Based on this, can you guess my opinion on this issue? My typical approach to a public meeting is that I am not there to tell people what I think, I am there to listen to what the public thinks. However my fellow council members began by sharing their opinions on this issue, largely arguing for its passage. The primary arguments were:

1. The proposal originated from the master plan, section 5.8 (5). I don't have any explanation of the justification used for this proposal other than perhaps trying to make placing this area under the same zoning as the surrounding area. Some argue that if we have a master plan, we should follow it.

2. Multi family dwellings could impose more demands on infrastructure (utilities, roads) than single family.

3. Existing single family dwellings adjacent to these lots might be concerned that their property value would be lower in the vicinity of multi family dwellings than with single family dwellings.

The mayor expressed his concerns that this was opening a can of worms, and I followed by stating my objections mostly consisting of:

1. The master plan is not law, it is a guideline. I personally object to much of the master plan and do not feel it should tie our hands and hold us bound to follow it.

2. We have impact fees so that development growth pays for itself. There are multiple traffic access points to these lots, not a single traffic funnel. If there was a failure in the original planning of this area I do not feel those that invested in these properties should be punished. We often talk about fair treatment to existing property owners when they purchased lots under the designated zoning, and the same applies here.

3. There can be scenarios where property depreciates with development, but there are also scenarios where it depreciates without development. If these lots become less attractive for development they may remain dormant and depressed. That can have an economically depressing effect on the entire area. At the same time the properties that were purchased as R-4 are likely to lose value if this proposal passes. Is it right to breach the original terms of the purchase and damage the property owner's value of their property to favor another person's presumed property value?

Some are using arguments about how this can bring in more or less taxes. I am not motivated by this argument. I am not looking to use issues like this as a means to maximize the taxes that someone pays. I am always looking for way to reduce the size and cost of government.

I encourage you to take a look at this area if you are really interested in this issue. You will find a sign posted announcing the public meeting, and you will notice that the only adjacent dwellings are on the first half of Eisenhower.

I intend to oppose the new restriction that this rezoning would impose on the owners of these properties.

These items were public meeting items so there was no vote. These will be formally considered for passage most likely at our next council meeting.
We next dealt with items that we cast votes on. I made a motion to allow signs to have changeable text and advertise items not limited to the business (such as other businesses or community notices) that passed unanimously. I next made a motion to have the city use the same city employee benefit arrangement as we have had in the past which passed unanimously. I then attempted to move authorizing a temporary closure of the culdesac to allow for a block party, but the mayor said I used my quota of motions and a colleague snuck in to take ownership of it. Of course this was in good fun and I am not bothered in the least. This again passed. We also appointed Bob Bradley to represent us on CapCOG (Capital Area Council of Governments) and appointed Ron Smith as chair of Planning and Zoning.

Another item we reviewed was water rates and debt service. We are still charging below our cost of water service, but I support our moves to gradually get the prices more in line with costs to encourage conservation and reduce property taxes. We are roughly middle of the pack on water fees compared to surrounding areas. On residential sewer fees we are toward the high end of price for low usage but well below others on price for heavy sewer usage. This will likely be adjusted in the future.

That is most of the council activity this week.
Lastly you may have heard about the Libertarian Party being referred to as a "mob" by Congressman Lloyd Doggett in our opposition to more intrusion of the federal government into the relationship between you and your doctor:
Lloyd Doggett calls protestors 'a mob'
And then apologized for it

I agree that you marginalize your message when you cause yourself to be perceived as angry and irrational. It is far better to appeal to reason and logic, even if your opposition is unreasonable and illogical. For a model to follow, it is hard to beat Dr Milton Friedman:

Go to 4:36 of this video for a concise statement on government intrusion in medical care:

An explanation of the rise in health costs from 1978, which tells the same story today:

The role of government in medical care:

That's it for now. Stay cool while others around you are blowing steam.

7/17/09/09

Last week I was living in a tent in Arizona:

Now I am back in the hotbox. Last night's council meeting wasn't too bad, but it had it's moments. You probably won't read about it in The Log because they didn't show up.

It began with the pander fest. This is the annual process of groups coming to council begging for money. Readers of this site know that I am a Libertarian and believe that the only legitimate purpose of government is protection of individual rights. I do not support using coercive powers to tax you in order to support the Chamber of Commerce, Keep Lago Vista Beautiful, Fourth of July Council, Lago Vista Players, North Shore Heritage Society, and Friends of Balcones Canyonlands. These groups collectively asked for $47,700 of your money. I volunteer with the Balcones Canyonlands and have donated my own money to them. I have donated to Keep Lago Vista Beautiful and the Fourth of July Council. I bought a ticket and attended the Lago Vista Player's excellent "Bye Bye Birdie" performance. These were all voluntary acts that did not involve the coercive power of government taxation.

Let me address the Chamber of Commerce. As you know I had a proposal that would have given them approximately $140,000. Instead they beg council for $36,000. They want to use this money for moving their office from the school property to another location, among other things. That is fine if they want to use funds from their membership, but I do not support taxpayers having to pay for this.

The mayor pointed out that our finances are tight and our property tax collections are projected to be a quarter million short of what they were last year. Let's not look for more ways to spend money, let's keep your money in your pocket.

I moved approval of an agreement with the Rusty Allen Airport which passed. This has been a long time coming and represents a lot of work between the city and the airport.

I also moved changing the speed limit from 40 to 30 in the residential section of Boggy Ford and Highland starting at American Drive. I asked that where there in not a stop sign that a reduced speed ahead sign be placed to alert drivers to the speed change.

That is all for now. Take care.

5/21/09

I generally agree with Bill Stuart here. As James Madison said, if we were all angels there would be no need for government. The reason government exists is to provide police and courts to resolve disputes peacefully and to protect people from the harm done by others. Today municipal governments are involved in providing utilities, permitting processes on private property, libraries, recreational facilities, and many other endeavors. While I would hope for a return to smaller government, the people that work for our city are doing a very good job regardless of what department they are in. The city has done an excellent job under difficult circumstances to put us in good financial condition. As we go forward in our budget process I believe we will be able to put the right priorities on the core responsibilities of government.

We have had 2 rather short council meetings since I last posted. On June 4 we had a discussion of fees for services provided by the city. It was noted that the golf course fees for merchandise and snacks are based on 40% of cost. Dale Mitchell asked how the cost is determined. It seems to me that we should not be micro-managing the prices of items in the golf course. It is customary for the course to offer discounts depending on season or if a group is having a tournament. We do not want the city telling one person they get a discounted water tap fee and another person has to pay more. I think it would be better to state in the table of fees that these items will be priced at the discretion of the golf course manager with approval of the city manager.

Last night we discussed the results of the excellent work by the Charter Review committee. Perhaps the most contentious issue is whether we are in compliance in using separate accounts on our bonds. Dale Mitchell showed how some of the ordinances that we previously passed stated a separate depository should be used for each bond. Council believes going forward we should not require separate bank accounts for each bond. As long as they are separate in our accounting we are fine. Perhaps we need to be careful in our wording of bond ordinances going forward.

We also had a discussion of those bond projects that had been deferred and what our priorities are going forward. We want to be frugal and prioritize the projects we spend money on.

For a completely different topic, you may enjoy this:

Lastly, I dare comment about religion in politics. This posting may inflame you, but I just gotta say it. Last night we began our city council meeting with a very eloquent invocation by a local pastor. We have such an invocation every month. I do not think we should do this. We are not a Christian council. Our laws and taxes apply to Muslims, atheists, Jews, Druids, and whatever. As a life long Christian that takes my faith seriously, I want government to have no role or influence in religion. Saying a Christian prayer before a council meeting is wrong. We should have no prayer and just get on with business. I am not going to make a big deal about it unless I have others in the community willing to work with me on this. If I made a big deal about every single thing I disagree with I would not be as brilliantly effective as I am.

5/21/09

If you missed our council meeting tonight, here is a recap:

Well OK, it wasn't the real council meeting, but pretty close to it.

We had a proposal to amend our fence ordinance. I am always impressed at the ways government can micromanage private property. One of the changes was to permit certain kinds of fences that previously were not legal. I voted in favor of the ordinance because I defend private property rights, and it passed.

So why all the talk about shrubbery?

My colleague Darrel Hunt asked about the section of the ordinance that prohibits shrubbery on property bordering the golf course. Darrel, like many people in Lago Vista, lives on the golf course. Darrel wanted to know why he could not plant shrubbery on the back of his property. The ordinance prohibits shrubbery or hedges bordering a golf course. See Section 22 at http://codes.franklinlegal.net/lagovista%2Dflp/. We then had a nice discussion about the difference between shrubbery and hedges, and how tall a shrubbery should be, and whether it is OK for shrubbery to be placed right next to each other or how they should be spaced. It is times like this when I am glad I have an iPhone so I can check my email and baseball scores. I recommended that we go ahead and pass the ordinance with the proposed changes and perhaps we come back at a later time to consider amending the section on shrubbery.

There was another change in the ordinance to make these provisions apply to property at the airport. Previously the airport properties were exempt from these fencing provisions. My colleague D'Anne Gloris has property at the airport and asked why this is proposed. I am sympathetic but did not feel the positive changes should be turned away for this negative change.

Understand what happened here. Government likes to micromanage your private property, but council members like to exempt themselves. You would do the same thing if you were on council. That is one of the dangers of government gaining too much power.

In other activity, I got my ethics ordinance passed. Yes, I can actually get something done on this council. Actually the real credit goes to the city manager and city attorney who did most of the work writing it. Some issues I wanted addressed had to do with the language the city attorney used in the ordinance. I found no mention of how the process for dealing with ethics complaints applies to elected officials. The ordinance only seems to mention those appointed by city council. Obviously city council members are elected by the public, not appointed by council. The attorney said the ordinance refers to city officials of which elected council members are included. I also mentioned that the ordinance says council will consider ethics complaints approved by 2 council members, one of which is the mayor. What happens if the complaint is against the mayor? The attorney says it would proceed to the mayor pro tem and onward if necessary. I don't find the language to clearly cover these concerns, but he assured us it was covered.

We had an action item for considering the excellent work of the charter review committee. The attorney presented a memo stating some concerns. It was unclear how council should proceed. There seem to be 3 recommendations for language changes in the charter. It seems to me these would have to go to the public for adoption, but council is reluctant to spend money on an election if it really isn't necessary. I think we will end up considering each recommendation individually.

The streamlined platting ordinance was approved. This was a lengthy process and city staff spent a lot of time on this. This sets up an opportunity to continue the process by streamlining an outdated zoning ordinance.

That's most of it. Happy shrubbery planting, assuming you don't have to seek the approval of politicians or knights that formerly said "NI".

5/7/09

Who was the biggest winner at city council tonight?

Yes, Al Gore was the big winner. How?

We were presented with a resolution to join Travis County in an effort to comply with ozone regulations. A representative from Travis County told us that we need to join them in this effort to improve air quality, work cooperatively with them, reduce our carbon footprint ...

Reduce our carbon footprint? Some of you are aware that ozone is composed of 3 oxygen atoms. There is no carbon in ozone. What's this about carbon footprint?

Have you ever heard of a Freudian slip? The clear ulterior motive here is global warming. This is Al Gore getting big government to threaten small government to comply with his agenda. If you want to know what I think about that, click the Global Warming link on the left side of the screen.

The fact is that ozone has consistently decreased over the years, yet politicians in Washington setting the compliance levels at lower and lower levels. Look at their own data:


Now look at what they are forcing cities like ours to do:


I made a motion to postpone consideration to the next meeting. I don't think most council members really understood what they were voting on. There was never a working session to discuss it and voting on this on such short notice does not seem wise. My motion to postpone was ignored and we voted 6-1 (my dissent) to approve the resolution.

There was a lot of other stuff on a very busy agenda.

We began with an executive session which included a discussion of the ethics ordinance I have been working on on the agenda. It was decided by the mayor to move the ethics discussion from the executive session agenda to the regular meeting agenda and we proceeded on.

We then had a public hearing with Planning and Zoning regarding a new platting ordinance. Improvements have been made to streamline it, which I support. One item I noticed is that 1.13.G.1 says "The city shall not provide water or sewer service outside the corporate limits of the City of Lago Vista." In the past we considered opportunities to provide such service if we have the capacity and the clients bears the cost and makes it financially attractive to the city. It was suggested that 1.13.G.1 does not have to be strictly adhered to and there are provisions for exceptions in the ordinance. I am not a lawyer, but my read of this ordinance does not tell me that there are any exceptions to restricting utilities outside the city. I expect the ordinance will pass as written.

We also had a public hearing of the impact fee study. Impact fees are a good way of having growth pay for itself instead of making taxpayers subsidize growth. Developers must pay these fees for the impact on water and sewer demand. I had a question about the staff recommendation for higher impact fee and lower tap fees. The mayor said he opposes this because tap fees can be used without restriction but impact fees must be used only for infrastructure. Part of me thinks we should make impact fees more closely reflect the true cost which is higher, but tap fees are paid by water users anyway and it may not really matter. We will vote at a later time on what fees to adopt.

We had a presentation by the charter review committee on their recommendations. I have disagreed with Anne Ochoa on matters of policy previously, but the work her committee did was outstanding. They did a very thorough review of our charter in contrast to state law as well as our current practice. It appears there is not much in the way of substantive charter changes that need to go to the voters. The Charter review report is here:



We then had a lengthy presentation from Art Kern suggesting we eliminate minimum charges for water. His argument is that if he uses no water, why be forced to pay for it? I am sympathetic to this argument, but understand that there is cost to maintaining availability. You pay minimum charges for phone, internet, cable TV, and other services regardless of how much you use it. You pay this because you want those services available. Same goes for water. We took no action to eliminate minimum charges.

We amended our budget agenda to allocate a tax refund to Super S. This is the corporate welfare policy I voted against a few years ago (dig through the archives for more details). I voted with council to approve the amendment because the policy was already decided and all we are doing is complying with the agreement, even if I don't like it.

By the time we got to the end of the meeting, the mayor informed us that since the ethics review was on the executive session agenda and not on the regular meeting agenda, we could not address it because it needs to be on the agenda with sufficient notice for the meeting being held. Oh well, I guess we will talk next time. If you care, here is what I intended to present:

Latest draft of ethics ordinance

Considerations for further amendment

Well that should do it for now. Hope you keep yourself cool with all that global warming. I wonder how we could reduce this guy's carbon footprint?



4/30/09

Do you know who this is?


Apparently it's me!




Frankly I can understand why someone who doesn't know me very well might get this impression. We have all seen politicians that were more concerned with their ego than anything else.

You may not believe me, but I am sincere in my principles. Yes I am a daydreamer. I dream of a government that focusses on its limited role, defends property rights, defends the free market, and promotes voluntary interaction. That is a long way away from reality, but I dare to dream.

As far as being in the company of Reagan and Churchill, my aspirations are higher. I do not expect to ever achieve what those great individuals achieved, yet my role model is Jesus Christ. I will never walk on water, rise from the dead, or turn water into wine, yet I will continue to aspire to do as my role model would. Despite being rejected, abandoned, tortured, and killed, he did not let go of his principles.

Now if that makes me Barney Fife, well GOLLY! Oops, wrong character ...



4/26/09

I want to declare a success. Well, a partial success. Twice the LOG had as their headline story a discussion of imposing taxes on the tourism industry. I did not succeed in repealing the tax. I did succeed in bringing attention to an issue and having serious deliberation on policy. I must mention that some of you may think I am incoherent when you read the article by Mike Parker. Mike is a nice person and I don't believe he intends any harm on me. However, he quotes me:

"It's not unanimous," he said about local businesses supporting the bed tax. "They're paying for it. They're being taxed."

As the one who was there making the statement, this quote doesn't make a great deal of sense. Allow me to put it into proper context. My colleague Bob Bradley commented that he got a letter from a business owner opposing the repeal of the tax. He also said he thinks it is better for businesses to get promotion for free. I responded that the letter he got was from one business owner and that "it's not unanimous". What did he think of the several letters from other business owners supporting the repeal? It appeared Bob was not aware of these letters or hadn't read them. I then refuted the notion that these businesses are getting free advertising. That's when I said "They're paying for it. They're being taxed."

I trust that makes me appear less of an idiot than the article suggests. I will let you judge for yourself. Enjoy the article and letter below:










4/16/09

The bed tax lies awake!

The agenda this evening was pretty light. I pointed out that our charter does not allow a council member to abstain from a vote unless it is a conflict of interest and must state the reason for abstaining in the minutes. This caused the minutes to be amended to show the abstaining member to be shown voting NO. There was consideration of downzoning properties on Eisenhower Ave from R4 (multifamily) to R1 (single family). It was decided to get feedback from those property owners first. That was about it.

And then there is the "bed tax". I was surprised that my motion was seconded so that we could actually discuss it. One of the council members said he got a letter from a business owner opposing repealing the tax. When I mentioned their were other business owners that sent letter supporting repeal, it was apparent those letters were forgotten or were not read. In any case, I voted YES, everyone else voted NO, and that was the end of it.

But that really isn't the end of it. There is a new generation of people that were exposed to the possibility of change. Most cities adopt these tax and spend policies and never seriously discuss them. I was able to get some business owners to support this effort. I was able to get people to show up at council meetings to discuss it. I was able to get council members and staff to discuss it. I was able to get front page coverage of this issue:







A new generation is coming. We saw them at Tea Parties all over the country yesterday. At one of the Tea Parties I told the crowd that much focus in on the federal government. Much focus is on the state government. When was the last time you went to city hall? If you are going to attend massive tea parties all over the country, why can't you go down the street to support repealing a tax in your community?

Today only 53% of you think that Capitalism is better than Socialism.

In Russia, Vladimir Putin is warning us not to become socialists. In the April 4 edition of the Montreal "Globe and Mail" John Ibbitson says we already are socialists:



I have already shown you the cover of Newsweek magazine saying the same thing:



The new generation will replace you. They ones that are having government taxation and debt piled on their back with replace you. They are reading newspapers and websites. They will remember the effort to repeal the "bed tax". Next time, they will succeed.

3/25/09

Want a simple and easy way to have a tax protest before the April 15 IRS filing deadline? You don't have to march on Washington. You don't have to leave Lago Vista. Just print out one, or both, of the documents below, sign them, and drop off 7 copies at city hall and ask the attendant to put them in the mailboxes of council members.

Click on these images below to open these files

Why do this? Click on the letter below and it should explain it:



3/19/09

"For a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket trying to lift himself up by the handle." (Sir Winston Churchill)

You cannot tax yourself into prosperity. Sir Winston Churchill said it. Ronald Reagan said it. Adam Smith said it. Dr Milton Friedman said it. And now I say it.

Yet we tax local businesses under the premise that it will make them prosperous.

Tonight I presented my intent to repeal Lago Vista's Hotel Occupancy Tax (Article 11.200) otherwise known as the "Bed Tax". We tax anyone that charges for overnight lodging, take their money and put it into a government fund, then hand out some of it in order to promote those businesses. Right now we have over $140,000 of their money just sitting in city hall doing nothing. Does that sound like a free market? It's not, it's socialism. Yet defenders of this tax say that the tax benefits these businesses. That is not the opinion of the business owners who wrote letters supporting the repeal of it. Defenders of this tax say that people don't complain about it. That's right, they just look at the artificially inflated price of the room and decide not to pay it.

The discussion we had tonight was very cordial. The Chamber of Commerce which defends this tax was out in force and presented their objections respectfully. One of the business owners that feels the oppressive impact of this tax spoke in favor of repeal.

I understand why the Chamber wants this tax. If you had a business where you could use force and coercion to take money from your clients to guarantee your income, you might be in favor of that too (unless you had scruples). In my business, if I do not perform to my client's level of satisfaction, they send me out the door. It's probably the same in your business. For most of us, we have to earn our income. There is always the opportunity for your client to choose someone else. What the Chamber wants is to eliminate choice and competition. My point is that the clients of the Chamber are not 7 politicians who can use coercion to give them money. Their clients are the local businesses who can contribute to the Chamber when they provide services worth the investment.

This will be on the agenda for the April 16 meeting. Isn't it appropriate that we vote on repealing a tax after we suffer through IRS filing? If you are with me in defense of the free market, economic prosperity, and liberty, let city council know about it. If you defend taxation and socialism, I think there are some nice homes in California.









In other news, we approved the audit presented by Neffendorf, Knopp, Horry, and Doss. The audit was well presented and the information is favorable. The city is in pretty good financial shape and there are very few recommendations for improvement. Our city manager and staff have done an excellent job.

We had a few budgetary items to give more bed tax money to the Chamber of Commerce (I made the motion, for the record), replace broken copy machines, and use money allocated for the postponed Allegiance station water project for emergency work at water plant #1.

There was a discussion about a new contract with the Rusty Allen airport. Being a Libertarian, I am happy to agree with the consensus of council to maintain a cost neutral relationship which does not burden taxpayers with the financial responsibility of the airport.

One other item we took action on is canceling the May city council election. Why? Because none of you challenged those in office. I greatly respect my fellow council members and enjoy working with them. However, it is disappointing that these races are uncontested. It tells me that you either love what they are doing, or don't agree but also don't care. Understand that while there is no basis for attacking these fine individuals, their is basis for attacking policies, actions, and ideas. I attack these ideas. I attacked eminent domain abuse and lost. I am now attacking socialist taxation policies and might lose. That won't stop me from trying.

Lastly, I wanted to give you my thoughts about the animal shelter. This issue has not been on the city council agenda in some time, but has been written about in the NTL Log. I support what the city staff has done. We were in a situation where we were being asked for an ever growing tax burden to support the LifeLong Friends (formerly PAWS) animal shelter. What staff did is to find options for the state mandated animal control. We found other options which were very reasonable. This does not preclude using LifeLong Friends, and if they offer a reasonable cost to the taxpayer with appropriate service we will be happy to use them. Those that want to continue to support LifeLong Friends may do so. We now have the ability to make choices and use the most appropriate service at the best price. Hey, that sounds a little like a free market?

Perhaps the free market is dead. Perhaps socialism is inevitable. For those who believe you can tax yourself into prosperity, I only suggest you check out some homes in California.

3/6/09

Last night's council meeting began with an appreciation for the work that our building inspectors performed during hurricane Katrina. These two inspectors, Linda Alger and Gary Campbell, travelled down to the affected areas and helped with the difficult work down there.

Next was a proclamation honoring Judge Pat Malloy. It was difficult for people to keep their composure as the proclamation was read, as Pat was a well respected and loved member of the community.

There was a presentation by James Brown, former mayor of Jonestown, in his capacity as Social Services Program Administrator for the Travis County Health and Human Services and Veterans Service Family Support Services. James wanted to make our community aware of the services they provide so that people in need know where to go. He also mentioned that they are looking for volunteers to help with some administrative work. They are located right next to city hall in Jonestown, 18649 GM 1431 Suite 6A, 267-3245. I must comment that I am not a supporter of government welfare. I support lower taxation, smaller government, and promotion of the great volunteer and private charities that provide these services.

There was a request by The Hollows to reduce their letter of credit requirements and set the maintenance bonds. The letters of credit are the surety the city imposes to complete a development if the builder fails. Maintenance bonds are used to fix any problems after work if complete. CIty staff has inspected the work and concluded that the letters of credit can be significantly reduced since a lot of work has already been completed. I moved to approve staff's recommendations and it passed without objection.

Next there was an ordinance setting the impact advisory committee. This was a housekeeping measure to make official what the impact committee was already doing. Impact fees are used to assess builders for funding expansion of utilities capacity. As builders produce increasing demand, they are the ones who should fund the impact of demand on the utilities capacity. There was an ordinance in our binder which I moved approval of, and this motion was seconded. Then we were handed a revised copy with some edits in it. I asked that this version be substituted for the original ordinance, but that was not seconded as D'Anne Gloris said it did not contain dates for when terms on the committee expired. The ordinance in the binder didn't contain these dates either. Then Dick Bohn made oral amendments stating the terms and other necessary edits, and this motion to amend was seconded. I asked the secretary to read back these amendments. Frankly, you are always at risk when something drafted by staff is being amended on the fly. The secretary had not captured the numerous changes mentioned, so it took some time to straighten it out. You may be wondering why am I making a big deal about all this. The reason is that council and the mayor at this point became totally confused. There was a vote that passed, but I knew that all we had done is to vote on amending the original motion. We had not passed the main motion to pass the ordinance. The secretary would have to record that the amendments were approved, but the ordinance was never voted on. I raised a point of order that another vote was required. Because the mayor and council do not understand proper meeting procedure as I do there was big, confusing discussion about this. Eventually I was able to persuade the mayor to call for the final vote, which passed. We really need the mayor and council to have a better understanding of parliamentary procedure.

We then discussed awarding a bid for remodeling city hall. I noticed that the low bid was selected. I am always leery of selecting a low bid, especially when there is a large disparity between the lowest and highest bid. I was reassured that the builder, who was present, have done many large projects and are not newcomers to this business. The bid was awarded to Lago Builders.

We then voted to approve the city joining the Cooperative Purchasing Network, which is a free service that allows entities to participate in a cooperative purchasing program. This should give the city get better deals and save taxpayer dollars.

Now is another example of how things could have been better handled. I had put on the agenda a discussion of the bed tax. I was unable to get information I needed until just before the meeting, so I asked the mayor to postpone this discussion to the next council meeting. If this would have been announced at the beginning of the meeting, people who came to speak on this topic would have been able to either leave or address the topic in citizen inquiry. Instead the mayor said nothing until the item came up as one of the last items on the agenda and then announced that was was removed from the agenda. I made a motion to suspend the rules to allow people to address the topic as citizen inquiry for not more than 10 minutes, but the mayor said no. I wanted to be respectful of the people that sat there the whole meeting waiting for this to come up. It would have been much more appropriate to allow me to make a motion at the beginning of the meeting to amend the agenda and postpone this item to the next meeting, allowing the people that took the time to appear to address us in citizen inquiry.

The city manager announced in his report that after several years of operation, now Super S is asking for the tax subsidy that was passed (against my dissenting vote) several years ago. This proves my point; Super S did not need your taxes in order to build a grocery store. Now that times are tough they are using your taxes as their "bailout". If you complain about George Bush and Barack Obama with their "bailouts" and nationalization of our economy, you would be a hypocrite to be silent on the "bailout" of Super S. I am glad Super S is here and they are only doing what the rest of city council have allowed them to do, but this creeping socialism from your city council must end.

2/22/09

In case you didn't already know:

"We are all Socialists now"



At Thursday's council meeting we began with appointment of Hugh Farmer and Art Sedillo as municipal judges to replace Pat Malloy. We of course are saddened at the passing of Pat and express our condolences to his family. The position of judge is one of great importance and authority. I asked Hugh and Art to address council to express how they would approach the position. Both expressed concern of being unbiased and ethical, which is very welcome. We unanimously appointed both to the positions.

We also granted a variance to allow a property owner to have the city pay to install a street light. I was very much on the fence. The current ordinance is a bit hard to justify. It requires signatures from everyone within 500 feet. If there are vacant lots or people just aren't home and don't care, it seems overly burdensome. However I generally do not like the idea of putting burdens on taxpayers. The property owner states that the area is a high crime area and we will save money by having fewer police calls when the area is lit. We passed the variance, but I commented that I do not want to set a precedent where someone can impose the burden of installing security systems and other deterrents on their property on to taxpayers. At some point personal responsibility needs to be embraced.

I made the motion to approve the new zoning plan for The Falls development. There was wide agreement that this was a more agreeable plan than the previous one, and there was no objection.

That was most of it. Let's see if we can maintain some semblance of liberty and the free market as our nation drifts further into socialism.

2/6/09

I promise, the was no collusion between myself and the cartoonist:



Last night's council meeting began with the appointment of Dale Mitchell to fill the council seat vacated by Susan Euresti. I welcome Dale to council and look forward to working with him. This position will be up for election in May.

We also had a public hearing to discuss a rezoning request from residential to commercial for lot 1183A, which is a Reytex property just off Lohman Ford next to the homes formally used as the Reytex offices. We heard opposition from neighboring property owners concerned that this would cause more traffic and other nuisances. The use of the property has not been determined, but we are told that the owner is considering a water retention pond or a parking lot. A retention pond would not require rezoning but a parking lot would.

We considered amending an ordinance for city provision of street lights. The requester lives on Cheyenne Cove and says it is a high crime area and they need light to deter this activity. We did not have an ordinance to vote on in our packet so we really couldn't take any action. The objection to the current ordinance is that it requires signatures from property owners within 500 feet, which seems a bit extreme. The typical petition for variances and most other matters requires signatures from property owners within 200 feet. My issue is that there is not preventing them putting in a light on their own. When I was a kid my father installed a lamp in the front yard that automatically turned on when it got dark. People can purchase motion activated flood lights, alarm systems, and all manner of security measures. The requesters want to have the taxpayers pay. I have no objection to having a light as long as you are not shining it into someone else's window and causing a nuisance. I don't know if the ordinance should be changed, but I don't like the idea of taxpayers taking this burden. Neighborhoods need to accept some degree of responsibility. I realize that fewer calls to the police department saves taxpayer money, but that doesn't mean taxpayers need to pay more taxes to install security systems on your property.

We granted an extension of 180 days for a site development plan for Travis Plaza Cafe at 20711 Dawn Drive. We were told the property is owned by the father of our city secretary and due to personal circumstances an extension is being requested. I later got a call from a resident stating that the property was recently put up for sale and that the property owner has no intention of developing it.

We approved some changes to the sign ordinance and building committee ordinance that we mostly just clean up items.

We also approved a resolution awarding a bid for the traffic signal at Dawn and Lohman Ford. I got a call from a resident about this saying that a signal is not needed. The vote to approve this project was prior to my term on council and the vote last night was just to select the bid.

We then had the most excitement of the night voting on whether to seek attorney fees for Steven Reed vs City of Lago Vista case. Steven Reed is not a resident of Lago Vista but he filed a suit claiming the city was not properly formed. The case was ruled in favor of the city and thus far we have incurred about $7k in attorney's fees. This is not a lot of money, and the question was whether we should seek this money. I made a motion authorizing the city attorney to pursue recover of legal fees. I believe in the concept of loser pays. This is not intended to be a punitive action, but simply a way to address frivolous suits and defend those that incur legal fees. The vote resulted in a tie, which fails to pass.

Lastly we discussed a proposed ethics ordinance. Our charter says we have to have one, but we don't. I don't want something too verbose and complex that will deter people from serving on council or on our boards. The mayor put me in charge of a committee to review the proposal from staff. I wasn't asked for consent, so it is sort of involuntary servitude. That's OK, I don't strongly object. I will work with Darrel Hunt on this.

That's all for now. Smoke 'em if you got 'em.

1/24/09

I wanted to give you a timely update.

Susan Euresti has resigned from council. She is relocating to Georgetown for business purposes.

As some of you know, Susan defeated me in the election of 2007. Though we have disagreements on policies, she has been very good to work with. For the Fourth of July parade she supplied me with a golf cart and all materials to decorate and hand out goodies. It is important that people be able to disagree on policy yet work respectfully with each other. I wish Susan well in her endeavors.

What this means to you is there is an opening on council. Those interested in serving can contact me or other council members. Council will appoint person to fill this vacancy in a few eeeks. There will be an election to permanently fill the 2 year term in May.

1/15/09

It has been a long time since a city council meeting. Here is what happened last night.

We began with an appearance by new county commissioner Karen Huber. I am somewhat to blame/credit for her victory over Gerald Daugherty because my executive director Wes Benedict was in the race. I was planning to ask the commissioner some questions but she left quickly after saying hello. The questions I wanted to ask were:

- Will the land use controls you propose for Travis County only apply to unincorporated areas, or will our approvals of development in Lago Vista be subject to approval by Travis County?

- You mention that Gerald Daugherty opposed a budget that increased taxes and that the "free market" philosophy causes higher taxes, so how do you propose to address what many in our area feel is a high tax burden?

- You talk about the demands that growth imposes on water supply, but would you support addressing the TCEQ "no discharge" rule which causes us to acquire property and spray effluent?

- You mention the desire to keep the community safe, so would you support tougher sentencing in Travis County when juveniles do harm to someone or their property and hold parents accountable in order to avoid victimless crimes such as with curfew laws?

We then had a lengthy discussion of the new proposal for The Falls development. It appears that the new plan is much more agreeable to everyone than the one previously approved by council, except for Jim Awalt. I cannot figure out whether Jim prefers the previous plan or just doesn't ever want the property developed. One of Jim's concerns is whether a marina would comply with LCRA rules, but that is a matter for LCRA to determine, not Lago Vista city council.

We also had a very lengthy discussion about the proposal to allow parking on approved surfaces. I think we all agreed with it and could have approved it quickly, but it seemed there was a fascination with the subject that prolonged dwelling on it. One item that came from the audience was why we don't enforce it more actively and instead rely on a complaint based approach. I defend the complaint based approach because if people don't object there isn't a need to enforce it. If the people in your neighborhood do not find it unsightly for someone to park a vehicle somewhere, why should government care? Do we really want government crawling all over us forcing us to comply with rules that don't harm anyone?

I made a motion dissolving the Economic Development Foundation which passed without objection. I am all in favor of economic development in the free market, not at the taxpayer's expense.

I also reported the LCRA predicts our drought will extend into next year and our lake level could fall to 620 by June. That is mighty low. We are prepared to deal with the water supply issues, but let's hope we get a lot of unexpected rain.

Happy New Year, and GO STEELERS!

12/18/08

I am very delinquent.

I have not updated this page since Thanksgiving. There have been 2 council meetings since then. Why am I so delinquent. Well, here's one reason:



That is the Lakeside Singers, a local group that puts on Christmas concerts. This photo was taken from a performance we did at a nursing home a few weeks ago. My voice was copiously employed over the last several weeks with a number of groups. That occupied a lot of my time. My principle involvement was with the Texas Choral Consort.

So now let's get caught up.

At the meeting held on Dec 4, there was a joint meeting with Planning and Zoning concerning a proposed development called Ensenada near Continental and Cody. There is some controversy because the development is on the lake shore and may block views of homes that are currently there. However, the existing zoning for that area would also block views. The developer is proposing a planned development district that they think would be more acceptable than the existing zoning. Another issue is that the development would be in the flood plane and sometimes Continental is under water, so how would residents evacuate? There is also a question about a pile of soil on the property that the developer says was a mistake by a contractor, but people want this eyesore removed. I don't think people were very receptive to this development. The developer said what they wanted was some public feedback before they come forward with a more formal development proposal.

Additionally, there was further discussion of revisions to the ordinance governing parking of vehicles on lots. It looks to me like staff has come up with the best approach to meet the interests of council. There is debate about whether it is too impractical to not allow a vehicle to be parked on gravel or a pervious material, but staff is recommending a limited enumerated types of materials to be permitted. I don't want to belabor this and give staff an impossible job, and the revision is much better than the current conflicts in the existing ordinances.

Tonight we had a review of a traffic study conducted on a few problem areas. Near the elementary school tends to be an area where people are parking illegally because there isn't enough access for drop off/pickup. Some recommendations are being made for signage to help remind people, and some discussion with the school needs to happen to get enforcement to happen. The result of the current condition is that traffic is getting blocked and students are more at risk from the heavy traffic. Another recommendation is installation of sidewalks on the north side of Dawn Drive. While this is a nice amenity and would aid student pedestrian travel, I am not sure how beneficial it would be and we would have to intrude into people's front yards. Since there is already sidewalk on the south side of Dawn, it may be more beneficial and cost effective to put crosswalks in to get people across the street onto the existing sidewalks.

We also had a review of the capital improvement projects from the 2006 and 2008 bonds. Good news is that overall we are anticipating we won't need all of the bond money for these projects so we can pay down our debt. Some projects dealing with water service are complete, and some are pending bids or other work projects. Generally the high priority items are getting done. Some of the effluent expansion is being delayed until the demand starts trending upward. Staff has saved about $50k by coming up with a new design for distributing effluent on the golf course.

Another positive note is that we had a complimentary letter for the police department from someone who went into insulin shock while driving. Officers Don Vorner and Brad Voneesheid responded and immediately recognized her condition and called the paramedics. The writer of the letter said how nice and understanding the officers were. This is not the first compliment I have seen in my years on council and I think our department is doing a great job.

Well that will have to hold you over until after the holidays. I hope you have a restful and blessed Christmas and New Year.

11/26/08

Happy Turkey day, hope all goes well for you.

Yes I know the last council meeting was a week ago and I am late with my update, but nobody complained leading me to think nobody reads this anyway. That won't stop me from documenting the history of this council.

The main point of discussion at our meeting concerned the airport and the parking ordinance.

Regarding the airport, we were informed the airport POA wants to discontinue the contract with the city. That lead the city to consider imposing a tax district called a PID, which I do not like. It would impose new property taxes on some number of properties around the airport. It seems the main concern of the POA is their liability if an accident occurs at the airport. We all seemed to agree there are ways to address the liability concerns within the context of the existing contract, which we would like to continue.

Regarding the parking ordinance, we seem to be close to a final draft. The last part is whether the ordinance should explicitely state what kind of parking surfaces are permitted and the material to be used (concrete, pavers, etc) or simply state what would not be acceptable and allow people some flexibility to conform. The latter is my preference, but this does make it difficult for staff to draft. If you write legislation that is vague it can be difficult to enforce. However if you write it with a lot of detail it can become ridiculous because you can't anticipate every case and such laws may be very unreasonable on specific properties.

Lastly, in an effort to remain "fair and balanced" I have updated my Global Warming page.

There is a video from James Burke that I find to be the best explanation of the alarmist view of global warming, far better than Al Gore's presentation. It is found at "James Burke from 1989"

On the other hand, new evidence is increasingly on the side of the skeptics, as you can see at "Attacks on the skeptics"

That's it for now. Enjoy your tryptophan..

11/7/08

A short agenda but a long discussion at last night's meeting

We began with a discussion with planning and zoning committee about a streamlined process for platting, which I support. It was obvious some people do not understand what platting is. Some were asking why we are changing the process when we have PDD's (plannned development districts). PDD's pertain to zoning, not platting. A plat is a subdivision of land into lots. For example, if you have 100 acres and divide it into 100 lots, that is platting. The plat shows how many lots there are and where the property lines are. It does not say anything about what the use is (residential, commercial, etc) or anything about the structures (building height, setbacks, etc). That is covered in zoning. A PDD is a zoning standard that is written by the city and the developer when the existing zoning classification doesn't work.

Another point that was raised is how do we get developers to help us. Sometimes we get incomplete information or last minute changes and it makes it hard for P&Z or council to render an opinion. I said we need to establish deadlines for developers to get information into our packets that we have at our meetings. If there are last minute changes it tends to hurt the chances of a developer to get approval. The natural tendency is to either defer a decision or reject it if last minute information comes in that we haven't had time to review. Sometimes the changes are helpful and merit reconsideration, so common sense discretion can be applied.

The overall objective is to eliminate duplication or unnecessary effort which will save the taxpayer money.

One of my colleagues objects to eliminating the requirement to notify property owners when property is replatted. There are 2 areas of the city that are designated as unplatted and currently our process is to notify nearby property owners if it is to be replatted. There is public notification when a site development plan is presented and that will not change. The same goes for a zoning change. I do not see the necessity of public notice when an area already zoned is platted. There is no change in the use, only how the property lines in the area will be drawn.

There was also a discussion about proposals to deal with the previously mentioned problem of conflict within our ordinances about parking. The screening requirements, fence requirements, and surface requirements currently cannot be complied with because they are contradictory. I support eliminating the screening requirement and allowing parking on improved surfaces.

There was some discussion about mandating how many boats or vehicles someone can have and prohibiting anyone other than the property owner from parking on your property. I absolutely oppose this. We even had one of our council members justify this approach because some of you "don't have good taste". Do you really want the police forcing you to prove that you own everything parked on your property? If you don't have enough parking space on your property and obstruct the right of way by having thing parked in the street, we already have laws that pertain. We don't need more unenforceable laws.
The other item that had some discussion was an ethics ordinance. Our charter review committee found that we are not in compliance with the requirement to have such an ordinance. A draft ordinance was presented which was recently adopted by Cedar Park. As you know I am very supportive of open government, but we all agreed that this draft was too onerous and would have the effect to scaring away candidates from running for office or serving on our boards. I favor having a simple ordinance that is in agreement with the provisions already existing in our charter to disclose and eliminate conflicts of interest. An interesting section of the draft ordinance was the creation of an ethics review commission would would oversee potential conflicts of interest. I find it strange that Cedar Park has city council appoint members to this commission, which effectively has city council overseeing city council. To have any real purpose it should be the public with oversight over council and perhaps these members should be elected. In short I think we will have a much more compact proposal when we finally consider this.

Lastly, there was discussion of moving council meetings up to start at 6:30 instead of 7:30. This can impact working people like me, so I don't want to make it too early, but 6:30 is OK. Look for an announcement on this. Also, the Christmas tree lighting ceremony will now be Dec 8.

That's it for now. See ya.

10/19/08

Our last city council meeting was brief, but let me cover some other ground first.

I notice lots of political signs in people's yards. There must be an election soon! I also notice many of these properties have more than one sign, in fact quite a few. Do you know that the Lago Vista sign ordinance prohibits more than 1 yard sign per candidate per lot? I won't turn you in; I feel this is a First Amendment issue. I am in compliance, as you can see:



For the council meeting, the majority of the discussion involved what to do about recreational vehicles and boats that were parked not in compliance with our zoning codes. The code prohibits parking on a non-improved surface and states that they must be screened from view. However our code also prohibits fences taller than 6 feet which makes it impossible to screen an RV. There was discussion about what kinds of improved surfaces (concrete, asphalt, etc) should be permitted. It seems to me we should simply list surfaces which are NOT permissible, such as grass and dirt. That way we don't have to rewrite code every time a new surface material comes along. For screening, I think waiving the requirement for taller vehicles or allowing fences to be taller can address it.

Some council members were saying that such vehicles should be taken off of properties and stored in private storage. I think it is not right for people that purchased property on a lake to be told they have to pay to store their boat somewhere else.

I think we also need to avoid writing laws than ignore common sense. I know someone that has an old stagecoach and has planted it in their yard to enhance the visual appeal. If you write a broad law denying all vehicles from being parked on grass, would the stagecoach be illegal?

Now for some follow up on eminent domain. This is the latest coverage from the NLT LOG. If nothing else, at least we have raised the issue and made people aware of the concern. I do not agree with the interpretation of state law cited here. I worked and lobbied for the bills referenced in the state legislature, so I am familiar with them. That does not mean efforts at the local level to protect your property rights are without merit:





10/2/08

No, I did not see the debate on TV because we had our own on city council.

Before I get into city issues, I don't mind sharing what I think about federal government bailouts:
First, many of you have been calling into city hall worried about eminent domain. You saw that our council agenda had an item regarding acquiring property. City staff has been fielding calls about this.

Where were you when I needed you? You could have helped me when I presented this to council. Instead, Mike Thornton told us that nobody showed up to support me so we lost by a 4-3 vote.

The item on the agenda was not about eminent domain, but because our charter has no protection you are vulnerable if council did have such an item on the agenda. If you really care, help me. Contact me and tell me you want to protect your property rights. There are still things that can be done, but I cannot do them alone.

Tonight we began by recognizing a very deserving individual. Lago Vista's Lindsey Charmichael returned from the 2008 Paralympics in Beijing, China with a bronze medal in archery. A tremendous accomplishment.

We had a discussion of streamlining the planning and zoning process. This is an effort I lead in my first term as liaison to P&Z and I think this presents a big opportunity to eliminate some confusion and save lots of money and time. I am very encouraged to see this go forward.

We approved a final plat for the Villa Montechino development, which has been a long time in the making. On my motion it was unanimously approved.
We then considered a variance for a sign for a business called Cody Pools. The sign blew down and when it was put back up the city said it was not in compliance with our ordinances. This is pretty crazy, but a sign that was in place before the new ordinance was written is grandfathered in. However if it ever gets damaged it cannot be replaced, even if it is the same sign. I think common sense has to apply here. I made a motion to approve the variance to let the sign go back up, and the motion won 4-3.

We approved a capital improvement program, which prioritizes and plans infrastructure investment. With the possibility of tough economic conditions next year, it is a separate matter whether we vote to authorize bonds to pay for these projects. We will have to see where we are next year. Thus far no spending is authorized for these projects.

That's most of the big stuff. If you want to help tackle even bigger threats, tell Congress to vote NO on a bailout and help me fight for your property rights.

9/18/08

Tonight I failed to persuade council to support a resolution further defining powers of eminent domain. The vote was 3 in support (myself, D'Anne Gloris, Darrel Hunt) and 4 opposed.

Why did it fail?

- Some expressed the notion that state law already has language defining eminent domain powers and that for a city to do so is redundant. Despite the fact that the Institute for Justice presented examples of Texas cities that have done exactly what I was trying to do, some thought our city should not address the issue. I think there is a fundamental misunderstanding that I was unable to effectively argue tonight.

- Former council member Mike Thornton said there was no outcry for this and that I was the only one supporting it. Although we had some letters of support and a letter in the LOG, he does have a point. Nobody showed up to speak in favor. If you cared about this, you didn't convey that to members of council. That certainly did not help my effort.

- Mike also said that they carefully looked at the charter language when they first wrote it years ago. What they didn't know 5 years ago is that the Supreme Court would say that the 5th amendment no longer protects you from having government give your property to someone else. That is why cities have changed their charters in Texas and all over the country.

- Mike also said the we presented a similar resolution to the Texas Municipal League a few years ago which got dismissed, proving that there is no support at the state and municipal level for preventing eminent domain abuse. If I sound like I am picking on Mike, I do like him personally but absolutely disagree with his lack of concern for limited government. Organizations like TML want cities to have unlimited power. When the Kelo decision ruled that cities can transfer property to other private entities, TML applauded this. Do you want to be on their side? Do you want to give a politician that power? Mike does, and I find that frightening. We have constitutions and charters for the purpose of limiting government power and protecting your rights. You can either be on the side of TML which gives government all the power and takes away your rights, or on my side where government has specific and limited powers as defined in its constitutions and charters.

- Lastly, Mike said that if a charter proposal passes, it will bind future councils for the next 5 years. Of course! That is the point! Someday these council members will not be on council. The city will have grown and other more ambitious politicians will have the votes. How secure will your property rights be? We limit government power specifically because we don't want it abused. Once upon a time the states ratified the US Constitution. It has been shredded and our federal government has grown way beyond its intended purpose. The same can happen to a city.

I intend to be involved with the charter review committee to clear up the misunderstanding of how state and local law coexist. I hope we can get a charter amendment on the ballot for you to vote on. It won't happen if you sit on your hands. If you don't speak up now, don't complain when the next property taken through eminent domain is yours.

In other news, we adopted the city budget tonight with a reduced tax rate. We also increased the rate for waste collection service due to increased operating costs.

That is all for now. I do respect my fellow council members and we had a good lengthy discussion tonight. I feel there are some fundamental misunderstandings, but this is not due to malice. I hope we can get better educated before we suffer the consequences.

9/13/08

The latest big news story in Lago Vista:



Please drop a letter to council members at city hall or show up next Thursday to let our council know that you support this. Below is a letter that I presented to council on this topic:

Fellow council members,

I have asked the mayor to add this item to the agenda to discuss an issue of concern for the people of Lago Vista.

As you know, the charter review committee is working on updates for the city charter. The updates will be presented for a public vote in May of next year. It would be helpful for the committee to receive input from council to be able to focus on specific areas. My intention is not to issue mandates, but to respect the discretion of the charter review committee. I want to recognize their skills and opinions, but offer respectful guidance form council.

We are all aware that the issue of eminent domain has become prominent in Lago Vista. The condemnation of the golf course raised the issue and many residents understood that eminent domain is not an issue that exists elsewhere but also exists here.

My hope is to issue assurance to the people of Lago Vista that we do respect property rights and support reasonable protection of private property. The current charter states that eminent domain can be used for a public purpose, but does not define what a public purpose is. The Supreme Court "Kelo" decision implies that anything can be a public purpose, including taking you property and giving it to someone else. This caused widespread outrage across the country. Many cities, including Austin, modified their laws to specifically define the understanding of public purpose. In 2005 our council unanimously stated that cities in Texas should modify their laws to define public purpose in its application to eminent domain.

The resolution presented does not eliminate eminent domain. It simple allows the charter review committee to apply reasonable definition to section 2.03 so that eminent domain cannot be abused. I have asked Matt Miller from the Institute for Justice to address us and discuss what other cities have done to update their laws to prevent eminent domain abuse.

I ask your support of this important resolution.

Pat Dixon, Lago Vista council place #1

Below is the text of the resolution:

RESOLUTION:

A RESOLUTION REGARDING THE DEFINITION OF THE "PUBLIC PURPOSE" CLAUSE IN SECTION 2.03 (EMINENT DOMAIN) OF THE CITY CHARTER

WHEREAS: The June 2005 US Supreme Court ruling in the Kelo vs. New London case further exposed the threat of private property owners to government condemnation and taking of their property to transfer to private entities;

WHEREAS: In the wake of this ruling, cities across the United States and Texas passed ordinances restricting the eminent domain powers of government;
WHEREAS: The City of Lago Vista unanimously passed a resolution in 2005 "That the City of Lago Vista proposes that the Texas Municipal League promote to its member cities the importance of defending property rights and limiting municipal eminent domain powers by clearly stating the limits of these powers in their charters and ordinances.";

WHEREAS: The property owners of Lago Vista depend upon city government to defend their property rights;

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF LAGO VISTA, TEXAS, THAT:

The City of Lago Vista formally requests that the Citizens Review Committee address the definition of "Public Purpose" in section 2.03 of the city charter and consider language to prevent the use of eminent domain for taking private property from one private entity and transferring property to another private entity

8/22/08

A pretty busy week for city council. Here is what has transpired.

On Monday we had our budget retreat. The budget proposal from staff is very well prepared and they did a very good job. I think it is moving in the right direction of having taxes lower and having fees set at their cost recovery point.

The biggest item I would like to see addressed is the hotel tax. We currently enforce a "bed tax" which taxes people providing overnight lodging service. The money goes into a city fund that can only be used to promote tourism. The city has accumulated over $102,000 in this fund. Since our city staff has no time to promote tourism, it gets sent to organizations like the Chamber of Commerce. We can't really tell if our money is used by these organizations for its intended purpose. This is remarkably inefficient. It is commonly understood that for every dollar government spends it takes as much as 2 dollars in taxation to fund the overhead plus the expense. I have been proposing that we end the "bed tax" and have all the money dispersed to organizations like the Chamber as a one-time shot in the arm, and then close out the account. That allows hotels to fund the Chamber directly without city government overhead. Measures like this would help free up city staff to focus on its core purpose and allow the free market to thrive.

At our council meeting last night we approved the 4th draft of a short term occupancy ordinance. The current ordinances make it illegal to rent out a residence for lodging for less than 30 days. The new ordinance provides a legal means of requesting a permit for this purpose. There are already laws on the books to address nuisances which impose penalties on people that park in the right of way, create noise, or trash. Although not my ideal ordinance, it is a clear improvement over the current laws.

A complication is that it makes the "bed tax" practically unenforceable. Trying to find every person that might charge someone to sleep overnight and impose a tax is not realistic. The "bed tax" is more trouble than it is worth and will cost more to enforce than any benefit we would derive. Yet another reason to allow hotels to deal directly with the Chamber and cut out the government middleman.

We had a spirited discussion of releasing surety for the Villa Montechino development. The surety consisted of a letter of credit and warranty bond to ensure that if the development did not get completed the city would have the funds to complete the infrastructure. Brian Atlas has been working on this project from the start and was not very happy with recent concerns. I asked him to speak because I saw him in the audience and wanted a balanced understanding of the issue. The city reduced his letter of credit significantly about a month ago, and I was wondering why he was asking for further relief so soon when it appeared more work on the development remained to be completed. He began by saying that he was asking for partial relief instead of the complete release of the obligation that was previously requested. He then began saying that the city has not been fair with him and has been changing terms and conditions as the project proceeded. The city manager explained that there were differences between Brian's original agreement and what actually transpired. We could not approve the complete release as presented.

We set the preliminary property tax rate at 0.5700/$100, which is a reduction of 0.01 from the current tax rate. There will be public meetings on Sept 4 and Sept 11 prior to our vote on setting the final tax rate Sept 18.

There was a discussion of providing water service to Gary and Angela Hudson who live outside city limits. I would not object if we had excess supply capacity and the service rates covered the full cost of water service. Since the current water rates are lower than the actual cost and is subsidized by city property tax, it would be bad fiscal policy to provide water service to those not paying city property tax. We are working our way towards rates that cover the cost of the service, and when we reach that point I would have no objection to providing the service as long as we have sufficient capacity.

The most emotional issue of the night regarded the animal shelter. There is a huge volume of letters for and against the Lifelong Friends animal shelter. By state law the city must provide 3 days of shelter, food, and water for animals that are picked up by animal control. The shelter acknowledges that it is overcrowded, and it seems their adoption policies are very restrictive. Our council has agreed to open up solicitation of bids under terms that we specify. After the meeting several people expressed their concerns to me, and I think it might be a good idea to have an informal talk. I used to schedule "Chat with Pat" sessions to allow people to come and share their concerns, but few people expressed interest. If at least 10 people email me at Pat@PatDixon.org expressing their interest in talking to me about animal control and the shelter, I will arrange to set up a time somewhere in town where we can get together and have a discussion.

I have done some research on the tax appraisal process in preparation for a resolution to present to the Texas Municipal League. The previous Travis County appraiser Art Cory told us 2 years ago that appraisal districts do not have access to market data on property sales and that there is inequity in the way the comptroller audits property rich districts like ours compared to the districts receiving Robin Hood money. I am finding this to be a very complicated issue. I believe I will have something to offer, but I think the best way to reduce you tax burden is to elect Libertarians.

Lastly, at the Sept 4 meeting I will have a representative from the Institute for Justice speak about eminent domain. I will be presenting a resolution asking to review our charter language and protect you from eminent domain abuse such as in the Supreme Court's Kelo case. If you care about your property rights, I would welcome your attendance at the Sept 4 council meeting.

8/9/08

It's been busy, so sorry for my delayed update

At our council meeting we had a pretty light agenda. The Island Phase II discussion was withdrawn after the the developer withdrew their plans.

We had a vote to adopt a resolution on the new Master Plan. As I have mentioned before, I respectfully dissent. Ron Paul endorsed me and the only principled vote I can cast consistent with the endorsement is in opposition.

We did discuss proposals for the annual Texas Municipal League conference. I proposed a resolution regarding a more equitable tax appraisal approach. Although a lot of the inequity has to do with more scrutiny of the wealthy school districts, the appraisals also effect municipal taxpayers. I agreed to present draft resolutions at a future council meeting.

There has been a lot of talk about the animal shelter. I had had several discussions and visited the shelter and I believe the allegations of abuse are without basis. However I do have a concern that the shelter's adoption policies seem to be very strict and there is an accumulation of animals in the shelter driving up operating costs. If it is a private shelter relying on donations, that's fine. However the city must be responsible stewards of you tax money and if we find another provider for animal control that meets the requirements, provides appropriate service, and reduces your tax burden, I am interested.

That is all for now.

7/18/08

First I want to let you know about something that has nothing to do with Lago Vista City Council:

Invitation to meet presidential candidate polling at 6% nationally

It is free of charge and open to the public right here in Austin, so I didn't want you to miss out

People may have noticed I was pretty quiet at tonight's council meeting. There really wasn't much for me to say. The meeting went uneventfully.

First there was a tribute to Hollace Bowden, "Mr Lago Vista". One of the nicest people around and a big part of this city's history.

Then there were presentations from various groups requesting the city to give them money in the budget. I respect these groups and value their contribution to the community, but I prefer that they not be financed through coercion. I would like to make government smaller and spend less of your money so we can put money back into the pockets of our residents and businesses so that you can support the causes that you most care about.

There was one particular issue discussed about a request for money from LifeLong Friends, formally known as the PAWS animal shelter. Several of the former volunteers were present to state that the current conditions and treatment of animals at the shelter is not acceptable. I have visited the shelter before, but not recently. I should probably check it out. I do understand it is difficult with little funding and few volunteers to do the job, especially when people drop animals at you doorstep. I thank these people for bringing their concerns to our attention.

We approved the new FEMA flood plane maps, as if we had a choice. The problem here is a National Flood Insurance Program that micro manages city policies and encourages people to build in locations that can get flooded. Maybe when Libertarians get in Congress we can eliminate these federal bureaucracies and allow people and cities to take responsibility for their actions.

There was an item for discussion of the master plan, but I had nothing to add from previous comments. I want to explain that I know the people that worked on this made genuine and sincere efforts to do the right thing, but I have fundamental disagreements of the role of government micro managing the economy and private property rights.

That's really all there is to it. If you want to see me Saturday night at the big event we will be happy to have you.

7/13/08

The issue of short term rentals continues to be in the news. Refer to the Archives for more background on the issue. Below is the most recent revision of an ordinance presented at our last council meeting (what is referred to as Proposal #2).

MS Word version with revision markings

Text version without revision notations

There is another draft being worked on. Here are some comments I have sent to staff regarding a new draft:

It seems to me that when there is a nuisance situation, the violators as well as the property owner should be held accountable. I would suggest the first offense be a warning that the officer has the discretion to give. If someone is loud and the officer has to knock on the door, most of the time they will quiet down and the problem is resolved. If it re-occurs, reciprocity should be assessed on an escalating basis. This goes to both the offender and the property owner. There is a de-escalation procedure so that the property doesn't forever carry an oppressive penalty.

For example, a person calls and complains that it is late and someone is being loud. The officer responds as under our existing ordinance and knocks on the door of the offending party. If the occupant is cooperative and promises to quiet down, the officer notifies them that they have been warned and leaves. A letter will be mailed to the property owner notifying them of this warning. An hour later the same person calls and says they are at it again. This time the officer issues a citation, which will also be sent in the mail to the property owner. A week later there is a call that the same house is being loud, and the officer finds a different occupant in the house. The citation escalates and the property owner gets the escalating penalty. The property owner who has been renting out this property finds all these escalating penalties in the mail and starts scrutinizing renters closer. For the next 6 months there are no complaints. Then there is another call with a complaint. The officer responds and issues a warning because the record has been clean for a sufficient time to clear the record.

I suggest that if the penalty be a fine, it be based on the cost of our involvement. The time the dispatcher, officer, and staff take to administer this incident should be the starting point, and the second offense should double it, the third will triple, and so on.

So how does the fine get paid? Either the occupant or the property owner can pay, but it will escalate to the point that the property owner will be involved. For example, if the officer issues a $1,000 fine to the occupant at the time of the incident, there is likely to be sticker shock. The occupant and the property owner are going to have to figure out how they are going to handle this. Ultimately we should hold the property owner responsible for paying if the occupant is non responsive.

There is the argument that if someone gives someone else a gun and that person kills someone you don't send the gun owner to death row. However if they are an accomplice they are guilty. I am proposing the same approach here.

You notice I don't mention anything about a permit or a registration as was mentioned at our last meeting. That is intentional. I think that approach creates more bureaucracy, more enforcement challenges, and really does not address the nuisance issue effectively. To me the only issue is one of nuisance.

I hope this is helpful. I understand there are details to be filled in, but I would like to see an approach like this form the basis of the remedy.

No action has been taken at this time. We want to take our time and do this right.

7/2/08

First we will start off with my 15 minutes of national fame, from the June 23rd USA Today:

Tonight's meeting started off with a discussion of the short term rental issue. The background is that it is currently illegal in Lago Vista for a person to rent out their house to someone else. This may come as a surprise since a lot of people do this not thinking it would be illegal. When I first moved here I got a long term assignment in Virginia and considered renting out my house to someone. I would not have imagined I would be breaking the law. What harm would it do to anyone?

The first question is whether it should be legal for someone in a residential area to rent their house. The argument against says this violates the zoning which is single family residential, not multi family commercial. It also causes trash, noise, and parking nuisances.

I disagree. The fact is that this law is unenforceable and we already have lots of people in violation. I do not think government has any business telling me who can be on my property. There are only 2 ways I can think of to enforce this. One is to have police responsible for finding out what people are in what buildings. This is Orwellian and I do not think police want to be in that business. The other way is if a neighbor complains. We have all heard of cities where neighborhoods use intimidation tactics to shut out people of a particular ethnicity, faith, or lifestyle. I am not sympathetic to someone saying they do not want someone in their neighbor's house. I do not care what people are in what building. The only complaint I am sympathetic to is if their neighbor is causing a nuisance.

The way to address that is to enforce nuisance laws, not through zoning. Our city staff is concerned that a renter gets a citation one week for a loud party, next week a different renter blocks traffic on the street, next week a different renter has a loud fraternity party. If you fine the renters, you cannot eliminate the problem.

The solution is to hold the property owner accountable. If the owner is irresponsible in allowing someone to disturb his neighbors, make the owner responsible and impose retribution. Escalate the penalty for repeat offenses. If it were up to me, I would have no restriction on what happens inside a house and enforce nuisance laws against the property owner. That would handle it.

We agreed to have city staff issue another draft to provide a simple process to make short term rentals legal. Understand again that the current laws says this is illegal, so we are trying to find a way to make short term rentals legal.

We then had a presentation from the Master Planning Committee on their revisions of the Master Plan. I want to mention that these volunteers have put in a lot of work over the last 20 months and their effort is appreciated.

However I must respectfully admit that I have a deep philosophical opposition to the goals and objectives expressed in the Master Plan. Any rational reader of this plan would have to admit that it is fundamentally opposed to the principles of a free market. Forgive me, but the goals and objectives of this Master Plan are socialist.

Consider Objective 2.5:

Objective 2.5: Identify and pursue the types of businesses that allow the City of Lago Vista to be more self sustaining and take advantage of existing commercial and recreational facilities, proximity to Lake Travis and natural hill country aesthetics.

Most of you probably find nothing wrong with that. I do. It states that is is government's objective to decide which businesses we have. It clearly rejects the free market. When the market dictates demand for a particular good or service, supply meets the demand. When government thinks it is smarter than the marketplace, you have socialism. The Soviet Union crumbled, North Korea is starving, and Cuba is 50 years behind the times.

Consider this one:

Objective 4.3: Develop programs that encourage and provide incentives for the construction of energy efficient residences and use of native plants an low water-use landscaping.

A lot of free market principles are under attack from global warming alarmists. They want government to tax you to create house that Al Gore and Austin mayor Will Wynn want you to have. If you want efficiency, make sure that fuel and water prices accurately reflect their true cost. Let people make their own decisions with their own money.

Look at this one:

Objective 4.5: Investigate providing City utilities to predetermined underdeveloped areas within Lago Vista as a development stimulus.

So we take areas where someone didn't want to develop and force taxpayers to make them develop anyway? A developer should put their own money into the project and not force you to subsidize them. That is the way the market works.

The last one I will mention is:

Objective 8.6: Initiate and develop recreational programs needed by the community that private associations or private interests are not able to provide.

In order to accept the premise of this objective, you must reject the free market and adopt socialism. The premise is that if someone wants something that they can't get enough other people to support, they can use the coercive powers of government to force you to pay for it. I cannot help but think what Patrick Henry would think if he knew that people are so willing to give up liberty because government thinks they should force recreational programs on the taxpayers.

I fully expect this Master Plan to be adopted. It does not become law but is regarded as a guide for planning and zoning. Regardless, I cannot put my name behind something that I reject in principle.

We then had liaison assignments and I picked up the LCRA and FEMA floodplain responsibilities.

Lastly we discussed the water and wastewater rates. I was encouraged to hear unanimous support for lowering our tax rate and adjusting our water rates to cover their costs. We have had rates that were well below that actual cost so we would lose money if we provided service to properties outside of the city that didn't pay property tax. We are working toward having the utilities be a self sustaining operation and lower you increasing property tax burden.

That will do for now. Have a great Independence Day and remember the principles of economic and individual liberty that are the foundation of our country.

6/19/08

I enjoy the opportunity to state my oath to defend the Constitution of the United States. Some may consider it a formality, I consider it an obligation:



Now for the news:

Our council meeting tonight began with discussion of a request to use the city's swimming pool to run a for-profit swimming lesson. I support people that get out there and create a profitable business. However, the pool is fully booked and we would have to bump someone off the schedule to allow this. I would only do so if the business was charged a reasonable fee to cover their impact on maintenance. I frankly do not support government getting outside of its core business, and running swimming pools is not a core function of government. I know it is a popular amenity, especially this summer, but that doesn't mean it is the business of government. The person requesting the use of the pool did not appear and the request was unanimously denied.

Next we had several approvals for a project called The Majestic and Keegan's Crossing. These were unanimously approved by the planning and zoning committee, and our council also approved them.

We then considered approvals regarding Villa Montechino. The primary concern expressed by Richard Wainright is the location of buildings near the perimeter of the property, which puts them in proximity to his property. Previous to my term, the council had approved the zoning to permit this, and to deny this request would have sent everything backwards and overturn the previous decisions of the planning and zoning and city council. I understand some people have the expectation that they will always be surrounded by pristine wilderness and that zoning will protect them. Zoning is a poor substitute for private property ownership and binding contracts.

We had a lengthy discussion about a sign variance for the Lago Vista Coffee Co. This property has been several businesses over the years and I think the signs on the property have been there for quite a while. Right now the sign has the gas station's price board on top, the coffee shop's logo in the middle, and the coffee shop's message board with changeable text on the bottom. The sign ordinance says this is out of compliance because it gives the business too much sign area; don't you just love government? The memo from the building committee stated that they approved of the sign displaying the business logo but does not recommend approving the one on the bottom with the text. I presume this would mean the sign on the bottom would have to be removed or just sit there blank without being used. Susan Euresti made a motion to approve a variance to allow the sign with the logo. The meaning of this motion appeared to be unclear to some, but to me it looked exactly like what the building committee recommended. My intent was to make sure this business at least had a sign permitted. I don't like government making things harder for our local businesses. I was then considering a substitute motion to be more lenient when the coffee shop owner presented a compromise proposal consisting of the message board remaining and replacing the large logo sign with a smaller one. I voted for the original motion by Susan but it was defeated. I then made another motion approving the compromise as illustrated in the drawing supplied by the owner. This passed. A lot of talk about a sign.

We then discussed budget priorities. I decided to become a punching bag by making the following recommendations:

- Lower the ad valorem tax rate in order to balance the utility rates. For some time I have told you that we sell water for less than it costs. This is a disincentive to conservation and prevents serving utilities outside our city limits, which eliminates a potential revenue stream. It looks like we have made some progress on this, but I would like to see continued progress in this budget. When you are getting killed on property taxes, we need to help give our people a break.

- We have a bed tax that accrues money in a fund that can only be used to promote tourism. I propose abolishing the bed tax and liquidating the funds for their intended purpose. We are actually hurting tourism by taxing the people trying to promote tourism. No matter how good our city staff is, it is tremendously inefficient to tax the tourism industry and have government try to promote tourism. Let's get government out of the tourism industry.

- Our city participates in a plan that imposes a 1% retail tax on all our local business. Cities like Rollingwood, Westlake, Cedar Park, and Pflugerville tried it for a while and then found out it was not a good deal and dropped out. What I referring to is Capital Metro. There are alternatives like CARTS. We need to be be responsible stewards of your money and be fair to our local businesses.

That concludes the bulk of the council meeting, but I do want to mention an item that has much bandied about. There is a proposal to pass an ordinance addressing the ability of a person to rent out their residence to someone else. It is referred to as "short term rental". I have been getting a lot of email about it. Those that know me know where I stand. It is your property. You own it. You make the decisions about what happens on your property. As long as you don't harm anyone else, government should leave you alone. There are some that think government should micro-manage what you do on your property to prevent the possibility that you could harm someone else. By that logic, we should put everyone in prison to prevent crime. Our police department already enforces nuisance laws. We have noise ordinances. If you rent your house to someone that has a party, police can respond if things get too loud. By the way, if we outlawed renting out your residence, how would we enforce it? Would we ask our police officers to randomly knock on doors and make you prove that you are the owner of your home? Let's not create more wacky laws, but repeal the ones that try to micro-manage your life. If you haven't hurt anyone or their property, government should leave you alone.

See you next time!

6/5/08

Back in the hot seat again! My re-election was greated with the following fanfare:




So here is the news:
We started with approval of a bond for expansion of water and wastewater, police building, drainage study, traffic improvements, and fire hydrants. Being a Libertarian you might think I would vote NO anytime we incur tax obligation or debt. However, like the 2006 bonds there is impact fee financing behind these bonds, which are a user fee. User fees are better than taxes; the people benefitting from the service are the ones who pay. I made the motion to approve the $2 million bond.

We then had a lengthy discussion of the Property Owners Assn asking to overturn the decision of Planning and Zoning for Emerald Park. P&Z turned down a request for P1-B zoning and recommended P1-A. The difference is that P1-B allows structures such as those currently in other parks like Bark K (large picnic shelter, guard house, gates, permanent rest rooms, etc). P1-A does not permit hardly any structures. In my opinion the park would not be very usable under P1-A. P&Z turned down P1-B because it provides for residences such as mobile homes on the property. However, council would have to approve of the location and the POA has no intention of placing residences on the property. It seems P1-B could be employed and mobile homes could be excluded as written, but P&Z and some council members think this is too broad. I moved to approve P1-A now and get the process started for a PDD (Planned Development District). The PDD could simply say that the park would use P1-B zoning except that there would be now residences or mobile homes. I think that would meet everyone's needs.

We next discussed a new sign ordinance. While in some cases it makes reasonable accommodations for signs that are illegal under the existing ordinance, upon questioning it seems the ordinance overall is much more restrictive. The member that presented the ordinance was Susan Euresti. I respect Susan and think she is a fine person, but I must make a comment. She stated that one of the council candidates (Brad Waite) had 1 sign that was illegally placed under the current ordinance. However during Susan's 2007 campaign she had many violations. She had a huge sign (must have been 4 foot square) on a hillside, several attached to trees, and many yards with more than one of her signs. These are all violations under the current ordinance. I mentioned that it is hard to justify making police do more when the existing ordinance is not being enforced. You don't get more enforcement by passing more laws. It is really an unfunded mandate. I would ask the proposers of such ideas to first demonstrate they themselves would comply with the existing law, then provide the funding to enforce what they propose. I was the lone dissenting vote.

I moved to extend the development agreement for The Falls by an additional 18 months. The explanation is that they have been heavily involved in zoning issues and need more time to compete the project. Don't you just love zoning? The motion passed.

I also moved to reduce the letter of credit for the Brian Atlas "Villa Montechino" project by a half million. City staff have already confirmed that the amount of work that Atlas has completed is more than the reduction in the surety. Atlas needs to borrow more money to complete the project and reducing hits debt obligation helps him with the bank. The motion passed.

Lastly I will explain my dissenting vote on using $2.4 million from the 2006 bond to buy the Lago Vista golf course. It was basically a protest vote that I knew I would loose. When I was recognized I told council that council already voted to buy the course and the matter on the floor was whether to finance it this way, but I asked if I could discuss the effluent situation. I heard no objection, so I proceeded to say that we currently have the following acreage in use for effluent disposal:

Lago Vista golf course: 96 acres

Bar K (The Hills) golf course: 26 acres

Cedar Breaks: 67 acres

What we are not using that we already have set aside are:

Cedar Breaks: 220 acres

Turnback Canyon: 70 acres

At the same time, the POA parks would like to have us spray water on their lands. This adds up to:

Cody Park: 61 acres

Arrowhead Park: 63 acres

Greenshore Park: 20 acres

Hancock Park: 40 acres

Paseo de Vaca/Bar K park: 119 acres

TOTAL: 303 acres:

Therefore, we are using 188 acres, but potentially have 773 acres available. I fail to see the urgency for using the golf course for effluent. We do need to stay ahead and use impact fees to buy future acreage or allow subdivisions to set aside this land like Turnback Canyon did.

At this point a point of order was raised that my discussion was not pertinent. This was correct, but I thought I had requested to speak tangentially with approval.

So what if we didn't need the effluent capacity urgently. What about the need to keep a golf course open? Would you say the same thing about bailing out a factory that closed down? Do you believe in the free market, or should government impose taxes to take over failing businesses. Dr Milton Friedman always said the failures are just as important as the successes.

Well I am tired, but happy to be back on council. Despite disagreements I think our council and staff are composed of good people and I look froward to the next 2 years working with them.

5/20/08

First, I would like to commend Marcia Gully for running for office and giving the voters a choice. All the candidates gave an opportunity for the people of Lago Vista to determine who is the best person to represent them on city council.

My margin of victory was not large. I understand that many people may not have been voting for Marcia but against me. There may have been some that thought neither of us were the ideal choice. Of course if you want to elect someone that you agree with all the time, elect yourself! You are not going to find someone that agrees with you on everything.

There are other voting methods that give more power to voters. One option is approval voting, where you cast a vote for every candidate that you approve of. For example, if candidates A, B, and C were on the ballot, you could vote approval for A and B. Another could vote approval of A and C. Another votes only for A. A would have the most votes and win. Also, None Of The Above (NOTA) could be a candidate. If NOTA gets the most votes, that says none of the candidates were acceptable and the office is unfilled.

Both techniques have been used before and are commonly used inside the Liberarian Party. It works well by giving voters more power and keeping bad candidates out of office.

One of the problems I have encountered in running for office is the perception people have of me. I know many of you are busy and do not have time to research every candidate. Therefore, when The LOG prints cartoons of me with Micky Mouse ears, it leaves an impression.

Being our local newspaper of record that everyone receives, The LOG is able to reach a lot of people and influence perception. Clearly The LOG has not liked me too well over the years. Just check the Archive on this site for evidence.

In this recent election The LOG printed a story about the candidate forum. I think anyone who attended had a different understanding of what I said than what The LOG printed. Not only were The LOG's quotations of me inaccurate, but they were grammatically dubious.

Though a juxtasposition of my fustian locution with the adroit eloquence of William F Buckly would manifest my rhetorical flaccidity, admonitory would greet adumbrate prose that would matriculate my parlance with the petulant and puerile. I say Shibboleth!

Then comes the matter of printing my opponent's responses to candidate questions 2 days prior to the election, while mine were included with everyone else's a week earlier. Did Marcia miss the deadline? Would I be allowed to miss the deadline? How is it that The LOG decides to print one candidate's campaign promotion for free just prior to election day?

I will defend The LOG's ability to print anything they want. If they want to takes sides, fine. In the battles of Hamilton and Jefferson, The American Aurora and Gazette of the Unites States fought each other in the battle of persuasion, often with questionable ethics.
This website will offer truth and opinion. I will tell you what I know and what I think. You can contrast it with The LOG and decide what you believe.

I will do my best to serve you and uphold the principles of Liberty.
3/12/08
This letter was posted in this week's newspaper, The LOG:







5/20/07
This is my final post to the site. It has been an adventure. I wish the best to the new council members. Take care!


5/17/07 It was my last council meeting, and I went out with a bang.

First we considered a variance to allow Villa Montechino, the development on what used to be Marshall Vista, to put signs on their lake front to advertise their development. While they are placing the signs on their own property, the property they are placing the signs on is not in the development they are advertising. Our sign ordinance does not allow putting signs to advertise a development that is not within the development they are advertising. Council voted to approve the variance as the signs would only be seen from the lake and would not be seen by property owners in Lago Vista. However I have another reason for approving the variance that I did not mention at the meeting. I do not intend to insult staff or anyone else, but our recent election demonstrates that the sign ordinance we have is ignored by the people that are supporting it. I can say in my case every single one of my signs was in compliance with the ordinance. In every case I asked consent of the property owner before I placed a sign on their property. I made sure we only had one sign per lot. Saturday evening at 11 PM I drove all over Lago Vista and picked up every sign I had out there. Sunday morning all my signs were removed. How could we deny someone that jumps through the hoops for a request to put a sign on their property when we have people ignoring the ordinance and getting away with it? It appears to me we should not even have the ordinance if it doesn't mean anything.

Next I will come to the confrontation of the evening. Some of you are aware that there are ongoing issues with the Deli Werks that have been building to a climax. The short history is that the city understood when this area was changed from residential to commercial zoning it was with the understanding that this would not become a bar and music hall. The owner does not accept that such restrictions were agreed to. We now have a popular restaurant and entertainment venue that in the opinion of the city is not in compliance with the conditions under which it was created. On the agenda tonight was a request for variances from the Deli Werks in order to resolve all of these issues and have them considered to be in compliance.

As many of you know we have been working on a revised noise ordinance. The live music at the Deli Werks was the reason we considered modifying our noise ordinance. Much work has been done on this and I think we can address some of the issues with the Deli Werks in this ordinance while applying a fair treatment to other noise issues in the city. I saw this as a first step to resolve issues with the Deli Werks.

I spoke with the owner Alan Carlson about this last week and we both agreed that the request for variances is premature until we resolve the noise ordinance. I would prefer to handle one issue at a time and see if we can find some common ground. Hopefully we could resolve some of the easiest concerns and narrow down the issues to a few. Trying to resolve every issue in one meeting is not a good approach.

When the item came up on the agenda, councilman Hugh Farmer made a motion that we not consider the request for variance and remove it from the agenda. I agreed with this for the reasons I stated. In my mind it was basically the same as a motion to remove the item from the agenda or to table consideration. I will now bore you to tears with proper meeting procedure. Technically such motions are not debateable and should be voted on immediately, however council members began speaking to the issue. I mentioned that I agreed with the motion because I did not think we were prepared to solve all of these issues tonight. The mayor allowed Alan Carlson to speak and it became rather animated. There was a back and forth about these disagreements that continued to escalate into threats of lawsuits. As I felt council had consensus on approving Hugh's motion I called the question, meaning "Let's all stop talking and vote". I was trying to avoid an every escalating confrontation. It then appeared council wasn't sure what we were voting on. The secretary re-read the motion Hugh made, but some council members didn't like it and wanted tougher language that basically said we were no longer going to discuss these issues with the Deli Werks and enforce penalties on them. Hugh then again stated his motion which I understood to be that we not consider the request for variances and remove it from the agenda. There was no amendment to this language and we voted in favor. Therefore nothing happened and the issues we had prior to the meeting remain the same. My hope is that we can keep this out of the courtroom and handle one issue at a time.

Next we discussed calling a letter of credit on the Lago Vista Retail Center development. This is the site of the Super S grocery store. There is a water retention pond that is supposed to be built on the site but has not been completed. The developer does not seem to be living up to the contract they agreed to. As part of the agreement they secured a letter of credit which would provide funds to the city to complete work if the developer failed to do so. On our agenda was a motion to call a letter of credit to force the developer to give us the money to complete the retention pond. The city will not allow other stores in the retail center to open until this work is complete. We agreed for the city to send a letter to the developer stating our position.

Those were the big items of the night. It was a sufficient send off to my rewarding yet challenging 2 year tenure on council.

5/12/07

Pat Dixon 443, Susan Euresti 614

Congratulations to Susan Euresti. I wish her well for the next 2 years on city council.

[IF]

If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you

But make allowance for their doubting too,

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,

Or being hated, don't give way to hating,

And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,

If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

And never breath a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;

If all men count with you, but none too much,

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,

And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!

--Rudyard Kipling

This website will be shut down in 2 weeks.

5/9/07 Election day is Saturday.
I first want to tell you about 1st Lieutenant Jacob Warshavsky. Several weeks ago Jacob found out about my campaign and asked if he could help. He is a 2004 graduate of West Point, last year served in Iraq, and is now a Troop Executive officer at Fort Hood. He drove to Lago Vista through a heavy rain storm to help at the event we held a few weeks ago. Those of you that met him know the quality of this man. We should all be proud of those that put their lives on the line in service of our country.

I want to let you know about something I have been working on for the city. I have discussed this with city staff and expect this to be available soon. Below is a description.

LAGO VISTA ALERT

The city of Lago Vista has a new service to send public alerts. This system in not a substitute for emergency alert systems for severe weather, national emergencies, or other critical conditions.

Subscribing to the service is simple. A subscription feature is provided on the Lago Vista website www.LagoVistaTexas.ORG and at www.PatDixon.org. A person enters their email address into the entry box provided which is labeled "Subscribe to LagoVistaAlert". A confirmation message will be sent to this email address asking the person to reply if they want to subscribe. By replying to the message, they will now be able to receive alerts.

The person can unsubscribe at any time by sending a blank email message to LagoVistaAlert-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com.

For city staff the process is very simple. When a concern such as a street closure, boil water notice, or safety related issue occurs, city staff can send an email message to a single email address alerting people of the situation. Every subscriber will receive a text message of the alert. Only city staff can send this alert and no subscriber can send messages to the group.

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Below is the subscribe button, which will be placed on the city website when it is fully implemented. If you want to sign up during the testing period, feel free.

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We recently had one of the all-time record quickest council meetings, only 35 minutes! Believe me, they aren't all like that. However, I think it is important to make sure your concerns are heard. Public sessions can take quite a bit of time, but are very necessary.

That is all until after election day. I am doing my best to serve you and ask for your vote on Saturday May 12.

4/25/07 It has been a busy time and I am overdue for an update.

I first want to tell you about 1st Lieutenant Jacob Warshavsky. Several weeks ago Jacob found out about my campaign and asked if he could help. He is a 2004 graduate of West Point, last year served in Iraq, and is now a Troop Executive officer at Fort Hood. He drove to Lago Vista through a heavy rain storm to help at the event we held last week. Those of you that met him know the quality of this man. We should all be proud of those that put their lives on the line in service of our country.
I next want to talk a bit about the biggest issue discussed at our last council meeting, the proposed noise ordinance. First I want to say that I have spent significant time with the parties involved and believe a reasonable solution can be derived. The issue is that a business received 6 citations last year for violating the existing noise ordinance while they had a band playing at their location. In my observation of the video recording of these incidents, the police are doing exactly what the ordinance says they should do. In at least one of the cases I believe there was a band playing outdoors. Most of the complaints that occurred later in the year were with a band playing indoors with doors closed. The business owner believes the complaints are frivolous, and police do not have any discretion to waive the citation.

In our discussion we agreed that we cannot write laws that only apply to one business. The law needs to apply evenly and fairly to anyone that might be subjected to noise from a business, construction, neighbor, or any other offending source.

In my research of the approach of other cities and several experts, I think a reasonable solution should measure the noise level at the receiving property, not the source property. The person filing the complaint would have the officer measure from their property line to the direction of the noise source. It is basically the same as the current procedure except that currently the officer has no metric to determine whether the complaint is a violation or frivolous. By including a sound level measurement they now have the criteria they need.

This is a difficult issue and it will take some time to work it out. If we have open discussions and build some consensus, I think we can find a reasonable solution.

4/7/07
First, you are all invited to a Meet the Candidate event at Remington's with free Beer, Drinks, and Appetizer's. It will be Tuesday April 17 at 7 PM. What better thing to do than sip a beer after you file your 1040 form and talk about how we can lower your taxes next year? If you have questions, are interested in helping with the campaign, or just want to kick back after dealing with the IRS, come on by! Remington's is located at 20602 FM 1431, behind Diamond Shamrock at the light on Lohman's Ford, 267-7292.

Also, you can submit questions for the candidate debate held April 30 at K Oaks. You can hand them in at the city hall, library, or LVISD administration building. They have question boxes to deposit your question.

Let's talk about Thursday's council meeting. I want to say that I appreciate any of the volunteers that help out on our committees. The Master Plan committee has been drafting a revised set of goals and it was presented to council at the meeting. A goal that I hold to and we have stated as policy is that growth should pay for itself. It should not be the taxpayer subsidizing the developer or business to move in. My read of the goals in the master plan seems to contradict this. I see statements about providing development stimulus, incentives, and promoting growth. I will try to attend these committee meetings as they work on further aspects of the plan.

The big item was the Planned Development district for the Turnback Ranch project. There have been some people that expressed great concern with this project. There has been some misunderstanding on some points. Some have stated that this property is protected as wildlife habitat. I do volunteer work in the Balcones Canyonlands wildlife refuge and am familiar with protected habitat. I have investigated the property ownership history of this land and at no time am I aware of any involvement of the Forest Service or federal agency ownership of this land. Apparently some were under the impression that this land could never be developed. They may want to contact their original seller for clarification. Also some have said that a PDD should not be issued because the land should adhere to the same zoning standards as everyone else. This property was not zoned previously. Someone could have built the Eiffel Tower on it. Of course the Parisians hated the tower initially, but everyone loves it now. Anyway the PDD now clarifies the nature of the development. There were a lot of questions asked and I got the sense that the public understands what is happening. Mayor Jones commended the city manager for holding informal meetings with the developer and property owners to work out their concerns, and I agree. There are still several more steps in the process.

We had a long talk about the proposed new noise ordinance. It looks like an improvement that will address most of our concerns. It basically follows the principles I had proposed earlier of combining a decibel meter threshold with some discretion from the officer. We will probably vote on it at our next meeting.

I will note that Brian Schwab and the city manager had a constructive discussion about requirements for vegetation on lots during a drought. It seems silly to mandate that a person put in a lawn and vegetation but they cannot water it if we are going through rationing restrictions on water use. I really wonder if the supply-demand governance and the price mechanism isn't the simplest and most effective way to address this.

Lastly the city manager complimented city council for the new Super S grocery store. While I do enjoy the new store and appreciate Bill's sentiments, I don't think city council should accept any credit. It wasn't our money that an entrepreneur invests in a new business. It isn't the politicians taking the financial risk. All compliment should go to the risk takers who step out there and give it a try.

I hope to see you at Remington's on the 17th!

4/1/07 An update to the website was in order. I had compiled 2 years of archives from this site into a new page called "Archive". That way I keep this opening page pretty clean with the latest stuff, and people can access any of the old stuff on the new page.

I was at the Super S opening Saturday at 7:15. I got in before the crowd. It is a nice store and is a welcome addition. Would I still vote against a tax subsidy for this store when Super S Corp said they did not need it? Yes.

I then built a hiking trail with some volunteers in the Balcones Wildlife Refuge. It was a beautiful day to be outdoors after the rains we had last week.

I then attended the dedication of the F4 fighter plane monument at the airport. The volunteers that did this work did a great job. Mayor Jones applauded the fact that all the money that went into this project was donated voluntarily, which is terrific.

I also spent much of the weekend talking to many of you. My signs will be ready soon and if you would like one just get in touch. Here is what they look like:



3/26/07 I want to give you an update on an item that has been a long time in coming.

We now have all of our local code online at the new city website http://www.lagovistatexas.org. If you select the "Information" menu and select "City Ordinances", you can then select the "Lago Vista City Ordinances" link to view all of our code in the Franklin Legal Publishing system. I can accept some small degree of credit for pressing this issue to completion by bringing it up at council meetings and keeping it on the docket. The real credit goes to city staff for getting this done amidst everything else they do. It takes a lot of work to cross check all the paper records with the electronic compilation of these rules. Also much thanks goes to Cathy Harrington for the work she has done on the new website. I think it is a tremendous benefit to allow you to drill through our local code and find the information you need. I also think it is good for you to be able to contact me with recommendations for improvements on these rules now that you can search through them and drill down into the language.

I have had many good discussions in the past few weeks about my campaign for re-election. I appreciate the opportunity to discuss the issues that are important to you and welcome your comments. I hope to continue to serve you and would appreciate your support on the May 12 election.

3/2/07
Get ready to drink from the fire hose. There is a lot of news, so here it goes.

First, the discussion concerning building heights ran long and will require subsequent discussion. Some of the discussion may have been confusing, but I think it was effective at pointing out the difference between public and private legal arrangements. Deed restrictions and restrictive covenants are private contracts which are enforced by the parties under contract. The court is the recourse for mediating any disputes involving such contracts. Zoning is a public approach to restricting property uses. The question posed was whether changes to zoning restrictions on building height would conflict with deed restrictions. I believe from our discussion the answer is that there is no conflict; they are separately enforced between different sets of parties. There was no sense of consensus from the planning and zoning committee where they stood on the issues.

Next, we go to an issue of property concerning Turnback Canyon. This is a proposed development just north/west along the lake next to Bark K park. The primary issue is several adjacent residents stated that they bought their home with the understanding that this property was dedicated park land or had some other use that precluded development. In fact this area was not zoned at all. I don't know who told them that it could not be developed. Sometimes a property owner can get the wrong impression. When I moved into my house there were signs on the windows saying "This is a protected view". When the property owner downhill from me began plans to build a house on that vacant lot, the protected view thing went out the window. That's when I bought his property.

Of primary concern in this case is a strip of land that would serve as the primary entrance into this development. It would place a street between the backyards of adjacent home owners. Some of them have children and are concerned that such a street would be a hazard.

The testimony was emotional and verbose. There will be further hearings on this subject and it might be possible that developer and property owners can mediate a mutually beneficial resolution.

We had a good discussion on the proposed modifications to the noise ordinance. There are 2 proposed ordinances. One of them in my opinion reads like a long laundry list of prohibited activities. The other incorporates a decibel meter as criteria for issuing a citation. There are concerns that efforts to use decibel meters as evidence in court. I distributed my thoughts to council which are attached here.

We also had a discussion of water service during our drought. The anticipated revenue from our utilities may fall short of budget due to the drought conditions. My comment is that the only way to address diminished supply is through price. The problem is that our water rates are the lowest in the Austin area while our property tax rate is the highest. This is out of balance. We need to bring down our taxation and have people pay what the water actually costs. It makes no sense to subsidize low water rates with high taxation, especially in drought conditions. We should be encouraging conservation through setting the right price.

On that subject, I was recently in Montreal and saw an article in the Globe and Mail that is pertinent to this issue. The article was about energy company Direct Energy calling for an end to government subsidies to lower prices because they discourage conservation. I understand the cynical view that the energy company just wants higher prices. However, any comprehension of the market states that higher prices will lower demand. At the same time, the energy company replaces a guaranteed revenue stream with one that requires performance to earn its revenue. That is just like our situation with water usage.



Lastly, I will recommend the following for your required reading. First is a book by ABC News reporter John Stossel "Give Me a Break" . I met John in New Hampshire recently and I find this book very informative and entertaining. Next I will recommend "Somebody's Got to Say It. by my buddy Neal Boortz. Neal was in town for a book signing recently. This book will entertain, challenge, and enrage you.

Happy reading!

2/27/07
Thursday night there will be a discussion on changes to the zoning ordinances. The purpose of this meeting is to determine of changes to a zoning ordinance would have any legal conflicts with existing deed restrictions and to gauge to P&Z opinion of restrictions to building height. I feel it is important to be very forthcoming and open about what is being discussed. Below are some of the documents that will be reviewed:

(1) Letter to Planning and Zoning discussing proposals.

(2) Proposed simplification and consolidation, Table A/B.

(3) Tommy Thompson's proposed modifications to height restrictions.

(4) Tommy Thompson's discussion of proposed changes.

(5) Analysis of lot vacancy and densities.

2/13/07
I begin with a clarification of my posting on Jan 18. I referred to the misfortune of items that were removed from our agenda due to the ice storm that we had. I want to make clear that the city is not at fault for having to delay these issues. This was an act of nature that precluded matters from being prepared for our meeting.

I also want to clarify a few items about the front page article in the Log about the post office. The US Post office does list the 78645 zip code to include Lago Vista, Jonestown, and Point Venture. When we began our investigation, we did not know this. The assumption was the the Post Office listed only Leander in this zip code and that through a simple database change we could add our cities to the system. The only 2 remedies to eliminating Leander from the 78645 zip code are to ensure that vendors address their shipments accurately or to get big enough to have our own main office for the postal system.

Lastly, I am announcing that I will run for re-election to city council place #1. I look forward to representing you for another 2 years on council.

2/1/07 We had council meetings the last 2 evenings.

On both nights we had public hearings on an annexation. The annexation is to extend our jurisdiction over property that currently includes regulations from Lago Vista, Austin, and Travis County. Through the annexation it will allow Lago Vista to have jurisdiction and not deal with conflicting regulations. I think this is clearly a good idea, but some people are concerned that there are ulterior motives in that it will impact property on Draper's Cove. The annexation would not affect those properties.

Another hotly contested issue if the proposed zoning for the Peninsula project. This was formerly the Lago Vista Resort/Inn, which has gone bankrupt several times. It is currently boarded up with chain link fence around it. The developers has spent a long time working with the city and adjacent property owners to work out an agreeable proposal. Still, some property owners in The Cove are insisting that only a project that is constrained to existing zoning will be acceptable. The P&Z recommended the zoning proposal be tabled. Council had a vote to table the request and I voted No. The vote to table prevailed.

By the way, I want to commend Richard Wolf for recusing himself from P&Z for this item as he has a conflict of interest. Chapter 171 of the local government code prohibits someone with a conflict of interest from participating on such a decision. I also want to commend Susan Euresti for the way she presided over the meeting.

In the matter of The Peninsula, I kept hearing from people that said they definitely want this property developed but only under the existing restrictions. I don't know how businesses that continue to fail under these restrictions will lead to another business that will succeed under these same restrictions. I wonder if those opposing this project are willing to purchase the property and invest their own money to build a viable business under these restrictions. At the rate they are going it seems they will end up 10 years from now next to property that has remained a fenced off abandoned hotel. What will happen to their property value then?

Let me be completely honest here. I think government is too big and too intrusive. I think it micro manages peoples private property and private affairs too much. While I believe these are the fundamental principles of this land of liberty and many claim to support these principles, a lot of people do not. They are less concerned about protecting their property RIGHTS than ignoring the property RIGHTS of others in order to maintain property VALUES. It is shameful that these words are today regarded as radical and extreme. I do appreciate that people have purchased property with the notion that zoning will keep adjacent properties unchanged forever. The fact is that things do change and zoning laws change. If you want guarantees, buy the property. I bought the property behind my house. If you are dependent on politicians do deny your neighbor from using their property and never making use of the process for changing zoning, you have a bad bargain.

Lastly, I gave an update on our Post Office. Some business have been concerned that their suppliers are often getting packages labeled Leander instead of Lago Vista. Delivery trucks run around Leander looking for the address and don't find it. It was hoped a simple database change could list Lago Vista in the 78645 Zip Code and solve the problem. I spent some time with the office of Congressman Ron Paul. They were extremely helpful and I am very appreciative of their help. We found that the 78645 Zip Code already lists Lago Vista as well as Jonestown and Point Venture in the US Postal System. The problem is that Leander is the main post office and ours is just a branch of Leander. Even though 78645 is completely outside of Leander, it still lists Leander as the primary city because that is where the main post office is. There is no kind of database change in the US Postal system that would help. The only way anything would change is if Lago Vista had its very own stand alone post office which was independent of Leander. The US Postal system would not do that until Lago Vista grew by about a factor of 5 times what it is today. Simple economies of scale apply here. Therefore, to anyone that wants to ensure shipments get to Lago Vista, work with the shipper to ensure they address Lago Vista instead of Leander. The shipper has to take this responsibility.

That's all for now!

1/18/07 I think we set a record for shortest council meeting tonight. YEEHAW!!!

Actually, it's not all good. There were several pending matters that we are having to delay due to the ice storms that shut down the city for 3 days this week. This is not good news for the people that were hoping to get approvals to move forward on these pending matters. For you out of towners, here is some of the evidence of our misfortune:







I know you people in Ohio have no sympathy whatever. I grew up the the Cleveland snow belt and still remember snow drifts bigger than me. And yes, I still have my Christmas lights up.

What we did get done is approval a permit for Bruce Fowler to store an airplane at his residence. Some complaints were registered that this would cause too much noise. Noise is a subject of some debate as you may know. There is an ongoing court case involving the DeliWerks, and the ordinance is being scrutinized for possible modification. However, the issue of noise is the same whether it is a barking dog, a loud car engine, or a lawnmower. I have no problem with what someone stores in their home. The only role for government here is the harm it may do to someone else. We approved the permit for Mr Fowler.

That is the only real action that occurred. While I have you, let me open up another topic that I have been asked about recently.

I am getting asked "Are you going to run for office again"? Elections are in May and my 2 year term will expire. I have no problem being completely honest with you about my sentiments. These are my options:

1. Don't run. I am very busy and am involved with several volunteer and non-profit orgs. Oh by the way, I also run a consulting business. It is not like I need more things to do. Unlike most of politicians I am not looking to make a career out of being in power. George Washington was a role model for us all by refusing to accept monarchical powers and extended duration in office.

2. Run again. I do enjoy working with people and taking on the challenges that face a growing city. My client workload is quite steady and predictable.

3. Some of you have asked me about running for mayor. My observation is that this would take about 8 hours a week during business hours to meet the demands of the position. I do not know if I can commit to that level of personal sacrifice. It would mean significant loss of billable hours and income from my clients.

A decision is not urgent at this time. I will continue to focus on the immediate issues before us and be ready to chart my course when candidate filing commences.

1/4/07 Happy New Year! We kicked off the new year last night at city council. Here is what happened.

We began with a presentation by Carole Roseberry and her neighbors regarding trees that they would like to remove or trim. They claim the trees are blocking their view of the lake and reduce their property value. The trees they are referring to are not on their property, but they have written permission from Mr Eckerd to remove or trim certain "trash" trees. The problem is that it is unclear whether Mr Eckerd owns this property. This is being disputed in court and until that is settled the city cannot grant permission. For example, I cannot permit you to cut down trees on my neighbor's property. You have to get that permission from my neighbor, not from me. Another concern is the impact on drainage if trees are removed which could require a non-source point permit. I asked Carole if it was permissible to trim the trees on a routine basis instead of removing them. I did not get a clear answer on that. We will have to wait until the courts settle the property ownership before any action is taken.

We approved several projects including the request by The Hollows to amend their Planned Development District (PDD) to allow for a taller structure. Council and P&Z visited the site to determine the impact of this structure and determined that it would not have a significant detrimental effect.

We then discussed the ordinance mandating specific types and percentages of building materials on commercial buildings. This would make buildings like the Rolling Hills Church, ATA Martial Arts Academy, and Super S grocery store out of compliance. I feel this is micro-management. Owners of these commercial properties purchased their property under one set of zoning rules and now we are changing those rules in a way that may not permit them to proceed. I was the lone NO vote.

We filled several vacancies on the various committees. We still have one vacancy for an alternate position on Planning and Zoning.

Lastly I asked the mayor to add an item on our next agenda to approve a resolution on our post office. This is an effort to have the postal system officially recognize Lago Vista. Currently some businesses are hurt by deliveries addressed to Leander. People delivering to these businesses are apparently driving around Leander and not finding them. I have been working with the office of Congressman Ron Paul to have this changed. I would like council to formally approve of the action that we would like to be done. The expected result would be that the 78645 zip code would be listed as Lago Vista instead of Leander. This would help our local businesses.

12/14/06 We had a show cause hearing last night regarding the property owners of Marshall Harbor. I think the people who came to speak may not have understood the purpose of the hearing.

Council previously passed an ordinance stating that the property owners of Marshall Harbor were responsible for providing the infrastructure (water, sewer, etc) for their property. After this development went bankrupt, the responsibility passes on the the successors and assigns. The purpose of our hearing was to allow these property owners to state why they might disagree with our action. There was an opportunity to persuade council that we had made the wrong decision and that we could appeal or alter the ordinance.

We found that most of the owners did not want to respond to our questions. That made the meeting go quickly and no action was taken. The issue is still pending in court.

On another matter, Congressman Ron Paul's office is helping to get the postal system to recognize Lago Vista. Currently, mail coming to Lago Vista is listed as Leander. This is a problem for several businesses who are having trouble getting delivery trucks to find them. The solution proposed by Dr Paul's office would keep our existing area code of 78645 but officially recognize Lago Vista in our address. I want to make sure that before we go forward that we are agreed on how we want this to work. If you are a business owner that is affected by this, feel free to contact me with any comments.

Please visit the Donate page and help our local organizations.

12/11/06 I have a couple of updates on my Donate page. Please click on Donate and consider supporting our local organizations with a tax deductible contribution.

12/7/06 A very busy evening at city hall, but first a request.
As I did last year, I ask your support for our local organizations. Many of you are looking for tax deductible contributions to make by the end of the year. You can make contributions in our community to the many organizations that we have. Please visit the Donate page for information about these organizations.

Last night began with a planning and zoning meeting. One of the items discussed was a procedure for replacing members that are missing meetings. It is very important that this committee make quorum as council must have planning and zoning render decisions before council can take action. If they do not make quorum, then we have to tell a property owner that they need to wait another month before we can consider their request. This is unacceptable. The committee voted to adopt a policy that after 2 consecutive missed meetings, the chair will call and send a letter to that member inquiring if they intend to serve. If the member misses a 3rd consecutive meeting, they will consider the member to have resigned and report the position to council as vacant. I support this policy.

The council meeting began with several public hearings on proposed developments. One of the proposals from Centex discussed allowing construction of taller structures and higher density. There was some public discussion of this issue, but I took special notice of comments by Don Groody. Several months ago Don presented a proposal to allow variances on a structure that he intended to develop. Many nearby property owners spoke out against his development saying that it would increase density, create an eyesore that they didn't want to look at, and be at odds with the zoning for that area. Last night Don rose to speak against the Centex proposal because it would create more density, create something that he didn't want to look at, and be at odds with the zoning we have adopted in this city. I could not help but point out the contradiction in his statement. The result of last night's action was to approve the Centex proposal with the exception of allowing the height variance they requested. Further consideration of the building height will determine the outcome of that concern.

At citizen inquiry, Mark Alger of the Deli Werks spoke about problems with the current noise ordinance. He said that he is getting citations when the noise level is not perceptible outside his building and this is hurting his business. I think there is general consensus among council that the current ordinance needs to be addressed. The principle here is that if a person moves in next to an airport, they can't complain about the noise. However, if your neighbor starts playing his electric guitar at 2:00 in the morning it is more than an inconvenience. The current ordinance puts the police department in a difficult situation. The rule of law dictates we enforce the law as written, but I think a sub committee can be formed to come up with a better approach.

We also had a performance review of the city manager. Council is in agreement that Bill Angelo is doing a very good job, especially in regard to fiscal management.

Please consider supporting our local organizations this Christmas and visit my Donate page for more information.

11/30/06 A short update tonight, but I have a special treat at the end of this message!
We had a short council meeting tonight to discuss the Villa Montechino project. As you know, this is the effort by a new developer to complete a previously incomplete and bankrupt development called Marshall Harbor. What we did tonight was NOT repeal the development agreement and Planned Development District (PDD, a custom made zoning agreement) that had been previously approved when the new developer first approached our city council. In addition, we approved a new utility agreement and subdivision construction agreement. You may know that there is a complex pending lawsuit regarding a few of the current property owners, and these new agreements address some details and risks to the city associated with this project. Now for the treat. If you only have 28 minutes to spend, please view the following video of Milton Friedman in the 1960s (Dr. Milton Friedman interview). If you have another hour, it is well worth listening to this vintage debate with Dr Milton Friedman, again from the 1960s (Debate with Dr Milton Friedman). A great demonstration of the greatness of this man.

11/16/06 Back from a break, I have 3 items for tonight's posting:

(1) Dr. Milton Friedman

(2) Tonight's council meeting

(3) City dining tab

(1) The greatest economist and advocate for the free market of our time passed away today. Dr. Milton Friedman was recognized by many as an effective and persuasive promoter of minimal government intervention, social tolerance, and fiscal responsibility. On any matter of economics, he is my primary reference. If you are not familiar with Dr. Friedman or his great work "Free to Choose", please click on these links.

(2) Tonight's council meeting began with an overflow crowd to discuss the proposed development at the sight of the current Lago Vista Resort/Cabo Loco. The current operation is out of business. The new developer wants to put in a high scale condominium project with public access to restaurants. A Planned Development District agreement was presented, but it was clear from the developer and the city that it is preliminary and many in the public still have concerns. Nothing was approved tonight, but it appears there is still room for discussion between the developer and property owners to achieve consensus.

We then discussed the results of the deer committee. I commend Randy Kruger and members of the committee for taking on this emotional issue. I think it was good that we discussed it and conducted the survey. While many of the responses I got were emotional in nature and marginalized the messenger, there was some good and reasoned discussion. Some of the recommendations of the committee are reasonable and perhaps helpful. I want to make sure anything we do does not put city staff and police officers in a position where there are very reluctant to enforce what we pass into law. In general, I think at this point the best action is no action. My original concern on this issue was expressed early on after I was elected and I expressed my concern about the number of deer incidents in the staff reports. The safety and traffic accident issues are my primary concern. However, you cannot bullet proof the world and people need to accept responsibility for themselves.

We also approved contracts to repair a water tank and acquire vehicles for which funding was approved in the bond and budget proposals.

I cast an unpopular vote regarding a resolution for the library. From what was presented, the state is having to cut back on grants available to libraries. Of course, this money comes from taxes. You know that I am in favor of lower taxes and lower government spending, putting more money back in your pockets so that you can spend it. If you have any questions about that, go back to those links for Dr. Milton Friedman. The resolution requested that our city oppose these cuts because we need the funding. I cast the lone dissenting vote. I later had a conversation with 2 representatives from the library who expressed the concern that the state's changes put smaller libraries at a major disadvantage. I got the impression that the process is not a level playing field, and that the intent of the resolution was not so much to oppose lower spending but to make the process more fair to all grant applicants. I am certainly in favor of equal treatment and a fair process.

I requested that council allow volunteer groups to present themselves at our next meeting, as we did last year. The intent was to allow the volunteer groups to promote themselves as taxpayers are looking for end of the year income write offs which will keep more money in town. Regrettably, I got no support from council.

I also mentioned that the work on simplifying and consolidating the zoning ordinance, as well as proposals for dealing with height restrictions, will probably be presented to Planning and Zoning in January. I had planned to do this in December, but we cancelled the Dec 21 council meeting. Also, I mentioned I am working with Congressman Ron Paul's office on trying to get our own zip code for Lago Vista.
Fred brought up the idea of having our executive sessions changed so that the public doesn't have to wonder how long before the public session resumes. In other organizations, the way it is handled is that the committee goes into executive session for a specific time period. When that time is up, the public session reconvenes. I am generally supportive of this idea. I think we should state before we go into executive session how long we will be in there so that the public isn't sitting around all night wondering if they should stay or go home.

(3) Now, let's talk about that dinner tab. I WAS FRAMED! In my previous post I told you exactly what happened at Sullivan's Restaurant in downtown Austin. What I didn't know is that Fred was telling me a fib. He said the the city (meaning the taxpayers) would pay the dinner bill. Tonight I was told that what actually happened is after I left Sullivans, the rest of them paid out of their pockets against the city manager's credit card. When tonight's meeting began, Bob Bradley made a reference to a letter in today's LOG and mentioned that no tax money was used. I had not read the LOG yet so I didn't know what he was talking about. I found Brian Schwab had written a letter about my previous post. Therefore, both I and Brian have some egg on our face. No hard feelings Fred, you got me! I am glad that it was handled this way and that your tax money is going towards its intended purpose.

That's the way uncle Milton would want it (RIP).

10/26/06 Some people may not like me to mention this, but I think it would be good for you to know where your tax money is going.

This evening your city council had dinner together at Sullivan's in Austin. Sullivan's is a high priced restaurant downtown. The annual meeting of the Texas Municipal League (TML) is being held in Austin this week, and it was suggested we get together downtown for dinner tonight. All of your city council members are attending this conference except myself. I am very busy with clients and campaigns right now, but I was able to break away for dinner.

Joining me tonight were Bill Angelo, the Harless's, the Farmer's, the Jones's, and the Bradley's. I am not concerned with any open meetings rules issues on this matter, since I am not aware of any city business that was discussed and would find any such complaints frivolous.

My concern is what happened after dinner. Perhaps I was naive when I asked how we were going to settle the bill. I expected each of us would either decline if we thought it was too expensive or accept the invitation and pay our own way. Fred Harless said the city is paying for it. The bill was about $500. While this is hardly noticeable in a budget that exceeds $3 million, I informed Fred that what he really means is the taxpayers of Lago Vista are paying for it. I pulled $40 cash out of my wallet and laid it on the table. I do not think the role of government is to take your tax money for city council to wine and dine themselves in a high priced restaurant. Fred said that is the way they always do it, and I am sure lots of other cities do the same thing. That doesn't make it right. This attitude can result in many small expenses adding up to significant tax burden for you.

I will not be able to attend the Nov 2 council meeting. Keep an eye on things.

10/20/06 "Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice, moderation in defense of justice is no virtue", Barry Goldwater.

Let me begin with last night's council meeting. Things went pretty quickly and productively. We approved the contract for Quality Assurance Health Service to provide for the restaurant inspections mandated by state law. I do no like excessive regulation, but we are forced to do this. It is good that we now can make choices about who we select to provide this service. I moved to approve relaxing some dates in the agreement with Super S to complete their grocery store project. I still oppose targeted tax subsidies, but do not want micromanagement to cripple the development of this project. The last action was an agreement to install a line to provide water plant effluent to the Hills at Lago Vista golf course. This will cost about $24k for the city to install the line, but is a better financial arrangement than having to expand our Cedar Breaks effluent dispersing system.

Now I would like to comment on feedback from the previous meeting. Many of you read what I posted and sent me replies. Most were supportive, a few critical. However, many misunderstood the context. I am not making personal attacks. I am criticizing specific decisions. On this website I have often mentioned that I think the members of council are good people that mean well. Last night's council meeting was an example of people working together and achieving consensus with decorum.
However, when there is bad judgment, I will say so. Examples that I have posted on this site are:

- Approving the mayor's ordinance on meeting rules which had only been introduced the day of the meeting in a private email to council

- Ignorance of proper procedure when residents want to speak on a matter that affects their property

- Hypocrisy on the issue of eminent domain

These are specific issues that I have criticized. Many of the actions our council has taken have been unanimous and I have supported those decisions on this website. However, when the actions of council are contrary to the principles of liberty, free markets, and private property rights, I will not moderate. I will not shrink from my responsibility as your elected representative. I will speak.

10/7/06 Anyone lose a bird? This little guy showed up when I was riding my bike. I was on Oak Ridge coming up to Branding Iron, and I noticed this little guy fluttering away. I noticed it is clearly not indigenous and could not get more than a few inches above ground. It appeared to be injured. It took about a half hour of gently approaching the guy before it would let me touch him and have him jump on my finger. I have a neighbor caring for it for the time being. She has bird food and a cage. If anyone claims this little guy, contact me so we can get this pet back to the owner.









10/5/06

HYP-O-CRITE: One who affects virtues or qualities he does not have.

I have said before that I think my fellow council members mean well. I do not regard them as evil, and I am sure that in their minds they think they are doing the right thing.

Yet, how can I respect people that say one thing and do another? How can I respect people that will criticize others for the speck in their eye, but ignore the log in their own eye?

Last year, this was my resolution that your city council unanimously approved:

BE IT RESOLVED: That the City of Lago Vista proposes that the Texas Municipal League promote to its members cities the importance of defending property rights and limiting municipal eminent domain powers by clearly stating the limits of these powers in their charters and ordinances.

Tonight, when the mayor got to the item that I had placed on the agenda, he immediately asked for a motion. This is proper, but very unusual. In every case I can remember, the mayor allows Fred Harless, Hugh Farmer, or someone else to advocate their proposal before a motion is made. When it came to my resolution, he did not ask me to present it. He did not ask for discussion. He immediately asked for a motion. I perceived that the mayor was trying a deliberate tactic to prevent me from speaking. I made a motion to approve the following resolution:

BE IT RESOLVED: The City of Lago Vista formally requests that the next Citizens Review Committee address the definition of "Public Purpose" in section 2.03 of the city charter and consider language to prevent the use of eminent domain for taking private property from one private entity and transferring property to another private entity.

It was quite apparent that my fellow council members did not even read the one-page resolution I had placed in the binders that all council members received last weekend. I would also bet they didn't read anything I had put together and placed in the binder at our last meeting concerning this subject. As proof, the mayor did not know what resolution I was referring to, and I had to tell him where it was in the binder and show him the paper copy.

The mayor asked for a second to the motion. We waited. Nobody said anything. Nobody did anything. Nobody did as much as ask a question. Nobody would second my motion. The motion failed.

Perhaps they would be more receptive to this motion:

Mayor, I move that the person reading this website have their property condemned and acquired through eminent domain so that we can give it to someone else that we can take more tax revenue from.

Apparently, your council members are much happier about endorsing such an assault on private property rights, but they would probably find an excuse to have a closed door executive session to hide such intentions.

Why will council not even discuss the issue of private property rights in Lago Vista? They are very willing to talk about how terrible some other city is, but when it come to accepting responsibility for cleaning up our own issues, they ignore them and continue to criticize others for the same laws we have on our own books.

HYPOCRITES!

Perhaps there is a reason there was no discussion. Perhaps they already had the discussion. I have a suspicion that the other council members already had their discussion privately before the meeting. How can you explain that nobody even asked a question? Nobody would even second the motion just to discuss it? Does this represent independent thinking? Can you believe that 6 council members would just sit there speechless, motionless, unless they had already had their discussion and were following orders?

This has happened before. This council has shown little concern for the Texas Open Meetings Act and has skirted this law to defeat my efforts for more open and honest government in the past. If they continue to succeed in absence of ethical scruples, why change?

They do not care for your property rights! They do not care for open discussion! They just don't give a damn.

AND NEITHER DO YOU!

Where are you when it comes to defending your property rights? Where are you when I am trying to do the right thing for you? Where are you when I make efforts to follow through on the issues I promoted in my campaign?

I am alone. Maybe it just isn't worth it. If you don't care enough about your rights, maybe I shouldn't either. I don't need this. I run a consulting business that pays me every hour I work. I run several non-profit, volunteer organizations. I don't have cable TV because I don't have time to watch it. I have plenty of productive things to do that keep me fully engaged and allow me to work with good people and achieve great things.

HYPOCRITES!

At the close of the meeting, the mayor asked if there were any items for future council meetings. I seriously considered the following:

Mayor, I would like an item placed on the agenda to condemn the properties of Randy Kruger, Mike Thornton, Hugh Farmer, Fred Harless, Bob Bradley, and Dennis Jones to acquire through eminent domain and place a mini Wal-Mart on each one.

You are the ones that have the power. You have the vote. You are "We The People". You get to determine whether those that represent you will follow through on their commitments, do what they said they would do, or you can elect ...

HYPOCRITES!

10/3/06 "Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice that log that is in your own eye?" Matthew 7:3

On Thursday I will make a motion to ask council to pass a resolution. A resolution is not law. It is a formal statement from council. The statement on Thursday will be for council to back up what they said last year on the subject of eminent domain.

Last year council unanimously passed a resolution stating that cities in Texas should ensure their charters and ordinances prevent the type of private property seizure that occurred in the famous Kelo case. Yet, we have not done anything about our own laws. Are we going to criticize other for their faults but not address our own?

Lago Vista is likely to grow significantly. With growth comes pressure for council to favor developers and corporations over private property owners. If we want to prevent this type of abuse, now is the time to do it.

Next year, there will be a citizens review committee to review the city charter and make recommendations. The current language in the charter says that eminent domain can be used "for any public purpose". There is no definition of what "public purpose" means. In the wake of the Supreme Court's Kelo decision, "public purpose" could mean just about anything. By passing this resolution on Thursday, council is giving this committee a specific item to address. It is not binding and the committee is free to do as they wish. However, council will be on record stating their expectations from the committee.

The resolution is:

A RESOLUTION REGARDING THE DEFINITION OF THE "PUBLIC PURPOSE" CLAUSE IN SECTION 2.03 (EMINENT DOMAIN) OF THE CITY CHARTER

WHEREAS: The June 2005 US Supreme Court ruling in the Kelo vs. New London case further exposed the threat of private property owners to government condemnation and taking of their property to transfer to private entities;

WHEREAS: In the wake of this ruling, cities across the United States and Texas passed ordinances restricting the eminent domain powers of government;

WHEREAS: The City of Lago Vista unanimously passed a resolution in 2005 "That the City of Lago Vista proposes that the Texas Municipal League promote to its member cities the importance of defending property rights and limiting municipal eminent domain powers by clearly stating the limits of these powers in their charters and ordinances.";

WHEREAS: The property owners of Lago Vista depend upon city government to defend their property rights;

WHEREAS: Per section 11.14 of the city charter, there will be a Citizens Review Committee established in 2007 to review the city charter and recommend changes;

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF LAGO VISTA, TEXAS, THAT:

The City of Lago Vista formally requests that the 2007 Citizens Review Committee address the definition of "Public Purpose" in section 2.03 of the city charter and consider language to prevent the use of eminent domain for taking private property from one private entity and transferring property to another private entity.

Let's hope that on Thursday, council will recognize the log in our own eye and back up what we said last year.

9/21/06 Do you want to empower government to take away your property, or empower yourself to protect your property?

We got some clear answers tonight on where council stands on protecting your property rights. I support you. The rest support more government power and control.

At the last council meeting I asked the mayor to add an item to the agenda. I specifically requested a working session, not an action item. I wanted to discuss the issue of eminent domain among council to see where we stand on the issue before we vote on anything.

Unfortunately, the agenda listed an action item for a resolution to the Texas Municipal League on eminent domain. This was clearly not what I requested. I did that last year and specifically told council I was not doing it again this year. Instead I was asking council to follow through on the resolution they unanimously passed last year to make clear what the eminent domain powers of the city are.

Let me step back a minute. Last year the Supreme Court ruled in the Kelo vs New London case that a city can take your property away from you and give it to a private entity, such as a corporation. Ordinarily cities could only take property for a "public use", which traditionally means a city owned and operated item such as a road, police department, utility, etc. The Court ruled that "public use" could also include a city using eminent domain power to take away your house and property and giving it to a corporation because they will get more tax revenue.

There was widespread outrage and cities across the country changed their laws to prohibit such practices. Councilman Brewster McCracken passed an ordinance in Austin that further restricted taking away property. The Lago Vista city council unanimously passed a resolution requesting that all cities address their rules and make very clear what "public use" means and under what conditions eminent domain power can be used to take away your property.

Apparently these council members didn't really mean it. I find it hypocritical for council to say that other cities should fix their laws, but to refuse to fix our own.

I began tonight by presenting a draft version of an ordinance which would further define the "public use" definition. It also included a provision for preventing a developer or corporation to get a city to take away your property under the pretense of using it for a "public use" (like a new city hall) and a year or so later letting that developer or corporation take over that property. This really does happen! They use it to purchase property cheaper than by actually having to deal with the property owner.

After I had presented all the background information which I printed and distributed to council, I asked how many on council would support this. I was the only one with a hand raised.

The mayor agreed to add an action item on the next meeting agenda on the issue of eminent domain power and defining "public use".

In other matters, we passed the budget and adopted the lower 0.5959 tax rate. It was originally proposed as 0.61, but fortunately we approved a more fiscally conservative approach.

We also had a vote to recommend setting the flood plain at the 722 level. I commented that really we are voting under duress. We don't have a choice in this matter. The federal government has mandated this decision by threatening to deny flood insurance if we do not comply. I reluctantly voted in favor. The only real recourse is to send people to Washington that respect private property rights.

Lastly, I will mention yet another property rights case. This is the case of Bruce and Stephanie Fowler. They are building a home here and are getting trapped in the nightmare of zoning code. Bruce has a small sea plane. The house will be on the lake, and he simply wants to build his garage so that he can store this little plane in there. No possible harm can come to anyone else by having this is his garage. We all have cars, lawnmowers, boats, and gasoline in our garages. What is the big deal? Well, the zoning code we have tells you everything you are allowed to do on your property. This means that if the law doesn't let you do it, you can't do it. For Bruce's home it does not say you can put a plane in your garage. Therefore, according to the code, he can't do it. Nuts, isn't it? This code is exactly backwards from the way other cities do it. They write code that says here is what is prohibited. If it isn't prohibited, you are free to use your own property. The likely result is that Bruce and Stephanie will go through an arduous process of trying to get the code changed just to put something in his garage.

It used to be that the United States was great and prosperous because we had private property rights. The more time I spend on city council, the more I see how these rights have eroded. Will you wait until your property is taken away before you do something about it?

9/7/06 It was a marathon meeting tonight. Here is the news.

First, you may accuse me of being a hypocrite. I made a motion to incur $6.5 million in debt. How can someone call them-self a fiscal conservative and vote to incur debt?

The alternative was basically to close down Lago Vista. Sorry, no more homes built here. No more developments, no more stores. We do not have the utilities to serve you.

That may have some appeal. I personally do not care if Lago gets bigger or not. Government's job is to protect your rights and property. Period!
However, the fact is that the city has a monopoly on the water and sewer service. So, as the business owner of the water and sewer, do we meet the demand or not?

I have been working hard to get the utility rates to cover the cost of the utility service. It looks like I will fail. However, we are using impact fees to pay for this infrastructure. This is a Libertarian concept; the developers that get the benefit of the additional capacity pay for it. Unfortunately, so do taxpayers. I am working to get a better balance on who pays, but it may take some time. The point is that much of the cost for the $6.5 million bond will be borne by the developers that are adding demand. That is something I can support.

In other matters, we had several public hearings. Unfortunately, we really didn't hear the public. Nobody had anything to say. It saved time, but made the proceedings somewhat mundane.

The item that may take on the most interest was a motion to force the Marshall Harbor property owners to comply with their original contract. Marshall Harbor is a development that went bankrupt several years ago. The developer never installed the utilities as per the contract. Further development efforts have been held up in court with disputes about what utilities are supposed to be provided by whom. The city's current position is to remain somewhat neutral and simply sustain the existing contractual obligations the property owners have.

We approved several development efforts for the Centex "The Hollows" and a marina for "The Island".

We approved a contract for the vendor that supplies airplane fuel to the airport. The previous concern was that the city was not protected in case of an accident. The agreement requires the vendor to insure against such accidents and include the city as a named insured to prevent financial impact to the taxpayers.

There was a bit of debate about changes to the drought contingency plan. The proposal was a simple change to the watering schedule under severe rationing conditions. The original ordinance had a schedule that was an outlier to every other city in the area. What we did was change the schedule to be the same as everybody else. That way, when people see that Leander, Lakeway, and Austin have their day to water, it is the same in Lago Vista.

While we were discussing this, some council members expressed concern that the trigger points for rationing should not include lake level. At first hearing, I strongly disagreed. If you can't get water into the plant, you cannot provide it. Upon further discussion, it appeared the concern was that trigger points should only be applied when we are getting close to the intake level. We should not have trigger points 30 feet before we get in trouble. In defense, Mike Thornton said the ordinance gives latitude to the city manager to determine whether the lake level trigger should be used as a criteria. Hugh Farmer said this is what concerned him, and I agree in principle. The rule of law, not rule of man, should apply in a non-arbitrary way. On the other hand, sometimes you can legislate minutia that takes rational thinking and common sense out of the discussion.

In the end, despite all the discussion about lake level triggers, nobody moved to amend for this concern. All we had on the floor was a motion to synchronize the watering schedules. I voted in favor and it passed.

Lastly, I asked the mayor to put a working session on our next agenda for the issue of eminent domain and the definition of "public use". Many of you are aware of the Supreme Court's Kelo decision that allowed a city to take away someone's property and give it to a private company, claiming it was a "public use". In the wave of that atrocity, many cities, including Austin, tightened up their ordinances to restrict the definition of "public use". Why hasn't Lago Vista done this? Does Austin respect private property rights more than Lago Vista? Let's get with it!

That's all for now.

8/24/06 "The reason poor people are poor is that they keep doing the things that make them poor." Neal Boortz, Boortz.com

This morning we had our budget meeting. One of the items that was discussed concerned Capital Metro

There have been 4 cities (Rollingwood, Westlake, Cedar Park, and Pflugerville) that have all left the Capital Metro service plan. The concern is how much in taxes are being paid for the services provided. Every retail business in Lago Vista adds a 1% tax on every item sold. Capital Metro collects this tax from cities that participate in its service plan. A Capital Metro shuttle picks up people in Lago Vista and makes several stops on its way to Lakeline mall. They also occasionally provide service for shuttling people to events in the town, like the Hill Country Days fair. There is also a van service for people who carpool. Disabled people can also be transported by Capital Metro. They also provide some money to the city to maintain roads.

How many people ride Capital Metro in Lago Vista? It looks like about 15. Capital Metro's planning department reports only 64 average daily boarding on the route from Lago Vista to Lakeline. There are 6 major stops on the way through Jonestown and Cedar Park. With 64 daily boarding, that would be 32 round trip. They do not provide any finer breakdown on the boardings, but there is unlikely to be more than 15 riders from Lago Vista.

Is it worth $188,000 to transport 15 people?

In the budget discussion, we discussed the need to get more details on what we are getting for our money. The main points of discussion were that public transportation will never be cost effective, but you have to provide it for the poor people. The consensus was that council needs more detailed information about

I must commend councilman Fred Harless. As many of you know, Fred is the board secretary of Capital Metro. Fred was very rational and cooperative in discussing this issue. We learned quite a bit from this conversation.

The other major issue I brought up was the utility rates. As I have mentioned several times, I want a better balance of lower property taxes and utility rates that cover the cost of utilities.

I began with a presentation of the city's current ranking of tax and debt. The Texas Municipal League did a survey in 2005 of 604 Texas cities. Lago Vista scored ranked 512 highest property tax, ranked 535 highest Debt/Valuation, and ranked 587 Debt/Population. That means that out of 604 cities surveyed, Lago was near the very highest tax and highest debt ratios in Texas. We are moving in a direction of lower taxes and debt, but it is important to know where we stand today.

The proposed tax rate in the budget would drop for 0.6754 to 0.5959. However, much of this reduction is due to higher tax appraisals. I presented a plan that would drop the rate to 0.55 while raising utility rates to roughly the average of other cities in the area. I did not get consensus from council on this proposal. There was a sentiment that poor people could not pay higher utility rates, and that apartment landlords would not reduce their rent with lower property taxes.

On both issues, council defended tax subsidized services to make things easy for poor people to be poor. I think most of us are compassionate and willing to help each other through voluntary means. However, I oppose government coercion and threats forcing people to be generous. You do not help poor people by making it easy to be poor. You do not encourage people to take personal responsibility for their condition by playing Robin Hood. It is also remarkable how little respect politicians have for the free market.

In general, I support the budget. There are lots of things I would like to do to lower taxes and spending in the budget, but the general direction of the budget is in the right direction.

We also had a meeting of our height committee tonight. We have a proposal we are working on that consolidates and simplifies the zoning tables while making more allowances for taller homes. We expect by next meeting we will have something to formally vote on.

8/18/06 A pretty uneventful council meeting last night. Here is what happened.

During citizen inquiry, I mentioned that the PAWS animal shelter still needs donations to cover the cost of the emergency air conditioning repair. I thanked the LOG newspaper for printing a story about this problem. We then went into executive session, and when I returned there was a check placed on the table in front of me for $150 to PAWS from Jerry Sisemore. I hope he doesn't mind that I mention this, but thanks Jerry!

We approved the site development plan for Phase 2-A of the Centex "The Hollows" project. We also tabled action to approve a development agreement for "The Falls" subdivision. We also tabled action on a resolution for the hotel occupancy tax (bed tax). We had already passed a new ordinance on this tax, and the resolution is intended to help define policy on its use. We didn't have much time to review this resolution before the meeting, so we tabled it for future consideration.

I made an appointment for the vacant position on the Planning and Zoning Committee. We currently have 2 alternates, Susan Euresti and Richard Wolf. Both have shown excellent attendance and a good understanding of code. I felt they were both well qualified. I made a motion to have Susan fill the vacancy, which passed unanimously.

We then had a vote to set the temporary ad valorem (property) tax rate. This is the rate that will be published for public meetings. We can lower the rate in its final adoption, but cannot raise it above the temporary rate. The staff's draft budget proposes setting it at $0.5969/$100 valuation. This is a reduction from the current $0.677 rate. A motion was made to set the temporary rate at $0.61 in order to give some flexibility in case we want to spend more money. I preferred to stick with the lower tax rate in the budget, so I moved to amend the motion and replace the $0.61 rate with the $0.5969 rate from the budget. Fred Harless seconded the motion, but later said he wanted to withdraw his second. You can't do that, so I raised a point of order to have a vote on my amendment. I was the only one in favor of my amendment for the lower tax rate, so we ended up approving the $0.61 as our temporary rate. I hope we end up setting the final rate at or below $0.5969.

We set public hearings for Sept 7 and 14. I have a conflict on Sept 14, so I will not be able to attend.

That does it for now. For all who have helped with donations to LV PAWS, thank you!

8/13/06 PLEASE HELP!

The Lago Vista PAWS animal shelter recently had an emergency. The air conditioning unit died, and they had to get an emergency replacement. Can you imagine with the heat we have had what kind of suffering conditions those animals would have had to endure?

The shelter will be billed about $6,000 for this replacement. They were able to get a grant from a humane society for $3,000. There remaining $3,000 is money that they did not anticipate spending on this emergency and seriously impacts their budget.

I offer this challenge to you. I am looking for 29 people to join me in donating $100 to pay for this emergency repair. I urge you to contact me or the PAWS shelter (see www.lvpaws.org). LV PAWS is a 501c3 non-profit and your donations are tax deductible.

Please help!

8/7/06 I am overdue for an update, so here we go.

Thursday night I made a presentation to Planning and Zoning about the simplification of our zoning ordinance. We have more zoning categories than cities 10 times our size. We are trying to make things simpler for staff to enforce and for property owners to understand. Some of the zoning classifications have minimal differences between them, and can be consolidated. The proposal is not ready for a vote yet. Any zoning change would require a new zoning map, which takes some significant work to produce. Since our Building Height committee is also considering proposals that would affect the map, we will see if the consolidation and height proposals mesh and present one proposal for a vote. We don't want to change the zoning code once for consolidation and then again for height, which would be confusing and cause a lot of extra work.

The council meeting began with an executive session. After the executive session, Mike Thornton made a motion to instruct the city attorney to present a contract to intervene in a case against Kyle Texas. The case is one in which the NAACP and Home Builders Associations are suing Kyle for increasing the minimum area of home built in Kyle. This could affect lots of cities. All of this is publicly available information (US District Court, Western District of Texas, Austin Division, Civ No A05CA979).

Some of you may be aware of issues with growth in Kyle. There was a story in the Austin Statesman about Kyle considering stopping construction of churches because they have 51 of them and think they would rather get more revenue from non tax-exempt businesses. That is the problem when politicians are motivated by tax revenue.

The mayor then said Mike Thornton had made a motion to intervene in the case. I raised a point of order, as that was not Mike Thornton's motion. He asked to get a contract from the attorneys that we could review prior to voting on intervening. The motion was clarified and we approved instructing the attorneys to present us a contract.

Fred Harless then made a motion to repeal the existing bed tax ordinance and replace it with a new one. I have made it very clear that I oppose a tax that is targeted on a specific business and empowers government to control the economy and promote tourism instead of allowing the entrepreneurs to risk their own money and allow the free market to work. I made a motion to divide the question. This is a very common procedure. I wanted to vote YES to repealing the existing ordinance, and vote NO to replacing it. Nobody on council understood what "divide the question" meant, so I had to explain it. Council did not allow the motion to be divided, so I had to vote YES on the motion since the new ordinance in an improvement on what we had.
There was quite a bit of discussion about the city's relationship with the airport property owner's association. There is a lot of complexity involved in the insurance requirements and liability if an accident occurs. The provider of airplane fuel does not carry insurance for such accidents and is unwilling to do so. If the city had to cover this, then each taxpayer would then be liable for the risk and have to contribute to insurance premiums. The problem is solved if the airport were privately owned. The airport POA should be the ones that operate the airport and cover the costs of operations and insurance.

There was also another presentation by developers of The Falls. They had made a presentation a few months ago on this project. We found quite a few residents were hostile to this development and accused the developers of being "land flippers". There will be several public hearings before approvals are considered for this project.

The annual budget was presented, and I asked if it would be appropriate to add an agenda for our next meeting to consider a resolution instructing the city manager on setting the tax and utility rates. Our current procedure is quite informal. Council just sorts of talks about things, the city manager writes the budget proposal, we have a retreat to discuss it, and then it is presented for a vote all at once. The problem is that there is no formal record of council setting priorities and policy for the budget. It is unfortunately pretty late to have such resolutions, since the budget draft has already been produced. I should have started this earlier and had such resolutions presented to council for a formal vote so that the city manager has more assurance on the direction council would like the budget to go. Council was reluctant to do so at this time and would not allow this to be added to the next meeting agenda.

Additionally, the mayor mentioned that the city's property tax base had grown dramatically this year, and he said this was due to tremendous growth in the city. WRONG! I think the mayor simply made a mistake. It is well known that the tax appraisal district dramatically raised the appraised values this year. While we have some more homes built and some more retail, the increase in the property tax base is largely due to the rise in appraised values of existing properties.

That's all for now. Stay tuned!

7/21/06 WARNING: The following is political suicide. No pandering found here.

Last night we approved a drought contingency plan. We are already in the mild condition of this plan with our lake level at the 655 ft level. It is expected we will get to the moderate or severe level of this plan this year, at which point there will be prohibited water usage.

SUICIDE NOTE #1: However, I want to go back to the start of our meeting at this point. We began with an invocation from Bob Bradley. I respect Bob a great deal. Yet in his prayer he asked the Lord that we "do what is good for the majority and not for the benefit of a few". I respectfully disagree. Nowhere in the Constitution does the word "democracy" or "democratic" exist. The Constitution does say in Article 4 Section 4 what kind of government we will have: a Republic. In a Republic, the will of the majority cannot overrule the rights of the minority. It is the job of government to protect the rights and property of every individual, and not be subject to mob rule. This is pertinent to the following suicide notes.

SUICIDE NOTE #2: On the agenda was the approval of re-zoning a parcel from single family to multi family usage. The lot is located up where Boggy Ford and Highland Lakes splits. The area is currently zoned single family. We received copious letters and public testimony in opposition of rezoning this lot. I believe it was 65% of the property owners in a 200 ft radius of this lot were opposed. These people felt that they purchased their property with the understanding that it would remain single family, and that allowing a multi family development would present problems that would make the area unattractive. At the last meeting, the Planning and Zoning voted to deny rezoning this lot. Last night a motion was made from council to also deny rezoning the lot. There were several people in the audience wearing stickers that said NO to ReZoning this lot.

I voted no. Why?

The motion was to prevent a private property owner from using their property unless it complies with everyone else's ideal. There is an assault on private property rights in this country. The Supreme Court's Kelo decision was only an exposure of a problem that has been growing for some time. When the majority can gang up on an individual and micro-manage what they can or can't do on their own property, I will defend the rights of the property owner.

I am sensitive to the arguments of neighboring property owners. I understand that the lot owner bought the property when it was zoned as single family. However, last night our council could have legally rezoned this lot. If you are really concerned about what might happen to the property next to you, do not rely on 7 council members to protect you. Zoning can and does change. Do what the conservancy agencies do. Purchase the property and put deed restrictions on it. That is the best way to preserve your interest.

Is this suggestion irrational? It is exactly what I did when my lake view was threatened. My neighbors and I bought the property below us when the owner planned to put a house on it. Even with the 15 ft height restriction, the house would have impaired our view of the lake. Now we own it, and I don't need to beg 7 council members to feel sympathy for me.

This nation and this state was built on the principles of private property rights. Let's keep them.

SUICIDE NOTE #3: We heard several requests for money from groups in town. The total price tag was around $75k. This does not count a suggestion that we spend $60k to heat the city pool. Most of them currently receive a percentage of money from the hotel bed tax, which is used to promote tourism.

While $75k is paltry in comparison to the overall budget, I oppose forcing you to pay for things that you can voluntarily do on your own. I have consistently promoted these same organizations, as you can see on this website. I have made financial contributions to them voluntarily. But the requests being made are really requests to take money out of your pocket that you may have planned to use for the needs of your family or the needs of others. When the force of government is used to make decisions for you, you lose your liberty and ability to make choices.

About $45k of this amount is being requested by the Economic Development Foundation and Chamber of Commerce. You either support the free market or socialism. If you prefer socialism, you support forcing people to take $45k out of their wallets to let government micro-manage the marketplace. If you support the free market tradition that made our country the power of the world while the Soviet Union crumbled, North Korea starved, and Cuba fell 50 years behind the times, then you support keeping money in the pockets of families that can make their own decisions about which businesses to patronize.

I am still breathing, for the time being. Let's see how long I survive.

7/19/06 Last night we had our discussion on the 5 year Capital Improvement Plan (CIP). The plan generally looks good. Even though we are looking at issuing about $6.5 million for the bond this year, the long term projection will result in a declining tax rate.

How is that possible?

We will be using impact fees we are collecting to pay for these projects, and we anticipate moderate growth that will bring in additional revenue. Impact fees are payments that developers pay to cover the additional cost of infrastructure they need to service their development. This again is an example of having the people that benefit from the service paying for it, instead of imposing higher taxes on everyone to the benefit of a few. I support this.

The great bulk of the projects are for water and wastewater service. We are addressing maintenance issues to prevent loss of service and expanding capacity to serve the growing needs of the city. Without these projects, we would risk having equipment failures that would leave people literally dry. We would also have to impose a moratorium on growth. I think these projects are needed and we have to make these investments now.

There was some discussion about adding in other projects into this year's bond. The police department and city hall are undersized. Recent council meetings have had more people than we have room for. I think we have to live within our means for a while and not take on too much debt or project work too fast. The projects in this year's bond represent a lot of work, and we don't want to exceed our capacity to get these projects done. Additionally, I want to keep our declining tax rate plans on target. Even though our growth and impact fee forecast is conservative, I prefer to stick with those numbers. There was discussion that these numbers are too conservative, and we could take on additional projects while getting more impact fees and tax revenue to keep the tax rate low. I agree this is possible, but with a very dynamic and uncertain economy I think that is too risky.

In summary, I think the $6.5 million bond issue will be a cost effective approach to meeting the service needs while reducing the tax burden.

On another note, the ad valorem (city property tax) tax rates I listed previously do not factor in homestead exemptions, municipal utility districts, and other factors. I realize this. I am sure someone can do a very detailed analysis to take all economic factors (wages, appraised values, cost of living, etc) and give the tax impact in Lago Vista versus elsewhere.

That is not my point. The point is that we are using the ad valorem taxes to subsidize low water rates. Other cities separate their utilities so that the rates you pay for water cover the cost of water, and the taxes you pay for everything else do not pay for water. I am trying to promote an effort that will get us in line with what other cities do and address a growing demand for water in drought conditions.

7/13/06 Tonight we had our first meeting of the building height sub-committee. I was elected as chair of this subcommittee. We had over an hour of discussion on the topic and I think it was productive. A committee benefits from differing viewpoints so that when a consensus is reached, it represents a mutually beneficial solution. Currently there is no involvement from the Building Committee, so we will make one last effort to see if they would like to be included. In about a month we will meet again and start to consider specific proposals.

I have a pertinent reading assignment that I highly recommend. Even if you only read the first few pages, it makes some very good arguments for protecting private property rights. Please take a look at this study on property rights reform from the Reason Foundation

7/6/06 Do you know your tax rate?

Tonight during council we had a discussion of the budget. We had just gone over 2 reports showing the water rationing we may have to enforce because of drought and the water rates in Lago Vista that are much lower than just about anywhere else in the area. I stated that we need to have a proper balance between what we charge for water and what we demand in taxes. I stated that although the Lago Vista water rates are the lowest in the area, our property taxes are the highest.

"That's not true!" replied Mayor Dennis Jones. Both he and Fred Harless took the position that our tax rate could not possibly be the highest in the area.

Ad Valorem tax rates (municipal tax rate per $100 appraised value):

Lago Vista, $0.675

Pflugerville, $0.635

Jonestown, $0.625

Lockhart, $0.615

Leander, $0.548

Bastrop, $0.5277

Burnet, $0.52

Cedar Park, $0.518

Hutto, $0.494

San Marcos, $0.471

Austin, $0.443

Marble Falls, $0.42

Round Rock, $0.371

Georgetown, $0.346

Kyle, $0.277

Lakeway, $0.2275

Tonight's meeting was lengthy, starting with a planning and zoning meeting. I was asked to comment on the effort I am making with staff to simplify the zoning ordinance. This is not an intent to change zoning, but to simplify what what already have. He have about 29 different zoning classifications and it is very cumbersome. Working with staff I have found redundancies and unnecessary complexity that we can consolidate and simplify. I intend to have a draft for the next planning and zoning meeting.

We then had a lengthy public hearing on a proposed zoning change to allow a 3/4 acre lot to go from single family dwelling to multiple dwellings of single family residences. It would require the height limit on the buildings to go from 15 to 25 feet. Nearly every resident in the area opposes this, and the planning and zoning committee denied the change, which kills the project. Many of the residents expressed the wish that this lot remain greenspace to keep it beautiful. As it is, it could still be developed or have some future project get approved that would be just like this one. For those who want this lot preserved as greenspace, there is a clear solution. Buy it.

We also approved a recognition of $250 for each of the 40 some employees of the city for the excellent work they have done cutting costs and delaying their wage increase to improve our finances. Our current finances are in good shape. I see this as a cost saving investment to retain good staff. It is very costly to lose quality and experienced personel.

Lastly, I will leave you with a reading assignment "The Politics of Sky-High Housing Prices"

I hope you have a better handle on your tax rate than some people I know!

6/28/06 Here's what's up:

Let's start with the dear subject of deer. When I first got on council I dug through the details of the monthly reports. I did notice the number of reported incidents of clearing dead deer from the road. I think the number is roughly 20/month. I realize that these are only the reported cases, so the actual number is probably more. I thought this might be a significant number so I brought it up for discussion in council. I found a general reluctance for anyone on council to touch "the third rail". Past discussion had generated some heat among deer lovers in the community.

If you weren't aware of my activism regarding nature and the outdoors, peruse my website a little more. I think it conveys my appreciation for all of God's creation.

In the past few months, my fellow councilman Randy Kruger reintroduced the subject of the deer population. He mentioned concerns about road safety and disease with what might be an overpopulation. Anyone that drive through Lago Vista will see deer all over the place.

I think we can all agree that we like these furry critters and it is fun having them around. However, I think people that use words like "massacre" are engaging in hyperbole. Those are the kind of words I hear from some of the concerned residents. I am well aware this is an emotional issue, but I hope we can be level headed in our debate.

At the moment, all we are doing is discussing the issue. That is proper. No money has been spent or allocated, and none should until we have a better sense of the situation. A sub-committee has been formed to discuss the issue, which I am not a member of. I think they are working on a survey that will be sent out to get a sense of what people think. I had some people tell me that the survey should not have YES/NO answers, but degrees of agreement/disagreement, as well as "Undecided". I agree this would be an improvement. Having done several surveys, it is important that the answers be presented for easy tabulation afterwards. Written responses are very difficult to tabulate and may not provide useable information.

My general position thus far is that it is good to discuss it. I generally do not look to government first to solve all problems. I like the idea of letting people vote with their own money instead of being forced to support something through taxation. Therefore, I would prefer that any money that might be spent on this be done through private donations from the people that support the effort. I do not think you can bullet-proof the world, and people have to accept some responsibility for their own safety. There are lots of road and disease hazards and having government throw your money at them is not always the best approach. However, I do not agree with those that would have us ignore a potential hazard. If we anticipate our police department stressed to respond to deer related accidents, we may want to be pro-active. I sympathize with people that are concerned about deer, but are you also sympathetic to the mother and 2 young children driving home from Dallas at 2 AM on 1431, swerve to miss a deer that darted out, and collide head on with another family going the other direction? I also do not want police having to hand out citations for feeding deer, although I wish people did not do this. Let nature take care of nature.

Changing subjects completely, let's talk about the budget. I will post a more elaborate position at a future time, but here is my current thinking.

The city has been getting healthier financially with lower costs and higher revenues. However, let's not be like Congress. Every penny that Congress sees gets spent. For that matter, they spend money that doesn't exists and puts your children and grandchildren in trillions of dollars of debt. Lago Vista does not have to go on a spending spree.

My top priority is helping get a better balance between the general taxation and the utilities. As I have mentioned many times, you are all subsidizing your neighbor's water bill. That money is coming out of you city taxes. Therefore, if you are careful to conserve water but your neighbor is growing a tropical forest with gushing sprinkler heads, he can thank you for your generous donation. The water rates in Lago are much lower than surrounding areas, but our tax rate is much higher. I would like to get a better balance. I think a phased approach is the best way. If we do this over a couple of years, it will be easier to adjust to. With the anticipated 3 years drought, we need to ensure that the people that are using the water pay for it, and reward those that conserve. This also helps the overall city finances, as our auditor recommended.

Another effort I support in order to eliminate complexity and bureaucracy for city staff, promote tourism, and minimize taxation is to eliminate the bed tax. Right now we have a tax assessed on every hotel room that goes into a dedicated account in the city budget. We only have a few hotels here, so it is not a lot of revenue. This money cannot be spent on police, operation, utilities, or most anything else. It can only be spent on things that are related to tourism. Of course, it can be argued that just about anything that makes the city better promotes tourism. Where does the money go from there? Well in recent years it pretty much just sits there. The fund has accumulated to over $70k by now. However, that money is minor compared to the money spent by staff just dealing with it. The city staff is pretty lean and doesn't have a lot of spare time to go around promoting tourism. If there is an emergency in the water plant and people have no water, does that get deferred so the city manager can go around promoting tourism? Part of this money is distributed to local organizations, and requires staff to work is supposed to get what. When it comes time to audit, we have created a whole new set of ways in which a transaction can be accidentally put in the wrong category. Let's fix this the right way. You promote tourism by letting the hotels charge lower rates, letting them spend that money on advertising, or investing it in the Chamber of Commerce.

The last item to mention is the money that gets distributed from this tourism fund. Right now we have a number of local organizations that get a fractional percentage of money from this bed tax fund. My fellow councilman Fred Harless and I agree on this point; these organizations should present a request for a annual budget, and the money should not be a percentage of our revenue. Let us evaluate their presentation instead of just using a fixed formula.
We are nearing the end, and I just want to mention that I am working on getting a meeting of the Building Height sub-committee together. This is something that has been on the back burner so long that the flame has almost gone out. However, since I recently asked council to appoint me and they did so, I have taken the initiative. The tentative date is July 13 7:30 PM at city hall. My intent is just to start the discussion and see where it goes.

Lastly, for your entertainment pleasure I present the latest Live and Let Live . Live and Let Live (click here) television show. The subject is Lago Vista politics, so I hope you enjoy.

This lengthy post should tide you over until after the holiday. Have a great Independence Day!

6/16/06 It was a pretty simple council meeting last night.

We began by approving a right of way resolution for the construction of a highway on 1431 west of town. The property under consideration is city owned, not privately owned. Therefore, the "condemnation" is really just a transfer of government property to be used for the highway. The goal is to address a dangerous section of 1431 and make it safer.

We also approved the annexations for Travis Hollows, which has been discussed several times previously.

We approved the Planned Development District for The Island property. Again, this was needed to make the development that existed before our ordinances compliant with the current ordinances.

We also approved a donation of a lot to the city. The lot is one that most likely cannot be developed.

We approved a rate increase of $1.50 for the waste collection services. This is a market adjustment that we have avoided for some time. The service being provided is good and the new cost is market competetive.

We postponed action on a contract to provide fuel to the airport. There are some paperwork details that were not ready, so we will address this at a later meeting.

We had quite a bit of discussion about the capital improvement program. I like the general direction we are going on this. Although funding of the projects would require issuance of bond debt, the long term debt obligation is on a good downward trend. Most of the projects have to do with the reliability and capacity of our water and sewer services. I am in favor of meeting the needs of the market demand. I think it imperative that added capacity be coordinated with the rate adjustments needed so that new customers are paying the cost of the service. We will be having a separate session to specifically prioritize the projects. We will also be discussing the budget soon. I intend to post some comments on both these subjects in future postings.

Have a good weekend.

6/12/06 Welcome back. I had a lot of work to do at a convention in Houston last weekend, so I did not have time to post an update.

Many of you know that council approved the Planned Development District, vacation, and re-plat of the property for the Villa Montechino project. This is the property that previously was the Marshall Harbor development that went bankrupt several years ago. I wish the developer success in the project.

As I stated last Thursday at the meeting, not only do I support private property rights but also the rule of law. I did research section 212 of the state code pertaining to the rules on re-platting existing property. It is clear to me that the plat notes, especially plat note 4, which were filed with the original Marshall Harbor property, provided for the ability to re-plat the property if the original development was not completed. I believe it anticipated precisely the situation we faced last Thursday. Therefore I voted in favor of the re-plat as the current property owner Brian Atlas can legally do so per the terms of this contract.

We have a meeting this Thursday, so I will try to get a timely post following that meeting.

6/1/06 A new council is in town. I want to thank Jim Orr for his service on council. We may not have voted the same way on all the issues, but I always felt there was mutual respect between us and I valued his insight. The only change on council is the addition of Mike Thornton. Mike and I know each other from church and he is a very respectful and sincere person. Again, we may not always vote the same way, but I am confident we can work well together and that he will be an asset to council.

We had a public hearing on the Island re-zoning as a Planned Development District (PDD). This was necessary because the development occurred before our zoning ordinances, and much of what was there was out of compliance. Planning and Zoning approved the PDD.

Much of tonight's meeting was in executive session. Following executive session, I did make a motion pertinent to the case with WULA (Western United Life Assurance) to prepare for a hearing and cease all negotiations on the land, which passed unanimously.

We also had a unanimous vote to deny an extension to Mickey Redwine to begin construction of his residence.

I did get the minutes of the March 2 meeting amended. I wanted to get Super S on the record in response to my question, saying that the tax subsidy that the rest of council gave them was not needed for the long term viability of the project, it just got the project started sooner.

We had a discussion about the rate increase from IESI, the company that handles our garbage collection. I suggested that though the rate increase is probably meritted, it would be good to get other bids and see what the market rate is. I am not in favor of going to the lowest bidder all the time. You normally get what you pay for, and will end up paying more in the long run for poor service. Council generally agreed, but the mayor will speak with them on negotiations for the contract. There is a cost to change vendors, so that needs to be factored.

Regarding the budget, I asked if the water study would be complete in time to use this information in the budget discussions. I sounds like we should have the study complete by July.
I did mention the concerns I had about the role of email and the Open Meetings Act. I distributed the story about the lawsuit in Alpine, Texas which I mentioned in my voluminous posting on 5/22. My intention was to make sure council is aware of the gray area and danger points of using email correspondence when it pertains to city agenda items.

5/27/06 Just a clarification regarding the statement in Thursday's LOG "Councilman Pat Dixon asked that Centex create the study, to which it agreed". The study it is talking about is a study to determine the long term water service needs for the area. We are trying to determine whether our utilities should offer service to developments outside of the city, like Centex. I want to make it very clear that Centex should not create the study. I only asked that they fund the hiring of an independent engineer to produce the study. It is not that I don't trust Centex, but we don't want the developer to just turn around and say "We did our study and it says you can give us water real cheap." By appointing an independent firm, both the city and Centex can review the study and determine its accuracy. The study should contain at least 2 things:

1. It needs to have the long term water service capacity for the city, and any additional capacity to serve outside areas. We know how many vacant lots we have in the city limits. The tax appraiser Art Cory says it would take another 40 years to fully populate these lots.

2. It needs to determine the cost of service. Right now we are selling water below cost and subsidizing the rest of the cost with taxation. If we sell water at the same rates outside the city to people that don't pay our taxes, we lose money. There are economies of scale and that margin may go down as more volume flows, but right now our rates are about 35% below the cost to provide the service. We need the study to tell us where our rates need to be at these higher volumes to make it economically feasible.

5/25/06 I got a call yesterday from the office of the Travis County Attorney (David Escamilla). This is a separate office from Ronnie Earle, the County District Attorney. They told me that the email advocacy without public notice is a very gray area of the Texas Open Meetings Act, and should definitely be avoided. I just wanted to throw that in with the rest of the paper trail.

5/22/06 Get ready to drink from the fire hose. I am about to close the book on the events of Dec 15, 2005.

That was the evening that Mayor Jones won a 6-1 decision (myself dissenting) killing my effort to establish meeting rules and substituting his rules. This followed the mayor's private message to council members that morning telling them not to support my proposal. That followed a training session 2 weeks earlier where council was told that this kind of private advocacy was a possible violation of the Texas Open Meetings Act.

Now that I have inflamed some of you, it is time for my disclaimer. I am not calling Mayor Jones evil, corrupt, or stupid. Over time I think Mayor Jones and I have come to respect each other more. The Mayor has given me opportunity to express my opinion, even when they differ with his. We have found common ground on some issues, and when we disagree we do so respectfully.

That does not change the fact that the actions of Dec 15 were not in the spirit of open government and respect for my efforts.

I fully realize that debate about Robert's Rules and legal technicalities can be mundane and trivial. The world will not end with Dec 15. However, without respect for the process and each other, little things turn into big things.

The end of the story is this; council members need to respect one another and conduct themselves openly before the property owners and taxpayers. Let's not have a repeat of Dec 15.

I do not have and never had any intention of pursuing legal action against the mayor. It does no good to put Mayor Jones in jail. In this age of litigation, we don't need to give more work to lawyers. My sole interest is to understand if this was a legal activity. Should council be discouraged from doing this? If not, is it OK for me to start sending around private emails to council telling them how they should vote? The court of public opinion can weigh in.

The result of the legal analysis is a mixed bag. It could be argued that the mayor violated the act, but depending on legal technicalities it may not qualify as offense. The Texas Attorney General's Office referred to some previous rulings suggesting that the mayor did violate the law. The Travis County District Attorney, Ronnie Earle, also had my request to investigate. I need to say that I was not very impressed with the delays and confusion in that office. After more than 4 months of being unable to convince me they even had my request, they tell me that the case "did not qualify" because there was no vote prior to the meeting. I waited 4 months for that? I could accept a reasoned argument based on the law, but this response indicates they not only don't know the law but didn't do any investigation. I also got feedback from the Texas Municipal League and the Freedom of Information Foundation of Texas, and was told it technically may not be a violation but it can certainly be interpreted as one. It all boils down to whether the mayor's email was an "exchange" of information. If anyone had replied to it, it would constitute a meeting and both sender and responder would be subject to up to 6 months in jail. It could be argued that if nobody responded, the mayor still "exchanged" his advocacy with the rest of council in private without public notice.

Before I open the fire hose and drench you with a detailed chronology, you have a decision to make. Does this matter? Will you scrutinize the people that govern you and make them deal honestly and openly with you on the important issues that effect your rights, your property, and your family?

Chronological history of events:

May 5, 2005: Dixon is elected to Lago Vista city council, place 1.

July 7, 2005: At Lago Vista council meeting, Dixon informed council that there is no ordinance addressing rules of order for council meetings, as mandated by the city charter. Dixon asked Mayor Jones to add discussion of this issue as a working session for a future council meeting agenda.

July 21, 2005: In council working session, Dixon discussed council meeting procedures and his preference for adopting Roberts Rules of Order. Mayor Jones expressed reluctance to Roberts Rules. Dixon expressed interest in working with the mayor to draft an ordinance that was acceptable.

Oct 5, 2005: At council meeting during discussion of future agenda items, Dixon mentions he is working on a draft ordinance for adopting rules of order and is looking forward to meeting with Mayor Jones to draft an acceptable proposal.

Nov 30, 2005: Council attended two 3-hour sessions of training on the Texas Open Meetings Act conducted by attorney William M McKamie. During the session, Dixon asked McKamie what the law says about email correspondence among council members. McKamie indicated that informational correspondence is appropriate, but best handled by having staff distribute the notices. He added that email correspondence among council members that advocate positions on items that would be on a meeting agenda and acted upon is not appropriate. It was explained that such discussion among council must be done publicly with proper notice.

Dec 10, 2005: Council members received binders for the Dec 15, 2005 council meeting. The agenda included under item #9 an action on setting rules of order for council meetings. There had been no working session for council to read a proposed draft and deliberate on any proposed ordinance.

Dec 12, 2005: Dixon sent an email to Mayor Dennis Jones, copied to the city manager Bill Angelo, with a draft ordinance Dixon had been working on and asking to meet and discuss. Later that day Dixon phoned the city manager Bill Angelo asking about the procedure for disseminating the draft ordinance to council prior to the meeting. Angelo informed Dixon that he should send the draft to city secretary Joyce Stapleton.

Dec 13, 2005: Dixon sent an email to the city secretary Joyce Stapleton, copying to Bill Angelo, with the draft ordinance to provide to council prior to the Dec 15 meeting.

Dec 15, 2005: At 8:53 AM Mayor Jones sent an email to all council members advocating that members not vote for Dixon's draft ordinance, including a copy of an ordinance that the mayor had written. The mayor advocated in his email that council support his draft instead of Dixon's. Dixon is the only member of council that is not retired and at the time the mayor's message was sent Dixon was with clients and unable to respond prior to the council meeting that evening. At the council meeting that evening at 7:30 p.m., Mayor Jones made a motion to approve his own ordinance specifying the Texas Municipal League handbook for rules of order. Dixon mentioned that this handbook, though it serves as a fine general introduction to the topic, cannot serve as a rulebook since it does not specify rules. Dixon added that we had not seen the mayor's ordinance until today and did not have time to read it. Dixon moved to table Jones' motion. Jones initially refused to allow the motion to table until Dixon explained that the motion is in order. The motion to table failed for lack of a second. Dixon asked council to vote against the mayor's ordinance. There was no further deliberation on the matter, and council voted of 6 to 1 (Dixon dissenting) for the mayor's ordinance. Dixon asked council to consider that the mayor's email that morning was a violation of the Open Meetings act that had been covered in the training. Councilman Fred Harless stated that it was not a violation.

Dec 17, 2005: Dixon contacted the former mayor of Cibolo, TX, Mr Charles Ruppert, to ask his opinion as to whether our mayor violated TOMA with his email to council on Dec 15. His reply stated that the mayor's email is a violation of TOMA section 551.042.

Dec 18, 2005: Dixon called the Travis County district attorney's office (office of Ronnie Earle) at 512-854-9400. Dixon was informed that cases involving open meetings are handled by the Public Integrity division and was forwarded to that department. Dixon explained that he was requesting an interpretation of the TOMA regarding his case. The office said they would send him a "Request to Investigate" packet.

Dec 19, 2005: Dixon contacted attorney William McKamie by phone, who had presented the training on Nov 30, on this matter. Mr McKamie confirmed that the mayor's email on Dec 15 advocating his position on this matter was not appropriate.

Dec 29, 2005: Dixon filed a "Request to Investigate" with the DA's Special Prosecution office and mailed it to the address provided with the packet (PO Box 1748, Austin 78767).
Jan 3, 2006: Dixon's "Request to Investigate" packet received at address of Travis County District Attorney public integrity division.
Jan 10, 2006. Dixon phoned the state attorney general's office to inquire about the interpretation of TOMA. Their interpretation is that a case like this is a clear violation of the TOMA. The office stated that they could not formally rule on such a case and that the county DA would have to handle it.

February 2006: Dixon phoned Earle's Public Integrity division several times for an update and was informed it was still being investigated.

March 14, 2006: At 2:00 PM, Dixon called Yvette Guero at the Travis County district attorney's office to explain that it has been quite some time since the investigation form was received by their office and would like an update on progress with the investigation. Guero suggested that there was no record of the inquiry and it may have been lost.

March 15, 2006: At 9:00 AM Dixon phoned Mary Helen Talley, receptionist at Travis County DA office. She said she thought John Freo may be the investigating attorney because she heard him talk about the Lago Vista case in the hall. She thinks he may be out of the office until next week. Talley transferred Dixon to talk to Yvette Guero, who said Dixon should deliver another copy of the inquiry form at their office, 205 W 9th, Suit 400. Dixon left a voice message for John Freo to get feedback on the investigation. Later that morning, Dixon received a call from Mindy Johansson in the DA's White Collar crime division. Johansson said there are 2 departments (White Collar Crime and Public Integrity Division) that might handle this case, but the White Collar department may not have the request. She suggested dropping off the request at their office at 509 W 11th Suite 1.100, and provided her direct phone number 512-854-4407. Dixon made copies of the "Request to Investigate" packet. He hand delivered a copy to Mary Helen Talley at the Public Integrity division at 12:57. He then hand delivered a copy to Mindy Johansson at the DA's White Collar crime division.

March 23, 2006: Dixon phoned the state attorney general's office to seek advice on how to proceed, given the county DA's lack of progress. The attorney general's office provided information in the Morales ruling of Aug 30, 1995 (95-055) and the Cornyn ruling of Nov 20, 2000 (JC-0307) that support the assertion that Mayor Jones' actions are a violation of TOMA. They advised that their office cannot give an official ruling, as the county would still have to rule on local offenses. In order to get a formal opinion, a state legislator would have to request the office to investigate.

March 24, 2006: Dixon spoke with district 48 state representative Donna Howard to request the attorney general's office render a formal opinion on the case.

March 28, 2006: Dixon spoke with Mary Helen Talley at the DA's Public Integrity Division to follow up. She said investigator John Freo would probably be handling the case. Dixon also phoned Mindy Johansson at the DA's White Collar Crime division to find that investigator Debra Smith would probably handle the case.

March 30, 2006: District 48 state representative Donna Howard replied that the attorney general's office could not give a formal opinion.

April 13, 2006: Dixon called the DA's White Collar Crime division to speak to Mindy Johansson. He reached division head Patty Robertson and was informed that Mindy no longer worked for the office. Dixon left a message for Debra Smith to contact him with an update. Later that day, John Freo of DA's public integrity division called Dixon and said he did not know who had the case. He said they had a big backlog and were trying to clear their case files.
April 14, 2006: At 9:23 AM the Travis county White Collar crime division called Dixon. Debra Smith said that an investigator looked at the case and decided it "did not qualify". The investigator stated that is was not a TOMA violation because no vote was taken prior to the council meeting that evening.

May 16, 2006: Dixon contacted the Texas Municipal League for their interpretation of using council email to advocate a vote in private. The May 5, 2004 white paper "Email Issues for City Officials" by TML director of legal services Scott Houston states that such correspondence is not appropriate. Houston replied to Dixon's request and stated that it could be argued that it might not be an offense if there was no reply to Mayor Jones' advocacy, but the jail and fine penalty under TOMA would apply to both the mayor and anyone that replied to him.

May 22, 2006: Replies from the Freedom of Information Foundation of Texas (www.foift.org) suggested the language of TOMA is unclear. The interpretation of "verbal exchange" does include email correspondence, but it is not clear if there is an "exchange" if none of the council members reply.

May 24, 2006: A reply from the Travis County Attorney (David Escamilla) confirmed that such an email advocacy without public notice is a very gray area in the TOMA and is very risky. Council members should definitely avoid doing this.

END OF STORY

5/18/06 The following is NOT an apology ...


Patti Ulrich spoke to me on Aril 13, 2005 at the Deli Werks candidate forum. She said she did not like some things about how I presented myself at Randy Kruger's campaign event and the Republican Club's meeting, but said that she and her husband John could be listed as endorsements for my campaign. I told her that I appreciated her candid feedback and her endorsement, which I placed on my website soon after.

Now it is a year later, April 14, 2006 when I receive an email from Patti claiming that her endorsement was conditional on the assumption that I was a Republican. She claims that she just now discovered her endorsement on my website, my Libertarian affiliation, and that she demands an apology.

Anyone suggesting that I hide my allegiances does not know me. I am pretty good about recollecting details and events. Her assertions are utterly false.

From the ridiculous to the sublime, we had a spirited and sometimes contentious, but respectful and productive meeting tonight. As I have said several times, despite differences of opinion our council can make good decisions together by considering each other's opinions. Although I have had serious disagreement over some actions taken by this council, I respect these men for their intent.

We started with our second public hearing on the Centex annexation. I did have a concern over replatting a portion of this property, but the annexation does not affect the process of later public hearings and deliberation over replat. There was little discussion otherwise.

We had an executive session with legal counsel over several items, and I believe we are proceeding appropriately in these matters.

We also had the opportunity to vote on providing water service to the Centex developments outside of the city. The problem is that what we charge for water does not cover the cost of the operation, so we subsidize our low rates with property taxes. Centex properties outside the city would not pay our city property tax and would have us giving them water at a loss at the current rates. I am a proponent of having the people that use the service bear the cost. The agreement we are considering would have an enhanced rate to make up this difference. The 2 issues are that we don't really know the differential between our rates and operating cost if we add economies of scale for more customers, and there is uncertainty in our long term capacity if we try to serve more customers outside our area.

I decided to be bold and propose that Centex, being the interested party in getting the water service, fund the independent long term study of water service and rate structure to provide water outside our area, while servicing those in the city limits. No action was taken, but I think this is a no brainer that will go forward and allow council to make an informed decision in the future.

We had quite a bit of debate about having a future public hearing about the new floodplane restrictions that council will need to consider. Nobody from FEMA will make themselves available for such a hearing, so there may not be merit in having a meeting without being able to provide answers. I suggested that in the spirit of good and open government, we may want to allow people another opportunity to talk about this as we get closer to the end of this long process. We have had 2 public meetings with FEMA, but that was some time ago. Reality is starting to set in. Some argued there is no point in discussing something that the federal government has already forced us to do. I disagree with that reasoning, as I find it entirely appropriate to allow those affected to discuss and understand what is happening. In the end, we plan to have a brief explanation in the LOG of what is happening with the floodplane, and people still have the ability to ask such questions during citizen inquiry at our meetings.

I took a respectfully dissenting view in discussion of further regulations on commercial buildings. The motive is to restrict what building materials can be used for commercial buildings in order to make them look better. Are we to believe that the choice of building material prevents construction of an ugly building? Would that apply to the Eiffel Tower? We have a church and a karate studio built within the last few years with some metal material on the exterior. I would guess this building approach was the most sensible and economic choice. It appears a couple of commercial builders now want to restrict such choice city wide in order to enhance the surroundings of their buildings. The fair and simple way is for them to purchase the property nearby. Instead, they want the city to micro-manage every construction job in town, adding more work to an already busy staff, and throw private property rights in the trash. I hope we vote this down.

That will do it for now. If anyone else wants their endorsement removed because I am not in their club, I will be more than happy to do so. Just don't ask for an apology.

5/13/06 We had an executive session on Wednesday morning to discuss the Villa Montechino replat and PDD (Planned Development District). Following the meeting, Planning and Zoning had their meeting to vote on these items. Since I still earn an income and have client obligations, I left planning and zoning the following note:



We also had the first of 2 public hearings on requested annexations by Centex and Velton Crawford. We will have the second hearing next Thursday.

5/7/06 I have not had time until now to update the site because of our choir's (TXConsort.org) performances of Mozart's "Requiem" this weekend. Better late than never.

The first observation from our council meeting Thursday is we need a bigger space for meetings. I would guess we only accommodated 2/3 of the people, and the rest had to squeeze into a hallway. We need to allow the residents to participate and have a voice. It would save money if there was another larger room we could hold public business. The meetings we have held at K-Oaks have more than enough room, but I don't know how often we could do that.

The big issue of the evening was the Villa Montechino development. This is proposed for the site of a development that went bankrupt several years ago called Marshall's Harbor. At issue is that the developer is requesting plats and zoning that differ from the original bankrupt development. Some of the adjacent property owners say the proposal is illegal, we have not had enough public input, and there will be too much traffic.

As far as traffic, my understanding is that the traffic engineers concluded their study and are certain that the proposal accommodates the expected traffic flow.

I certainly agree that we haven't given the public enough chance to weigh in. We still had letters arriving the day of the meeting that we did not have a chance to read.

The legal concerns are the biggest issue. Council has an executive session scheduled Wednesday morning to discuss this further.

This is a hot issue. I am a firm supporter of private property rights. The Kelo decision only made us aware of the attack on property rights that has been going on for a long time. Many people misunderstand what property rights are. You have a right to your property, not someone else's. If you want to ensure nobody builds something you don't like next to you, buying the adjacent property is the best and fairest way to guarantee this outcome. Another way is to ensure that the purchase of your property has a good contract that addresses your concerns. That is the issue in this case. Some property owners say that the plat notes and state law section 212 specifically prohibit re-plat of the property as proposed for Villa Montechino. I am not in favor of voiding contracts where someone has made a commitment to purchase based on terms and conditions. I will approach the executive session with interest.

Both Planning and Zoning and the Building committee appointed 2 members each to serve on a sub-committee to work on the issue of height restrictions in the zoning code. I discovered that they were waiting on someone from council to be appointed to the sub-committee. I was able to nominate myself and got a unanimous vote from council. This will not be an overnight process, and I foresee it will take some time before consensus will occur.

I also informed council that I have been working with staff on simplification of existing zoning code, and I expect to have something to propose in the June timeframe. Right now we have 29 different zoning categories, and this causes much confusion and extra work. Some of these classifications are obsolete or redundant. Simplification can produce tangible benefits and reduce the cost of bureacracy without requiring tax dollars to fix it.

I also asked for an update on the codification process. The city has spent money to get the existing codes and ordinances put together in electronic form so that we can more easily see what our owns rules say. It takes time for staff to review the electronic version and make sure they match what council actually passed.

That will do for now. Take care.

4/29/06 Some of you may wonder how many people actually use this website. The server statistics show 11,947 unique visitors since this site was posted. So far this year, the average daily number of unique visitors to the site is 41, with a high of 124 unique visitors on Feb 26, 2006. I am glad this site is of use to so many people.

4/27/06 Tonight I cast the most conflicted vote of my council tenure.

We began with an executive session regarding an ongoing legal matter and some city property. I can't discuss the details of executive session, which always bothers me. You know that I am a proponent of open government, so I wish I could disclose more.

That was followed by votes on the Town Center and Super S grocery store. It is amusing that I am accused of opposing the grocery store when I am the one making the motion to approve the development agreement and zoning variances to allow it to be built. I would guess most of you readers of this site are the ones smart enough to know the difference between voting YES to build it but voting NO to use your tax money to do it? The development agreement does have some details to be resolved, so I made the motion to approve it pending acceptance from the city manager and city engineer. My motions to approve the agreement and planned development district (zoning accomodations) passed unanimously. Will there be any cartoons giving me credit for this, with my mouse ears on?

Lastly, we had the contentious issue of the long defunct Marshall's Harbor area which is finally being considered for development by Brian Atlas. At issue is a development agreement, which specifies an understanding between the city and Atlas what the financial arrangements are for the utilities on the development. The agreement has nothing to do with the zoning, density, or plat. Those issues are to be addressed in public hearings. Many people in neighboring areas are concerned with the zoning because they don't want their properties affected by what is next to them. I saw nothing in the development agreement that I could object to. Randy Kruger also seemed to have reviewed the agreement and had lots of questions, which were all answered. After considerable discussion from council and the residents present at the meeting, I could find nothing in the agreement that would cause me to vote NO.

Why was I conflicted? The audience made one persuasive point; some of them had not seen the agreement and did not have enough time to review it and comment on it tonight. I confess that that is a very persuasive argument to postpone consideration in order to make a good faith effort for open government. While our consideration and vote tonight was perfectly legal, we should go the extra mile to include our residents in the process. Often times we do make motions without providing all conceivable documentation to the public in advance, such as actions taken after executive session. You cannot have a city wide vote on every action taken by council. That is why we have elected representatives to make these votes. I will note some of the people in the audience did have copies of the agreement.

Therefore, my decision was not whether to oppose the agreement. It was whether to have council vote tonight, or postpone until more of the residents read it. I had strong sentiments both ways and had to make a call and stick with it.

It reminds me of my experience as a basketball referee. You have a split second to make a call on your best judgment and stick with it. You cannot ask the teams to do the play over if you have doubts about what you saw. You make the call and move on to the next play. You will make mistakes, but most of the time you get it right.

I decided that:

- The development agreement is now available to the public for anyone that wants to see what we voted on.

- The proposed zoning changes are also available to the public prior to our consideration.

- The main concerns are not the development agreement but the zoning.

- There will be a public hearing on the zoning changes.

- If the zoning is not approved, the development agreement has no bearing.

I made the motion to approve the development agreement. It passed with 2 voting NO. I left tonight knowing that the vote was not easy, but it takes courage to do your best, take action, and move on.

4/15/06 As I stated previously I will not be able to attend the April 20 council meeting. One of the items on the agenda is to restrict the types of building materials used for commercial buildings to certain approved materials. For the record, I would vote NO. We already have very complex regulations on development, and do not need to add more workload to the building inspectors. Certainly if someone owned a tract of land and planted a subdivision with upscale buildings, that is fine. Insisting that everyone in Lago Vista has to jump through more hoops and add bureaucracy to our city building process is not something I can support.

I won't be there to comment, so I'll see how it turns out.

4/12/06 "Sometimes you're the windshield, sometimes you're the bug"

After the 2 meeting we had yesterday, it is obvious that the federal and state governments are the windshield and the rest of us are bugs.

We had a meeting with FEMA regarding the flood plain maps yesterday. I could write an entire book on this subject, but the result is that there are no options. We are forced under duress of the federal government to increase the flood plain from 716 to 723 ft and deny building permits below the new level.

From my research I found that National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) insurance is only required for structures built with a federally backed loan. This makes sense. If you have a federally backed loan, the loss of your home is a loss of collateral to the lender which is insured by the federal government. If you don't have a federally backed loan, if your structure gets wiped out the federal government is not injured. But, if you have been holding a lakefront property for the last 10 years and now want to pay cash to build your house, do not believe the lake will reach your structure, and even if it does you will accept responsibility for the risk you took, the city still will not be allowed to give you a permit. The explanation that we heard is that we all have restrictions on our property rights for the collective good. Do you need further evidence of the assault on private property rights? FEMA writes the ordinance that we have to pass, and language that would grant permits to those without federally backed loans would not be acceptable by FEMA and would prevent anyone in Lago Vista from getting flood insurace. I do not blame FEMA, NFIP, LCRA, or any other acronym. The blame lies with the people we have put in US Congress. The federal government has imposed these restrictions on property rights. Time for a little house cleaning?

For further entertainment, you can see the video of my interview on this subject here (Click to see video).

Last night we had a meeting with the school board to hear a presentation from the tax appraiser. The result of this one is that your appraised value will go up 25%. Because of caps on your annual property taxes, that means that your property tax will go up 10% this year, 10% next year, and 2% the following year, all things being equal. Art Cory, the chief appraiser, was very courteous and informative in his presentation. It was apparent that the reason that such a sudden increase is coming is that the appraisal district does not get realtime sales information. Mr Cory explained that the Texas comptroller does have access to the MLS information and generates a report that states what the value of properties are in the real estate market. The appraisal district is restricted by state law from accessing MLS sales information from the Texas Real Estate Commission and has to wait until the comptroller's report to see if their appraised values match the marketplace.

I am a low tax, smaller government person. Setting the tax rate is a different matter than the method of collecting the tax. I want taxes low and the tax collection system to be fair and efficient. It seems that for the appraisal district to not have the information they need to assess properties based on the market is creating inefficiency and inequity.

I do not blame the appraisal district for doing their job. I blame the people in elected state office for wasting our money and creating an inefficient and unfair tax collection system.

There are times when we in local government cannot defend your rights and property. The people we have put in US Congress and state office are the ones that created the windshield. It is time for us bugs to revolt.

4/9/06 Some calendar updates, some of which have nothing to do with city council, but are of interest to Lago Vista:

Today I stopped into Sun Hardware and was delighted to see an information table regarding "The FairTax". If you don't know what that is, Monday evening 5:30 PM at the POA Activity Center there will be a presentation from Americans for Fair Taxation (www.FairTax.org) on this bill that currently has 54 sponsors in Congress and a NY Times #1 best selling book written by my friend Neal Boortz (Boortz.com). If I can drag you away from your 1040 form long enough, it will be well worth your while to know how we can end the IRS all together. I have signed on and endorsed the plan, and have been on television debating its merits (Click to see video)

Unfortunately I will not be able to attend. Many of you know that I perform in a classical music organization, the Texas Choral Consort (www.TXConsort.org). We have a rehearsal for "Mozart's Requiem" that evening

That is an excellent segue into another calendar event, which is the Hill Country Singers performances on April 29 and 30. I bought my ticket!

Council has a meeting on Tuesday at 2:00 PM with representatives of FEMA regarding the floodplane maps and flood insurance. This is an issue that has a lot of people concerned, so hopefully we can address some of the questions you may have. The meeting will be held at city hall

Later that evening at 7:00 PM, council and the school board has a meeting with the county tax appraiser. It appears appraised values may go up, and this is an opportunity to raise questions and get answers. This presentation will be at the high school's Viking Hall.

Lastly, as I mentioned before I will not be present for the April 20 council meeting. My attendance record is still way better than most of US Congress.

4/6/06 A lengthy council meeting tonight, so here is the update.

At the planning and zoning meeting, there was a discussion of being more flexible in the setback requirements for homes on the golf courses, in order to allow larger and more valuable homes to be built. I am certainly in favor of giving more freedom to property owners. There are a number of technical issues that arise, such as access to utilities if the setbacks are too narrow. The discussion was good as it brought a lot of issues to the surface, but in the end there was no solid proposal that planning and zoning could send forward for council to consider.

Additionally, the issue of height restrictions came up. Some months ago planning and zoning decided to create a sub-committee to look at this issue. Tonight I inquired about this, and what is needed is a representative from council to be added to the committee. Currently there are 2 from planning and zoning and 2 from the building committee already appointed, according the the chair of planning and zoning. I asked the mayor to have council consider appointing someone the the sub-committee the first meeting in May.

I will be out of town for the next council meeting on April 20. That is the only one I will have missed. My attendance has been a lot better that most of our people in Congress.

The council meeting started with a lengthy dispute from Robert Crowe about his water bill. His bill went up dramatically in October and November by about $200 each month and claims that it is due to a faulty water meter. It also turns out that he had a leaky toilet and a water hose that had been left running when the city came to investigate. The city re-tested the meter and found it to be accurate. I was not inclined to give Mr Crowe a break based on the evidence I had and proposed that he pay what was due and have him send the meter to an independent agency to test and certify the meter. I deal with industrial instrumentation all the time and have had the same thing done with equipment that I have installed. If he shows the meter was inaccurate, we could rebate what he was overcharged. The consensus of council was to allow the mayor to reach a settlement with Mr Crowe. We all accept the readings of the meters we have for our billing, and I don't want you having to pick up the tab for someone else challenging their bill. It may not be a lot of money, but I think it is important to be consistent.

We also had a conundrum with a boat dock that Richard Funk is building. It turns out that he has discovered that the boat dock he is building is actually on someone else's property. He talked to the property owner and the both agreed to re-plat the property so that Mr Funk can continue. However, until this occurs, which can take some time, we cannot allow the dock to be on someone else's property. The resolution is that he can put the parts of the dis-assembled dock on his property until the property lines are re-drawn, and then he can continue.

We had several approvals of the projects for Travis Hollows, the Super S Grocery store (I voted yes, for the record), Marshall's Harbor, and Canyon Oaks. Additionally, we had a presentation from a group that plans to develop an area called The Falls, and are interested in a voluntary annexation. There is a lot of development interest, and the city manager said that with all of this activity and the limited staff, the process may not be real fast. That is why we have to address the complexity of our ordinances and streamline the process to avoid an increasing cost of bureaucracy as we grow.

Finally, I will mention we had a discussion about the growing deer population. I applaud Randy Kruger for being proactive. I am concerned of the potential loss of life from auto accidents for failure to act on this. We all love the furry critters, but we need to consider the cost and safety to our residents. I handed an article from Mike Leggett, outdoors writer for the Austin Statesman, to each council member which shows what approaches do and don't work for adressing the deer population problem. I think if we stay ahead of the game we will all be better off.

Good night, all

3/29/06 Good news. No, I did not save a bunch of money on car insurance. The good news is a good audit

Tonight we reviewed the annual audit with the auditor. Generally, we are in good shape. The auditor gave us the highest possible rating . Feel free to go to city hall and look it over. One of the challenges in reading the audit is that accounting methods change, and it can be difficult to compare one year to the next.

I was happy that we had 1.5 hours of discussion with the auditor and asked a lot of questions. I went through the audit this week and bookmarked areas where I had questions. Tonight, many of my questions were the same ones that my fellow council members were asking. We dug into a lot of details and got a good feel for where we stand.

The auditor had some recommendations to improve our record keeping, which mostly consists of bringing in dedicated accounting help. The city manager will bring us a proposal to fill this need.

One of the big areas of discussion tonight was where utility debt should be. This is rather complex, but basically we are using general obligation bonds, which are payed for with taxes, to build the utility infrastructure. The merit of this approach is that interest rates on these bonds can be lower than bonding through revenue bonds, which are backed by utility rates. It certainly is fiscally prudent to pay lower interest, but there are 2 caveats. One is that there is a bonding ceiling, so that if we had a need to finance a true general government project, like a police station, we may not have enough left under the ceiling to finance it. The other issue is that it makes accounting unclear. Ideally, utilities should operate like a stand alone business and charge rates that cover the true cost. Right now, we are taxing you at a high rate and using this to subsidize the utility department. As I have often said, the people that use the service are the ones that should pay for it.

Consider this:

* Our method of using general taxation to pay for utilities is unusual compared to other cities. The auditor serves on Pflugerville council, and told us that they use the common practice of having the utility department as a stand alone operation and do not co-mingle with the general fund

* Our utility rates are way lower than anywhere else around


* Those rates do not cover the true cost of the utilities

* We are taxing you at a high rate to make up the difference

* We are expecting drought conditions for the next 3 years. If people think water is cheap, they won't conserve

I think there is general consensus on council now to correct the imbalance to lower the tax rate and have the utility rate reflect the true cost.

One of the first things I look at in an audit is debt. I am probably the council member that is most interested in this number. The history history of long term debt obligation to you, the taxpayer, is:

2000, $15 million

2001, $30 million

2002, $28 million

2003, $27 million

2004, $34 million

2005, $32 million

The good news is that our debt is not on an ever increasing trajectory, unlike US Congress. I will work to keep this number from getting out of hand.

I want to compliment the auditor, Blakeslee, Monzingo & Co, for their good work and for being very helpful in answering our question with a good command of facts and patience. I want to compliment our city manager and staff whom the auditor said did an excellent job preparing information and were very cooperative to work with. I also compliment our council for digging in and getting a good feel for our fiscal position.

3/16/06Who's the leader of the fight to end tax subsidies?

MIC - KEY - DIXON!



Do I want a grocery store? YES

Do I want a corporate welfare tax subsidy? NO

Now from the ridiculous to the mundane

Tonight's council meeting went pretty smooth. We approved plats for Centex and Dollar General. The Centex project got some attention recently from allegations that the city gave them pre-mature permission to start work. This is incorrect. There are requirements the city has for Centex to proceed, and those have been met. Separately, there are requirements that LCRA has for Centex to proceed. LCRA had put a stop to Centex until their conditions are met. I understand that those conditions have now been met an LCRA has given them permission to continue. I know of no case where the city acted improperly.

We approved having city staff work on a contract for airport maintenance and rehabilitation. What is on the table is a grant to have Texas Department of Transportation to provide grant money to fund 90% of the project. This is a good deal. I am loath to spend your money, as you know. However, the work description is for essential maintenance that will have to be paid someday. Either we do it now at a huge discount, or later and bill you for the whole job. The total project is around $570,000. The other 10% is likely to be a combination of the Airport Property Owners Assn and city funds. I voted in favor.

We have a timeline for the FEMA flood-plane consideration. I am still hoping to do what I can to provide options to affected property owners.

I will note that the financial reports are very good. We are well ahead of budget on revenue, and expenses are well below budget. We need to make sure we do not find new ways to spend money as we have a lot of debt to pay.

Lastly, I will comment that there is a proposed revision to the building code that puts additional restrictions on building materials for the purpose of enhancing the overall visual image by enforcing design consistency. To me, a neighborhood of cookie-cutter houses that are identical except the paint is not that attractive. Some of the most attractive neighborhoods are the ones where the developer and property owner can be creative in their design and use new and innovative or more traditional building materials. Trying to micro-manage this by adding to the mountain of bureaucracy does not sound like a good idea.

It is midnight and time to take off my mouse ears. Good night!

3/3/06 We now have a grocery store, hurray! I, along with all of you, am happy about this

What I am not happy about is corporate welfare. That is why I was the lone dissenting vote opposing a tax subsidy to Super S Foods. I am not sure what I can and can't tell you about the terms, as it was discussed in executive session. However, what I can say is that I remain committed to the principles that I expressed in the campaign, while on council, and on this site. I will not pander to appease anyone.

I asked several questions of the Super S representatives. One that invoked many groans from the audience is the following scenario. Imagine 5 years from now Lago Vista is much bigger. Now HEB, Randall's, Albertsons, or Whole Foods thinks they would like to put a store here. What if they ask for a tax subsidy? Maybe you think that is unlikely. If Super S gets one, why not someone else? If they did get the subsidy, wouldn't Super S be subsidizing their competition? This is exactly the same argument presented when Austin was considering incentives for the new Whole Foods development on 6th and Lamar. There was a proposal to include a book stare (Border, Barnes and Noble) and record store. Well, Book People and Waterloo Records didn't care to subsidize their competition across the street with their retail taxes. This is an epidemic throughout the country, where small businesses are forced to support their competition.

One argument in favor of the subsidy is that it would not even exist without the tax revenue brought in from the new grocery store. This makes several assumptions. I do not have the credentials of Dr Milton Friedman, so you don't have to take my word for it. If you really want to study this, here is a small sample of research (Institute for Local Self Reliance , Reason Foundation , UpJohn Institute, Fisher and Peters ) that shows such incentives, at best, do not provide the intended benefits.

I will not support creating an un-even playing field. I want competition, not government, to determine winners and losers in the market. I support the free market, not socialism.

In other matters, we will also get a Dollar General store. I spoke to the representative of Dollar General, who showed up very early at 6 PM. I was impressed with her knowledge of the business. I did not realize that Dollar General also carries grocery items, though they do not have produce.

The discussion of the ESD brought up an interesting proposal. It was stated that the ESD could hire a consultant for $25k in order to reduce insurance premiums, but they do not have the money. One resident asked if donations could be made to the ESD to pay for the consultant. Wow, how about that? Instead of us taxing you more, how about making your own choice with your money?

Lastly, Centex seems to be on the way to getting to work. Some have expressed concern that Centex is not following proper procedure. I am certainly concerned if anyone is getting special treatment. The rule of law dictates that the law apply equally to everyone.
3/1/06 I won't say anything. Watch this video ( REMOVED BY REQUEST OF PROVIDER, JEFF REGAL ) and render your own verdict.

2/25/06 I believe Hugh Farmer to be a good man with the best of intentions. Why am I saying this? Because I am going to slam him.

This morning we had a special meeting of council to allow Centex to clear and develop property before the Golden Cheek Warblers (those are birds, not a rock band) begin nesting in the habitat. Of only 3 residents in attendance, I recognized one of them who lives in the area of the development and expected that they would want to make some comments.

Hugh Farmer presided, as Mayor Jones was absent. Hugh asked for a motion, and Fred Harless moved to approve the clearing. Bob Bradley seconded.

At every council meeting I have attended, we now have a motion on the floor and it is time for discussion. The same for every board and committee that I participate on, as well as every city council, board or committee I am aware of that have any semblance of proper meeting procedure.

That is why I was alarmed that Hugh Farmer then asked for a vote, and Hugh started by voting "Aye". What the heck is going on? I raised my hand and got the attention of Hugh, stating that I thought there were residents interested in making comments before we vote on the motion. Hugh seemed offended, and said we are not voting on the motion but making the motion. I pointed out that the motion was already made and seconded. Hugh then commented that this is the reason we do not use Roberts Rules, and then proceeded to start discussion without Hugh's mystery voting procedure.

IGNORANCE: The state of being destitute of knowledge or education.

You may think this mundane. Why am I so picky about rules and procedures?

Because we are not running some little country club here. We are making law. Details matter. When we don't know what the heck we are voting on, don't you think that matters? When people making laws can't even follow their own rules, don't you think that matters?

A person that is stupid is incapable of learning. A person that is ignorant is capable, but just doesn't bother to do so. How well does Hugh understand Roberts Rules? Has he received any training on parliamentary procedure? To claim that proper procedures are to blame for confusing the heck out of council is ignorance.

We then go to discussion, and council asked several questions of the developer. When discussion closed, Hugh asked if there was more discussion. When no other council member raised a hand, I commented that I thought there was a resident that would like to comment. Since we began the meeting as we did, I wanted to make sure we didn't go to a vote before the few people that came out at 10:30 on a Saturday had a chance to speak.

As someone who routinely presides over meetings, I would have welcomed this comment and recognized the residents to speak. Hugh chose to take offense to my comment as if I was insulting him. He felt the need to chastise me because he was going to run the meeting and I was not sitting in his chair. All I could do is stare at him in amazement that anyone could take offense at my comment.

How many of you have read thus far? Have I put you to sleep? Does this all seem mundane and trivial?

"Those who can be trusted with small deeds can be trusted with great deeds"

If I am the only one who cares about doing things properly, we will continue proceeding improperly. When will you care enough to demonstrate that you care?

We did end up approving of allowing Centex to begin work.

I now have some good news. The police department continues to get some very complementary letters regarding the professionalism and courtesy of the officers. See the letters from residents Tami Hood and Steve Smith .

2/18/06
Nothing earth shattering occurred at the council meeting.

As listed on the meeting agenda, the Casa Lago resort (The Inn) is delinquent in payment of taxes. As you know, I am a tax fighter. I want to reduce taxation and allow residents to make choices when it comes to spending money. However, when someone is delinquent in their payment, it increases the tax burden on everyone else.

The financial reports are looking good. Revenues are well in excess of expenses. The city manager credits city staff with cost cutting. The temptation is always there to spend surplus funds. I will work to reduce the debt obligation and tax burden. There are some things that we need to spend money on, but I will not be looking for new ways to spend away surplus.

We discussed the fact that the low lake levels may need to be taken into consideration for the case of rationing. The next 3 years are predicted to be warmer and dryer than normal, so the low lake levels are likely to be a long-term condition. Obviously, if the lake level were to drop below the intake for the water plant, we have no water. Currently, the revenue on water service does not cover expenses, and our rates are still low relative to the surrounding area. People should not get the impression that water is cheap and casually use it to excess. When we appreciate the true cost of providing these utilities, we will be more responsible in its use and hopefully avoid rationing.

There was a rather dramatic development in Houston recently in regards to the Texas Municipal League (TML). The fourth largest city in the entire country has dropped its membership in TML. (See article on Americans for Prosperity or TexasInsider. As you know, I have differences of opinion with TML regarding their position on eminent domain, among other things.

Speaking of eminent domain, I read a rather interesting study on the subject recently from a researcher at Florida State that may be of interest to you. This is the link and here is the Adobe Acrobat file. Enjoy!

2/12/06 I'm back!

A few people have asked my opinion of the city's capital improvement plan and a subsequent bond. This issue follows on the heels of the school bond vote, which naturally raises concerns to taxpayers. The information I have been presented thus far is very encouraging. It shows that with the inclusion of the bonds to cover the 5-year CIP, the debt obligation is being reduced, so that the debt service portion of ad valorem tax should be reduced consistently over the next 5 years or more. I cannot personally corroborate those numbers, and obviously that needs to be done. Many of you know that I am arguably the most fiscal conservative member on council, and I am always reluctant to spend more money. However, if the numbers I see are accurate, I think taxpayers will be pleased.

Part of the debt reduction is due to usage of impact fees. I know of complaints that the city has a million dollar slush fund of impact fee money that has not been used for its intended purpose. The fact is that the money has not been improperly used. Council is discussing using the money for bond financing based on a predictable stream of impact fee revenue. Per state law, the money has to be used for items identified in the impact fee study. The good thing about impact fees is that instead of raising taxes across the board when developers require more infrastructure (water, sewer, police service, etc), the developer incurs the cost for the impact they make. Of course, that cost gets passed on to the new property owners.

As I have said before, the ones that make use of the service are the ones who should pay. I am very happy to give you a recent example of this. Council received copies of a letter from Floyd Myers of Lake Kiowa, TX to our police chief Robert Smith. Myers describes how he became concerned for his daughter, who lives in Lago Vista. She was undergoing an extreme amount of stress and Myers feared for her well being after several days of not being able to reach her by phone. Myers contacted the police department to check on her, and describes how the department personnel and officers were very kind, understanding, skilled, and professional in handling the situation. It turned out their daughter was OK, but in appreciation Myers wrote a check for $500 to the Lago Vista Police Department! (Click here to see the actual letter)

Floyd Myers had no obligation to do this. Nobody put a gun to his head and forced him to compensate for the work the police did. I think I can speculate that Myers felt that it is proper for him to compensate since he the beneficiary of this work.

Recall that I asked you to do the same. I challenged you to voluntarily support the local organizations that support you. Perhaps some of you did so, but I happen to know from speaking to some of these organizations that most of you have not come through. Does that mean that Lago Vista residents prefer to have government put a gun to their head and take money out of their pocket, instead of giving you the freedom of choice to support the causes important to you?

I will next comment on the divisive issue of the Casa Lago development. Our last council meeting was predictably intense with an overflow crowd to voice their opinion. For out of towners, the basic issue is that an existing resort, which had been in bankruptcy for years and is now back in operation, has a proposed re-development for a much larger and more elaborate offering. Proponents argue this will give more tax base and will be much nicer than the existing facility. Others argue that large structures will block their lake view, increase traffic, increase noise, violate the existing zoning and master plan, and decrease their property value.

If you didn't read the two books I gave to council, you probably don't know my position on this issue. In short, the conflict is between the contractual obligations and rule of law versus private property rights.

If you purchase property under specified terms and conditions, there is a breach of contract if either side does not live up to the contract. That is the feeling of property owners when they purchase property in an area zoned for a specific purpose. I am certainly sympathetic to this concern. However, we all know that there is no guarantee that zoning will not change. In the political process, you can elect people or support initiative/referendum measures to change existing rules.

As I have said before, I do not care whether Lago Vista gets bigger or not. My job is to protect your rights and property, regardless of how big we are. Arguments about increasing the tax base are not my main concern. New developments do not come free, as they require more infrastructure. Of course impact fees help cover this cost, but do not assume that every development is going to make it and provide the tax revenue you predict.

On the other side, there is an assault on private property rights in this country. The Supreme Court's Kelo decision only highlighted the deterioration that has gone on for years. To what extent do you want government to micro-manage what you can do on the property that you claim is yours?

It seems to me that the developer Mr Adams is sincerely interested in accommodating the concerns addressed by the residents, and the Planned Development District approach may yield a solution that allows Mr Adams to develop on his property while preserving the spirit of the contractual concerns that residents are concerned about.

Lastly, I will conclude by finally setting a date for my next Chat with Pat. It will be Wednesday Feb 22 at 7 PM at Cabo Loco, which is the restaurant at the Casa Lago resort, 1900 American Drive. I will be somewhere in the restaurant, not in the bar. If you don't show up, I will just have a quiet meal. Don't complain that I didn't give you the chance to voice your concern. I am particularly interested in discussing concerns about eminent domain. I have shown that our current local laws have similar language to that of cities like New London, which is not specific about the definition of "public purpose". Many cities, including Austin, have passed changes to make certain the definition is more specific to prevent property takings as in Kelo.

If you made it this far, you are as tired from reading as I am from writing. Let's take a break and sleep on it.

1/27/06 Below is the letter sent to the Travis County Elections Division concerning last week's council meeting:

This letter is to express the concern from the City of Lago Vista that the lack of a verifiable paper trail in the voting process is troubling. Our city feels that it is important to ensure the integrity of the voting process.

We do not make any allegation that the Travis County Elections Division has been negligent or fraudulent in the voting services provided. We understand the merits of efficiency in the use of electronic voting machines, and understand that they are mandated by the federal HAVA (Help America Vote Act) law.

However, we urge Travis County to consider offering such voting machines with the option of producing a hard copy ballot to be used for validation and recount.

1/19/06 "Blest are you when they insult you and persecute you and utter every kind of slander against you because of Me. Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is great in heaven; they persecuted the prophets before you in the very same way." Matthew 5, 11-12

I begin at the end. The last item we discussed at tonight's council meeting was the inflammatory rhetoric of some residents that has been in the local paper and elsewhere concerning our city government. I commend council member Bob Bradley for speaking up about this issue. It is not comfortable to discuss publicly, but it is far healthier to cut into the patient than to let a cancer spread in the dark.

I respect every member of council and staff. I believe they all have the best of intentions. You have heard me say this before, but I am saying it again.
I also do not hesitate to voice my opinion in dissent, sometimes passionately so. I will not sit there like a potted plant and go with the flow. There have been some instances where I severely criticize council for their judgment, and I will continue to do so when appropriate.

There is difference between arguments of judgment and personal attacks. The rhetoric of some residents is getting personal and is often filled with baseless accusations. I understand the power of such rhetoric. William Randolph Hearst used this to great advantage in his day. However, just as with Hearst, these people marginalize themselves eventually.

The response of some council members is to call these people malcontents and label the rhetoric as hate. I disagree with this approach. To do so is to validate it.

Our nation was founded by malcontents like Samuel Adams, Patrick Henry, and Thomas Jefferson. We are a strong nation because what some may label as seditious actually makes use stronger. We debate and share opinions and eventually form consensus.

Bob Bradley suggested having a town hall meeting to let the public and council deal with it openly. That is the same motivation I have for my Chat with Pat sessions, which I will try to schedule shortly. What other recourse would there be? Censoring speech? Legislating equal time for opposing sides? NO!

I can you tell where the motivation for some of this antagonism originates: ME. People are reading this website, listening to what I say at council, and extrapolating conspiracy theories and baseless accusations. I cannot control someone's interpretation. Will this stop me from posting to this website? Should the city command me to shut this down? How about if I just wear a muzzle at council meetings? I wouldn't let that happen

My request to residents is to talk to us when you don't like something. If you spout off without being informed, you are playing the fool

My request to council is to grow a hard shell. I have lived in cities filled with intense hatred, and what we have is nowhere close.

On other more mundane matters, I was successful in getting the support of council to request the Travis County Elections Division to consider offering electronic voting machines that provide a verifiable paper trail. I realize the efficiency of the electronic machines and the federal HAVA mandate to use these machines, but I fail to see how it is asking too much to provide a hard copy to verify the ballot you cast and allow you to drop it into a voting box to be used in case of a recount. How many of you have computers? If you don't, how are you reading this website? Well, how many of you have a computer without a printer? I know the answer, and it is not many. Then explain why Diebold can't hook a printer to their voting machines? We need to express to the people providing these services that we don't like the current product.

The other matter I would like to discuss is the plan by developer Brian Atlas on the Marshall's Harbor subdivision. For you out of towners, Marshall's Harbor was a high dollar residential and golfing development that went bust several years ago and has been lying dormant all that time. Everyone has been anxious for someone to come along and take it to completion. Atlas made a presentation tonight about his plans for lot density, providing utilities, and other details. This is where I will voice a difference of opinion with my fellow council members. I sat quietly observing council micro-manage every detail of this plan. With all due respect to councilman Kruger, he was really hung up about the fact that Mr Atlas is now planning a much bigger project than the agreement we approved several meetings ago. I certainly appreciate scrutiny of proper procedure, but from my perspective we are trying to pile rocks on top of the mountain of bureaucracy that developers are having to deal with. I do not know Mr Atlas well enough to know if he will build a big beautiful palace that will be the jewel of the hill country, or if he is just a fly by nightoutfit. What I do know is that he has purchased the property and wants to get busy, and I so no reason to make more hoops for him to jump through.

I close by suggesting everyone in Lago Vista read John 15, 18-27. PEACE

1/17/06 : I decided to move the information about the volunteer organizations to my Donate page. The need to support volunteer organizations in our area is all year long, so please consider supporting them.

The inquiry concerning the Texas Open Meetings Act has been received by the district attorney's office. There is no definitive date for the reply, but it is being investigated.

One of the issues before council is the Centex development named "The Hollows". Centex would like to build a tall structure on their development and is requesting a change to the zoning to allow this structure.

Consider that this structure will not be on the lot next to your house. It will not be on the lot next to anyone. This development is in a currently un-developed area. I do not want government to be an obstacle to positive progress in our area. Do we want these developments to move to Jonestown and Point Venture and leave you with a higher tax burden when we don't have enough revenue to maintain our services? I think it is important to consider these factors in the decision we make.

1/5/06 : Happy new year, Hook 'em Horns!

Last night's council meeting was mundane by comparison to its predecessor. Good, I like it that way. Most of the actions were re-appointing people to boards.

I felt it was important to explain to Mr Polling why we could not waive his rebate fee for water and sewer service. Mr Polling understandably feels that when everyone else gets their service within 150 of the main line subsidized by Lago Vista taxpayers, why should he get stuck paying $2000? Unfortunately the ordinances we have on the books give us no flexibility on this issue. I for one would like to remedy this situation by cleaning up these ordinances.

The interlocal agreement on floodplain management is one of those things that sounds like a lot of bureaucracy, but honestly you have to pick your battles. All we did last night was approve a revised agreement that addresses some changes in fees and cleans up some language.

The planned development district change for Centex certainly occupied the Zoning Committee for quite some time. It will be interesting to see what the final recommendation will be.

The issue that I did express some outrage on is the fact that the Federal HAVA law now mandates that there is no local control over elections and we are mandated to use electronic voting machines that have no paper trail. As someone that has been professionally dependent on computers throughout my career, I clearly understand their benefit. I do support using them in the voting process. However, you cannot do a recount without a paper trail! There is no way to validate results without physical evidence. I was happy that my fellow members also expressed outrage at this. However, we have no choice in the matter. The problem lies in Washington DC, and maybe we should replace some of those people with those that can bring some integrity back to the process (hint, hint).

At this point I need to comment on some recent letters to the editor. Regarding the issue that I cry and scream when I don't get my way, look at the record. How many times have I been on the dissenting side of a vote? When this occurs, I argue my position to my best ability and then move on to the next item. Regarding comments that there is a dark side to our city government, I haven't seen it. I am still very upset at the process (or lack thereof) at recent meetings, but I say for the 100th time that I have no evidence of any intentional malice. I am hearing much speculation about motives, and much of this is unfounded.

Lastly, for those visitors to this site around the country, here are my recent contributions to local headlines:





12/19/05 : William McKammie (www.mckamielaw.com) runs a law office in San Antonio. On November 30, the mayor brought him in to spend an entire day training council members on the Texas Open Meetings Act. I spoke to Mr McKamie today, and he confirmed my interpretation of the mayor's actions. The mayor, 16 days after being trained on the Open Meetings Act, clearly violated the law. His actions to thwart my months of work were done illegally and with questionable ethics.

12/19/05 : Charles Ruppert is a two-term mayor in Cibolo, TX. Cibolo is much like Lago Vista in population, proximity to a major city, and several other respects. He is a West Point graduate and served 25 years in the Army. As mayor he has cut the ad valorem tax rate in each of the last 4 years by 29%. Their current tax rate is $0.27; Lago Vista is $0.67. At the same time, he has been recognized as an expert in the use of impact fees to build infrastructure. Streets have been paved, water towers built, a new city hall built, sewer and drainage projects completed, all using impact fees while increasing city staff salaries to remain competitive and reducing the tax rate. He is recognized as a model for municipal leadership in Texas. He is now running for Guadalupe commissioner's court in the 2006 general elections.

I want you to see what he says about last week's meeting:

Pat,

Sorry I missed your phone call the other night, but I was busy going door-to-door gathering signatures on my petition to have my name placed on the March primary ballot for county judge. See attached flyer.

WOW! I find it amazing how any governing body could operate a meeting on anything but Roberts Rules of Order. Basically, you are stuck with whatever adopted procedures are in place, either by ordinance or city charter.
Under Roberts Rules, once a motion is seconded, the mayor can delay calling for the question by enterring into discussion. But, eventually a vote must be taken. The mayor cannot ignore a valid motion that has been seconded. What do your procedures state?

Another option might be initiative. Does your city charter address this. Normally, an ordinance can be put to a public vote once the minimum number of signatures on a petition is submitted.

As to the memorandum, now that is a serious matter. The same limitations of an inquiry made at a meeting are equally applicable to e-mails between elected officials. Section 551.042 allows for a statement of specific factual information, a recitation of existing policy, and proposal to place an item on a future agenda. E-mails must not engage in discussion! Clearly, the mayor is discussing why he disagrees with your proposal. He should have made these comments publicly at the meeting, not beforehand in an e-mail memorandum.

All violations of the open meetings act should be reported to the county attorney. If the county attorney does not investigate or dismisses the case, then you can try the district attorney. After that it's the attorney general.

If you have a local newspaper, they would run with the story. You will need to decide if you want to be a protected source (1st amendment right) or go public. Sometimes the press can put enough pressure on elected officials not to sweep transgressions under the rug.

Good Luck! I am appalled that your mayor would openly resort to undermining what clearly is a legitimate topic for for discussion at a council meeting.
Charles

P.S. Obviously your mayor is not familiar with Roberts Rules. Otherwise, he would know that a presiding officer may rule on disruptions or other non-productive procedural ploys as "dilatory." Tell him to look it up!

This is how the actions of our council are regarded by our peers.

12/15/05 : Tonight's council meeting did not fill me with the Christmas spirit. You might say I need a bit of cheering up

I will start with a disclaimer: I do respect the members of council and staff. These are good people with the best of intentions. Our council is composed of accomplished people that may disagree on issues, but offer excellent insight and experience when considering matters presented to them.

Having said that, I have no explanation for the ridiculous ordinance that the other council members passed into law tonight that frankly says "We have established rules, but they make no sense." Specifically, the ordinance we approved tonight to govern our council meetings was presented for the first time by email to council at 11:07 today. Council had a total of 8 hours and 23 minutes to find this in their email, read it, and vote on it tonight. I have a very busy and successful consulting business. Do not expect me to jump away from my clients every 5 minutes to see if the mayor sent me an email. How confident are you as a voter that council carefully deliberated and cast an informed vote to enact a law that was submitted at lunchtime today?

The short history of this issue will explain my disappointment. The only reason we addressed this issue is that I brought it up when I first came to council. I discovered we had no rules. Can we table a motion we don't like? Can we ask to end discussion during a filibuster so we can vote on the issue? Does this require 2/3 or majority to end discussion? What happens if a council member thinks the mayor made an incorrect ruling? There were no answers. I pointed this out at my second council meeting back in June and asked to have council discuss it. I did some research on ordinances that other cities have adopted. I had discussions with council members and mayors in other Texas cities to get their recommendations. I refreshed my understanding of parliamentary procedure by reviewing previous training materials I had. As the state chair of the 3rd largest political party in Texas, I have taken the appropriate training to enable me to herd the cats during our state committee meetings. I have put a lot of work into this effort to present something to council that would constitute good law.

Throughout this process, I have been very forthright with the mayor and council. I have kept members updated on my intent, and have tried to get with the mayor so that we could discuss this matter. Council was well aware that my intention was to work with the mayor to present something to council that addressed our concerns.

Apparently, I was completely ignored and shut out of the process. On Saturday, we received our binder for this week's meeting. I found that the agenda number 9 said that council was to consider adopting rules of order as an action item. No notice. No working session. No actual written ordinance to consider. I couldn't believe it! I would expect at least the consideration we give every other law we consider; present the ordinance in a working session for comment so that we can make an informed vote at a later council meeting. I would have at least expected the mayor to tell me "Hey Pat, I would like to take action on this matter, so let's get together and work out something that we can present to council." Instead, I get this covert tactic. So I took all the research I had worked on and put together a draft ordinance over the weekend so that we would have something to actually vote on. On Monday morning at 8:42 I sent the following email to the mayor and city manager:

From: Patrick Dixon

Date: Mon, 12 Dec 2005 08:42:15 -0600

To: DennisJones, Bill Angelo

Conversation: Council Rules of Order

Subject: Council Rules of Order

Mayor,
I saw that the agenda has an action item regarding rules of order for council meetings. I have been working on an ordinance for this topic. I have been reviewing similar ordinances in other cities and have used some of their language in my draft. I would like to use this as a starting point. Perhaps I could meet with you tomorrow morning 8:00 at city hall to discuss further.
Attached is the draft ordinance

That evening I asked the city manager what was the appropriate way to disseminate the proposed ordinance to council so that they have a chance to read it before addressing it. He said to send it to the secretary to send to council. On Tuesday morning at 7:31 I sent an email to the secretary and city manager to forward my draft to council

The mayor never replied to my email. I tried to reach him by phone several times, but could not reach him.

Today, the mayor has an email sent to council at 11:07 containing my draft. But that's not all. Surprise surprise, there is a completely new ordinance that nobody has ever seen. I managed to have enough time between meetings and other business obligations to find this in my email and read it before the meeting. I had a hard time believing this was a sincere proposal. The goofiest part is that its reference for rules of order is the Texas Municipal League Handbook for Mayors and Councilmembers 2003. If you were to read Chapter 5, we will find a nice writeup on suggestions for how council meetings should work. It is good reading to get people familiar with the concept. It gives several options and recommendations for how to do conduct meetings. It basically says "You could do this, or this, or this, or something else". It also tells you that most cities use Roberts Rules of Order to govern their meetings, and even tells you that you can get Roberts Rules in most book stores.

Would you use this for law? OF COURSE NOT! How many times do courts embarrass cities for poorly written laws. How would you like to be a council member in New London, Connecticut after the Kelo decision? I am certain the Texas Municipal League never intended for anyone to adopt their loose discussion of meeting rules as actual law! But then, they didn't anticipate our council.

But that's not all! How would you feel if you had spent several months doing all this research, finding out you have 5 days before the issue will be voted on, rushed to present something in advance of the meeting, and then have the mayor send the following email to council today at 8:53 this morning:

DATE: DECEMBER 13, 2005

TO: CITY COUNCIL AND STAFF

FROM: MAYOR DENNIS JONES

SUBJECT: MEETINGS

Although I sincerely appreciate Council Member Dixons initiative in this matter, I do not agree with him and particularly disagree in regards to adopting Robert Rules. Our meetings are going fine.

I am strongly opposed adopting Roberts Rules of Order. It allows too many ways someone could disrupt a meeting or tie up the meeting on procedural matters rather than the real issues at hand.
The draft written by staff is fine. Its pretty close to the way we operate now and puts us in compliance with the Home Rule Charter. Lets not fix something thats not broken.

Don't you think it would have been courteous for the mayor to express this to me and talk about it so that we can work something out to present to council? Instead, I waste a #$%*@^! lot of time doing this work only to be ignored and shut out of the process to have a hair-brained ordinance presented.

Tonight, I had no idea what the mayor was going to do. He started by making a motion to approve his 8 hour and 23 minute old ordinance. Fred Harless seconded. I asked council to at least give us some time to think about this. Why are we in a hurry to vote on an ordinance that none of them understand? Let me work with the mayor so understand his concerns and present something to council that gives us time to at least read it and have consensus. I then made a motion to table. In a perfect example of our problem, the mayor did not know what to do. He initially indicated that he would not allow it. With all due respect, this reflects utter ignorance of meeting procedures that every city council on the planet operates by. I had to explain to him that the motion to table is completely in order. The motion to table failed for lack of a second. I then asked again for council to vote no so that we can take the appropriate time to consider enacting a law into perpetuity.

Six (6) votes in favor of an awful law that council does not understand and probably hasn't read. As often the case, my lone vote in dissent.

It is now 11:00 at night and at some point I will stop writing and go to bed. However, consider this. This council has no problem spending weeks and months deliberating over complex and voluminous laws that impact your property rights and personal liberty. A casual look at our zoning ordinances demonstrates that council doesn't care too much about throwing lots of obstacles in your way. However, when it comes to governing themselves, this council is not willing to spend any time to consider whether we are passing good law and is afraid to actually follow rules that govern city councils, non-profit boards, corporate board rooms, the state legislature, and every other respectable institution

I will close by re-visiting my disclaimer. I have said a lot of things about the mayor and council. I have strong disagreements with their action tonight. I feel they have given me no respect and treat me as an outsider. Yet I am mature enough to deal with it. This is the game of politics. I do not know that these men intend malice, and still feel they have good intentions. However, you as a voter need to hold these men accountable for their actions. If they don't smarten up and act in a responsible way, you are the one that need to take action

MERRY CHRISTMAS, JOY TO THE WORLD. Can't you feel the love?

12/1/05 : Here's the news:

Yesterday was a full day of training on the open meetings act and its application to planning and zoning, and board of adjustment. This was informative, and the lawyer who presented the information was very good.

At tonight's meeting, we began with discussion of a couple of development projects going on in our area. Both groups were requesting re-platting of their properties to change the lot configurations they would offer. Both seem to have a lot going for them. I am of the opinion that if they are the property owners and are doing no harm to anyone else, why stand in the way? The planning and zoning committee recommended approval of the re-plat proposals, and council concurred

We also approved a friendly annexation of property in the Travis Hollow subdivision, which has been discussed previously on council

Mr Poling was not present due to a medical issue to discuss his case on paying a rebate for a water line extension. I think we did the right thing by tabling the issue to allow Mr Poling to appear at the next opportunity so that we can settle the matter

In a related case, I made the motion to use the $195 in standby fees to reduce the rebate fee due to Mr Schwab on his property. This was clearly a fairness issue, and I think the outcome was good for all parties.

We also approved a change to the sign ordinance to make signs at the airport and site developments less restrictive. I was a little too anxious to speak on this, as Councilman Orr was the one who originally presented to airport issue to us. Fortunately, we made sure Councilman Orr was on record making the motion to approve.

We debated to notion of providing water and sewer services to the Centex development that is not in our city limits. The issue is whether this is financially beneficial to Lago Vista taxpayers. We would not be getting ad valorem tax from this property, but would not have to provide anything other than utilities (no police, etc) and Centex would pay for infrastructure plus we would get revenue from the utility rates. It seems this would be favorable, but until I see a financial forecast I won't know. Council had consensus on getting the financial forecast before rendering a decision

The city manager suggested we begin installing newer water meters on new homes that use radio transmission for reading the meters. This greatly reduces the labor hours from the utility department to do meter reading, which reduces operation cost. This sounds good to me. However, I offered a suggestion that was greeted with much skepticism by council. My idea is that it might be good to offer an incentive for current homeowners to replace their meters. It would help promote getting these meters replaced. The idea is to have the homeowner pay to have the meter replaced to qualify for a lower utility rate. The city manager said the meter is about $150, and there would be some labor cost. A caveat is that this would create 2 rate classifications, which may introduce complexity. However, what I have in mind is to reduce the city's capital outlay yet still benefit by promoting a way to reduce the operating cost of the utility department. At the same time, the homeowner has a way to reduce their recurring utility costs. It's just an idea, we'll see if it goes anywhere

Councilman Hugh Farmer gave us an update on the time table for the FEMA flood plane maps. As I stated before, I hope to offer property owners affected by this change some option that will protect their property rights.

We finished with an executive session on the city manager's performance appraisal. Being executive session, I will not relay the details of the discussion. The mayor announced in the following open session that a contract will be presented at a future council meeting for approval. I will state that I am very pleased with the performance of Bill Angelo. He shows an excellent command of the facts and has been very helpful in my inquiries.

I will conclude by mentioning a conversation I had recently with one of our Lago Vista residents. We were discussing eminent domain. He did not agree with my concern that we should ensure our charter language prevents the kind of property rights abuse demonstrated in the Kelo case. His words were "sometimes the rights of the individual have to be sacrificed for the collective." Being a Libertarian, you might imagine the cringe I suffered from that comment. He asked if I agreed that it is government's job to do what is best for the "collective".

"NO" I replied.

What form of government are we supposed to have? Most of your will say "A democracy, of course".

WRONG!

We took an oath to defend the Constitution of the United States when we took office. Article 4 section 4 explicitly tells us the form of government we are supposed to have. Hint: Nowhere in the Constitution does "democracy" or any derivative of that word appear. It is on purpose. I will leave it to you to figure it out and prove it to yourself. I have given you all the hints you need. I gave every council member a copy of "Good to be King" and "The Law" for this reason.

I replied to this individual that "The purpose of government is to protect the rights and property of the governed". Don't take my word for it. Prove it to yourself.

That's all for now. I will see if I can schedule a Chat with Pat session before the holidays gobble us up.

11/17/05 : Tonight's meeting went relatively quickly, which is a good thing.

It began with the presentation of local volunteer groups, which I arranged. The purpose is to allow Lago Vista residents to be reminded that as it becomes time to report your income to the IRS, there are groups here in town that will help reduce your taxable income, as well as help our community. I will post contact information for these groups here on my site.

I made a $100 contribution to one of the organizations that presented. I challenge you to match my contribution. Pick one of these organizations, or split it among them. We are a very generous community. The effort we made in the Katrina relief effort was just one example. This is an opportunity to help ourselves.

The early action items were approving of things that we already had consensus on, and this moved quickly

There was an item to approve having the city enter into a contract to build a weather station at the airport. My read of the agreement obligated the city for $22K. I had determined to vote NO, since this was not an emergency need and should have been presented during annual budgeting. However, Councilman Jim Orr explained that the money would all be coming from the Airport Property Owners Assn and other groups. The city taxpayers would have no impact. This is excellent, and I happily voted in favor of a project that is funded by private interests and not city taxpayers.

There was quite a bit of discussion of the policies on charges to get water and sewer services. The current policy is that a property owner does not pay for these services to be tied in if they are less than 150 feet from the line. Of course, it is not free and somebody does pay; the taxpayers. Instead of having the people that benefit from the service pay, we have a subsidy paid by the tax base. I oppose this. I expect I am in the minority. The current council argues this has been a great program to provide services where there aren't any. By some criteria, this may be true. I certainly want to discuss and research this more. The whole matter is brought up because 2 property owners are being assessed additional fees to get water and sewer because people that pay to have extensions more than 150 feet to their property can establish a rebate agreement with the city, which obligates property owners to tie into the extension and rebate a pro-rated cost to the person that paid for the extension. This applies even if the property owner tapping in is lees than 150 feet from the original service line; they have to tap into the extension and pay the rebate.

Tell me if you honestly think the previous paragraph is simple and straightforward. I hope you agree it isn't.

I am of the general opinion that each property should pay the cost to provide service to their property, and this should be revenue neutral by reducing the overall tax burden to the residents. At the same time, rebate agreements should be a civil matter among cooperating property owners, and the city should stay out of it. The sentiment from other council members seems to be that this would never work because only government can do these things. I think you know what I think of that.

Another one that I was opposed to on first reading was amending the sign ordinance to add 2 more categories of permitted signs. I want simpler law, not more complex and cumbersome code. However, in this case the current ordinance is restricting signs at the airport and development sites in an unreasonable way. By adding these classifications it makes these cases less restrictive. That is something I can support.

In closing, I challenge you! Can you match my $100 contribution! Can we count on you to support the organizations that support us?

11/12/05 : If you are with a volunteer or non-profit organization in Lago Vista, I would like you to contact me. I asked the mayor to add time on the agenda to recognize these groups at our meeting this Thursday. I would like each group to take 2 minutes to explain what they do, state whether donations are tax deductible, and where to send donations (address, phone, website). Please get in touch with me by Tuesday so I have a list of those attending.

11/11/05 : Below is the reply I received from the Texas Municipal League regarding our eminent domain resolution. For a reminder, here is the resolution we presented:

RESOLUTION FOR 2005 TML CONFERENCE REGARDING EMINENT DOMAIN
Whereas the property owners of Lago Vista depend upon city government to defend their property rights

Whereas the city of Lago Vista has an opportunity to demonstrate responsible leadership by proposal of this resolution before the 2005 Texas Municipal League conference

BE IT RESOLVED:

That the City of Lago Vista proposes that the Texas Municipal League promote to its members cities the importance of defending property rights and limiting municipal eminent domain powers by clearly stating the limits of these powers in their charters and ordinances.
Below is the response from TML:
"Councilmember Dixon:
The Lago Vista resolution dealing with eminent domain was defeated by the TML resolutions committee. If I had to guess, I'd say that members of the resolutions committee view TML as an organization that is charged with protecting municipal authority, whereas the resolution asks TML to promote the importance of limiting a municipal authority, in this case the power of eminent domain. I would be happy to discuss this further by telephone at any time.

Thanks for your inquiry.
Frank Sturzl

Executive Director"

11/8/05 : While most political news today involves the election, I received some news from the Texas Municipal League

As mentioned previously, I authored a resolution encouraging cities in Texas to ensure their charters and ordinances clearly state their policies on eminent domain. This is to avoid such scenarios as the Kelo vs New London case where it was unclear whether the city ordinance permitted eminent domain takings to promote economic development by transferring property to another private entity. The resolution was intended for submittal to the Texas Municipal League conference for adoption. Our council unanimously passed the resolution.

Today I received a response from TML. They basically said that the purpose of TML is to give more power to government, and since this resolution does not do that, they rejected it.

Isn't that nice?

Candidly, that was the type of result I expected. It is concerning that an attempt to make government clarify to property owners what the rules are is interpreted by TML as a bad thing. Does that mean they prefer for property owners to be in the dark and not know what government can do to them? All the resolution asked was for government to be honest with people. I guess that is asking too much.

11/4/05 : It was a lengthy and often confusing city council meeting last night.
The confusion came from council members who do not comprehend parliamentary procedure. It was very unclear what we were voting on when there was a main motion on the floor, which then is amended, and then discussion dwells on other subjects before the matter of the amendment is resolved. Parliamentary procedure works beautifully, but only if the participants know how to use it.

The presentations on development projects by Steven Adams and Brian Atlas were impressive. My default position is if they own the property, I have no reason to oppose such development. It will take some doing to convince me that a property owner should not be allowed to develop on their own property.

I did talk to the planning and zoning board about progress on the sub-committee to address building height. I am not sure I got the answer I was looking for, but it sounded like I need to talk to our city manager about having a chair of the sub-committee appointed. This seems odd, but that is what I was told.

We did amend ordinance 05-05-05-01 to increase the duration of building permits. Several people who are building large custom homes were expressing that the permits are not long enough to complete their projects. This was an example of the confusion that happens when a meeting is not orderly. There were various amendments proposed with uncertain language, and I had to intervene to resolve and clarify what we were actually voting on. Fortunately the members were cooperative and I think (I hope) that the outcome was understood. I will be carefully looking at the minutes to make sure of this.

We also amended ordinance 05-09-15-03 to reduce the fee for portable building permits, and to consolidate them into a single fee regardless of its size. There was also confusion on this topic, as there were 2 amendments proposed and it was unclear what topic was on the floor. Hugh wanted to reduce some fees, but it was unclear to me which fees he had in mind because the language of the amendment was unclear. That is why I did not second his amendment.

I was the lone dissenting vote to approve the curfew ordinance. As I stated last night, I recognize that when we have teens breaking into cars and getting a wrist slap, there is no deterrent. When police feel they cannot make inquiries to assess a threat without fear of a harassment or minority profiling charge, it renders them ineffective. These are serious problems and they need to be addressed. However, to target a particular demographic and time of day make it a crime to be on the street is not good law. The cases I referred to last night ( Hodgkins v. Peterson, Nunez v, City of San Diego and Ramos v. Town of Vernon) demonstrate that these laws are being overturned. Also, the Dallas curfew ordinance that is regarded as the model did get challenged in Qutb v. Strauss. Although the fifth circuit upheld the ordinance, this was after the federal district court struck it down, meaning it is certainly not a slam dunk. I also add in the Ramos case, the argument to strike the ordinance was that there was not sufficient data presented to demonstrate the impact of the ordinance. That is why section 8 of our ordinance contains language requiring a city manager's report. In our case, not only is our data insufficient, it doesn't exist at all. This is a risk if there is a challenge to our ordinance and the judge references the Ramos case.

Lastly, I suggested to council that we allow local volunteer groups to present themselves at our next meeting. I have in mind each group having a couple minutes to say who they are, what they do, and where to send a check. As we are getting toward year end and people are looking for places to put their income before having to report it to the IRS, it would be good to remind people that we have organizations in town that they can contribute to. Lago Vista is a very generous community. The Katrina relief effort is just one example. This is an opportunity for our community to help itself.

10/21/05 : For your amusement, below is the letter from Brian Schwab on Oct 6, and my response on Oct 20, in the North Lake Travis LOG. It is amusing in that Brian accuses the council of being "anti-growth", and his solution would be to oppose a new retail center.



10/20/05: First on the agenda tonight was the Chamber of Commerce handing out gift baskets with candy, T-shirts, and stuff. Let me state for the record that I do not support taking tax money out of your pocket to give to the Chamber. I appreciate the gesture, and I assume the Chamber checked the legality. I cannot return the Hershey bar after I consume it.

I did have some corrections to the minutes of previous meetings, which were adopted. I suppose I am cursed with being fastidious.

I did express the concern several people had about losing local control after merging emergency service districts #7 and #1. The is a lot of upside, especially in regard to expense, for the merger. Government should always be kept as local as possible so that residents and taxpayers in one area are not affected by political decisions in another area. We voted to endorse the merger on the overwhelming fiscal and service benefits it provides

Prior to the presentation by Lance Poling, I was in favor of denying the request to waive fees for connecting to water and sewer service. This case is one where the city made an ordinance in which someone who pays for water and sewer lines extended to their property get partially reimbursed by others that tap into their extension. This seems reasonable. The problem in this case is that the Poling family is being told that they must tap into this extension, but the original water and sewer feeds are right in front of their property. Under city rules, there are no fees for water connections under 150 feet. Since they are less that 150 feet from the original feed, they do not feel they should be made to pay additional money to tap into an extension. They presented their case very well. However, my read of our rules is that we cannot waive these fees as we already have agreement with another property owner for reimbursal. We agreed to table for now and study further. I still think we need to uphold the contact and deny the waiver, but I think we should address this to prevent future occurences:

- Require affected property owners of such situations if they occur. In this case, the Poling's were not notified until they saw the reimbursal fee assessed.

- I think we should eliminate the 150 feet stipulation. The current stipulation means that if a property owner ties into service lines less than 150 feet, instead of that property owner paying, all the taxpayers pay. That is the wrong principle. The user should pay the cost, not everyone else. We can either assess on a linear footage, or a flat fee for less than 150 feet

The next item was to consider waiving impact fees for Alan Carlson and The Deli Werks. I talked to Alan several times during the campaign. During candidate's night at his Deli Werks I stated that I will not take money out of all the taxpayers and then decide which business gets it. What Alan is asking is that instead of himself paying the impact fee to get sewer service to his property, he wants all other Lago Vista taxpayers to pay it. I cannot support that, and that's why no action was taken.

There are 2 other aspects of this issue. Alan and I discussed during the campaign the way in which current zoning ordinances are damaging to businesses and property owners. For example, denying The Deli Werks the ability to have a flea market is just wrong. I do not fault council for enforcing their ordinance; I fault the ordinance. We do need to fix these rules to remove the stranglehold on property owners and businesses.

However, my second point is that Alan appears to be disregarding contracts and rules he has agreed to with the city. There are several violations he is charged with. Although I may not agree with all of these rules, when you enter into an agreement you need to uphold your part of the contract. I see no alternative to enforcing these agreements.

I was uncomfortable with the vote to adopt the National Incident Management System as our standard, simply because there was very little information presented. I have grown to trust the opinion of our city manager and police chief, who both support this. My concern always is that federal government mandates are almost never a good thing. I am not comfortable entering into agreement for more federal control. However, I was assured that this agreement maintains local control and is simply an aid to streamline emergency responses when required.

We had some discussion about the proposal from the Building Committee that building permit durations be lengthened for larger homes. I am certainly in favor of this. However, several council members debated in some detail how long these durations should be and how much we should charge for extensions of the permit. I really think we micro-manage this too much. This will be further discussed and acted upon at a future meeting

That will cover it for now. Keep in touch

10/13/05 : The annexation hearing that I thought was last night is actually tonight. I slight miscue on the schedule, but I am prepared for it.

I did have Chat with Pat last night. Nobody showed. That's OK, I enjoyed my hamburger at Bam's. I'm going to continue to offer people the opportunity to talk to me, and if they don't show I will just enjoy my meal.

I must comment on a recent letter from our friend Brian Schwab. In it, Brian states that the new video rental store will offer triple-x movies. At the council meeting where the retail center was discussed, Pastor Vince Smith asked whether the video store would have triple-x movies. The developer said that they would not. The city manager explained the ordinance regarding sales of adult materials. I believe Past Smith and others in attendance were satisfied with the response.

Brian damages his credibility when he makes erroneous statements like this. If it is his intent to marginalize himself, he is doing a good job of it.

10/11/05 : The best laid plans ...

I was informed that there is a council meeting for the public hearing on annexation at the same time as Chat with Pat. I decided to move up Chat with Pat to 6:00 and then go to the hearing. Again, the purpose of Chat with Pat is to give you a chance to let me know what's on your cranium, without the formality of council procedure, and to do so while patronizing a local business.

10/6/05 : A full plate at council tonight. Let's dig in!

First, the planning and zoning had a lengthy discussion on height restrictions. This is a divisive issue, but I was very pleased that there was a lot of input. I think this needs to continue to be discussed to build consensus towards a solution that addresses the concerns of all parties.

Much of council was in executive session. I know it is frustrating to have so much happen behind closed doors, but I am encouraged that council works well together in addressing tough problems.

As I stated previously, I had to hold my nose in voting to approve regulations of restaurants and swimming pools. The notion of classifying swimming pools on private property as "semi-public" is abhorent. If government doesn't own it, it is private. However, state law makes us regulate swimming pools on certain private property under their statute. What happened to America?

There was a short discussion of reviewing the curfew ordinance. I will not be timid on expressing my opinion even if it is politically damaging. The notion of a police officer ordering anyone to go home when they have not violated anyone else's rights or property is not what government should be doing. Suspicion of potential to commit a crime does not warrant police intervention. I also do not favor government acting as a surrogate parent. I will be interested in what people have to say at the public hearing.

That's all for now. Hope to see some of you at Chat with Pat, or else I will just enjoy my hamburger.

10/5/05 : I know it's been a while, but I have a good excuse. For details of my travels, see PatDixon.org/pct2005.html. California brought out the tree hugger in me

You may notice I placed "Chat with Pat" on my schedule. This is the new title for what was the "staff" meeting. The purpose is to give Lago Vista residents an opportunity to talk to a councilman about their concerns while patronizing a local business. I will be there even if nobody else shows and enjoy a hamburger.

Tomorrow night there will be a vote to approve a contract with the city of Austin to inspect restaurants and swimming pools. I must sincerely state that the notion of government regulation of this kind is not what George Washington and Patrick Henry had in mind. Unfortunately, there are no other providers to go to, and the Austin contract will increase compliance cost for the restaurants. Have you noticed we don't have many restaurants here, and have had several go out of business. Texas state law mandates that cities enforce compliance to have licensed inspectors under contract. Council has 2 choices;

- do not approve the contract, committing an act of civil disobedience, and risk penalties from the state government

- hold our noses to approve the contract, hoping that next year there are multiple licensed inspectors to choose from

A free market that reduces regulatory costs and holds businesses accountable for harm is the government policy that I favor. Perhaps we can get state lawmakers to start thinking this way.

Now that we are past the budget cycle, there are several items that I want to focus on:

- My primary long term focus is to get government out of the way of progress while protecting property rights. I want to look at ways our zoning ordinances and codes can be addressed to clearly address nuisance and trespass, but not over-regulate. Regulation that micro manages what property owners and businesses can do on their own property are a dis-incentive to purchasing property and running businesses. I personally don't care whether our city gets big or stays the same size, except that the debt obligations we have depend on growth.

- As a defender of property rights, we must ensure that the assault on property rights through eminent domain seizures that is rampant in our country does not happen here. We should follow the lead of Austin councilman Brewster McKracken, whom I have corresponded with, to ensure our ordinances and charter clearly state protections for the property owner.

- I have discussed with council the need to establish rules of order in our meetings. Currently it is not addressed in any of our ordinances. Most cities use Roberts Rules of Order. It was evident in our last meeting that we need tighter procedures

- The floodplain issue with FEMA raised concerns among several people in the community. I am told that council has no alternative but to deny building permits below the new floodplain. Again, this is a property rights issue. I will endeavor to have further discussions with FEMA to see if property owners that invested in lakeside lots have options so that they don't lose the ability to build.

That's all for now. Stay tuned!

9/17/05 : Several observations on our last council meeting:

I am quite happy with the budget. While there are items in it that I disagree with, clearly the overall direction is fiscally conservative. We are lowering the tax rate, addressing debt reduction, making the users of goods and services pay instead of subsidizing through taxation, and putting the priority on the core functions of government.

A concern I have is that several times, it was unclear what was going on during our meeting. When we discussed the contract for health inspections, we had no contract in our binders. Therefore it appeared we really didn't have anything we could approve. At that point there was a motion to table. Since there was no motion to table, I inquired about this. Putting something on the agenda does not mean there is a motion. Without a motion, order of the day moves on to the next agenda item. However we actually had a vote to table something which had not been moved. It was ruled the motion to table passed, but then Fred moved to approve the contract, which we had assumed to be tabled. A role call suggested that the motion to table had not passed, upon which council voted to approve the contract, which we did not have

Confused? I think we all were. That is why I asked to secretary to record me as abstaining

It is clear that we need to adopt rules of order as other cities have done. Roberts Rules are the standard that most cities use. Without some understanding of our rules, the rulings by council can be confusing and arbitrary. I have already discussed this with other council members and will be proposing an ordinance to address this.

9/14/05 : You may be aware that Lago Vista is helping in a big way with the Katrina relief effort by flying supplies out of our Rusty Allen airport. To help with the relief effort, you can make a donation to:

LV Lions Club Charitable Fund, Inc.

P.O. Box 4603

Lago Vista, TX 78645

This is a 501(c)3 corporation so your contributions will be tax deductible

9/11/05 : Most everything I can say on this day is over-shadowed by the remembrance of those that perished on this day in 2001, as well as those that suffered and are recovering on the Gulf Coast. Lago Vista can be proud of our efforts to deliver supplies to the victims, that was written about in this week's Log. The efforts of D'Anne and Bob Gloris, Cabo Loco, Kurt Barks, and others is commendable.



We got the good news that option B has been chosen for the 1431 re-route. This is clearly the best option, and I applaud the decision

I took a further look at the study posted at www.FDEP.org regarding FEMA's raising of the floodplain to 722 ft. If you go to fdep.org/basinpaper.shtml and look at Appendix A, the Hydrology study, you will get closer to answering the questions posed by upset property owners last Thursday evening. I don't know if it addresses every detail of interest, such as why the base level for the study was 690 ft instead of the "full" level of 681. However, anyone that intends to challenge FEMA on their results needs to fully comprehend this study. If you want to examine the computer simulations mentioned in this report, you need to do some research to find out who you can talk to for more information. Having been involved in developing computer simulations, I can tell you that a good understanding of differential equations is required.

Lastly, I want you to remember this: You can't be generous with someone else's money. This means that nobody on city council is being generous if they "give" more money to one thing or another. As we near the conclusion of the budget process, I will do my best to keep your income in your pocket to care for yourself, your family, and our community. Either city government can take money away from you and spend it for you, or we can let you be generous with your money. I have supported PAWS, Keep Lago Vista Beautiful, and other organizations with my own money. I encourage you to be generous with your money, time, and talent, and not to trust any politician that tries to convince you that they are "generous" by spending your money.

9/8/05 : Wednesday's public hearing on the budget and tax rate was mostly un-eventful, with the exception of Brian Schwab

Brian helped me during my campaign. We shared some concerns on budget and growth.

On Wednesday, he told us how we had demonstrated that we are anti-growth. Since we have approved every development presented to us thus far, apparently Brian would prefer we prohibit these developments. Perhaps Brian wants to promote the growth of weeds.

Brian went on to allege that the budget inflates legal fees because of crony-ism between council and legal counsel. He damages his credibility when he makes unsubstantiated accusations.

We are going in the right direction with the budget. We are using conservative estimates, and setting money aside for debt obligations, setting market adjustments to retain experienced police officers, and lowering the tax rate. It looks like this is bad news for Brian.

Last night's public hearing with FEMA on raising the flood plane was not real pleasant.

I am a Libertarian. That means that I defend private property rights. The federal government mandating that local officials (like me) impose restrictions on private property is abhorent.
Do we commit an act of civil disobedience and defy federal law, or do our duty as representatives of Lago Vista? In my capacity as state chair I work to change federal law by recruiting federal candidates like Michael Badnarik (www.Badnarik.org). However, in my capacity as on city council I do not see too many options.

The likely outcome is that council will amend the zoning ordinance to deny building permits below the new flood plane, plus a 1 foot freeboard (723 ft), unless the construction matches the standards imposed by FEMA. I am looking for options that will protect current property owners that now have their homes or properties in the new flood plane. I am being told there are none.

Assaults on private property rights come in several forms. The recent supreme court's eminent domain ruling in the Kelo case was an overt example. The discussions last night were a prime example of what is wrong with government going beyond its core function and imposing too much authority.

One of the problems in the presentation is that people wanted to know the basis and assumptions used in the study to determine that the flood plane should be increased to 722. Much later, it was mentioned that the study is available at www.FDEP.org. This should have been mentioned first thing.

I will continue to look for ways that we can change our ordinances to defend private property rights.

9/2/05 : I was successful in getting my eminent domain resolution passed (fanfare, fanfare).

Last night's meeting was relatively un-eventful. We passed another resolution to TML regarding the fees that the state imposes on us traffic tickets, which only increases our costs. We allowed the mayor to look into our TML risk pool representatives and cast a vote on our selection. We also transferred $250k into the general fund from an un-used construction fund.

There was discussion of an ordinance for food and pool inspections. The free market should determine which restaurants make it or don't, and government should not be in the pool inspection business. The problem is this is a state law that mandates that we must do this.

For comic relief, I note that someone provided all council members with a posting from Brian Schwab. In it, Brian gives non-complimentary appraisal of the new council members. He describes me as "confused whether he's the Libertarian chairman or an alderman". I'm not confused; I'm both! Perhaps Brian is confused.

8/25/05 : This is an update for the last 2 council meetings

Last week we had very good meetings on the budget. I like the way we have consensus on lowering the tax rate and addressing debt obligations. We also have common interests in retaining our police force. As many of you know, I share the position that our founding fathers had; the purpose of government is to protect your rights and property. We need to place a priority on these core functions. As a fiscal conservative, I think we are moving in the right direction.

I have to admit that the lengthy discussion on the minute details of signs to promote The Island struck me as the kind of bureaucracy we need to eliminate. The challenge here is that the rule of law withers when we make arbitrary variances that make our ordinances effectively irrelevant. We need to address the ordinances so that we spend less time dealing with ways to subvert them. I do not pretend that this is easy and it will not be overnight. We need to find consensus on our belief in property rights and getting government out of micro-managing affairs.

I wrote up some comments on the budget and copied my fellow council members and the city manager. These were well received. In it, I mentioned my pleasure at the way things were going, but stated my preference for empowering the people with their choice to donate money voluntarily instead of have us take their tax money and acting as middle man to re-distribute it

I was very pleased to name Richard Wolf to the Planning and Zoning board. I also thank Larry Hagler and Paul Isham for putting forth their interest in serving

Tonight I presented Glen Overton, president of Keep Lago Vista Beautiful, with a $100 check. I know that they do good work, because I see them in their orange vests out cleaning up and doing good work. Organizations like KLVB, Lago Vista PAWS, and others are ones that I contribute to voluntarily. The alternative is for government to take tax money out of your pocket by force and spend it as 7 people desire. I want you to be able to donate directly to the organizations that you support and not have government act as a middle man. I challenge my fellow council members and all of you to voluntarily support such organizations as you see fit, so that we don't dig into your pockets for more tax money.

In this evening's meeting, I have to admit that I was not prepared. The first time I saw the development agreement for the retail center was tonight. I found that it had been put in my city hall mailbox earlier in the week. We did identify a couple of wording problems, which had me concerned if we were to approve this. However, with the review by both the city and developer, as well as legal counsel, we felt that there was sufficient scrutiny that with the corrections we found that development should proceed.

I received a reply from the office of Austin councilman Brewster McKracken's office regarding his eminent domain ordinance. They have been very helpful. I intend to present a similar measure for approval in Lago after I have had some time to review it with others. It is important that cities take proper actions to make their laws clear and protect property rights. As long as such laws are written in such a manner to limit government power instead of granting powers, they will not conflict with state law.

8/10/05 : For those of you interested in the resolution I have proposed for presentation to the Texas Municipal League, here it is:

DRAFT RESOLUTION FOR 2005 TML CONFERENCE REGARDING EMINENT DOMAIN

Whereas the property owners of Lago Vista depend upon city government to defend their property rights

Whereas the city of Lago Vista has an opportunity to demonstrate responsible leadership by proposal of this resolution before the 2005 Texas Municipal League conference

BE IT RESOLVED:

That the City of Lago Vista proposes that the Texas Municipal League promote to its members cities the importance of defending property rights and limiting municipal eminent domain powers by clearly stating the limits of these powers in their charters and ordinances.

Patrick J Dixon

Lago Vista City Council Place #1

8/8/05 : My apologies for neglecting this page. I have had some formatting problems, which I hope to correct soon.

We had a council meeting last Thursday. There wasn't a lot on the agenda, and we spent most of it in executive session. My resolution to the Texas Municipal League regarding eminent domain will be voted at an upcoming meeting.

Other than that, we are just waiting for the budget proposal to begin reviewing the numbers.

7/21/05 : At our council meeting tonight we had several items to consider

I voted "NO" on the resolution regarding the Travis County Bond Issue. I understand that we would prefer that county money be spent in our area, however we cannot say that we want to spend money for Arkansas Bend without saying we want the tax burden of the bond package added on the backs of Travis County taxpayers. Being a fiscal conservative, I am doing what I can to relieve the tax burden of Lago Vista residents. Like my political hero Congressman Ron Paul, I am not afraid to be the lone dissenting vote to defend taxpayers. Let the voters of Travis County make their decision, and if the bond passes we can then work to direct funds in our direction.

We had a lot of groups asking for more money. This is expected as we go through the budget process. From the audit, clearly we do not have lots of discretionary funds laying around. We have a lot of debt, and current revenues are not keeping up with expenses.

I presented a proposed resolution to the Texas Municipal League to have them promote the effort of Texas cities to review their rules on Eminent Domain. Cities need to be clear in these rules so that a court is not presented with arbitrary and conflicting rules. I also support Bill Angelo's concern that we are having to pay the state for operating our municipal court.

I also presented my concerns on our charter clause regarding eminent domain. I presented a packet demonstrating that Texas cities and counties have already responded to this concern by amending their rules. I also included an excellent study on the subject by the Reason Foundation entitled "New Study: Eminent Domain, Private Property, and Redevelopment" which can be found at the link below:

Studies by Reason Foundation on Eminent Domain

I proposed that the charter review process should include appropriate amendments to protect property owners. Some suggestions:

- PRIVATE PROPERTY SHALL NOT BE TAKEN FOR THE PURPOSE OF ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

- PRIVATE PROPERTY SHALL NOT BE TAKEN FOR THE PURPOSE OF TRANSFER TO ANOTHER PRIVATE ENTITY


- PRIVATE PROPERTY SHALL ONLY BE TAKEN FOR THE PURPOSE OF RIGHT-OF-WAY FOR ROADS AND UTILITIES

- EMINENT DOMAIN SHALL ONLY BE USED AS A LAST RESORT

I understand the concerns of council members that we do not want to conflict with state law. However, we need to ensure that are rules are clear and that we defend property rights for our residents.

I presented my suggestion regarding having established rules of order for our meetings. I am surprised that there is opposition to the use of Roberts Rules. As I pointed out, most cities use Roberts Rules. As the chair of a state committee and a member of several boards, I know that Roberts Rules when applied properly make a meeting run smoothly. Any meeting can get out of hand if the members don't respect the rules. I intend to discuss this with the mayor and work on drafting an ordinance.

That is all for now

7/12/05 : Look what I found in my mailbox!



I have such a way with people, don't I?

I am really impressed with the stationary they used. They used a magic marker on some paper towels and crumpled it up in my mailbox. Somehow, I think the honeymoon is over.

7/8/05 : I had been looking at the general long term debt numbers for the past 5 years and notice a sharp, dramatic increase in the last 2 years:

2000 - $0.077 MIL ($77k)

2001 - $0.065 MIL ($65k)< /p>

2002 - $1.3 MIL

2003 - $26 MIL

2004 - $34.5 MIL

So what happened to our debt in 2003? I finally saw that the proprietary debt numbers were the other part of the story. We had been using general funds to pay debt service on utilities. In 2003, the auditor suggested that we should not categorize the utility debt as proprietary if it is being paid with general funds, so the debt was re-categorized from general to proprietary. This seems to me to be an appropriate thing, however it confused me into thinking there was an extraordinary amount of debt incurred in 2003.

The combined general and proprietary debt obligation to the city, which shows the whole picture, is:

2000 - $15 MIL

2001 - $30 MIL

2002 - $28 MIL

2003 - $27 MIL

2004 - $34.6 MIL

7/7/05 : A full plate at the council meeting tonight. But don't leave this site without checking out my first appearance as a cartoon character (below). I am quite flattered. When I saw the picture, my reaction was "Hey, that's me!" My reaction to the cartoon was spontaneous laughter. That's what cartoons are for. I don't know what the "ROCK SOLID" is about on my tie, but I love the connotation.



I arrived late for the planning and zoning meeting. The honest and embarrassing reason is that when I got back from my client, I set my glasses down and went through my mail before leaving the house. I entirely forgot which room I set my glasses down. I searched every room I remember being in 3 times, as well as my car and the mailbox. I found them in a bathroom I don't even remember being in. Perhaps I should be recalled? Early Alzheimer's?

When I arrived, there was no zoning meeting. They did not have quorum, which is troubling. It was explained to me that my lateness was disappointing. Although not needed for a quorum, I am very sorry for my lateness and will make every effort to be on time in the future.

We began with a presentation to allow a developer to build boat docks. I did not see a good reason to hold up a property owner making this investment, and the council later gave the green light. We then went into executive session about a lawsuit against the city from Mr Poe. Back in public session, I made the motion for declaratory action and appointing additional counsel, which passed. We then had a lengthy presentation by the Chamber of Commerce and Heritage Society about increasing the bed tax proceeds to the Chamber from 40% to 80%. The bed tax, as I understand, must be spent on tourism. I do not agree with taxation for the purpose of having government do the advertizing that businesses should do on their own. However, the decision is whether the city should spend money on tourism or the Chamber spend it on tourism. I am conflicted. We then green-lighted the Retail Center development. We then appointed Mike Thornton to the Board of Adjustment

My most embarrassing moment was to speak against a motion to support the Arkansas Bend Improvement as included in the "proposed" Travis County bond issue. "Proposed" suggested to me it had not been approved, therefore the debate was to support further tax obligation to the taxpayers of the city and county. I went to great lengths to explain my small government, Libertarian principles in my lone opposition to the motion. It was then explained that the bond in question was not "proposed" but already approved. I then had to make my Roseanne Rosanna-Danna "Never mind" retraction, sheepishly.

Bob Bradley spoke of his interest to create zoning for light industry, which I approve of. I then had several agenda requests for our next meeting:

- In light of the assault on property rights, the Kelo ruling, and our charter clause eminent domain for "public use", I asked to put discussion of this topic on our agenda

- It appears we do not have any rules of order codified. We should have reference to Roberts Rules. I asked for a discussion of this at the next meeting

- I asked about our efforts to lobby for the 1431 option B. It was explained the city has done all it can

- I mentioned the the zoning board failed to meet quorum, and suggested appointing a new alternate at the next meeting

That's all for now. Stay tuned!

6/24/05 : Yesterday's Supreme Court ruling means there is only one recourse left to protect your property. You must put people on city council that will defend your property rights. Use this as a litmus test. Ask candidates whether they will take your property form you and give it to a developer, corporation, or someone else. Many of you came here to retire and your property does not have a price tag on it. It is tragic how our country has lost the values that made it great. The courts will not help you any more. Put people in office that will defend your rights and property

6/23/05 : Below is the story that appeared in the LOG about last week's unfortunate events at the council meeting:





6/22/05 : The next staff meeting is scheduled for Wednesday July 13, 7 PM at the Deli Werks. I welcome anyone to come by and participate on an open and honest discussion of your concerns. I do not ostracize people for their opinions. Whether you are for, against, or neutral (like me) on the recall, I will listen to you.

6/16/05 : We had quite a council meeting tonight. Most of the actual business was in executive session, which I am not allowed to make public. No substantive actions were taken tonight. However, much heat was generated over what was not on the agenda.

I have known Fred Harless for several years as fellow members of the church. I believe him to be a good man that I respect. As a matter of fact, he is the first person I talked to about running for council. Despite anything he said about me tonight, I am more than willing to work with him openly and honestly in a spirit of trust and reconcile any disagreements we may have.

I have known Keith Wadsworth for many years. I have supported his efforts to address issues with the school district and his campaigns for office. I know him to have the best of intentions and I trust and respect him.

Despite what anyone says, I have taken no position of any kind on the recall of members Orr and Harless. This is a matter to be decided by the people of Lago Vista. I will work with anyone on council that the people decide to elect. I think it best to take a position of impartiality. I will neither contribute to nor obstruct the recall effort. I hope I have made that perfectly clear.

Presumptions that I favor the recall based on my affiliation with Keith are a complete extrapolation on too little data. I have volunteers on my staff that both oppose and support the recall, and others that have no position known to me. I am not looking for people that all have the same opinion. I am looking for a diversity of opinion that reflects the interest of the community and can disagree on opinions with decorum and respect.

I was elected to do a job. A leader is not afraid to confront difficult issues and stand by their principles. I intend to do the job that I promised the voters of Lago Vista that I would do. I am certain that decisions I will make will sometimes be lonely and perhaps contrary to other council members. Leadership is not for the timid, and I believe I have demonstrated that I cannot be intimidated.

I cannot control what people say. My staff is not composed of robots that carry out all my commands. I am certain that there are people on my staff that will say things I disagree with. The 1st amendment comes to mind. I will of course speak my mind as well and not hesitate to disagree with anyone on a matter of principle. I think it more courteous to address disputes personally before going public. If an email starts floating around that has people concerned about my character, talk to me. I will listen. You can chose to broadcast a private conversation if you like, but I think it more courteous and respectful to talk to me personally instead of creating a public spectacle.

In conclusion, I will continue to do the best I can to defend the rights and property of the residents of Lago Vista. I don't expect everyone to love me. Trust takes time to materialize. I hope I will earn your trust.

6/9/05 : We had our audit review tonight. I was very pleased with the auditor, who seemed very capable and had a good command of the facts. I had many questions, and I was very pleased that Randy Kruger had some excellent insight and interest into several issues. Of concern is that the revenues are below budget and the long term debt grew to $34 million. I was also curious about the payroll going up by $120k in the police department. This is surprising because I did not think we had more staff, but this may have been due to increased health insurance and a new staff person having a half year the previous year and a full year last year.

6/8/05 : I had my first staff meeting tonight at The Deli Werks. We are off to a good start. My chief of staff Keith Wadsworth will do an excellent job helping me with this.

The purpose of these volunteers on the staff is not to micro-manage the various departments and organizations in the city. I do not want these people trying to tell others how to do their job. The purpose is to be a liaison to the various departments, organizations, and issues in the city to keep me informed of the issues. I do not know all the answers and cannot be everywhere, so I appreciate these volunteers that will be able to focus on something and advise me on a monthly basis of the issues I need to be aware of and advise me on policy. These meeting will be open to the public, and should help foster a spirit of open communication.

6/2/05 : As the liaison to the planning and zoning board, I decided to meet with the building inspector Earl today to get his perspective on things. I particularly wanted to understand the "compatible use" issue that was a problem for the Deli Werks. The provision that seems to apply is the "accessory use" items in section 6 of the ordinance.

I also attended the planning and zoning hearing tonight and the joint meeting with council. I was pleased to see that the "moonscape" on 1431 looks like it will be developed. Also a presentation was made by Tom Thompson stating that our height restriction on buildings of 15 feet is well below surrounding town of Point Venture, Jonestown, and the Hollows at 28 feet.

The council meeting went pretty well. I moved to approve a temporary parking ordinance for July 4th festivities. This is one that could create controversy among Libertarians. Some would argue that you cannot tell a taxpayer that they can't park on the street they are paying for. As Michael Badnarik says, you need to ask who's property are we dealing with. In this case it is city property, and council needs to decide issues like this. I see no reason to raise a stink in order to celebrate the founding of our country and have a manageable traffic situation.

We approved letting a property owner put a fence on their property. We discussed the budget. I expressed my concern that we still do not have the 2004 audit, and I was assured it would be next week. I reminded council about the article I gave them showing our police pay at the bottom of surrounding towns and stated that this is a budget priority for me.

5/27/05 : I am very pleased that today we resolved the matter of the Anderson's and their building permit. I cannot tell you what we discussed in executive session, but the outcome is a happy one very everyone. I am proud that my first official act as councilman was to schedule this meeting to resolve this matter.

I also gave a copy to each council member of the article that appeared in the Austin Statesman on May 19 that showed Lago Vista is at the very bottom for our area in paying our police officers. This will need to be considered in setting our budget priorities

5/25/05 : WULA sent a letter to the city stating that the building permit for the Anderson's will not jeopardize the 3rd party set aside agreement. The council meeting on Friday should be quick and allow the Anderson's to get started on their property.

5/22/05 : All council members have received their copy of Bastiat's "The Law" and Badnarik's "Good to be King"

5/21/05 : I was sworn into office and presided at my first meeting. I was able to schedule a special meeting to resolve the matter on the Anderson property. They have been denied a building permit for over 18 months and are about to incur huge costs. Hopefully we can resolve the issue and grant them the permit.


5/11/05 : The RM 1431 re-route is being considered. Option A is preferred by a few business owners in Cedar Park. Option B is preferred by Lago Vista and Jonestown residents. I talked to the owners of Cartwright's BBQ, one of the affected businesses that prefer option A. As a Libertarian I was concerned that they were being confronted with an emminent domain seizure, which I do not favor. It turns out that they actually want their restaurant bull-dozed so that they can get compensation. Option B would route 1431 so that they are no longer on it, but the existing road would essentially be a "business" route and be maintained by Cedar Park.

I attended the TxDOT public forum in Jonestown. I met several Jonestown council members there, as well as a representative from county commisioner Daugherty's office.

A property owner does not own a right to have traffic flow concentrated on their business. Option B is less costly, will be done sooner, will be safer, and will be much more convenient during the construction phase. I see no downside and great benefit to Option B