Austin’s peculiar ‘at-large’ method  as well as the so-called ‘Gentlemen’s Agreement’ that protects Latino and African-American seats is a deviation from conventional at-large systems. In the Austin implementation there are ‘places’ that force a voter to compare candidates running for a specific seat – candidates explicitly run against each other. Hence, in Austin, someone can run for the ‘Hispanic’ seat. The more conventional arrangement features a pool of candidates and the voter allocates their multiple votes across that pool. Candidates are not explicitly running against each other for a specific place. This has important implications when considering the impact of SMDs on ethnic and gender representation.

With that important clarification, here are some key findings from the political science literature on SMDs that are relevant to Austin’s discussion:

1. Geographic districts are likely to help Latino’s ‘descriptive’ representation, but might hurt women’s. Including some pooled at-large seats can reduce risk to women’s representation.

The most recent and exhaustive review of at-large versus single-member districts in a national data set concludes that only African-American male candidates are significantly helped by single-member districts; white women candidates are hurt.

Latinos, Latinas, and female African-Americans seem to perform at relatively similar levels under the ‘pooled’ version of at-large districts (as opposed to Austin’s place-driven implementation). Hispanics show significant variation in the level of ethnocentric voting and so SMDs tend to beat the at-large average only when there’s a very high density of Hispanic voters.

The precise reasons for the success of white women in at-large systems are elusive, but there’s a suggestion that the lack of direct head-to-head competition in the at-large pools is more helpful to female candidates’ style and triggers less overt sexist bias in voters. Black men are disadvantaged by the at-large systems, but significantly benefit from ethnocentric voting under SMDs.

However, if we dig deeper into the data and older research and adapt it to Austin’s quirky citywide implementation, it becomes clear that the effect on Latino descriptive representation would be high because of the dense nature of the districts being designed, as well as the fact that the Austin place-driven implementation potentially forces some of the ethnic polarization through head-to-head contests that the pooled systems avoid. For example, in Boston, the first Hispanic city council person was elected from a citywide pool by assembling a coalition of progressives, non-Latin American new immigrants, and Hispanics. According to the candidate, when Bostonians voted for him, they were not picking him ‘over’ an explicit choice, but rather including him in their preferred pool.

The implication for Austin is that a hybrid system with some at-large seats might be the best balance of the different ‘descriptive’ representation needs. It’s important to note that the at-large seats should be a pool and not place-based if the goal is to support women or give an additional shot to African-American or Asian candidates. Having to explicitly pick a candidate to run against might generate bias that makes success difficult.

2. SMDs are unlikely to improve long-term, citywide voter turnout.

The most recent study with the most extensive controls found that SMDs are not drivers of increased turnout. While it’s possible that some previously inactive neighborhoods will see more activity as the result of contested elections, there’s no empirical basis to claim that SMDs will systematically increase turnout. Instead, the timing of elections was found to be the most important element.

However, the fact that SMDs do not affect turnout is not an argument against them. For example, the glib tone of this Statesman editorial against SMDs urging some participation ‘boot-strapping’ by marginal Austinites is off the mark. SMDs are not the path, but overlooking the sub-optimal design of our institutions in properly engaging the young, the poor, and the newly arrived is the wrong direction for boosting Austin’s civic engagement. Instead we should consider changing the timing of elections, mail voting, public financing, and bulking up teens’ civic education on the mechanics of voting.

3. A higher number of districts are likely to increase public spending unless the Mayor gets a veto.

This is a repeated finding over the last few decades. As the number of seats (whether at-large or SMD) increase, then the coordination costs amongst the higher number of legislators along with their constituent connections mean higher expenditures relative to similar communities with fewer legislators. Whether this is good or bad is up to one’s values: one person’s park is another’s pork. However, more recent research indicates that local governments where Mayors have a veto tend to reduce if not eliminate the additional spending since the Mayor is responsive to a citywide median voter. The takeaway is that smaller bodies coordinate more efficiently and that providing the Mayor with a veto is a good hedge against excessively costly logrolling.

In Austin, we will have to balance the desire to create opportunities for African-American representation with logrolling downsides.  The larger the final council member count, the more important including a Mayoral veto in the package becomes to reduce the risk of becoming a public expenditure outlier.

4. SMDs are likely to create unpredictable NIMBY dynamics.

One of the more eloquent critics of SMDs in Austin has been Chris Bradford who has raised the idea of ‘ward courtesy.’ Certainly, there is some support for ward courtesy in the spend-and-let-spend literature mentioned above. However, the most detailed examination of locally-unwanted land-uses (in this case fire stations and community centers) and SMDs found that the uses still got sited somewhere. In Austin, SMDs would disrupt the existing sole median voter (e.g. a Central Austin preservationist) with a new set of many median voters . It doesn’t seem that the incentives under such a scheme prevent collusion by coalitions of SMD representatives from packing or ganging up on one district.

For supporters of thoughtful land use like Chris, this could cut both ways. For example, on the one hand, building aggressive market-rate housing density in the core could become more viable since those communities will lose their outsize influence over the existing electorate’s median voter. This might be unwelcome news to some of the most vocal proponents of SMDs. SMD reps accountable to neighborhoods could also become a lot more polarized around topics such as supportive housing than the current set of citywide officials. I don’t think anyone can claim that the precise pattern of NIMBYism that will arise is obvious or that it will be permanently enshrined by an SMD system.

The transition to SMDs will lower the barriers to entry for minority opinions (as opposed to ‘minority’ ethnic groups) and sometimes they will win. I’d expect a much faster tempo of incorporation of new ideas; whether they gain enduring clout is hard to assess.

5. The dominant coalition displaced by SMDs is likely to resort to greater use of referendums to achieve policy priorities.

When a group that is used to getting its way through control of a citywide majority finds its ability to direct policy undercut by a new system with several, dynamic median voters that destabilize the policy status quo, they might try and circumvent the process through the use of referendums.  This step provides a mechanism to re-establish the previous sole, citywide median voter. The implication: a transition to SMDs should ensure that the qualification for a referendum process is meaningful enough that it doesn’t undermine the elected branches.

1. Don’t forget about sub-group income levels. Not everybody is ‘OK’.

I often refer to the above chart as the most important overlooked chart in Austin policy and politics. Focusing on the city’s overall economic situation and rendering an ‘OK’ evaluation based simply on unemployment relative to other municipalities obscures the significant pain being experienced by sub-groups. Moreover, making it simply a question of unemployment rates also obscures the decline in wages.

2. Discuss policy choices. Policy nihilism conceals the possibility of making unemployment lower sooner.

The coverage did not delve into  policy options to reduce unemployment through municipal action. There are many potential policy choices from the left and right (e.g. have local public sector adopt a German kurzarbeit scheme, ease development regulations, undertake more capital projects and accelerate existing projects, etc.). The absence of a policy discussion might leave readers with an impression that the conventional wisdom dictates there’s nothing that can be done or worth discussing to ameliorate local unemployment in the short-term.

3. Focus on the value added (or destroyed) by policy makers on top of the City’s economic fundamentals.

The Statesman’s article implies that there are certain aspects of the local economy – the location of the state public sector as well as the presence of technology companies – that help Austin outperform other communities. However, looking at relative levels can be misleading. As I have argued in the past, it’s better to focus on communities that share a narrow band of characteristics that make them quite similar to Austin. So, other state capitals with tech hubs in the Southwest would be more appropriate than nebulous comparisons to other cities. Visually, the newspaper could do a set of simple scatter plot visualizations to give readers a sense of how Austin performs given certain underlying characteristics. Said visualization approach replicates a multivariate analysis in a user-friendly way.

My concern is that readers will walk away thinking that the existing policy mix is value-creating when a more statistically-sound evaluation might reveal that we are actually wasting the underlying trove of economic advantages we possess.

4. There is no forecast or ‘threat’ assessment.

Toward its conclusion, the piece indicates that Austin has a positive ‘reputation’ that allows talent to be attracted. In my estimation, I believe this has to do with people thinking of Austin as a place with interesting cultural amenities, housing affordability relative to the coasts, quality public spaces, and dense urban land use. The article does not consider whether this important asset is likely to remain given the city’s existing land use decisions. The article does discuss the potential downside of public sector layoffs, but in general, it did not ask whether the underlying mix of industries and policies are best moving forward.

I sincerely hope that the Statesman’s journalists will consider some of these suggestions as they continue with their important series.

No one seems to dispute that the number of people voting for local office holders would increase if we reduce the overall number of elections and coordinate with federal. This finding is consistent with comparative polisci research (for example, Wattenberg, 2002). So if the problem is turnout, then fewer, coordinated elections is the solution.

However, those advocating against fewer, coordinated elections raise the concern that the participants will be (1) partisans (2) served by a poorer marketplace of ideas that is constrained by a set of (3) insider oligarchs.

Personally, I find partisanship to be a pretty good heuristic; if a city council candidate is a Republican, that’s pretty helpful to know. Amidst a see of Democrats, I would seek supplementary information.

Which gets to number (2)…it seems that the existing highly engaged base of ‘May’ voters will still create demand for locally-focused information. The locally focused orgs (e.g. ANC) will still demand elected accountability. So, the number of forums and questionnaires will be the same; maybe the Statesman runs fewer stories, but the Chronicle, the Post, and the bloggers will still generate a lot of content that the existing ‘May’ base can find.

As for (3), in a sea of Democrats, it seems that the endorsements of neighborhood groups, environmentalists, labor, etc. retain or even gain in value as candidate differentiation. It also seems that inevitably, the long-term equilibrium is for these organized interests to seek to leverage the party organizations if they indeed become dominant. I don’t see how the status quo is especially unfriendly to money vis-a-vis grassroots organizations.

Sure, I agree with critics that the new median voter might be less knowledgeable about the intricacies, but again why is that bad? Why not take it to its logical conclusion and have our public administrators appointed by expert panels? The new lower info voters will just freeride on the high information civic enthusiasts, which happens to be the status quo already.

Finally, the status quo is not going to transform existing general election only voters into muni voters. On the other hand, the coordinated election will lead to at least some increase in municipal engagement from the general election only voters. I guess I am just not that pessimistic about the long-term chance of a combined failure by media, existing organized groups, and whatever new policy entrepreneurs emerge to help the new, broader electorate more or less accurately translate their policy preferences into elected officials.

It seems that this discussion is being waged on the short-term-focused terrain of which potential Mayoral candidate is best helped by either scheme; but in the long-term, it seems having fewer, more meaningful elections is a win-win. Especially if coupled with public financing, mail voting and single-member districts.

Austin appears to have bottomed at around 2.8 homicides per 100k residents.  I wonder if the recent increase in rate volatility combined with the potential for a trailing average uptick in the near future is a result of more young men migrating into Austin, or perhaps a shift in the underlying community demographics towards a younger city.

Given the relatively high proportion of the City of Austin budget dedicated towards public safety, it seems feasible to ask for policymakers and APD to anticipate a demographic shift and begin putting programs (e.g. targeted after-school for boys with behavior issues at school) in place that can mitigate the effects of the shift.  A lot of our effectiveness in catching a potential wave will depend on the urgency placed on public safety risk management by the City Council.  I say ‘risk management’ because it’s unclear if indeed there’s a fundamental demographic transition that will make the days of 2.8/100k extremely difficult to repeat; however, the data should make us want to hedge against that possiblity.  Hopefully, this chart gets the (some?) conversation started.

Here’s my data file in XLSX format (AtxHomicideRate) .  Population numbers come from the City demographer’s website.

So, why aren’t our local discourse and policies more aggressive on this front?

One part of the problem is the fragmentation of municipal-level public institutions that might be able to do something about it (AISD, ACC, City, County).  A second issue is that the current election design (at-large districts for City, lack of publicly-funded elections for all entities) makes it hard for more progressive political economy coalitions to form.  Third, there doesn’t seem to be a lot of civic density/community organizing around boosting median incomes.  Therefore, it’s not surprising that Austin doesn’t seem to create a lot of value with its human capital.

As a result of the current recession, I think there is greater recognition that we need to refocus on the growth of middle class median income.  Many of the effective policies for boosting median wages such as quality K-12, affordable higher ed, effective workforce development, and community support for private sector union organizing campaigns are all local efforts.  Add these to transit, corporate subsidization, and land use…and all of a sudden local policymakers possess a pretty extensive toolkit to contribute to median income growth in their region.  The question is whether proponents of such activism can get organized to empower local policymakers that want to deploy such tools.

The PowerSmack blog has two posts asking Austin Energy to jumpstart its lagging commitment to renewable energy.  Worth a read.  That said, I’d like to see their data adjusted for population/customer portfolio.  KAW readers already know that I find that slight increases in energy costs to green our portfolio are worth it, especially if we can come up with programs to deal with low-income customers that might be stretched by the increase.

Anyway, check out the PowerSmack blog.  Hopefully, we’ll get more details on the organizing going on to keep AE accountable to showing some green leadership.

Here are the deal details.  The City pays out $20,000 for ten years for a nominal total of $200,000.  The state’s recruitment- and talent poaching-focused Texas Enterprise Fund would provide an additional $1,000,000.  Austin’s population is only about 3% of the state’s population, though it’s likely that we produce more revenue per capita to state coffers than the average community, so let’s say 7% of the state’s money comes from Austinites.  That’s a total of $270,000 nominal going to the folks at LegalZoom.

In exchange for Austin’s $270k, LegalZoom agrees to provide jobs, make real estate improvements to its space, and use minority and women sub-contractors in the improvements.  At the onset, LegalZoom agrees to bring in 50 jobs, augmenting the number to a total of 600 jobs by 2016.  To put these numbers in context, Austin’s proposed budget for FY 2010 is $2.75 billion.  Austin has about half a million working age adults (over 18 under 65).  So, either way, this deal is neither a substantial public expense nor a significant contributor to employment.  The City’s analysts estimate a net benefit to the City’s revenues of $563,000, and LegalZoom indicates that about 540 of the 600 jobs will be local new hires.

Is this a good deal?

In the chart below, I calculate the expected nominal dollar benefits to City revenues under different flight probabilities by LegalZoom if no incentive package is offered.  While the media coverage seems to convey a sense of 100% flight probability if the incentives are nixed, that is unlikely to be the case.

The return on revenues for the City are decent in the event that LegalZoom is likely to skip Austin without incentives, but if that is not the case than this investment looks less compelling as a revenue generator.  This is especially the case if there is a good chance of LegalZoom relocating regardless of incentives, and particularly so because Austin has many ways of generating revenue through enforcement of fines, efficiency initiatives, or just plain old increases of fees and taxes.  From this analysis it does not appear that the revenue generation is a compelling factor in this deal.

The job creation however, does seem much more compelling.  While LegalZoom indicated their net total job creation in the public hearing process, I could not find an estimate of the expected duration of those jobs in years.  This is needed to calculate the subsidy cost per job year.  Let’s assume that each job will last an average of 5 years.  Thus, even if there is only a 5% chance of flight, the expected jobs created by the deal would be 27 for a total of 135 job years.  Even under that conservative scenario, Austin public monies would be buying  a job year for $2,000.  Simply put, even if LegalZoom was very likely to show up without the incentives, buying the certainty of the jobs is pretty cheap and the most compelling piece of the deal.

As a one shot deal the LegalZoom job creation commitment makes the incentives pretty compelling for an Austin taxpayer, but as a long-term strategy, there are some potentially troubling issues that should be addressed.

For starters, it’s unclear why exactly LegalZoom is seeking these incentives or why the Austin policymakers think this might be a sector worth subsidizing.  As Wells Dunbar implies, LegalZoom’s proposal might be opportunistic wrangling, as opposed to a make-or-break incentive mix.  With the Hanger Orthopedic incentives, it was clearly an investment in creating a cluster around one of our desired growth areas (medical) where Austin is not yet a dominant leader.  Dunbar goes on to hypothesize that we are probably offering incentives because some other town is also in the mix, invoking a collective-action dilemma.  Further, the focus on funding relocation probably seems random and unfair to existing Austin companies that might believe they could transform local subsidies into additional job years more efficiently than relocating firms.

To remedy these issues the Council could look into creating an even more structured incentives process that focuses exclusively on key strategic areas like medical technology and life sciences and that uses a market-based bidding mechanism to reward efficient job year creation regardless of the geographic origins of the company.

1. What’s the niche that APL should fill in terms of working and collaborative spaces that the market isn’t going to.

Access to resources. Big open spaces for LARGE meetings. Besides the space itself access to library resources would be very beneficial. Hoovers, Lexis Nexis, etc.

2. Should APL charge or is it free?

Must be free. It is a library after all. Donation based for events would be a good way to monetize. Maybe could charge for access to meeting rooms and conference rooms, though.

3. Should it be first-come-first serve or should reservations be possible?

Reservations for meeting rooms and conference rooms and event meeting space. But for the coworking itself, just first come first serve.

4. What pointers would you give APL and the Council about making public facilities useful for entrepreneurs, solo consultants, and people who need spaces to get things done but don’t work for businesses/orgs with lots of resources?

I would go the Barnes and Noble route. Making a library just like a book store would be amazing. There’s a natural synergy that happens in a book store because of access to resources + ability to talk openly without worrying about being quiet like in a standard library. Conjunctured gets requests all the time for busineses in town that want to host offsite team working days for 10-12 people. We can’t handle that many people in one room, so having rooms like that would be beneficial. The key is having a space that is not just a space, but a community. You would need to have a designated Community Manager, that helps people get to know each other, find opportunities, etc. People are not attracted to open spaces—they’re attracted to being a part of something. (At least the solo workers). Would be happy to talk to you or anyone in the city more in length about this in person. Kudos to you for getting the conversation going!

No doubt [Police Chief David] Kunkle had good intentions when he urged the department to alter its reporting procedures to make the city’s crime-reporting procedures more accurate. However, several criminal justice experts say the change appears to violate the FBI’s standardized, nationwide classification systems and may also have inflated the improvement in the overall crime rate.

Kunkle, who will retire next year, brought strong leadership to the Dallas Police Department and solid progress in fighting crime. The city’s crime trend is moving in the proper direction.

Nonetheless, doubt has been cast over the integrity of the crime stats, and an independent third-party review is the best way to clear up these questions. Citizens can then have confidence in the city’s crime-counting policy – or learn where reform is needed.

Police departments adopt the procedures by which the self-report crime stats to the FBI.  This is the case in Austin as well.  Police Chiefs want data to be reflective of actual underlying crime, both to avoid unnecessary fear and to optimally allocate policing resources.  Unfortunately, in an attempt to carve out noisiness, its possible for procedures that go too far and elimination actual signal, so to speak.  A lot of police departments are going to come under fire for their procedures as the Gov 2.o movement asks for more public safety data. Austin should be pro-active and tackle this problem by setting up continuous, detailed independent review.

The risk now is that the task force – rich in community activists but weak on the business community – will become mired in questions of public participation rather than tackling the central planning problems. “I think the challenge is to realize that, as worthwhile as public participation is, it’s a part of planning, but it isn’t in itself planning,” commented member Frederick Steiner, who is dean of the University of Texas School of Architecture and a nationally respected planner. “We need to move ahead to address some of the really important issues that the comprehensive plan can help address. For example, in all of the forums I’ve been involved in so far, transportation has come up as a major issue. That will require quite a bit of very careful analysis. We also have issues of clean air, clean water, and so much more. … If you direct growth in a certain area, what are the trade-offs? Congestion, where do the new people go, the issues of preservation of neighborhoods and density – those are the big issues for me.”

Steiner explicitly mentions trade-offs that need to be deliberated.  Sadly, the existing model of public outreach often is an uphill climb to get a representative sample that is an inch deep, not insight about true citizen preferences uncovered after deliberation on trad-offs.  As I argued in a recent post on the planning process, we need to mix up our use of conventional outreach and consider using deliberative polling and citizen juries.