Austin

Austin

Waymo is finally ready to hit the highway. Starting today, the company's robotaxis will gradually start to include more highway trips in its routes in Phoenix, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. In addition, Waymo's Bay Area service is extending south to San Jose, including 24/7 curbside access at both terminals of San Jose International Airport - the company's second airport service after Phoenix.

It was a huge upset, right? Right? Whether you find it maddening or irresistible, MLS's fine margins remain a key part of the league. Even against the best of the best, like last year's Miami team that set a single-season points record, struggling teams still have a chance to win thanks to closely controlled roster rules designed to maintain parity.

Clarksville is one of Austin's few truly walkable neighborhoods, with a main commercial street, school, and public park all within a roughly square-mile radius, satisfying the needs of daily life. It was here that romance blossomed for architect Michael Hsu and his now wife, Sarah, a contemporary art adviser. Soon after the couple met in 2020, she moved into a bungalow just down the street from the plot that he had recently purchased, envisioning settling down in the area.

"This case began 493 days ago, in early May of '24, and is only about restoring my property entitlements," said Paul Stables, the property owner.

In November, 2020, the city hired Kroll Associates to review and evaluate the Austin Police Department (APD) on the extent to which discrimination, racism and bigotry are present in the protocols and practices of the department, beginning with an assessment of the academy. As the resolution notes, Kroll recommended that the academy shift away from "stress-oriented military style curricula toward a resiliency -based approach."

On Wednesday, October 1, the first day National Public Radio (NPR) no longer has any federal funding, Austin's NPR station announced a new venture. Austin Signal, a daily weekday "magazine" in the form of a news show by KUT News, will launch Monday, October 6. A press release says the show "blends trusted local reporting with Austin's vibrant culture to keep Central Texans connected and informed." Each episode will be 30 minutes long, and will air weekdays at 1 pm on KUT 90.5.

The memo arrived nearly two months after Austin lost a $105 million grant for the Interstate 35 cap-and-stitch program, which was initially awarded last year. That funding was lost as part of a national rescission of unobligated Neighborhood Access & Equity awards, even though the city had already committed $104 million in local money to ensure structural supports are included in TxDOT's rebuild of I-35 through downtown.

The agreement late Friday ends a weekslong stalemate after the Austin Firefighters Association rejected of a proposal that it said wouldn't substantially increase wages for its personnel. The AFA agreed to a deal that would raise wages by at least 3 percent over four years. The contract also would eventually reduce firefighters' hours to fewer than 50 per week, a key provision that the city pushed back on.

The Austin Police Department announced on Friday that they have, through "a wide range of DNA testing," identified a suspect in the murders covered in HBO's The Yogurt Shop Murders. According to the Austin American-Statesman, Robert Eugene Brashers has now been connected to the crime. He had no other connection to Austin besides these murders. Brashers has also been linked to three other murders in the 90s, as well as the sexual assault of a 14-year-old girl in 1997.

"It felt good," Manning said. "I wish I could have done that the last [three] weeks. But I'm glad we did it tonight ... Got the ball in my guys' hands and let them go to work."

Nicks noted that he told the city manager and City Council in January that firefighters want a work week reduction and the same kind of wage offer EMS and Austin Police have achieved. Basically, Nicks said, while police and EMS employees received wage increases close to 6 percent, 5 percent and 4 percent, the city is offering most firefighters no general wage increase in the first, second, third and fourth years of the contract.

The city will not renew its contract with Urban Alchemy to manage two key downtown homeless shelters following the discovery of improper data handling by the nonprofit's staff. The Homeless Strategy Office confirmed the contract will end on Sept. 30 and that another service provider, Endeavors, will assume operations under an emergency contract. According to a memo dated Sept. 15, the decision was made after Urban Alchemy staff were found to have "improperly, and without permission, misrepresented Homeless Management Information System (HMIS) exit dates and records." Although the data was later corrected, the city characterized the breach as serious enough to warrant an immediate end to the relationship.