Why is Austin City Council Willing to Be in the doghouse over the Dog's Head development?
Note - this was first published on the campaign substack on July 12.
I am pro-economic development, I’m pro-urban growth, pro-public-private-partnership. Cool, glad to have that out of the way. So hear me out when I say that this proposed Dog’s Head development should honestly have EVERY AUSTINITE WORRIED. My alarm and concern is certainly not knee-jerk “no” to a big city project.
Summary - What is the Dog’s Head deal?
The city of Austin is about to give a private developer (The Endeavor Real Estate Group) a 45-year deal on 2,600 acres along the Colorado River through the creation of a Tax Increment Reinvestment Zone (TIRZ).
A TIRZ is created when a city draws a line around a geographic area and then locks in today's tax value. As that area grows and taxes go up, all of that additional new tax money gets set aside just for projects inside that same line. The Endeavor Group says Dog's Head needs hundreds of millions of dollars in roads, water lines, and drainage before anything can be built, and that they themselves can't afford to front all of that cost alone.
The first step in the process was completed when Austin City Council annexed the land and signed the development agreement on May 21, 2026 . Prior to that, the Endeavor Real Estate Group owned the land. The contract is full of language that remove almost all mechanisms of citizen input or engagement during the term…even though our taxpayer money funds the development on this developer-owned land; and even though the use of that land (also unclear at this time) will impact residents of Austin in surrounding areas. Full contract linked here.
Most of city residents didn’t find out until the vote was already scheduled. Environmental reviews were also bypassed even though the land is is a designated floodplain. Yep, you read that right. Now, in a matter of weeks, the creation of the TIRZ financing tool Texas cities use to pay for infrastructure in a specific area, using the extra property tax money that new development in that area generates.
This is crazy, right? Yes…it’s stunning that there hasn’t been good-faith review and transparency about what exactly is being sacrificed by the very expensive deal for the city, and for whose benefit? What is being hidden from average voters, and why do our City Council leaders keep hiding it? It is very unusual and problematic that this deal is getting rushed past the parts of the checks and balances for local government such as the city commissions, neighbors associations, unions, environmental impact analysis, or any other avenues of public review.
This is suspicious. And this process is what should worry every Austinite, whether you support this development or not.
What makes the Dog’s Head deal suspicious and worthy of more public scrutiny?
1. Citizens were left out, from the very start
When the Endeavor Real Estate Group’s plan for the 2,600-acre “Dog’s Head” tract came together, the city wasn’t legally required to notify the neighbors who’d be living next to it — and so they did not. Residents near the site say they learned what was coming just days before the Council’s initial vote on May 21, 2026. Lee Edwards, who lives in the neighborhood right by the new boundaries of Dog’s Head told me and reporters he happened to learn about all of this from another resident just 57 hours before the vote. He was alarmed when he found out about the road-widening plan that appeared to run straight through his living room.
By the time the annexation and 45-year development agreement passed on May 21, 2026, neighbors, environmental advocates, and even some Travis County Commissioners were still trying to figure out basic facts about the project. County Commissioner Ann Howard called the whole review process “rushed,” and the city’s own Environmental Commission later described the episode as “a total system failure”by the city that has now seriously eroded public trust.
In addition, community members have shared with me their own stunning timeline of begging to be listened to by current City Council members. These are people with jobs, businesses to run, family to take care of. Instead they are frustrated and exhausted about having to chase City Council and the developers because their lives and property (some of whom have put life savings into, or have lived in those homes for generations) are at-risk by this irresponsibly rapid timeline. One of the neighbors who is likely to be displaced if this goes through as currently planned is dealing with Stage-4 cancer. The cruelty and inaccessibility of elected representatives who are gambling people’s lives by simply agreeing to lines drawn on a map by developers who are not residents of the existing neighborhoods impacted is shocking.
A resident of the Hergotz neighborhood impacted by Dog’s Head shared this timeline of them trying to engage with and get answers from the city
2. The Environmental Commission got left out of review for a development deal of this size
The Environmental Commission wasn’t consulted before the May annexation and development agreement were approved. It wasn’t until June 17, almost a month later, that the Commission voted to stand up its own “Dog’s Head Working Group” so they may respond to a deal already in motion. That roughly 20-person group scrambled through late-June meetings and delivered its recommendations on July 1 …. this was also rushed to be ready three weeks before Council’s scheduled TIRZ vote this next week.
Commission Vice Chair Jennifer Bristol said that this deal “threw the city code, the city’s environmental criteria manual, and the boards and commissions process... under the bus.”
3. Will this really boost jobs for Austin?
Since 2012, Austin has had a policy — won after months of organizing by construction unions and worker advocates — that companies receiving city economic incentives are supposed to pay prevailing or living wages on the construction work tied to that assistance. It is so that public subsidies are supportive and a boost to Austin construction companies and workers.
However, Dog’s Head is structured as a TIRZ, not a direct incentive grant. It seems that the development agreement’s fine print on labor standards hasn’t been made a central part of the public conversation the way the environmental and transparency fights have.
That’s a huge miss: if hundreds of millions of dollars in public infrastructure spending are going to build out this site over decades, Austinites deserve a clear, public answer on whether our construction workforce will benefit and be protected under the same wage standards the city already committed to a decade ago.
4. Why is the city bankrolling Endeavor’s Group’s project while our existing streets and utility infrastructure needs the funds?
This isn't a case where the city trying to “develop unused public land" (something that also shows up in news articles. The Endeavor Real Estate group has been spending almost 7 years quietly buying up 26 parcels of this land; then came to the city asking for annexation, tax financing, and code exemptions to build out land it already owned.
"We've been working on it for seven years now, and it needs to be in the city," he said. "Frankly, it's a better project for the developer if it's in the city. So, it's a mutually beneficial deal." Richard Suttle, attorney for Endeavor, addressing Austin City Council on May 21, 2026 (KUT)
That makes sense for public-private partnerships and why instruments like TIRZ exist. Creating a TIRZ is what allowed Austin to build neighborhoods such as Mueller, the Seaholm/City Hall district, and Colony Park. At the same time, when Austin tried to create a TIRZ to fund development on the old Statesman site on South Congress, a judge struck it down after residents sued. The ruling was that the TIRZ deal mostly benefited a private developer at the public’s expense. That’s the same question hanging over this development deal for Dog’s Head too.
Finally, Austin has existing neighborhoods with unmet infrastructure needs right now.Residents have been complaining about roads, drainage issues, damaged or missing sidewalks, limited flood mitigation. Funding these comes from the same limited capital. One should also point out that the Endeavor Group has plenty of other ways to fund this land development that does not require a deal with such unchecked terms. The city and taxpayers have no obligation to fund something that has such little transparency and clarity on benefits.
5. Show us the money!!
If you read any media news article or see most of City Council’s quotes about this, Dog’s Head is being pitched as an answer to the city’s current budget crisis.
Officials and city documents point to eye-popping long-term numbers — over $3 billion in projected property and sales tax revenue for the city and county combined through 2061, and city modeling suggesting the land’s assessed value could jump from about $17 million today to as much as $26 billion by 2061.
Those are 2061 numbers. Our budget problems are a 2026 problem. There’s a real disconnect between “this will pay off by mid-century” and “we need help balancing the budget now” — and nobody voting on this deal, at the city or the county, has explained how projected revenue three decades out fixes a structural budget gap we’re facing this year.
Additionally, there’s another catch in how TIRZs work under Texas law: the whole point of a TIRZ is that new tax revenue generated inside the zone gets captured and spent inside that same zone. As proposed here, 80% of the city’s new property tax revenue from Dog’s Head and 50% of the county’s would be redirected back into Dog’s Head infrastructure, not the city’s general fund. This does not help our neighborhoods and social services programs asking for help today.
The City Council needs to explain this to us. Even when the money eventually materializes, most of it is contractually obligated to stay inside Dog’s Head’s own borders. It cannot show up as new funding for East Austin’s existing flood risks, or the sidewalks our other neighborhoods have been requesting for years, or in lieu the libraries and social services budgets that currently getting squeezed.
What are we supposed to do?
Our voices matter! Speak up and share your concerns with Austin City Council
The upcoming Tuesday’s Travis County Commissioners Court vote and the Austin City Council vote at their 23rd July meeting matter. Both deserve to hear from you before then. And if you cannot be there, contact me at team[at]nehaforatx[dot]com so I might speak up for you!
For too long citizens have been unnecessarily placed into YIMBY/NIMBY opposing camps with the assumption that one cares about development and growth more than the other. We need to stop letting politics and politicians divide us and stand up for greater principles of community. For the sake of policy and community clarity….I am not suggesting that there is no world in which a development plan about Dog’s Head deal can exist. And obviously we need to find new tax revenue for Austin and Travis County. I’m genuinely curious and open to seeing how this land might be redeveloped responsibly and sustainably.
However, as it stands right now…. a deal this large, this long (45 years!!!!!), and this financially significant deserves a process both governments can actually be proud of: real notice to the people it affects, environmental review before the ink dries, clear answers on labor standards, an honest accounting of whose needs come first, and a transparent explanation of how the money actually flows. We have a crisis of imagination when it comes to how we may support the long-term development of Austin without sacrificing the voices and well-being of residents today.