Big plans. More parking. Room to grow. 🚗💛 We’re paving the way for approximately 7,000 new parking spaces with construction of the Yellow Garage, plus adding 1,500 Lot H Surface parking spaces to help meet today’s parking needs. From expanding our parking options, to preparing for what’s next, we’re keeping our growing community in mind every step of the way. More room to park. More places to go. That’s #JourneyWithAUS! Learn more about the Journey With AUS expansion program: austintexas.gov/AUSJourney

Hey y'all, tomorrow @texasmonthly is publishing a story I've been working on for a while—a deep dive into the conservative takeover at UT. It's the Nov. cover story. If you've been seeing the headlines, but confused abt what's happening @ the 40 Acres, check back here in the AM!

Austin wants to refund every dollar of a comedy club's city property taxes for five years so the club can digitize old costumes and make a documentary. On October 22, the City Council votes on whether to give Esther's Follies on Sixth Street $182,664. The city's own rules require a "compelling need to prevent displacement or closure." The city's reason here is that without the money, renovations "would be deferred." But part of the money is for digitizing old costumes, scripts and video, to help with exhibits and "a documentary currently in development." The business already got $1.37 million in federal Shuttered Venue grants during the pandemic, plus two PPP loans. Every other business on Sixth Street pays its property taxes in full, as does does every homeowner in Austin. The city claims a $1.6 million "net benefit” from doing this, but it’s completely unclear how the digitizing old costumes and funding a documentary adds up to $1.6 million vs letting the business compete on equal terms with every other tax-paying business.

An incredible honor to be endorsed by 31 local police associations as well as TMPA, FOP, and CLEAT (who together represent 81,000+ officers) the Texas Sheriff’s Regional Alliance, and many more.  While my liberal opponent stood with the lawless mob, I have always stood with law enforcement. mayesmiddleton.com/news/midd…

Latest #WatsonWire: The Magic of Saving Muny. The public golf course that most of us call “Muny” is an important Austin asset. It’s officially called Lions Municipal Golf Course. For many years, there’s been uncertainty surrounding its future. Would it remain greenspace, would it stay a golf course, or would it be developed? I’m happy to announce that there’s finally an excellent path forward that includes Muny belonging to the City of Austin and the WAYA campus belonging to WAYA. Muny became the first public golf course in Austin when it was constructed in 1924 on University of Texas land. It’s still owned by UT. It’s been leased and operated by the City pretty much since the beginning. In 1950, it was the first public golf course in the South to desegregate, and it’s listed in the National Register of Historic Places as a civil rights landmark. Read more: bit.ly/MunyWire

Apparently, the $ PISD is contributing to this would be lost to Robinhood/recapture. So at least by doing this, they get access to the arena for graduation & other events instead of just sending the cash to the state with nothing in return. They will also benefit from the increased tax revenue from the entire complex. If you are a fan of Abbott’s “pro business” policies then you can’t be a critic of this

This incredible building and patio should not be empty at the legendary Lions Muny. Colonel Brackenridge would not be pleased with the @austintexasgov and @UTAustin. Get it together and properly activate this legendary space for another 100 years!

Marc Andreessen on why cities ended up with $3 million homes, public housing, and no middle class "There's a French geographer who has the best analysis on this, a great book called Twilight of the Elites. If you replant the commanding heights of your economy on knowledge work, you're going to slam basically all economic growth into the cities" "The cities become a magnet for two kinds of people. The highly educated elite who can afford $3 million houses, and then public housing. Who's squeezed out is the entire middle class. If you're a cop or a firefighter and you work in Palo Alto, you can be commuting 3 hours both ways just to have a house and afford a family" "You look at the cities and there's lots of dogs, very few kids. You can't buy a house, you can't have a family. You've ejected the middle out of the cities into the countryside, but you've deindustrialized, so there's no new economic activity happening in the countryside"

"Don't DOGE Our Austin" is the newest group fighting the City Hall audit on November's ballot, and it's run out of the same office as the city workers' union that helped write the rules for City Hall's own audit. The union, AFSCME, gave $50,000 to Austinites for Equity, the main group fighting Proposition I. Last week, that PAC sent $27,000 to Don't DOGE Our Austin. Both PACs are registered to the same office suite as the union. Both have the same treasurer, which is the union's business manager. Imagine thinking “DOGE” is a pejorative to Austinites, in a city where contract after contract gets renewed without anyone checking what it is accomplished, and the main beneficiaries seem to be the NGOs cashing the checks.

.@USAttyEssayli on today's Operation in Skid Row: "Individuals that we targeted in today's operations are selling drugs to homeless people. They’re keeping the homeless addicted to hard drugs—we're talking fentanyl, methamphetamine, cocaine, and PCP…The drug dealers are very sophisticated. They know when the homeless get their public assistance benefits payments; they get them on the 1st and the 15th, and they’re there like clockwork. They're there in their fancy cars, selling the drugs and collecting the cash. Some of it we saw in today’s operation."

Prosecutors claim there is nothing they can do when someone has mental health issues, other than dismiss the case. But the legislature never contemplated or intended for mental health to mean that those individuals are exempt from the law. Prosecutors are failing to hold individuals, and the judicial system, accountable. More needs to be done on mental health absolutely. But using it as a crutch to justify dismissing serious criminal offenses is absurd and irresponsible.