Is Austin a good place to raise kids? We cant decide whether to accept a relo - help! (Round Rock: to rent, townhome)

[jobert]

There are 3 "inflatable places" within a couple of miles from me - Jumpy Gym, Going Bananas, and another one off of S.Congress/Slaughter. There is also one at Westgate/Cannon further out west. I guess the southside is more kid friendly.

[capcat]

Originally Posted by hoffdano

What is an inflatable place? Is that one of those things people rent for kids parties where they jump around inside a "room?"

Would parents say something like "Honey, that town has everything we need for our family: safety, affordable housing, good schools, clean air and water but they don't have any inflatable places. I guess we'll scratch that city off our list."

I know. However do parents manage to raise children without one.

[Melissa78703]

Originally Posted by lynnsl

Like what? We would love to hear about the ridiculous amount of things to do with kids!

Re: location, we are looking at the west/southwest/Bee Cave area.

Wonderful area for a family! I don't intend to have children, but if I did, that's exactly where I'd look. Very pretty scenery, too. I think you'll be very happy there. Eanes ISD is one of the nation's best, too.

[jobert]

Another thing about the zoo situation - the SA zoo and Seaworld are about 60-90 minutes from my house. If they were 3 miles away, would I go more than once a year? Probably not. If they were 3 miles from my house, would it still cost than $150 to take our family? Probably. I don't see the big deal. I lived 45 minutes away from Cowboy Stadium, I'm a huge fan - I only went maybe once a year. Is that a legitimate reason to live in Dallas? Not really. I like the people I'm surrounded by in Austin, that's a legitimate reason to live somewhere.

[TexasHorseLady]

Dang, I raised two kids to adulthood in Austin with NO inflatable places! How on earth did I manage it?

As for zoos, there's the San Antonio Zoo and the zoo in Waco (a really nice one) for those every year or two trips to the zoo. Somehow, though, even living in Barton Hills just minutes from downtown Austin, the kids never lacked for something to do (quite the contrary, they were busy most of the time, I had to make sure they had some "down time" to just hang around and think about things).

Surprisingly enough, none of it included inflatable places. What WERE we thinking? (Can't remember any inflatable places when I was growing up, either, come to think of it, even in Dallas!)

[Melissa78703]

Originally Posted by TexasHorseLady

Dang, I raised two kids to adulthood in Austin with NO inflatable places! How on earth did I manage it?

LOL! My parents wouldn't even allow me in an "inflatable place" when I was a kid--too dangerous, with all of the other kids bouncing around.

I would hope that Austin's claim to family-friendly fame isn't that it has a lot of inflatable places. That would be truly depressing. There's a lot of fun stuff for kiddos, from yoga for children, pottery-making classes for children, Suzuki music schools, and the Children's museum isn't too shabby. Lots of kid-oriented restaurants and cafes, and Zilker Park (the train) is masses of fun.

I thought we had a tiny petting zoo somewhere south of the city ... we don't??

[mimimomx3]

Originally Posted by hoffdano

I think this is a very misleading statement. Most bonds that are issued and put up for voter approval are related to schools. Any school district with growing enrollment will have to fund new construction and that is done through bonds.

Voters DO defeat bonds - as Round Rock voters did just a few years ago for a very poorly built $300M bond package.

As for Austin itself - I don't think bonds/taxes are any more common than any other Texas city with growing needs.

The first light rail project in Austin, over ten years ago, was soundly defeated because of the poor economics of the proposal.

Overall, tax rates (sales, property) in Austin are comparable to those in other Texas cities.

Personally, and that's all I can do- give my opinion- there is a lot of waste in education spending in AISD. Too many administrators, too many special programs, too much money going to things that aren't directly relating to education. Ever increasing budgets, even in periods of growth, is not invevitable, in fact it is irresponsible.

Round Rock voters DID reject bonds, and so they should. Austin voters are not quite so discenrning. Austin SHOULD have voted down light rail, but no, the ever expanding city council repackaged and slithered it right down our throats...and for what? 80 riders a day?

In a recession, or actually a DEPRESSION, taxes should be going down. That's what I meant in my comment to the OP- Austin is not an economically conservative town. I'm just trying to avoid her frustration if this is an important issue for her.

[kaenhu]

Originally Posted by lynnsl

I didnt say anything about worrying about Austin being too liberal to raise kids in general... I said we were worried about it being too liberal for US. Every family has their own beliefs and values...at least I think that's the way it's supposed to work. Part of our value system is to respect people of all walks, races, politics, etc. (By the way, we are a minority family). But part of our value system is also to raise our kids according to certain core beliefs we have. And we want them around teachers, students, and families that share some of the more important core beliefs. We are Christian, so that is important to us. We are patriotic about our country, President, troops, etc...so that is important to us. At the right time, we want our kids to understand about all kinds of social lifestyles, etc...but ideally not in elementary schools, so that is important to us.

Hello,

This is my first post here. Our family has a lot in common with yours so I thought I'd post. My hubby and I both went to UT and loved it. We both said that we'd come back to Austin to raise a family after we were done with our job training (that had to be done in other cities). We are also a minority (biracial--Black/Asian) Christ-following family. Honestly, we weren't thinking at all about raising children here--we wanted to come back because we had a great time in Austin.

We moved back here 11 years ago when our first child was 2 months old. We nearly forgot that UT was here for the first 5 years. We got busy with raising kids, finding a church home, looking into school options, making new friends and doing a lot of other stuff that new families and new parents do everywhere else. So I can definitely say that while UT and the college thing is big in Austin, you can avoid it when you are in suburbia. Easily.

We see a lot of different types of people here--people from other countries, people from different races, and a handful of other biracial families. I consider myself politically moderate with some left leaning ideas, but definitely with Christian/Biblical core values, which we try to instill in our kids. Most of our friends are from our church, and they are all over the spectrum, most being a lot like me (because let's face it--most people make friends with people that they have stuff in common with) to being way more left to being way more right. It is no big deal. I do think there are just all sorts in Austin and it is not hard to find your niche if you put in a little bit of effort. And if you are planning on living in Westlake or SW Austin, it will be a cinch.

On the racial side, I have loved being a minority here in Austin and I love even more being a biracial family here. I have gotten really spoiled--strangers in the stores or on the streets tell me that my kids are beautiful all the time. We do not get that when we go to Dallas or Houston or even San Antonio. While I think that Texans are friendly in general, I do feel that Austinites are more friendly than even Texas friendly. I feel that race is just not a big deal here. As a minority, you might have had the experience where you feel very "not white". My hubby and I used to live in a city (not in TX) where everywhere we went, people stared at us as if we had wings and a tail. I don't feel that way at all in Austin. We're just us and it's all cool.

Kid-friendly activities? We love the kite festival at Zilker, and we have gone to some of those summer Shakespeare in the park things, plus my husband has taken the kids to a symphony in the park thing, also in the summer. We have gone to a bunch of those folk art festival things, Pecan Street festival and a few other small ones around town. There is a Pow-Wow in South Austin every year and we went one year and it was really fun. We went to a Chinese New Year thing that they had up in North Austin--dragon dance, Asian fashion show, and of course lots of great Asian food. At Christmas time, we've enjoyed the Armadillo Christmas Bazaar and the Trail of Lights. Those are the "special" events that we have participated in, and if you buy one of those Austin Events calendars, you will see that there are a ton of things just about every week and weekend. Reggae music festival, family-friendly hip hop weekend, etc.

That may sound kind of lame compared to aquariums and theme parks and the like, but that is what our family does and our kids generally have a great time. Like one poster said, there are a lot of things to do in Austin, but they are more on the scale of simple family type activities and more on the outdoors side.

Most weekends though, we are consumed with birthday parties, dance lessons and gym/swim meets and soccer games. Not unlike most suburban families anywhere else.

I hope that helped some. Best wishes whatever you decide.

ETA: we homeschool but my kids have friends in Eanes, AISD and private schools and a few homeschool friends. Again, no big deal.

[stan4]

Originally Posted by hoffdano

What is an inflatable place? Is that one of those things people rent for kids parties where they jump around inside a "room?"

Would parents say something like "Honey, that town has everything we need for our family: safety, affordable housing, good schools, clean air and water but they don't have any inflatable places. I guess we'll scratch that city off our list."

Lol...'inflatable places.'

[stan4]

Originally Posted by mimimomx3

Personally, and that's all I can do- give my opinion- there is a lot of waste in education spending in AISD. Too many administrators, too many special programs, too much money going to things that aren't directly relating to education. Ever increasing budgets, even in periods of growth, is not invevitable, in fact it is irresponsible.

.

Interestingly, as I was getting ready to move, a good friend of mine (who now teaches in the area there) was bent out of shape because AISD was considering eliminating homework. The idea being that kids who did homework would be at an unfair advantage.
Did they ever wind up eliminating homework?