BG Reads | News - July 6, 2022
[AUSTIN METRO]
Planning Commission considers working group to tackle ‘archaic’ land use code (Austin Monitor)
Austin’s Planning Commission is once more dipping its toes into turbulent waters, with plans to form a working group that would tackle small-scale reforms to the 38-year-old Land Development Code.
On Tuesday commissioners opted to postpone action for another two weeks to iron out differing opinions over approach. Commissioners aim to reconvene next Tuesday with a more concrete proposal outlining the working group’s direction.
“We had some great ideas come through with CodeNEXT, and when it didn’t get passed, a lot of them just fell away,” said Commissioner James Shieh, who led the charge advocating the group’s formation. “There are different knobs that we can turn in the existing code to get more housing and to make it more affordable to develop.”
The?late-stage failure ?of CodeNEXT in 2018 threw a fatal wrench in the city’s code rewrite initiative, making prospects for the overdue change seem near impossible. But with a worsening housing and cost-of-living crisis, debate over the chokehold on development has resurfaced, with City Council considering?major changes ?to parking, compatibility, and?accessory dwelling unit requirements .
Commissioners Shieh and Greg Anderson believe that the Planning Commission could be an asset in this renewed interest, proposing that the new housing working group act as a think tank for smaller-scale code amendments to send up to Council. But others are concerned that too broad a focus will condemn it to the same fate as CodeNEXT.
“Either through legal means or a lack of political will, Council has not seen it fit to bring forward broad reforms,” Commissioner Robert Schneider said. “I just don’t want to spend a lot of time and effort on something that is broad or very controversial and then just collapsing again.”…?(LINK TO FULL STORY)
Austin is one of the most expensive cities to build a home in Texas (KXAN)
A new report found the City of Austin stands out among other large metros in Texas and not in a good way.
A housing analysis found Austin is one of the most expensive cities to build new homes in Texas.
“For more than two years, our market reached an apex of demand and a deep valley of inventory which drove median prices higher. However, this is not a new phenomenon for our region. Austin has for decades been consistently slow to prioritize housing, and the findings of this report calls for specific actions local policy makers should take,” a Tuesday press release read.
The Austin Board of Realtors (ABoR) and the Home Builders Association of Greater Austin (HBAGA) requested the report from the Texas Real Estate Research Center at Texas A&M University.
The report found ?the City of Austin charged $18,168 in development fees per unit for a suburban-style development; that would be for 200 single-family homes on 40 acres. That’s 80.4% or more than $8,000 higher than the same fees, on average, for the same type of development in the five largest metro areas in Texas.
“This report confirms what those in the real estate community have known for a long time. Although there was little existing data prior to the report being conducted, we now can show that development fees are drastically higher in Austin than most other cities in Central Texas and major metro areas in Texas. This is a huge barrier to building homes and a significant concern considering we are in a housing supply crisis across the region.”…?(LINK TO FULL STORY)
City, police union prep for ‘more substantial’ meetings as labor contract nears expiration (Austin Monitor)
With three months until the current labor agreement expires, the city of Austin and the Austin Police Association are making progress toward a new contract that balances the city’s goals of increased transparency and oversight with the union’s goals of pay raises and other benefits.
“The next couple of meetings will be probably the more substantial meetings,” APA attorney Ron DeLord said. “We’re at that point where we’re responding and getting everything on the table for discussion.”?
The two negotiating teams discussed provisions related to promotions and hiring at their latest meeting on Thursday, with both parties mostly agreeing to standardize the processes for candidates.
“We just feel like, if you leave it up to this (promotions) panel to ask questions, it’s going to be a free-for-all,” said Deven Desai, the city’s chief labor relations officer.
APA, which represents more than 1,600 Austin police officers, also proposed updating the contract to allow the city to offer hiring perks, such as signing bonuses and moving expenses, at its discretion, citing the tight labor market and APD’s?long-standing staffing shortages .?
As of April 6, APD was short 190 sworn officers and 93 civilian staff – a vacancy rate of roughly 12 percent across the department, according to?an April 15 memo ?from Chief Joseph Chacon to city staff.?
“We just don’t want to lose out on qualified people because, maybe everything being equal … someone would go to Fort Worth (over Austin) because they got a $5,000 signing bonus,” said Melanie Rodriguez, Austin Police Women’s Association president and APA board member. “We don’t want to be behind the power curve on that.”…?(LINK TO FULL STORY)
Original Z'Tejas location to shutter in about 6 months (Austin Business Journal)
Z’Tejas got its start 33 years ago on West Sixth Street in a decades-old house. Soon, the doors will close for good at that original location.
The Austin-based Southwestern restaurant chain that?emerged from two bankruptcies ?was?later purchased ?by?Randy Cohen ?and others, who helped give it new life in several locations. But as the skyline continues to evolve, the property?at 1110 W Sixth St. on the edge of downtown, which housed Z’Tejas since 1989, will likely become something new.
"We knew it was coming; that building is so old, it's gotta' be wiped down," Cohen said.?"Repairs and maintenance cost 25% to 50% more than any other location. I mean, you're spending all your time putting Band-Aids on something when I don't own a property — it's not cost effective to do the things you want to do."
The land, owned by?Larry McGuire ?of McGuire Moorman Lambert Hospitality under the name 1110 West 6th Partners LP, was most recently appraised for tax purposes at $2.4 million. It’s unclear exactly what will come next at this property. Austin Business Journal reached out to the McGuire Moorman group but had not received a response as of publication time.
领英推荐
McGuire is a prolific restaurateur. McGuire Moorman spots include Perla's, Lamberts, Clark's, Swedish Hill, Sammie's Italian and Josephine House…?(LINK TO FULL STORY)
San Marcos is reconsidering economic incentives for film studio project after protest (KUT)
The San Marcos City Council held a discussion last to address concerns about the environmental impact of a new development coming to San Marcos: an 820,000-square-foot film studio on the recharge zone of the Edwards Aquifer.
City Council?already voted 6-1 last month to give the developer a tax break . Proponents of the project point to its economic benefits and its potential to diversify the local economy with a more creative industry.
But two council members who voted in favor of the deal decided to bring it back to council after a grassroots movement known as?Protect the River ?formed in protest.
The group says its aim is "to protect the San Marcos River and the Edwards Aquifer Zone from further development and destruction." Its message spread across social media, and their Instagram account quickly gained thousands of followers in the days after it was created. The group has been encouraging followers on Instagram to contact City Council members and city staff directly to tell them they "oppose development in the environmentally sensitive recharge zone."…?(LINK TO FULL STORY)
[TEXAS]
Texas to start randomly inspecting public schools for weak entry points this fall (KUT)
Republican state lawmakers continue to focus on school safety more than changes to gun laws after the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde – and starting this fall at Texas’ public schools, the state will start implementing what it’s calling “random intruder detection audits.” A Texas State University group called the Texas School Safety Center has been tasked by Gov. Greg Abbott to go to schools around the state and check for weak access points to enter the building, said Kate McGee, a higher education reporter for the Texas Tribune. “The center is really emphasizing that these are not going to be people simulating some kind of active threat, but they are going to just try and get in,” McGee said. “And they’re going to train them to be able to do this so it doesn’t create alarm or hysteria.”
McGee said that local law enforcement and district officials will know if the audits are coming in a particular week or day but that individual school campuses will receive no warning. “That has a lot of education advocates, teacher groups worried because, you know, a given student or classroom or teacher might see someone trying to get into a back door and not know who that person is and might negatively react,” McGee said.
“You know, we have schools around the state that have school marshals – people who can carry weapons on campus. And the question is, could this be an issue if no one on the campus is aware that this kind of audit might be happening and might cause some kind of actual accident?” Though research has not shown that hardening schools has reduced gun violence, McGee said, intruder attempts are a strategy that some schools have previously taken on an individual basis. Now that the governor has asked the school safety center to do them more broadly across the state, additional staff will be trained this summer to begin audits in September, with a goal of hitting 100% of districts and about 75% of campuses by the end of 2022-2023 school year…?(LINK TO FULL STORY)
The Texas economy is still growing, but optimism is waning (Houston Chronicle)
The Texas economy, which expanded at solid pace in recent months, is expected to slow through the second half of the year amid the nation’s weakening economic outlook. A new analysis from the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas lays out the picture: the nation’s economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic is continuing, and Texas is recovering at a faster clip than the nation as a whole. Still, revenue growth among Texas companies remains constrained by supply chain disruptions and labor shortages, and businesses are becoming more pessimistic as inflation remains high and interest rates rise. “The data still looks pretty healthy, especially on the labor market side,” said Laila Assanie, a senior business economist at the Dallas Fed. “But what has turned is the outlook." In a survey of 366 Texas business executives conducted in June, Assanie said, half cited supply chain disruptions as a primary factor constraining their firm’s revenue, and 41 percent pointed to labor shortages as a key issue.
Those numbers are consistent with survey results from earlier this year. But a new issue surfaced in June: 26 percent of the executives cited “weak demand” as affecting their business, up from 15 percent in March. That’s a sign that inflation and the darkening outlook for the economy is leading some customers to spend more cautiously. The job market, meanwhile, remains tight, with employers across sectors reporting labor shortages. In Texas, Assanie said, employment in most sectors has returned to pre-pandemic levels. Employment in the state grew at an annualized rate of 6.2 percent in May, double the national rate. The unemployment rate stood at 4.2 percent in May, higher than the national rate of 3.6 percent, but reflecting growth in the state’s labor force. The scorching-hot housing market is finally cooling off in the state’s major metropolitan areas, including Houston, where the median home price recently hit a record $351,000, according to the Dallas Fed…?(LINK TO FULL STORY)
Texas border county leaders declare ‘invasion,’ urge Abbott to expel migrants (San Antonio Express-News)
Leaders in several Texas border counties declared Tuesday they are under “invasion” and called on Gov. Greg Abbott to start expelling migrants suspected of crossing into the country illegally. The move aligns with some conservative officials and activists who have privately urged Abbott to begin unilaterally enforcing federal immigration laws. Expelling migrants from the country would be unprecedented for the state but justified, they argue, by the Biden administration’s push to expand legal pathways for migrants to enter the country. “This is not a photo op today,” said Kinney County Judge Tully Shahan, one of several county officials to declare a “local state of disaster” due to the surge in migrant encounters at the southern border. “We don’t want to lose America,” Shahan said. “The Biden administration won’t do a thing about it. They could stop this thing this hour. They could stop it now.”
Kinney County was one of at least four counties — joined by Goliad, Terrell and Uvalde — to issue a disaster declaration this week and call on Abbott to enforce federal immigration laws. The governor said in April that he has declined to do so because he’s concerned about legal consequences. Texas would almost certainly face a barrage of legal challenges if Abbott decided to expel migrants instead of turning them over to Border Patrol or detaining them on state trespassing charges, as he has done under his border initiative, Operation Lone Star. “There are federal laws that law enforcement could be prosecuted under if they were to take someone, without authority, and immediately return them across the border,” Abbott said in April. By rolling back Trump-era immigration measures, local officials argued Tuesday, Biden is abdicating the federal government’s constitutional duty to defend states from invasion and “domestic violence.” Otherwise, they say, states have the constitutional right to protect themselves from “imminent danger” or invasion. But legal experts say the “border invasion” strategy would likely run afoul of U.S. asylum laws, along with legal precedent that gives the federal government broad discretion in setting and enforcing immigration policy…?(LINK TO FULL STORY)
Cowboys criticized over deal with gun-themed coffee company (Associated Press)
The Dallas Cowboys sparked criticism on social media Tuesday after announcing a marketing agreement with a gun-themed coffee company with blends that include “AK-47 Espresso,” “Silencer Smooth” and “Murdered Out.” The partnership with the Black Rifle Coffee Co. was revealed on Twitter the day after more than a half-dozen people died in a shooting at a Fourth of July parade in suburban Chicago. It also comes a little more than a month since the Cowboys announced their role in a $400,000 donation to support victims and survivors of the school shooting in Uvalde in South Texas, where 19 students and two teachers died. The tweet announcing the agreement between “America's Team” and “America's Coffee” drew about 200 comments in the first few hours, most of them critical and suggesting the timing of the announcement was poor. “Maybe read the room a bit, guys,” one person posted, while another wrote, “The Dallas Cowboys just lost one of their biggest fans. Integrity matters.”
The Cowboys declined comment. The tweet links to a contest offering two tickets to a Cowboys home game and a one-year subscription to the coffee company. Most of the company's sales are direct to consumer. Black Rifle was founded by U.S. Army veteran Evan Hafer, who has made support of veterans one of the tenets of his company. “BRCC is proud to partner with the Dallas Cowboys, who are strongly committed to our mission of supporting veterans, first responders, and America’s men and women in uniform,” a Black Rifle spokesman said. “The long-planned announcement was timed to coincide with the Independence Day holiday — America’s Team. America’s Coffee. America’s Birthday.” Reaction to the marketing agreement suggests a “split identification among fans” of the Cowboys, according to T. Bettina Cornwell, academic director of the University of Oregon's Warsaw Sports Marketing Center. “For those opposed to gun violence, there is no good timing,” Cornwell said in an email. “The business question is, ‘Have the Cowboys made a misstep in terms of their relationship with their more moderate fans?’” Cowboys owner Jerry Jones' steadfast support of the military was best illustrated when he was one of the most outspoken NFL owners against players kneeling during The Star-Spangled Banner before games to protest racial injustice and police brutality…?(LINK TO FULL STORY)
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