BG Reads | News You Need to Know (August 14, 2020)
[BINGHAM GROUP]
*NEW* BG Podcast Episode 102 - Episode 102: Austin FC Updates with Club President Andy Loughnane (SHOW LINK)
Note: Show also available on iTunes, Spotify, Google Play, Sound Cloud, and Stitcher
[AUSTIN METRO]
Austin cuts and reinvests 5 percent of police budget, promises more changes over the next yearn (KUT)
Austin is immediately cutting $20 million from the city’s police budget – and council members are vowing to make bigger reductions in the coming year.
“I think this is without a doubt the most significant change in Austin’s public safety priorities in generations,” Council Member Greg Casar said after Thursday's unanimous vote. "This moment is something that’s been borne out of a lot of hurt in the community. ... There's so much more that we know our community is asking for."
With everything tallied, the City Council voted Thursday to flag roughly $150 million – about a third of funding for police – to potentially be moved out of the department or spent elsewhere. It’s the first time in at least six years that the council has not increased the police budget, which has grown by 50% since 2013.
Of the immediate cuts, roughly $3.5 million would go toward Austin-Travis County Emergency Medical Services’ response to COVID-19. Another $6.5 million would go to housing assistance for people currently living on the street, and just under $1 million would go to staff non-police officers responding to mental health calls.
Hours after the vote, Police Chief Brian Manley said that while he worried about staffing levels, he welcomed some of the change.
“Oftentimes police officers are sent to situations for which we’re not always the best trained or the best equipped," he said. "We’re just simply the only ones available and we have wanted that alternative reponse."
The City Council adopted the changes to the police budget Thursday as it signed off on a $4.2 billion budget ahead of Oct. 1, the start of the city’s fiscal year… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
How Asian Americans are helping fight the pandemic in Austin, facing rise in racism (Austin American-Statesman)
While the coronavirus pandemic has triggered an increase in racial aggressions against people of East Asian descent across the country, many in those communities are working daily to help stem the impact of the crisis. Locally, the Austin Chinese American Network, which has hundreds of members in the region, recently donated thousands of homemade face shields to medical facilities. Volunteers are now preparing something similar for school districts in the area.
Hugh Li, the president of the organization, said opportunities to help amid the pandemic are chances to show how the Chinese community can contribute to their local communities. “The impact we are making here is real, and the appreciation and gratitude people show us and that we feel is also real,” Li said. Frank Ong, who is of Taiwanese descent, led and oversaw Austin-based biotech firm Everlywell’s efforts to gain authorization from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for an at-home collection coronavirus testing kit that the company developed. Earlier this month, St. Edward’s University announced a partnership with Everlywell to provide staff, faculty and students with testing kits in preparation for returning to campus in the fall. Darlene Lanham, executive director of Asian Family Support Services of Austin, which helps hundreds of survivors of family or sexual violence each year, said her organization focuses on serving Asian and immigrant communities but offers help to anyone who might need it… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Austin will send $460 million transportation bond to voters in November (Community Impact)
Austin voters will decide in November whether they want to approve a bond measure that would allow the city to borrow money in order to make improvements to sidewalks, trails, bikeways and streets that have fallen into disrepair.
The bond would include $102 million in funding to be used for capital improvements to the Longhorn Dam Bridge crossing Lady Bird Lake, the South Pleasant Valley Road corridor, Barton Springs Road and a project to revitalize South Congress Avenue.
In December, the city revealed a "wishbone" design for the Longhorn Dam Bridge, with three prongs spanning the water and connecting to the Ann and Roy Butler Hike and Bike Trail. When those designs were released, funding for the construction of that bridge had yet to be identified.
According to Greg Canally, deputy chief financial officer for the city, the bond proposal would add about $77-$80 per year in property tax payments for the median homeowner in the city.
District 5 Council Member Ann Kitchen said she was uncomfortable with that high number and brought an amendment to her City Council peers Aug. 13 that would have knocked the bond down to $300 million, saving the median taxpayer about $29 per year…(LINK TO FULL STORY)
[TEXAS]
Governor Abbott statement on Austin City Council decision to defund Austin Police Department (Office of the Texas Governor)
Governor Greg Abbott [Thursday] issued a statement following Austin City Council's decision to cut $150 million from the Austin Police Department's budget:
"Some cities are more focused on political agendas than public safety," said Governor Abbott. "Austin’s decision puts the brave men and women of the Austin Police Department and their families at greater risk, and paves the way for lawlessness. Public safety is job one, and Austin has abandoned that duty. The legislature will take this issue up next session, but in the meantime, the Texas Department of Public Safety will stand in the gap to protect our capital city."… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
COVID's true toll in Texas is higher than reported, data shows (Houston Chronicle)
Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in Texas, the state’s death toll from all causes has soared by thousands above historical averages — a sobering spike that experts say reveals the true toll of the disease. Between the beginning of the local pandemic and the end of July, 95,000 deaths were reported in Texas, according to U.S. Centers for Disease Control data. Based on historical mortality records and predictive modeling, government epidemiologists would have expected to see about 82,500 deaths during that time. The CDC attributed more than 7,100 deaths to COVID-19, but that leaves roughly 5,500 more than expected and with no identified tie to the pandemic. The CDC’s chief of mortality, Dr. Bob Anderson, said these “excess deaths” are likely from a range of pandemic-related problems, including misclassifications because doctors did not initially understand the many ways that COVID-19 affects the circulatory system and results in a stroke or a heart attack.
“It can cause all sorts of havoc in the body,” he said. The CDC data offers an opaque but important estimate of how deadly the virus has been in Texas, which suffered from testing shortages for weeks as COVID-19 case counts climbed. “It has shocked me to see people think that there’s overcounts of the COVID deaths, because I can’t even imagine that that’d be the case,” said Mark Hayward, a professor at the University of Texas who studies mortality trends. “The undercount is so dramatic.” And there is a clear racial disparity in the undercounts. Between March and the end of July, Texas recorded more than 21,000 deaths of Latinos — more than 5,000 higher than epidemiologists predicted. Of those, about 2,100 were attributed to COVID-19. That leaves more than 3,000 deaths in excess of the expected number, many of them in border counties that lack resources for testing. Latinos are especially vulnerable to COVID-19 because they are more likely than their white counterparts to be exposed to the virus at jobs where working from home is impossible. They also have a higher prevalence of conditions including obesity and diabetes, which heighten the risk of serious illness for COVID-19 patients. In Starr County, Chuy Alvarez said he and his fellow justices of the peace — who are charged with investigating potential COVID-19 deaths — do not test bodies because of cost issues. The Rio Grande Valley county has yet to record a single at-home coronavirus fatality, he said, though its confirmed virus deaths of 8.8 per 10,000 residents is more than 2.5 times higher than Harris County’s, according to state health department figures… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Shopping for students without schoolrooms, Texas is spending $250 million to narrow the digital divide (Texas Tribune)
One of every six public school students in Texas does not have access to high-speed internet, and 30% of them don’t have a “dedicated and adequate learning device” — a laptop or tablet computer — according to Texas educators who answered a voluntary state survey earlier this year.
The survey is part of an urgent attempt to solve a problem that’s been festering for years — the digital divide between the haves and have-nots of the internet age.
And it helps explain the size of this back-to-school shopping order from the state of Texas: 716,000 laptops and tablets, 295,000 internet hot spots, priced a little over $250 million.
Public schools closed last spring as the coronavirus took hold of Texas. Students went home for online learning — if they had access to computers and the internet.
As the new school year begins, students have state leaders’ promise that they don’t have to physically go to school. Schools will have to provide in-person classes to those who want them, at some point, but state education officials are giving students and parents the option of online education during the pandemic.
The logistics are crazy, and with some schools already opening for classes, state and local education officials are scrambling to adjust. For in-person classes, they’re rearranging furniture and meal plans, transportation and janitorial services — the whole kit and caboodle. For online learning, there is a different dance: making sure students who aren’t being taught in school buildings have the right devices and networks to continue their education from home… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Could a run for a vacant Senate seat be next for Texas House Rep. Stickland? (Fort Worth Star-Telegram)
State Rep. Jonathan Stickland of Bedford now owns a home in Parker County, according to the appraisal district’s website. According to the website, Stickland owns 3.3 acres in Willow Park, just west of Fort Worth. When asked whether he is moving to Parker County or running for the state Senate District 30 seat which may come open soon, Stickland declined to comment, saying “I don’t want to talk about that right now but look for something big soon.”
Last year, Stickland announced that he was not seeking re-election to the Texas House. Republican Jeff Cason and Democrat Jeff Whitfield will face off Nov. 3 for that seat. .Former Bedford Mayor Jim Griffin ran unsuccessfully in the March 3 Republican primary. The District 30 state Senate seat might go up for grabs after Sen. Pat Fallon was nominated by Republican chairmen Saturday to replace U.S. Rep. John Ratcliffe as the party’s nominee in Congressional District 4. Party chairman met to name a new nominee after Ratcliffe was confirmed as Director of National Intelligence. District 30 stretches from Sherman and Denton to Weatherford and Wichita Falls, and includes Parker and Wise counties… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
[NATION]
Senate leaves until September without coronavirus relief deal (The Hill)
The Senate left Washington, D.C., on Thursday until September — the latest sign that a deal on a fifth coronavirus relief package is, at least, weeks away. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) had kept the chamber in session this week, which was technically the first in its August recess, as a last-ditch attempt to create space for the administration and congressional Democrats to get an agreement. But with talks stalemated, senators argue there is little reason for them to keep holding daily, roughly 1 1/2-hour sessions. The House already left town and isn't expected to return until Sept. 14.
“We will have our regular pro forma meetings through the end of the state work period. If the Speaker of the House and the minority leader of the Senate decide to finally let another package move forward … it would take bipartisan consent to meet for legislative business sooner than scheduled,” McConnell said as he wrapped up the Senate until next month. McConnell added that he hoped the Senate would be able to “act sometime soon.” Senators will get at least 24 hours notice to return if congressional Democrats, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and White House chief of staff Mark Meadows are able to break the impasse and votes are scheduled. Otherwise, the Senate will formally reconvene on Sept. 8. Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) predicted during a conference call on Tuesday that if negotiators didn't restart by Thursday, the administration's executive orders would be the only action that takes place until early September. “If it doesn’t happen in the next 48 hours, I think this is all you’re going to see until Congress gets back into session after Labor Day," Grassley told reporters… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
‘The President Was Not Encouraging’: What Obama Really Thought About Biden (Politico)
The way Joe Biden explained it on the campaign trail in Iowa, he and his friend Barack Obama had long talked of Biden succeeding him in the White House, continuing the work of their administration. It was only tragic fate, in the form of the loss of his son Beau, that intervened. Now, after four years, the plan could finally go forward, with Biden running as the administration’s true heir.
Barack Obama, Biden solemnly declared in his campaign announcement in Philadelphia, is “an extraordinary man, an extraordinary president.” On the social media-generated #BestFriendsDay, the campaign posted a picture of “Joe” and “Barack” friendship bracelets. Biden relabeled himself an “Obama-Biden Democrat.”
But behind all the BFF bonhomie is a much more complicated story—one fueled by the misgivings the 44th president had about the would-be 46th, the deep hurt still felt among Biden’s allies over how Obama embraced Hillary Clinton as his successor, and a powerful sense of pride that is driving Biden to prove that the former president and many of his aides underestimated the very real strengths of his partner… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
The Bingham Group, LLC is an Austin-based full service lobbying firm representing and advising clients on municipal, legislative, and regulatory matters throughout Texas.
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