Take Back Austin leader running against Flannigan

Mackenzie Kelly, leader of the group Take Back Austin, announced Thursday that she would be running against District 6 City Council Member Jimmy Flannigan this November. Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, Take Back Austin petitioners were collecting signatures for a ballot initiative to force the city to rescind its decision to allow homeless people to sit or camp in public places. With city and state orders requiring nonessential workers to stay home, that petition drive has all but disappeared. Kelly, who appointed herself as her own campaign treasurer on Wednesday, said in a press release that she would “fight to lower runaway property taxes, reduce regulatory burdens on Austin’s business community and push for an external city audit.” Austin voters rejected a ballot proposition in 2018 that would have required the external audit. Kelly ran against Don Zimmerman in 2014, the year he was elected to Council, and Zimmerman appointed her to the Austin Commission on Women. Kelly was president of the 100th Austin Citizen Police Academy, which graduated in 2019. She is “employed in the health care sector working with front-line workers who care for the area’s elderly population,” according to her news release.