A Dem v Dem battle in Southwest Austin

Two big announcements this morning: Council Member Paige Ellis will run for a third term in City Council District 8 next year AND former EMS Association president Selena Xie will challenge her for the position.

Ellis's second term goes through next year. If she wants to exceed the two-term limit, she'll need to gather signatures from 5% of the 67,918 "qualified voters" in her district, which by my count = 3,395 signatures.

Ellis is a seasoned canvasser and in an interview this morning she expressed confidence that she'd be able to get the needed signatures. Still, 3,400 signatures in one district requires a significant effort. Kathie Tovo spent thousands of dollars on paid canvassers to get the job done in 2018 –– and her district's population is much less spread out than Ellis's. However, Ellis said she has "constituents ready to volunteer" for the effort.

In the statement announcing her candidacy, Ellis stressed that she would be a "steady hand to policy making and expertise in the areas of housing, mobility, environmental responsibility, and emergency services."

She also mentioned that she had lived in Southwest Austin for 15 years, an obvious contrast with Xie, who relocated to Oak Hill from the east side late last year. Speaking to me by phone, she recalled that one of her opponents in her first race in 2018, Bobby Levinski, was repeatedly pressed on his recent arrival in the district at candidate forums.

"It was definitely an issue in 2018 when Bobby had moved in just outside of that six month window," she said.

When I asked her about her focus in her third term, she mentioned getting affordable housing included in the ACC Pinnacle Campus, minimizing the size and impact of the Mopac South project. In recent months she has also become increasingly vocal about her frustration with the city's progress on planned infrastructure projects in Southwest Austin.

Ellis touted endorsements from 16 local elected officials, including four of her colleagues on Council: Vanessa Fuentes, Chito Vela, Ryan Alter and Zo Qadri.

Xie says she will 'show up'

In her own announcement, Xie went on the attack right off the bat:

“As a frontline worker, I don’t work from home - and I don’t think our City Council should either,” Xie said. “I came to the decision to run after meeting with numerous district residents from many different backgrounds. They all said the same thing - that D8 deserves a Councilmember who shows up. On council, I will bring the same energy to improving affordability, public safety, infrastructure, the environment, constituent services, and communication with residents to District 8 that I brought as EMS Association President. I know we can do better for the people who I’ve been proud to serve.”

It is true that Ellis and her staff do not work at their City Hall office as often as most others on Council, but Ellis herself shows up to every public meeting. In fact, when KXAN last year reviewed attendance records for Council members in 2023, Ellis was one of two who had showed up in-person for all 24 meetings.

So far, Xie's statement and website don't highlight any significant ideological distinctions with the incumbent. They are both generally liberals, although Xie has described herself as a leftist, which is probably not something Ellis would do.

When I asked Xie this morning where she differs from Ellis on the issues, she said she would have a stronger focus on public safety, noting that nobody on Council has on-the-ground experience in police/fire/EMS.

And echoing the complaints that have been made about the recent rezoning of Acacia Cliffs, Xie said, "While I do believe that we need to increase our housing stock, I don't think we should simply allow displacement to occur."

When I asked how she would have handled Acacia Cliffs, she said Council should have negotiated harder with the developer for "more concessions" for the current residents.

"If we are displacing people, they can end up homeless," she said. "We're allowing developers to foist these costs onto taxpayers."

It sounds like Xie is staking out a position similar to Greg Casar, who was typically supportive of land use reforms to facilitate greater density but made a point of voting against upzonings of existing multifamily housing.

(To be clear, there is nothing the city can do to stop an apartment building from being redeveloped and many of these old complexes will be redeveloped no matter what. If Council did not approve the DB90 zoning the developer requested for Acacia Cliffs, the complex might be redeveloped but without any affordable housing. The theory for rejecting the rezoning is that it would make redevelopment of the property less appealing and perhaps stop it from happening entirely, although that is far from assured.)

Above all else, however, Xie's case against Ellis seems to be that the incumbent isn't a hard enough worker or effective enough advocate.

And now for a little punditry...

Xie has a big challenge in convincing center-left voters in District 8 to ditch Ellis. I'm not convinced this "work from home" attack will land unless it can be paired with some evidence of Ellis being unresponsive in a way that regular voters will appreciate. This isn't like Natasha Harper-Madison, whose absenteeism and erratic behavior have clearly left District 1 underrepresented on the dais.

IMO, Xie would probably be better off simply casting Ellis as part of a City Council that has dropped the ball on X,Y,Z, whether that's EMS ambulances being shut down or the city's struggles to deliver promised infrastructure projects. In fact, even though Xie is a progressive, that kind of messaging targeted at D8's substantial bloc of Republican voters might bear fruit for her.

Speaking of Republicans...will there be a conservative candidate too? We'll see. 2026 is not gearing up to be a good year for any candidate in Austin within spitting distance of Trump, but even a really weak conservative candidate (e.g. Richard Smith, the guy Ellis clobbered in '22) could affect the race by drawing votes away from one of the two liberals.

It will be interesting to see how the candidates position themselves on taxes, especially given the likely prospect of a tax rate election this year.

Managing Xie's campaign is Joe Cascino, a 25-year-old consultant who spent a year in Mayor Kirk Watson's office and then managed Watson's successful reelection last year. But I wouldn't read too much into the association with Watson –– I don't expect the mayor to get involved against a colleague, particularly one he hasn't clashed with.

If somebody forwarded you this email, please consider subscribing to the newsletter by visiting the website.