District 5 - David Weinberg
What is your favorite historic building or legacy business in your district, and why?
The Broken Spoke
A classic Austin dance hall that represents the city's musical heritage and the importance of keeping longtime local businesses alive.
In 2024, Austin City Council adopted the Equity-Based Historic Preservation Plan to replace Austin’s 1981 historic preservation plan with a more inclusive, community-oriented vision for the City’s preservation program. Its proposed policies, programs, and tools aim to protect Austin’s unique heritage and shape an equitable, inclusive, sustainable, and economically vital future for all. The plan's future success will rely on buy-in from Council to execute its recommendations.
If elected, would you support the plan’s recommended policy changes, and the budget allocations needed to support them, to ensure that the future of preservation in Austin is proactive, collaborative, and accessible to all? Please explain.
Yes. Austin's history belongs to all of its residents, and our preservation efforts should reflect the full diversity of the people and communities that built this city. I would support implementing the Equity-Based Historic Preservation Plan, with responsible funding for its priorities. Preservation should not only protect familiar landmarks, but also recognize underrepresented histories, support neighborhood participation, and help ensure that future generations can experience what makes Austin unique.
Historic places play a significant role in Austin’s economy. South Congress, the Paramount Theatre, and Barton Springs are beloved to locals and tourists alike, as are legacy businesses like Broken Spoke, Cisco’s, and the Continental Club. These places support local jobs and local dollars in addition to embodying our local heritage. They define our identity and make Austin a destination in so many ways.
If elected, how would you leverage historic places to generate economic benefits for Austin?
Historic places are an important part of Austin's identity and economic vitality. They attract visitors, support small businesses, create local jobs, and make our neighborhoods distinctive. I would work to promote historic destinations, encourage residents and visitors to support locally owned legacy businesses, and make it easier to maintain and reuse historic buildings. Responsible preservation can strengthen our local economy while ensuring that Austin's growth does not erase the character that makes our city special.
In 2023, City Council officially proclaimed October as Legacy Business Month in honor of Preservation Austin’s inaugural Legacy Business Month passport program, which encourages Austinites to support participating businesses and broadly promotes their heritage. The city’s explosive growth has made protections and financial support for legacy businesses more important than ever. City governments in San Francisco and San Antonio have adopted ground-breaking legacy business programs to protect and support their cities’ legacy businesses through designation, education, and directly supporting businesses with financial resources.
If elected, would you support creating a similar program for the City of Austin? Why or why not?
Yes. Austin should explore a legacy business program that recognizes longtime local businesses and helps them remain part of our community. These businesses contribute to our culture, create jobs, and give our neighborhoods a sense of identity. The city should work with business owners to identify their needs and consider practical tools such as public recognition, technical assistance, help navigating city programs, and targeted financial support where appropriate. We should make it easier for local businesses to survive and thrive as Austin grows.
Preservation Austin, Austin Infill Coalition, and AIA Austin partnered on a Preservation Bonus that City Council adopted as part of HOME Phase 1 in 2023. The bonus exchanges increased development entitlements for preserving single-family homes built before 1961 to preserve more naturally affordable, historic-aged homes while supporting density. Since the adoption of this tool, however, fewer than 10 residential infill projects have used the Preservation Bonus. Research conducted by Cedar shows that expanding entitlements for Preservation Bonus projects, such as increased impervious cover and allowing four units per lot, could generate 10x as many housing units as the current bonus allows, and save more historic-aged houses from demolition (see report HERE).
If elected, would you support increasing entitlements for Preservation Bonus projects to preserve existing housing and support Austin’s affordability goals? Why or why not?
I would need more information on this matter before giving a definitive answer. Specifically, I would want to see data on how many properties this could potentially impact, and what the results of the existing projects have been. I believe that HOME may be creating housing in certain parts of the city that is more affordable to some but generally not affordable to working class Austinites. In some neighborhoods HOME is creating housing that is not affordable at all. I don't see it as a tool that as yet is moving the needle on housing affordability, unlike that has been accomplished in Austin's rental market over the past five years. In some District 5 neighborhoods, HOME is proving to be a costly burden on neighborhoods where HOAs and neighborhood associations are facing costly litigation over enforcing neighborhood deed restrictions. I believe in neighborhoods and neighborhood compatibility and HOME is not taking us thus far in a direction of preservation or affordability.
Historic resource surveys inventory historic neighborhoods and make recommendations on buildings and districts eligible for historic designation. Accurate and up-to-date surveys enable City staff, elected officials, and citizens alike to make decisions about which properties and neighborhoods ought to be protected. For example, in 2020, the Rogers-Washington-Holy Cross neighborhood successfully became Austin's first local historic district dedicated exclusively to Black heritage. This effort relied on data gathered in the 2016 East Austin Historic Resource Survey to define the district's boundaries and identify contributing structures. Without this survey, this historic district may not have been possible.
If elected, will you support annual funding for historic surveys and the City’s preservation office? Please explain your answer.
Yes. The city needs accurate, up-to-date historic surveys to make informed decisions about what should be preserved. Without that information, important buildings, neighborhoods, and cultural resources can be lost before their significance is fully understood. I would support predictable annual funding for historic surveys and the preservation office, with an emphasis on identifying underrepresented histories and working directly with neighborhood residents. Proactive planning is more effective than waiting until a historic resource is threatened.
Local historic districts, established by City Council through historic zoning overlays, are one of the most important preservation tools available to protect Austin’s historic and cultural resources. The City of Austin’s existing historic resource surveys include recommendations for designating dozens of new local historic districts across our city. Proactive zoning efforts for historic districts are the most effective way to protect heritage in a city changing as rapidly as ours. Before 2021, a simple majority of City Council votes was required to establish a local historic district as long as 51 percent of all property owners within a proposed district’s boundary approved. Since 2021, however, state law requires a supermajority vote by Council to designate a local historic district if just one property owner within the proposed boundaries objects. Austin currently has only 8 local historic districts and has not designated a district since state law changed.
If elected, would you support the proactive designation of local historic districts that the City’s historic resource surveys identify as priorities? Would you do so even if a minority of property owners object? Why or why not?
I would likely take these on a case by case basis and want to work in close collaboration with the council member and various stakeholders where these cases arise rather than having a hard and fast one size fits all approach.
As a member of Austin City Council, what is one policy or initiative you would enact to ensure the preservation of our city’s historic and cultural heritage?
I would want to make sure that the Historic Landmarks Commission is property consulted on all matters where it should be. That it is was not consulted on possible demolition of the historic Barton Springs Road Bridge in 2023 is a serious oversight in city policymaking that should not happen again.