BG Reads 7.12.2024

🗞️ Bingham Group Reads - July 12, 2024

July 12, 2024

Bingham Group Reads

Presented by:

www.binghamgp.com

July 12, 2024

Today's BG Reads include:

🟣 The Austin Council meets today at 10AM to receive the draft FY 24/25 budget

🟣 Should the City of Austin run a bank? City Council eying it (KXAN)

🟣 Expect traffic and airport delays during President Biden's visit Monday (KUT)

🟣 Community groups await fate of nearly $80M in budget recommendations (Austin Monitor)

Read On!

[BINGHAM GROUP]

[CITY OF AUSTIN]

🟣 [TODAY] Regular Meeting of the Austin City Council (7.12.2024 @10AM) - Presentation and discussion of the City Manager’s Fiscal Year 2024-2025 Proposed Budget.

[AUSTIN METRO NEWS]

Should the City of Austin run a bank? City Council eying it (KXAN)

Next week, Austin City Council members could vote to kickstart a feasibility study for the creation of a “public bank,” which “is owned and operated by a public institution, such as a municipal government,” according to council documents.

Brought forward by Council Member Zohaib “Zo” Qadri — and co-sponsored by members Ryan Alter, Vanessa Fuentes and José ”Chito” Vela — the resolution asks the city manager to look at any legal barriers and possible models for creating a public bank.

“I think creating a public bank to be able to reinvest in city revenues locally, to democratize banking and provide non-predatory banking services is only a positive,” Qadri said… (LINK TO FULL STORY)

🟣 Links to the feasibility studies and reports for public banks in several U.S. cities:

Expect traffic and airport delays during President Biden's visit Monday (KUT)

Air Force One will touch down in Austin for the first time in almost five years on Monday.

President Biden will be in town to deliver a speech commemorating 60 years since the Civil Rights Act was signed by former President Lyndon B. Johnson.

The speech is scheduled for 12:30 p.m. at the LBJ Library. The event isn’t open to the public, but will be streamed on Youtube. Biden will also record an interview in Austin with NBC News Anchor Lester Holt. It’s set to air at 8 p.m.

When the president will land in Austin and what roads he will take throughout the city is not publicly known, but here’s what we do know:

Drivers should expect delays and street closures on the roads to and from the LBJ Library and the airport. Avoid driving or parking on Robert Dedman Drive, Clyde Littlefield Drive, Red River Street and E. Dean Keeton Street, Comal Street and Manor Road near the library.

City officials suggest taking the bus that day, though some routes will be changed to accommodate road closures. Capital Metro delays and detours are posted here.

Protests could also impact traffic… (LINK TO FULL STORY)

Community groups await fate of nearly $80M in budget recommendations (Austin Monitor)

A coalition of more than 40 community groups is hoping the new city manager has found room in the next city budget for nearly $80 million of spending to address homelessness, economic insecurity and an assortment of other progressive causes.

The groups – which include Austin Justice Coalition, Sierra Club Austin, VOCAL-TX and Equity Action – have spent recent months crafting the Community Investment Budget designating 32 line items that would total just over 5 percent of the roughly $1.4 billion current budget.

Taken together, items related to homelessness and economic insecurity total almost $19 million, with another $15 million for community resilience hubs representing the single largest line item.

Representatives of the group said earlier this week they were waiting to find out how much of the CIB items would be included in the baseline draft budget that will be delivered today. Outside of the baseline total, Kathy Mitchell, senior adviser for Equity Action, said it’s possible new City Manager T.C. Broadnax could include $20 million to $30 million in discretionary items for City Council members to allocate that could cover some of the CIB items... (LINK TO FULL STORY)

Commission resolution aims to slow down sale of district chilling system (Austin Monitor)

City Council is scheduled to consider hiring J.P. Morgan Securities LLC to advise on the potential sale of Austin Energy’s district cooling system, but not everyone thinks that is a good idea.

The Resource Management Commission will likely ask Council to postpone evaluation of the sale of the chilling system at its meeting next Tuesday, Commissioner Paul Robbins – the environmentalist for whom the downtown district chilling system is named – told the Austin Monitor on Thursday. The system provides chilled water to help air conditioners efficiently cool large buildings occupied by thousands of people downtown.

The commission’s resolution says the proposal “was not discussed with community stakeholders in advance of its consideration by the City Council” and that “sale of the system could adversely affect peak demand and energy efficiency” in more than 60 large buildings. One reason Austin Energy developed the chiller system was to keep customers and diversify revenue sources at a time when deregulation was threatening to cut the utility’s customer base. If Austin Energy sold the business now, it would lose the revenue from the current chiller customers and not be able to add chiller customers in the future… (LINK TO FULL STORY)

[TEXAS NEWS]

With 1.2M customers in the dark, CenterPoint aims to restore power to 750K by Sunday (Houston Chronicle)

About 1.2 million customers were still in the dark and without air conditioning in a triple-digit heat index two days after Hurricane Beryl ripped through Houston.

CenterPoint promised it would restore 1 million customers Wednesday; by the end of Tuesday, the company had restored about one-third of total outages. The company's website showed 1,371,480 customers were still without power as of 4:55 a.m. Wednesday, down from more than 2.26 million during Hurricane Beryl Monday. Beryl, which hit Texas as a Category 1 hurricane and later was downgraded to a tropical storm, killed at least eight people in the Houston area.

More than 2.2 million Houston customers lost power in the storm. The company said in the release that it plans to release updated estimates Thursday. "Our restoration progress so far reflects our continued commitment to deliver on our promises to our customers," Senior Vice President of Electric Business Lynnae Wilson stated in the release. "We are fully focused on achieving our next restoration goals, while continuing to address the issues in the hardest-hit areas where there is major damage to our equipment and infrastructure."… (LINK TO FULL STORY)

[US and World News]

Key takeaways from Biden’s news conference: Insistence on staying in the race and flubbed names (Associated Press)

Joe Biden faced a test Thursday that he had avoided so far this year — a solo news conference with questions from the White House press corps.

The news conference was meant to reassure a disheartened group of Democratic lawmakers, allies and persuadable voters in this year’s election that Biden still has the strength and stamina to be president. Biden has tried to defend his feeble and tongue-tied performance in the June 27 debate against Republican Donald Trump as an outlier rather than evidence that at 81 he lacks the vigor and commanding presence that the public expects from the commander in chief.

He made at least two notable flubs, referring at an event beforehand to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as “President Putin” and then calling Kamala Harris “Vice President Trump” when asked about her by a reporter. But he also gave detailed responses about his work to preserve NATO and his plans for a second term. And he insisted he’s not leaving the race even as a growing number of Democratic lawmakers ask him to step aside…

Progressives circle wagons around embattled Biden (The Hill)

Progressives are standing behind President Biden, turning their constant critique of him into solidarity at a pivotal moment.

The question is: For how long?

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and the rest of the Squad are defending the 81-year-old president as several of their moderate colleagues on Capitol Hill have called for him to step down. 

Publicly, their support is an effort to quell concerns over his chances of winning the White House against Donald Trump. But some strategists and sources close to progressive members say they may be playing a longer game behind closed doors, where they could help persuade him delicately in private if more elected Democrats say he should drop out.

“I think they’re buying time and creating space for private pressure,” said one Democratic strategist close to key progressives in Congress. “This is very much a ball game.”… (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

District 4

District 6

District 7 (Open seat)

District 10 (Open seat)

_________________________

🔎 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