Category Archives: Health and Human Service

Health and Human Services refers to social services, education, public health, health care services, animal welfare, sustainable food, social equity, veterans’ affairs, populations at risk, and related matters.

NEWS: Mayor Adler declares Local State of Disaster to help flood recovery

Today Mayor Steve Adler declared a Local State of Disaster which remains in effect for seven days until it is ratified and extended by the City Council. An item will appear on the agenda of the special called meeting of Sunday, November 8, 2015 for ratification and extension.

“Due to the extreme amount of rainfall and record flooding that struck the City of Austin on October 30, 2015, the City is facing tremendous physical and economic losses. Tragically, there has been loss of life. Hundreds of homes and businesses have been damaged, and many more residents and families are in need of temporary housing and other individual assistance,” Mayor Adler wrote in a memo to the City Council today. “Likewise, our City departments and public utilities are incurring unanticipated costs as they support our residents and address damages to infrastructure.”

The disaster declaration allows for greater coordination with Travis County’s own disaster declaration to facilitate reimbursement from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

For questions and media requests, please contact Jason Stanford, Communications Director, Office of Mayor Steve Adler, (512) 978-2153 office (512) 619-5756 cell.

Results from Spirit of East Austin Community Forum

Feedback from the Spirit of East Austin Community Forum has been overwhelmingly positive due in part to the dialogue focused on ways to create equitable economic and community development in East Austin. After September 12, a qualitative analysis team assembled and collected 1,990 Post-it notes to help determine next steps.

As part of our next steps, we will be scheduling community meetings to present the initial results and receive feedback to ensure they honestly reflect the community’s needs. The intention is to continue receiving ongoing input from the community while inviting stakeholders to volunteer for working teams to develop a set of community-based recommendations (i.e., projects, policies, and/or programs).

These working teams would be located in critical areas needing attention including, but not limited to, the following neighborhoods: Montopolis, Dove Springs, Colony Park, Rundberg, and Central East Austin among others. The working teams would not replace current neighborhood organizations or efforts. Instead, they would form parallel to and in collaboration with these groups to gather information and make recommendations. We want to move quickly to form our recommendations and want all input. We expect to have city staff, community members, and other experts to participate in these working teams. Satisfying a set of community-based attributes, each community team would be responsible for developing a set of recommendations that would fall into one of the following categories:

Shovel-ready (up to 1 year): Some recommendations would focus on quick, “shovel-ready” projects that may have already received attention, for example, creating sidewalks to increase walkability.
Fertile Ground (1 to 3 years): Additional work would focus on projects that require relatively minimal effort, but they have high impact on the community.
Strategic (3 to 5+ years): Long–term investments that offer greater community impact and would be strategically focused on dynamic economic development.

Helpful links:

Spirit of East Austin Community Forum analysis (online, interactive presentation)

Spirit of East Austin Online Community Forum (You must log in to access, contribute)

SPEECH: “The future of Austin rises in the East”

“It’s time to take stock of what is good and to build from that foundation of good a better, stronger and more equitable East Austin. To press forward faster, to taking our best assets and leverage them to bring unprecedented focus, energy, investment and opportunity to East Austin.

“As we Face East, we do not excuse or dismiss the parts of our past that are, at best, ugly and unjust. Rather, we can use this history as fuel for the kind of determination to shape a more equitable and prosperous future in our City’s East Austin. The community has gathered before to participate in studies and help create plans. Just by way of example, The African American, Hispanic and Asian Quality of Life reports; Colony Park master plan; the 1984 master plan; neighborhood Master Plans. We thank you for this important work. From those gatherings, some progress has been made. Yet, we all know that what has happened in the past is not nearly enough and not nearly as great as our potential. And, I hope in knowing that, it makes us all the more determined. I am determined.

“This is our shared dilemma: Many of our highest achievements in job creation, higher education, health and technology, happen in other zip codes. This imbalance has threatened the idea of Austin as a just and equitable community for decades. This imbalance does not come as a surprise. This imbalance comes as the outcome of design – the direct result of where this city has focused. It is time to turn that same level of focus to Face East.”

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Speech: State of Our City

We’re going to talk about “change” tonight, because Austin is ready for change. We’ve voted for change. But if you want to see change — look around. 1,200 of us in an accessible, free, community-gathering place. This is what change in government feels like!

Thank you Christopher Michael for poetry that challenges us to build bridges. Thank you Max Frost for starting this evening with live music, after all we’re in Austin, Texas. Thank you, Valentina Tovar, for a beautiful speech. Your generation’s passion is a powerful example to mine. Finally, thank you Dr. Cruz for joining other central Texas superintendents and school boards in educating our children, perhaps the single most important thing we do to insure economic opportunity and preserve our quality of life. And thank you for letting us borrow such a fabulous facility.

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