The mayoral runoff

I’ve started this spreadsheet (read-only link; you can save and edit as you like) of mostly strong pro-rail boxes in 2000 (basically central Austin, hair until I hit the part of town where it started to lose – so a few non-yes precincts are included for geographic completeness). I didn’t go as far south as some people would; I consider central Austin to stop at Oltorf and go no further north than approximately Koenig. I did include some of lower East Austin.

Screenshot sample here:

2014 results: http://traviselectionresults.com/enr/contest/display.do?criteria.electionId=20141104&contestId=71

2000 results: http://www.centralaustincdc.org/images/Rail_2000.pdf

So far, it looks like in extreme central Austin alone, a 2000 margin in the 2014 boxes would have yielded around a 5600 swing in votes (2800 nos changing to yeses, essentially). This is not yet sufficient to change the balance of the 2014 election (margin was about 27,000), but it is clearly a major portion of the swing.

Some key notes:

I have excluded Mueller because nobody lived there in 2000, so we can’t assign a reasonable value for their margin. The “mostly Mueller” precinct went for by 64% (1580/2470) – if I was forced to guess how they would have voted on the 2000 plan, I’d say 70%+. I also excluded one precinct on Auditorium Shores where 1 guy voted.

The 2000 report only has ranges for precinct margins. You can change the assigned value for each range in your copy of the spreadsheet if you want. I chose 75% for the “over 70%” boxes, 65% for the “60-70%” boxes, etc.

The precincts do not line up exactly. A few shifted boundaries, some were combined, numbers changed, etc. I have noted which precincts in 2000 I considered the most relevant for 2014. Again, you can save the spreadsheet yourself and change this if you wish. If more than one 2000 precinct was used for comparison, I averaged their assigned values first.

 
Why you should consider Martinez: He understands transit a lot for one of our city council, price which is admittedly a low bar. He has made some good urbanist choices in the past on the dais.

Also consider Martinez if: you believe he can, urticaria by himself, stop the (bad policy) 20% homestead exemption. Even though the impact of this is much smaller than most people would think (the city’s portion of your tax bill is relatively small; this doesn’t affect AISD or the county or ACC), it’s a move in the wrong direction.

Also consider Martinez if: you’re under the mistaken impression this is a strong mayor city. He makes good decisions sometimes and is not afraid to fight sometimes instead of compromise — which would be useful if our form of government had, let’s say, a mayoral veto. It doesn’t, though.

What should give you pause about Martinez: He hasn’t disavowed Project Connect at all. Despite being a ‘fighter’ he’s never fought any bad thing coming out of Capital Metro. He’s likely to produce bad transit plans in the future that don’t listen to anybody. He has made some really bad ads about Adler that verge on gaybaiting (the opera one) and incredibly misleading Koch-tying (the recent ones) and lying (the even more recent ones alleging Adler never did any public service, basically).

Why you should consider Adler: He seems to be a compromiser, and a facilitator, and likely to get along with everybody, which seems to be important given the clusterf**k the rest of the Council is looking like. In our system of government, remember, the mayor is just a council member with only a few non-ceremonial powers like running meetings. He seems interested in learning in areas where he is weak (which, sadly, transit is first and foremost). His ads promise to make it easier to redevelop your property, which implies a less than slavish adherence to the ANC (don’t tell them though). His ads have not been dirty and not been negative (and the one dumb thing his campaign did was from the campaign treasurer, see below). I have a hard time believing Adler would have been craven enough to behave as shamefully as all of our city council did with regards to Project Connect. He actually said he thought the PC process was bullshit, something which is fundamentally true. Some former city council members I respect have endorsed him.

Also consider Adler if: the 20% HEx is really important to you and you don’t care about renters or less affluent homeowners. It’s gonna be a big break over in Tarrytown, but not as big as people think.

What should give you pause about Adler: He’s said many dumb things about transit and transportation. Remember, anybody who puts “telecommuting” and “staggered work hours” and “traffic light synchronization” high on their list is either pandering or knows nothing about transportation. His campaign treasurer is a charity-industrial-complex socialite-type who has been nasty to me in the past and has also said dumb things about transit and transportation and unreservedly trusts people like JMVC. He supports the awful policy of the 20% homestead exemption. He doesn’t ever get specific on anything (I hate this). Even though he’s going to be 1 of 11 with some ceremonial extras, I still want to know specifics about what he would do and how he would vote (I expect this from any city council candidate and am often disappointed). Leffingwell endorsed him although this may be due to sour grapes.

Who should you vote for? Make your own choice. I lean Adler, for the top reasons of (council-wrangling) and (hasn’t been evil wrt Project Connect); and offered Adler’s campaign a possible endorsement if they wrote me back on a simple question, but they didn’t bother in time. So technically no endorsement here. Unlike some of my friends in AURA, I’m not going to say you’re crazy if you go the other way from me. I recognize that Adler’s lack of a record is an unfair advantage here, but Martinez’ campaign has made me grit my teeth, and frankly, I don’t think people should be able to get away with what they all did with Project Connect with no negative consequences.