BG Reads // May 22, 2025

Author

A.J. Bingham
May 22, 2025

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✅ Today's BG Reads include:

🗳️📺 The Austin Council Regular Meeting Agenda (Today @10AM + Livestream Link)

[CITY OF AUSTIN]

🏛️ City Memos:

May 20:

May 19:

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[AUSTIN METRO NEWS]

✅ Austin Mayor Kirk Watson backs downsized plan for I-35 caps, citing financial constraints (Austin American-Statesman)

Austin Mayor Kirk Watson on Tuesday backed a proposal to fund only two of six proposed decks over Interstate 35 ahead of a major City Council vote, tipping the scales in favor of a pared down and less pricey version of the long-coveted plan. For months now, the council has debated how to proceed with the so-called "Cap and Stitch Program."

As originally envisioned, the $1.4 billion plan calls for installing six "caps" over parts of I-35 in central Austin that would be topped with parks and other amenities, and two bridges known as "stitches" that would feature bike and pedestrian paths. But with a worsening financial outlook, including the likely loss of a $105 million federal grant for the project, city leaders collectively agreed to drop the two stitches, leaving council members to grapple with how many caps to proceed with.

The 11-member body, which is slated to vote on the issue Thursday, must make a decision by the end of the month. That's because the Texas Department of Transportation needs to know how many caps the city wants to build so the agency can include support columns in its design plans for an expansion of I-35 in Central Austin. The city also must foot the bill for those structures. Two main camps have emerged in the debate: Those who want to pay for columns for five of the caps at a cost of $203 million — and those who want to follow the recommendation of city budget staff to fund only two caps at a cost of $49 million.

That would bring down total project costs to about $1 billion and $401 million, respectively, according to city staff and council members, though the caps likely won't be built for many years. Until Watson weighed in on Tuesday, council members were evenly split between the two groups. “After looking at the choices we face, including how best to balance our comprehensive city needs and our financial resources, I've decided to support the staff recommendation,” Watson said in a statement, joining council members Krista Laine, Marc Duchen, Mike Siegel, Vanessa Fuentes and Paige Ellis… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ With free tuition, Austin Community College sees jump in students enrolling right after high school (KUT)

ACC administrators were hoping the pilot program would make college more accessible and affordable. The school's vice chancellor of institutional research and analytics said it's done that and more.

“We saw students raising their educational aspirations as a result of this program," Jenna Cullinane Hege said.

She said for the last couple years, about 3,300 or 3,400 students enrolled in ACC right after high school. During the last academic year, that shot up to about 5,000, marking a more than 40% increase in the number of direct-to-college students. That figure was double what ACC had been anticipating, she said.

“I think one of the reasons for that is that ACC designed this program as what’s called a ‘first-dollar program,’ which means you get to keep your financial aid,” Cullinane Hege said… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ FAA staffing issues lead to Austin airport delays (AXIOS Austin)

More than 100 flights were delayed at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport on Wednesday — the second time this month — due to federal aviation staffing issues.

Why it matters: Just ahead of a busy travel weekend, the delays point to a wider problem in Austin and elsewhere involving concerns over aviation safety and reliability.

What's happening: Citing staffing issues, the Federal Aviation Administration issued a ground delay at the Austin airport Wednesday, leading to delays for more than 180 flights.

  • At least 120 flights were delayed on May 11, some for more than 90 minutes, over air traffic control staffing issues.

  • In March, the FAA placed a brief ground stop in Austin for incoming flights from all Houston and Dallas airports.

[TEXAS NEWS]

✅ Bill to curb abuses of affordable housing tax breaks moves a step from becoming law (Austin Business Journal)

A measure that would put major new constraints — some say too many — on a program aimed at incentivizing affordable multifamily housing across Texas has won overwhelming approval from the state House and Senate, and it will take effective immediately if Gov. Greg Abbott signs it. House Bill 21 would sound a death knell for so-called “traveling" housing finance corporations — a term for entities located hundreds of miles away that, in exchange for large fees from developers and investors, use their legal status to remove properties from the tax rolls of local jurisdictions by buying them and then designating them affordable housing, often without making them any more affordable.

"This solves the biggest part of the problem, and it probably sends a message to (bad actors in the industry) not to look for any more loopholes" in the state's affordable housing regulations, said state Rep. Gary Gates, R-Richmond, who spearheaded the measure.

But critics of HB 21 are likening it to a sledgehammer when a scalpel is needed, saying it risks severely hampering legitimate affordable housing projects statewide if it becomes law. That's because it contains retroactive provisions and would not only apply to traveling HFCs but also to those operating within the jurisdictions — and with the blessing of — the cities and counties that formed them.

“I don’t see how these new regulations create an environment where people are going to be able to do business in this segment of affordable housing," said Todd Kercheval, executive director of the Texas Association of Local Housing Finance Agencies, a trade group. Kercheval's group and others, such as the Texas Affiliation of Affordable Housing Providers, have described traveling HFCs as a scourge on their industry and have backed legislative efforts, albeit more targeted, to stamp them out. But with HB 21 already to Abbott — and having received the two-thirds majorities in the House and Senate needed to take effect immediately if he signs it — the clock is ticking… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Water bills face deadline threat as Texas lawmakers negotiate spending priorities (Texas Tribune)

Texas is running out of water. And Texas lawmakers are running out of time to solve the problem.

With just days left until the legislative session ends, two key pieces of legislation await key votes in the state House and Senate.

The two pieces of legislation, Senate Bill 7 and House Joint Resolution 7, are supposed to work together to spend billions of dollars to save the state’s water supply. Despite Gov. Greg Abbott declaring water an emergency item at the start of the legislative session, which means the bills can be fast-tracked, lawmakers, water agencies, and advocacy groups have reached an impasse on how to spend the money.

“This is a priority for leadership. It is going to have to be negotiated,” said Perry Fowler, executive director of the Texas Water Infrastructure Network. “This is big, important policy. It is not easy stuff. You end up getting some bumps and bruises.”… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Texas Legislature on verge of completely banning THC products after key House vote (Texas Tribune)

The Texas House late Wednesday gave initial approval to a bill that would ban all products containing tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, likely spelling the end for the state’s short-lived hemp industry.

Under the legislation, which is nearing the governor’s desk for approval, adults would face up to a year in jail for possessing hemp products with any amount of THC — a stricter penalty than what is on the books for possessing up to 2 ounces of marijuana.

The bill’s expected passage portends a minor earthquake for the state’s economy, effectively shuttering a field that, by one estimate, accounts for roughly 50,000 jobs and generates $8 billion in tax revenue annually.

THC products, now a ubiquitous presence at gas stations, convenience stores and thousands of other retailers across Texas, are now poised to be taken off the shelves. The about-face comes six years after the Legislature inadvertently touched off a massive boom in hemp-based products when lawmakers, intending to boost Texas agriculture, authorized the sale of consumable hemp… 🟪 (READ MORE)

[US and World News]

✅ First FDA-cleared Alzheimer's blood test could make diagnoses faster, more accurate (NPR)

A new blood test that detects a hallmark of Alzheimer's is poised to change the way doctors diagnose and treat the disease.

The test, the first of its kind to be cleared by the Food and Drug Administration, is for people 55 and older who already have memory problems or other signs and symptoms of Alzheimer's.

The results show whether the brain of a person with cognitive symptoms also has amyloid plaques, clumps of toxic proteins that build up in the spaces between brain cells. The presence of plaques in a person with cognitive symptoms usually confirms an Alzheimer's diagnosis… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ In lawsuit over teen’s death, judge rejects arguments that AI chatbots have free speech rights (Associated Press)

A federal judge on Wednesday rejected arguments made by an artificial intelligence company that its chatbots are protected by the First Amendment — at least for now. The developers behind Character.AI are seeking to dismiss a lawsuit alleging the company’s chatbots pushed a teenage boy to kill himself.

The judge’s order will allow the wrongful death lawsuit to proceed, in what legal experts say is among the latest constitutional tests of artificial intelligence.

The suit was filed by a mother from Florida, Megan Garcia, who alleges that her 14-year-old son Sewell Setzer III fell victim to a Character.AI chatbot that pulled him into what she described as an emotionally and sexually abusive relationship that led to his suicide.

Meetali Jain of the Tech Justice Law Project, one of the attorneys for Garcia, said the judge’s order sends a message that Silicon Valley “needs to stop and think and impose guardrails before it launches products to market.”… 🟪 (READ MORE)

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