The city of San Marcos announced the hiring of former New Braunfels Planning Director Shannon Mattingly as the city's new director of planning and development services on Jan. 5. In her position, Mattingly will oversee the city's planning efforts as well as building inspections and permits, the Community Development Block Grant Program and the Main Street Program. Mattingly's first day on the job was Jan. 15. What attracted you to the job here? I've been in this area for almost seven years now. I really like the area. New Braunfels is growing and very busy, but San Marcos was really doing some neat planning stuff. It really felt like they were on the cutting edge of getting some plans adopted new comp plan, new codes, neighborhood planning so really doing some things that were much more pro-planning than what we were able to do when I was in New Braunfels. I love the location. It's a great community. It has so much to offer. It's a lot of the same issues [as in New Braunfels], just different context. In New Braunfels we were dealing with a lot of concerns from the tourist community and coming up with ways to address that. Here it's more university and students. The interesting part about it is the issues are the same: parking in the neighborhoods, overflow into the established neighborhoods. A lot of that is the same, just a different issue causing it. With a community like San Marcos thats growing so fast, you're job becomes very important. The codes you lay out can have immediate consequences. Does that excite you? We were growing so fast in New Braunfels. Unfortunately we were very limited in staff and so we truly spent all of our time processing things as fast as we could, as fast as they were coming in. San Marcos has set themselves up to succeed because they've got the staff that they need to truly be able to do some long-range planning and try to get out in front of the issues instead of waiting and reacting to them when they come in. That's nice that it's kind of already set up that way. It is a lot of fun. Its fun getting to know the community and learning a whole new set of codes, which are definitely different than what I was reviewing. There's a lot of development coming in. A lot of residential and mixed use thats looking to come in to the area. It's going to be exciting. There are just so many different things. Torchy's will be opening soon, which is apparently the best thing in the world for this community. A lot of work has been accomplished in the last few years with the development process (SMART Code, Comp plan, etc). Do you feel like your role is to maintain the course, or have you identified some areas where you want to initiate change? I think it's going to be a combination. I think we've put some good processes in place, but I think at this point its tweaking the process. Figuring out whats working, what's not working. The comp plan hasn't been in place for that long, and of course with the new codes coming online its going to be How do we integrate [the plan and the codes] together? And its going to be looking at concerns of the development community as well as the residents and figuring out how we balance all of that. I think its more tweaking than it is actually any new processes. It's about trying to figure out what's working and keep improving it. What do you think this city or cities in general can do to better attract middle class, middle-income housing? I think its going to be making sure as were transitioning and looking at our comprehensive plan and looking at the new codes that were finding ways to address those concerns. I know there has been a lot of discussion about retention of the middle class and as students are graduating, having jobs and housing available to them so they can stay instead of going to Austin. It's going to be looking at the housing market that we have and the products we have and looking at ways to work with the economic development groups and the [Greater San Marcos Partnership] and looking at ... intermingling [economic development] with the housing so we can try to promote some different mixes and diversity to our housing market. It looks like most of [the new developments] coming in are going to have some sort of mixed-use component, so its going to be making sure that were setting ourselves up for success in how those all integrate, making them walkable and livable and all that. What are some ways you believe you can foster local business development in your role as planning director? I think its going to be working with the downtown businesses. Main Street is part of our department, but its also going to be working with the Greater San Marcos Partnership on the economic development side on business expansion and retention. Looking at ways we can streamline our processes so its not as difficult for expansions of businesses and its very clear what that process is, and were very customer-friendly in working with businesses to help them stay here and be able to expand their businesses here. I'm not saying the process is broken, but its continuing to facilitate that as good as we can make it. It's going to be about meeting the business owners, finding out what they have issues with and that sort of thing. What are you doing to familiarize yourself with the San Marcos community? What's your entry plan? A lot of it is driving out and looking at cases as they're coming in, looking at cases, trying to get out in the community because you have a tendency after you've been somewhere for a while that you get pigeon-holed into the office, so I'm hoping to spend more time driving around and getting more familiar with the area. I have a little bit of an advantage that Ive lived this close [to San Marcos], but really thats my first thing; figuring out the lay of the land. Then its going to a lot of meetings and trying to build some of the relationships and foster the relationships between all of the stakeholders within the community and getting to know people. I'm not sure I really have a plan going forward other than self-immersion. A lot of discussion recently has focused on increasing density downtown. Some have met that with resistance because it will have such far-reaching effects on the city's downtown. Do you feel like its possible to maintain that historic feel while increasing density downtown? I think its something we need to look at. It becomes a policy decision of the council. The way its set up, you have to go through those height discussions with council. The way [the process] is set up, it really gives the discretion back to the policy makers. I think decisions about [height warrants] are going to be a case-by-case, how the product comes in, what the proposal is, what they're looking at doing, how it integrates into the system. How do you see your role in that situation between the development community and City Council? A lot of times the development community looks to us to tell them what we think council wants to see. Its us helping to fine-tune that for them as they're coming in. They're saying, 'We want to do 15 stories and we want it to look like this,'and us being able to say, 'The policy of the council has been that they want to see things going in this direction in this area, so let's talk about how we can find a compromise for you that works for [council].' Hopefully that makes things less contentious. Is there anything in San Marcos that you've noticed that you want to prioritize or that the city needs more or less of? Or anything you feel like the city has especially gotten right? One thing I have to say is that the city has done a really good job on their [capital improvement] projects to integrate sidewalks into it and to make it a more walkable community. Definitely I want to be looking at how were improving our transportation and our connectivity. I have a 20-year-old son, and every time he comes home he goes, I'm so glad you're over there now because I need you to fix the roads. Its just awful, Mom. I laugh because coming from Austin to this area when people talk about awful roads I go 'Yeah, right.' But it is all about what you're used to and the context you put it into. So it is about looking at how you integrate the transportation system and whats being developed on it. I really think San Marcos has really done a good job of looking at complete streets, and how everything is integrated together and making it more walkable. We have such a huge network of parks and the environmental side and protecting the river, I think we've done a really good job of that. What I really like is the fact that you can actually walk along the river and access the river, whereas in New Braunfels it's all privately owned. So unless you're in it, theres no way to access it. That's definitely something that's a big benefit to the community.