City Council‘s final meeting before the July break (June 22) will feature more CodeNEXT talk (and proposed slowdown), Austin Energy proposing another wind power purchase, and a request from the state Facilities board that smelly Austin kick in on the Capitol Complex redevelopment. “Council: Take a Deep Breath,” June 23.
Whole Foods has a new corporate overlord. Late last week, online retailer giant Amazon agreed to purchase the high-end Austin-based grocery chain for a reported $13.4 billion. The question now on the minds of observers becomes how Jeff Bezos will transform the organic outpost. Will cashierless checkout technology replace jobs? Is every Whole Foods going to turn into a mini distribution center? Will Seattle and Bay Area tech companies one day rule us all? Answers found in the make-your-own-peanut-butter aisle.
SB 4 Update: The state of Texas voluntarily dropped the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund (MALDEF) from its pre-emptive suit against the group and Austin over anti-immigrant Senate Bill 4. Speaking of: Hearings for the suit filed by the state begin on Thu., June 29, while those for the legal challenge against the state, filed by cities, including Austin, start in San Antonio this Mon., June 26. (Houston joined that suit on Wednesday.) Plan for a litigious summer.
Finally, Full Exoneration: After 25 years, Fran and Dan Keller are free of the charges hanging over their heads since 1992, when they were wrongly convicted of sordid crimes at their Oak Hill day care – crimes that never happened. Travis County District Attorney Margaret Moore moved dismissal of all charges, and the Kellers will apply for state compensation for 21 years in prison.
The Trump deportation force offered to extend protections for DREAMers (undocumented students who came to the country as young children) and grant work permits for now, but hasn’t made a decision for the long-term. Trump simultaneously rolled back the DAPA program, which would have protected some parents of undocumented immigrants who are lawful permanent residents from deportation.
Travis County Commissioners voted Tuesday to end a policy that allowed county law enforcement employees to accrue an unlimited amount of vacation time. Their pools are now capped at 400 hours of paid leave, with employees eligible to receive up to 240 hours of accrued and unused time when they leave the county.
The Austin Chronicle has joined media partners the Austin American-Statesman, the Austin Business Journal, the Austin Monitor, KUT, and KLRU at CodeNEXT Hub (www.codenexthub.org), an online aggregator compiling reportage and other resources about the years-long effort to rewrite city zoning regulations.
This article appears in June 23 • 2017.