A former Austin Energy employee
has been accused of defrauding the
city utility.
The man is blamed for siphoning
off nearly $1 million over
the course of six years.
We're gonna talk about how he did it
and what Austin Energy is doing
to prevent it from happening again.
Plus, the YMCA in downtown Austin
wants to expand and renovate its
current digs, adding housing,
restaurants, and office space.
But some folks around the spot are
concerned about how it could affect
the neighborhood.
Hear about their plans coming up on
today's show.
The Austin Signal is a production of
K UT News, hosted by Jerry
Quijano.
And Christmas time is here, but at a
bar in North Austin, it's Christmas
Day every single day.
What's the reason behind it?
Stay with us and find out.
That's on today's Austin
Signal.
Howdy out there.
This is Austin Signal.
It is Wednesday, December 10th.
We're glad to have you here with us.
I'm your host, Jerry Quijano,
and we appreciate you tuning in to
Listener Powered Public
Radio.
Let's get into today's show.
A former Austin Energy employee
is accused of defrauding the city of
almost one million dollars over the
six years that he was working for
the city owned utility.
For more about the story, we're
joined by Andrew Weber.
He is KUT's government
accountability reporter.
Hiya, Andrew. Hey Jerry.
So tell us how how was this fraud
discovered?
This fraud was discovered
by us through a city audit,
but Austin Energy sort
of tipped off the city auditor's
office about this employee, Mark
Ibotta.
Back in twenty twenty-three.
He was basically
using credit card
like sort of procurement as they
call the pro card, I think a lot
of folks would know.
And basically charging
for services that were
you know, non existent through
contractors that were
connected to him and his
family, and it was ultimately
about nine hundred not about, it
was nine hundred eighty thousand
dollars that they could estimate.
They said there there could be more,
but that's the sort of final amount
that they that they could confirm.
And this happened over the course of
six years. The audit I'm guessing
happened this year in twenty twenty
five. Was there something that
spurred it?
Yeah, it was I mean, his firing it
was like this is something they've
been looking into for a minute, but
it was released this year.
So and that was after,
you know, they the the auditor's
office looked at this over
a couple of years, over more than a
year and a half, and found that,
you know, had to sort of, you know,
do the paper trail of it, follow the
money kind of thing.
And then reached out to APD
and then he was indicted
in August, August twenty eighth,
I believe, and then he was arrested
and then released on bottom.
Okay, so what has Austin
Energy done as a result of this
incident or these this fraud?
What how has it changed its policy
to avoid ha this from happening
in the future?
Well, they've cut down on those sort
of pro card payments for
contracting because he was Marky
Barrow was in a very unique position
where he could do maintenance and
then he could determine, okay, we
need a third party to do this, and
that's how this all sort of
happened, and he would just charge
it to a credit card.
So there was no city contracting,
you know, per se
on the books and since then
they've cut down I believe the
last three years the average was
like one point five million per
year. Last year it was down to I
believe five hundred seventy
thousand. So they've they've cut
down on those payments and they've
required management to approve these
sort of purchases.
Okay, so this was a a an audit
conducted by Austin Energy.
H have there been criminal charges?
What what is the status of that?
Yeah, yeah.
After this audit sort of wrapped up,
the auditor's office passed all this
off to ABD.
He was indicted by a grand jury
in August, and then he
was arrested shortly after and
released on bond.
Okie dokie. Well, you can read more
about this story over at KUT.org.
It's from KUT's government
accountability reporter Andrew
Weber, who we've been chatting with
here on Austin Signal.
Andrew, thank you. Yes, sir.
Thank you, Jerry.
All right, thank you for making this
part of your Wednesday.
The Town Lake YMCA in downtown
Austin is planning an expansion and
a renovation of its current property
to include housing and other
commercial and community spaces.
KUT's Luz Moneno Lozano
has that story over at KUT.org.
And she's got the details for us
today on Austin Signal.
Howdy Luz.
Hey Jerry, how's it going?
It's going well.
So tell us, where's the current
space and and what's the approximate
size of it?
Yeah, so this is like a hundred
and ten thousand square feet,
give or take.
You know, this is a kind of a
popular YMCA location.
I mean, w there's several locations
all across the city, but if anyone
is going to the YMCA, I've heard a
lot about this town lake one.
It does sound like the the current
facility is was kind of nearing the
end of its life.
So they were gonna have to renovate
anyway. And so this is gonna be part
of this whole like how can we
not only improve the
on site facility, but expand
it to include other amenities.
So what are some of the amenities
that they want to include?
One of the big things is this is
gonna include is housing.
They said it was gonna include
around ninety affordable
housing units, up to seven
hundred and fifty condos.
Okay. But there's also gonna be
space for community events and
sp and things like
that. There's also gonna be
youth programming, there's gonna
be a child care facility.
And so all of this is kind of
playing into like how can we
bring more affordable housing
and childcare downtown, especially
to people who are working downtown,
but don't necessarily live here.
And so it kind of puts it all
together.
Okay, and this was presented to city
council yesterday, correct?
It was. Yeah. So this was just kind
of it's a it's an initial step.
It's a first step in in the process.
So the YMCA team
basically presented their
plan to the city council.
You know, they they went through all
of their amenities
and things that this was gonna
include and why they thought it was
important. But there's still a lot
of steps that are gonna have to take
place before this becomes official.
But I think they're hoping to break
ground assuming that they kind of
get all their ducks in a row in
twenty twenty eight.
Okay, and how did c city council
members f feel about the idea?
I I think we had a
lot of positive feedback.
I think the city council is
realizing that we do need some kind
of housing child care combination
in addition to some of the other
things that the YMC already offers.
Downtown.
So it they seemed pretty on board.
There was some concerns that we that
were raised about
traffic that if you've if
anyone drives on Lorthamar and sees
your Chavez, you know that that is a
it gets pretty backed up.
A little busy around there.
Just just a little bit.
And there was concerns about
environmental impacts, like where
would the like extra wastewater
and those kinds of things, how was
it gonna impact that?
So it sounds like council had a lot
of questions just as they're kind of
initially kind of proposing this.
But I do think that several of
them were like, I'm really excited
about this opportunity and we hoping
that this is gonna make it to the
finish line.
And I know some of the neighbors who
live in that area they also shared
some of those concerns or maybe had
some concerns of their own.
What did they have to say?
Yeah, one of the biggest things was
how it's gonna change the
look and feel of the neighborhood.
That particular corner
of of the lake is filled
with trees.
If you like kind of look over
North Lamar from the
what would that be, the south side
of the river. It's just it's it's
it's beautiful, you know.
This is what we do in Austin.
We love our trees, we love our
nature, we love our green.
If they put these
three buildings up, it is
definitely gonna change what that
view looks like.
And there was a lot of concern about
that. And several neighbors also
had traffic concerns because it's
already it's already a congested
intersection and people who live
there are like, Okay, this is like
my normal route to things.
But one of the big things that this
will do that they really talked
about is it does give them access
like to the hike and bike trail.
You can walk to restaurants and
grocery stores.
So, you know, they're hoping that
this will kind of play into that as
well.
Okay, well like I said, you have the
story over at KUT
dot org.
We have been speaking with KUT City
Hall reporter Luz Moreno Lozano.
We appreciate your reporting.
Thanks for coming on Austin Signal.
Thanks, Jerry.
And thank you out there for tuning
into the signal.
We're gonna have a story about lalas
coming up next. It's Christmas time
year round over there.
Come partake in it.
Join us. We'll be back in one
moment.
You're listening to the Austin
Signal? Hi, I'm Matt Reilly,
Program Director for KUTX.
One of my favorite songs
out of Austin from this
year is from Die
Spitz.
It's called Punishers.
The intro of the song grabs me
right away. It's just these
sort of gloomy,
fuzzed-out,
Black Sabbath-inspired notes.
I like this song because
it has those elements of post
punk and grunge and those sounds
are a part of my musical DNA and I'm
a jaded old Gen X guy.
So when I hear members of Gen
Z making
sounds that resonate
from my youth, it
just makes me happy.
So Dice Bits started
pretty much in high school, and
we've been fans of this band
since their inception.
And they're a former KUTX artist
of the month.
And we've watched them
evolve into this
snarling little punk band
into a more expansive sound
that brings in elements of post
punk and grunge and is
mature beyond their years.
The vibe of this song is just face
punching.
Brain melting.
Exactly what you want from rock and
roll. Thundering, lots of drums.
Love this song, and you can run
through a brick wall after listening
to it.
My name is Matt Reilly, and I'm the
program director here at KUTX, and
you can find out all of our favorite
songs from 2025 at our website
at KUTX.org.
This is the Austin Signal.
Thank you to Matt and thank you
to you for tuning in to Austin
Signal. We are listener powered
public radio.
You might have noticed things
looking a lot more Christmasy
around town lately, you know, 'tis
the season and such.
But at a bar in North Austin,
it's Christmas time all
the time.
Why though?
KUT's Marissa Charpentier
has the story told at a past
AT explained live event.
There's a place in Austin
where it's been Christmas every
day since 1972.
It's a small dive bar called
La La's Little Nugget.
Red and green ornaments dangle
from the ceiling.
There are snow globes and Christmas
trees and tons and tons
of Christmas lights.
And it kind of still
feels like the 70s.
There's a velvet Elvis painting
on the wall, an old pool table,
and a really outdated jukebox.
If you don't know what I'm talking
about, just drive around the
Crestview area, look
for the building with Santa Slay
and some reindeer on the roof.
They're always there, even
in the dead of summer.
I went there recently to meet
someone.
My name is Angela Reed.
Angela and I each ordered one
of Lala's signature Christmas-themed
cocktails, and we walked around to
sit on the patio.
She told me she used to go to Lala's
a lot in the 90s when she lived
in the neighborhood.
In those days, she says the bar
was truly a hole in the wall.
Dark, smoky, kind of like
old Christmas ornaments
in there.
Which today it seems like they've
like freshened it up and it's almost
like they decorated it to be this
way. But back then it seemed like
no, they had been there for a long
time.
She said there was a story back then
about why the decorations were
always there.
The owner owned this bar with
her husband and they
had decorated for Christmas and that
he'd left her on Christmas
Eve.
And so almost as a vengeance,
she kept the bar and never
changed the decor.
But she wanted to know if that
was true.
Surely someone at the bar would
know, so we grabbed our drinks and
wandered around asking people
why was it always Christmas at
La La's?
We started talking to this older man
and his friends, but then a young
sort of hipster guy who was
like reading a book or something
leaned over to us.
I've heard a tragic story about how
the owner's daughter died
on Christmas or Christmas Eve.
He's dealt with it s through making
the decor of the bar
Christmas all year long.
Then we walked a few tables
over. There was a group of women
wearing ugly Christmas sweaters.
One of them offered to Google
the answer for us, but like,
where's the fun in that?
And then finally we spotted
some people wearing actual La
La's shirts.
They were sitting down, having some
drinks, so we went up to them.
They told us the bar owner was a
woman.
She just didn't want to take she
didn't want to take it down.
Now, they also told us to
look up a Kenny Chesney
song called Jesus and Elvis.
They said the lyrics to it were
inspired by La La's.
It turns out it was originally
written by Texas musician
Hayes Carl.
I found this video where he said he
used to spend a lot of time at La
La's.
I asked around what the story
was 'cause I was curious and what I
heard was a tragic one.
It was that Lalad had a son who'd
gone off to fight in Vietnam at
Christmas time and she promised she
wouldn't take those lights down
until he made it back home.
And all these years later those
lights are still hanging up there.
So this is a song about that place
that's called Jesus and Elvis.
Jesus and Elvis
painted on velvet,
hanging at the bar
here every night.
It's good to be back again.
Oh me and my old
friends, Beneath
the neon crossing a string
of Christmas legs.
So let's review.
An ex-lover?
Just a general love of
Christmas?
A son killed at war?
This can't all explain why La
La's is always decorated for
Christmas, right?
To get the real story, I'd
need to get someone official on the
record.
My name is Max Moreland.
I oversee all operations for
the bar division of
FBR, based here
in Austin, Texas.
Max's company took over La La's
about eight years ago when the
original owner retired.
I asked him for the story behind the
Christmas decor, but he gave
me the same three stories.
The owner's husband left her on
Christmas.
Fell into this depression from her,
you know, ongoing divorce.
Си декорадва Christmas one
year and when the holidays were
over.
She took them down and the bar felt
too naked.
And finally, her son went off
to war in Vietnam.
And she swore these decorations
will stay up until my son comes
home.
Now I asked Max which
one is the real story.
Is any of that true?
One of 'em is.
Is that the second one?
It's up for you d whatever you wanna
whatever you want to believe in.
So it's like Santa, you know?
It's up to you.
It's open for interpretation.
I mean come on
I asked him a few more times and
he still wouldn't give in.
To learn the real story, I'd
need to learn more about the woman
behind the bar.
A woman named Frances.
She was tough.
She was hard to impress.
That's Mike Levine.
He's been going to La La's since the
nineties.
I mean we didn't hang out socially
outside the bar, but I don't know
that she was ever outside that bar.
I'm fairly certain that if the
bar was open she was there.
He told me that Francis opened
La La's in nineteen seventy
two and she ran the place
for the next forty years.
One of the reasons that she created
la La's and and and had the
environment she had in there was
because and she used to say this
often was because she wanted a place
where women could feel safe to drink
alone. And she've created
you know, in the modern parlance a
safe space to do that.
For most of the decades the bar was
open, it was just Francis
and her business partner Sarah
behind the bar making drinks.
Francis didn't take bull
from anyone.
Francis Who would never overpour
your drink.
If you ordered a Jameson on the
rocks, it was gonna be two fingers
of Jameson and that is it.
No more, no less, and she had little
fingers.
Frances was also
a private person.
She didn't share a lot about her
family or her background.
There she was behind that bar for
I don't know, thirty five whatever
years and nobody knew
anything about her.
To give you an example,
Frances died shortly
after she sold the bar, about
six years ago.
It wasn't until the day she
was buried that Mike learned
her real name.
I always thought the name
La La's was
Christmassy.
Like I thought the law follow la la
or something. I thought the La La's
thing was a a nod to Christmas.
And then you know, I'm a
pall bearer in her funeral.
He looked down at the program
and saw her last name was
Lala.
That was to me the ultimate surprise
of like, you know, her life was
like, Oh my god, that was her last
name all along.
And it sounds s silly but like that
would have also jabbed with her
sense of humor.
Frances was the kind of
person who'd keep up Christmas
lights well past the month of
December.
And then when Halloween would come
around, put Halloween decorations
over the Christmas ones,
she was the kind of person to
embellish the truth,
just to mess with people.
So I brought the rumors about La
La's Christmas decorations up
to Mike. The husband who left on
Christmas, the son sent off to war.
She would have absolutely
exaggerated on the story
to mess with the college kids in the
eighties.
No doubt in my mind.
Like that's her MO all the way.
She liked to mess with folks.
But again, that that doesn't mean
that none of it's true.
Mike wouldn't say which story
was true either.
He didn't want to set the record
straight. He brought up an old
phrase I'd heard before.
Well they say print the legend, you
know, don't don't worry about the
truth.
Print the legend.
This idea that sometimes in
life the stories we tell ourselves
become bigger than the truth.
I asked Mike one more question.
Did he think Frances herself
would want the real story to be
revealed?
I mean, look, she
might have been a tough lady.
She might have had her her moments
and and people don't remember her
as maybe the most warm human being
that ever walked the earth.
But the fact is that she
created this place that
has a sense of humor about it
and is a a safe place for
people to come and hang out.
And so clearly
she was a warm person and clearly
she was somebody who cared about her
fellow human.
And I think that is the legacy of
the bar, you know.
And the story is fun
or sad or interesting.
Or whatever you need it to be.
Now, for the sake of honesty,
I will say someone did
tell me which story is the
true story.
But in preparing for tonight,
I kept thinking back to that phrase:
print the legend.
It's actually part of a longer quote
from an old Western called The
Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.
In the movie, a newspaper editor
gets a scoop.
He learns that the story that's long
been told about the person who
killed the local outlaw
is actually a myth.
But the editor decides not
to reveal the truth.
You're not going to use the story,
Mr. Scott.
No, sir.
This is the West, sir.
When the legend becomes fact,
print the legend.
Sometimes the lore of
an event or a place
is more interesting
than what really happened.
And what kind of person would I be
if I spoiled the fun?
Okay, at this point, if you
still want to know what the true
story is, come find me, buy
me a drink after the show.
Maybe I'll tell you.
But for now, I'll just
say, this is the West.
That was our former colleague
Marissa Charpentier at an ATX
Plain live show at the Paramount
Theater back in February of
2023.
Maybe you were there that night.
That's it for today's episode of
Austin Signal.
Thank you to KUT's Andrew Weber and
Luz Moreno Lozano, as well
as Matt Reilly from our sister
station KUTX.
And thank you to Kristen Cabrera,
our managing producer, and Rayna
Sevilla, our technical director.
I'm your host, Jerry Quijano.
Austin Signal will be back at one
o'clock tomorrow afternoon.
We'll talk to you then.