I moved to Austin, in what would later become District 9, over 21 years ago. Having grown up the youngest of three boys in a single mother household, I immediately fell in love with this city’s quality of life from the trail around Lady Bird Lake (then Town Lake) to the live music scene Downtown. Austin was my first real experience with abundance after having watched my mother raise us amazingly while working two or more jobs underpaying jobs throughout my childhood.
While most UT students spent their time exclusively on the Forty Acres and maybe on West Campus or East Riverside, I didn’t want to limit myself to that college experience. I was routinely the person checking out new restaurants in Austin, swimming at Barton Springs or getting a haircut on the East Side. That same sense of discovery and abundance drove me to pursue entrepreneurship and create Localeur which started in Austin almost a decade ago and has sent more than 7 million travelers to local businesses both here and in 200 cities around the world since.
Austin is still a place with so much abundance, but latency and a lack of leadership on key issues around housing and equity, in particular, have forced more and more Austinites to become burdened with housing costs and lose one of the key ingredients that makes this city special: affordability.
I am running for Austin City Council because we need someone representing District 9 who will listen, who will collaborate, who will be a problem solver, and who will lead when needed not through politics but through community.
My track record of serving Austin spans time from 2010 through 2013 as vice chair of the Austin Music Commission, where I helped designate Red River as a cultural District and updated the sound ordinance, to the Downtown Commission, where I was an early advocate for the role density can play in fostering affordability and reducing car dependency. My commitment has included service on the board of directors of AIDS Services of Austin for eight years, including chairing it’s largest-ever non-Walk fundraising event, and helping to open the city’s only dental clinic focused on serving people affected by HIV and AIDS. More recently, from 2014-21, I served on the board of directors for Austin PBS, including on its executive committee during critical discussions that led to the phenomenal partnership with Austin Community College. And for the last five years, I have served on the board for ZACH Theatre, including two years chairing it’s Membership Committee where I led efforts to bring several new people of color, millennials and LGBTQ professionals onto the board.
Even beyond these official roles, I have been a tireless community advocate and builder whether placing fellow millennials on nonprofit boards, working with Travis County Judge Andy Brown to help tens of thousands of our neighbors get COVID-19 vaccines, delivering water and food to Austinites in the aftermath of Winter Storm Uri alongside Austin Justice Coalition, speaking out on social justice and equity issues impacting the Black community and entrepreneurs, or raising funds for Project Transitions, Inc., an affordable housing effort that has contributed to the citywide effort to support our unhoused population.
Creativity, collaboration, leadership, problem solving, and tenacity are just a few of the core attributes Austin can count on me to bring to City Hall. I’ve demonstrated these qualities time and time again and it’s why I have the most diverse and robust coalition of supporters from nonprofit leaders like Paul Scott, the CEO of Health Alliance for Austin Musicians, Eugene Sepulveda of the Entrepreneurs Foundation and Colin Wallis, CEO of Austin Parks Foundation, business leaders like Leslie Wingo (Sanders\Wingo), Mark McClain (Sailpoint), Beau Armstrong (Stratus Properties) and Brett Hurt, the founder of Bazaarvoice and data.world, restauranteurs such as Jessica Sanders (DrinkWell), C.K. Chin (Wu Chow), and Philip Speer (Comedor), and politically engaged leaders like Chas Moore (Austin Justice Coalition), Erin Gurak (former District Director for Rep. Lloyd Doggett) and Dr. Kevin Michael Foster, AISD Board Trustee.
I bring the acumen, energy and solution-orientation desperately needed in District 9 and I bring it not out of political ambition, but out of community mindedness.
In a crowded field of City Council candidates in D9, the choice for the 2022 election remains as clear as the day I filed. Vote Joah Spearman for District 9.
Please support me for Austin City Council, District 9. Early voting starts Monday, October 24, running weekdays through Friday, Nov. 4 and Election Day is Tuesday, Nov. 8.