BG Reads | News You Need to Know (March 25, 2022)
[BG Podcast]
Episode 152: Discussing Municipal Crypto and Blockchain Policy
Today’s episode (152) features Elijah John Bowdre, Chairman of the Miami-Dade County Cryptocurrency Task Force.
Created in May 2021 (led by the efforts of Commissioner Danielle Cohen Higgins), Task Force is comprised of eight industry-expert appointees who shall work to study the possibility of incorporating cryptocurrency as a form of payment for County taxes, fees, and services and other recommendations that may be beneficial to Miami-Dade County.
[AUSTIN METRO NEWS]
Booming Austin metro leads U.S. in population growth from 2020 to 2021 (CultureMap Austin)
Austin-Round Rock racked up one of the largest population gains among U.S. metros from July 2020 to July 2021, according to new estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau.
Taking into account births, deaths, move-ins, and move-outs, the Austin area's population grew by 53,301 during the one-year period, the Census Bureau says.
The bureau estimates Austin's population stood at 2,352,426 as of July 1, 2021. The region’s headcount increased 2.3 percent during the one-year period.
The Census Bureau attributes 40,264 new Austin-area residents to domestic migration, or people moving from other U.S. metro areas. Domestic migration is a major factor in calculating population gains and losses.
Three other major Texas metro areas appear in the national top 10 for numeric population growth (rather than percentage growth) from July 2020 to July 2021, according to the Census Bureau. They are:
Dallas-Fort Worth metro area, ranked first with 97,290 additional residents. Estimated July 1, 2021, population: 7,759,615. One-year growth rate: 1.3 percent.
Houston metro area, ranked third with 69,094 additional residents. Estimated July 1, 2021, population: 7,206,841. One-year growth rate: 1 percent.
San Antonio metro area, ranked eighth with 35,105 additional residents. Estimated July 1, 2021, population: 2,601,788. One-year growth rate: 1.4 percent.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, Austin ISD clash over Pride Week events (Austin American-Statesman)
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has accused the Austin school district of breaking state law with Pride Week activities that he characterized as attempts to indoctrinate students with liberal attitudes on sexual orientation and gender identity. "Liberal school districts are aggressively pushing LGBTQ+ views on Texas Kids!" Paxton said Tuesday night on Twitter, where he announced his campaign against the district's "immoral and illegal" Pride Week celebration, which began Monday. Austin school officials fired back, accusing Paxton of launching a misguided attack designed to score political points at the expense of students. "I want all our LGBTQIA+ students to know that we are proud of them and that we will protect them against political attacks," Superintendent Stephanie S. Elizalde replied on Twitter.
A social media-fueled backlash to this year's Pride Week also resulted in death threats against Doss Elementary School teachers and prompted the school to move Wednesday's pride parade indoors, with police present, "because we were actually worried that this political controversy could possibly threaten the safety of these kids," district spokesman Jason Stanford said. The Pride Week clash underlines increasingly sharp divisions over issues of sexual identity — a battle that has spilled into the courts over Paxton's opinion that gender-affirming medical care for transgender adolescents constitutes child abuse and into school libraries, where conservatives are pushing to eliminate books that they believe contain obscene sexual content, many of them with LGBTQ themes. The Austin district has celebrated Pride Week for at least 14 years, with 2022 activities to be determined campus by campus along broad themes, such as "Differences are awesome" for Tuesday and "Know your rights" on Wednesday. Paxton and other conservatives have focused much of their ire on Doss Elementary's published Pride Week agenda, which included the use of "community circles" — guided conversations on topics such as family and respecting differences… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Austin City Council makes mixed-use Colony Park community ‘a top priority’ (KXAN)
Austin City Council on Thursday passed a resolution that affirms the Colony Park Sustainable Community in northeast Austin is a “top priority” and will now look at ways to fill a financial gap of $103 million.
“That’s to provide the backbone infrastructure,” explained Sylnovia Holt-Rabb, the director of the City of Austin Economic Development Department. “That’s the number we need to target, but depending on how we come to a final agreement around the master development, there could be some give and take between the developer, what they put in as well as what the city puts in.”
The 208 acres of city-owned property sitting along Loyola Lane between Johnny Morris Road and Decker Lane would be developed to feature, “1,072 single-family homes, 831 multi-family apartments, 230,000 square feet of mixed-use office/institutional space, 130,000 square feet of mixed-use retail space, 53 acres of parks, trails, and open space,” according to city council documents… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Israeli electric vehicle company to open first US headquarters in Pflugerville (Austin Business Journal)
An Israeli electric vehicle company that announced in July the selection of the Austin area for its U.S. headquarters has found its home in Pflugerville.
REE Automotive Ltd. (Nasdaq: REE) is planning to handle operations, research and design and light manufacturing in a nearly 120,000-square-foot facility in Pecan 130 Business Park near East Pecan Street and the State Highway 130 toll road. There is no set move-in date, but the company plans to open in Pflugerville ahead of a start of production in 2023. The facility is expected to employ at least 125 people.
The company — which has operations around the globe, including the United Kingdom and Germany — manufacturers completely flat and modular chassis that support all sizes of electric and, in the future, autonomous vehicles, such as passenger shuttles, delivery vehicles, buses and recreational vehicles.
REE's technology, dubbed REEcorner, packs vehicle components like steering, braking, suspension, powertrain and control into a single compact module between the chassis and the wheel. The company's partners include Hino Motors Ltd., the commercial vehicle arm of Toyota Motor Corp.; Magna International Inc.; J.B. Poindexter and Co.; Navya and American Axle & Manufacturing Inc.
"The Austin region is the perfect choice for bringing to life our REEcorner technology and platforms at scale, with a highly-skilled tech workforce, well-structured regulatory environment, and entrepreneurial spirit that matches our own," REE Chief Operating Officer Mike Charlton said in a statement. "As we work toward prototype delivery this year of our new P7 platform intended to power commercial vehicles such as walk-in delivery vans, we‘re eager to be close to our partners and customers as we target commercial production in 2023. We are excited to call Pflugerville – and Texas – home."… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
[TEXAS NEWS]
Texas created a program to help students reenroll in college during the pandemic. Schools struggled to find students who qualified. (Texas Tribune)
When the federal government handed Gov. Greg Abbott $307 million in the spring of 2020 to help Texas’ education systems survive the COVID-19 pandemic, he set aside $47 million specifically for former students, those who had earned some credit but left before finishing their degree or certificate.
There are 4 million Texans who have some college credit but never earned a credential. It’s a group that the state higher education leaders want to bring back into the classroom to learn new skills and fill high-demand jobs across the state. That interest has only heightened during the pandemic, especially at Texas’ community colleges, which have experienced staggering enrollment declines.
With that $47 million from the Governor's Emergency Education Relief Fund in hand, The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board — the state agency that oversees Texas’ colleges and universities and manages the state’s financial aid program — created the Reskilling Support Fund Grant Program… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Sen. Ted Cruz scores presidential points with his show at the Ketanji Brown Jackson SCOTUS hearings (Houston Chronicle)
While U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz has triggered derision from Democrats and been lampooned on late-night talk shows for his questioning of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson and confrontations with his peers on the Senate Judiciary Committee, he’s getting exactly what he needs out of the four days of hearings to remain a key player for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. For days, Cruz has been the toast of conservative media, with multiple appearances on FOX News Channel’s biggest shows, and celebratory headlines on far-right outlets such as Breitbart and BlazeTV for pushing Jackson on her views about critical race theory and transgender issues — two of the hottest issues in Republican politics right now.
“Ted Cruz knows how to do this,” said Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia. “He understands how this all works.” Cruz, a Houston Republican, knows the audience isn’t the crowd in the room in Washington, D.C. or the journalists, Sabato said.. Republicans can’t stop Jackson’s confirmation, and they know it. But for those hoping to have a chance at running for president, a Supreme Court nomination fight in the U.S. Senate’s Judiciary Committee is political gold and a way to keep a candidate in the minds of hardcore Republican voters. Cruz is doing exactly that with his actions, Sabato said. “It’s the conservative right,” he said. “They are watching these hearings. This is what they live for.” Cruz has had several memorable exchanges with Jackson and Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee. He’s questioned if he could declare himself Asian, scoffed at Jackson’s refusal to try to define what a woman is, and read segments of a children’s book that is taught at a private school where she was a member of the board of trustees… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
[NATIONAL NEWS]
Texas Tech ‘D’ is next hurdle for Coach K, Duke (Associated Press)
Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski’s 26th, and final, appearance in the NCAA Sweet 16 is a classic matchup of offense vs. defense in the West Region semifinal in San Francisco.
The Blue Devils are scoring better than 80 points per game, freshman star Paolo Banchero is at the top of his game and the 7-foot-1 Mark Williams has been great on both ends of the court.
Texas Tech’s top 10 field-goal defense and scoring defense can cover for its offensive shortcomings. Never mind the school tournament-record 97 points the Red Raiders scored against Montana State in the first round. The 59-53 win over Notre Dame was a truer picture of how coach Mark Adams’ rugged team plays… (LINK TO FULL STORY)