Mayor boots conservation advocate

Mayor Ivy Taylor has removed a thorn from the side of local developers.

The thorn was Amy Hardberger, a water-law expert who has served on the San Antonio Water System’s Capital Improvements Advisory Committee since former Mayor Julián Castro appointed her in 2013. The committee is tasked with updating impact fees: an expense to real estate developers who pass it on to homebuyers to pay for water-supply expansion.

On May 16, Hardberger received a letter from Taylor noting her imminent removal.

“Recognizing that your term expired in 2015, I want to express my gratitude for helping San Antonio become a more globally competitive city,” Taylor wrote. “I am moving forward with a new appointment, and upon their confirmation, your service will conclude.”

An advocate for water conservation, Hardberger — the daughter of former Mayor Phil Hardberger — has been a lone voice of dissent on the developer-driven committee.

In 2014, she was the only member to side with a SAWS staff proposal to increase the supply portion of the impact fees to $2,796 per household, the full amount.

The rest of the 11-member committee endorsed a smaller increase, to $1,590, a boon to developers that would have left all SAWS ratepayers subsidizing new development through water bills.

City Council, including Taylor, later voted for the higher increase. Since becoming mayor, Taylor has proven more deferential to local developers.

On May 10, she called SAWS and CPS Energy executives to a meeting with developers so the latter could air complaints about bureaucratic “red tape,” according to a source close to City Hall.

“SAWS and CPS Energy are key partners in reaching our goals for San Antonio’s future,” Taylor later wrote in a memo to council members about the meeting. “We often think about rates and reliability as contributors to economic development efforts but we also need to remember that the speed and ease of the development process is critical.”

Hardberger is concerned about development as well, but as it relates to water conservation. She wants the city to require more conservation through land-use ordinances. By 2025, San Antonio is expected to add about 1 million residents, and Hardberger believes attitudes about growth must change.

“There is a better way (to build), and land use is the biggest opportunity to reduce water use,” she told me. “The people who are the most in control of land use are (developers) … Our ability to move forward is going to be 100 percent reliant on how we decide to develop the land. We need big shifts.”

Hardberger also has sharply criticized the Vista Ridge water project — a $2.8 billion initiative by SAWS to supply up to 16.3 billion gallons a year via a 142-mile pipeline from Burleson County.

The mayor has joined the business community in pushing for the pipeline. Her removal of Hardberger this month from the committee will silence a frequent critic of the status quo.

“It’s her prerogative to do it,” Hardberger said. “I think we can all guess why she did it. We have not seen eye to eye on Vista Ridge … I’m sure there are some people who would really like me to be quiet.”

Taylor could not be reached for comment Friday; she was traveling in the Canary Islands on a “trade and cultural mission” organized by the San Antonio Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. Asked why Taylor had removed Hardberger from the committee, her office released a prepared statement:

“I am taking a careful look at all the mayoral appointments that have been made to boards and commissions, in particular those that have expired,” the mayor said. “In this case, I want to ensure that my appointment to the Capital Improvements Advisory Committee represents the Real Estate/Building Industry because it is a designated position.”

The committee, though, already is overrepresented by industry.

“There are supposed to be community representatives,” Hardberger said. “My concern is, who’s in the room representing the average person?”