BG Reads 10.20.2023

🗞️ BG Reads | News - October 20, 2023

October 20, 2023

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October 20, 2023

In today's BG Reads:

✅ Council approves convention center expansion contracts

✅ Texas land being wrestled away from cities

✅ Austinites are spending nearly one-third of their income on rent or a mortgage

Read on!

[BINGHAM GROUP]

Council to consider city manager search firm this week 🎙️ BG Podcast Ep. 222:

  • On this episode the Bingham Group CEO A.J. Bingham and Associate Hannah Garcia wrap up the week of October 9th in Austin politics.

  • The BG Podcast is also available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

🔎 Jobs List

[AUSTIN METRO NEWS]

Council approves convention center expansion contracts (Austin Monitor)

On Thursday, City Council voted to award the contract for construction and pre-construction of a refurbished and enlarged Austin Convention Center to two firms, JE Dunn Construction and Turner Construction, for up to $1.2 billion. They also directed staff to negotiate a $65 million contract with architects LMN and Page Southerland Page, called LMN/Page, for design and engineering services for the center.

Funding for the construction will be allocated from the city’s Hotel Occupancy Tax and revenues from the convention center.

Although several Council members asked questions, none voted against the items. However, Council Member Vanessa Fuentes was off the dais and Council Member Natasha Harper-Madison was absent from the meeting.

After contracts are executed, LMN/Page will begin work in early 2024. According to the current timeline, the convention center is expected to close and be demolished in 2025, with the larger convention center slated to open in late 2028. The center will close after the 2025 South by Southwest and is set to reopen before the 2029 SXSW, according to news reports… (LINK TO FULL STORY)

Texas land being wrestled away from cities (Austin Business Journal)

When representatives from MileStone Community Builders LLC arrived in the city of Hays early in the morning on Sept. 1, legal documents in hand, the doors of the modest one-story brick building that serves as City Hall were closed — and would be through the long Labor Day weekend.

Companies — first Walters Southwest, then MileStone — have for nearly two decades tried to build a neighborhood called Hays Commons on 500-plus acres, which could more than double the population of the small city of about 250. But no one had been able to reach a deal with city leaders concerned about the potential adverse impacts of dense development on the Edwards Aquifer, which serves as the city's primary water source.

But that September morning was the dawn of the first day of a new state law that allows landowners to remove themselves from the regulatory reach of cities. Leaders at MileStone intended to do just that. The city of Hays had to send someone to meet them so they could hand deliver a letter asking to be removed, or deannexed, from the city's extra-territorial jurisdiction. The ETJ, as it's known in planning parlance, is a buffer zone beyond city limits where a municipality exerts a small degree of control, usually over things such as utilities and land platting... (LINK TO FULL STORY)

Round Rock, Cedar Park and now Taylor: Longtime economic chief to guide yet another city for his next chapter (Austin Business Journal)

For more than a decade, Ben White has been involved in Williamson County economic development efforts, first in Round Rock and for the last five years in Cedar Park. He'll make his way to a third city north of Austin, as the city of Taylor announced on Oct. 18that White will take over as the head of the Taylor Economic Development Corp. in mid-November.

White — who was recently named by the Austin Business Journal as a Power Player as being among those who “wield utmost influence” in the Austin area — will replace Mark Thomas, who is set to retire after leading the Taylor EDC since 2016. The Taylor EDC was founded by voters in 1994 and is funded by one-half percent of the annual sales tax in the city. It leads economic development efforts for the city about 35 miles northeast of Austin... (LINK TO FULL STORY)

Study: Austinites are spending nearly one-third of their income on rent or a mortgage (KVUE)

A new study shows that more Austinites are paying rents so high they take up more than 30% of their income.  

According to ApartmentList.com, more Austinites are considered "cost-burdened," meaning they spend more than 30% of their income on rent or a mortgage. 

The study says out of more than 190,000 Austin metro households, 49% are cost-burdened. That's up from 47% back in 2019… (LINK TO FULL STORY)

[TEXAS NEWS]

‘Why the hell are we here?’: Texas lawmakers, owner debate controversial Colony Ridge (Dallas Morning News)

Several local officials pushed back against allegations that a housing community north of Houston was filled with a large number of migrants living in Texas illegally. The officials told a House panel Thursday that several of the rumors related to the area are false. Some lawmakers on the committee also appeared confused as to what problems, if any, exist in Colony Ridge, the development that gained attention late last month following reports in conservative media outlets.

“Why the hell are we here?” GOP Rep. Jay Dean of Longview asked one of the developers of Colony Ridge at Thursday’s hearing. “I still don’t know the answer,” replied John Harris, who owns the development with his brother. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott tasked lawmakers with passing bills related to Colony Ridge after stories on a conservative publication’s website said there were “thousands” of undocumented migrants living there.

But invited witnesses included Liberty County Judge Jay Knight, Liberty County Sheriff Bobby Rader, Harris, McCraw and representatives from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. None of them corroborated any of the allegations — which included that there were a high number of crimes in the development, that thousands of undocumented immigrants lived in Colony Ridge, that there is drug cartel activity in the development and that the housing development is a “colonia.” Knight dismissed the “colonia” allegation. Rader told lawmakers that there had not been an arrest related to drug cartels in three years. Abbott previously said that legislative committees could find out whether the allegations are true by inviting state and local officials to testify. But some hard-right elected officials have still asked the Legislature to take the reports seriously and investigate them. During the hearing, Attorney General Ken Paxton publicly released a letter he sent to Texas GOP lawmakers in the U.S. House.

“The development appears to be attracting and enabling illegal alien settlement in the state of Texas and distressing neighboring cities and school districts,” Paxton said in the letter. But Paxton did not provide proof or say how he knows the development is “attracting and enabling” migrants living in Texas without proper documentation. His office did not respond to an email Thursday afternoon asking for evidence… (LINK TO FULL STORY)

Takeaways from Thursday's Houston mayoral debate (Houston Chronicle)

With less than three weeks until election day, leading mayoral candidates took the stage at another debate Thursday morning, making their pitch to Houston voters that they are the right choice for tackling crime and improving city services. The event – hosted by Houston Public Media, Univision and the University of Houston's Hobby School of Public Affairs – featured state Sen. John Whitmire, former Metro Chair Gilbert Garcia, former Councilmember Jack Christie, attorney Lee Kaplan and Councilmember Robert Gallegos. U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, who was also invited, was unable to attend because of the U.S. House speaker vote in Washington D.C.

Police Chief Troy Finner told the City Council yesterday both violent and nonviolent crimes are down across Houston compared to 2022. But nearly half of the city electorate continued to identify crime as the single most important issue facing the city today, according to the Hobby School survey. As of April, the city had 342 fewer full-time equivalent police officers than it had 25 years ago, data from the Houston Police Department shows. While research debates the link between crime rates and the number of police officers, all candidates on Thursday reaffirmed their support for boosting HPD’s rank. On Thursday, the state senator lamented what he considered a “misconception of the use of the DPS.”

State troopers already have a working relationship with HPD, Whitmire noted. Using DPS resources such as helicopters, forensic scientists and their anti-gang task force will free up more local officers to be in the neighborhoods, he said. The latest census data, released last year, showed Hispanics now constitute 45% of Houston's population. Meanwhile, a large portion of the city’s Hispanic residents are concerned about unemployment and childcare, past surveys show... (LINK TO FULL STORY)

[US/WORLD NEWS]

Biden declares Israel and Ukraine support is vital for US security, will ask Congress for billions (Associated Press)

Declaring that U.S. leadership “holds the world together,” President Joe Biden told Americans on Thursday night the country must deepen its support of Ukraine and Israel in the middle of two vastly different, unpredictable and bloody wars. Acknowledging that “these conflicts can seem far away,” Biden insisted in a rare Oval Office address that they remain “vital for America’s national security” as he prepared to ask Congress for billions of dollars in military assistance for both countries. “History has taught us when terrorists don’t pay a price for their terror, when dictators don’t pay a price for their aggression, they cause more chaos and death and more destruction,” Biden said. “They keep going. And the cost and the threat to America and the world keep rising.”

Biden’s speech reflected an expansive view of U.S. obligations overseas at a time when he faces political resistance at home to additional funding. He’s expected to ask for $105 billion on Friday, including $60 billion for Ukraine, much of which would replenish U.S. weapons stockpiles provided earlier. There’s also $14 billion for Israel, $10 billion for unspecified humanitarian efforts, $14 billion for managing the U.S.-Mexico border and fighting fentanyl trafficking and $7 billion for the Indo-Pacific region, which includes Taiwan. The proposal was described by three people familiar with the details who insisted on anonymity before the official announcement. “It’s a smart investment that’s going to pay dividends for American security for generations,” Biden said. He hopes that combining all of these issues into one piece of legislation will create the necessary coalition for congressional approval.

His speech came the day after his high-stakes trip to Israel, where he showed solidarity with the country after the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas and pushed for more humanitarian assistance to Palestinians. With Israel continuing to bombard the Gaza Strip and preparing a ground invasion, Biden placed an increased emphasis on the deadly toll that the conflict has had on civilians there, saying he’s “heartbroken by the tragic loss of Palestinian life.”… (LINK TO FULL STORY)

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