Kathie Tovo runs for Texas House

I usually don't pay much attention to state legislative races, but I gotta make an exception for Kathie Tovo, one of the main characters of city politics in my time covering City Hall. This landed in my inbox this morning:

AUSTIN, TX - Today, Kathie Tovo, former Mayor Pro Tem and Austin City Council Member and former University of Texas lecturer, declared she was running for Texas State House of Representatives, District 49, to fill the district being vacated by Texas gubernatorial candidate Gina Hinojosa.

“The reason I’m running is simple: The government of Texas is destroying our state’s quality of life by attacking our constitutionally protected public schools, banning books and applying political purity tests to professors and teachers, and attacking the personal rights of all Texans who don’t agree with the Republican Party,” Tovo said.

These are all legit points that will probably land well with Austin Democratic primary voters. I think if Texas Democrats want to win back power they need to start raking the GOP over the coals on property taxes (yes, very high school district property taxes are a state policy choice) and Democrats in blue areas, including Austin, can play an important role in doing that. But that's a conversation for another day....

Tovo joins several other candidates in the Dem primary. There is Montserrat Garibay, a labor activist and Education Dept official in the Biden administration, who is endorsed by a number of local progressive elected officials, including Greg Casar and Wendy Davis. Josh Reyna, a longtime legislative staffer, and Steve Rivas, a local political consultant, are also candidates. Below is the district:

Tovo's campaign team will include Laura Hernandez, Jim Wick and David Butts. That's an interesting trio that reflects a reunification of sorts. Wick managed Tovo's 2011 campaign for Council but he and Hernandez later worked for Adler and have been closely associated with the pro-housing Council members who clashed with Tovo over land use policy. Butts, on the other hand, is one of the most influential figures in the rise of the "neighborhood" brand of environmentalism of the 90's and 2000's.

Zoning traditionally isn't an issue that comes up in state government but in the last two legislative sessions YIMBY advocates have gotten a number of bills passed that reduced the power of local governments to block new housing. Travis County's legislative delegation split on those votes. Hinojosa, who is tight with the anti-growth types locally, generally supported the city's right to restrict new housing.

We'll see if Tovo's housing and land use record comes up in the race at all. It's hardly the first issue people think about when they're voting for state legislature, but in a district like HD 49 (highly engaged, highly educated), there is a sizable minority of YIMBY-pilled Democratic primary voters (and donors) that a Tovo opponent would be foolish to overlook.

One argument for Tovo's candidacy that perhaps even her longtime adversaries in city politics might appreciate: she knows how to slow things down. In a GOP-run state, that's a particularly valuable quality in a Democratic legislator.

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