Next Quarterly ZNA Meeting
Monday, February 27, 2006
Zilker Elementary School
1900 Bluebonnet
Homeowners, renters, and business owners are welcome.
Meet your neighbors.
Learn about issues affecting you and
the neighborhood you live in.
6:30 p.m. Meet and Greet Social
7-8:45 Guest Presentations
City of Austin Public Works on Neighborhood Streets and Speed Limits
SOS Alliance on
Clean Water / Clean Government
Charter Amendments
Neighbors on
How to Protest Your Tax Appraisal
The Best Party in Town Is Right Here in Zilker
78th Annual Zilker Park Kite Festival
Sunday, March 5, 2006
12 noon in Zilker Park
The Exchange Club of Austin announces the 78th Zilker Park Kite Festival, to be held March 5, 2006. Hundreds of kites and colors will fill the sky as thousands gather to welcome the spring in Zilker Park on Kite Day. The Zilker Park Kite Festival, sponsored by The Exchange Club and the City of Austin Parks and Recreation Department, is FREE of charge to attend or participate in. Registration for competition starts at 12 noon, events start at 1 pm. Everyone is welcome to come enjoy this grand celebration of spring, even the family pets.
Created in 1929, the Kite Festival competition events have changed little since then. Participants are encouraged to compete with their homemade kites in the steadiest, highest angle, most unusual, smallest, and largest events. There are youth and adult categories and a 50-yard dash for kids between 7 and 12 years of age. Trophies will be awarded to the first, second, and third place winners. More information on the competition can be seen at the Kite Festival Web site: www.zilkerkitefestival.com.
Don't have a kite? Come make a FREE kite at our on-field kite workshop. All materials are supplied and the kite is guaranteed to fly. You don?t have to fly a kite to enjoy the festival. Check out our vendors offering the most delicious specialty food made in Austin. Games and contests for the kids will be offered all afternoon. Professional sport kite team, The End of the Line kite team, will give special demonstrations. Kites will dance to music and multiple kite group ballets will be performed. Kite buggies, kite skateboards, and huge 40-, 50-, and 90-foot kites will be displayed on the kite field all day.
Through concessions sales, the Zilker Park Kite Festival raises funds to break the cycle of child abuse. Funds generated go to organizations such as the Rainbow Room, Family Connections, and the Pebble Project that are dedicated to helping kids lead safe and happy lives.
Call 512-448-KITE (5483) for more information.
Rain Date is Sunday, March 12.
New ZNA Officers for 2006
Here is ZNA's executive committee for 2006:
Jeff Jack, President, is an architect who has been a neighborhood activist in Austin for more than 20 years.
Richard Gravois, Vice President and Web master, is one of the founders of ZNA, going back to the day before the Memorial Day flood of 1981. That makes him and Paulette antediluvian residents of Kinney Avenue.
Dave Ward, Vice President and Parks Committee chair, moved into the neighborhood in 1995. He and his wife are raising two children, five cats, and one dog. They love Zilker and live in the old Lloyd Payne home.
Ryan Stryker, Secretary, is one of Zilker's newest residents, with a home on Goodrich being completed just this month. He hails from the frozen northern province of Wells Branch, and is exceedingly jazzed about this long-overdue relocation
Andy and Rachel Elder, Treasurer and Social chair, are celebrating their first wedding anniversary and their first anniversary as Zilker residents in March. They often take Emmy the Wonder Weimaraner for walks all over the neighborhood.
Dave Piper, Neighborhood Planning chair, is a telecommunications network operations manager who moved to Zilker in 2003 because of its central location and wonderful, eclectic character.
Peggy Pfaff, ANC alternate, has been an Austin resident, renting in and around the Zilker area, since 1998. She just celebrated her first year as a homeowner at her "1/2" house on Oxford.
Bobby Rigney, Zoning chair, is ZNA's go-to guy for maps. If you were worried that you haven't seen his little pickup around lately, relax. He just got a new car.
Lorraine Atherton, newsletter editor, grew up in East Austin and has lived in Zilker since 1983. She works at home as a freelance copy editor.
Ba Cossie, Holiday Family coordinator, and Kaye Trybus, Town Lake Park representative, are also ZNA members emeritus.
Besides the elected offices and committee chairs, ZNA relies on members to fill some very important unelected positions. We need a neighbor who can keep track of a fairly simple spreadsheet to head up our membership committee, another neighbor who can take charge of our quarterly newsletter distribution, and a representative to attend the Commander's Forum (a meeting of citizens and police commanders in South Austin to share concerns about public safety and law enforcement). If you can help out, contact any of the officers listed on the back page.
Town Lake Park Grand Opening II
and 100 Shovel Salute
This One Is for Real!
Two years ago we held a Town Lake Park
Grand Opening "Dry Run."
This time, we mean it.
BYOS (Bring Your Own Shovel)
We want to break ground with 100 shovels,
so bring yours!
February 22, 2006
11:28 A.M.
Under the Big Top
At the Site of the Future
Town Lake Park
Barton Springs Road
Just West of Palmer Auditorium
~Program Preview~
Presentation by the
Honorable Mayor Will Wynn
Special Recognitions
Music by Ronnie Dittmar
Lunch Catered by Changos and Manuel's
Parking is free at Palmer Events Garage, Courtesy of the Austin Convention and Visitors Bureau
Come early, seating is limited!
For more information, jspeer@delta-associates.com or 417-9428, or www.southaustinculture.org.
Event Sponsored by South Austin Culture Club and Austin Parks and Recreation Department
Zilker Neighbors Have the Spirit!
by Barbara Cossie
Thanks to everyone who supported ZNA's 2005 Holiday Family Program by dropping off gifts or giving money. Because of you, eight families from Zilker Elementary School had a happier holiday. They included one Katrina family and 18 children (eleven boys ages 1 to 12 and seven girls ages 3 months to 12 years). All the families are selected by the counselor at Zilker Elementary, and this time all were single-parent households except one. Each family received toys for the children, clothes, needed household items, food, and HEB gift cards. They were all very grateful for the spirit of giving shown by their Zilker neighbors.
Since 1999, Zilker residents have been spreading their holiday spirit to a few more families every year. The 2005 season brings our total to 29 families.
ZNA has always been delighted by the generous response to the Holiday Family Program. The spirit of giving brightens the season for all of us all year round.
A Walk Back in Time:
Life on Valeria Street in 1953
by Pat Cramer
Can you picture Austin and our Zilker neighborhood in 1953? Ruby and Bruce Gardner of 1711 Valeria can. That was the year they bought their house for $10,000 and moved in with their four children, ages 10 to infant.
Austin's population was 125,000, there was no IH 35, the train station was at Third and Congress, and our Amtrak Station was the freight depot. There were no parking meters and no one-way streets. In South Austin, the city limits sign was at Barton Skyway and Lamar (now the southern limit of the Zilker Neighborhood Association). Past that, Lamar became the Fredericksburg Highway. Ben White did not exist. To get to Congress Avenue, Ruby and Bruce had to use West Mary or Barton Springs Road; Oltorf dead-ended on the east side of the railroad tracks at South Fifth.
Zilker neighborhood was very convenient for Ruby. Bruce drove their car downtown every day to work for the Highway Department, and Ruby could walk to Hyden's Grocery on Oxford and Lamar, Mays Variety/Hardware Store next door to Hyden's, and a drugstore at the intersection of Kinney and Lamar.
All the children attended Zilker Elementary School, which had just opened in 1950; the oldest went to Fulmore Junior High, the rest to the newly opened Porter Junior High, then Travis and Crockett high schools.
Valeria was an unpaved street in 1953. There were houses up and down Kinney, some on Ford. Theirs was the last house to be built on Valeria. Black families farmed north of Hether and drove their horses and wagons down Valeria. From them, the Gardners learned Valeria was a wet weather creek! Eventually, Valeria was paved and each homeowner was assessed a fee of $300, a great deal at the time.
For entertainment, the children played with neighbor children, rode their bikes, and rollerskated. Bruce and Ruby took the children to see the shows presented at the Zilker Hillside Theater and also to UT band concerts. There were two places to see movies in South Austin, one at Live Oak and Congress, the other a drive-in on Congress by the railroad tracks (just south of what is now Ben White).
When her youngest started high school, Ruby took a part-time job at Scarbrough's department store downtown and later was a seasonal worker for the IRS. She also worked for Nau's Drugstore on West Lynn for 20 years, M-F, 12-5. After Bruce retired from the Highway Department in 1976, he worked 22 years for UT Athletics as the baseball scorekeeper, retiring from that job in 1998. Bruce now volunteers at the Senior Center on Manchaca that he and Ruby frequent. Today Bruce is in his nineties, Ruby in her eighties. They have seven great grandchildren! You'll often see them out walking in the neighborhood, two of the longest residents of Zilker.
A Note from the Editor
The Zilker Neighborhood Plan needs some volunteers to put together a history of our neighborhood, especially its twentieth-century development, from the Barton Springs Baptist Church and Cemetery to Andrew Zilker's donation of Zilker Park to architectural landmarks to Zilker Elementary to our favorite trailer parks to the political battles over Barton Springs. A few dedicated neighbors like Pat Cramer and Richard Gravois, who understand that it's hard to see where you are going if you don't remember where you've been, have made a good start. If you would like to help, contact Richard Gravois, ZNA vice president and Web master, and ask him about Wiki.
Lorraine Atherton
Don't Cut That Oak
A Warning from the Texas Forest Service
Be careful with firewood at this time of year. Transporting and storing diseased wood is a known means of spreading the devastating oak wilt fungus to previously uninfected neighborhoods.
Avoid wounding oaks during vulnerable seasons. The general recommendation is to avoid injuries to oaks from February through June. The best times for pruning of oaks are during the heat of summer (minimal spore production) or the cold of winter (minimal insect activity).
Paint all oak wounds including pruning cuts. Throughout the year, immediately apply a thin coat of latex or pruning paint to all fresh wounds and other injuries that expose the inner bark or sapwood of oaks. This prevents contaminated sap beetles from infecting the wound with oak wilt spores.
Destroy diseased red oaks. A knowledgeable arborist or forester should diagnose red oaks (Spanish, Texas red, blackjack, or shumard oak) that die rapidly (2-3 weeks) or in groups (2 or more trees over several years) for oak wilt. During the burn ban, trees suspected to have died recently from oak wilt should be destroyed by burying or chipping.
Select well-seasoned firewood. Well-seasoned wood is cut before the summer and is typically dry with loose bark and cracked ends. Avoid oak wood that appears unseasoned, that may have tight bark and cut ends which show no cracks or signs of aging. The extreme heat and drying of a full Texas summer effectively destroys the fungus in cut firewood.
Visit www.texasoakwilt.org for more information, or call the TFS/Lower Colorado River Authority?s Oak Wilt Hotline at 512-473-3517.
Coal Tar Ban Now in Effect
A message from Nancy L. McClintock, assistant director of the City of Austin Watershed and Development Review Department
On November 17, 2005, the City of Austin became the first city in the U.S. to ban the use of coal tar-containing pavement sealants. The ban is based on research completed by the U.S. Geological Services and the City. It went into effect on January 1, 2006.
The City has banned these products because they are a potent source of polycyclic aromatic hydrocar-bons, an organic contaminant known to be carcino-genic and toxic to aquatic life. For more on this initiative and the research that supports it, see www.ci.austin.tx.us/watershed/coaltar_main.htm.
We are asking for your cooperation in the transition from coal tar-containing products to alternatives by taking the following steps:
Request Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS) from any potential contractor or sealcoat applicator before purchase or application to verify compliance with the new ordinance. Make sure that these sheets clearly state whether the product contains coal tar. The ban is for coal tar containing products, not just those with a higher percentage of coal tar. Blending coal tar with asphalt sealants will be deemed a violation of this ordinance.
Be aware that the ban prohibits use of these products in the City of Austin and its planning. jurisdiction. You may determine whether a particular site is in the City's planning jurisdiction by calling our GIS Service at 512-974-2797.
Our in-house spills response team has been trained to use simple field tests to determine the presence of coal tar in sealants. Note that the use of banned products is a Class C misdemeanor punishable by up to $2,000 for the initial violation. Each day a violation occurs or continues is a separate offense.
Thank you for your cooperation in protecting Austin's waterways. If you have additional questions or comments, please call Tom Ennis at 974-2722 or our Spills Hotline at 512-974-2550.
Neighborhood Planning Update
by Dave Piper
The official City neighborhood planning process is well under way with periodic meetings held at Faith United Methodist Church on South Lamar (next to Matt's El Rancho) or at the City offices at 505 Barton Springs Road. The purpose of these meetings, in which approximately thirty other Austin neighborhoods have participated over the last ten years, is to formulate a vision for the neighborhood and determine how to achieve it. See the City?s Web site under "Neighborhood Planning" in the dropdown window at the top of the page for a schedule of these meetings, which are open to all. You can also email Mark Walters, our City facilitator, and ask to be added to his meeting notification list. Mark's email address is mark.walters@ ci.austin.tx.us.
Two years ago the City had divided the neighborhoods along the South Lamar corridor into four planning areas (Zilker, Barton Hills, Galindo, and Manchaca) following the boundaries of existing neighborhood associations. Since then, the four areas have been combined into one large planning area called the South Lamar Combined Neighborhood Planning Area (SLCNPA), which now includes Barton View, a small area south of Ben White, as well. With some persuasion citizens convinced the City staff to retain the original four planning areas, organizing the final combined plan to encompass individual plans for each. This will allow neighbors to address the very different character of their individual areas while cooperating in areas of overlapping interest.
ZNA is advocating to protect the safety of Zilker's residents by addressing adverse traffic and parking situations, sewer and utility inadequacies, and building code enforcement. We also want to preserve and enhance the character of the neighborhood by maintaining the single family housing stock in established areas, addressing design compatibility and scale of new development, cultivating businesses that serve the neighborhood, and improving bus service and access to it. We would like to be able to walk or bike more safely to more places.
We are also advocating to protect the natural environment such as the tree canopy, creeks and watersheds, parkland, and scenic views and vistas. This ties in with efforts to reduce water and air pollution as well as lighting and noise levels. ZNA also seeks to keep diversity of age, race, and ethnicity, and to mitigate the increasing lack of affordability in the face of escalating property values and taxes. Zilker Elementary School is an important element in attracting and sustaining a diverse mix of people in the neighborhood.
As this goes to press, neighbors in the four plan areas are just beginning planning exercises to help us map future land uses. Please get involved. To work with ZNA's planning committee, call Dave Piper at 916-9636. Or contact the city's planners through Mark Walters at 974-7695.
What Does Planning Have To Do
with the Movies?
Based on ZNA's neighborhood planning survey of 2004, our planning committee has focused on two major goals: first, to "enhance the opportunity for our existing residents to remain in our neighborhoods," and second, to "enhance the opportunity for new residents and businesses to be successful in the neighborhood." In keeping with those goals, ZNA has recently tried to bring neighbors near Lamar Plaza together with the management at Alamo Drafthouse Cinema to form a committee to consider compatibility issues. The Alamo management told us back in December that they are worried, for instance, about their trash dumpster and the source of litter in the back parking lot, overflow parking in the neighborhood, traffic flow through the parking areas and whether they will be able to close the driveway between the front and back parking, and whether it will create problems for the neighbors if they sell beer and wine after midnight for the occasional late-night movie. At the first meeting of the new committee, late in January, the main topic was the extension of liquor sales past midnight, which requires a special permit from the state. The Alamo will not be the first business in the neighborhood to apply for a late-hours liquor permit, but the ZNA executive committee doesn't have much experience with the process. We appreciate the opportunity to work with the Alamo before they commit to the application.
Annick Beaudet has contacted many of the neighbors on Dexter, Treadwell, and Kinney. If she missed you and you would like to join the committee, please contact Mike Sherrill at Alamo Drafthouse or ZNA vice president Dave Ward at 468-4944.