🟪 Austin Metro primary runoffs we’re watching

🟪 Austin City Council Work Session Today at 9AM

🟪 City Council approves 2,600-acre 'Dog's Head' development in East Austin (KUT)

🟪 Austin ISD needs to pass a budget by the end of June. It still hasn’t released a plan (KUT)

🟪 Austin officials greenlight new natural gas units in major power generation, storage expansion (Community Impact)

🟪 Austin OKs changes to citywide density bonus program (Austin Business Journal)

🟪 Trump endorsed Ken Paxton in Texas. But John Cornyn isn't going quietly. (Wall Street Journal)

🟪 Bush Airport to be 1 of 3 U.S. entry points for travelers from certain countries amid Ebola outbreak (KHOU)

🟪 Justice Department scrubs its website of news releases about Jan. 6 defendants (Associated Press)

Primary Runoffs We’re Watching

Travis County Precinct 4 (Democrat)

Hays County Commissioner (Democrat)

Texas House District 49 (Democrat)

Austin City Council Work Session Today at 9AM

AGENDA

LIVESTREAM (ATXN 1)

ITEM WATCH:

✅ City Council approves 2,600-acre 'Dog's Head' development in East Austin (KUT)

Austin City Council approved an agreement to develop more than 2,600 acres along the Colorado River known as the “Dog’s Head” tracts.

Austinites largely testified against the deal Thursday, which cropped up on the council agenda just last week — and wasn’t vetted by city commissions ahead of the vote.

After hours of testimony, council members moved ahead to annex the site that’s roughly the size of downtown, kicking off a development process that would bring a mixed-use development to the East Austin tracts.

The 45-year deal would incorporate the 2,600-acre site into city limits and allow for a mixed-use development with the possibility of housing, along with commercial or industrial use.

The plot, which was previously an industrial site, is owned by an LLC with ties to Endeavor Real Estate Group, which would develop the land… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Austin ISD needs to pass a budget by the end of June. It still hasn’t released a plan (KUT)

The Austin Independent School District expects a $181 million deficit in its next budget. But officials still haven’t released a proposal for what cuts will be made.

The district originally said it would release a plan for the next budget by Thursday. Now, it won’t be released until June 4, adding to the uncertainty teachers and parents have been feeling for the last few weeks.

At Thursday's board meeting, Superintendent Matias Segura said district officials have identified $130 million in potential cuts. He said they pushed the date to share the recommended budget while they work to find close to $50 million in additional cuts.

"This isn't an opportunity for me to take things off the list,” Segura said. "There's refinement, there's adjustments, but $180 million is not something that can be covered by going backwards.”… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Austin officials greenlight new natural gas units in major power generation, storage expansion (Community Impact)

Austin Energy will add hundreds of megawatts of new power generation and storage capacity under contracts approved May 21, and pursue the more controversial implementation of natural gas "peaker" units intended to stabilize the local grid.

The city-owned utility is making renewable energy and system reliability additions under its Resource, Generation and Climate Protection Plan, adopted in 2024 with the aim of reaching fully carbon-free energy by 2035.

City officials previously advanced several renewable projects this spring like nearly 40 MW of solar installations on city property and an agreement for up to 40 MW battery storage capacity. That measure was finalized this month and follows a separate 100 MW storage deal. One megawatt can serve about 250 households, AE estimates.

City Council, which serves as AE's board of directors, authorized several more renewable and reliability measures in May including:

AE General Manager Stuart Reilly said the additions come in response to the city's rapid growth, and long-range utility planning for rising energy demands and resilience measures… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ APD working to educate people on e-bike, e-moto laws (KXAN)

Austin Police and other agencies are working to educate people about the bikes and the rules to operate them.

“Right now we are doing a lot of outreach,” said Lt. Michael Endres with the Austin Police Department. “I talk to people downtown all the time. I work weekends on 6th street and we see people on e-everything down there. I stop and say you need a light, you need a helmet, you need all these things.”

The bikes have also caught the eye of Austin city council member Paige Ellis who is proposing regulations of “high powered e-dirt bikes and e-motorcycles.”

KXAN asked APD about e-motos as well, they look like dirt bikes and can reach much higher speeds.

“The e-motos are not allowed on the streets,” said Lt. Endres. “So they should not be out. It is incumbent on parents to go outside in the garage and look at what it is their kids have. If it doesn’t have pedals, the motor is over 750 watts or higher, if it is capable of moving pretty fast down the street, over 28 mph then it probably is considered an e-moto, a pocket bike, or a mini bike and it’s not allowed on public roadways.”… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Austin OKs changes to citywide density bonus program (Austin Business Journal)

Austin has updated a program that provides more options for buildings to go higher.

The Austin City Council voted on May 21 to update its citywide density bonus program to create four new bonuses. They can be used to boost the maximum heights for properties across the city. The four different density bonuses can boost a property’s maximum height by 15, 30, 45 and 60 feet from base entitlements.

The density bonuses can be applied to properties with commercial and office zoning categories. They can’t be used on sites that have a vertical mixed-use designation or sites that have already received a density bonus. 

The projects built under the density bonus programs would likely be mixed-use, as the ordinance passed has some commercial use requirements and the density bonuses apply to zones that already allow commercial uses.

To get a density bonus, a developer needs to make sure any new project provides a certain amount of affordable housing. They could also pay a fee in lieu of providing on site affordable units… 🟪 (READ MORE)

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✅ Trump endorsed Ken Paxton in Texas. But John Cornyn isn't going quietly. (Wall Street Journal)

After receiving a coveted Senate endorsement from President Trump last week, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton took an early victory lap. Paxton released an ad touting the endorsement before quickly pivoting to one targeting Democratic nominee James Talarico. He asked his rival in the Republican primary, longtime Sen. John Cornyn, to stop the negative attack ads for the final days of the ugly race. Cornyn responded with a definitive no. “Judgment day is coming for Ken Paxton,” Cornyn told reporters in Houston last week.

Conventional political wisdom considers Trump’s 11th-hour endorsement of Paxton to likely be a final blow in what was already a difficult battle for Cornyn. If true, the longtime senator is going down swinging, in a battle he has said from the beginning was largely motivated by his disgust for Paxton. At his own rally in San Antonio, Paxton said: “We’ll have Tuesday and then we’re going to have a little race with James Talarico,” before testing out derogatory nicknames for the Democrat. He challenged the crowd, as he does at every rally, to name one of Cornyn’s accomplishments in office. Paxton and Cornyn are in a runoff for the party nomination, after neither won 50% of the vote in an initial March primary. Tuesday’s runoff election will be the latest test of the president’s power, as he has used the political muscle of his MAGA base to push out dissenting voices in the Republican Party.

While Paxton’s campaign celebrated the endorsement, Cornyn’s campaign put out a press release listing all the headlines that called Paxton a gift to Democrats in the general election. James Henson, director of the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas, said he thinks the endorsement will give a final boost to Paxton. Old-school party stalwarts loyal to Cornyn may not like to admit it, Henson said, but polling and other data shows Paxton more in line with the party’s electorate. “Paxton’s alignment with Trump and the Trump era is a better fit for where the base is right now,” he said. “If Cornyn winds up pulling this out, it’ll be because he dug it out with superior resources and campaigning.”… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Early voting numbers show largest turnout in Republican primary runoff as Paxton, Cornyn battle over U.S. Senate seat (KXAN)

The number of early Republican voters who cast a ballot last week in the runoff election far outpaces any runoff election data from this decade. Data from the Texas Secretary of State’s office shows there were 829,119 mail-in and in-person votes cast in the week of early voting. That reflects a 103% increase from the Republican primary runoff in 2020; a 77% increase from 2022; and a 230% increase from 2024.

A likely reason for the higher turnout is the battle over the U.S. Senate nomination between Senator John Cornyn and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. Cornyn barely edged out Paxton in the March primary by less than 20,000 votes. President Donald Trump had stayed out of the race until last week when he decided to endorse Paxton for the seat.

On Sunday, Trump took his endorsement even further by not only praising Paxton, but criticizing Cornyn. “Ken’s opponent was VERY disloyal to me, as President, and didn’t fight hard enough for the desperately needed SAVE AMERICA ACT,” Trump wrote on social media. Cornyn told Nexstar on Saturday he was surprised by the endorsement but still felt he had a chance to win the runoff.

He believes he is the best chance for the Republican party to win in November and thinks Paxton would be a liability. “Were we to nominate somebody with the baggage that he brings into a general election, I think all that would be at risk,” Cornyn said. Paxton told his supporters at a campaign event in San Antonio last week that he thinks it is time for Cornyn to step down from public office. “Can you name one good accomplishment of John Cornyn in those 42 years,” Paxton asked the crowd of Cornyn’s decades of public service.

The crowd responded with an emphatic, “No.” The winner of the runoff election will face State Rep. James Talarico in November. Talarico defeated Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett in the March primary. Both Democratic candidates received more than one million votes but Talarico still got a majority of voters… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Bush Airport to be 1 of 3 U.S. entry points for travelers from certain countries amid Ebola outbreak (KHOU)

Houston’s Bush Airport has been designated as one of three airports authorized to screen passengers entering the U.S. from certain African countries as the Ebola outbreak spreads. Bush Airport and Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson Airport will join Dulles International Airport as the only entry points for passengers who have been in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda or South Sudan within the last 21 days.

“This requirement applies to all passengers, including U.S. citizens and LPRs (lawful permanent residents), who were present in those countries,” according to a notice from the U.S. Department of State. Bush Airport can begin accepting those passengers on flights departing after 10:59 p.m. Houston time on Tuesday, May 26. For Atlanta, the requirement begins for flights departing Friday night, May 22. Both Houston and Atlanta are host cities for the World Cup, and the Democratic Republic of Congo’s team is expected to have base camps in both cities.

The DRC’s first match in Houston is scheduled for June 17. Houston health officials and infectious disease experts are closely monitoring the Ebola outbreak ahead of the World Cup. This outbreak involves a rarer strain of Ebola that doctors say behaves differently from more common forms of the virus. The concern in Houston stems from the fact that the DR Congo national soccer team is expected to use Houston as its home base during the FIFA World Cup, with players, staff and fans anticipated to spend several weeks in the city.

Dr. John McCullers, dean of the Tilman J. Fertitta Family College of Medicine at the University of Houston, said the virus is highly deadly but does not spread easily. “It’s one of those infectious diseases that’s really, really deadly, but it’s also harder to get because you have to have really direct contact with bodily fluids of an infected person,” McCullers said… 🟪 (READ MORE)

✅ Justice Department scrubs its website of news releases about Jan. 6 defendants (Associated Press)

The Department of Justice is acknowledging it has removed from its website news releases about criminal cases related to the Jan. 6, 2021, riot, calling the information about the prosecutions “partisan propaganda.”

The purge of news releases documenting criminal charges, convictions and sentencings is the latest step by the Trump administration to dramatically rewrite the history of the assault on the Capitol, when hundreds of supporters of Republican President Donald Trump stormed the building in an effort to halt the congressional certification of his 2020 election loss to Democrat Joe Biden. Trump, on his first day back in office in January 2025, pardoned, commuted the prison sentences or vowed to dismiss the cases of all of the 1,500-plus people charged with crimes during the Capitol assault, including those convicted of attacking officers with makeshift weapons such as flagpoles, a hockey stick and crutch. On Monday, the Justice Department announced the creation of a $1.776 billion fund meant to compensate Trump allies who feel they were unjustly investigated and prosecuted.

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche has not ruled out that rioters convicted of violence will be eligible for payouts, prompting bipartisan anger in Congress. After a journalist on Friday observed on the social media platform X that the Justice Department was “quietly” removing news releases on its website that were related to the Jan. 6 attack, including about a Texas man who pleaded guilty to assault and also faced separate state charges of soliciting a minor, the department responded through its “rapid response” account that there was “nothing ‘quiet’ about it.”… 🟪 (READ MORE)