austin skate notes

Travis Burke has been floating ollies at Round Rock over the past couple of days. He’s taking this semester off from college so he can MC a contest Mike Crum is organizing at the Allen skate park. According to Burkle, Crum has secured Busch beer as a sponsor and is offering to pay Travis $200 to MC along with an ice chest full of Busch that also says ‘Busch’ on the side. Travis confided to me that he would have actually driven up there just for the ice chest.

Saturday’s breastfeeding expo at Republic Square Park was a huge success. Area mothers gathered to perform a synchronized ‘latch-on’ at 11:00 AM as mothers across the US gathered to increase breastfeeding awareness. Austin’s gathering next to Saturday’s farmer’s market consisted of 103 babies, which could be the largest breastfeeding gathering in the US.

Tonight’s HR booking at Stubb’s Jr. recalls an often-repeated story I had heard about one of his first visits to Austin where the DC performer burned the Big Boys frontman, Biscuit, who was exhibiting some true Austin hospitality. Here’s a copy-and-paste of the story from this site.

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The other day while I was cleaning out some old files, I came across some letters Kevin Mouton had forwarded to my skate zine back in the early nineties. Kevin and Adam Young had been skating in their high school parking lot when two men attacked them with brass knuckles. The two teenaged skateboarders were beaten unconscious without any provocation whatsoever. That was pretty commonplace in the Lake Charles, LA area back then. During the time I spent there, one of the most frequently-asked questions in public seemed to be, “You want some shit?!?” From my experience, there just didn’t seem to be a right answer to that one.

The letters were from a district attorney informing Kevin and Adam of the punishment received by their attackers. It seems oddly coincidental that these two letters would pop up in the midst of the Jena 6 and Hot Springs 6 protests. Though it hasn’t captured as much attention, skateboarders are gathering today in Hot Springs, AR, to protest the
YouTube-publicized police choking of a 13-year-old skateboarder on Go Skateboarding Day.

As this age of quarrel continues, James Juneau just won’t quit inventing new abuses for the coping in Round Rock. Now he’s got low-to-high ollies to smith grinds into birdbath. Round Rock night sessions are wow.

The turnout at the skatepark closure meeting this morning was substantial. Every TV station I could think of was there. Oh, and there were a lot of skateboarders as well. A few brought the attitude that the city needs to shut the hell up, pick up the trash, and open the skatepark. But most had a positive, we’re-here-to-help, perspective.

Parks and Recreation Director, Rick Atkins, led the meeting with a presentation outlining the city’s plans for addressing some of the pain points.

• More trash cans are on the way
• The pavillion behind the bowl will be demolished
• A playscape for children will be built next to the skatepark to attract families to the area
• A gate will be installed in the south fence
• Increased police presence
• City law banning cigarettes and alcohol consumption at skatepark
• Water fountains to be installed

Some clarifications were made by RR city staffers. The recreation center bathrooms are available to skaters, but they need to leave their skateboards at the front desk where they’ll be watched so they don’t get stolen. The 11:00 PM light shut-off is on the to-do list for getting a warning flasher added.

While it sucks that that the city sent out such a negative press release emphasizing the 115 police calls to the skatepark, it is up to the skateboarders to rescue this situation. We’re going to have to police our own scene and make sure people who act the fool don’t screw it up for the rest of us. We’re also going to have to pick up trash that careless people have left behind. If each of us grabbed two water bottles off the grass on our way out, this would be a non-issue.

Round Rock will keep the park closed for the week since it’s closure on Saturday. Already 9 people have been arrested for tresspassing. Barge at your own peril. 

News 8 Austin has a story about the meeting and a poll asking if the city is over-reacting. Check the comments on the poll. Here’s their actual coverage of the meeting (thanks to Scott for posting the video).

Skaters and skateboard sympathizers living in Williamson County have the opportunity right now to help get a skatepark built in their area. Although it’s not mentioned on the Williamson County Bond website, there is $300,000 included in the Parks bond package for building a skatepark in their regional county park. Since Cedar Park bailed on building a skatepark due to oldsters complaining about teenagers invading their neighborhood parks, they kicked $125,000 to the county, which will boost the budget to $425,000 if voters approve this bond. Early voting is taking place now through Friday and all you have to do is show up at any Williamson County polling station with your drivers license if you’re a registered voter.

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This past winter skaters and bmx’ers attended public input meetings to lobby for public skatepark funds to be included in the next city bond. Having already convinced Travis County commissioners and voters to allocate $500,000 in last year’s county bond election, the momentum was in force for the city bond lobbying campaign. This vocal crowd showed up with such force at each of the input meetings, that city staffers asked leaders of the Austin Public Skatepark Action Committee to limit their speakers to just a few advocates. Frequently, people who were attending the meetings in support of other issues like the downtown public library would dedicate a portion of their speeches to supporting the skatepark campaign.

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Perhaps fearing for his safety, ex-Mayor Bruce Todd enlisted two APD officers to escort him to August’s public input meeting at City Hall where he promoted his case for a law requiring all adult bicyclists to wear helmets. He rallied perhaps 20 people to make emotional pleas that a helmet law would save lives or at a minimum reduce health care costs for the city. The City Council chose not to act on his proposed legislation.

Now Todd is back and he’s signed up current Mayor Will Wynn to make it happen. Wynn and Todd have convinced doctors at Brackenridge and Seton hospitals to keep a running tally of how many people are admitted with head injuries suffered while riding bicycles. They will also track over the next 12 months the costs of these injuries and whether or not each patient was wearing a helmet.

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