🟪 Austin City Council urged to pause plan for parks over I-35 (KUT)

🟪 Austin considers major zoning shifts to support smaller-scale housing, neighborhood retail (Community Impact)

🟪 Round Rock to consider water agreement with Georgetown (Community Impact)

🟪 Defense, aerospace incubator launches in burgeoning innovation hub south of Austin (Austin Business Journal)

🟪 Amazon’s Zoox rolling out its double-ended robotaxis in Austin (Austin American-Statesman)

🟪 Trump and Republican National Committee lean toward Dallas for unusual 2026 GOP midterm convention (New York Times)

🟪 Airport disruptions abound as senators chase deal to end Homeland Security budget standoff (Associated Press)

🟪 Pentagon orders troops from 82nd Airborne Division to deploy to Middle East (NPR)

READ ON!

☀️ Client Spotlight: Food delivery app Wonder targets Austin amid Texas expansion (Austin Business Journal)

A New York-based food delivery service plans to expand its operations to Austin next year.

Wonder, a mealtime platform, is targeting Texas as part of its recent expansion efforts, according to an announcement. This marks the company's first move outside of the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic, with San Antonio, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston and Austin as select markets.

The platform combines delivery, pickup, dine-in, meal kits and chef-driven food into one experience across its physical locations and app services.

Customers are able to order from several acclaimed chefs and restaurant brands, including Bobby Flay Steak, Marcus Samuelsson's Streetbird, Di Fara Pizza and Texas-based Tejas Barbecue… 🟪 (READ MORE)

🏛️ Today @9AM: Austin Council Work Session

Items to watch:

🟪 A resolution initiating amendments to City Code Title 25 (Land Development) to create new zoning districts that will allow for a range of small housing types such as townhomes, cottage courts, and small-scale multi-unit residential uses (also known as “missing middle housing”) and new zoning districts that will allow for developments that mix residential and commercial or civic uses (also known as “mixed-use”); and to amend existing Land Development Code provisions and administrative barriers to better facilitate missing middle housing and mixed-use development.

🟪 A public hearing and an ordinance amending City Code Chapter 25-10 (Sign Regulations) to authorize larger signs in the public right-of-way that include electronic images, light, and off-premises advertising and waiving City Code Section 25-1-501 (Initiation of Amendments).

🏛️ Council Economic Opportunity Committee (March 20, 2026)

🟪 Briefing presentation on the Economic Development Roadmap, a strategic plan intended to guide Austin's economic development strategy over the next 3 years. [Dr. Eric A. Johnson - Assistant City Manager, City Manager’s Office]

🟪 Video Link

✅ Austin City Council urged to pause plan for parks over I-35 (KUT)

The city of Austin has come down from its post-pandemic development and growth Less than a year after Austin's City Council signed off on a plan to build parks over sunken stretches of I-35, city staff are now urging elected leaders to pump the brakes on committing any more public money for the ambitious project.

"At this point, we just can't recommend you move forward with such a decision, because that does create such a significant risk," Kim Olivares, the city's director of financial services, said at a council work session Tuesday.

Olivares said city staff don't know how much the project will wind up costing and, so far, no private donors have stepped forward to help. Similar projects in Dallas, Seattle and Boston have had at least half their costs paid for by private philanthropic contributions, she said.

Even if the city chooses not to move forward now, the chance to build caps wouldn't disappear entirely. TxDOT has several windows of opportunity before the I-35 expansion's estimated completion in 2033. But with each missed opportunity, the cost rises… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Austin considers major zoning shifts to support smaller-scale housing, neighborhood retail (Community Impact)

Officials are preparing to allow a wider range of mixed-use development and encourage more varied housing types across Austin.

The zoning initiative is aimed at missing middle residential and mixed-use projects, and builds on a recent city study about those kinds of developments and proposals to expand their use. It follows other wide-ranging revisions made to Austin's complex land development code first adopted in the 1980s.

“A lot of our most charming, walkable neighborhoods in Austin predate 1984," said council member Paige Ellis, who's sponsoring the latest reforms. "I’m trying to do what we can as a council to fix some of the overcorrection that happened in 1984, and now we are missing an entire generation of missing middle housing because no one’s been able to build it.”… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Round Rock to consider water agreement with Georgetown (Community Impact)

Round Rock City Council will consider an agreement for the city to continue treating water for the city of Georgetown at its March 26 meeting.

The cities of Round Rock and Georgetown entered into a water treatment and transmission agreement several years ago, with Round Rock treating up to 3 million gallons of raw water per day from Lake Georgetown because of the extra treatment capacity at Round Rock’s plant. Round Rock’s water treatment plant has the capacity to treat 52 million gallons per day.

With the agreement now expired, Georgetown asked Round Rock to renew the deal. According to city documents, Round Rock will have additional capacity to treat water based on future demand projections. Per the agreement, Georgetown will be charged a monthly base rate of $3,702 and volume rate of $2.21 per thousand gallons of water… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Defense, aerospace incubator launches in burgeoning innovation hub south of Austin (Austin Business Journal)

The Hays Caldwell Economic Development Partnership and Los Angeles-based Starburst announced on March 20 an aerospace and defense accelerator that will be located in San Marcos. It comes as the Austin region – and particularly the suburbs – continue to attract a wealth of companies in that sphere.

What's being called the Innovation Corridor Defense Accelerator will help high-potential defense and dual-use startups from concept to market by helping to validate their technologies and connect them with the defense ecosystem for successful industry adoption, according to an announcement. It stems from an Hays Caldwell EDP marketing trip that identified the need for a defense-focused innovation hub in the region between Austin and San Antonio.

Entities said that they are working on finalizing lease for the accelerator to be located in the 58-acre STAR Park, which is owned by Texas State University and handles research and incubation… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Amazon’s Zoox rolling out its double-ended robotaxis in Austin (Austin American-Statesman)

Austin will soon be seeing another robotaxi on its streets, but this one looks very different.

Zoox Inc. is bringing its purpose-built, double-ended autonomous robotaxi to Austin. The company said it will begin testing its robotaxis, which feature neither a steering wheel nor pedals, this week.

In a few weeks, Zoox employees, as well as their family and friends, will be able to hail rides in Austin, a spokesperson said. The company plans to open up its waitlist and begin offering early rides to a limited audience by the end of this year.

Once open to the public, rides will be available via the Zoox app. The company has been mapping parts of Austin since June 2024. 

The company’s robotaxis look entirely different from its Toyota Highlander SUVs that are currently roaming parts of downtown and East Austin.

The autonomous vehicles are bidirectional and symmetrical, meaning they have no front or back. They have sliding glass doors on both sides and a skylight above. Inside are four inward-facing seats, similar to those in a ferris wheel or train car, with chargers, ports and a control panel for support, music and climate control… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Trump and Republican National Committee lean toward Dallas for unusual 2026 GOP midterm convention (New York Times)

President Trump and the Republican National Committee are strongly considering Dallas as the site of an unusual midterm convention later this year, according to two people with knowledge of the discussions. Republicans are working to finalize the plan as they seek to rally their voters in the face of political headwinds. Some details must still be finalized, including the exact dates, and officials said formal paperwork still needed to be signed.

But Trump advisers who are looking to parade their candidates and rally the base are close to settling on Dallas over other options, which had included Las Vegas, according to the people, who were granted anonymity to share private planning information. The party is targeting a date after Labor Day to try to maximize early-voting momentum.

Political parties typically hold conventions once every four years, only when nominating a presidential candidate and formalizing their platform. But Mr. Trump has pushed for a major gathering before this year’s midterm elections to motivate his supporters at what is expected to effectively amount to a major rally for the party. Danielle Alvarez, a senior adviser to the Republican National Committee, said in a statement that “while there has been speculation in the media about the location and date, no contracts have been signed.”

“The upcoming Midterm Convention is happening because of President Trump’s leadership, vision, and unwavering commitment to the America First movement,” she said. The R.N.C. took steps at its winter meeting to clear the way for a convention-style event this year. Speaker Mike Johnson, Republican of Louisiana, said this month at the party’s retreat in Florida, “I can’t wait for the midterm convention that we’re going to have before early voting starts in the fall where we parade all of our stars across the stage and we talk about all the great things we’ve done for the American people.” He added, “This is a midterm like none other.”… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ After killing its desalination project, Corpus Christi explores buying water from a privately owned plant (Texas Tribune)

Six months after scrapping their own seawater desalination plant project, Corpus Christi City Council voted Tuesday to consider an agreement with a private company to purchase water from its desalination plant to help stave off an impending water emergency.

The council voted 7-1 to begin negotiations to acquire water from a desalination plant that’s under construction and owned by Corpus Christi Polymers, a plastic manufacturer. The plant will filter salt and other minerals out from seawater or salty groundwater to make it drinkable.

The city is in the grips of a historic drought and two of its main reservoirs have fallen to 8.4% capacity, sparking fears that the city within months may have to declare a water emergency — signaling that the city has just 180 days’ supply of water left. City manager Peter Zanoni has called desalination a drought-resistant, long-term solution to providing water to the 500,000 people across seven counties who depend on the water system… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Corpus Christi council votes to begin process to remove mayor (Texas Tribune)

The Corpus Christi City Council voted on Tuesday to launch a removal hearing for Mayor Paulette Guajardo over allegations of misconduct.

The decision comes as the city faces a growing water crisis. A water emergency may be just months away, according to city leaders. But the controversy surrounding the mayor stems from a hotel development project, not the city’s management of its water supply.

After a tense debate, council members voted 5-3 to begin a trial to decide whether to eject Guajardo, who has been in office since 2021.

A citizen petition to remove Guajardo that precipitated the council vote includes allegations that she put an item on the council’s agenda to award $2 million in tax incentives to a developer seeking to build a Homewood Suites in Corpus Christi, and that a PowerPoint presentation about the project included a slide showing a FEMA flood map that had been altered… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ How Texas became ground zero for AI data centers reshaping the energy industry (Houston Chronicle)

A California-based company is planning a new type of ranch in the heart of West Texas, measured not in herds of cattle, but in gigawatts of electricity. At the site in Fort Stockton, Pacifico Energy wants to construct a private grid — roughly the size of Ireland’s — exclusively for data centers that train artificial intelligence models. Few other states could accommodate a country-sized grid.

But Texas boasts open land and ample natural gas. This makes the state attractive to a growing number of companies like Pacifico that are sidestepping yearslong grid connections by building their own power plants — one of the quickest ways for data centers to get online. This speed is crucial to tech companies as they compete against each other to develop the most cutting-edge AI. According to Cleanview, a company that tracks data center projects, Texas has more proposals to circumvent the power grid than any other state.

“You see a massive movement of these big data center campuses, all coming towards Texas,” said Aman Joshi, chief commercial officer of Bloom Energy, which provides on-site power generation to data centers. Most data centers, even the ones building their own power plants, still want to ultimately connect to the Texas power grid, where it’s faster to get online than grids elsewhere. But an unprecedented data center backlog is forcing even Texas to slow new grid hookups. So, more companies like Pacifico are turning toward developing self-sufficient power islands as they wait for the grid to catch up. The resulting flood of both on-grid and off-grid data centers is why Texas is emerging as the fastest-growing data center market.

It could have more data centers than anywhere else in the world by 2030. Many data center developers who want to bypass the grid say using natural gas is the best way to do so. Compared to other energy sources, gas can most readily provide data centers power all the time, which is important because many of them host online systems for critical services such as banks, hospitals and first responders. That makes Texas — the country’s largest gas producer — one of the most attractive places for AI data center complexes… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Airport disruptions abound as senators chase deal to end Homeland Security budget standoff (Associated Press)

Travel disruptions deepened Tuesday as senators raced to salvage a proposal to end the Homeland Security shutdown by funding much of the department, including airport workers going without pay, but excluding immigration operations that have been core to the dispute.

The sudden sense of urgency comes as U.S. airports are snarled by long security lines, with travelers being told to arrive hours before their flights in Houston, Atlanta and Baltimore/Washington International. Routine Department of Homeland Security funding was halted in mid-February ahead of the busy spring travel season. Nearly 11% of Transportation Security Administration workers who were scheduled to report for duty Monday — more than 3,200 — missed work, and at least 458 have have quit altogether since the shutdown began, according to DHS.

Democrats are refusing to fund the department without restraints on Trump’s immigration enforcement and mass deportation operations after federal agents killed two citizens in Minneapolis… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Pentagon orders troops from 82nd Airborne Division to deploy to Middle East (NPR)

As the war approaches the one-month mark the Trump administration keeps its options open, submitting a ceasefire plan to Iran, while also deploying up to 3,000 U.S. Army paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division to the Middle East.

Revelations about the ceasefire plan come as multiple Iranian officials continue to deny that any negotiations to end the war are taking place.

It also comes as the United States is preparing to deploy up to 3,000 paratroopers to supplement some 50,000 troops already present in the Middle East.

Israel's military, meanwhile, continued to strike the heart of Tehran Wednesday and Iran fired more missiles at Israel… 🟪 (READ MORE)