Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission (ICRC) commissioners have adopted a
preliminary map of new Austin City Council district boundaries that will be shown to the public in the next round of public forums.
"The ICRC has worked tirelessly to incorporate as much information from as many sources as possible into these preliminary maps, including extensive feedback from citizens at a dozen public forums," said District 8 Commissioner Joshua Blank. "Now that we have a map in hand, we're looking forward to hearing even more from the community at our upcoming public forums."
Beginning in July, the commissioners and their mapping specialist have spent eight hours in 12 public forums starting on July 15 through Aug. 27, 2021 discussing the mapping process and listening to public testimony. The ICRC hosted 105 attendees, listened to 48 speakers, collected 50 maps, over 100 emails and listened to two voice messages from the public.
"These maps are a reflection of some great collaboration across all the committee members, public input and in partnership with key local community groups," said District 5 Commissioner Prabhu Kannan. "The commission has worked really hard to be fair, mindful of truly wanting to keep neighborhoods intact and abide by legal guidelines outlined."
After hearing public testimony and deliberating proposed changes to the draft map, 12 commissioners voted to approve the preliminary map on Wednesday, Sept. 15, 2021 at the Permitting and Development Center (PDC), 6310 Wilhelmina Delco Dr., Austin, TX 78752.
The ICRC is prepared to host five forums for the public to view visualizations of the approved map and give their input to the ICRC. The first forum will be held this Saturday, Sept. 18 from 11 a.m.-1 p.m. at the Gus Garcia Recreation Center at 1201 E. Runberg Lane, Austin, TX 78753.
Additional public forum information is listed below:
Public Forum No. 2
Tuesday, Sept. 21, 2021: 6-8 p.m.
Mayfield Cottage
3505 W. 35th St.,
Austin, TX 78703
Public Forum No. 3
Saturday, Sept. 25, 2021: 1-3 p.m.
George Morales Dove Springs Recreation Center
5801 Ainez Dr.
Austin, TX 78744
Public Forum No. 4
Tuesday, Sept. 28, 2021: 6-8 p.m.
Via Videoconference on Zoom
Register in advance for this webinar:
https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_jroATJQiRF2nqm9bOkZ1gw After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinar.
Public Forum No. 5
Saturday, Oct. 2, 2021: 11 a.m.-1 p.m.
Travis County Community Center at Oak Hill
8656 Texas Highway 71
Austin, TX 78735
"The next step is publicizing the draft to gather another round of community input to continue to drive transparency and fairness as we race to the finish line and get this completed on time," Kannan said.
After hearing from residents and reviewing public testimony from the five forums, the next step for commissioners and the mapping specialist will be to discuss potential revisions, incorporate those revisions and vote on a proposed final map in October. The ICRC will present a draft of the final map at three additional public forums to receive input from the public. The commissioners will redraw the final map with public testimony during the last week of October, have another vote on the map and present it to the Austin city council by November 1.
Submit feedback To submit feedback directly to the commission about redistricting please email:
icrc.commissioners@austintexas.gov or write to: Housing and Planning Department, Attn: ICRC, P.O. Box 1088, Austin, Texas 78767.
Due to rapid changes in scheduling due to COVID restrictions, for the most up-to-date events information from the ICRC please refer to the following events pages:
https://www.speakupaustin.org/city-of-austin-redistricting/ https://www.facebook.com/pg/AustinRedistric/events/ Public input forums are recorded and made available after the meetings here:
http://www.austintexas.gov/page/watch-atxn-live.
Past meetings, agendas and map presentations can be viewed on the commission's website at
www.austintexas.gov/cityclerk/boards_commissions/meetings/116_1.htm Interpretation and/or translation services will be available free of charge by advance request in Spanish, Chinese or Vietnamese. Call 311 or email
matthew.dugan@austintexas.gov to request these services 48 hours in advance of a forum.
To find City Council Districts in Austin visit this link and type in an address:
https://www.austintexas.gov/GIS/CouncilDistrictMap/ ICRC Information Commissioners are: Joshua Blank (District 8), Sara Inés Calderón (D2), Erin Dempsey (D10), Camellia Falcon (D7), Luis Gonzalez (D10, Vice-Chair), Errol Hardin (D1), Shaina Kambo (D9), Prabhu Kannan (D5), Dr. Sterling Lands (D4), Hoang Le (D3), Brigham Morris (D3), Christina Puentes (D7, Chair), Eugene Schneider (D6) and Selina Yee (D1).
The ICRC board will hold its weekly commission meeting at the Permitting and Development Center (PDC), 6310 Wilhelmina Delco Dr., Austin, TX 78752, 6 p.m., Wednesday, Sept. 22, 2021.
