Austin voters select new City Council members
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Voters in Austin City Council Districts 2, 4, 6, 7 and 10 headed to the polls Tuesday to select their council members.
Why it matters: The City Council determines the city budget, sets the city's property tax rate and oversees city operations.
District 2: Vanessa Fuentes, the incumbent who was named elected official of the year by the National Association of Social Workers, cruised to re-election in this southeast district with more than 85.6% of the vote, per unofficial election results. She ran against Robert Reynolds, who has previously run for office as a Republican.
District 4: José "Chito" Vela, an immigration attorney who is the incumbent in this north-central district, won against community organizer Monica Guzmán and three other candidates with roughly 58.5% of the vote.
District 6: Krista Laine, co-founder of Access Education RRISD, which fought right-wing control of Round Rock public schools, narrowly beat Mackenzie Kelly, a Republican who is the incumbent in this northwestern district.
- Laine grabbed 51.6% of the vote compared to Kelly's 48.4% in Travis County.
- District 6 also covers a sliver of Williamson County, where Laine held a 51% advantage over Kelly's 48.9% with 15 of 16 precincts reporting as of 6am.
District 7: Mike Siegel, a former Democratic congressional candidate and civil rights lawyer, is headed to a December runoff against civil rights attorney Gary Bledsoe to represent this north-central district. Incumbent Leslie Pool couldn't run again because of term limits.
- Siegel led with 39.8% of the vote compared to Bledsoe's 19.3%
District 10: Marc Duchen, a consultant who opposes city reforms to encourage housing density, narrowly defeated Ashika Ganguly, a former Austin public school teacher who is the legislative director for state Rep. John Bucy (D-Austin).
- Duchen held on to nearly 50.6% of the vote, compared to Ganguly's 49.4%.
- Incumbent Alison Alter decided not to run for a third term in this northwest Austin district.