As I look back on 2025, the strongest emotion I feel is gratitude. This has been a year of real progress for Rally Austin, where we have grown our team and began to demonstrate impact via our projects. We are also ending the year with three incredible milestones that together set a new tone for our partnership with the community and with the City of Austin. On December 11th, the city council approved the following 3 items:
Austin City Council’s approval of the Place Based Enhancement Agreement for Blocks 16 and 18 on East 11th Street stands out as a win! After decades of community advocacy, the African American Cultural Heritage District, with the leadership of the Urban Renewal Board of the City Austin, this economic development project aims to achieve affordability, local business opportunity, and preserve cultural identity. The redevelopment will deliver cultural arts space, affordable condominiums, live and work townhomes, culturally focused public art and commercial restaurant space. The approval of the Place Based Enhancement application allows access to bond funding interest rates lower than what would be available without the credit enhancement. This allows the project to proceed working to assemble the capital stack to move the project forward. I am grateful momentum continues on E. 11th.
Council’s approval of new leaders to the Rally Austin Board adds further momentum. These new appointments reinforce Rally’s multi-sector governance approach where community representation and industry experience work side by side to support thoughtful project oversight and organizational strategy during an important moment of growth. I want to extend a warm welcome to all of our 2025 board additions: Genesis Gavino (City of Austin), Tam Hawkins (DECA-Diverse Ethnic Chamber Association), Davon Barbour (Austin Downtown Alliance), Deletta Dean (City of Austin), Angel Vales Lara (Austin ISD) and Sara Vanderbeek (Arts Commission). These voices will join our Rally board members who have already brought momentum and oversight, to help guide Rally’s next phase and ensure that our work continues to reflect both lived experience and best practices in real estate, development and community centered work. I am grateful for each of our hard-working, committed board members!
Finally, Council’s support for the amendment to the interlocal agreement represents a significant strengthening of the foundation between Rally and the City. The updated agreement better aligns authorities and expectations for development, project financing and public private partnerships and is specifically designed to improve project execution through greater efficiency and accountability. I am grateful for the year ahead to finalize an updated interlocal agreement with our partners at the City of Austin.
The close of 2025 marks a milestone for our organization. Rally Austin has now been in existence for five years and I am very proud of the foundation we have built for long-term stability of the organization. When Rally began, our mandate was straightforward in language but complex in implementation. We were created to protect what makes Austin special while ensuring that development continues to produce economic and community benefits. The first five years were the foundation stage of our organizational roadmap where we were charged with establishing an agency that could be financially independent, while simultaneously executing program and project delivery to build a revenue generating asset portfolio and operationalizing a program of work with the community.
Part of reaching this moment comes from the way our board has activated throughout 2025. They have helped refine Rally’s long-term direction with a focus on the next 20 months and they have supported a development strategy that positions Rally to secure the resources needed to reach organizational sustainability and then deepen long term community impact. The realistic roadmap for the coming years reflects a shift from building structure into managing assets, negotiating property transfers with public partners, managing and acquiring sites for development and eventually achieving full autonomy including Rally’s first independent bond issuance.
The next chapter for Rally Austin begins immediately when the calendar turns. 2026 will be the beginning of our expansion era and there is already tremendous momentum behind it.
We are preparing for a significant year of community investment. We are honored that City of Austin Board and Commissions and creative and cultural organizations throughout the city have already expressed support for Rally’s 2026 bond proposal which is designed to protect creative infrastructure, expand affordable commercial and residential space and deliver community driven developments across the city.
This is possible because the last five years have allowed us to build the structure that makes public and philanthropic investment work together rather than separately. We now have the ability to package donor partnership opportunities at both the program and project level which will help retain cultural spaces, strengthen complete communities and support iconic and legacy development opportunities across the region – giving philanthropists a chance to co-invest in innovative ways with Rally Austin.
At the same time Rally will continue to grow our asset and project portfolio. We will identify the next catalytic projects that align with affordability, cultural preservation, and local economic development and community identity. And throughout that work we will continue to collaborate in partnership with the City of Austin, private sector partners, local businesses and community leaders who understand that protecting the character of this city is not sentimental. It is smart economic stewardship and the right thing to do.
I close this message with sincere appreciation and gratitude. Austin is navigating financial pressure, and it is no secret that the city has been required to make hard decisions in the face of reduced federal resources.
I am incredibly grateful for the experience of working with the Rally Austin team, our Board, the City of Austin and the many artists, community activists, business owners and organizations that have chosen to stand behind a movement that says growth can honor our past.
We enter 2026 with gratitude, confidence and a renewed sense of purpose. Rally Austin is here to work side by side with partners across the city and the region to protect the authenticity of Austin, to support the affordability required to keep our talent and our legacy here and to continue building a model of development that truly reflects our values. I look forward to the year ahead and I invite you to stay engaged with Rally and to find the right moment to participate in this movement that is bigger than any single project. We are grateful for this next chapter and look forward to working with you in the year ahead!
With sincere gratitude,
Theresa
