BG Reads // April 29, 2025

Author

A.J. Bingham
April 29, 2025

Presented By

✅ Today's BG Reads include:

[CITY OF AUSTIN]

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[AUSTIN METRO NEWS]

✅ Homelessness strategy plan calls for $101M in spending from city, partner groups (Austin Monitor)

Austin’s Homeless Strategy Office is proposing a funding package totaling just under $101 million for homelessness response efforts in the city’s next budget, with about one-third allocated toward maintaining existing programs, one-third for new city investments, and one-third for initiatives expected to be funded by partner organizations.

The spending plan laid out in a presentation to a joint meeting of the City Council’s Audit and Finance Committee and Public Health Committee includes approximately $15.65 million to continue support for programs currently funded by soon-to-expire American Rescue Plan Act dollars, $7.3 million in other existing one-time initiatives that would need ongoing support, and roughly $33 million in new investments to expand services and shelter capacity. Additional contributions from outside funders totaling about $16.2 million are also being sought.

The proposed investments broadly break down as follows… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ An Austin-area guide to the May 3 election (KUT)

Voters across Travis, Williamson and Hays counties will line up on May 3 to cast their ballots, deciding who represents them and how their local school districts get funded. Here’s what you need to know to vote in the election.

Over a dozen mayoral and city council seats are contested across multiple cities, including Cedar Park, Round Rock and West Lake Hills… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Memo: APD used facial recognition technology to identify robbery, assault suspect (KXAN)

In a city memo last week, the city of Austin reported the Austin Police Department used facial recognition technology to help identify a suspect wanted in connection with three separate alleged crimes last week in Austin… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ City leaders have renewed hope for federal funds for local projects in the 2026 congressional budget (Austin Monitor)

An array of local projects that lost millions of dollars in federal funding in March may secure a second chance in the next congressional budget cycle.

That’s the word from the city’s intergovernmental relations office, which notified the mayor and City Council last week that the same funding requests, along with several new ones, will be resubmitted for the fiscal year 2026 appropriations bill. Austin’s U.S. Reps. Lloyd Doggett and Greg Casar are making the requests for a wide range of projects in their districts.

While the “continuing resolution” that Congress approved last month served to avoid a federal government shutdown, it also excluded all Congressional Community Project Funding, or earmarks, which for Austin meant the loss of nearly $10 million.

A 10-year moratorium on congressional earmarks was lifted in 2022. Since then, Austin has secured about $23.6 million in community project funding.

According to the city memo from Carrie Rogers, intergovernmental relations officer, congressional leadership said they will allow members to request earmarks as part of the 2026 appropriations process, and may consider previously submitted 2025 budget requests… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ As Bastrop grows, training programs aim to help workforce earn 'thriving wage' (Austin Business Journal)

After nearly 35 years of living in Smithville, Janice Bruno contends that one of the Austin region's smallest cities is anything but sleepy. It already boasts a historic Main Street, a municipal airport and the cachet of serving as the filming location for many movies, most notably "Hope Floats." But she considers it capable of much more.

Over the last few years, new neighbors like Elon Musk's Boring Co., X and SpaceX, as well as LS Electric Co. Ltd., have moved to Bastrop County. The population of the county has swelled along with them, with 17,000 people added to its tally over the last four years — roughly the size of four Smithvilles.

In 2021, Bruno and a group of others in the city about 45 miles southeast of Austin were looking for a way to create a pathway for jobs for people amid the incoming boom. They bootstrapped together about $1 million in grants and seed money, leased a 3,000-square-foot former county tax assessor building and launched Smithville Workforce Training Center — now known as Career Tracks, which services Bastrop, Lee, Fayette and Caldwell counties… 🟪 (READ MORE)


✅ This Austin fitness center is made for content creators and brand production (Austin Business Journal)

It's tough to be a fitness influencer if you've got no place to film content.

That's where Phase Six Content Dojo comes in, a facility at 7601 S. Congress Ave. that's doing gyms differently by offering a place for fitness influencers to film, as well as space for events and a location for companies to shoot product videos. Its slogan — "this ain't no f'n gym!" — makes clear that it's a place to produce fitness content that's set up like a gym, but not actually a gym despite a mixed martial arts area, weights and more.

Steph and Jay Rose opened Phase Six in 2023 after coming up with the idea of a fitness space for content creation because, as influencers themselves, they needed such a facility but couldn't find one. The Roses, whose workout model is based on mobility and strength training, have more than 1 million followers on Instagram combined, while Phase Six has nearly 600,000… 🟪 (READ MORE)

[TEXAS NEWS]

✅ Tariff ‘chaos’ drags key Texas manufacturing gauge to worst since 2020 (Bloomberg)

A widely followed measure of Texas manufacturing activity weakened significantly as executives used words like “chaos” and “insanity” to describe the turmoil spurred by President Donald Trump’s tariffs, according to a report by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. A general gauge of business activity plunged to its worst reading since May 2020 based on recent survey responses from 87 Texas manufacturers, the Dallas Fed said Monday. While responses indicated modest current growth in production, company outlooks fell to a post-pandemic low as respondents pointed to frazzled supply lines and difficulty in forecasting. Survey indexes tracking the prices of raw materials and finished goods came in well above average, and almost 60% of respondents said higher tariffs would negatively impact their business this year.

Even as a majority of companies said they would pass higher costs onto customers, some 38% said it’s becoming harder or much harder to do so. US prices have increased more than 20% in the past four years, increasing concern that consumers may be fatigued, or have less spending power, to tolerate another ramp up in inflation. “The tariff issue is a mess, and we are now starting to see vendors passing along increases, which we will have to in turn pass along to our customers,” a respondent in the printing industry told the Dallas Fed.

Another in food manufacturing said “tariffs and tariff uncertainty are wreaking havoc on our supply lines and capital spending plans.” An executive in electronics manufacturing said, “We have already had to turn around and refuse shipments because customers cannot afford the tariffs, delaying our ability to build, which will eventually lead to job losses.” Even companies with domestic inputs felt pressure because of a reduction in demand, one survey respondent said. Texas accounts for about 10% of total US manufacturing. One executive in the solidly Republican state told the Dallas Fed that “we believe the direction the current administration is leading our country is on target, but the pain to get there may be longer and more intense than originally anticipated.”… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Texas House and Senate at odds over how to boost public school funding and teacher pay (San Antonio Express-News)

The Texas House and Senate have each supported billions in new investments for public schools, but their strategies and bottom-line amounts remain far apart as lawmakers from each chamber head to the negotiating table in the closing weeks of session. The House passed a landmark $7.7 billion school funding bill last week that would revamp special education, invest in merit-based teacher pay and make dozens of changes big and small to the complex funding formulas that decide what schools get how much. It would also raise schools’ base, per-student funding for the first time since 2019 — providing huge relief to districts statewide, many of which have cut budgets, closed campuses or run deficits in recent years. The Senate prefers much more targeted increases that specify how the districts can use the money, including one bill that would make a similar investment in special education and a $4.3 billion measure earmarked directly for teacher pay bonuses.

“There’s a philosophical difference in how to deliver the money to the school districts,” said H.D. Chambers, executive director of the Texas School Alliance. “Do you put it in buckets? Or do you do it more discretionary, and you let the schools decide?” Proposals in both chambers would likely provide the most significant investments to rural school districts, with legislators saying it’s because smaller districts lack the economies of scale of larger ones, causing struggles to recruit and retain staff. Most of the state’s small and rural school districts are represented by Republicans, who control the Legislature, while the larger, urban districts in big cities like Houston and San Antonio often are represented by Democrats. The two chambers must hash out the differences before the session ends on June 2… 🟪 (READ MORE)

[US and World News]

✅ Trump is giving automakers a break on tariffs (NPR)

President Trump has decided to give automakers a break on some of his tariffs, the latest retreat from a get-tough policy he has said is aimed at bringing manufacturing jobs to America and driving up government revenues.

The formal announcement is expected on Tuesday ahead of a Michigan rally marking Trump's 100 days in office. Trump's on-again, off-again tariffs have sparked whipsaw moves in financial markets, and most polls show Americans are concerned about Trump's handling of the economy.

The move will ensure that the different types of tariffs charged by the administration don't stack up on imports of foreign cars. The Wall Street Journal first reported the shift on Monday. An administration official confirmed the changes, speaking on condition of anonymity… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Mark Carney warns Canadians in Liberal Party victory speech: ‘Trump is trying to break us’ (Associated Press)

Prime Minister Mark Carney’s Liberal Party won Canada’s federal election on Monday, capping a stunning turnaround in fortunes fueled by U.S. President Donald Trump’s annexation threats and trade war.

After polls closed, the Liberals were projected to win more of Parliament’s 343 seats than the Conservatives. It wasn’t immediately clear, though, if they would win an outright majority — at least 172 — or would need to rely on one of the smaller parties to pass legislation.

The Liberals looked headed for a crushing defeat until the American president started attacking Canada’s economy and threatening its sovereignty, suggesting it should become the 51st state. Trump’s actions infuriated Canadians and stoked a surge in nationalism that helped the Liberals flip the election narrative and win a fourth-straight term in power... 🟪 (LINK TO FULL STORY)

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