Issues

Our current land use rules were first passed in 1984. We’re a growing city, but Reagan-era policies are funneling the gains of that growth away from the people who made it possible. We must ensure a future for Austin that is affordable and climate-resilient, so that our city can be a place that welcomes all and recognizes housing as a human right.

It’s time to bring our land use rules in alignment with Imagine Austin, the Austin Strategic Housing Blueprint, and the Austin Climate Equity Plan by reforming the rules that keep housing unaffordable.

In addition, we must be proactive about preventing displacement of and stopping homelessness at the source by fortifying our right-to-return and right-to-stay programs, expanding community land trusts, investing in housing vouchers for low-income residents, and ensuring the $300M in Project Connect anti-displacement funds gets spent on truly affordable housing. We must also expand the highly successful University Neighborhood Overlay (UNO) program to further expand student access to affordable housing, walkability near transit, and safe streets.

Transportation and housing policy is climate policy. If we want to meet our goal of net-zero emissions by 2040, we must prioritize equitable transit-oriented development on our Project Connect corridors, invest in transit, bike, and pedestrian infrastructure citywide, plant native trees on our streets to clean up air quality and provide shade, phase out our fossil fuel usage, and commit to climate justice. We must protect the delicate ecosystems of the region by preserving and expanding our green spaces for all future generations to enjoy.

While Travis County voter registration remains at a record high, there is always more work to be done, especially amidst attacks and voter suppression from Greg Abbott’s GOP.

We must advocate for voter registration options at every point of contact with the City Of Austin so residents can get registered easily, as well as investing in robust voter education citywide. We must advocate to expand voting locations within District 9, especially near UT campus, which has rarely seen enough polling locations to meet the needs of a 50,000+ strong student body.

Women, LGBTQIA+ people, and people of color are extremely underrepresented on our appointed city commissions. As your city council member, I will appoint commissioners that truly reflect the diversity of our city. We must ensure interpretation services for people with disabilities and/or non-English speakers at any public-facing city government events and uplift the voices of our disabled neighbors to ensure accessibility in all parts of city life.

As we grow as a city, we must meet our growing transportation needs. We must ensure that Project Connect gets built in a timely and equitable manner, so that Austinites will be able to access high quality, frequent public transit services.

To meet our Vision Zero goals, we must invest in infrastructure like safe bus shelters, crosswalks, protected bike lanes, safe streets, and sidewalks. Supporting a robust slate of transportation options will make our streets safer for all road users, while reducing congestion and slashing our carbon emissions.

If we want to meet our climate goals and prevent hundreds of D9 businesses and homes from being demolished, we need advocates on council to demand an I-35 plan from TxDOT that commits to building no wider and no higher.

Austin’s small businesses foster growth and give our communities a sense of place to call home. Sadly, the same policy paradigm that drives up housing costs in Austin has increasingly led to skyrocketing commercial rents, forcing small businesses to raise prices just to make the payments or simply close up shop.

We must support small businesses, especially those that are Black and Latino owned, so that our city can retain a sense of place and culture rooted in community. In addition, we must commit to robust citywide labor protections and foster the creation of worker cooperatives when possible.

For too long, many municipalities have taken a monolithic approach to public safety. We must continue to find ways to work within state law to win real policing reforms in Austin, such as strengthening and expanding on policing reforms like 9-1-1 Mental Health Services, increased police oversight, and ending APD’s mishandling of sexual assault cases.

We must take a holistic view of public safety that fully funds our EMS and fire services, recommits to our Vision Zero goals, and invests in affordable housing, mental health services, and food accessibility so that no person is too poor to live.

Austin prides itself as the “Live Music Capital Of The World.” We’re the birthplace of SXSW, and the home to a diverse history of arts and culture that put our city on the map in the first place.

But as we’ve grown, artists have been left behind, pushed out of town by rising costs of living. We need local elected officials that both value our local artists and work with them to secure a place in our city. We must expand the pilot program of directing hotel occupancy tax revenue to musicians, strengthening affordable housing options for artists, supporting local venues and studios, and uplifting working-class, Black, and Latino artists through city-sponsored projects and funding.