Downtown Alliance director Betts retires

On Thursday, the city honored Charlie Betts with a Distinguished Service Award. Betts, who is retiring, had served as executive director of the Downtown Austin Alliance for the past 17 years. Mayor Lee Leffingwell presented the award, calling Betts a good friend and “positive force for the City of Austin.” Betts accepted the honor, saying, “Our job at the DAA is to advocate — to make downtown attractive to investors and developers. We’ve always had great support from this Council and a number of councils previously. I think the investment of infrastructure downtown has paid dividends to all of us.” Leffingwell made it clear that he would miss Betts and joked, “I feel so bad about it, I am going to join him in about a month and a half.”