🟪 Austin area ranks as fastest-growing major Texas metro in 2025 (Austin Business Journal)

🟪 Austin ISD approves nonprofit to takeover 3 middle schools to avoid state action (CBS Austin)

🟪 Expansion of Austin's missing middle, mixed-use zoning advances (Community Impact)

🟪 Austin adopts new homeless strategy plan, but leaders aren't sure of the cost (KUT)

🟪 Speaker Dustin Burrows lists data centers, property taxes and annexing slice of New Mexico among 2027 priorities (Texas Tribune)

🟪 Senate votes to fund much of DHS, minus immigration enforcement (NPR)

🟪 Trump extends deadline for striking Iran's energy plants to April 7 (Reuters)

READ ON!

☀️ Client Spotlight: Grubhub parent company seeks real estate for Austin expansion (Austin Business Journal)

A food hall with delivery service plans to open 120 locations across Texas, including a major push into the Austin market.

New York-based Wonder Group Inc., which acquired Grubhub in 2025 for $650 million, offers a variety of restaurant options under one roof. More than 60% of its business comes through delivery, according to Wonder Executive Vice President Jason Rusk. Wonder’s goal is to have enough locations to deliver food across the Austin metropolitan area, Rusk said. 

Wonder spaces also provide sit-down options. Its locations cook up different cuisines so customers who want various options can still order together. Restaurants inside Wonder include Yasas, Alanza Pizza, Burger Baby, Pop Salad, Happy Tuna, Bobby Flay Steak, Tejas Barbecue, El Diez Mexican Bowls and more.

Wonder is looking to secure real estate across the Austin metro and other Texas markets as it ramps up for a quick expansion. Of the company's 120 planned stores across Texas, Rusk said “many” will be in the Austin area. He did not specify how many would be here. Rusk was recently in Austin looking at sites. Target markets for Wonder include downtown Austin, Arboretum, Cedar Park, Georgetown, Kyle, Leander, Mueller, North Central Austin, Pflugerville, Round Rock, Southpark Meadows, Sunset Valley and Tech Ridge… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Austin area ranks as fastest-growing major Texas metro in 2025 (Austin Business Journal)

The Austin metro's population grew at the fastest rate among the major Texas metros from 2024 to 2025.

The Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos metro's population grew by 2.1% from July 1, 2024, to July 1, 2025, according to an American City Business Journals Analysis of U.S. Census Bureau estimates. The region had an estimated 2.62 million residents in 2025, up from about 2.57 million residents the year prior.

The 2.1% figure is down from 2.7% between 2023 to 2024.

The Austin area was able to add residents in a variety of methods. Births outpaced deaths from 2024 to 2025. The Census estimates showed the metro had about 16,000 residents added through natural change, which accounts for the difference between births and deaths in an area. But the bulk of the growth came from people moving here. The region netted 37,500 residents through both international and domestic migration… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Austin ISD approves nonprofit to takeover 3 middle schools to avoid state action (CBS Austin)

Austin ISD trustees approved a third-party partnership that will shift daily operations at three middle schools to an outside nonprofit, a move that will shield the campuses from state intervention for two years.

Burnet, Dobie and Webb middle schools will partner with the Texas Council for International Studies under a program known as an 1882 partnership. A 2017 Texas law allows schools to bring in an outside nonprofit or charter organization to manage daily operations. In exchange, the schools are exempt from state intervention for two years and receive additional funding.

Trustees approved the service agreement with the Texas Council for International Studies for the three campuses as part of a broader set of agenda items, including acceptance of an application approved by the Head Start Policy Council for a Head Start grant through the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, approval of the 2026-2027 Additional Days School Year academic calendar, and a contract with Travis County for after-school and summer childcare… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Austin adopts new homeless strategy plan, but leaders aren't sure of the cost (KUT)

Austin city leaders have approved a new strategic plan to address some of the issues people experiencing homelessness face.

David Gray, the city’s homeless strategy officer, said it will act as a road map for addressing homelessness over the next two years. The plan was crafted with more than two dozen community partners and includes adding shelter beds to the system, opening two centers that help coordinate services and increasing collaboration with community partners.

“If we want to get people out of our abandoned buildings and out of parks and greenbelts, we need more beds to put them in, and we need more spaces to bring those people inside," Gray said. “And that is exactly why our plan touches on adding more shelter beds, enhancing rapid rehousing and permanent supportive housing service delivery and boosting our navigation centers.”… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Expansion of Austin's missing middle, mixed-use zoning advances (Community Impact)

City Council took the first step toward broadening the types of multiunit housing that can be built in Austin neighborhoods and allowing more mixed-use development citywide.

On March 26, council advanced the creation of two new zoning categories over the year ahead.

One is meant to support more multiunit “missing middle” housing at scales in between single-family homes and bigger apartment complexes. The other is aimed at transit- and pedestrian-oriented developments blending residential and commercial space, from smaller corner stores to larger mixed-use buildings.

"Middle missing housing is the next logical step in this council’s goal to make housing accessible and affordable," Mayor Kirk Watson said in a statement. "Having a well-rounded, robust, and active housing market means addressing what’s missing, and these mid-density developments are what’s missing. Building missing middle will broaden housing choice, which we know is crucial to building a life here in Austin, Texas.”… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Speaker Dustin Burrows lists data centers, property taxes and annexing slice of New Mexico among 2027 priorities (Texas Tribune)

Texas House Speaker Dustin Burrows directed lawmakers to study the secession of New Mexico counties to Texas, the development of data centers in the state, property tax relief and more in a list of his priorities for next year’s legislative session released Thursday.

The Lubbock Republican’s interim charges overlap with Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s initial to-do list in their shared focuses on reducing property taxes, securing Texas from potential foreign threats and homing in on potential fraud and abuse in government spending.

But Burrows’ priorities cover a broader range of policy issues for House committees to tackle in preparation for the 2027 legislative session. Burrows also created three new committees on governmental oversight, health care affordability and general aviation.

He instructed the governmental oversight committee to study the implications of adding to Texas “one or more contiguous counties of New Mexico” and the process to do so, after welcoming a proposal out of New Mexico to allow its counties to band together and secede. While the Texas-New Mexico boundary is unlikely to shift next year, the proposal will likely appeal to pro-secessionists in Texas, some of whom are among Burrows’ conservative skeptics… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Texas retains its export crown while AI boom drives imports higher (San Antonio Express-News)

Texas is continuing its lead as the largest export state in the U.S., according to new study. Global credit rating agency Fitch Ratings tracked imports and exports for all 50 states and found that global shifts in tariffs and supply chains have deepened disparities between states and across industries. Imports in Texas grew roughly 4% from 2024 to 2025, likely driven by machinery imports related to artificial intelligence and data center investment.

Fitch found that states benefiting from AI-related capital, like Texas, saw stronger trade momentum than other states, particularly those tied to the auto industry, which is heavily exposed to tariffs.

Imports of machinery, excluding electrical equipment, rose 25% nationally year over year, while electrical machinery and electronics imports rose 6%. These industries represent demand for equipment needed to manufacture chips and support AI infrastructure, like data centers. Texas has become a hotspot for data center development, with the industry expanding rapidly across commercial real estate. That growth comes as the Trump administration and tech companies push to compete with China in artificial intelligence, with the state’s share projected to grow 142% through 2028. In Texas, machinery imports rose from $93 billion to $129 billion, a roughly 39% increase.

Electrical machinery and electronics imports rose 8%. Other states with significant data center growth saw increases in overall imports as well, with Arizona and Nevada seeing a 36% and 92% rise respectively. The Lone Star State also saw increased exports in electrical machinery and electronics, up 8%, and in non-electrical machinery, up 26%… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Meta boosts investment in West Texas AI data center by over sixfold to $10 billion (CNBC)

Meta is boosting its spending commitment on a forthcoming AI data center in West Texas by more than sixfold to $10 billion, with an aim to reach 1 gigawatt of capacity by the time the facility comes online in 2028, the company said on Thursday.

The data center being built in El Paso will lead to the creation of 300 new jobs, Meta said, with more than 4,000 construction workers required at its peak. The company also said it’s committed to adding over 5,000 megawatts of clean power to the grid, and will ease the water burden by working with specialized nonprofits to bring fresh water to the area.

“Since breaking ground last year, we have been proud to call El Paso home and are committed to being a good neighbor,” the company said in a blog post on Thursday.

When Meta started construction at the 1.2-million-square-foot site in October, its planned investment was $1.5 billion. Gary Demasi, Meta’s vice president of data center development, revealed the steppedup investment at an annual Borderplex Alliance summit in El Paso… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Senate votes to fund much of DHS, minus immigration enforcement (NPR)

The Senate voted overnight to fund large swaths of the Department of Homeland Security after a 42-day standoff over immigration enforcement tactics. The bill does not include funding for the agency's main immigration enforcement operations.

The legislation now goes to the House for a vote.

The DHS funding lapse forced tens of thousands of employees to work without pay - or quit– and resulted in long waits at some airports amid peak spring break travel.

Democrats have refused to support funding for DHS over objections to immigration enforcement tactics used by the agency's officers. Democrats insisted on reforms to the agency after federal officers killed two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Trump extends deadline for striking Iran's energy plants to April 7 (Reuters)

U.S. President Donald ​Trump said he would again extend a deadline for Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz or face the destruction of its energy plants, after Tehran earlier rejected a 15-point ‌U.S. proposal to end the fighting.

The war has spread across the Middle East, killing thousands of people and hitting the global economy with soaring energy and fertiliser prices that have fuelled inflation fears.

The United States and Israel launched strikes on Iran on February 28 during talks with Tehran about its nuclear programme that had not yet yielded a deal.

On Thursday, Trump threatened during a cabinet meeting at the White House to increase pressure on Iran if it did not make a deal. He later posted on ​social media that he would pause threatened attacks on Iranian energy plants for 10 days until April 6 at 8 p.m. Eastern daylight time (0000 GMT on April 7).

"Talks are ongoing and, despite ​erroneous statements to the contrary by the Fake News Media, and others, they are going very well," he added in his Truth Social post... 🟪 (READ MORE)