ATA issued a candidate questionnaire to all candidates running in the November 2022 general election. All questions were the same for Mayor, City Council, County Clerk and County Judge. Responses have not been edited. View all responses here.
Daniela Silva – City Council District 3 candidate
As we head into the 4th year of Covid-19, what learnings have you taken from the pandemic and how will you apply those to your policies and community outreach moving forward?
The pandemic showed me how disconnected people are from city resources. We need to put a much greater effort into helping folks access existing programs and support systems so that policies are appropriately reaching their intended targets.
How will you work with City leadership to provide a housing plan for unhoused residents?
As a city we need to change our culture and attitude to remove the stigma placed on the unhoused. I will work towards decriminalizing houselessness again and stop the sweeps. I plan to sponsor housing-first policies and promote investment in community benefits; not just investment in more public housing but investment in mental health services, EMS, mobile clinics, wrap-around services, and community resiliency hubs. I will vote to partner with organizations like The Other Ones Foundation and Foundation Communities to expand our supply of deeply affordable and long-term supportive housing. Additionally, I will advocate for change in current policy so we can keep shelters open to all in extreme weather, particularly in extreme heat. The open-door policy shelters have once temperatures reach below a certain threshold should also be applied once temperatures reach above a certain threshold. Just as importantly, drug addiction is an illness and we need to treat it as such. Laws that punish the use or dependence of drugs are just as harmful as the drugs themselves. I plan to work to decriminalize drug usage, support harm reduction in our community, and expand addiction recovery resources.
How will you work with City leadership to support marginalized communities in Austin?
I will hire people from marginalized communities in my office, and will appoint them to serve on Austin boards and commissions so that people from within the community can lead and create change. I will work with various local organizations and tribes to draw from a short list of candidates to staff these various positions appropriately. I will work to create a government that is more accessible to its people by meeting regularly with constituents, advocating for city resources to be available in more languages (and not just translated by AI, but translated with a human-centered and culturally-competent approach). I will use my platform to expand and protect green space in Austin, support equitable access to healthcare (including the creation of a hospital on the East side), address East Austin’s food apartheid, advocate for renters’ rights, build densely in areas of transit, upzone West Austin, amend the land development code, and invest in public transit, city bike programs, and light rail.
Homeowners and renters experienced enormous increases in Travis County Property Taxes in 2022. How will you address Austin’s ongoing housing shortage and displacement issues?
Equitable and sustainable housing development is one of the key focuses of my platform. The housing issue is not just about creating more housing, it’s about where you build it and who is allowed to live there. Currently, districts 1, 2, 3, and 4 have been carrying the burden of development, with new structures being built on a daily basis; whereas in other parts of town, building as much as an ADU is close to impossible. We need to make some big changes, not just to our land development code, but to our municipal culture. I fervently support reducing car-dependency in Austin and working together to create a more healthy, accessible city. I believe people of all backgrounds deserve access to good schools, green space, other city amenities, and that we should remove barriers preventing that vision regardless of zip code. Specifically, I support eliminating single family zoning at the municipal level. I believe we should incentivize SMART housing to attract builders to create low-income housing, especially around transit corridors. Austin’s current Land Development Code must be changed to allow VMU2 and increase the height entitlement in exchange for greater community benefits, including affordability. As a city council member, I will also work with the Housing Authority of the City of Austin (HACA) to revitalize public housing assets, seek additional rental assistance vouchers, and advance innovative housing solutions, including legalizing more housing in these neighborhoods. All that being said, it cannot go without being mentioned that many renters would choose to own their home if they had the opportunity. There must be a focus on increasing the percentage of ownership opportunities in new, denser developments in every district of the city. This is a matter of economic equity, especially in relation to communities of color who have been historically shut out from the opportunity to build generational wealth via property ownership.
As our community continues to rely on virtual spaces, how should the City address the digital divide? What steps would you take to bridge that divide?
We should approach the issue through a lens of equity, increasing accessibility for marginalized groups, and ensuring said groups have a leading role in bridging the divide. We must start with a complete overhaul of the city website and city apps to make them more accessible to people with hearing and visual differences, people who speak languages other than English, etc. We also need to support schools in preparing students for a digital-based workforce, and support public libraries and community colleges in offering beginner to advanced tech courses.
What are your thoughts on the City of Austin using cryptocurrency (AustinCoin)?
I am opposed to the idea. Cryptocurrency is volatile and lacks a central regulating authority, and it has a spotty record thus far. Just five months after the city of Miami adopted cryptocurrency last year, the price of MiamiCoin had dropped nearly 93% from its peak price. I’m not willing to take that kind of gamble with my community.
Even if it were stable enough to rely on, the fact remains that cryptocurrency is bad for the environment. It’s estimated that each Bitcoin transaction uses around 2100 kWh — the amount of energy consumed by an average American household in 75 days. I want to move Austin towards green technology, cleaner air, cleaner water and greater biodiversity; using cryptocurrencies will not help us achieve that goal.
How can the City better work with Austin’s tech community to bring innovative approaches to civic challenges?
There is great potential for Austin’s robust tech community to bring innovative solutions to some of our civic challenges, and I am interested in particular in sitting down with women and BIPOC leaders in the industry to learn from their experience about the problems and solutions they see. I will work to expand free wifi access within the city to the extent allowed by state law, and I will explore ways to offer WiFi on CapMetro buses and at CapMetro covered bus stops to incentivize public transportation and make it more enjoyable for folks who depend on it every day. We also need a massive overhaul of the city website and all digital city resources to make them more accessible to all.
For more information visit www.danielaforaustin.com