Austin's business community has split on the city's $90 million transportation bond election in November. Two weeks after the Real Estate Council of Austin's board voted to oppose the bond proposal, the Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce on Monday joined about 20 local groups in support of the vote.
"It is a significant first step," homebuilder Terry Mitchell , chairman of the chamber's transportation committee, said at a Monday news conference called by a political action committee formed to support the bond election. Mitchell, who is also president of Momark Development, said that $27.2 million of the money would go to projects to lessen traffic congestion and $19.5 million to reconstruct aging streets, but he added that the area's overall transportation needs could be in the billions of dollars.
"This bond should not be seen as an end-all," he said.
The Downtown Austin Alliance also supports Proposition 1, which includes about 30 specific projects and other money for sidewalks, road repair, traffic calming and signal improvements around the city. The list of supporters cited by Get Austin Moving , the political committee pushing for passage of the proposition, also included several bicycle groups, environmental advocates and trails organizations.
Officials with the Real Estate Council argued that given the bond proposal's hefty dose of nonroad projects — about 43 percent of the spending, including $14.4 million for a boardwalk extension of the Lady Bird Lake hike-and-bike trail — voters should have been offered two propositions: one for roads and one for the bike, sidewalk and trails projects.
The Real Estate Council's executive board has not decided whether it will form a political action committee to raise money for ads, mailings or other activity to oppose Proposition 1.
Ted Siff , former Texas director of the Trust for Public Land and treasurer of Get Austin Moving, said Monday that the group hopes to raise about $100,000 to campaign for Proposition 1. So far, he said, the group has secured about $20,000 in cash and pledges.
Siff's group also unveiled the 36 members of its steering committee, including Mitchell; former Austin Mayor Gus Garcia; former Austin Council Member Brigid Shea ; Joe Cantalupo , former executive director of the Capital Area Metropolitan Planning Organization; Capital Metro board members Frank Fernandez and Beverly Silas ; Central Austin developer Perry Lorenz ; and Richard Ridings, a longtime consulting engineer for the Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority.
