Deep-Pocket Donors Fund Right-Wing School Board Candidates in the Austin Suburbs

Map by The Austin Chronicle Art Staff

Fueled by mask mandates and culture wars reinvigorated by the Texas Legislature, conservative activism has heated up in the suburbs surrounding Austin. Those activists are turning out on the ballots of school board races, where opposition to masks, vaccine mandates, and politically progressive education ideologies are the top-of-mind topics. Meanwhile, the fast-growing exurbs in the very corners of Travis County are trying to keep up with their infrastructure needs and asking for more money for emergency and utility districts, in what's looking like an anti-tax, anti-government local election cycle.

Lake Travis ISD

In Lake Travis ISD, the wave of conservative activist money is coming in at tsunami force, in a preview of what other school districts, including Austin and Round Rock, may see when they hold their board elections in November. Lake Travis Families PAC controls a war chest of $100,000, an unheard-of amount for school board elections in what is still a smallish suburban district, which more typically sees low-dollar donations and low-profile candidates. The fundraising committee was organized by Christian and Krystle Alvarado, whose children go to school in the district, and has endorsed Erin Archer, John Aoueille, and Kim Flasch in the LTISD Board races.

Although both the Alvarados and their PAC's own messaging claim theirs is a nonpartisan agenda, they align with far-right conservative values – strongly opposed to mask and vaccine mandates and contemptuous of what they see as liberal propaganda in schools. "My values are straightforward – I believe parents should make choices for their kids," Christian Alvarado wrote in a statement posted to the PAC's Facebook page. "I do not agree with modern progressivism that claims my kids are oppressed because they are Hispanic."

Brendan Steinhouser, an Austin-based GOP political consultant and early tea party organizer, is providing his professional services to the Families PAC. Earlier this year, he told Politico, "The most successful message immediately is just parental choice and parental involvement … we are concerned about what [students are] being taught in public schools."

The nonpartisan LTISD Board has traditionally had a slight conservative bent. Parents say this cycle reflects an ideological swing in a district whose board has mostly been focused on maintaining the district's elite status in both academics and athletics. Last fall, one Lake Travis mom made headlines when she went before the board to voice her concerns about purported discussions of anal sex in classrooms.

Georgetown and Pflugerville ISDs

In Georgetown ISD, three candidates aligned with right-wing values are running for the three open seats on the board of trustees at a time when GISD has been roiled by a sexual assault case involving middle school students. "We've all seen liberal school boards push leftist ideology," warned a poster endorsing James Scherer, Elizabeth McFarland, and Cody Hirt (running in Places 1, 2, and 3, respectively). "12,000 future adults – don't let them be indoctrinated." Although the poster did not disclose its author, the three candidates named did not disavow the claims.

Meanwhile, the least politically charged races in one of Central Texas' bigger districts this cycle may be in Pflugerville, where the top issues include budgetary concerns and the country's ongoing K-12 mental health crisis. Three seats – Places 3, 4, and 5 – are up for election. – Morgan O'Hanlon

In Far Southeast Travis, Making Money Out of MUD(s)

Someday, it'll be the "Greater Creedmoor/Mustang Ridge Metroplex"

Our older readers may reflexively equate municipal utility districts – MUDs – with greedy developers and wasteful edge-city sprawl, but Texas has now raised generations of kids in places where this kind of super-streamlined, hyperlocal government makes all the important development decisions. Wells Branch is a MUD, as is what's left of Anderson Mill that's not become part of Austin, Cedar Park, or Leander. So are the multiple properties around Pilot Knob, out by the airport, that are starting to become neighborhoods like Easton Park. Even farther southeast past the airport, voters will get to confirm the creation of Creedmoor and Mustang Ridge MUDs, as the 87th Texas Legislature authorized with no opposition in its first of four 2021 sessions. State Rep. Eddie Rodriguez, D-Austin, who will soon be out of office entirely, carried the measure to create the districts.

This is at least a little bit weird, maybe even Austin Weird, because Creedmoor and Mustang Ridge are actual incorporated towns, close to each other and home to about 1,200 people between them. They haven't been towns for long – 1982 and 1985, respectively, as local property owners sought to avoid being annexed by Austin; these include some of the more colorful local business clans of the later 20th century, like the Gregory family behind Texas Disposal Systems (whose big landfill is near Creedmoor) and the Laws cousins, Alton and Charles, who incorporated Mustang Ridge and also controlled the Creedmoor-Maha Water Supply Corp. that still serves much of the area. Neither of these towns, let alone their surroundings that are likewise filling up with new Austinites, have much in the way of infrastructure, so this creation of MUDs allows for, among other things, the adoption of bond programs that far exceed these villages' financial capacity as is. In Creedmoor's case, that's $111.9 million in wastewater and drainage improvements, $51.3 million for roads, and $6 million in parks that one or more developers would build out for later reimbursement. In Mustang Ridge, it's $143.1 million, $82.4 million, and $8 million. There are multiple propositions involved in each case. – Mike Clark-Madison

More Money for Emergency Services, East and West

A different Proposition A will be on the ballot for residents of Travis County Emergency Service Districts 1 and 13, which lie on opposite sides of the county. These jurisdictions and a dozen-plus others like them, created by the Texas Legis­lature, serve areas beyond the territory of Austin's fire and emergency medical services. ESD 1 covers the north shore of Lake Travis, including Lago Vista, Jonestown, and the Village of Point Venture, and is looking for an increase in its local sales tax rate from 1% to 2%. ESD 13 serves Manor and is asking voters to adopt that same local sales tax, not to exceed 2%. As Travis County faces ever-mounting wildfire risk, especially in fast-growing wildland-urban interface areas outside Austin to both the east and the west, ESDs need funding to continue doing their lifesaving job. – Lina Fisher