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- BG Reads 2.26.2025
BG Reads 2.26.2025
🟪 BG Reads - February 26, 2025
Bingham Group Reads
Presented by:
February 26, 2025
âś… Today's BG Reads include:
🟪 Bond task force votes to roll climate-related projects into 2026 election (Austin Monitor)
🟪 Newly released renderings show the Austin Convention Center's upcoming transformation (KUT)
🟪 High housing costs, inflation bite into Texas sales tax growth (Texas Tribune)
🟪 Trump policy concerns send US consumer confidence plummeting to eight-month low (Reuters)
Read On!
[CITY OF AUSTIN]
🏛️ Tomorrow @10AM: Austin Council Regular Session
Agenda (54 items)
[FIRM NEWS]
This Friday, NASCAR Cup Series driver Kyle Larson and Truck Series driver Rajah Caruth will join sponsor Hendrick Automotive Group—the largest privately held automotive retail organization in the United States and a Bingham Group client—to award a $25,000 grant to the Auto Technology program at Crockett Early College High School.
The donation is part of the Hendrick, Get Set. Go! grant program, which leverages the excitement of the HendrickCars.com racing program to promote STEM education in the automotive industry.
The event will include a check presentation, a Q&A session, and an engine-building demonstration.
Check out Hendrick’s Austin Dealerships:
[AUSTIN METRO NEWS]
âś… Bond task force votes to roll climate-related projects into 2026 election (Austin Monitor)
The city’s 2026 Bond Election Advisory Task Force (video link + agenda) has decided against pursuing a climate-focused bond election in 2025, opting instead to incorporate climate-related projects into a broader 2026 general obligation bond election. The decision followed discussion about funding availability for bond elections in consecutive years, the public engagement process for a 2025 election and the readiness of proposed climate projects.
City staff presented an overview of the Environmental Investment Plan, which outlines just over $7 billion in potential climate-related investments covering needs such as carbon emission reductions, land and water conservation, community resilience and municipal sustainability improvements.
While the need for such investments is well documented, staff emphasized that a fully refined list of bond-eligible projects will not be finalized until at least April. The uncertainty on project readiness was a key factor in the task force’s decision, with members acknowledging that many of the proposed projects require additional scoping, prioritization and cost analysis before being included in a bond package.
Without this groundwork, a 2025 election risked presenting voters with proposals that lacked clarity or feasibility… 🟪 (LINK TO FULL STORY)
âś… Newly released renderings show the Austin Convention Center's upcoming transformation (KUT)
A design for the Austin Convention Center expansion and redevelopment was revealed Tuesday. The city expansion has been in the works for years and has been part of a nearly decade-long study to expand the convention center in an effort to become more attractive space for large events and conferences.
Architects from LMN Architects and Page Southerland Page presented the new design to the Austin City Council during a work session. Today, the center is the 61st largest in the country, which officials said makes it tough to compete with other large cities.
After the redevelopment, Austin’s convention center is projected to be the 35th largest.
The $1.6 billion project will be paid for by funds from Hotel Occupancy Tax and Convention Center, and will allow the city to host larger events as well as multiple events at a time. The amount of rentable space will nearly double to 620,000 square feet, with room to add an additional 140,000 square feet… 🟪 (LINK TO FULL STORY)
âś… Austin homebuilding landscape in focus (Austin Business Journal)
Rooftops continue to rise across the metro, particularly in the suburbs, and the Austin Business Journal's latest lists showcase the homebuilders leading the charge. Thousands of home starts and closings were reported in the metro last year.
Overall, Austin’s housing inventory — a mix of new and old homes — and active listings have steadily risen over the past year, according to the Austin Board of Realtors and Unlock MLS, a favorable development for homebuyers as the market comes back into balance after the high-flying pace of sales in recent years. D.R. Horton Inc. continues to be the No. 1 volume homebuilder in the metro by sales, with just over $929 million in homes sold in 2024.
The builder, which has been active in subdivisions such as Bar W Ranch, Durango and Southgrove, closed 2,764 homes last year. Prices for D.R. Horton homes range from $190,000 to $650,000, according to the list… 🟪 (LINK TO FULL STORY)
[TEXAS NEWS]
âś… High housing costs, inflation bite into Texas sales tax growth (Texas Tribune)
It’s more expensive to live in Texas than in previous years, and the cost of living is making it harder for the state to generate much-needed tax revenue, state officials said Tuesday. The state’s high housing costs — like rising homeowners insurance premiums and sky-high rents — as well as higher food costs have bitten into the state’s sales tax revenue, representatives for the Texas Comptroller’s office told state lawmakers Tuesday.
Sales taxes make up more than half of the state’s budget. Texans are spending a larger share of their budget on keeping a roof over their heads and food on the table, costs that largely don’t generate sales tax revenue, and aren’t spending as much of their income on goods that do, said Brad Reynolds, chief revenue estimator for the comptroller’s office.
Sales tax revenue makes up about 58% of Texas’ overall budget. State sales tax revenue ballooned amid the state’s pandemic-era economic boom. But the state’s population and economic growth have slowed and sales tax collections, too, have contracted.
Reynolds told lawmakers on the House Ways and Means Committee he expects sales tax collections to grow over the next few years — but at a slower pace than in recent years. State tax collections declined slightly in fiscal year 2024, he noted… 🟪 (LINK TO FULL STORY)
✅ Texas wants the NCAA to start “sex-screening” its student athletes (Texas Tribune)
Texas is suing the largest college sports governing body in the country in the hopes that a court will order the organization to “immediately begin screening the sex of student athletes.”
Although the National Collegiate Athletic Association has already barred transgender women from playing in women’s sports, Texas’ attorney general has accused the group of using loopholes to allow such competition.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is asking for a temporary injunction that either orders the screenings or requires that the NCAA and its affiliates immediately stop using the terms “women,” “female,” or “girl” to market any of its women’s sports teams or competitions… 🟪 (LINK TO FULL STORY)
[US and World News]
âś… Trump policy concerns send US consumer confidence plummeting to eight-month low (Reuters)
U.S. consumer confidence deteriorated at its sharpest pace in 3-1/2 years in February while 12-month inflation expectations surged, offering further signs that Americans were growing anxious about the potential negative economic impact of the policies of President Donald Trump's administration. The Conference Board survey on Tuesday noted that "comments on the current administration and its policies dominated the responses."
It followed on the heels of surveys last week showing steep declines in business and consumer sentiment in February. Tariffs on imports, which Trump has already imposed or is planning to, have been singled out as the major issue in almost every survey of households and businesses.
Economists said unprecedented layoffs of federal government workers were also taking a toll on consumers' psyche, which they said posed a risk to spending, the main engine of the economy. "Americans are increasingly pessimistic about the outlook. No Federal government has ever before threatened government workers with mass firings and it is starting to scare the daylights out of consumers," said Christopher Rupkey, chief economist at FWDBONDS.
"The economy could well ground to a halt in the first quarter of the year as consumers stay home." The Conference Board's consumer confidence index dropped 7 points, the biggest decline since August 2021, to 98.3 this month. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast the index falling to only 102.5. The third straight monthly decrease pushed the index to the lowest level since June 2024. It is now at the bottom of the range that has prevailed since 2022. The cutoff date for the survey was February 19.
Confidence slumped across all age groups, with sharp decreases in the 35-55 age cohort. Nearly all income groups reported a decline, with the exception of households earning less than $15,000 a year and between $100,000–125,000. "There was a sharp increase in the mentions of trade and tariffs, back to a level unseen since 2019," said Stephanie Guichard, senior economist, global indicators at the Conference Board… 🟪 (LINK TO FULL STORY)
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