Jump to content

Recommended Posts

  • Replies 8.5k
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Posted
On 10/27/2025 at 6:30 PM, Eskimohorn said:


Plenty of blame to be shared, including city management and police.

Name one major city “solving” homelessness. This is a regional, state, and national crisis. Hell, we have private and county prisons sending vulnerable pops to Austin and have been for decades. Cuts in public housing and hospitals have had a huge effect. As have our self-started opioid epidemic and policies attacking our middle class.

Stop talking about things you dont know anything about and focus on expanding Pflugerville’s strip centers and smoke shops.

Dallas.

I mean, before the One Big Beautiful Bill cut the funding the city was using to address homelessness.  But Dallas actually had a very successful program to address homelessness.  

And before that, Houston developed a really good program.  It's similar to what Dallas was doing.  Essentially, you target a homeless camp and send in police, santitation, and social workers in a single sweep.  You take the people to a temporary center for processing, where they stay for 72 hours.  During that 72 hours, the city identifies what they need.  Some just need a call to a family member who takes them in.  Other people need serious mental-health services.  Anyone still there after 72 hours gets sent over to a longer-term facility that gives them an apartment for some amount of time (I think it's six months), where there are various social services available.  The end result was that something like 90% of the people left before six months, having found permanent housing (often with family who didn't have the first clue that they were homeless).

Anyway--there is a formula for successfully addressing homelessness.  Cities that are pretty close by have implemented it.  It's not rocket surgery.  We just refuse to do it.

  • Hook 'Em 7
Posted
Dallas.
I mean, before the One Big Beautiful Bill cut the funding the city was using to address homelessness.  But Dallas actually had a very successful program to address homelessness.  
And before that, Houston developed a really good program.  It's similar to what Dallas was doing.  Essentially, you target a homeless camp and send in police, santitation, and social workers in a single sweep.  You take the people to a temporary center for processing, where they stay for 72 hours.  During that 72 hours, the city identifies what they need.  Some just need a call to a family member who takes them in.  Other people need serious mental-health services.  Anyone still there after 72 hours gets sent over to a longer-term facility that gives them an apartment for some amount of time (I think it's six months), where there are various social services available.  The end result was that something like 90% of the people left before six months, having found permanent housing (often with family who didn't have the first clue that they were homeless).
Anyway--there is a formula for successfully addressing homelessness.  Cities that are pretty close by have implemented it.  It's not rocket surgery.  We just refuse to do it.
Pretty sure a lot of their "solution" was buying them a bus ticket to Austin. Not sure Austin can use that strategy.
Posted
23 minutes ago, Modessit said:
3 hours ago, Ghost of LL said:
Dallas.
I mean, before the One Big Beautiful Bill cut the funding the city was using to address homelessness.  But Dallas actually had a very successful program to address homelessness.  
And before that, Houston developed a really good program.  It's similar to what Dallas was doing.  Essentially, you target a homeless camp and send in police, santitation, and social workers in a single sweep.  You take the people to a temporary center for processing, where they stay for 72 hours.  During that 72 hours, the city identifies what they need.  Some just need a call to a family member who takes them in.  Other people need serious mental-health services.  Anyone still there after 72 hours gets sent over to a longer-term facility that gives them an apartment for some amount of time (I think it's six months), where there are various social services available.  The end result was that something like 90% of the people left before six months, having found permanent housing (often with family who didn't have the first clue that they were homeless).
Anyway--there is a formula for successfully addressing homelessness.  Cities that are pretty close by have implemented it.  It's not rocket surgery.  We just refuse to do it.

Pretty sure a lot of their "solution" was buying them a bus ticket to Austin. Not sure Austin can use that strategy.

Oh, I don't know.  I can absolutely see our leadership deciding that we should give homeless people in Austin a bus ticket to Austin.

  • Haha 2
Posted
3 hours ago, Deej said:

I'm impressed, I would have assumed that most phone calls to the families would end more like this...

 

crank-pulp.gif.875db911bcb87c82cf5252aaab3d1564.gif

I kind of would've, too.  But I talked to the guy in Houston who was in charge of their program and he had some really interesting insight on that. 

A lot of them fell out of touch with family not because of any conscious desire on the part of the family.  Instead, it was more often at the initiative of the person who eventually fell into homelessness.  Without a home or a job, there was no physical place to find them.  And very often, the homeless person was too ashamed about their circumstance to answer a call on their cell phone (if they were able to retain that).

It's only when a social worker gets involved and convinces them to make that call that they get over that shame and reach out to their family.  And in the vast majority of cases, the family is (1) relieved that they're alive and ok and (2) willing and eager to help.

17 minutes ago, Modessit said:
3 hours ago, Ghost of LL said:
Dallas.
I mean, before the One Big Beautiful Bill cut the funding the city was using to address homelessness.  But Dallas actually had a very successful program to address homelessness.  
And before that, Houston developed a really good program.  It's similar to what Dallas was doing.  Essentially, you target a homeless camp and send in police, santitation, and social workers in a single sweep.  You take the people to a temporary center for processing, where they stay for 72 hours.  During that 72 hours, the city identifies what they need.  Some just need a call to a family member who takes them in.  Other people need serious mental-health services.  Anyone still there after 72 hours gets sent over to a longer-term facility that gives them an apartment for some amount of time (I think it's six months), where there are various social services available.  The end result was that something like 90% of the people left before six months, having found permanent housing (often with family who didn't have the first clue that they were homeless).
Anyway--there is a formula for successfully addressing homelessness.  Cities that are pretty close by have implemented it.  It's not rocket surgery.  We just refuse to do it.

Pretty sure a lot of their "solution" was buying them a bus ticket to Austin. Not sure Austin can use that strategy.

That's Williamson County's solution, for sure.

I don't remember the specifics, but I think Houston will buy a bus ticket if there is a family member in the destination willing to receive them.  But they're not just buying a ticket to some random city (whether it be Austin or San Francisco).

Posted
Pretty sure a lot of their "solution" was buying them a bus ticket to Austin. Not sure Austin can use that strategy.

Yeah one Houston tactic was to relocate them to the burbs and they just went back to their hide-holes when funding dried up.

Seems what Houston is doing is what you can do with a police that doesnt quietly quit. But thats a churn strategy, hopefully you help the ones you can faster than others migrate in.

Austin does have intervention programs for short term homeless.
Posted

After some back and forth, I’ve decided to vote for prop Q.  To be clear, I expect Prop Q to fail. I also expect the failure of Prop Q to launch careers and other initiatives that will cause this city real harm. 

Im voting for prop Q for three main reasons:

1)  Half of this increase covers essential needs. Yes, our homeless strategy is an incoherent, inhumane mess and it’s likely that 25-30% of this will be wasted or actively increase misery. That’s unfortunate but there is no reality but this one. 
2) Austin’s city taxe rates are not too high and won’t be if this passes. We’re getting killed by recapture, and the people bitching the most about this increase are the same people who vote for the people robbing us blind while their party bans books and refuses  to reform property taxes.
3) Most importantly, opposition to Prop Q has united the worst and most dishonest people in Austin’s public life, and they have run their campaign on the basis of misinformation and kicking down. Fuck them. 
 

 

Posted
Just now, Bozo_Casanova said:

After some back and forth, I’ve decided to vote for prop Q.  To be clear, I expect Prop Q to fail. I also expect the failure of Prop Q to launch careers and other initiatives that will cause this city real harm. 

Im voting for prop Q for three main reasons:

1)  Half of this increase covers essential needs. Yes, our homeless strategy is an incoherent, inhumane mess and it’s likely that 25-30% of this will be wasted or actively increase misery. That’s unfortunate but there is no reality but this one. 
2) Austin’s city tax[e] rates are not too high and won’t be if this passes. We’re getting killed by recapture, and the people bitching the most about this increase are the same people who vote for the people robbing us blind while their party bans books and refuses  to reform property taxes.
3) Most importantly, opposition to Prop Q has united the worst and most dishonest people in Austin’s public life, and they have run their campaign on the basis of misinformation and kicking down. Fuck them. 
 

 

Are you kidding me?!  Every Pro-Q group is either one of the many homeless NGOs, or some other group of asshats funded by the City Council.  The dude that's the sock puppet for Love Austin PAC is Watson's former campaign manager, some kid that's maybe 2 years out of school and looks like John Belushi's morning shit.  This camp houses the grifters and shills of Travis County, the dishonest shitstains of public service and money-grabbing non-profits.

The Anti-PropQ crowd is about as non-partisan as you can get for city of Austin.  I've seen the usual suspects (SAN and Mat Mackoviak) all the way to left leaning orgs saying avoid it at all costs.  The main point they've been trying to vocalize is that city council codes all their ancillary projects into the budget, and leaves the essentials on the chopping block to play to the voter base.  "Voting against Q is voting to cut police, fire, and essential city services," when in fact they need adults in the room that can set a budget within their means.  

And to speak to point 2, no one in here is saying the AISD taxes are acceptable, but AISD taxes aren't on the ballot.  Recapture needs to be audited and rebalanced, as it seems to have completely overshot the initial desired outcomes of bringing the small districts into parity with the big ones, and now all the big districts are suffering.  The fact we elected last go-round to jack up AISD taxes to the sum of $90M just so the district could pocket $20M says how fucked recapture is, and how stupid the voter base is to keep voting for every damn tax increase.

  • Hook 'Em 1
Posted (edited)
13 minutes ago, PvilleStang said:

Every Pro-Q group is either one of the many homeless NGOs, or some other group of asshats funded by the City Council. 

Yes. Nobody can possibly compete with the immense power of Big Homeless.

 

13 minutes ago, PvilleStang said:

The Anti-PropQ crowd is about as non-partisan as you can get for city of Austin.

It is nonpartisan. I said it united the worst and most dishonest people in town. From left to right. Find me a person who has either gotten something spectacularly wrong or intentionally lied to the public about something really important to serve their  personal agenda in the last 15 years and they are solidly aligned against Prop Q. Along with a few good ones. 
 

Edited by Bozo_Casanova
Posted
15 minutes ago, Bozo_Casanova said:

After some back and forth, I’ve decided to vote for prop Q.  To be clear, I expect Prop Q to fail. I also expect the failure of Prop Q to launch careers and other initiatives that will cause this city real harm. 

Im voting for prop Q for three main reasons:

1)  Half of this increase covers essential needs. Yes, our homeless strategy is an incoherent, inhumane mess and it’s likely that 25-30% of this will be wasted or actively increase misery. That’s unfortunate but there is no reality but this one. 
2) Austin’s city taxe rates are not too high and won’t be if this passes. We’re getting killed by recapture, and the people bitching the most about this increase are the same people who vote for the people robbing us blind while their party bans books and refuses  to reform property taxes.
3) Most importantly, opposition to Prop Q has united the worst and most dishonest people in Austin’s public life, and they have run their campaign on the basis of misinformation and kicking down. Fuck them. 
 

 

1)  Council can easily find 30M in the general fund budget to cut to avoid this increase.  As I discussed on another thread, non public safety spending (police, fire, EMS) has soared over the last decade and should be reigned in.  

2) Why care so much about tax rates? The property values in the Austin metro are the highest in the state, so of course rates will be lower. Austin used to have the highest total tax paid by residents per capita of any major metro, and likely still does. Yes, Robin Hood is a disaster.  That's no reason to have city raise taxes even more.

3) meh.  There are no good guys in any of this.    

  • Hook 'Em 2
Posted

$1 million for the new logo

$10 million for airport “art”

$3 million for foreign travel (like right now- fuck your sister city)

 

That is already 1/3 of the budget “deficit” of the $30 million dollar shortfall they claim they need $100 million dollars is new taxes to pay for. 
 

They should not be given another dime until spending is addressed. The hardest thing for a politician to do should be to spend a tax dollar. 

  • Hook 'Em 1
  • Like 1
Posted
18 minutes ago, bschoolprof said:

1)  Council can easily find 30M in the general fund budget to cut to avoid this increase.  As I discussed on another thread, non public safety spending (police, fire, EMS) has soared over the last decade and should be reigned in.  

Soared? If you say so, but I think a city should do more than just police and EMS. And, not for nothing, our police are among the best paid in the state but not among the best cops in the state. 
 

 

26 minutes ago, bschoolprof said:

3) meh.  There are no good guys in any of this.    

No, but there are worse guys, and the movement against prop Q unites all of them. 

Posted (edited)
5 minutes ago, Bozo_Casanova said:

Soared? If you say so, but I think a city should do more than just police and EMS. And, not for nothing, our police are among the best paid in the state but not among the best cops in the state. 
 

 

 

Yes.  If non-safety spending increased at the rate of the "overpaid" cops, fire, and EMS over the last decade, we'd have a surplus, not a deficit.  I went through the last 10 years of budgets on the city website.  Non safety EMS has gone up by about 7-8% every year for a decade.  There's a lot of fat there.  Easily 30M.  This whole charade is laughable, and shouldn't be partisan.  

And in what way did I imply that the city should spend money only on police and EMS? 

Edited by bschoolprof
Posted
1 minute ago, bschoolprof said:

This whole charade is laughable, and shouldn't be partisan.  

It’s not. But for the record, we’ve been short changing everything but police fire in EMS until the last decade or so. I realize that most people here do not want to live in a grown-up real world big city, but that’s what Austin is and will be whether we act like it or not.

Posted
3 minutes ago, Bozo_Casanova said:

And, not for nothing, our police are among the best paid in the state but not among the best cops in the state. 

PREACH.

3 minutes ago, Bozo_Casanova said:

No, but there are worse guys, and the movement against prop Q unites all of them. 

Not entirely wrong, but some of us think the toxic stew of "entitlement but no accountability" that is the time-honored recipe cooked up by our leadership class needs to be tossed out whenever it can.

And yeah, I get the irony that if more of us would just show up and vote against some of these candidates (don't blame me, I vote in every election) it would help.

But I innately fucking bristle at the constant approach of "give me everything, and don't you dare expect me to account for shit."  Actually.....going back to your first comment, that might as well be APD's motto.  Give us all the money, and unlimited power, and zero accountability.  In fact, if you subject us to ANY accountability, we'll "quiet quit."

  • Hook 'Em 1
Posted
3 minutes ago, bschoolprof said:

the "overpaid" cops

I didn’t say they were overpaid,  but when six of the best paid police stand around to watch two others conduct a traffic stop half a mile away while not responding to somebody setting a fire in my alley and breaking into my garage and any number of other things they don’t have time for, it doesn’t put me in a back the blue mood. 

Posted
3 minutes ago, Bozo_Casanova said:

I didn’t say they were overpaid,  but when six of the best paid police stand around to watch two others conduct a traffic stop half a mile away while not responding to somebody setting a fire in my alley and breaking into my garage and any number of other things they don’t have time for, it doesn’t put me in a back the blue mood. 

Imagine a job where you literally only do the parts you like, and none of the parts that you don't, and you're not answerable to anyone for it.

Now, imagine that among people in this state who hold that job, you are the most highly paid.

 

If that sounds good to you, you should march down to APD hiring posthaste.

  • Hook 'Em 1
Posted
8 minutes ago, Bozo_Casanova said:

It’s not. But for the record, we’ve been short changing everything but police fire in EMS until the last decade or so. I realize that most people here do not want to live in a grown-up real world big city, but that’s what Austin is and will be whether we act like it or not.

Show your work.  

In 2015, the city spent $286 million on non safety from the general fund.  In 2025, it's 634 million!  What grown up goodies are we really getting for that extra 350 million?  You don't think a reasonable person could find 30 million to trim there?  Only Austin would consider a permanent tax increase to cover this.  It's insanity.  

Posted
10 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

"give me everything, and don't you dare expect me to account for shit."

I think that only really exists in two places

1) police

2) economic development 

In virtually every other area, what people experience as a lack of accountability is, in reality, the city suffering from decades of underinvestment and public indifference. 
 

Posted
18 minutes ago, bschoolprof said:

Show your work.  

In 2015, the city spent $286 million on non safety from the general fund.  In 2025, it's 634 million!  What grown up goodies are we really getting for that extra 350 million?  You don't think a reasonable person could find 30 million to trim there?  Only Austin would consider a permanent tax increase to cover this.  It's insanity.  

They've also attempted to grow the police force to match the officer per resident ratios, which was a major reason for the growth.  Again, not defending some of the dumb shit they do, but population growth leads to the necessary growth of Fire, Police, EMS.  The 4 employees per truck approach on the trucks, not sure how that stands up to national averages, but doesn't seem too out of line, either...

Posted
21 minutes ago, bschoolprof said:

Show your work.  

In 2015, the city spent $286 million on non safety from the general fund.  In 2025, it's 634 million!  What grown up goodies are we really getting for that extra 350 million?  You don't think a reasonable person could find 30 million to trim there?  Only Austin would consider a permanent tax increase to cover this.  It's insanity.  

You are the one implicitly asserting that the total is excessive so please feel free to show your work if you are moved to do so. That said, I’m 100% sure that well over 5% of spend in this city (including the police and public safety) is bloat, just as it is in every city and every big company and every other complex bureaucracy in the world. Nobody gets to perfect efficiency but the city of Austin is not a worse offender than, say, Dell, WalMart, or the University of Texas. 
 

But in the aggregate most of that increase is merely catching up with the cost of being a fast growing real life city our size.

Posted
1 minute ago, PvilleStang said:

They've also attempted to grow the police force to match the officer per resident ratios, which was a major reason for the growth.  Again, not defending some of the dumb shit they do

I’m more concerned about the important shit they don’t do, like responding to break-ins in progress even when close by.

3 minutes ago, PvilleStang said:

population growth leads to the necessary growth of Fire, Police, EMS.  The 4 employees per truck approach on the trucks, not sure how that stands up to national averages, but doesn't seem too out of line, either...


Agree with you there- Fire is a unique subject because the truth nobody wants to say out loud is that we have more Fire stations and trucks than we need, because things don’t burn like they used to, which is why they arrive before EMS so often. But everyone loves the fire department and it’s not unique to Austin, so it’s relatively benign as such things go. 

Posted (edited)
57 minutes ago, Bozo_Casanova said:

I didn’t say they were overpaid,  but when six of the best paid police stand around to watch two others conduct a traffic stop half a mile away while not responding to somebody setting a fire in my alley and breaking into my garage and any number of other things they don’t have time for, it doesn’t put me in a back the blue mood. 

Maybe being fully staffed would lower the cost when we are spending $84 million in OT. 
 

For Austin's fire, police and emergency medical professionals, overtime is just a fact of life. In the last budget year, overtime spending on those three departments was $84 million, according to city payroll data.

https://www.kut.org/crime-justice/2025-08-14/austin-tx-police-department-apd-overtime-pay-budget

 

All of the worst people in Austin, including the city council, support prop Q. 
 

That is more than enough reason to vote NO

Edited by ChickenSandwich
  • Hook 'Em 1
Posted
1 hour ago, Bozo_Casanova said:

After some back and forth, I’ve decided to vote for prop Q.  To be clear, I expect Prop Q to fail. I also expect the failure of Prop Q to launch careers and other initiatives that will cause this city real harm. 

Im voting for prop Q for three main reasons:

1)  Half of this increase covers essential needs. Yes, our homeless strategy is an incoherent, inhumane mess and it’s likely that 25-30% of this will be wasted or actively increase misery. That’s unfortunate but there is no reality but this one. 
2) Austin’s city taxe rates are not too high and won’t be if this passes. We’re getting killed by recapture, and the people bitching the most about this increase are the same people who vote for the people robbing us blind while their party bans books and refuses  to reform property taxes.
3) Most importantly, opposition to Prop Q has united the worst and most dishonest people in Austin’s public life, and they have run their campaign on the basis of misinformation and kicking down. Fuck them. 
 

 

I gotta tell you--you're Point 3 makes absolutely no sense to me.  The fact that someone you hate is going to vote against Prop Q is no basis to conclude that you should vote for it.  Some things should be non-controversial.  Matt Mackowiac could vote against a proposition to kill all puppies in Austin, that doesn't mean that you or I or anyone else should vote for it.  

Proposed legislation should stand or fall on its own merits.  And the other two points you outline indicate that Prop Q has none.

Austin's tax rates are too high when applied to to the residential real estate in this city.  Compare the tax burden a citizen in Austin pays to any other peer city.  I don't care whether we're talking San Antonio or San Jose--Austin residents pay more, and generally get far less.

Otherwise, you beg the question when you write that the increase covers essential needs.  The increase covers "essential" needs only because so much of the budget is already taken up covering non-essential needs.  The budget is bloated.  But many budgets are bloated.  Austin's is bloated in in ways that are both highly publicized and intensely stupid.

And that's why you're exactly right that this ill-concieved, ill-considered, and ill-timed proposition will launch careers and initiatives that are going to be bad for the City.  But that's an indictment of the Council who put this proposition on the ballot just weeks after the airport-art debacle and the city-logo kerfuffle.  And you advocate giving that Council more money?

  • Hook 'Em 1
Posted
2 hours ago, Bozo_Casanova said:

Yes. Nobody can possibly compete with the immense power of Big Homeless.

 

It is nonpartisan. I said it united the worst and most dishonest people in town. From left to right. Find me a person who has either gotten something spectacularly wrong or intentionally lied to the public about something really important to serve their  personal agenda in the last 15 years and they are solidly aligned against Prop Q. Along with a few good ones. 
 

Prop Q is Project Connect 2.0. Tapping into the visceral need to fix a real problem in Austin (public transit for Prop B, homelessness for Prop Q). Project Connect was sold to taxpayers for $5B. Then right when they started digging they decided they needed another $10B on top of the $5B they got from the taxpayers because the bedrock was too hard. I see this happening with the homeless situation because there aren’t any viable alternatives in place. A lot of the Prop Q money will be spent on consultants being paid millions to review projects and say whether or not they could work. 

Don’t be a sucker. I want to address the homelessness issue here in Austin too, but the way Project Connect turned out should be a huge red flag for everyone regarding how city leadership on both sides does business. We can’t even get a direct train line to the airport when that should be one of the main priorities. This city can’t even bring back the damn Airport Flyer bus!! 

Posted
55 minutes ago, Ghost of LL said:

The fact that someone you hate is going to vote against Prop Q is no basis to conclude that you should vote for it. 

I don’t know about that, but either way, look- it’s almost certainly not going to pass.

59 minutes ago, Ghost of LL said:

But that's an indictment of the Council who put this proposition on the ballot just weeks after the airport-art debacle and the city-logo kerfuffle.  And you advocate giving that Council more money?

No it’s an indictment of the voters and the citizens of a city that has overcome incredible strokes of good luck and natural advantages in order to avoid being a great city. Our council isn’t great, but it’s 100x better than the voters deserve.

Posted (edited)

Lol. No, the city residents deserve much better (but admittedly need to vote more, but most just leave because they can’t afford it - Garza was elected by 13% of the vote). 
 

The biggest problem with Austin leadership is the inability to admit policy failures and try something else. Instead the answer is always we didn't spend enough of your money for it to work. 
 

Edited by ChickenSandwich

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.



×
×
  • Create New...