Austin mayor talks affordable housing, police, political future in 2024

Austin Mayor Kirk Watson on Wednesday sat down with KXAN's Daniel Marin to discuss a variety of challenges and opportunities for the City of Austin as the new year gets underway. This is their conversation below which has been edited for clarity and length.

Part of the mission of KXAN News is to foster a more informed and engaged community. We deliver in-depth coverage on topics like affordability, safety and mobility that affect the daily lives of Central Texans. And we explore sustainable solutions to economic, systemic and social problems. One way to achieve those goals is providing direct and consistent access to leaders who make decisions that shape local policy — seeking to understand their stances, holding them accountable for promises and asking tough questions when needed. This series of interviews with City of Austin Mayor Kirk Watson is designed with that in mind.

AUSTIN (KXAN) — Austin Mayor Kirk Watson on Wednesday sat down with KXAN's Daniel Marin to discuss a variety of challenges and opportunities for the City of Austin as the new year gets underway. This is their conversation below which has been edited for clarity and length.

Daniel: Last year saw a lot of change within the city organization itself. Change can be hard for some people. First of all, how do you work to smooth that over? And then secondly, what kind of institutional knowledge remains in some key areas such as homeless strategies and public safety?

Watson: Yeah, well, those are good questions. First of all, there has been a lot of change, and that change was necessary, in my view. In fact, I ran saying that we were going to shake up City Hall. There were some things that we needed to do to make the kinds of changes so the government operates the way it ought to.

Very early in the new year, we changed city managers. We brought in Jesus Garza as our interim city manager and he brought in a quality team of folks with good common sense, knowing what they were doing. And then we saw some additional changes. For example, we saw a change at Austin Energy. We knew that there needed to be some change there. And we saw some change in our Homeland Security and Emergency Management program. We also needed some change at the airport. In my view, we're several years behind where we ought to be on getting that airport running. But we had a busy year in that regard, and I could go on and on.

The way I think you do that, so that even with the change, it's not chaotic, is that you empower the people that are here and are not the ones that are leaving. You empower them to help be part of the process in a way that maybe they weren't before and part of the reason you needed to see change. And you also bring in high quality people to serve in those new positions.

One example, one of the big changes was that of the assistant city manager over public safety. We've had for the past year an interim assistant city manager over public safety, but it just so happens to be someone that's a former acting chief of police for the City of Austin and someone that really knows that what's going on there. So that's part of what you do. And I think the city manager, working with the council, has done a really good job in that regard.

Another part of your question was how we see some of those changes and how they're impacting. One of the things that we made a change was in the area of homeless services and addressing the needs of people living homeless. Well, we did something that is a big change but also one that will assure that we're a lot less chaotic and more sustainable. And that is to create a specific office that's in charge of homeless services and put a really qualified manager in that position in David Gray. And so, we're already seeing results from that, and we'll see more in 2024. Because that was an area, in my view, that needed some serious changes, and they've been made, and then we'll start seeing even more fruits from that.

That was going to be my follow-up question. Are you happy with what you're seeing so far? Is too soon to tell?

I'm happy with what we're seeing so far. I'll give a couple of examples. One is that when I came into office a year ago, we knew we were way behind on the number of emergency shelter beds (for those who are homeless). And that makes a real difference for a couple of reasons. One is we know that even if you're wanting someone to be in permanent supportive housing, that the longer people are on the street, the more difficult it is to get them into some sort of supportive housing. And so, you want to try to get people off the street more rapidly. It's almost a mirror of the length of time they've been on the street and how long it takes to see the help actually pay off. So, you need those emergency shelter beds.

In addition, the public has told us they want the camping ban enforced, but it's very difficult to enforce the camping ban in any humane way if you don't have a place for people to go, not to mention the fact that the state has also mandated enforcement of the camping ban. So, one of the things that we did that I'm very pleased with is we've increased the number of shelter beds in a very positive way. We opened the marshalling yard — that's about 300 beds. We just have reopened what we call the Eighth Street shelter— It's the old Salvation Army facility. There are already women that are in that facility that will be a dedicated facility for women and transgender people living homeless. That will be up to 150 beds, and I think probably even a few more. So, we're making progress.

In addition to that, we've begun the process on the $65 million that I was able to get the state to give in grants to nonprofits in the city. $5 million of that has already gone to two entities that are doing stabilization of people that could end up being homeless if we're not careful. And so, we're on the front end of that. And we're very close to beginning the process of taking the some of the rest of that money — won't be all of that $60 million — and build tiny shelters that are non-congregate shelters. So yes, I am very pleased with the progress. We've got a ways to go. I won't be satisfied. I'm not satisfied yet. But that's not a negative statement. It's just that we've done well, but we got more to do.

Jumping to public safety and the ongoing challenges when it comes to police staffing. How confident are you that the ordinance regarding police pay and benefits will help slow resignations and retirements? And secondly, a police contract, how confident are you that we'll see one this year?

Watson: Well, both important and good questions. First with regard to the ordinance, so that folks will know, the ordinance that I'll bring forward this month will probably pass at the Feb. 1 meeting. That would be my guess. We're talking about it soon. That ordinance is to continue an ordinance that we passed back in (early 2023).

When you don't have a contract, we wanted to make sure that our police felt supported and knew we had their backs. And so, what we did was, we made sure through an ordinance that we were guaranteeing salaries. In fact, they got a 4% pay increase and we guaranteed benefits and retirement. We even created a program to incentivize people so that they would come into our cadet classes. We also created an additional step in the retirement program, so we'd be in a position to better retain police officers. We need to redo that ordinance; we need to do it again is what I mean. And I want to do it in plenty of time before the current ordinance expires so that our police officers will know we still have their back. So, I anticipate we'll be talking about that during the month of January and it'll pass right at the end of the month of January.

With regard to a contract, I think there's agreement that the best approach to attract and retain police officers is to get us on to a long-term contract. That requires everybody to come to the table. So, we will be talking with the Austin Police Association, the new president, about how we get back to the table. I will say that my conversations with him since his election have been very positive. He speaks real clearly, and I can hear him clearly. And I look forward to the opportunity to work with him. So, I guess I would say I'm very hopeful.

Let me jump to the HOME Initiative — this idea of allowing for the building of more homes within established neighborhoods to help create more housing. A lot of times, the city council, with an idea this big, they'll want to study, study, study and then implement. And it seems like the idea with HOME is to just kind of implement and then study the effects. Do you think that's the way to go with this?

Watson: Well, I would disagree a little bit with the way you phrase that. First of all, there has been an ongoing debate in this community for about a decade about how best to address the need of getting more housing on the ground. And so, it's not like somebody just woke up one day and said, 'Well, we haven't talked about this, let's do this now.' In fact, there was Code Next and the follow up to Code Next, all of the different things. So, this has been an ongoing discussion. This isn't this isn't new; this isn't new thinking. It's a different approach.

And instead of an all or nothing, everywhere, all at once sort of approach like Code Next that got us nothing instead of everything, everywhere all at once.

It got the city some litigation.

It did get some litigation and the city lost that litigation. That was before my time. So, we actually learned from that and what we tried to do this time is we had the joint meeting with the planning commission. It's why everybody got notice about what was going on. We attempted to do this in a far more transparent, open way. So, I wouldn't say that it was implement and then study. I would say, instead, it was learn from what's gone on for almost a decade and then utilize that for implementation.

But importantly, there are legitimate thoughts and concerns about how it will play out. That's why I offered the amendment that I offered — that was unanimously supported by the Council — which was that we are going to routinely, very early and throughout collect data about what is actually happening with this. So, that it's not a theoretical; we're not playing a game of theory here about how this is actually going to work, we will have real data. And that will allow the city to calibrate as it needs to. It will allow the city to make decisions about whether there's an unintended consequence and change that or is there something we need that's working so well, we need to do it even more. So, those kinds of things.

There was a lot of learning from the past that led to us approaching it differently and I think better, getting us to a result. We we'd gone basically a decade with no result. We can now get to a result. And then we have we're going to follow that up by assessing it with metrics and real information.

How confident are you that this idea, HOME, is the way forward?

Watson: Well, I wouldn't have voted for it if I didn't think that it was needed, and I didn't think that it was a positive step. I also really believe that what we ought to do is assess it as we go along. And that's why I carried that additional amendment.

I wanted to touch on the city's relationship with the state, the Capitol just a few blocks up. You said it was "knives out for us" at the state level. How are you going to work to foster that relationship between the state and the city? And do you see any areas where there could be inroads for a better relationship with the state?

Watson: Sure. Oh, yeah. Great question. When I ran, I said I was going to work better to have a better relationship with the state. When we went into the legislative session — that's what I was referring to — there were some folks that wanted to take away the autonomy of Austin Energy. There was a real effort to do away with Project Connect, which the voters voted and said they wanted a rail system. So, we need to have a working relationship with the State of Texas.

I'm proud of the fact that I served in the Texas Senate for 13-and-a-half years and have really strong relationships with the State of Texas. So overall, we had a very successful legislative session, because I was able to talk to people and people know me, and they were able to talk to me, tell me what they didn't like about something that the city had done before I got here. My guess is they'll do some of the same about what they don't like now that I am here. But that's what relationships are about.

And we've seen results. I mean, we saw it legislatively. I mentioned it a few minutes ago when we were talking about how we address people living homeless. Think of the last time that the state of Texas was willing to give the City of Austin $65 million to address an issue? Well, that was because of me working with the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs and the governor's office to get that help. I've been working with our commissioner of the General Land Office, Dr. Dawn Buckingham, with regard to a building that's in her jurisdiction, the old Hobby (state) building. It's a pretty dilapidated building just a couple of blocks north of where we're sitting right now that we want to turn into workforce housing. So those kinds of things are the benefits of having those relationships and not creating unnecessary enemies.

How would you characterize your relationship with the governor's office and the lt. governor's office?

Watson: I would consider it to be a much better relationship and a good relationship.

You've been mayor again for about a year now. Are you running for reelection?

I'm sorry, I'm sorry. What did you say? (chuckles) No. Look, that's the plan. I'm proud of what we've done in the past year. I've really enjoyed being mayor.

The other night on New Year's I got asked a question by a reporter, 'You were mayor before and you're mayor again? Why would you do that?' (chuckles) And my answer was that it's because I love this city. And it shows how much I love this city. We've got a lot left to do. We've made changes; we have fixed a bunch of things that needed to be fixed. And yet, we've still got work to do. So, this job is one that that I'm proud of, and love. And so, the plan is that's what I'll do.