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City Council Member José “Chito” Vela has been hard at work since he was sworn in to the District 4 seat in February following his election in January. He’s been holding down two jobs, serving as a Council member and…
After completing her fourth year in office, City Council Member Natasha Harper-Madison wishes she’d known from her first day roughly as much as she knows now about the workings of city government. Her thinking: There should be an apparatus that…
Elected to represent Southeast Austin’s District 2 in 2020, City Council Member Vanessa Fuentes has quickly become one of the more accessible and well-known members of the dais within the community. That was intentional, Fuentes told the Austin Monitor. It’s…
The Austin area is in for a cold holiday weekend. Temperatures will start dropping on Thursday afternoon into the teens and stay there until Saturday, at least. As the state prepares for this severe weather event, you should prepare, too.…
The current state of Zilker Park, from an ecological perspective, is about what you would expect for a 100-plus-year-old metropolitan park in a city with a population just shy of 1 million. With 2.6 million visitors enjoying nature and amenities…
The city’s Ethics Review Commission has issued a letter of notification to City Council Member Paige Ellis, documenting a handful of campaign contributions that exceeded campaign finance rules and were not returned to donors in a timely fashion. Last week…
A coalition of environmental groups last week announced its opposition to a proposed 5,000-seat concert venue at 14820 Fitzhugh Road, near Dripping Springs. The coalition, Stop Fitzhugh Concert Venue, says it’s concerned about negative impacts the venue might bring to…
Christmas Eve and Christmas Day are peak days for home fires and injuries from inattentive cooking, according to the National Fire Protection Association. Travis County’s fire marshal’s office, the U.S. Fire Administration and NFPA are partnering up for the holidays…
In a Sunday ruling denying qualified immunity to the Austin police officer who fatally shot Mike Ramos, U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman sharply criticized the city’s handling of excessive force incidents. The ruling stems from the civil suit filed against…
An audit presented to the City Council Audit & Finance committee last week says the city is not keeping up with planning for cold weather shelters and that city staff have not received sufficient training in dealing with people seeking…
The city is moving forward with its effort to update its floodplain maps, in anticipation of an expected increase in dramatic rainfall and flooding events caused by climate change over the next decade. Earlier this month, the Watershed Protection Department…
Just months after the management switch-up at the Austin Resource Center for the Homeless, the Downtown Austin Alliance is praising what it calls “transformational change” at the downtown men’s shelter. The alliance’s safety and hospitality committee toured the facility in…
