Austin @ Large: Max on a Mission

Among the ironies of the season: Max Nofziger, the Voice of South Austin, has his mayoral campaign headquarters downtown, while Will Wynn, the Man From Downtown, has his HQ in South Austin -- in the former Cinema West porno house, which Nofziger takes credit for getting shut down. That may say something about Wynn -- "a Dallas developer," as Nofziger dismisses him, would throw his hat into the ring from a different corner. But his own choice says something about Nofziger, who has already been endorsed by former Mayor Lee Cooke and other well-known men in suits. After the travails that convulsed Austin during and since the Kirk Watson era, Max Nofziger has become -- if he wasn't already -- part of the Establishment.

At least some Republicans and business lobbyists trust hippie icon Nofziger more than real estate pro Will Wynn, which is a fairly blunt repudiation of the Smart Growth agenda to which Wynn is, not entirely fairly, seen as heir. Now, Max is still Max -- he views his opposition to Gulf War II as an asset, and he calls himself "the only environmentalist in the race." But he argues that Wynn is greener in all the wrong ways. "I have more experience than the rest of the candidates combined, and if that's an important criterion, I win the election," he says. "If money is more important, then I suppose Will Wynn wins. I hope that in Austin experience is still a more important factor than money."

This spring marks Max Nofziger's 11th appearance on a City Council ballot, which is more than Leslie Cochran and Jennifer Gale combined, and his three terms in office notwithstanding, repetition is not typically an asset in Austin elections. Austin has a very short memory, and former electeds have done consistently poorly in subsequent campaigns. Nobody since Tom Miller has ever re-joined the City Council after a long absence, as Nofziger seeks to, though others have tried. Then again, nobody has ever joined the City Council after losing four previous elections -- except Max Nofziger. Yes, I remember writing two months ago that lightning does not strike twice. But what do I know? The current climate might be just peculiar and turbulent enough to produce Nofziger's perfect storm.

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He's Been Here Before

What Nofziger offers, he says, is specific experience with a local economy in the tank and a City Hall awash in red ink. In Nofziger's first two years in office, the City Council slashed Austin's budget by nearly 30%, burying a boom in which his predecessors "had spent their time figuring out how to spend money. And the current council is the same way. In the late 1980s, we looked at either closing fire stations or closing libraries. We'll have to make those kinds of decisions again, and nobody on the City Council today has done that before."

Nor has any current council member -- except Gus Garcia, who'll be gone when the time comes this year -- voted to raise property taxes. "No politician wants to raise taxes, but sometimes it has to be done," Nofziger says. "Certainly the first thing to look at is making the cuts. But you have to entertain the possibility." In his view, the fact that the council remains so virginal, as we enter a third year of bust and privation, speaks to the lack of leadership he wants to rectify. "They should have done some of this stuff" -- both tax hikes and spending cuts, including layoffs -- "last year, but I don't think they've reacted well to this crisis. They don't want to acknowledge how bad it really is."

Nofziger does not limit his brief to charges of benign neglect. "The City Council has dug a hole for itself here. It didn't 'just happen.' The council played a role, with its tax-and-spend policies," -- yes, he said "tax-and-spend" -- "in getting us into this position." Even after more than a decade of growing city budgets -- and, in Max's view, thickening layers of fat and unhealthy binges on consultant contracts -- funding for social services has remained flat since Nofziger left the council. The parks budget, among others, has never really recovered from the hits it took in the last bust. "Our overall budget has nearly doubled, and the amount of parkland has increased dramatically," he says. "During the boom, how could you not rebuild the areas that took those kinds of hits?"

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The South Austin Model

It's certainly a fertile time for being a nagging scold (as I should know), and Nofziger's campaign -- built around "points of urgency" -- might sound strident to a less nervous body politic. But Max has optimistic things to say, too. Like others, and with notable passion, he sees clean energy, alternative transportation, and the entertainment industry as foundations on which to erect a new economic edifice. "In those things, our marketplace is the world, and that's a real good basis for building a long-term, strong, sustainable economy," he says. (And one that can be seeded with public money from outside the General Fund -- perhaps from Austin Energy or Capital Metro.)

As for keeping Austin weird, Max -- who says the imbroglio over Sixth + Lamar tipped him into the race -- points to his stomping grounds on South Congress. "The porno theatre is gone and so are most of the prostitutes, and we've now seen that area just blossom as a retail center and a place to hang out. That's the approach I'd like to take with the entire city.

"If the city can help on one or two problems, then the creativity of the private sector and local entrepreneurs can flourish," he continues. "That's a real contrast between me and Will Wynn." (Wynn, of course, is leading the council's current meet-and-study efforts on the economy.) "We've already solved problems on South Congress, and small businesses are flourishing. That's a good sign of my experience. I don't have to form a committee to know what to do."