- The BG Reads
- Posts
- BG Reads 11.21.2023
BG Reads 11.21.2023
🗞️ BG Reads | News - November 21, 2023
November 21, 2023
In today's BG Reads:
âś… Planning Commission wants more teeth in HOME proposal
âś… Texas State University to host first 2024 presidential debate
âś… Is Southwest Airlines headed for another holiday mess?
More stories below. Read on!
[2024 Austin City Council Race Watch]
Next fall will see elections for the following Council positions, District 2, 4, 6, 7, 10, and Mayor. Candidates can’t file for a place on the ballot until July 22, 2024.
Declared candidates so far are:
District 2
District 7 (Open seat)
District 10 (Open seat)
[AUSTIN METRO NEWS]
Planning Commission wants more teeth in HOME proposal (Austin Monitor)
After 12 hours of listening to citizens’ suggestions and complaints about the proposed changes to the Land Development Code, known as the HOME initiative, the Planning Commission last week came up with a number of technical recommendations for City Council to consider when adopting the new regulations. Council and the commission held a joint hearing on the proposal last month.
According to the proposal, in the future there could be up to three homes on properties zoned SF-1, SF-2 or SF-3. In addition, the proposal would eliminate regulations about accessory apartments and guesthouses and limit applicability of McMansion standards to lots with just one home.
Because so many people wanted to talk to the commission and commissioners themselves had a number of ideas about how to improve the proposed ordinance, the commission started its meeting on Tuesday, Nov. 14, adjourned early Wednesday, Nov. 15, then came back to finish their work that evening… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Austin could tap private developers to help fill public safety gaps (KXAN)
After a downtown Austin Fire and EMS station temporarily closed for emergency renovations — highlighting the need for additional public safety spaces in busy parts of town — some city leaders are looking at ways to incentivize the private sector to help.
Austin City Council could vote next week to kickstart the process of adding public safety incentives to its density bonus programs, according to council documents.
“I know that we are running out of real estate property in the City of Austin. I know that the cost of those properties keep rising and I also know that developers may be willing to pay for property or police, fire and EMS substations as a community benefit,” Austin City Council Member Mackenzie Kelly said. She is the author of the resolution... (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Waterfall of projects, major investment slated for Hutto Megasite (Austin Business Journal)
For years, information regarding efforts to build out Hutto's Megasite — a 1,400-acre assemblage of land along what many economic development experts consider the most-desirable stretch of highway in the country — has trickled through. But over the coming weeks and months, it's poised to be more of a waterfall.
The land along U.S. Route 79, some of it owned by the city, has historically caught the attention of huge companies, from Tesla Inc. nearly a decade ago to Applied Materials Inc. more recently. While Tesla picked Nevada instead of Central Texas for the project it was scoping out at the time — it later put a factory and its headquarters in the Austin area — and the Applied Materials project has yet to materialize, other companies are preparing to start pouring billions of dollars into the area.
City officials last week approved a pair of purchase-and-sale agreements for more than 150 acres in the megasite for "Project Flex" and "Project Sequel," after approving another agreement earlier this year. And another agreement could get Hutto's blessing later this month… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Texas State University to host 2024 presidential debate (Community Impact)
Texas State University will host a presidential general election debate in Strahan Arena at the University Events Center on Sept. 16, 2024.The Commission on Presidential Debates announced Nov. 20 the first presidential debate of four scheduled leading up to the general election will take place at the Texas State campus in San Marcos.
Texas State will be the first location in Texas to host a presidential debate and is partnering with the city of San Marcos to organize the event. The university also has the distinction of being the only Texas university with a U.S. president as an alumni. The 36th U.S. President Lyndon Baines Johnson graduated in 1930 with a Bachelor of Science in history with a teaching certificate, according to information from the university… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
[BG PODCAST]
On this episode (224) Bingham Group CEO A.J. Bingham and Associate Hannah Garcia discuss the week of November 20th and 30th in Austin politics.
TOPICS INCLUDE:
âś… The HOME Initiative and What is the public outreach standard?
âś… 2024 Austin Council Race watch and more
Also available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify
[TEXAS NEWS]
Republican Rep. Andrew Murr, who led impeachment of Ken Paxton, won’t seek reelection (Texas Tribune)
Texas Rep. Andrew Murr, who led the impeachment of Attorney General Ken Paxton earlier this year, announced Monday that he would not seek reelection.
Murr, a Republican from Junction in his fifth term, said a decade in Austin has kept him away too long from professional and family obligations at home, including four children ranging from 15 months to 15 years old.
“I’ve missed touchdowns, base hits, school field trips and summer field strips and summer fishing trips. I’ve missed birthdays, first steps and first words,” Murr said in a retirement letter to constituents. “I’ve put ranch work on hold, often to its own detriment, and now — quite literally — cows are calling me home.”
Murr, 46, also faced the prospect of a difficult reelection. After Paxton was acquitted at the conclusion of his impeachment trial in September, he vowed revenge on the House Republicans who had voted overwhelmingly to indict him in May… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
More than two-thirds of Texas’ 30.3 million residents live in four largest metro areas (Texas Tribune)
Texas added nearly 1.6 million people between 2020 and Jan. 1, with the Austin region — the state’s fastest-growing metro area with 7.2% growth — drawing in the most new residents, according to new population data by the Texas Demographic Center. But Fort Worth added more residents — 48,542 — than any other city.
The so-called “Texas Triangle”— composed of the Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, San Antonio and Austin metro areas — now holds a whopping 68% of the state’s 30.3 million residents.
Overall, the population of Texas grew by 4% from January 2020 to January 2023, including new births as well as new residents moving to the area, the data show.
"Texas is growing at a rapid rate because we have high resident retention and are attracting new domestic residents,” said Lauren Leining, a data analyst at Texas 2036, which strategizes on long-term Texas policy. “With new state residents bringing in considerable wealth, Texas should take this opportunity to expand infrastructure in important ways."… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Is Southwest Airlines headed for another holiday mess? (Texas Monthly)
Southwest Airlines has bought itself a bunch of new toys for Christmas: planes with larger overhead bins, shiny new deicing trucks, and outdoor heaters that can blast 400,000 Btus of hot air to keep ground crews warm and prevent planes from getting stuck to the tarmac in freezing conditions. Its passengers are getting something, too: a promise that the airline will try not to leave them stranded again. Last year Southwest was the Grinch. After a massive winter storm blanketed much of the country starting on December 21, the airline’s operations went into a deep freeze.
By December 29, Southwest had canceled 16,700 flights—or about 2,500 more flights than all nine other major air carriers canceled, combined, that month. That left more than two million passengers out in the cold. The debacle has already cost the company $1.1 billion and could cost it even more. In October, the U.S. Department of Transportation said a fine would be justified for Southwest’s failure to provide passengers with “adequate customer service assistance, prompt flight status notifications, and proper and prompt refunds.”
To avoid a repeat of that nightmarish Christmas season, Southwest and a team of consultants spent months studying what went wrong and determined that no single factor was responsible for the cascade of cancellations. That meant there was no one fix. “We had all of these kind of individual shortcomings,” says Andrew Watterson, Southwest’s chief operating officer. “Taken together, they made this complex system fall over.”
So Southwest made a litany of changes. It reorganized business units, ponied up for new winter gear, added new functionality to its crew-scheduling software, and hired thousands of new workers. Yet some of the airline’s employees aren’t sure that enough has been done, and even company executives aren’t guaranteeing that in the event of another big storm, Southwest will provide smooth flying in the holiday-packed weeks ahead. Well before the first snowflakes began to fall on December 21, 2022, Southwest knew it had a big problem. The airline’s union leaders had blasted management for failing to upgrade its crew-scheduling software, among other issues. Casey Murray, president of the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association, had warned a month earlier that he believed the airline might be “one thunderstorm” away from a “complete meltdown.”… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Book on mayor's life, legacy is not funded by taxpayers, Houston First says (Houston Chronicle)
Houston's marketing and convention agency said Thursday it is not using taxpayer dollars to pay for distribution of an autobiography of outgoing Mayor Sylvester Turner, coming after a report saying that the mayor was pressuring Houston First to cover the cost of giving away the book at this year's State of the City address. Houston First board chair David Mincberg said Thursday that the organization's policy is that events are covered by event proceeds and donations. He later told reporters that he had not seen the invoices for the event.
"Houston First plans to collaborate with the event chairs and fundraisers to develop a strategy to generate additional private funds to pay for this project," Mincberg said in a statement Thursday. "Our goal is to have a plan in place in the coming weeks."
Houston First initially had an item on its Thursday meeting agenda that called for the agency to cover the $124,000 for Turner's autobiography that was handed out at his final the State of the City, which was hosted by Houston First. The item was pulled from the agenda, without explanation. Mincberg told the Chronicle that Houston First would pay the debt "as quickly as possible," and said they were never given a deadline to make payments. However, the city's convention agency does not have a fundraising plan in place to recoup the cash. Houston First operates a dozen parking facilities and event centers that host conventions, expos, concerts and theatrical performances. The organization took in $152 million in hotel, event and parking revenue in 2022, according to its financial records. The mayor's team has not jumped in to help pay for the books.
"If Mr. Mincberg needs Mayor Turner's assistance, he knows how to contact him to ask," the mayor's spokesperson Mary Benton said in an email Thursday afternoon… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
[US/WORLD NEWS]
An appeals court has struck down a key path for enforcing the Voting Rights Act (NPR)
A federal appeals court has struck down a key path for enforcing the Voting Rights Act.
The new ruling in an Arkansas redistricting lawsuit may set up the next U.S. Supreme Court fight that could further limit the reach of the Voting Rights Act's protections for people of color.
The legal dispute is focused on who is allowed to sue to try to enforce key provisions under Section 2 of the landmark civil rights law, which was first passed in 1965.
Private individuals and groups, who did not represent the U.S. government, have for decades brought the majority of Section 2 cases to court. Those cases have challenged the redrawing of voting maps and other steps in the elections process with claims that the voting power of people of color has been minimized… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Biden’s 81st birthday highlights biggest liability for 2024 (Bloomberg)
Birthdays can be bittersweet — particularly when you’re the oldest president in US history. As Joe Biden celebrates turning 81 on Monday, the occasion will highlight how age has become his greatest liability entering the final campaign of his 53-year political career and a likely rematch with his predecessor, Donald Trump. While the White House insists that Biden remains healthy enough to serve as commander in chief, recent polls show him trailing Trump across key swing states, with voters citing deep concerns about his health and acuity.
A Bloomberg News/Morning Consult survey this month found voters in seven swing states more likely to associate old age with Biden than any other topic. In an open-ended question asking what they had heard about the candidates lately, hundreds of respondents cited Biden’s age. Fewer than a dozen did the same for Trump.
Those perceptions have been fueled by high-profile moments including his fall at an Air Force Academy graduation, staircase stumbles boarding Air Force One, the revelation he was using a medical device to aid his breathing during sleep, and a series of verbal gaffes.
Taken together, they have fanned uneasiness among Democrats that the man who has cast himself as the bulwark against Trump’s return is just one illness or injury from plunging his campaign – and the nation – into calamity. White House aides have created a safety net of small accommodations, including regularly using a lower set of stairs for boarding Air Force One, to avoid giving fodder to opponents or the news media. Secret Service agents and staff are careful in cramped backstage settings, using flashlights and verbal warnings to guide the president’s path, according to a person familiar with the matter.
The president also interacts less frequently with the White House press corps, holding far fewer formal press conferences or off-the record sessions on Air Force One and only sitting for a single interview with a daily news print journalist… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
New Hampshire man had no car and no furniture, but died with a big secret, leaving his town millions (Associated Press)
Geoffrey Holt was unassuming as the caretaker of a mobile home park in Hinsdale, New Hampshire, where he lived a simple, but curious life.
Residents would see Holt around town in threadbare clothes — riding his lawn mower, headed to the convenience store, parked along the main road reading a newspaper or watching cars pass.
He did odd jobs for others, but rarely left town. Despite having taught driver’s ed to high schoolers, Holt had given up driving a car. He opted for a bicycle instead and finally the mower. His mobile home in the park was mostly empty of furniture -- no TV and no computer, either. The legs of the bed went through the floor.
“He seemed to have what he wanted, but he didn’t want much,” said Edwin “Smokey” Smith, Holt’s best friend and former employer.
But Holt died earlier this year with a secret: He was a multimillionaire. And what’s more, he gave it all away to this community of 4,200 people.
His will had brief instructions: $3.8 million to the town of Hinsdale to benefit the community in the areas of education, health, recreation and culture… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
_________________________
🔎 Have questions or in need of lobbying services? Fill out Bingham Group’s Service Interest Questionnaire and let us see how we can help.
SHARE BG READS FEEDBACK HERE
⬇️
Copyright (C) " target="_blank">unsubscribe
