Archive for January, 2010

With A+ bond rating, Bastrop sells debt for 3.856%

Wednesday, January 27th, 2010

Bastrop, Tx–Tuesday the city council agreed to issue $7.4 million in new construction bonds at an interest rate of 3.856062%. The offer from FTN Financial Capital Markets was the lowest of eight bids received earlier in the day. Six of the eight bids offered interest rates below 4% on the city bonds rated A+ by the agency Standard & Poor’s.

The funds will pay for completion of work on a new 15,000-square-foot city hall and a 26,000-square-foot civic center, utility and landscape improvements along Chestnut Street and some $1.2 million in electric utility upgrades, said City Manager Mike Talbot. In 2008 the council issued some bonds to begin the Chestnut Street, city hall and convention center projects.

Earlier this month the council approved the lowest qualified bids for city hall and convention center construction. The Chestnut Street work is about half done and should be completed this summer, said Talbot. The new city hall should be finished by year’s end and the convention center early in 2011. The electric system upgrades should be completed within a year, said Talbot.

Bastrop Power & Light customers will see any added costs reflected in electric rates. Convention center costs will come from hotel room rental taxes and the Chestnut Street work will be covered by a half cent sales tax which goes to the Bastrop Economic Development Corp. Cost of the new city hall, approved by voters in 2003, will show up in the debt service segment of city property tax bills.

Citing Standard & Poor’s bond rating report, Council Member Joe Beal said the city’s financial management team has “saved us a lot of money” in interest costs over the next 30 years.

Council Member Julie Hart agreed, saying “I’m excited to see these (interest) rates.”

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Jury takes on drunk driving death case

Tuesday, January 26th, 2010

Bastrop, Tx–A jury of nine women and three men heard opening arguments Jan. 26 in the intoxication manslaugher and intoxication assault case against a 59-year-old Cedar Creek waitress in 423rd District Court before District Judge Chris Duggan.

Susan Moore faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted on the manslaughter charge. She is also eligible for probation because she has no prior felony convictions. She pleaded not guilty to the charges in court Tuesday.

Evidence will show that Moore had more than twice the legal blood alcohol level in her system when her vehicle slammed into an auto headed in the opposite direction shortly before 5 p.m. on Texas 71 just west of Bastrop on Sept. 20, 2007, killing an Irish tourist and severely maiming another passenger, said Assistant District Attorney Greg Gilleland in his opening statement to the jury Tuesday afternoon. The accident victims “didn’t have a chance,” he said. Moore “wasn’t driving friendly,” Gilleland added.

In his own opening statement, defense attorney Neal Pfeiffer told the jury that other evidence will show reasonable doubt that Moore’s blood alcohol level at the time of the accident was more than the legal limit for intoxication. “Alcohol did not cause or contribute to this accident,” he said. “(Moore) is not guilty.”

According to investigators, Moore had left her job at Hill’s Cafe in Austin about 4 p.m. on the fatal day and was driving home when the accident occurred.

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Texas 71 records 1st traffic death of 2010

Tuesday, January 26th, 2010

Bastrop, Tx–What may have been the first highway traffic fatality of 2010 in the area took place about 4:48 p.m. Saturday near the intersection of Texas 21/71 and FM 20 just west of Bastrop.

Reported dead at the scene was 47-year-old Bradley Goble who was driving east on Texas 71 when his vehicle crossed the median and struck another auto, according to a Department of Public Safety report.

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Elgin city manager says he quits

Tuesday, January 26th, 2010

Elgin, Tx–After four and a half years on the job, Elgin City Manager Jeff Coffee told a staff meeting Jan. 26 that he’s resigning effective June 1, according to independent sources who contacted Bastrop-News.com during the day. Coffee could not be reached for comment.

Coffee reportedly told his staff he is leaving the city’s employ for other opportunities. By day’s end the Elgin Courier web site had posted the text of what it said was Coffee’s letter of resignation to the city council.

Tensions between the city manager, the council and mayor have been growing for more than a year. Some critics have pointed to the city’s allegedly weakened financial position during Coffee’s tenure. Others have questioned his handling of some personnel management issues and administrative changes involving the city’s economic development functions, parks and recreation programs and the controversial purchase of an 80-acre site on Elgin’s west side for future economic development near US 290 and the Capitol Metro rail line between Austin and Giddings.

Coffee came to Elgin under something of a cloud, since his license to practice law in Texas was suspended near the same time by the State Bar of Texas. A dispute over service to a client from whom he had accepted a fee was the source of the complaint, according to public records. Before being hired in Elgin, Coffee had never held a post in municipal government.

One veteran observer of Elgin politics, who asked not to be identified, said conflicts among city council members involving the city manager had become “a tired act” which needed resolution.

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Bastrop council selects low bids for city hall, convention center construction projects

Wednesday, January 20th, 2010

Bastrop, Tx–The city council awarded bids Jan. 19 for the best construction offers for a new city hall and Bastrop’s first ever convention center on Chestnut Street. The total cost is almost $1 million less than the most recent estimates last year.

Gaeke Construction Co. of Giddings will undertake the new city hall construction for a base bid of $1,587, 617. Furniture, fixtures, technology equipment and additional off-site utility and drainage requirements will push the final price tag to just over $2.8 million or $500,000 less than planning estimates.

The final cost for a 26,000-square-foot convention center across the street from the new city hall will reach $5.1 million. The bid will go to Collier Construction Co. of Brenham. The total expense, including some $320,000 in street, drainage and utility improvements to Farm Street, will be just over $496,000 below planning estimates.

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New city hall, convention center bid awards delayed

Thursday, January 14th, 2010

Bastrop, Tx–The best bids for building a new city hall and Bastrop convention center on Chestnut Street will be awarded Jan. 19, the city council decided Tuesday.

The council saw the final bid tabulations for the first time Jan 12 and asked for a week to review the results and consider which extra bid items it wants to add to the projects. Already agreed are almost $400,000 improvements to Farm Street on the north boundary of the civic center site.

Bids for both projects total roughly $7.8 million, some $1 million less than the original project budget. Apparent low bidders are Gaeke Construction of Giddings (city hall) and Collier Construction of Brenham (convention center). Gaeke offered to complete the work in 270 calendar days. Collier said the convention center will be finished in 365 days.

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Critics torch Bastrop tree law draft

Wednesday, January 13th, 2010

Bastrop, Tx–With an emotional group of critics of a proposed city tree preservation law watching, Bastrop City Manager Mike Talbot recommended at a meeting Tuesday–and the city council approved–withdrawing the proposed rules indefinitely because the issue had become disruptive to other endeavors.

After the draft regulations were recommended for council approval last month by the Planning and Zoning Commission, City Hall was flooded with phone calls and emails denouncing the measure, and council members began voicing reservations.

One of the critics who addressed the council, Georgia Parmalee, said the rules as proposed were excessive. “We can take care of our own trees with a little (city) guidance,” she said.

New tree preservation rules were proposed after a public outcry last year when commercial lots at three corners of the Texas 71 intersection with Texas 95 in Bastrop were largely stripped of trees and the formerly rolling terrain was leveled.

Council Members Julie Hart and Kay Garcia McAnally praised critics of the proposal for their civic engagement.

Mayor Terry Orr said he supports “some form of tree ordinance” but argued that the time is not right to pursue the issue, especially with the city planning director’s position vacant. Former planning director Stacy Snell resigned last month to accept a position in New Braunfels.

Trees were also the topic of two other items on Tuesday’s city council agenda. In one case the council approved a proposal by the Riverside Grove Homeowners Association to pay for and plant 72 shade trees in public rights of way in the subdivision over the next three years.

On a separate issue the council endorsed Talbot’s suggestion to ask a tree expert to investigate and make recommendations about a concern by downtown building owner Kay Wesson that a tree in the sidewalk near the intersection of Main and Pine Street is damaging her building at 901 Main St. The arborist is already giving advice about tree preservation measures during a landscaping and utility relocation project now underway on
Chestnut Street east of Water Street, said Talbot.

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Farm St. work added to new Bastrop convention center project plans by council

Monday, January 11th, 2010

Bastrop, Tx–Without taking a formal vote today, the city council agreed to include some street, drainage and utility improvements on Farm Street as part of the convention center construction project. The likely added cost will be about $430,000 and can mostly be financed with hotel room tax revenue, said Bastrop City Manager Mike Talbot.

Even with the additional work, civic center construction will remain well within its projected budget, Talbot said. Final bid tabulations for building the civic center and a new city hall are still being reviewed, but the total cost will be roughly $1 million less than the $8.8 million planning estimate, Talbot told the council at their Monday session.

The council expects to discuss selecting the winning bid or bids when it meets at 6 p.m. Jan. 12 at City Hall. Bids were opened last week.

A section of Farm Street between Gills Branch and the Union Pacific rail line is slated for the upgrades after residents along the street complained about potholes, narrow pavement, heavy traffic and a lack of sidewalks in the neighborhood. The comments came as the council discussed rezoning the civic center site which faces Chestnut Street. Council Member Bill Peterson, who has been studying the city’s capital improvement needs, called the Farm Street work “a top priority” among possible projects.

Farm Street marks the northern boundary of the convention center project with a parking lot entry/exit. The street is already a main east-west route between Texas 95 and Fisherman’s Park, said Peterson. Mina Elementary School and the Bastrop school district’s central administration offices are also on Farm Street, adding to the traffic load, said Mayor Terry Orr.

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State Rep. Kleinschmidt gets Democratic challenger from Bastrop County

Saturday, January 9th, 2010

Bastrop, Tx–Bastrop County cattle raiser Patti Jacobs will challenge Giddings lawyer Tim Kleinschmidt for re-election this year to the District 17 seat in the Texas House of Representatives.

KIeinschmidt, a Republican, was first elected to the House in 2008. He has no GOP primary opponent this year as he seeks a second term Jacobs put her name on the Democratic primary ballot Jan. 4. She does not have a Democratic opponent in the March 2 party primary.

District 17 includes Bastrop, Lee, Burleson, Fayette and Colorado County.

Jacobs heads Bastrop Cattle Co. which raises and markets organic beef. She was also a lead organizer of the 1832 Farmers Market in Bastrop. She has prior experience in politics and public affairs. She challenged Ronnie McDonald for re-election as Bastrop County Judge but subsequently helped guide one of his priority projects to completion, the Opportunity Bastrop County master plan for economic and community development.

In an interview this week, Jacobs said her campaign themes will include education and job creation, agriculture as “a 21st century industry,” and groundwater conservation for local development needs. Local residents “should be in control of our own future,” she said.

Kleinschmidt has already sold or leased water production rights to his own property in Lee County to water marketing interests looking to export groundwater to growing urban areas, said Jacobs. “We should keep our own water and kids” rather than exporting them to urban centers, she said.

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Republicans enliven 2010 Bastrop County election season with contested races

Tuesday, January 5th, 2010

Bastrop, Tx–When the Jan. 4 deadline passed for hopefuls to put their names on party primary election ballots in March, Bastrop County Republican challengers to incumbent office holders had turned out in force. As a result only seven current office holders seeking re-election, including two Republicans, will face no opposition for a new term in office.

Pct. 2 County Commissioner Clara Beckett drew a GOP primary opponent in the person of Adam Meuth. There is no Democratic candidate for the post.

At the same time Lee Dildy, the veteran Pct. 4 county commissioner who is seeking re-election, got a Democratic primary opponent even as two Republicans prepared to face off in the GOP primary for the job. Michael Flowers will challenge Dildy for the Democratic nod.

Also seeking the Pct. 4 commissioner’s post are Ron Jay and David “Rocky” Palmquist in the GOP primary.

And two new Republican candidates stepped forward to seek their party’s favor in the race for the Pct. 1 Justice of the Peace contest. At the filing deadline James “JW” Snell and Sue Ann Fruge joined Donna Van Gilder and Van Pressley as GOP contenders in the primary.

On the Democratic side, incumbent Bill Weddle is seeking re-election. His primary opponent is Donald “Dickie” Henderson.

Republicans also have challengers in races for three other county wide offices where Democrats incumbents are seeking re-election. Sarah Loucks put her name on the GOP ballot to oppose incumbent District Court Clerk Cathy Smith, a Democrat, and Republican Jason Leddie will oppose Democratic incumbent County Clerk Rose Pietsch in the November general election.

Republican Laurie Ingram had previously announced her bid to unseat Kathy Schroeder as county treasurer. Schroeder is seeking re-election as a Democrat.

Two Republicans are unopposed for new terms in county wide elective offices, District Attorney Bryan Goertz and County Surveyor Michael Olson.

On the Democratic side, neither County Judge Ronnie McDonald nor County Court at Law Judge Benton Eskew have opponents for re-election this year. At the same time three Democratic justice court judges are also unopposed for new terms, Raymah Davis in Pct. 2, Katherine Hanna in Pct. 3 and Larry Dunne in Pct. 4.

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