BG Reads | News You Need to Know (March 22, 2021)
[BINGHAM GROUP]
BG Podcast EP. 134: Exploring San Francisco's Tech Exodus and Where Austin Fits
Today’s episode (134) features Jennifer Stojkovic, Executive Director of sf.citi, the tech trade association of San Francisco.
With 1,000+ members and supporting companies, such as Google, Salesforce, and Microsoft, sf.citi engages in policy and projects serving the larger San Francisco community.
She and Bingham Group CEO A.J. discuss the impact COVD-19 has had on San Francisco, particularly how the pandemic has accelerated an exodus to rising Tier 1 cities like Austin.
You can listen to this episode and previous ones on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and SoundCloud. Please like, link, comment and subscribe!
Also check out The BIG 3, the three top headlines Austinites need to know.
We’re posting on our social media platforms and YouTube every Monday and Friday. We’d love your feedback and story suggestions as we develop this offering. Email at: info@binghamgp.com
[MEETING/HEARINGS]
[THE 87TH TEXAS LEGISLATURE]
LINK TO FILED HOUSE BILLS (5,224)
LINK TO FILED SENATE BILLS (2,397)
[AUSTIN METRO NEWS]
New interim Austin Police Chief to be named today (KXAN)
City Manager Spencer Cronk is expected to name the new interim Austin Police Chief Monday.
This comes after current APD Chief Brian Manley announced his retirement in February, saying he is ready after 30 years.
“I am at peace with my decision,” said Chief Manley in an email to Cronk and the entire department at the time of the announcement.
Manley became chief in June 2018 after leading Austin in his interim position through some of the most terrifying weeks the city has experienced, the bombings three years ago. His retirement takes effect at the end of March.
Austin City Council will vote to confirm the new interim chief at Thursday’s scheduled meeting… (LINK TO STORY)
City of Austin launches plan to bring events back safely (City of Austin)
Effective Friday, the City of Austin is launching new guidelines to enable events to begin to reopening safely. “Bringing Events Back: Austin-Travis County COVID-19 Safety Guide for Venues & Special Events” outlines COVID-19 health and safety recommendations for indoor venues, and new outdoor special event permit requirements for Austin Center for Events. These guidelines are a starting point for events to begin to happen again, and will be updated regularly as health conditions change.
“Austin Public Health reviewed key indicators which have been moving in the right direction,” said Dr. Mark Escott, Austin-Travis County Interim Health Authority. “We actually have a glimpse of normalcy as a reward of the hard work our community has done to protect each other with masking and hygiene practices but to make this a reality, we have to stay vigilant in the protection of ourselves and our community. If we see a surge in cases and hospitalizations, we have the flexibility to reconsider the scale of the event, modify the mitigation strategies, or cancel if needed.”
(LINK TO STORY)
Health officials urge Austinites to get tested for Covid if they traveled over spring break (KUT)
About a quarter of adults in Travis County have gotten at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, and the Austin area is seeing record-low numbers of coronavirus cases. But health officials were clear at a news conference Friday morning: “We’re not out of the woods yet.”
There are at least two COVID-19 variants now spreading in Austin, and students and families are returning from spring break next week. Dr. Mark Escott, interim health authority for Austin Public Health, said people who traveled over the break and were in places where social distancing and masking were not adhered to should quarantine and get tested.
“Please stay home next week, please get a test at the end of the week before you return to work or school,” he said. “That’s going to help limit the spread to other members of the community and help us to avoid a surge.”
The Austin area has seen a slight increase in COVID-19 hospital admissions over the last couple of days. Escott said that’s a reminder the community needs to keep following precautions: social distancing, masking and staying home when sick.
“If we can do that and we can maintain those protections over the next six weeks, our risk of a surge is going to dissipate very quickly as we approach May,” he said. “And God willing, we can have a more normal summer and fall ... if we can all continue to work together in the short term.”
Now in its third month of administering vaccines to the public, Austin Public Health is ramping up vaccination efforts — a process that’s been hindered by the fact the agency has been getting only 12,000 doses a week. APH is preparing to start up its first drive-thru vaccine distribution at Toney Burger Stadium on Saturday. It expects 1,500 first doses to be administered at the pilot event — by appointment only — but says the site has the capacity to serve 3,000 people per day.
APH Director Stephanie Hayden-Howard said APH is also looking into setting up more vaccine distributions in neighborhoods around the city. That could include at recreational centers, churches or even apartment complexes.
“The large sites are great because we definitely need to get a large number of vaccine out to the public and ensure we are doing that in a short amount of time,” she said. “But we’ve heard from the public that there is a concern that we should have more locations that are in your neighborhood, one that you can easily access.”
The agency says it has the ability to vaccinate 37,000 people per week at all of its distribution sites combined; it just needs more vaccines. APH has been getting 12,000 first doses a week from the state — with the accompanying second doses coming four weeks later… (LINK TO STORY)
Downtown Commission hears plans for APD headquarters relocation (Austin Monitor)
Alex Gale from the city’s Office of Real Estate Services and Darrell Alexander from the Building Services Department spoke to the Downtown Commission Wednesday on the relocation of the Austin Police Department headquarters.
Gale explained that Council had given direction to the city manager to search for a suitable space – potentially an existing, underused space – to relocate APD headquarters.
According to Gale, Real Estate Services intends to approach the relocation effort as it would any new administrative or special use space for a department. Right now, staffers are gearing up to do a scoping session with a development consultant to determine APD’s needs for the department. Gale expects the scoping sessions to be finished by May.
“We think that’s about a four- to six-month effort to really dig into what APD requirements are. And also taking into consideration what the reimagining of APD is, what all those different, new things that APD will be doing and maybe some of the things they may no longer be doing,” Gale said.
Following the request for approval process, there will be an additional follow-up with City Council regarding funding for the development and approval for any potential real estate transactions.
“That would then start a two- to three-year process to essentially either develop a new building or significantly renovate an existing city facility or tract of land,” Gale said.
Real Estate Services anticipates additional funds will be necessary for each step of the process… (LINK TO STORY)
[TEXAS NEWS]
Despite COVID-19 pandemic and winter freeze, San Antonio mayor's race off to quiet start (San Antonio Express-News)
San Antonio has had a tough year. The COVID-19 virus has killed nearly 3,000 residents and wiped out more than 140,000 jobs. San Antonians are still shaking from a traumatic winter storm in February that left hundreds of thousands of people in the cold without power and water. At the national level, residents endured a stressful presidential election — followed by a violent insurrection at the nation’s capitol.
But the San Antonio mayor’s race — which could have been a repeat of the bitter and personal contest between Mayor Ron Nirenberg and former City Councilman Greg Brockhouse two years ago — has played out quietly. There won’t be any debates between the two frontrunners. The police and fire unions, who heavily backed Brockhouse in his first bid to unseat Nirenberg, aren’t getting involved. And hardly any money is being raised. San Antonio has grown used to contentious mayoral campaigns. Since Julián Castro left for a Cabinet position in 2014, every mayor’s race has gone to a runoff. To political observers, this year’s race is the least fractious in decades — though it may gain more heat as early voting approaches in April. “In 20 years, it’s the quietest election season for major things facing the city,” veteran political strategist Christian Archer said. “People are just tuning it out for now.”… (LINK TO STORY)
Texas Supreme Court declines to say if ERCOT is immune to lawsuit (Austin American-Statesman)
A sharply divided Texas Supreme Court declined Friday to answer a burning question after the February freeze: Is ERCOT, the agency that operates the state power grid, immune from lawsuits?
In a 5-4 decision, the majority said their hands were tied by the Texas Constitution, which forbids ruling on issues when the court lacks jurisdiction, as it does in ERCOT v. Panda Power.
Four justices disagreed with that conclusion, issuing two dissenting opinions that accused the majority of ducking an issue of grave public importance — wasting time, energy and money with a delay that will require another round of court action before Texas businesses and residents know whether lawsuits against ERCOT can proceed.
"The Court can resolve the parties' dispute," Chief Justice Nathan Hecht wrote in dissent, "but instead it chooses delay and wasting more of the parties' and judicial system's time and resources."
Justice Eva Guzman was equally blunt: "The Court abdicates its Constitutional duty in this case by declining to resolve the merits of a dispute ... (that is) of escalating importance to the parties and the public."
Not true, Justice Jeff Boyd wrote for the majority.
"We are not insensitive to the importance of the issues," he wrote, invoking a prior ruling that equated the cumbersome legal question of a court's jurisdiction to "burning a house to roast a pig."
"But our lack of jurisdiction over moot cases is a mandate of the constitution, not a matter of convenience," Boyd wrote.
The case was eagerly watched by lawyers lining up to hit the Electric Reliability Council of Texas with lawsuits arguing that the agency's action and inaction during February's record-setting freeze led to prolonged power outages that caused death and property damage… (LINK TO STORY)
Experts fear reversing electricity prices from winter storm could make things worse (Texas Tribune)
Companies and entities at every level of the Texas energy supply chain are anxiously waiting to see whether the Texas Legislature will retroactively adjust the price of power in the state’s electricity market during the February blackouts in which more than 50 people died.
Some have said they would benefit from a decision to readjust the market, while others have said they would be hurt by such a move. But who would be helped or hurt, and by how much, is unclear — and lawmakers and regulators have not said how they would retroactively change the state’s electricity market more than a month after those prices settled.
Republican Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick has pressed regulators, lawmakers and even Republican Gov. Greg Abbott to readjust what happened in the market during the winter storm. In doing so, Patrick has turned the conversation about repricing into a political battle between the three most powerful people in Texas government.
Experts inside and outside the Capitol described this debate about repricing the market as a political sideshow about an issue that does not impact a majority of Texas electricity consumers and would do nothing to protect Texans from the next time extreme weather hits the state… (LINK TO STORY)
H-E-B, known for coming to the rescue with water and hot meals, added electricity to that list (Dallas Morning News)
H-E-B and Central Market’s head of energy, George Presses, shows two slides when he makes a pitch to management: a bright, busy store and one that’s dark, with hundreds of thousands of dollars of perishables going bad. “Everyone takes electricity for granted,” said Presses, vice president of fuel and energy for the San Antonio-based grocer. While Texas’ electric grid failed to provide reliable power during last month’s winter storm, a complicated and redundant system that H-E-B and Central Market have created with Houston-based Enchanted Rock Energy passed the difficult test.
The system, which includes installing a natural gas-powered generator behind a supermarket, costs H-E-B about $1 million per store. For that, H-E-B gets uninterrupted electricity during outages, saving as much as $500,000 in perishable food in a typical store. So far, H-E-B has installed 161 generators around Texas, including at its Central Market stores in Dallas, Fort Worth and Plano. Its Southlake Central Market doesn’t have a generator, and it lost electricity and was closed during the February power outages. Only about 40 of H-E-B’s 351 stores in the state lost power. Contrast that with the world’s largest retailer, Walmart, which had about 500 stores without power at various times during those five days in February, most of them in Texas. H-E-B, known for its operations acumen and coming to the rescue with water and hot meals during hurricanes, doesn’t like to leave the details to others. The retailer started looking for solutions in 2015 when a new store in Lake Jackson lost power on the day of its grand opening. The next year, H-E-B signed a formal agreement with Enchanted Rock of Houston, an energy technology company founded in 2006 to create long-duration backup power micro-grids that it owns, operates and maintains. Last summer, the city of Houston hired the company to build a system to keep its water purification plants operating during power outages… (LINK TO STORY)
The Texas rent relief program has been open for a month. It's made just 3 payments. (Houston Chronicle)
The Texas rent relief program has only made three payments despite being online for over a month, according to a video shared with the Houston Chronicle. “We’ve paid three payments which is better than none but is way too few,” Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs director Brooke Boston said on a Friday Zoom call. “We had some major system issues happen and so it’s really only been maybe, like, 14 days that we’ve been fully in our new system.” Boston’s remarks came as part of a Zoom webinar run by the Department of the Treasury for agencies administering the Emergency Rental Assistance Program to share best practices and find resources.
“This is a $1 billion rental assistance program that the State of Texas is standing up completely from scratch. While the funding will be extremely helpful to many thousands of Texans, it did not come with program guidelines or mechanisms for delivery,” Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs spokesperson Kristina Tirloni said in an email. The Texas rent relief program opened Feb. 15. Tenants and landlords quickly complained about the program’s accessibility. Among the top issues: The website would not allow applicants to enter their phone numbers, no one answered the phone number provided and people could not check their application status. After a slew of complaints, the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs took down the website and put a new one back up in the hopes of smoothing the process. “While the website was also improved, the system upgrade referenced on the webinar was the back-end application software system,” Tirloni wrote in an email. “Upgrades to the system were unsuccessful, so a new system was procured by the vendor to provide the necessary program functions… (LINK TO STORY)