BG Reads | News You Need to Know (June 10, 2020)
[BINGHAM GROUP]
*NEW* BG Podcast EP. 91: Public Transit in a COVID World with Randy Clarke, president & CEO, Capital Metro (LINK TO SHOW)
Colloquially known as CapMetro, Randy and Bingham Group CEO A.J. Bingham discuss how the agency adapted to a COVID-19 world, the Project Connect transit plan, and national public transit trends.
[AUSTIN METRO]
Project Connect Makes A Lot Of Promises. Equity Is One Of Them. (KUT)
The Capital Metro Board and Austin City Council are expected to vote Wednesday on a preferred plan for Project Connect, the proposal to expand the region’s transit system.
Leaders have been touting Project Connect’s benefits, such as reducing congestion and creating jobs. But they’re also promising another benefit that may be harder to measure: equity for historically underserved groups.
The plan proposes adding three new light rail train lines as well as new bus routes and park-and-ride centers. The vote Wednesday determines how the transit expansion would look, and in a couple months, leaders will finalize a financial plan that will go before voters in November.
Throughout May, Capital Metro held a series of virtual public meetings that outlined plans for the transit projects and proposals to pay for them. Equity was a key theme throughout the discussions… (LINK TO STORY)
Initial public safety reforms gain unanimous Austin City Council support ahead of vote (Community Impact)
In Austin, policymakers are poised to initiate a deep dive into public safety reform this week, as the city stakes its position in the growing debate over policing in America following the death of George Floyd, an unarmed black man, while in custody of Minneapolis cops and heightened demands for police accountability.
Floyd’s May 25 death spurred a marathon of protests against police brutality in all 50 states. Demonstrations in major cities grew violent, including in Austin where protesters also demanded justice for Michael Ramos, another unarmed black man shot three times and killed by Austin police on April 24. As protesters clashed with police in front of the department’s headquarters and along and on I-35, the department drew heavy criticism for its aggressive tactics and excessive use of force. Twenty-nine protesters were transported to the hospital for injuries sustained during the protests, 11 of which were hurt by beanbag bullets fired by officers, according to local emergency medical officials.
City Council members, after listening to eight hours of testimony from Austinites mostly demanding police accountability, cuts to the police budget and a change in department leadership, promised the community that changes were on their way. On June 11, City Council will approve the first round of those changes… (LINK TO FULL STORY)Read also: BG Blog - Recapping Last Thursday's Symbolic Vote to Defund the Police (6.9.2020)
April airport passenger traffic in Austin drops nearly 100% amid coronavirus pandemic (Austin American-Statesman)
Passenger traffic at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport continued its sharp descent amid the coronavirus pandemic, with April traffic falling nearly 100% over the same month last year, officials said Tuesday.
A total of 47,781 passengers traveled through the Austin airport in April, the first full month of travel restrictions to stop the spread of COVID-19, the disease linked to the coronavirus. That’s about a 96.6% decline compared with April 2019.
April data are the most recent made available by airport officials.
The staggeringly low numbers come after a massive drop in passenger traffic in March, when 700,655 passengers traveled through Austin’s airport — a total that was down by about 52.1% compared with March 2019.
March, typically a busy month at the airport as travelers come and go during the South by Southwest series of festivals, saw more than 1.46 million passengers in 2019, according to airport data.
Austin-Bergstrom spokeswoman Mandy McClendon said the airport had more than 17 million passengers last year… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
[TEXAS]
Texas ordered $1B in coronavirus supplies but canceled most deals over delays or faulty gear (Dallas Morning News)
In its mad dash to buy masks, gowns and other medical supplies to protect against the coronavirus, Texas is spending millions of dollars in no-bid deals and tapping vendors that have no history doing business with the state. The results have been mixed, according to state payment records and court documents. A California-based fabric firm new to the medical supply business successfully delivered thousands of gowns on a plane chartered from China. But last month, the state rejected over 200,000 face masks from another vendor because they turned out to be faulty.
In one unusual arrangement, the state is relying on the Lower Colorado River Authority and the private Dell Foundation for creative financing for a large shipment of personal protective equipment from Asia. As cases of coronavirus climbed, Texas, like many states, had to compete for scarce personal protective equipment in a turbulent market rife with soaring prices, hordes of vendors and tales of fraudsters across the country. The Texas Division of Emergency Management says it has safeguards in place, such as paying vendors only after supplies arrive and are inspected for quality, a step government watchdogs endorse. Since the pandemic began, the division has ordered over $1.1 billion worth of medical supplies, but has cancelled over half the deals because products never arrived or were defective, a spokesman said. The division has spent $200 million to date on personal protective equipment, which is being distributed statewide to health care workers and first responders. The state has paid 106 purchase orders for personal protective equipment, Christensen said. At least a dozen vendors the division used had no recent history doing business with the state, according to a review of payment records on the Texas Comptroller’s website… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Texas to require all police officers receive implicit bias training, in first George Floyd-inspired reform (Houston Chronicle)
In the first statewide policy change since George Floyd's death shook the nation, the Texas agency that regulates police, upon the request of Houston Democratic state Rep. Garnet Coleman, has agreed to add implicit bias training to a course required for every officer. The requirement was one that had been included in an early iteration, but not the final version, of the 2017 Sandra Bland Act, which requires all officers take de-escalation training among other measures.
This time, Coleman went a different route and simply asked the regulatory agency if it would make a rule change as opposed to waiting for new legislation. To his delight, the commission responded a day later that it would adopt the policy. Coleman said he will work with the agency on crafting and finalizing curriculum, but the purpose will be to train officers about the possibility that they may be unconsciously carrying preconceived notions or prejudices that can affect their actions on the job. “It does what the public is asking for,” Coleman said. “When a police officer doesn’t understand that they have this bias, the only way to change it is for them to recognize that they have a bias that may be a racial bias … When people say, ‘How do you change how people think?’ This is how you change how people think.”… (LINK TO STORY)
Spending cuts, police reforms among budget amendments proposed by Houston city council members (Houston Chronicle)
City council members have authored more than four dozen amendments to Mayor Sylvester Turner’s proposed budget to trim spending, create new sources of revenue and expand police accountability measures. Council members will take up the proposals Wednesday when they consider the mayor’s $5.1 billion budget plan, which is coming forward at an especially fraught moment. The city’s usual budget challenges have been aggravated by the economic crisis tied to COVID-19, while activists are gaining traction around the country in their calls to defund or scale back police departments after the death of Houston native George Floyd.
Many of the 50 budget amendments are a direct response to those topics, including one from Councilwoman Amy Peck that would establish a group to audit all city departments and programs, then recommend whether they should be continued with certain changes, folded into another program or dissolved altogether. The process would in some ways parallel the zero-based budgeting process used for Turner’s spending plan, which required department heads to analyze every function and justify each dollar spent rather than adding to existing budgets. Peck said Turner’s administration never showed council members the detailed results of zero-based budgeting — and her so-called sunset review commission has a broader scope. “With the sunset review, it's looking at every line item, but it goes past that,” she said. “It involves citizens and stakeholders and really gets into whether (the program is) serving the constituents, whether there are ways to consolidate, if there are technology advances to make. There could be some program within a department that's just not needed anymore.”… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Most Dallas council members consider defunding the police and using money for other services (Dallas Morning News)
In the past, the Dallas City Council has strongly supported the police department. Nine months ago it unanimously approved a $517 million police operating budget that beefed up salaries for midcareer officers. But as the council tries to address ongoing demonstrations against police violence, more members say they’re open to “defunding” — or reallocating resources from public safety into other city services. Several council members plan to release a memo calling for City Manager T.C. Broadnax to propose budget options that would take public safety dollars and funnel them into other resources to “restore trust.” The council will also ask for discussions on the topic to happen at their meetings. Ten out of 14 council members have supported the memo and plan to send duplicate letters to the city manager, said Adam Bazaldua.
Options include using the money to provide infrastructure, recreational spaces, libraries and affordable housing as well as to remedy discriminatory policies. Calls to reduce the police budget come as the city faces anywhere from a $73 million to $134 million shortfall next fiscal year because of the coronavirus pandemic. City officials have said they expect to make significant cuts in every department, including Dallas police. Mayor Eric Johnson said in a CNN interview that he believes there should be a “robust conversation about the police," the department’s relationship with communities and its use of force. “I don’t believe that we can do without a police force. So if by dismantle we mean not have the police exist anymore, I do not support that," Johnson said. “And by defund, I’m not sure what people mean. ... We need to look at every department, and we need to look at every part of our city to determine whether or not we are adequately spending on social services and what people need.” Bazaldua said that while cries to “defund” the police have been misunderstood, it’s clear to him that residents are urging council members to tackle public safety outside of a traditional police force. But Deputy Mayor Pro Tem Adam McGough, who represents northeast Dallas, said Tuesday he wouldn’t commit to taking resources away from police if the department will need that money for increased de-escalation training and other policies that would help build trust with communities… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
[NATION]
Senate GOP shifts on police reform (The Hill)
Senate Republicans are signaling a sharp shift on police reform, raising the chances that federal legislation could actually clear Congress and reach President Trump’s desk.
Just a week ago, it seemed likely that a legislative package would pass the House but run into a dam in the Senate, where Republicans seemed more focused on retaining their majority and bolstering an economy tanked by the coronavirus pandemic.
Yet the dark political clouds hovering over the White House and the Senate’s GOP majority coupled with a dramatic swing in polling showing a majority of Americans believe African Americans are the victims of excessive force by police have changed the political winds… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
IBM Abandons Facial Recognition Products, Condemns Racially Biased Surveillance (NPR)
IBM will no longer provide facial recognition technology to police departments for mass surveillance and racial profiling, Arvind Krishna, IBM's chief executive, wrote in a letter to Congress.
Krishna wrote that such technology could be used by police to violate "basic human rights and freedoms," and that would be out of step with the company's values.
"We believe now is the time to begin a national dialogue on whether and how facial recognition technology should be employed by domestic law enforcement agencies," Krishna said.
The nationwide demonstrations following the police killing of George Floyd already have led to changes to police departments around the country - over use of force policies, police misconduct and police contracts… (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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