BG Reads | News You Need to Know (March 8, 2023)
[AUSTIN METRO]
New charter review commission proposed (Austin monitor)
Although the previous City Council didn’t take action on a 2019 special report on citizen initiatives from the Office of the City Auditor, the current Council appears likely to approve creation of a new citizens commission tasked with recommending changes to the city charter.
In particular, the potential new commission might consider whether the city should alter requirements for petitions to create ordinances. Council members are specifically interested in asking members of the commission to consider increasing the number of voters required to sign petitions to get proposed ordinances onto citywide ballots.
Council Member Ryan Alter is the lead sponsor of the resolution on this week’s agenda calling for establishment of a Charter Review Commission. His co-sponsors include Council members Natasha Harper-Madison, Alison Alter and Leslie Pool, as well as Mayor Pro Tem Paige Ellis and Mayor Kirk Watson.
There are four types of citizen-initiated petitions, but the commission is likely to focus on the requirements for putting a new ordinance on the ballot. The requirements for putting a charter amendment on the ballot are set by state law, so the city can’t change them.
According to the auditor’s report, “most peer cities require more signatures for citizen initiatives than Austin. Only Austin has a set number of signatures required in addition to a percentage requirement. To propose a new law, petitioners in Austin must collect either signatures from 20,000 voters or 5 percent of voters, whichever number is smaller. Twenty-thousand signatures is currently about 3 percent of Austin voters and will continue to be a lower percentage as the city grows.”… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
TxDOT to seize part of Waller Beach Park for I-35 construction (KUT)
I-35 in Central Austin is on the cusp of a once-in-a-generation change as the Texas Department of Transportation gears up for an almost $5 billion transformation of the highway that slices through the city's core.
Before the state's contractors start eight years of construction, residents get a chance to weigh in on the sweeping project from Ben White Boulevard to U.S. 290 East. A federally mandated 60-day public comment period ends at 11:59 p.m.
Many of the far-reaching effects of expanding the 8-mile span are buried in plain sight among the 517 pages of the draft environmental impact statement — the document open to public comment — which balloons to almost 9,000 pages with attached technical reports, land surveys, maps and appendixes… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Austin ISD seeks community input on next superintendent, hopes to hire someone by July 1 (Community impact)
Austin ISD officials are seeking the community's input on what qualities they would like to see in the next superintendent.
"We need your thoughtful and candid input into this process in order to ensure that the voice of our community is part of our search to find the best superintendent for our district," said Gloria Davis, lead associate with GR Recruiting—the search firm hired by the district to find the next superintendent—during a town hall meeting March 7 at Webb Middle School.
Throughout the week, the district has offered town halls to community members, who discussed topics such as the challenges AISD currently faces and what they want to see in a new superintendent. Those attending brought up challenges they want the new superintendent to address such as special education and disability evaluations, saying the district is not where it should be at this point… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Historic Landmark Commission votes to keep the party going at legacy venue the Broken Spoke (Austin monitor)
The Broken Spoke will keep its doors open to honky-tonk enthusiasts for the foreseeable future, after a move to grant the venue a historic zoning designation made its way through the Historic Landmark Commission last week.
Now 59 years old, the Broken Spoke is one of few remaining vestiges of Austin’s star-studded musical legacy, boasting a history that includes acts from Bob Wills, Willie Nelson, Jerry Jeff Walker, Dale Watson and George Strait. While the venue was officially recognized by the Texas Historic Commission in 2021, the new historic zoning would provide additional preservation tools, including a property tax exemption and protection against future alteration.
Known for its memorabilia-filled interior and dance hall, the Broken Spoke has stood largely unaltered since former owner James White leased the land from former City Council Member Jay Johnson in 1964. By the 1970s, the venue had become a staple of Austin’s progressive country scene, alongside now-razed counterculture hot spots like the Skyline and Armadillo World Headquarters… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
[TEXAS]
Why momentum is building behind a 'shell' incentives bill at Texas Capitol (Austin Business Journal)
Members of the Texas business community are standing firmly behind proposed legislation that could bring back elements of a controversial economic development tool that legislators previously allowed to sunset.
In a rare bipartisan decision, lawmakers in 2021 did not renew what was known as Chapter 313 of the tax code, leading the incentives program to expire at the end of 2022.
But now that state lawmakers have returned to Austin for their biennial session, a "shell bill" has been filed that could reinstate portions of the Chapter 313 program as part of a wider effort to incentivize large economic development projects in the Lone Star State.
The Texas Jobs and Security Act, or House Bill 5, would establish a new statewide incentives program. The exact particulars of how it would do that remain to be seen but the effort is already attracting supporters and detractors. Supporters say that leaves room for negotiations while critics argue the effort is being rushed through the legislature.
The primary author of HB 5 is Rep. Todd Hunter, a Corpus Christi Republican. The bill attracted the attention of Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan, who named it a session priority, a powerful momentum boost… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Texas lawmakers propose historic investments to broadband and water infrastructure — but voters will have the last word (Texas tribune)
Texas lawmakers want voters to decide whether the state will spend billions of dollars in broadband and water infrastructure development with two House priority bills filed Monday calling for the historic investments.
Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan revealed House Bill 9 and House Bill 10, which seek to create the Texas Broadband Infrastructure Fund and the Texas Water Fund, respectively.
HB 9, filed by state Rep. Trent Ashby, would create the fund for $5 billion, to be administered by the Texas Comptroller’s office. The money would be used to bolster the Texas Broadband Development Office’s efforts to expand internet availability in the state, among other uses, and would be the biggest state investment in broadband development to date… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Texas Sen. John Cornyn 'would take nothing off the table' in response to Americans killed in Mexico (HOuston Chronicle)
U.S. Sen. John Cornyn said he "would take nothing off the table" when it comes to dealing with drug cartels after two Americans were killed in Mexico last week. The Texas Republican said as much when he was asked on Fox News on Tuesday if he would support "aggressive measures" such as "taking out the fentanyl labs in the jungles in Mexico." "I would not take anything off the table when it comes to protecting American lives," Cornyn said. Two of four Americans who were abducted in Mexico last week when their van was caught in a shootout were found dead, a top Mexican official said Tuesday. The two others were found alive, with one wounded, and returned to the U.S… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
[NATION]
Oklahoma weed legalization referendum defeated (Politico)
Oklahoma voters overwhelmingly rejected recreational marijuana legalization at the ballot on Tuesday, hitting the brakes on what’s become the country’s wildest weed market over the last five years.
The Associated Press called the contest with roughly two thirds of precincts counted and the petition failing by a more than 20-point margin.
The state’s booming medical program — with roughly 12,000 licensed businesses and nearly 400,000 enrolled patients — won’t be immediately impacted by the election defeat.
But many marijuana legalization advocates fear that the outcome will embolden state lawmakers who have long been wary of the freewheeling medical program to step up their efforts to put stricter limits on the marketplace.
“The anti-revolutionary forces want to return Oklahoma to their dream of this bygone era,” said Lawrence Pasternack, a legalization advocate who’s written extensively about the state’s weed experiment. “They see marijuana as anathema to that dream.”
The rejection of the Oklahoma referendum marks the latest ballot failure for legalization advocates in recent months. Voters in Arkansas, South Dakota and North Dakota defeated legalization referendums in November, while voters in Maryland and Missouri approved adult-use legalization petitions… (LINK TO FULL STORY)
Trump, vowing 'retribution,' foretells a second term of spite (New York Times)
Donald Trump has for decades trafficked in the language of vengeance, from his days as a New York developer vowing “an eye for an eye” in the real estate business to ticking through an enemies ledger in 2022 as he sought to oust every last Republican who voted for his impeachment. “Four down and six to go,” he cheered in a statement as one went down to defeat. But even though payback has long been part of his public persona, Trump’s speech on Saturday at the Conservative Political Action Conference was striking for how explicitly he signaled that any return trip to the White House would amount to a term of spite. “In 2016, I declared, ‘I am your voice,’” Trump told the crowd in National Harbor, Maryland. “Today, I add: I am your warrior. I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution.” He repeated the phrase for emphasis: “I am your retribution.”
Framing the 2024 election as a dire moment in an us-versus-them struggle — “the final battle,” as he put it — Trump charged forward in an uncharted direction for American politics, talking openly about leveraging the power of the presidency for political reprisals. His menacing declaration landed differently in the wake of the pro-Trump mob’s assault on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, in a last-ditch effort to keep him in power. The notion that Trump’s supporters could be spurred to violence is no longer hypothetical, as it was in 2016 when he urged a rally audience to “knock the crap out of” hecklers. The attack on the Capitol underscored that his most fanatical followers took his falsehoods and claims of victimhood seriously — and were willing to act on them. While Trump has long walked up to a transgressive line, he has often managed to avoid unambiguously crossing it, leaving his intentions just uncertain enough to allow his supporters to say he is being mistreated or misinterpreted. Steven Cheung, a spokesperson for Trump, said the speech was “a call to political action to defeat the Democrats who have put their collective boot on the throats of Americans,” adding, “Anyone who thinks otherwise is either being disingenuous or is outright lying because they know President Trump continues to be a threat to the political establishment.” But John Bolton, a national security adviser under Trump who later broke publicly with him, had little doubt what the former president meant on Saturday… (LINK TO FULL STORY)