Earlier this month, Harris County—the most populous county in Texas—launched a guaranteed income pilot program, known as Uplift Harris. The purported purpose of the program is to: “provide no-strings-attached $500 monthly cash payments to 1,928 Harris County residents for 18 months in hopes of providing a financial cushion that can help close the wealth gap.”...
A new Axios-Harris poll bolsters the idea that Washingto,n D.C. policymakers and Bidenomics have utterly failed most Americans. Some topline findings: “Republicans, rural residents, renters, women and singles disproportionately feel like they’re in a big fat funk financially…” “Six in 10 surveyed say they’re now ‘triggered’ by trips to the grocery store.” “Grocery purchases are...
On Tuesday, former State Senator John Whitmire was sworn-in as the Bayou City’s next mayor and he made it clear that public safety will be front-and-center. He said: “My number one priority and the priority of Houstonians is public safety. If we do not address public safety, the other quality of life issues will not...
Famed free-market economist Thomas Sowell once remarked that “Although the big word on the left is ‘compassion,’ the big agenda on the left is dependency.” Sowell’s insight is not only correct, but it’s also a fitting lens through which to view Harris County’s new guaranteed income pilot program, Uplift Harris. To start, Uplift Harris is...
The city of Austin finally did something right. On Thursday, Dec. 7, a supermajority on the Austin city council approved the first phase of the Home Options for Middle-Income Empowerment (HOME) initiative, which seeks to “allow up to three units on one single-family lot and would remove restrictions on how many nonrelated adults can live...
The most progressive city in the most progressive state in the nation is a feces-filled, crime-riddled ghost town that resembles something like “a failed state,” according to California expat Joe Rogan. All of which is to say, San Francisco is an utter disaster. Curious minds might look at the city’s ruinous condition and wonder its...
New data from the Bond Review Board suggests that Texas’ local debt soared to a total of $461.3 billion in fiscal year (FY) 2023, up from $417 billion in the prior year. That one-year jump represents a $44 billion increase or roughly 11% growth. The most deeply indebted governmental entities were public school districts. In...
A recent write-up from the Texas Tribune highlights an interesting phenomenon taking root in many major downtown Texas cities: that is, a “glut of empty office space.” As the article explains further: The Austin, Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston areas have office vacancy rates that range from 21% to 25%, vacancies that could complicate the post-pandemic...
Earlier this year, the Texas Legislature passed a new law (Senate Bill 2038) giving residents trapped in the extraterritorial jurisdiction (ETJ) “an exit strategy through either a petition or election process.” The law originated, in part, from concerns that “residents and property owners [were] subject to the regulatory authority of municipalities in the extraterritorial jurisdiction”...
Austin’s costly and controversial transit plan, Project Connect, is in the news again, after a group of area residents filed a lawsuit “arguing that the current plan is so different from the one presented to voters in 2020, that it should be put to the vote again.” To press home that point, the lawsuit offers...
In August, I wrote that “local governments everywhere seem to be scheming over how to get a big cut of your [property tax] relief,” and that bond elections and voter-approval tax rate elections (VATREs) were 2 main ways this erosion could happen. Well, with the November election cycle officials concluded, it’s possible to take stock...
On Tuesday, Texas voters went to the polls to say YEA or NAY to 214 separate new debt propositions worth $26.2 billion (principal only). Based on a cursory review of the official and unofficial election results, it is clear that most of the borrowing was approved. Using the Bond Review Board’s bond election database, we’ve...