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A topic that has gotten a lot of attention over the last few weeks will be back in the spotlight this coming Monday, after city officials have finalized plans for a workshop on Short Term Rentals and Special Use Permits in residential areas. That workshop is now set for this coming Monday, the 15th, starting at 4pm, and will include City Council and members of the Planning and Zoning Commission, who will sit down to discuss the many sides that make up this complicated issue dealing with short term rentals of residential property. And while as a general rule, no public comment is taken during workshop meetings with Council, Mayor Bruce Boyer promised during the Council meeting earlier this week that this meeting would indeed be a chance for folks to share their thoughts on the topic. Again, that meeting is set for this coming Monday the 15th, starting at 4pm, in Council Chambers at City Hall. 

KGNB News has confirmed that the Baptist Health System has purchased a 56-acre tract of land here in New Braunfels, at the Town Center at Creekside location on FM 306 at I-35, and they plan to build a hospital at that location over the next 2 years. The details about their purchase and the plans for that new hospital system are still coming in, but Baptist Health System officials say it will be a full-service hospital, complete with an ER, labor and delivery rooms, and other acute care facilities. A timeline for breaking ground or construction has not yet been released, but the Baptist Health System says they hope to have the hospital complete and ready to open to the public in 2012. We’ll have many more details about this story tomorrow morning during the KGNB Morning Report and online at kgnb.am. 

Candidates running for office this May now know where they will appear on the ballot, after drawing were held yesterday morning for the school district elections to determine in which order those candidates will appear on the ballot.

In the Comal ISD, the only contested race is in Dist. 7 between incumbent Bill Swint and challenger Jeffrey Victor, and the ballot will read in that order, with Swint listed first and Victor listed second. The other race, in Dist. 6, had only 1 candidate, incumbent David Spencer, who automatically wins reelection.

In the NBISD: There was also 1 uncontested race, in Dist. 4, where Joe Hassman automatically wins the seat. But the other races are all contested. In Dist. 1, Keith Smith is listed first on the ballot followed by Jay Patrick in the second position. And in the at-large race: There are 2 at-large seats up for grabs, and 6 candidates, each trying to be one of the top 2 vote-getters in the May election, which is all it takes to win one of those 2 seats. And when NBISD voters go to the polls, they’ll see Joe Castilleja’s name listed first, followed by Priscilla Segovia, Rob Johnson, Judy Graves in the 4th position, incumbent Mae Ruth Meyer is listed 5th, and Greg Sofran will be listed last on the ballot.

And don’t forget, there’s also a contested race for New Braunfels City Council this May. The Dist. 2 City Council race features incumbent Mark Goodner against fellow Dist. 2 resident Richard LaRochelle. The order on the ballot for that race will be drawn later today at City Hall. Dist. 1 incumbent Richard Zapata did not draw an opponent, and he automatically wins reelection to his 2nd term in office. 

The two opposing sides to the County Justice Center funding argument are now starting up their formal campaigns, trying to win voters to their side, in the hopes of winning the upcoming May 8th Special election that will decide if Commissioner’s Court can move forward with issuing debt to fund the construction of a 36-million dollar Justice Center in the heart of downtown New Braunfels. And both sides say that they have been organizing their efforts, and are getting ready to formally file the right paperwork in order to form PAC’s or Political Action Committees, which allow them to legally raise campaign funds, and then spend those funds on campaign signs, stickers, advertisements, and other marketing materials, all in an effort to win more voters to their side.

Of course, the idea behind the Justice Center comes from County Commissioner’s Court. But the county cannot actively campaign for or against the issue. They can only try to disseminate the facts behind their proposal. But that doesn’t stop private citizens from forming a PAC in support of the Commissioner’s plans. And Comal County Judge Danny Scheel says that while an official Political Action Committee has not yet been formed, he’s heard of a lot of interest to do so. Commissioners Court, and their supporters, argue that the Justice Center project is badly needed, for a variety of reasons ranging from the need to relieve overcrowding inside too few courtrooms at the existing courthouse annex to providing better courthouse security in order to meet standards set out by the Texas Commission on Jail Standards.

On the other side of the issue are those that oppose the Commissioner’s plan. A successful petition effort collected more than 65-hundred signatures, forcing this vote in the first place, and one of the organizers of that petition effort, Ken Valentine, says, they too have not yet filed their formal paperwork, his group is also planning on putting together their own Political Action Committee opposing the Commissioner’s plans for a Justice Center downtown. And Valentine says that while the official PAC isn’t created yet, they have launched a website for voters to learn more about their arguments. That site is http://comalcountyjusticecenterplanb.com

The Justice Center issue, which has been the focus of a lot of attention for months now, promises to become the hot-button political issue of the May election cycle, and as those official Political Action Committees are formed, we’ll have updates for you here on AM 1420 and online at kgnb.am.