BG Reads | News You Need to Know (September 28, 2022)
[HEARINGS AND MEETINGS]
[AUSTIN METRO]
County gets scoop on supportive housing construction plans (Austin Monitor)
Last week, Health and Human Services updated the Commissioners Court on the Travis County Supportive Housing Initiative, a $110 million, American Rescue Plan Act-funded project to bring housing to very low-income residents. Much of the commissioners’ discussion centered on making sure that the county funding was going toward housing for tenants with track records of homelessness, making at or below 30 percent of the area median income.
About 1,530 of the units are funded by Travis County at an average cost of $76,917 per unit. HHS intends to serve 1,670 households in total with those units.
Including site partners – or development projects that will share land with initiative developments – 3,082 units will be built on land used by developments funded by the resolution, 37 percent of which will be for those at 30 percent area median income or under. Ten percent of those units will be for 31-60 percent AMI, 21 percent will be for 61-80 percent AMI, and the rest will be market rate.
“About half of those are being funded by the county,” said Pilar Sanchez, an executive with HHS.
Commissioner Brigid Shea was concerned that too much of the housing being built was market rate.
“As I understood, the intent was to provide housing for people who are chronically homeless,” Shea said. “And I’m surprised to see that 32 percent of the housing – almost a third of it – will be market rate: 971 units. That’s not what I had understood we were using our federal money for.”… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Austin's functional green space plan needs more work (Austin Business Journal)
Austin’s Design Commission is pushing the brakes on a proposal to introduce a functional green space requirement that would demand commercial developers take additional steps to manage water runoff and retention in an effort to better protect the environment.
The commission unanimously voted Sept. 26 to bring a resolution to City Council recommending the postponement and a series of changes to the proposed functional green space plan.
A working group comprised of city staffers and members of the Planning Commission is currently reviewing the proposal, which will eventually go before the City Council. Commissioners said the desired effects of the program could be achieved without adding another layer of regulation, saving both the municipal government and local developers time and money… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
How nonprofits, tech giants are trying to bridge digital divide in Austin (Austin Business Journal)
Austin's reputation as a tech mecca reaches across the globe.
Yet there are still pockets of the city that lack access to the technology and connectivity that are often taken for granted by companies and the majority of the populace. The hundreds of buses deployed around Austin during the early months of the pandemic, so children learning from home could access the internet, was a stark reminder of that.
Even in a city overflowing with tech profits and tech talent, many realize the problem won’t solve itself.
A leading example of using tech for good is Code2College, which is working to increase the number of minority and low-income students in the fields known collectively as STEM: science, technology, engineering and math. It does so with after-school coding classes, professional development and connections with major tech companies.
Code2College has attracted the support of about 130 corporate partners, among them Atlassian, Indeed, VMware, Google and Meta Platforms, co-founder and CEO Matt Stephenson said… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
NOTE: Code2College is a 2022 recipient of the Bingham Group Foundation’s grant program ($10,000 unrestricted).
Travis County commissioners vote 4-1 to approve Central Health's FY 2022-23 budget and tax rate (Community Impact)
The Travis County judge and commissioners voted 4-1 to approve Central Health’s fiscal year 2022-23 budget and tax rate on Sept. 27.
The budget has an over $20 million increase from last year, funded in part by an increase in property tax revenue and a tobacco litigation settlement, which together brought in $286.1 million. Contingency reserves—essential emergency savings—will cover nearly $5 million in additional expenses.
The budget outlines new priorities for the district, including expanding services and direct care; implementing Epic, a software that holds electronic medical records; and building new health care clinics… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
[TEXAS]
The megastate G.O.P. rivalry between Abbott and DeSantis (New York Times)
Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida wanted to irritate a set of wealthy, liberal elites when he flew migrants to Martha’s Vineyard from Texas, delivering them a slice of the humanitarian crisis simmering along the nation’s southern border. But Mr. DeSantis’s stunt also annoyed an entirely different group — fellow Republicans in Austin, including some of the allies and aides of Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas. Publicly, Mr. Abbott has not criticized Mr. DeSantis’s migrant flights from his state. “Every state that wants to help, I’m happy for it,” said Dave Carney, Mr. Abbott’s top campaign strategist. But privately, the Florida governor’s gambit stung Mr. Abbott’s team. No one in the Texas governor’s office was given a heads-up that Mr. DeSantis planned to round up migrants in San Antonio, according to people familiar with the matter. Mr. Abbott had spent months — and millions of state tax dollars — methodically orchestrating a relocation program that, since April, had bused 11,000 migrants to Washington, New York and Chicago. Mr. DeSantis’s adaptation was considerably smaller.
But it immediately put the national spotlight on Mr. DeSantis, garnering headlines and earning him praise from Republicans and condemnation from Democrats. It also led to an investigation by the sheriff in San Antonio and a lawsuit from migrants who said they had been lured onto the planes under false pretenses. Mr. DeSantis grabbed the attention of right-wing America, using Mr. Abbott’s tactic, on Mr. Abbott’s turf, to bigger and more dramatic effect. Mr. DeSantis’s instinct for political theater has helped him quickly turn into Republicans’ leading alternative to former President Donald J. Trump. Even Texas Republicans tell pollsters that they prefer Mr. DeSantis over Mr. Abbott for president in 2024. The two Republican governors have been locked in an increasingly high-stakes contest of one-upmanship, wielding their own unique brands of conservatism and pushing boundaries by using desperate migrants for political gain. In Florida, Mr. DeSantis mused to donors last year about Mr. Abbott’s good political fortune to share 1,254 miles of border with Mexico and complained that he didn’t have the same to use as a backdrop, according to one person familiar with the conversation. For all the bluster, the war between Austin and Tallahassee is decidedly more cold than hot. Yet, the two governors’ policy moves antagonizing the Biden administration and the Democratic Party as a whole have been unfolding as an interstate call and response, with national repercussions… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Texas AG’s office sends mixed signals about whether it can fine nonprofits that pay for out-of-state abortions (Texas Tribune)
A federal judge heard arguments Tuesday about Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s role in enforcing the state’s abortion laws — and whether Paxton should be called to the stand to explain things himself.
The lawsuit was brought by a group of nonprofits, called abortion funds, that help Texans pay for abortions in states where the procedure remains legal. The abortion funds argue that Paxton’s statements since the overturn of Roe v. Wade, coupled with the actions of conservative lawmakers, have made them so fearful of potential criminal and civil penalties that they have stopped their work… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Texas will build more than 50 new electric car charging locations along major highways (Texas Tribune)
Texas can move forward with a plan to build a network of hundreds of electric vehicle charging locations across the state after the Federal Highway Administration approved the state’s plan on Tuesday.
Texas will use up to $408 million from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law signed into law last year to install fast-charging electric vehicle charging locations across the state. In the first year, Texas plans to build more than 50 new locations along major Texas interstates between El Paso, San Antonio, Austin, Dallas and Houston. A handful of stations are proposed in the Panhandle and the Rio Grande Valley.
In the next two to five years, the Texas Department of Transportation’s plan proposes expanding the stations into rural areas and building at least one electric vehicle charger in every one of the state’s 254 counties… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Esmaeil Porsa: As CEO of Harris Health, I implore our leaders to put health care over politics (Houston Chronicle)
(Esmaeil Porsa is the president and CEO of the Harris Health System.) The current county tax rate discussion is my third as president and CEO of Harris Health System. While I am grateful to our elected leaders on the Harris County Commissioners Court for their service to our community, I am profoundly saddened by the message that I am hearing from our court: To the uninsured population of Harris County , be thankful for what you are getting in terms of your access to health care. Never mind that you will have to wait longer for or forgo basic and essential preventive care, including cancer screening. And never mind that you will have to wait an unreasonable amount of time to see your primary care or specialist doctor.
To the public in general , never mind that many of you will die of preventable diseases when your early-stage breast cancer, lung cancer and colon cancer go undiagnosed. Never mind that many of you live in ZIP codes that on average have a life expectancy of 20 years less than the more affluent ZIP codes in this county. And never mind that we continue to put behind bars members of our community whose only crime is suffering from mental illness instead of investing in our community mental health services… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
[BG PODCAST]
Episode 166: Discussing the CHIPS Act and Austin's Semiconductor Ecosystem with Tyson Tuttle
Today's episode (166) is a continued discussion of the CHIPS and Science Act and its impact on Central Texas, with a lens on the region's semiconductor ecosystem.
Joining us is returning guest, Tyson Tuttle.
Tyson served as CEO of Austin-based Silicon Labs from 2012 to 2021, with leadership roles at the company including Chief Operating Officer and Chief Technology Officer.
We last had Tyson on for Ep. 52 where we discussed the Internet of Things, of which he led Silicon Labs transformation to a pure-play leader in.
-> EPISODE LINK <-
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