Lakeway mayor: As holidays wrap up, more big things planned for 2023
The holiday season is upon us, and I hope you’re looking forward to it as much as I am. First of all, thank you to everyone who came out to our Lights On ceremony this month. It was another successful event put on by our Parks & Recreation team. Santa and Mrs. Claus made another appearance in Lakeway to speak to quite a few good little boys and girls that evening, as well as to turn on the Trail of Lights for the remainder of the year just behind City Hall. It was such a great turnout and a wonderful evening. We’ll have another lighting ceremony this month with the lighting of the menorah for Hanukkah, which will take place for eight nights starting the evening of Dec. 18 just across from the Justice Complex at the corner of Cross Creek and Lohmans Crossing Road. If you’re interested in attending any of those evenings, feel free to email us at info@lakeway-tx.gov. And finally, we invite you to the Swim Center on Friday, Dec. 30 at 9 a.m. for the Polar Plunge. It’s a free event to help wash away 2022 and usher in the new year by taking a ride down the slide into the leisure pool. There will be some holiday treats and a chance to take a picture with the Lakeway Polar Bear. Visit our website (Lakeway-tx.gov) for more information.
While we’ve had some great festive events lately, your Lakeway City Council has also been busy these past few months with several other matters. Lakeway residents recently overwhelmingly passed a transportation bond that the City Council worked on for several months to put together. This $17.5 million bond will help with some much-needed improvements to our transportation infrastructure, including resurfacing work on some of our major local roads, culvert improvements, a few new traffic lights and new connectivity options. We will continue to discuss next steps in our upcoming council meetings.
Last month, your council participated in a groundbreaking ceremony for the new Town Center in development along Lohmans Crossing Road just across from The Hills entrance. This property is known as The Square at Lohmans, and will include several residential units, retail and restaurants, and a large park with a pavilion. Two other major developments will also be going into the area to complete the center of Lakeway, which will also include more residential units and a large greenspace area just west of H-E-B. Additionally, we will have a full Main Street and Lohmans Spur connection in that area over the course of the next year or two to help better connect our community. You’ll see more discussions about the developments into the new year.
As the new year does approach, a big change will take effect for those who have a golf cart. The City Council recently passed a revision to an ordinance that will allow golf carts to operate on some of our public roads, even if you are not going to a golf course. However, there are several items your golf cart will need to have starting in January, including a slow-moving emblem and state-issued license plate. We have a checklist of the items you will need, along with links to help you out, and rules you will need to follow on our website (Lakeway-tx.gov). For convenience, you can go directly to the webpage: Lakeway-tx.gov/golfcarts.
Finally, the holiday season means many things to each of us, but we can all agree on a central theme – it is a season of giving. Lakeway has always been a community willing to give their time, treasure and talent to helping others. We have dozens of volunteers who help the city on a variety of projects, whether it’s helping with our many events like the Fourth of July celebration, National Night Out or Witches Ride, or simply helping at the front desk at City Hall. Our many committees are staffed by volunteers in the community. Everyone who serves on the City Council is also a volunteer. On Dec. 1, we honored these volunteers at a special reception. We handed out three volunteer awards, and a special community partner award. Congratulations to the Lake Travis Community Library for winning our 2022 Community Partner award. Additionally, congratulations to city volunteer Kay Andrews for winning the Lifetime Achievement award, David Roos for winning the Unsung Hero award, and Ron Massa for receiving the Volunteer of the Year award. I invite you to once again visit our website to read more about our winners. They are all very deserving of these honors, so I hope you can join me in congratulating them. And thank you to our many city volunteers. We greatly appreciate everything you do for our community.
In closing, I hope you and your family have a wonderful holiday season!
Tom Kilgore is the mayor of Lakeway.
This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Lakeway mayor: As holidays wrap up, more big things planned for 2023
