On Tuesday, former President Barack Obama gave an address to the Democrat National Convention (DNC) which, in part, broached the issue of housing affordability. On the matter, he said: “If we want to make it easier for more young people to buy a home, we need to build more units and clear away some of...
One state lawmaker recently accused Texas Governor Greg Abbott of not “spend[ing] the tax $ that you collected from us on our neighborhood schools instead…hoarding it in the treasury.” Setting aside the fact that the Legislature authors the state budget and dictates where money is spent—not the chief executive—this critique gets things wrong in another...
A new poll from the University of Houston (UH) and Texas Southern University (TSU) finds that, even in today’s highly-charged political environment, there are still a few things that most people agree on. In this case, it’s the fact that housing costs are out-of-control. Here are a few highlights from the UH/TSU poll, which was conducted...
Every even-numbered year, the state’s Legislative Budget Board (LBB) publishes a helpful, user-friendly summation of the General Appropriations Act (GAA), otherwise known as the state’s two-year budget. On Wednesday, the LBB published the next iteration—its 2024-25 Fiscal Size-Up. From a 30,000 ft. level, this new report provides “a comprehensive review of how tax dollars were...
Almost one year after being mocked relentlessly for a holding short-lived “thirst strike,” U.S. Congressman Greg Casar is once again promoting the idea that government should mandate water breaks. On Tuesday, Casar took to X (formerly Twitter) to cheer on “a new federal heat rule to give American workers the right to rest, shade, &...
On Tuesday, the Austin American-Statesman published an interesting new look at the “highest paid city of Austin officials as of June 26.” This latest wage data reveals a handful of extremely well-paid city employees whose annual earnings often approach or exceed the President of the United States’ salary. According to the Statesman’s statistics, which were...
It turns out that Texas’ most progressive cities are not only unaffordable, but they’re also terribly gridlocked. According to Inrix’s new 2023 Global Traffic Scorecard, there were 4 Texas cities that ranked among the most heavily congested in the U.S. Those cities were: Houston (#8), Dallas (#17), Austin (#21), and San Antonio (#25). It goes...
Fiscal conservatism is alive-and-well in Texas’ 3rd largest county. As evidence, consider that Tarrant County officials last year approved a tax rate below the no-new-revenue (NNR) tax rate, resulting in an astonishing “13.17 percent” rate reduction. As impressive as that was though, county leaders took things one step further by creating a 10% local option...
In 2019, the Texas Legislature passed a law (House Bill 1495) to help correct “unethical political behavior” at the local level. One key provision in the law requires political subdivisions to disclose the amount of money being spent to lobby the legislature in their proposed budgets. As more fully articulated in Sec. 140.0045 (b)(2) of...
On May 15, 2024, Texas Public Policy Foundation’s James Quintero testified before the Senate committee on the issue of “squatter’s rights.” McCaw Property Management (n.d., para 1) defines a squatter as “somebody who is living on a land or in a building that is either unoccupied, abandoned, or foreclosed without the legal consent of the...
On Saturday, local governments of all types (i.e. cities, counties, school districts, and special districts) asked Texas voters to decide on nearly 275 separate bond propositions worth $17.4 billion (principal only). Using the Texas Bond Review Board’s bond election database, the Municipal Advisory Council of Texas’ website, and social media, we’ve tracked the results for...
Late last month, the Houston Chronicle published an article noting the Foundation’s longstanding effort “to see ETJs abolished completely.” What prompted the friendly mention was Tesla’s recent announcement that it would be using a new state law, Senate Bill 2038, to petition to have its electric vehicle factory, located in eastern Travis County, “removed from...