Council to debate time vs. money

Which is the more valuable commodity: time or money? Is it a higher moral imperative for a municipal government to keep a promise it made to its citizen even if it means keeping that promise may not be the most judicious use of taxpayers’ dollars?

These are some of the questions the City Council must grapple with Tuesday night when it considers whether to apply for federal funds to help with various capital improvement projects because, like most, if not all, such requests, strings are definitely attached.

The item in question is one to consider and possibly take action "to approve a request for the CAMPO 2019-2022 Project Call." Specifically, the council will debate whether it wants to seek federal funding for the following projects:

• Center Street rail siding relocation ($14.9 million)
• Burleson ($8.79 million)
• Lehman ($8.01 million)
• Kyle Crossing ($1.28 million)
• Post Road ($2.5 million)

If the CAMPO requests are granted, the feds would pay 80 percent of the aforementioned price tag for each project and the city would be required to pay the other 20 percent.

Three of the above-mentioned items appear to be simple and easy decisions. If the city can receive $11.92 million toward the relocation of the railroad siding that removes the stalled trains that block traffic on center street, when combined with other pledges from the county and elsewhere, the city’s cost for that project would only be $710,000. That sounds like a bargain. As far as the money for Kyle Crossing and Post Road, I’ve been told that federal funds to defray the costs on those projects are probably a long shot.

That leaves Burleson and Lehman and that’s where the moral debate comes in because, Mayor Travis Mitchell said today, if those moneys are approved by CAMPO, it would mean delaying work on those projects for at least a year beyond what voters were promised when they approved the sale of bonds to finance those road projects, and others, more than four years ago. On the other hand, the federal moneys mean the city could apply the bond revenue to other projects directly related to those roads, such as additional sidewalks for Lehman, additional lighting for Burleson, xeriscaping medians and Mitchell said he is a major advocate of xeriscaping. The leftover funds could even be used to help pay down the debt incurred by sale of the bonds, thus increasing the capacity for future capital improvement projects that could be funded by General Obligation bonds without triggering a property tax increase.

Mitchell even said one more option is available: the city could take a proposal back to the voters seeking permission to use those suddenly available funds on other projects unrelated to the ones approved for in the original bond sale — perhaps the Post Road or the Kyle Crossing projects, which are already part of the city’s five-year Capital Improvement Plan. The political gamble of that however is whether voters would be agreeable to renegotiating the use of that bond money after the city decided not to keep its promise on when to complete the Lehman and Burleson projects. It all comes down to trust.

The reasons why the Burleson and Lehman projects would need to be delayed if the city seeks CAMPO money to complete the projects is twofold: First and foremost, the money won’t be available until sometime in 2019 — most likely around the middle of that year — and, second, because federal dollars are involved, more extensive environmental impact studies will have to be conducted on both projects. Mitchell estimated the delay on starting the Lehman Road project could be between five and six months and the additional EPA studies could delay it for another18 months. Construction on Burleson probably would not begin until May 2019, he said.

CAMPO will announce next May which projects are being funded, according to Mitchell.

Citizens may weigh in on the matter — whether the city should get the feds to defray the costs of these two road projects or simply forget outside funds and get these two road projects completed when originally promised — during the Citizen Comments period at the beginning of Tuesday’s council session.

Incidentally, the item that follows the CAMPO request is directly related. That item would be considering whether to update the city’s Transportation Master Plan to include relocating the Center Street Railroad siding. Mitchell said this is strictly a formality because all projects approved for CAMPO funding must be a part of a Transportation Master Plan. The mayor also said that even though the map that accompanies this item suggests the relocated siding could cause stopped trains to block Kohlers Crossing, the siding is sufficient to accommodate the longest possible freight train to ever use that line without blocking traffic on Kohlers. In fact, he suggested, that map may not be 100 percent accurate.

Other items on Tuesday’s agenda include:

• The appointments from the new council members for the city’s Ethics Commission.
• The appointment of engineer Paul Scheibmeir to fill the Planning & Zoning Commission vacancy created when P&Z Chair Dex Ellison was elected to the City Council.
• A resolution to suspend for 90 days a proposed 11.9% rate increase sought by Centerpoint Gas, which, according to city officials, provides natural gas to approximately 8,000 residential customers in Kyle, 318 "small volume" commercial customers, and one "large commercial customer."
• A proposal to spend $216,188.68 to buy one of these for the Stormwater Utility.
• A recommendation on zoning for a multi-family/retail services development on Windy Hill Road that was delayed during the last council meeting in order to obtain a legal opinion on whether the project was already allowed because of a previous agreement the property’s owner signed with Hays County prior to its annexation into the city. Several council members expressed concern at that last meeting about the impact the development would have on Windy Hill Road traffic.