 In 1905 Austin had few sanitary sewers, virtually no public parks or playgrounds, and only one paved street.Three years later Austin voters overturned the alderman form of government, by which the city had been governed since 1839, and replaced it with commission government.Wooldridge headed the reform group voted into office in 1909 and served a decade as mayor, during which the city made steady if modest progress toward improving residential life.