Conversations with City Council candidates: Travis Mitchell, Place 1, challenger

Why are you running?

Primarily, I’m running because I am holistically invested in the future of Kyle. My children are going to go to school here. I have a business here. My future’s here. So I can’t sit back throughout my time and not participate in our government. I think it’s that important. So about six months ago I decided that running for City Council was something that made sense for me in terms of how I’m bent.


What two or three things would you like to accomplish during your three year term?
Number one would be tax reduction. I believe that we should model after San Marcos in creating a flat tax or a fixed tax rate, something that we key off of instead of adjusting our rate to meet our spending needs. San Marcos hasn’t changed their rate in the last eight years. I think we should do the same. I would advocate for a 49-cent tax rate which, to me, gives the city plenty of resources to do their job, but will cause us to tighten our belt. That is a 16 percent reduction from our current rate and we can do a lot for the citizens in terms of tax relief by going to that rate. I also believe in downtown revitalization. I don’t mean the Downtown Revitalization Grant Program of 2015. Rather I’m talking about a comprehensive model that brings all parties together including downtown property owners and businesses to create a collaborative effort for the purpose of doing something truly unique and sustainable for downtown long-term. That’s not an easy thing to do, but there are enough people that are vested in downtown currently to make something like that happen. We have to give it a try, a real legitimate effort and it takes somebody on City Council leading that charge. And I’m ready to lead that charge. I also believe that we should do everything we can to improve our infrastructure and that starts by being much smarter about the way we approach our roads. Our master transportation plan, while helpful, is not enough. As a business owner, I care about the details of how a program is laid out and how we structure things financially. For example, I would have vehemently argued against the 2013 road bonds in terms of the way they were delivered to the public and presented for a vote. I believe that we got way ahead of ourselves by putting that package to the voters before acquiring the right-of-way, utility easements and the engineering necessary to let the project out for bid and we shouldn’t have done it that way. We should have gotten all of our financials set up so that we knew exactly how much these projects were going to cost so when we actually passed the bond it would have been shovel ready and we could have started immediately. Doing it that way would have saved us likely millions of dollars in opportunity costs and time value of money.


Lowering the tax rate means less income which means fewer dollars you have to spend on certain areas. Which areas would you advocate reducing spending on?
I would start by reducing the City Council’s exorbitant salary of $100 a month. (Laughs). For start, the road bond issue is actually huge to me because the way we went about that is one of the primary catalysts for the high tax rate that we currently experience. So this is not necessarily about reducing payroll or something along those lines, but more in terms of how our debt is structured and how it’s delivered. Over half of our tax rate goes to service debt right now. That is insane to me. We have $95 million, give or take, depending on the month in debt as a city. San Marcos, for example, is in the low $70 million range. How is it a city twice our size has less debt? If you do the math on that, their debt to total asset calculation is about 2 percent. And Kyle’s debt to total asset is about 5 percent. So we are more than twice as leveraged as San Marcos year after year after year. That puts us at a competitive disadvantage. If we can reduce our debt to be more in line with the city of San Marcos we could start to level the playing field and reduce our taxes at the same time.


You have to replay that debt. So are you saying Kyle would have to wait until the amount of that debt is reduced before you can lower the tax rate?
No, I would not. I would start by looking hard at the proposed budget that the City presents to us. It’s hard to say exactly how you would reduce the debt before you have that budget for review and before you’re on the inside looking at it. But I have a lot of experience in debt reduction and overhead reduction. I’ve had to go through years of owning a business and making hard decisions and I have always balanced my budget. Always. I have always done the hard necessary work to make my business perform. And I would carry that same mentality to City Council.


Do you have a vision of how you would like downtown to look in 25 years?
I have the start of a vision. No one person can say how it should be because it’s almost irrelevant how I would view it. What matters is consensus among interested parties. So what my role in the downtown revitalization would be is to get those parties together and vested. Once that happens, their vision is what matters, not mine. I’m not trying to force anything on anyone. I’m only recognizing the desperate cries from so many small businesses in that area who want to see change and reform. Now, with that said, I can speak to some things. For one, the old town hall could be utilized a thousand times more efficiently than it currently is. Now, I have nothing against how it’s being used. I just want to add to it. The exterior facade and the landscaping or lack thereof along that square creates a lethargy to the downtown culture. With very minimal investment and heavy volunteerism, we could really improve that area. I would also support legislation to make our ordinances much more urbanized in that district, modeling after some of what you see in the city of Austin and some of what you see in San Marcos and some of what you see in other places like Tyler. It’s currently very difficult to do creative things in the downtown district. If the City doesn’t have a box for it, good luck. But we can do better by putting in the hard work necessary to bring reform to that district.


How do react to talk about the need for a downtown parking garage?
I would absolutely support a measure along those lines. Anything to create urban density will be great for downtown. Downtown districts thrive on density. Things like parking garages, multi-story buildings, multi-use facilities, all work in tandem to support the small businesses that create the culture. So I would absolutely support that. The question is not so much the parking garage to me but the demand for the parking garage. That’s the real challenge. Getting a developer in there to put the facility in place requires a lot of vision casting. It also requires a city, specifically a city council, championing that vision in unison. I want to help bring that about.


You referenced the importance you place on tax reduction earlier. Would you say that is the city council’s No. 1 priority in the upcoming budget?
I wouldn’t disagree if you said that. It certainly would be tied with anything else. Nothing would go above tax reduction.


Do you think the city should adopt a zero-based budgeting system?
I don’t know that term.


How about budgeting for outcomes?
I’ve never heard that term.


Everybody talks about the amount of traffic on Center Street. Most of that traffic could be alleviated by spending $2 million. Do you think the city council should approve a $2 million item to fix those traffic problems as part of the fiscal year 2016-17 budget and, if so, where should that money come from?
$2 million to create one-ways?


Because of policies outside city government’s direct control Kyle will never be in contention to land businesses like the Amazon distribution center that recently located in San Marcos or that new Samsung facility that went to Manor, of all places. But do you think the city should exert pressure to get those policies changed and, if so, what form should that pressure take?
I fundamentally disagree with your assumption that Kyle will never be the destination for places like that. I think Kyle is ideally suited for distribution centers and light manufacturing.


The problem, however, is not location but policies.
I absolutely agree with you. When I say I fundamentally disagree with your assumption, I’m looking into the future and seeing myself on council addressing some of those policies.


But the city isn’t the one controlling those policies. So my question is does the city have a role in influencing those who do control them?
I think the city has that among its highest mandates. If there is anything that we can do as a city to help attract businesses like the Amazon Fulfillment Center and so on to come to Kyle, we need to do what we can to make that happen. It’s perhaps the most critical element in reducing our tax rate and creating a more diverse tax base and employment base for our community. I’m not sure that we’re doing enough to attract those types of businesses. I hope that while on council, I can push the needle in the right direction to get some of those businesses to come to town.


What changes would you advocate to increase citizen participation in municipal government?
That’s actually an issue I care about as much as any issue. I hate the stigma that Kyle is a bedroom community. We are filled with tens of thousands of residents who don’t call or think of Kyle as home. They get up in the morning and go to work in another town and come home in the evening, eat their meals and go to bed. Changing that takes time and strategy. One way to start creating that vision is to enact what I would call a citizen orientation program whereby we reach out to new residents of Kyle personally through a volunteer organization and knock on their door and welcome them to Kyle through the good old-fashioned handshake and even a gift basket. Furthermore, we could invite those new residents to what I call a citizen orientation program. It’s really just a banquet and they come together and meet other new residents and listen to a presentation delivered by multiple parties including those on City Council, those in city government and some of the business leaders in town and volunteer organization leaders in town and tell them the new citizens all the great things Kyle has to offer. To me, capturing the attention of new residents is critical in shaping their perspective of our town. We currently do zilch for new residents and I want to change that.


What about existing residents? What would you do to increase their participation?
Well, I know we’re doing Facebook as a city We’ve hired a communications director, Kim Hilsenbeck, to try and help get information to our citizens. While that’s great, I think more can be done. I am very disappointed with the way our City Council communicates to our residents. To me, we can do far more than we are currently doing. So much of the ire drawn on City Council by our residents is the result of silence and/or a lack of commitment to transparency. The citizens don’t know what to make of that silence so they make up whatever version they want and whatever feels right to them. The problem is often times that’s wrong and their perspective is served up from the plate of bias. When I am on council, I will strive to break through to the citizens by writing often about the various challenging issues of the day in hopes that people can gain some insight into what’s actually taking place.


What additional changes would you propose to the city’s board, commission, committee structure?
Not much. I know we’ve gone through a pretty major restructuring in the last couple of years led, in part, by the mayor who strives to create some efficiencies and eliminate some redundancies in our committees. I, as a business owner, think committees oftentimes are pointless. They stir up a lot of discussion but rarely lead to substantive results. So I am very happy with that reduction and have no interest in forming new boards or committees.


Is someone appointed to a city board, commission or committee answerable to the city council member who appointed that person? How much influence should council members have over board, commission, committee members?
I think the City Council was elected to do a job. They are the ones the people said "Make my decisions." As a result, I think most of the boards and committees need to be an advisory board. They need to have an advisory capacity to the City Council. But, in my opinion, the City Council should have the final say on most issues, if not all.


But do you think it is the prerogative of a City Council member to instruct someone he or she has appointed to a commission on how to vote on a particular issue?
No.


Are you concerned about Kyle’s long-term sustainability?
Yes, very much so.


Why?
Our particular form of government is set up on some financial ju-jitsu. We put these financial systems in place to help fund new developments such as PIDs, TIFFs, MUDs, PUDs, so forth. These types of incentive programs oftentimes create the possibility for development with little up-front cost to the City. The City, as a result, is incentivized to push a project forward and give perhaps very little thought to the overall maintenance that they will then be on the hook for, moving forward. Maintenance on infrastructure is what has caused our tax rate to climb. We are now 20 years into the most incredible growth period in the history of our city. What that means is a lot of the roads that were put into place 20 years ago and water lines and sewer lines are now in major need of repair. We have to think in terms of how does new development play out long-term financially in terms of maintenance. There are several good books out there that speak to sustainability models, multi-use developments, that have certain types of commercial and residential co-existing in such a way that people are less incentivized to drive across town or from town to town and do most of their material shopping within a five-mile radius of where they live. I would support measures that go to that end. In terms of incentives I would do everything I could to incentivize developers to build and improve upon our current infrastructure as opposed to laying out new roads and new infrastructure. How that would work our for me practically is, for example, the town-home re-zoning on Live Oak Street, that was recently struck down. To me, a project like that is the most ideal use of that property. It was voted down 6-1 with council member Arabie in lone support and I found his arguments to be the most sane of the group. I felt that in-fill is something we need to focus on and what that means is connecting the land between existing developments. So we should concentrate on in-fill, building on empty lots that exist between existing developments. That creates an efficiency, a synergy for the surrounding community in terms of businesses and in terms of maintenance on the infrastructure that is currently in place. I would love to incentivize developers to come into interior of our town and improve the dilapidated infrastructure that we have. For me, to turn down a town-home development in the interior of our town right next to downtown, yet approve a large residential development on the outskirts of town is how we got into this mess in the first place.


Should the city prioritize growth alternatives it will incentivize?
Absolutely.


What, in your opinion, are the top 3 priorities should Kyle concentrate on?
Interior versus exterior would be one. Just eating up farmland on the outside of town to put in 2,000 homes is not what Kyle needs right now. What Kyle needs is interior development that improves upon our current infrastructure. So interior versus exterior. Commercial versus residential would be second. And then I would take those two things and throw the element of job creation as the means of measuring how I incentivize versus how large-scale the project is. That’s very important for me. As a city, we should not incentivize projects simply because they are large. That should not be our method of determining who gets city support and who doesn’t. I believe strongly that we should level the playing field and give the smallest possible business a chance at receiving incentives if they meet the requirements that we’re looking for. For example, if a mom-and-pop business wants to open in town and they want to build a small facility with existing infrastructure that needs improvement, if they have to upgrade their waterline from a six-inch to a 12-inch line, based on the amount of jobs they project to create, I would be in favor of giving them a tax credit for that amount. They still have to pay for it up front, but over a course of one, three or five years or longer, depending on the size of the project, we would credit them back their taxes for improving the City’s infrastructure. I could tease that out at length but that would be my priority.


Do you think city government should take a more active role in regional planning or is that, in your opinion, the exclusive prerogative of county government or organizations such as CAPCOG?
I think we should partner in regional planning. It has its limits, though. The City’s primary focus is on its citizens, but long-term planning for the region requires the input of all parties: city, county, state and others. So, yes, I would definitely be in favor of having a seat at that table, but, no, I would not expend all our resources on that.


In your opinion, does Kyle have a transportation problem and, if so, what specifically is that problem and what actions should the city take to remediate those problems?
I think Kyle has two transportation problems. One of them is not a transportation problem but a road problem and one of them is downtown. Our Highway150 that goes through downtown creates a substantial traffic problem daily. Add to that, the fact that a railroad goes through the heart of our town and it becomes nightmarish for businesses and residents trying to travel in that area. The 150 re-route is something, on the surface, that I’m excited about because, while you want traffic in your downtown area, the type of traffic we receive is not the best.


In its transportation plans, Kyle assumes the automobile is the only transportation source. That could mean, for someone working in Georgetown or San Antonio, their overall transportation costs could rival their housing costs. Do you think there’s a need for Kyle to bring transit investment into parity with roadway development?
Not currently, I do not. The idea that residents spend the same amount on transportation as they do on their homes is flawed. I have a family and a home and have for over 10 years had to make payments on both. My car expenses are a fraction of my home expenses. Depends on what kind of car you want. But Kyle is not the type of town at this point that demands massive transportation overall in terms of the way we get out citizens across town. Having interior rail systems and bus systems and things along those lines can not be accomplished currently in a responsible way from a financial perspective for the City. There are very few good options because there is very little demand. Our citizens all have cars. They all drive all over all the time and have no interest in even paying $3 for a taxi cab ride. They have their own car and will get in it before they will expend all the energy to take a taxi ride, even a cheap one. With that being said, there are some citizens who are in need of public transportation and the City has taken steps to try and meet that need. But beyond the scope of what we are currently looking at, I cannot see Kyle benefitting over and against the cost of such a program.


But I was referring to transit development more than mass transportation alternatives.
I think I’ve already spoken a little bit about creating commercial/residential hybrids so that people don’t have to drive as much, as well as parking garages and things along those lines. But we get ahead ourselves sometimes by comparing the city that we have to the city that we want. Those things have to grow organically and we can plan to that end, but it’s a long road to see some of those things happen.


Do you think Kyle has an air quality problem and, if so, do you think that problem could be solved by having the city commit resources and personnel to organizations such as the Central Texas Clean Air Coalition?
I think the Clean Air Coalition is similar to many other organizations. What I mean by that is they primarily serve themselves. While some of their functions are legitimate, I’m not convinced that joining any coalition or committee serves much of a purpose. There are metrics that the Clean Air Coalition prescribes to that I also prescribe to in terms of air quality. I believe in a lot of their tenets. But I’m not overly interested in memberships to various groups simply for the sake of saying "I’m on their team."


What are the city’s most prominent infrastructure needs?
Wastewater, right now, ironically. I know most people would say roads, but our road issues are being addressed, however inefficiently. But our wastewater treatment center is at capacity, full to the brim capacity, and we are adding to that daily. A new wastewater treatment plant is going to cost multiple millions of dollars. Some estimates 10, some estimates $20 million to create a new facility to support the growth. That is money we do not have. So, to me, the most pressing issue is answering the question "How do we source the money to increase the capacity of our town to deal with wastewater?’.


Do you have the answer to that question?
There are options. One option is to stymy growth while our developments that exist catch up. I don’t particularly think that’s best. Another option is to work with the developers to raise the money from their projects to support a wastewater treatment plant that is required as a result of their projects. I think I would be more in favor of something along those lines. However, it’s complicated because developers don’t give money to wastewater treatment plants without wanting something in return. And I am not overly interested in capitulating to developers, especially massive residential developers who want to put in projects on the outskirts of town.


Do you support the proposed charter changes that will be on the May ballot?
Yes, I do.


All of them?
Yes.


Under current policy, if the city council rejects a zoning request, the applicant is forbidden to resubmit the request for an entire year. Do you think this is fair?
I can answer that question in two ways. One from the perspective of the City and one from the perspective I had as a business owner. No business owner is ever going to like being told they have to wait a year. I know I wouldn’t had I requested rezoning for my business and been denied. At the same time, the City has its own business to run and if you request a zoning and are denied, what benefit is there in being able to immediately come back and request the same thing over and over. Without a material change in your business plan I would support the one-year hiatus. However, if there are material changes in your business plan or in the reason you are requesting this zoning change, I would be open to giving exceptions. The Council has a right to bring anything back, so the hiatus is really on the business side of things.


When the City needs to draft an entirely new Comprehensive Plan in about five years or so, what process would you recommend drafters take in developing that plan?
I think it starts with malleability. We have this idea that our Comprehensive Plan is supposed to rigidly tell us what to do on every piece of property in town from now until eternity. That is not the way the real world works. The Comprehensive Plan that in its current iteration is much better than its predecessor which liked to color in specific pieces of property and say "This project must be this and that project must be that." No city can thrive with such rigidity. I think our Comprehensive Plan needs to be seen more as a vision-casting document as opposed to a lawful, legal document. That’s the counsel I would give to the drafters.


How do you feel about single use zoning?
I’m not in favor of any zoning that has no defensible rationale behind it. Single use zoning makes sense in some spots, but Kyle’s growing up and we have to think in terms of multi-use. We have to think in terms of diversity. We have to think in terms of creativity. There is nothing about single-use only that promotes any of those things. So I would do away with it immediately. I would also add multiple layers and nuances into our commercial zoning, specifically, but also our residential. We currently have three buckets to put all of our commercial projects into: RS, W and CM. I am astounded that we have come so far as a city and still have only three buckets to put everything into. It creates enormous problems for the city in terms of approving re-zoning requests. I’m talking enormous problems. And I would advocate that we layer our zoning so that we can make decisions that don’t have such terrible side effects.


Is the city doing enough to manage stormwater? Do you support the creation of a stormwater utility in Kyle and the implementation of stormwater fees to pay for that utility?
I don’t think I do at this point. I will say that a stormwater fee is a relatively new concept to me. It’s something I’ve only given consideration to within the last month. So you shouldn’t vote me in or down on my opinion of this because it’s still formulating. There’s a lot of things to consider in the implementation of a stormwater fee. Whether you live in a neighborhood that has an HOA or not is huge for this fee because it creates problems either way you go. If we don’t address our stormwater drainage problems we could be looking at city expenses far exceeding the revenues of stormwater fees and have to take that out one way or another. You can’t have a free lunch in this town or anywhere for that matter. So whenever a storm comes in and causes significant damage, the citizens pay for it, one way or another, through a fee or through taxes. It’s coming down to the people of the town to pay for it. So I’m open to looking at it. At this point, my answer would be "no," but that could change.


What advice would you give to the individuals charged with drafting the city’s new Parks Master Plan?
Create parks that require minimal maintenance and create lots of them. I think a thriving and integrated parks system is one of the most vital components to a thriving town. So to have parks is perhaps one of the more important things that we can do in Kyle to attract people to stay once they come. My wife and I go to most of the parks in town with our children and while they are great, more could be done. So the Parks Master Plan is huge.


Anything you’d like to add?
I do think that our town suffers from substantial amounts of division and I’m frustrated by that. We have a City Council that by all accounts is divided and I want to help with that. The bitterness and the rancor in Kyle is preventing us from doing great things for our city. If you vote for me, I want you to understand that my true highest priority in Kyle is to help overcome that rancor trough reason, logical governance and a commitment to seeing the best in people.