Inside Texas Politics: Full interview with Save Austin Now co-chair Matt Mackowiak

[0:00] hey matt it's good to see you again here the city says it is now going to have to rebalance [0:04] its budget and find 109.5 million dollars to eliminate from the budget what kind of cuts [0:10] do you expect to see well that's actually not accurate the city manager proposed a budget that [0:16] fully funds public safety that that that left the property tax increase within the three and a half [0:21] percent that's allowed by state law so my understanding is they're going to consider [0:26] that based budget uh so you know cutting the cut was not real because the spending was not real the [0:32] spending was based on uh taxpayers proactively approving a tax increase that was the largest [0:38] property tax increase in city history 109 000 austenites voted no we won 63 37 a sweeping [0:46] taxpayer victory in the 13th largest city in the country so uh look our our city budget is 30 to [0:51] 40 percent larger per capita than houston dallas and san antonio the budget deficit was only 33 [0:57] million dollars that was two percent of the general fund our mayor and our council were unable or unwilling [1:03] to to do that they proposed a tax rate election and they lost badly we hope they follow the model [1:09] that the city of houston undertook under longtime democratic state senator john whitmyer who's now [1:14] mayor of houston who put in place an efficiency audit an outside efficiency audit that produced 120 [1:19] million dollars in suggested savings which the city put into place and which helped houston avoid a tax [1:25] rate election this year so it's time for them to get serious enough's enough you're not going to make [1:30] affordability better by raising taxes and that's why 109 000 austin voters voted down and just to make [1:36] sure that i'm clear the the city was saying that they're going to have to to rebalance the budget and [1:41] cut this but you say that's just not the case at all because the money wasn't there to start with right [1:45] yeah they were proposing a massive spending increase yeah you know so you know the math is [1:50] the math i'm i'm sorry they don't have 110 million dollars to spend i know that's disappointing to [1:55] some of them um but taxpayers in this city cannot afford to live here as it is and we sure as hell can't [2:01] uh deal with the 20 property tax increase forever which is what they were proposing totally tone deaf [2:06] totally ridiculous the broadest bipartisan coalition in the history of the city came together and fought this [2:12] you had the mayor and nine out of ten council members that supported it thankfully a centrist [2:15] democrat democratic council member named mark duchin courageously opposed it and he is now [2:21] leading the fight to try to try to utilize the houston model and i hope that's what they do city leaders [2:26] said that prop q would improve the quality of life in austin austin's still a liberal city but why do you [2:32] think that they rejected this two to one well there's a there's a real trust breakdown between taxpayers [2:38] in the city we've had so many embarrassing examples just in the last year 10 million dollars [2:43] they wanted to spend on new york hard for the airport the ridiculous 1.1 million dollar city [2:47] logo that made us a national laughing stock uh you know the paid the they wanted to get paid back for [2:52] lunches life coaches art furniture for their offices the list goes on and on and on all the waste [2:59] at city hall at a time when you have a budget deficit and when you're then going to ask taxpayers [3:04] to pay more look everyone recognizes affordability is the number one problem in austin period full [3:09] stop every poll shows that you simply do not make affordability better by raising taxes they could [3:14] have tried to raise taxes 33 million dollars to close the budget deficit they didn't do that they [3:18] did three and a half x that and they thought that the voters would approve it because generally [3:23] voters do approve tax elections in austin this time tax voters said enough's enough it really is [3:28] a watershed moment for our city and it's time now for the mayor and the council to do their job [3:33] to to instill fiscal responsibility to make tough decisions to fully support public safety and to [3:39] efficiently deliver city services is there any talk about an independent audit to look at the budget to [3:44] see if there are savings to be found in there i don't believe an internal audit done by the city [3:49] would rebuild the trust that clearly isn't there between taxpayers uh and city leaders i do believe [3:55] we need an outside audit that's what houston did they were able to get it done austin should do the [3:59] same thing and i hope city leaders choose to do it themselves we're going to give them a little time [4:04] to do that but at some point we're going to have to do it ourselves and and we certainly can do that [4:09] and we will do that if we must do you expect the results of this election though uh solid two to [4:15] one against raising taxes permanently by 20 do you expect this to force city council to do any soul [4:21] searching i do you would hope so i should say it that way you never know how people will react uh the [4:28] the statements that were put out after this vote a few of them were absolutely just as tone deaf as [4:32] the things beforehand uh council member vanessa fontes in particular specifically suggested that [4:37] now we have to cut paramedics uh no the only reason we have to cut paramedics is if city hall [4:42] chooses to cut paramedics the first thing you do if you're a serious city is you fully fund public [4:46] safety it is the primary responsibility of cities so again we hope that that the majority of the council [4:52] will see the light will hear the message will react appropriately and will do their jobs but we have [4:57] other options there'll be a charter election in may we can be active there and we have half the city [5:01] council up next november i expect to be very active there i do want to ask about uh let me just shift [5:08] off and ask you that now this election clearly a success for save austin now here you said that bringing [5:14] real change requires a lot more work by your organization what is next for you yeah i mean we're [5:21] engaged in a lot of different battles at the city level and and some of them were public on and some of [5:24] them we work on quietly and privately behind the scenes uh our first and and most significant [5:29] commitment to the city is to always fight for public safety we need more police officers we're [5:34] going to support this uh charter amendment that the fire union has to require four per truck their [5:38] staffing minimum which will be on the ballot in may i believe and which really needs to pass and i [5:42] think will pass uh and then we're going to be very focused on the budget look the budget's out of [5:46] control it's way too high per capita compared to houston austin and dallas our taxpayers sure are getting [5:51] squeezed from every single entity travis county's raising taxes nine percent uh this year because [5:57] of the flooding central health is raising taxes school districts are raising taxes it's getting [6:01] ridiculous and if we want san francisco uh that san francisco model to become the austin model where [6:07] basically austin becomes a playground for rich people we could keep doing what we're doing [6:10] we're losing this the the essential qualities of our city by making it impossible for for blue-collar [6:16] people for people who work with their hands for police officers and teachers to live in austin [6:21] we we can choose a better way but we're only going to do that if we have that outside audit [6:25] that finds efficiencies it gets rid of duplication and fraud and waste and we focus on delivering core [6:30] services at a really high level the way a world-class city should austin can be a world-class city but [6:35] we're going to have to make the choice that we're to move in that direction and that's what save austin [6:39] now will continue to do residents are not off the hook though city leaders say they'll still plan to [6:44] raise taxes the three and a half percent the effective tax rate by three and a half percent which is what [6:48] they can do without asking voters in an election that's around a hundred dollars a year or so do [6:52] you think that's justified in your opinion um good question um look i think city i think city governments [7:01] all across the country should do everything they can not to raise taxes that said state legislature [7:06] allows them to do it up to three and a half percent based on population growth and inflation um [7:11] so so we understand that they have the ability to do that again this is about the trust deficit that's [7:17] there if they were doing the things they could to become more efficient uh to to stop wasting money [7:22] to end programs that are clearly not benefiting a large number of citizens i think people would be [7:27] more willing to accept perhaps uh higher taxes but but the city hasn't done that work they just haven't [7:33] period done that work and so they have a chance now to do that work they have time to do it the [7:37] budget's not due till the end of august uh and so they're not going to have some massive amount of [7:42] money 110 million dollars to do all the things they wanted to do now they have to focus on doing the [7:46] things that they have to do and they should do those things well and efficiently and transparently [7:50] transparently and if they do again our our citizens pay high enough taxes already all they [7:55] want are efficient services delivered and they want a safe city a clean city that's not too much [8:00] to ask other cities have figured out how to do it miami nashville dallas phoenix these are cities [8:06] that have high standard of living austin can be that way too but we cannot continue down the [8:11] pathway of san francisco los angeles which we were doing for very long but this again was a [8:15] wake-up call and i do think the mayor and the council are going to hear the message [8:18] and if they don't hear this message we'll send additional messages what message did voters send [8:23] with the prop q results yeah i mean the message was clear was no we're not going to proactively [8:29] uh raise city property taxes 20 percent without you doing your job first it was a very clear message [8:35] this was a taxpayer revolt and these are pretty rare in austin trust me i've been here since 1984. [8:41] uh but but but people have been pushed to the edge financially yeah and so so it was a huge [8:47] huge wake-up call i'm so proud of of everyone that supported our effort i'm proud of all the [8:51] other efforts that were made and there were other efforts made certainly we had a broad bipartisan [8:55] coalition we had some courageous democratic former officials and and leaders who stepped up to to [9:01] communicate to democratic voters that you don't have to support this tax increase you can still be [9:06] compassionate care about people and instill fiscal discipline in the city budget so uh we're going [9:11] to try to hold this coalition together going forward so we can get more good things done [9:15] and that's what we'll work on matt good to see you thanks for the time thank you