City Council on Tuesday received its first briefing on what is expected to be a painstaking journey toward developing and implementing an investment strategy for funding Austin’s Climate Equity Plan.

A public hearing is set for today on the creation of an investment plan – one of the steps outlined in a resolution that Council approved in February. The resolution kicked off the staff-level work toward developing funding strategies.

A detailed memo from Chief Sustainability Officer Zach Baumer preceded his briefing to Council. The memo included departmental priorities and cost estimates for several big-ticket items, such as the acquisition of 20,000 acres of land for water-quality protection and sequestering of carbon emissions, large infrastructure improvement projects and electric vehicle charging programs.

Mayor Kirk Watson raised several questions regarding the financing methods needed to fund the projects and he sought greater clarity on what the trade-offs and benefits would be, with the ultimate aim of getting buy-in from the community. One of Watson’s notable achievements during his first mayoral tenure was orchestrating a peace accord between environmentalists and the business community, leading to their joint support of a 1998 bond election for land acquisition over the Edwards Aquifer and the expansion of the Austin Convention Center – a win-win for both sides... (LINK TO FULL STORY)

Production of Paramount+ show '1923' estimated to pump millions into Austin economy (Austin American-Statesman)

The production of season two of the Paramount+ show "1923" will pump more than $51 million into Austin's economy from wages, hotel stays and other local services, the city of Austin estimates.

A prequel of the popular show "Yellowstone," "1923" is a Western drama starring Helen Mirren and Harrison Ford. Season one was filmed in Montana.

Filming for season two will occur across Texas, and Austin will be a base of operations in the state, according to city documents. Production is planned to start in July and run through September. ATX Studios will host the production offices and sound stage.

As part of this, the city of Austin could offer a small incentive to a production company working on the show, King Street Productions Inc., to hire local workers. The Austin City Council will vote on the incentive Thursday.

King Street Productions is estimated to pay around $15 million total in local wages. The incentive up for vote Thursday is for a 0.5% return on the total of local wages paid by the production company, which city staff estimates will be around $75,000. The contract gives some breathing room in total payment amount but will be capped at $82,500… (LINK TO FULL STORY)

Meet the New Man Leading the City of Austin (Austin Chronicle)

T.C. Broadnax’s first month on the job as Austin’s city manager is drawing to a close – just as the city is preparing to enter a momentous period during which several critical policy and personnel decisions will be made.

On top of that to-do list for Broadnax is the hiring of a permanent police chief (Robin Henderson is interim chief). A nationwide search for candidates is currently underway. Broadnax’s executive team has also begun briefing him on the city’s Fiscal Year 2024-2025 budget, which he will present in July and City Council will amend and adopt in August.

Broadnax’s labor relations team is barreling ahead with negotiations over a long-term labor contract with the Austin Police Association; his housing, planning, and adjacent departments will be implementing the bold development reforms Council recently approved; and summer is for all intents and purposes already here – an increasingly perilous season in Texas, when extreme heats can cause the kind of emergencies that test city government’s ability to provide critical information and lifesaving supports to residents. (Consider that the last city manager, Spencer Cronk, lost his job shortly after a winter storm during which Council criticized his performance.)…(LINK TO FULL STORY)

Austin council to vote on increasing property tax exemption for older adults, disabled people (Austin American-Statesman)

Homeowners over 65 or those with a disability in Austin may not see an increase in their city property tax bill next year.

The Austin City Council will vote Thursday on an ordinance that would remove $154,000 of a home's appraised value from the city's taxable property calculations for homeowners over 65 or with a disability, up from the current $124,000 exemption.

Under this change, the city property tax bill of the average homestead receiving the senior/disabled property tax exemption would be around the same next year as it is this year, rather than seeing an increase under the current $124,000 exemption, according to a May 15 memo from city budget and performance officer Kerri Lang to the mayor and City Council.

"Senior and disabled homeowners deduct this amount from the assessed value of their property, after first applying the City’s 20% general homestead exemption, to arrive at their net taxable property value for a given year," Lang's memo states. "This taxable value is then multiplied by the City’s adopted tax rate to determine the homeowner’s annual property tax bill."

For non-senior homeowners, this change would result in an annual increase of $2.50 per $100,000 of taxable value, according to Lang's memo… (LINK TO FULL STORY)

[TEXAS NEWS]

How Ken Paxton is stretching the boundaries of consumer protection laws to pursue political targets (Texas Tribune)

Consumer protection laws give attorneys general broad legal authority to request a wide range of records when investigating businesses or charities for allegations of deceptive or fraudulent practices, such as gas stations that hike up fuel prices during hurricanes, companies that run robocalling phone scams and unscrupulous contractors who take advantage of homeowners.

But attorneys general have increasingly used their powers to also pursue investigations targeting organizations whose work conflicts with their political views. And Paxton, a Republican, is among the most aggressive. “He’s laying out kind of like the blueprint about how to do this,” said Paul Nolette, an expert in attorneys general and director of the Les Aspin Center for Government at Marquette University.

An analysis by ProPublica and The Texas Tribune shows that in the past two years, Paxton has used consumer protection law more than a dozen times to investigate a range of entities for activities like offering shelter to immigrants, providing health care to transgender teens or trying to foster a diverse workplace… (LINK TO FULL STORY)

[US/WORLD NEWS]

Biden’s problems with younger voters are glaring, poll finds (NPR)

Younger voters have been a crucial voting bloc for Democrats for decades.

Voters 18-29 years old made up roughly 1 in 6 voters in 2020, and President Biden won them by more than 20 points, according to exit polls. He won voters under 45, who were 40% of the electorate, by double-digits, too.

But surveys have found Biden struggling with the groups, and the latest NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll underscores the depth of his problems with them.

It’s a reason why Biden is locked in a tight race with former President Donald Trump and falls behind when third-party candidates are introduced, according to the survey.

In a head-to-head match up with Trump, Biden and Trump are in a statistical tie, with Biden narrowly ahead 50%-48%. He leads by just 4 points with voters under 45 and by 6 with Gen Z/Millennials.

Despite widespread college campus protests this spring, the Israel-Hamas war is not the top issue for younger voters.

A Harvard youth poll found that inflation, health care and housing topped the list of concerns for those 18-29. But the war is yet another, high-profile topic that younger voters break with Biden on… (LINK TO FULL STORY)

Biden’s Black voter troubles are setting off alarm bells (Politico)

Prominent Black officials are warning the Biden campaign that the president’s efforts to keep Black voters firmly and enthusiastically in his electoral coalition aren’t working — and that time is running out to get his message across.

The publicly voiced concern from these Black Democrats isn’t that the White House lacks policy achievements — it’s that Black voters aren’t hearing about them. Worse, they fear that the Biden campaign has not fully grasped the severity of the information gap at hand, particularly in key battleground states.

But more privately, Democratic operatives express other fears, including that Black influencers and media personalities have soured on Biden and that the president himself has eschewed major interviews and less scripted campaign stops, making him less accessible to voters. Black leaders also see the community as open to the Donald Trump campaign’s targeted entreaties.

And while Black voters, according to surveys, are supportive of Biden policies — like student debt relief and funding for historic Black colleges — when they’re familiar with them, the stubbornness of inflation remains a huge concern, as with the broader public.

Those concerns could prove especially critical in the battleground states of Georgia, where Black people make up about 32 percent of the eligible voting population, and in North Carolina, where they account for roughly 22 percent. Even a slight dip in support among Black voters in states like Pennsylvania — where roughly 10 percent of eligible voters are Black — could cost Biden the election… (LINK TO FULL STORY)

[2024 Austin City Council Race Watch]

This fall will see elections for the following Council Districts 2, 4, 6, 7, 10, and Mayor.

Declared candidates so far are:

Mayor

District 2

Council Member Vanessa Fuentes

District 4

District 6

District 7 (Open seat)

District 10 (Open seat)

_________________________

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