BG Reads // June 18, 2025

Author

A.J. Bingham
June 18, 2025

Presented By

✅ Today's BG Reads include:

🟪 Designers of new Austin Convention Center share insights on project (Austin Business Journal)

🟪 Austin ISD students in grades 3-8 improve STAAR reading scores, but still struggle with math (KUT)

🟪 San Marcos Police Department updates license plate reader policy (Community Impact)

🟪 With only 8% built, Texas quietly defunds state border wall program (Texas Tribune)

🟪 Trump struggles to press deportations without damaging the economy (Wall Street Journal)

[CITY OF AUSTIN]

[AUSTIN METRO NEWS]

✅ Designers of new Austin Convention Center share insights on project (Austin Business Journal)

The design of the yet-to-be-built Austin Convention Center is meant to reflect the city it will represent — and it will mark a stark contrast to the previous facility Austinites knew for decades.

The people who drafted the new Austin Convention Center said it will have better connections to its surrounding streets, plenty of outdoor areas and amped-up public spaces to make it better reflect Austin's outdoorsy yet big-city status.

"One of the first things that struck me when I started visiting Austin, I remember walking on the street and seeing the amount of restaurants and bars that you have that open up and connect to the street, and you have other spaces that have exterior patios," said Leonardo Da Costa, a design lead and principal for LMN Architects, which is designing the new convention center in partnership with Page. "It always felt to me, intriguing, this connection that people that live here (have), how they engage with the urban space" and blur "the line between what is private what is public.

“We had this idea of these interwoven experiences in one building that would reflect the urban side (of Austin), the vibrant street culture that you have here, the murals, the art scene that you have here, and then bringing that all inside the building."

The new $1.6 billion convention center, which will be built at the site of the current facility once it's demolished, will have about 70% more rentable space, or 620,000 square feet, than the old center, as well as a ballroom that will overlook Waller Creek and about 70,000 square feet of outdoor event space with open-air terraces and a public square on the northern edge of the property… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Austin ISD students in grades 3-8 improve STAAR reading scores, but still struggle with math (KUT)

Austin ISD students in third through eighth grade exceeded their pre-pandemic scores for reading across the board, results from the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness, or STAAR test, show.

The scores, released Tuesday, show nearly all grades saw at least a small increase in the percentage of students meeting grade level. The only exception was seventh graders, who saw no change year over year, with 53% of students meeting grade level in 2024 and 2025.

Elementary and middle school students saw mixed results in math, with some grade levels improving while others declined. None of the grade levels surpassed their pre-pandemic performance.

The results within Austin ISD mirrored results statewide. Gains in math varied by grade, but performance in reading language arts (RLA) topped pre-pandemic levels.

Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath said in a news release the results for grades 3-8 are encouraging… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ San Marcos Police Department updates license plate reader policy (Community Impact)

Following San Marcos City Council’s June 3 decision to deny the expansion of the San Marcos Police Department’s automated license plate reader, or ALPR, program due to privacy concerns, SMPD announced changes to its data-sharing policy in a June 13 news release.

Effective June 9, SMPD ceased all automatic sharing of ALPR data with outside law enforcement agencies. Going forward, data will only be shared upon formal request and must be tied to a confirmed criminal investigation or prosecution, according to the release. Requesting agencies must complete a formal process, including a non-disclosure agreement, before any data is released.

SMPD currently uses 19 Flock cameras, according to SMPD’s transparency page.

Flock Safety’s license plate cameras capture still images—not video—of passing vehicles. According to City Council documents, the system identifies a car’s license plate number, make, model, color, and state of registration. All captured data is stored for 30 days to allow time for crime reporting and investigative use… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Central Texas, Pflugerville expands mental health officers as calls rise (Community Impact)

Area across Central Texas, including Hays, Travis and Williamson counties, are adapting to growing mental health needs by embedding mental health officers and crisis intervention teams within their police departments.

The National Alliance on Mental Illness, or NAMI, revealed that more than half of Texas adults with a mental health condition did not receive treatment in 2020. Mental health leaders said that although legislation has since improved access, significant gaps remain.

Across the region, Crisis Intervention Teams, or CIT, and mental health units are being embedded in police departments. Some counties are also expanding psychiatric services within jails to help bridge gaps in Texas' mental health system... 🟪 (READ MORE)

[TEXAS/US NEWS]

✅ With only 8% built, Texas quietly defunds state border wall program (Texas Tribune)

The City of San Antonio is getting ready to swear in a new mayor and several council members on Wednesday. But before that ceremony can take place, the voting results must be canvassed.

The City Clerk’s office sent a request to the Bexar County Elections Department for the municipal election runoff vote tally. That is the unofficial number of votes cast in four city council races — including District One, D6, D8, D9 — and the mayor’s race.

City officials said they expected to receive the vote count by late Monday. A challenge of the vote is still possible even after the canvassing takes place.

Candidate Kelly Ann Gonzalez, who was narrowly defeated by Ric Galvan in District 6, has yet to concede the race after losing by only 25 votes.

By law, a recount can happen up to three days after the vote is canvassed.

After Wednesday's oath in council chambers, there will be a traditional blessing for the new city leaders at San Fernando Cathedral… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Spurs chairman unveils $1.5B downtown arena plan, promises no new local taxes (San Antonio Business Journal)

San Antonio Spurs Chairman Peter J. Holt outlined his vision for Project Marvel, a proposed downtown sports and entertainment district centered on a new NBA arena that could cost up to $1.5 billion.

The ambitious development, planned for the Hemisfair area, would rely on visitor taxes and private investment without increasing local resident tax burdens, Holt told KSAT in a recent interview at the Rock at La Cantera.

“Our community deserves an urban core that is world-class and makes our community really proud, and is a beacon of unity, joy, accessibility, fun, excitement and economic development,” Holt said.

The projected $1.3-$1.5 billion price tag aligns with the costs of recent NBA arena developments across the country.

Holt indicated the funding structure would mirror the successful public-private partnership used to build and maintain the Frost Bank Center, where the Spurs currently play… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Trump struggles to press deportations without damaging the economy (Wall Street Journal)

When federal agents raided Glenn Valley Foods in Omaha, Neb., last Tuesday, they arrested about 75 of the meat processor’s workers, roughly half of the production line. The following day, the plant was operating at about 15% of capacity, and a skeleton crew strained to fill orders. Chief Executive Gary Rohwer can’t see a future that doesn’t include immigrant workers.

“Without them, there wouldn’t be an industry,” he said. President Trump’s aggressive deportation push has slammed into an economic reality: Key industries in the U.S. rely heavily on workers living in the U.S. illegally, many of them for decades. That presents a major challenge for the administration unfolding in real time, with business leaders urging a softer approach while anti-immigration hard-liners demand more deportations. The conflict could be difficult to untangle—and public signs are emerging of a clash within the administration.

The Department of Homeland Security late last week directed immigration officers to pause arrests at farms, restaurants and hotels, stressing that sweeps should focus on people in the U.S. illegally who have criminal backgrounds. “Severe disruptions to our food supply would harm Americans,” wrote Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins on X Sunday.

“It took us decades to get into this mess and we are prioritizing deportations in a way that will get us out.” At the same time, DHS appeared to walk back its own directive from last week. In a letter to Immigration and Customs Enforcement leadership over the weekend, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem doubled down on the administration’s efforts to deport millions of people living in the country illegally. “[W]e must dramatically intensify arrest and removal operations nationwide,” she wrote in the letter, which was reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. “This is a nonnegotiable national priority.” ICE agents will be judged “every day by how many arrests you, your teammates and your office are able to effectuate,” she wrote, adding, “Failure is not an option.”… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ ‘I’m an American, bro!’: Latinos report raids in which U.S. citizenship is questioned (New York Times)

They swept into the Southern California car lot last Thursday at 4:32 p.m. — masked and armed Border Patrol agents in an unmarked white S.U.V. One agent soon twisted Jason Brian Gavidia’s arm and pressed him against a black metal fence outside the lot where he runs an auto body shop in Montebello, a working-class suburb east of the Los Angeles city limits.

Another officer then asked him an unusual question to prove whether he was a U.S. citizen or an undocumented immigrant. “What hospital were you born at?” the Border Patrol agent asked. Mr. Gavidia, 29, was born only a short drive from where they were standing, in East Los Angeles. He did not know the hospital’s name. “I was born here,” he shouted at the agent, adding, “I’m an American, bro!”

Mr. Gavidia was eventually released as he stood on the sidewalk. But another U.S. citizen, Javier Ramirez, 32 — Mr. Gavidia’s friend and co-worker — had been forced facedown to the ground by two agents in the car lot. Mr. Ramirez was put inside a van and driven to a federal detention center, where he remains in custody. Mr. Ramirez’s lawyer said that officials at the detention center had denied his request to speak to his client.

“I know enough to know this is not right at all,” Mr. Gavidia said in an interview. “Latinos in general are getting attacked. We’re all getting attacked.” The episode on Thursday was captured on video by Mr. Gavidia’s friend and the car lot’s security cameras, and described in interviews with Mr. Gavidia, Mr. Ramirez’s lawyer and another man who was at the shop during the raid. It has stirred fears in Montebello and other majority-Hispanic areas in and around Los Angeles that the agents involved in the Trump administration’s immigration raids are questioning the legal status of Americans who happen to be Latino… 🟪 (READ MORE)

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