The Ronald McDonald House is like others in that it houses families of children and children in order to help improve their health and well-being. For the cost of $10 per night people are able to spend the night in one of the 30 rooms in the Ronald McDonald House across from the hospital. At the House they are striving to provide access for families to children and vice-versa. It also is a positive place to be somewhere people can go. Mr. Burress started off not knowing much about LEED and about going green, but learned throughout the construction process and is now almost an expert. The project began in 2003 and construction began in 2006 with a budget of 9.3 million and the project was completed in 2007 with a total of 11.3 million in costs. When the project began there were only 9 to 12 LEED platinum projects so a lot of research had to be done. The Ronald McDonald House was the first LEED Platinum facility in Austin and the third in all of Texas. I learned how you are able to receive points in order to get rating points under LEED. It was amazing how everything big and small, from the outside, which was made up of recycled steel, fly ash concrete, and cultured stone, to the inside with solar powered water in bathroom sinks, was Green. I think that the House is really an example in demonstrating what is possible and what can be done. The House was completely Green and that's why it received a LEED Platinum rating.
The Ronald McDonald House is formaldehyde free. Storm water is captured and reused. There are sensors to measure humidity. They have all Energy star appliances. The House has a white roof and has solar panels. They are efficient in every way possible and these are a few examples of that. I learned about the key room switch which is when the guest enters their room the energy essentially has to be "turned on". Each guestroom has a unit that is an unoccupied mode unless a room key is inserted in the wall.
Mueller
The speaker at Mueller graduated with a degree in Public Relations from UT and went straight to Catellus. At Mueller we learned about the development of a new community in Austin that was previously the Robert Mueller Municipal Airport. There are currently 600 homes sold there and 440 apartment units with 80% being currently leased. When Mueller is finished developing the 700 acres they are hoping to have 4900 homes and 10,000 residents along with 10,000 workers. 15,000 trees are going to be planted and there is going to be 140 acres designated to the parks around the perimeter. 25% of the housing is low income housing being distributed through a shared appreciation program. The homes are very dense with very little yard, but no house is farther than 600 feet from green space. It is great that the homes are blended together so a $200,000 home might be next to a $1,000,000 home. To live in Mueller Austin residents will have to be LEED certified as well as certified by Austin Energy. Residential areas will have to have 3 star ratings and commercial must have at least a 2 star rating. Some in Mueller have been examples for others by going above and beyond such as Home Depot getting a 4 star rating and Chipotle getting solar panels on their roof. Homes can also have solar panels. Mueller was very unique because I have never seen a community like it in person before. It was interesting to see that so many people will actually live in these houses so close together, but with the parks they have a small town, friendly, neighborhood feel even being in Austin.Judy Fort: Rural Economic Development Representative, Central Texas & Coastal Bend Region
She is in charge of helping many people with their problems. The towns often neglect to make real plans for the future and when they do they do not stick to it. In Texas, 20% of people are actually living in the rural areas and 80% in the urban, but more people are moving to rural areas. Broadband is also helping to change the rural areas by making it possible for people to work in rural areas. Texas wants their main businesses to include aerospace, advanced technology, biotechnology, energy, computer technology, petroleum and refining, but most of these companies aren't what is moving to the rural areas. The rural areas are distribution centers and small businesses. It's funny that the rural towns are wanting to spend their only money on industrial parks when they have no reason for it currently. Economic developers work with locals. In rural economies the people can tax themselves up in order to get money for people to use to start small businesses or to bring in new businesses to make the economic base larger. There are different rules with tax dollars such as 30 people have to be employed and more than half have to be originally from that town and have to be employed at least a few years, etc. The Texas Capital fund helps businesses to expand and set up infrastructure and even offers a zero interest loan. I have not studied Texas rural vs. urban population density and tax benefits of rural communities before so everything was new and interesting.Sherri Gothart: Program Coordinator, Certified Retirement Communities
Mrs. Gothart briefly talked about the GO TEXAN Certified Retirement Community Program which is helping to bring retiring baby boomers to small communities in Texas such as Big Springs and Cuero. There are also 32 communities currently in the program. I had never heard about this and did not realize Texas was in the top couple of states that give retirees a place to call home every year. Obviously marketing to baby boomers is smart and will continue to work for Texas. I did not know such a large number of people move to Texas everyday, 1000-1300. I also learned that 400,000 retirees move every year.Seaholm Power, LLC
At Seaholm it was interesting to learn about everything that is being developed and especially about the City of Austin Power Plant. The new shopping mall will be so unique and will be an awesome place to hold events. It's going to be a new urban area. There will even be huge sidewalks with lots of people eating outside at restaurants. The $180 million project is being financed by 30% equity and 70% loans. They are not sure if this traditional model will even work. They are receiving some tax credits because the Power Plant will soon be a historic site. Unfortunately a lot of work has had to be done to get it to where it is today and will probably end up taking at least a few more years before the mall is finished. They are currently behind their time schedule for the high rise living, but hopefully soon it will be up and will provide space for living and enjoying Austin. It was really cool to see where the huge turbines were previously and look at the building and realize how much work it actually takes to make a place like that become something truly new and unique.Lance Morris of the Weitzman Group at Hill Country Galleria
We also visited a retail and office complex/mall located in Bee Cave, TX. Hill Country is 100 acres of land and it is currently almost 70% occupied in the retail/1st floor spaces and 55% occupied in the office space. Some large companies in the retail spaces are Dillards, Barnes and Noble, and Banana Republic. For the most part, they have 5 year leases. The mall first opened when the economy was going into a slump and ten banks had loans out on the property. Then when it was time to refinance no banks would do it and they had to foreclose. Bank of America had the biggest investment and took it back over. 2 principals within REIT Management and a UT law professor bought the property for half the price of the actual cost. To have a large retail area like this open it is necessary to have 150,000 people within a 5 mile radius, but currently there are only 100,000 within this area. These 100,000 make up for it a little bit because of their large disposable income. I thought it was unique that they had office spaces above the retail stores. I have not seen that before and it is extra square footage that is able to bring in additional income. This is a great case to show that real estate can be very risky and some times you need to back up your losses and leave and some times you take big risks and they turn out successful.
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