🟪 Austin budget forecast includes millions in cuts to housing, job and education programs (KUT)

🟪 Gov. Abbott threatens to pull $2.5 million in grants to Austin over APD's ICE rules (KUT)

🟪 Austin Transit Partnership approves Light Rail construction, land acquisition contracts (Community Impact)

🟪 Austin unveils proposed updates to its downtown density bonus program (Austin Business Journal)

🟪 SXSW unveils 2027 dates as festival shifts to Sunday finish (Austin Business Journal)

🟪 Gov. Greg Abbott threatens $200 million in funding from major Texas cities over ICE policies (Texas Tribune)

🟪 Texas needs at least $174 billion to avoid water crisis, state says (Texas Tribune)

READ ON!

🇸🇬 Monday night. Bingham Group was invited to attend the official opening of Enterprise Singapore Overseas Centre in Austin, the organization's fourth office, and first non-coastal U.S. presence., the others being New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco.

As Austin Mayor Kirk Watson said:

"We are recognizing the role we ought to be playing in this global economy. In many ways, we are maturing into that role, and it's opportunities like this that help us with that.

✅ Austin budget forecast includes millions in cuts to housing, job and education programs (KUT)

Programs that help low-income families, people experiencing homelessness and survivors of domestic abuse and sexual assault could face funding cuts in the city of Austin's next budget.

A first draft of what the budget could look like was released Thursday. The fiscal year 2027 forecast assumes what the state calls a no-new-revenue property tax rate, which means the city would set a tax rate that would generate no more than a 3.5% increase in tax revenue over the previous year.

That means the average taxpayer would pay about $2,074 a year for a home valued at $495,000. The budget would still have a projected deficit of $26.4 million, according to city officials.

In December, City Manager T.C. Broadnax said the city would have to cut nearly $17 million in social service contracts to keep the deficit from growing further.

The forecast released Thursday morning mirrored that projection while specifically pointing to cuts for permanent supportive housing, workforce development programs and adult education programs.

There is still money to cover a $30 million increase in personnel costs laid out in the three public safety contracts, $3 million to keep the Marshalling Yard emergency shelter open and $2.8 million to hire new firefighters… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Gov. Abbott threatens to pull $2.5 million in grants to Austin over APD's ICE rules (KUT)

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is threatening to terminate roughly $2.5 million in state grants awarded to Austin because of the city's policies on police cooperation with federal immigration authorities.

This comes just days after Attorney General Ken Paxton launched an investigation into the city’s policies on how it works with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The Austin Police Department announced new rules in March for how officers interact with ICE agents if they suspect someone is in the country without authorization. Those rules require officers to clear any communication with ICE with a supervisor if the suspect has a civil "administrative warrant" — or noncriminal warrant — flagged by ICE. APD is required to communicate with ICE for suspects facing criminal charges, according to the guidelines.

Abbott said the department's policies “impede or restrict the notification” to ICE and may be in breach of the grant agreements.

Andrew Mahaleris, Abbott's press secretary, said this is a safety issue… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Austin Transit Partnership approves Light Rail construction, land acquisition contracts (Community Impact)

Austin Transit Partnership continues to hit more Light Rail project milestones, approving an operations and maintenance building contract and a resolution to acquire parcels of land for the project at its April 15 meeting.

The 10-mile long, $7.1 billion light rail project is part of the Project Connect transit program approved by voters in 2020. This system will initially feature 15 stations with all-electric trains running every 5-10 minutes throughout most of the day, according to ATP.

In February, ATP approved a $60 million design-build contract for the first phase of the project. On April 15, the agency approved a contract with Kiewit Austin Partnership—a joint venture between Kiewit Building Group and Austin Commercial—in an amount not to exceed $25 million for the construction of an operations and maintenance facility as part of Phase 1 of the project.

The facility will serve as the light rail's home base for the trains to be cleaned, serviced and maintained and for the system's operators to work, said Brad Cummings, ATP senior vice president of procurement and contracts… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Austin unveils proposed updates to its downtown density bonus program (Austin Business Journal)

More details have emerged about how the city of Austin wants to update its downtown density bonus program. 

Austin city staff shared a proposal to add two combining districts for density bonuses — one that would add 400 feet to base entitlements and another bonus that would add 850 feet — and update other regulations to the city’s density bonus program. The proposal was presented to the Austin Planning Commission on April 14. 

Currently, the maximum height for most properties in downtown Austin is 350 feet. The smaller of the proposed combining districts could result in buildings that reach up to 750 feet. Structures could reach 1,200 feet under the larger proposed bonus. Those maximum heights would allow for recent towers in Austin to still get built as The Republic, which opened its office to tenants this past October, is about 710 feet tall. Waterline, which is set to open later this year and is the tallest tower in Texas, is 1,025 feet tall. 

Most downtown properties south of the Texas State Capitol building could utilize the proposed density bonuses. But city staff told the Planning Commission these proposed combining districts are just the first phase of updates being planned. They'd share more density bonus updates for other sites in downtown Austin… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ SXSW unveils 2027 dates as festival shifts to Sunday finish (Austin Business Journal)

The dates for next year's South by Southwest festival have been unveiled. 

South by Southwest announced that its festival and conference next year will start on March 15, which is a Monday, and end on Sunday, March 21. The SXSW EDU activities will run from March 13-16.

“SXSW continues to be the place where creative industries converge and new ideas take shape,” said Greg Rosenbaum, SXSW’s senior vice president of programming, in a statement. “In 2027, we’re bringing our global community together across education, film, music, technology, comedy, and culture for another week of discovery and collaboration.”

This marks the second year in a row where SXSW is planning to have its conferences and festivals run concurrently over one weekend, rather than spread out over two weekends. Next year, SXSW will continue to operate with a decentralized model without the use of the Austin Convention Center, which is currently being redeveloped and is planned to reopen in time for SXSW’s 2029 festival… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Gov. Greg Abbott threatens $200 million in funding from major Texas cities over ICE policies (Texas Tribune)

Gov. Greg Abbott’s office has threatened to cut state funding to three of Texas’ largest cities if they fail to change policies that the governor says limit police cooperation with federal immigration authorities.

Around $200 million in public safety funding is at risk for Houston, Dallas and Austin, which all have rules directing police officers not to prolong the detention of individuals during encounters like traffic stops for Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents. 

Some cities have also been under legal scrutiny from Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office, which said their policies violate Senate Bill 4, a state law that bans local governments from adopting measures that “materially limit” immigration enforcement. Some local leaders have pushed back against that charge, and the ACLU of Texas has said policies like Houston’s support “longstanding protections under the Fourth Amendment.”

Houston faces the biggest potential loss of state funding. On Monday, Abbott’s office told the state’s largest city that the state will withdraw around $110 million in public safety grants, if it does not repeal its ordinance.

Abbott’s office followed that on Thursday with similar letters to Austin — warning the city that around $2.5 million in similar funding could be at risk — and Dallas, which stands to lose more than $32 million in grants, as well as more than $55 million in World Cup public safety funding… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Texas needs at least $174 billion to avoid water crisis, state says (Texas Tribune)

Texas communities will need to spend $174 billion in the next 50 years to avert a severe water crisis, a new state analysis revealed Thursday. That’s more than double the $80 billion projected four years ago, when the Texas Water Development Board last passed a state water plan.

The three-member board presiding over the agency authorized the highly anticipated draft blueprint Thursday, the first administrative step toward adopting the water development board’s plans for the next 50 years. The plan, released every five years, encompasses the projects that 16 regional water planning groups in Texas said are the most urgent, water development board officials said. 

The board’s latest estimates come as the state’s water supply faces numerous threats. Growing communities across Texas are scrambling to secure water, keep up with construction costs and cope with a yearslong drought. This week, Corpus Christi officials said the city may be just months away from declaring a water emergency. Meanwhile, other rural cities by the Coastal Bend are rapidly drilling wells to avoid a crisis. Residents in North Texas have also been bracing for groundwater shortages… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Pentagon approaches automakers, manufacturers to boost weapons production (Wall Street Journal)

The Trump administration wants automakers and other American manufacturers to play a larger role in weapons production, reminiscent of a practice used during World War II. Senior defense officials have held talks about producing weapons and other military supplies with the top executives of several companies, including Mary Barra, chief executive officer of General Motors, and Jim Farley, CEO of Ford Motor, according to people familiar with the discussions.

The Pentagon is interested in enlisting the companies to use their personnel and factory capacity to increase production of munitions and other equipment as the wars in Ukraine and Iran deplete stocks. The talks were preliminary and wide-ranging, the people said. Defense officials said American manufacturers might be needed to backstop traditional defense companies and asked whether the companies could rapidly shift to defense work.

The Defense Department “is committed to rapidly expanding the defense industrial base by leveraging all available commercial solutions and technologies to ensure our warfighters maintain a decisive advantage,” a Pentagon official said. The discussions are the latest by the administration to put military manufacturing on what Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has called a “wartime footing.” Discussions started before the war in Iran, the people said.

The conflict’s strain on U.S. munitions stockpiles is further indication that the military needs more commercial partners to scale up supplies of munitions and tactical hardware, such as missiles and counterdrone technology, quickly. During the talks with U.S. manufacturing executives, defense officials framed bolstering weapons production as a matter of national security. The officials asked whether companies could help as the Pentagon seeks to shore up domestic manufacturing capacity, the people said. The officials also asked executives to identify barriers to taking on additional defense work, from contracting requirements to hurdles in the bidding process… 🟪 (READ MORE)