Zo touts rent drops in reelection announcement
Deep Dives
Explore related topics with these Wikipedia articles, rewritten for enjoyable reading:
-
YIMBY
13 min read
The article centers on pro-development housing policies and the debate between supply-side housing advocates and their critics. Understanding the YIMBY (Yes In My Backyard) movement provides essential context for the policy battles over parking requirements, occupancy limits, and missing middle housing that Qadri champions.
-
Missing middle housing
11 min read
The article specifically mentions 'missing-middle options' as a key housing reform. This urban planning concept—housing types between single-family homes and large apartment buildings—is central to understanding the land use changes Austin is implementing to increase housing supply.
-
Rent regulation
15 min read
The article's core claim is that Austin rents fell 10% due to supply-side policies rather than rent control. Understanding the economics and history of rent regulation provides valuable context for evaluating the competing approaches to housing affordability debated by Qadri and his opponents.
Zo Qadri has announced he is running for reelection next year for District 9. This is no surprise, of course. Qadri’s prodigious fundraising since his election in 2022 has made clear that he didn’t plan on being a one-hit wonder.
A couple things to note about D9:
- It's the only district unambiguously located in Central Austin
- It's got a major student population
- It's the only district where Prop Q passed.
Qadri has some pretty strong fundamentals in his favor. In addition to the big financial edge, he has incumbency, which no longer carries much weight in national/state partisan races but remains a major factor in down ballot nonpartisan races.
If Prop Q passed among the minority of D9 residents who are engaged enough to show up for an odd-year election, then Qadri has even less to fear from the 2026 midterm electorate, many of whom will be young renters entirely oblivious to the local debate about property taxes.
In contrast, one cannot provide the same reassurance to Paige Ellis and Ryan Alter, whose districts voted 74% and 64%, respectively, against Prop Q.
Furthermore, Qadri has a coherent story to tell about city spending. First, unlike some of his colleagues, he wasn't caught doing dumb shit with his city credit card. Second, he was the only member of Council last year who voted against the fiscally reckless police contract. It's been funny how conservatives have suggested this will hurt him. Why? The median Austin voter wants the police department to exist, but they don't want to blow the entire budget on it and they definitely don't equate public safety with the police union's agenda.
Qadri, who was elected to City Council with very little prior involvement in local issues, is still far from a policy wonk. He is pretty quiet on the dais and when he speaks, his remarks or questions appear to be prepared. While he is not known to get into the weeds of policy, his name has been on some important land use changes, such as the elimination of parking requirements and occupancy limits. He has good staff.
So far he has two declared opponents: Ard Ardalan and Rich Heyman. Both are making left-coded arguments against the pro-development policies embraced by this City Council to bolster housing supply. Both of them are otherwise progressive — Heyman was actually fired from his position as a UT lecturer over ...
This excerpt is provided for preview purposes. Full article content is available on the original publication.