The District 7 race

Early voting starts on Monday. Yikes!

The Chronicle endorsements

Here's who they endorsed today:

D2: Vanessa Fuentes

D4: Chito Vela

D6: Krista Laine

D7: Mike Siegel

D10: Ashika Ganguly

Mayor: No endorsement

For better or worse, the Chronicle's endorsement carries a lot of weight in down ballot races. For the silent majority of voters who aren't plugged into local politics, it's often the only thing they read about any of these races. The Statesman probably matters too, but the dramatic decline in subscriptions (paired with an online paywall) has significantly reduced its influence. I don't know how the number of eyeballs on the Chronicle compares now to 20 years ago, but at least it remains free and ubiquitous and, unlike the Statesman, it has a clear political identity that a large share of the electorate shares.

Like other progressive organizations in town, the Chronicle's view on local politics has transitioned over the past decade from "pro-neighborhood" to "pro-housing." The last holdout was Chronicle publisher Nick Barbaro, who until about a year ago wrote a weekly column that reflected the anti-development consensus of Austin 90's liberals.

It has been abundantly clear in recent election cycles that the editorial board has often split the baby on endorsements to accommodate Barbaro's dissenting view, such as the "joint endorsements" it issued two years ago in D5 and D9. I was expecting that to happen in D10 and/or D7 this year, but nope. The YIMBYs swept.

The District 7 race

District 7, which covers a bunch of central and north neighborhoods, is the only City Council race with a crowded field this year, which can make for very tedious campaign reporting. The fact is that both my time and your time is limited, so I can't devote as much space and consideration to every candidate, especially those who are clearly not viable because they haven't raised much money.

Leslie Pool, the last member of the original 10-1 Council, has held the seat since 2015 and will be leaving office in January. Pool was elected as a staunch protector of single-family neighborhoods but has in the last couple years transitioned into a major proponent of land use reform, to the shock and dismay of many of her long-time supporters but to the delight of urbanists who had long opposed her. She has not endorsed a successor.

Mike Siegel

The clear frontrunner is Mike Siegel, who benefits from the name recognition he achieved as a two-time Congressional candidate and as an increasingly prominent progressive activist in local politics.

Siegel is running as a movement progressive in the mold of Greg Casar, touting his organizing background and willingness to push for bold solutions on behalf of the environment, housing and workers rights.

Siegel lives in Crestview and worked for four years as an assistant city attorney in the city of Austin's Law Department. He says that experience gave him crucial insight into how the city can draft and defend ordinances against state pre-emption. More recently, he represented Equity Action in its suit against the city that resulted in a court ruling forcing the city to implement the Austin Police Oversight Act.

In 2018 and 2020, Siegel ran unsuccessfully against Republican Congressman Michael McCaul. He came far closer to unseating McCaul than any previous Dem nominee in the strongly Republican district. He later teamed up with Julie Oliver, who had also run two uphill challenges against a GOP incumbent in the neighboring Congressional district, to found Ground Game Texas, a nonprofit that aimed at pushing progressive policy in communities around the state, including many that are not thought of as lefty havens. A big focus was marijuana decriminalization referenda.

(Oliver and Siegel later had a falling out. She was abruptly fired by the board of Ground Game Texas and is now a treasurer for the campaign of opponent Gary Bledsoe. She told the Austin Bulldog that Siegel didn't have integrity and "just wants to get elected." Siegel declined to comment; Ground Game also declined to address Oliver's firing)

Siegel supports the raft of land development code changes Council has passed to enable smaller types of housing.

He is skeptical of the proposed police contract and says he is worried that city staff is understating the fiscal impact. Most voters, he says, want three things: for the police to arrive when they call, for the police to respect civil rights, and a public safety approach that extends beyond the police.

He blames the media for oversimplifying the city's public safety challenges.

"I think the average person in the public is like ‘we have bad response times, so let's pay cops more so we get better response times,'" he says. "It’s hard to overcome that inference because the media has been messaging that we 'defunded' the police."

He says it's likely that adopting the contract will not actually significantly boost staffing or response times. He notes that a large percentage of police cadets are dropping out of the academy, which has "a lot to do with culture and not money."

There needs to be a clearer understanding of what the city is paying for, he says, and what the tradeoffs will be in terms of cuts to other services or tax hikes.

A common suspicion of Siegel –– whether stated explicitly or hinted at –– is that he, like Casar, has aspirations for a post higher than City Council. Perhaps the Congressional seat that Lloyd Doggett is expected to vacate in the not-so-distant future.

Siegel rejects the notion that Council is a mere stepping stone for him but calls the critique "flattering."

"If that’s your top critique of me, that means that you can’t say anything about what I’ve done in 25 years," he says.

Asked to distinguish himself from his opponents, Siegel says that he has a unique blend of experience in political organizing and within city government that will allow him to be a particularly effective advocate on the dais.

As of the end of September, Siegel had raised $127k and had $43k on hand.

Adam Powell

Adam Powell is the most closely associated with the YIMBY/urbanist movement. He boasts the endorsement of urbanist group AURA and over the past year has become a regular at City Hall, testifying in support of land use changes and against the expansion of I-35, among other things.

Powell, 30, cites his own upbringing in support of his housing stances. He grew up in Leander, the son of teachers who he says could not afford to buy a home in the city. He wants the city to be able to provide more types of housing affordable to more types of people in central neighborhoods.

He says development is not only key to addressing the housing crisis, but is critical to generating more tax revenue for cash-strapped local governments.

He is wary of approving a new police contract without better understanding the fiscal impact.

"We don’t even actually know what the budgetary implications of this will be," he says. "If it’s going to be this level of [spending] increase, what’s the plan to cover that?"  

On Mayor Kirk Watson, he offers pros and cons. He's not a fan of the I-35 expansion or the DPS deployment last year, but he applauds Watson's support of land use changes and for saving Project Connect from near-death at the Legislature last year.

He is not interested in the "Cap & Stitch" plan for the expanded I-35, calling it a "wolf in sheep's clothing." The estimated price tag –– $800M upfront, $40-50M annually in maintenance –– is too high without a more clearly defined return on investment, he says.

"I have such a problem that we didn’t have a choice as voters to decide whether this expansion happens through the heart of our city," he says.

One thing he says he hears a lot about from voters is concerns about future power outages. Ensuring the resiliency of Austin Energy's infrastructure has to be a top priority for the city, he says.

When asked what distinguishes him from other candidates, he says that he has no interest in office beyond City Council.

"I don’t want to run for state or national office," he says. "I’m just a local politics guy."

As of the end of the September, Powell had raised $54k and only had $4,700 left.

Gary Bledsoe

Gary Bledsoe entered the race late, in June, after being courted by anti-growth forces desperate for somebody in the race to carry their banner. The situation is reminiscent of what happened in District 9 two years ago, when Linda Guerrero jumped into a YIMBY-dominated field at the last minute.

Bledsoe, who did not respond to two emails requesting an interview, is a noted civil rights attorney who has served as president of the Texas NAACP since 1991. A suit he brought against the state of Texas resulted in the hiring of the first Black Texas Ranger in 1988 and one he brought against the Austin Police Department resulted in the establishment of the city's first civilian police oversight office.

Central to the identity of Bledsoe's campaign is his opposition to the HOME initiative, which reduces minimum lot sizes and allows three units on single-family lots. He voices the familiar objections that other opponents of land use reform make –– that the new development will hurt the environment, disrupt neighborhoods and not be "affordable."

His comments about various issues have generally been noncommittal. The issues he outlines on his website are extremely vague. His housing platform, for instance:

• Addressing displacement with innovative solutions
• Advocating for diverse and affordable housing options
• Having more proactive plans that will lead to housing that our residents can afford, not affordable housing for which the costs and quantity are unknown

Most curiously, his website says that he wants to "end the Gentleman's Agreement," which in Austin generally refers to the informal deal that reserved one City Council seat for African Americans and one for Latinos before the establishment of geographic districts a decade ago.

Bledsoe raised $50k at the end of September and had $48k on hand.

Todd Shaw

Todd Shaw's political journey is a curious one that somewhat mirrors that of Leslie Pool, who appointed him to the Planning Commission at the height of the battle over CodeNEXT.

Shaw, like Pool, was a skeptic of the land use reforms being pushed in the name of environmentalism and affordability, but like Pool, he eventually changed his mind and became a supporter.

"It was really a tremendous learning opportunity for me," he says in an interview. "I was Allandale Neighborhood Association Zoning Chair and that’s your universe...But when you're on the Planning Commission, you start seeing things from a different viewpoint – talking to commissioners, talking to others about the lack of affordability. That made me realize how bad things had gotten."

Shaw eventually became chair of the commission and played a key role in crafting the HOME initiative that was eventually approved by Council.

"I'm a real bridge-builder," he says. "I like working with people who come from different sides of the table."

Shaw, an El Paso native who came to Austin to attend UT in 1981, worked at Austin Energy for 30 years, where he helped to oversee the building of the utility's chilled water system, which he would like to see remain under city ownership.

He wants to see the city get a police contract approved but that he would like to see police training "that is in line with our values" and "get away from more militia-style policing."

He recognizes that the budgetary pressures may force the city to ask voters to approve a tax hike in the near future, but his own experience in city government also informs his view that there are places to cut spending.

Shaw's has only raised about $20,000, but perhaps his longtime involvement in neighborhood politics will mitigate some of his financial shortcomings.

Shaw had raised $21.5k and had $14k left at the end of September.

Pierre Nguyễn

Pierre Nguyễn's main message relates to public safety and disaster preparedness.

"As someone who has deployed out on disasters all across the country, I've seen we weren't prepared," he says about the city's response to Winter Storm Uri. "And for a long time I was having conversations with emergency managers about the likelihood will continue to increase of more severe incidents."

He voices skepticism of HOME and other land use changes, echoing age-old concerns about increased density aggravating flooding.

He is supportive of the police contract, calling the raises reasonable and necessary to attracting and retaining a qualified police force.

Nguyễn had only raised about $10,000 at the end of September and only had a few hundred dollars on hand.

Edward Bautista

No disrespect to Bautista, who is a nice guy, but I am not going to devote time to reporting on a campaign that has raised less than $1,000. Here is his website.

If somebody forwarded you this email, please consider subscribing to the newsletter by visiting the website.