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Quote of the Day
“I don’t want the fox to be telling the farmer what hours he should look at the coop… The expectation of the citizens of Austin is that we get to see every one and we get to pick any one.”
— Commissioner Carlos Greaves, from Still-nascent police oversight commission pushes for transparent review of all complaints.
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Audit: Economic official granted arts, music funding against city code
From Chad Swiatecki:
According to the investigation, Holt-Rabb initially instructed staff to enforce the code provision barring overlap between the two grant programs, which are both funded by the city’s share of Hotel Occupancy Tax revenue. Staff reached out to awardees to inform them they would have to choose between the larger Cultural Arts Fund grants, which ranged from $25,000 to $100,000, or the smaller Live Music Fund grants, each worth $5,000 to $10,000. Three recipients were told to decline the LMF funds in favor of the more substantial Cultural Arts awards.
Following a meeting with a fourth awardee and concerns from staff that the group might be vocal in its objection, Holt-Rabb reversed course. She ultimately granted all four awardees a special exemption from the funding restriction, allowing them to keep both awards. The report notes that staff expressed discomfort with the decision, with one employee suggesting it was made to placate an upset grantee.
Still-nascent police oversight commission pushes for transparent review of all complaints
From Lina Fisher:
The urgency of beginning the work and cutting through plodding bureaucratic timelines was again a throughline of many commissioners’ concerns. Mitchell noted that “the laws are in flux” – indeed, the legislature is attempting to pass a law that would require reinstating G files for all law enforcement agencies across the state – but “in addition to any prohibiting law, we also have a police contract that the transparency we now have in Austin continues for the next three years.”
“We will move at a pace… to make sure you get your recommendation to the chief of police before she makes her recommendation,” OPO Complaint Investigator Kevin Masters assured commissioners, saying that by the next meeting, on July 18, OPO will have given them two previously closed adjudicated cases for training, and hopefully another that is open and ready for a CPRC recommendation.
“I hope that demonstrates that we’re ready to roll,” said Masters.
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Parks board reviews Austin’s drop on Trust for Public Land ParkScore
Austin’s city parks have fallen to 54th place in the Trust for Public Land’s ParkScore rankings, prompting the Parks and Recreation Board on Monday to discuss possible strategies for boosting funding amid the city’s projected $33 million budget deficit.
The annual comparison of 100 of the nation’s most populous cities ranks their park systems based on acreage, access, amenities, investment and equity. Austin parks scored lowest on amenities (33 out of 100 points) and equity (42 out of 100 points). At the same time, Austin parks scored above average – 75 out of 100 – on investment, and 56 on access, with 68 percent of the population living within a walkable half mile of a city park.
Board member Ted Eubanks, who led the discussion, stressed that the poor ratings on equity and amenities are, in his view, a reflection on city policies and not a knock on the Parks and Recreation Department. Eubanks suggested revisiting the city’s financial partnerships with nonprofits, a point also stated by several community members who spoke at the meeting.
The low parks score comes at a time when city department heads have been asked to identify 5 percent cuts in their budgets ahead of 2026 budget talks that start in mid-July.
“We’re here facing a cut where we should be working to figure out really how we’re facing a raise,” Eubanks said.
Separately, City Council members appear eager to look for a healthier funding stream for parks as they approach budget discussions next month. Council Member Paige Ellis this week floated the idea of adding a parks maintenance fee on monthly utility bills. Mayor Pro Tem Vanessa Fuentes and Council Member Ryan Alter have signaled their support for the idea as well as other possible new funding mechanisms for parks.
— Amy Smith
Use of Force, reviewed
At the second meeting of the Community Police Review Commission (CPRC), commissioners finally got a chance to dig into a semi-current police issue: the Use of Force report presented to Austin City Council last month, in which Ohio State University’s senior research scientist Dr. Robin Engel found that APD’s data reporting mechanisms are “rudimentary, inconsistent, and inaccurate.” That reportage, and how it changes based on Dr. Engel’s recommendations, will affect CPRC’s ability to fulfill its mandate to review cases accurately for the public.
Dr. Engel’s external review, commissioned by APD Chief Lisa Davis, found that APD is overreporting the number of use of force reports, due to over-counting Level 4 incidents, which do not include injury to civilians, but account for 40% of reports. Dr. Engel recommended reorganizing reports to Levels 1-3 and eliminating 4, which APD is in the process of doing. Part of this overreporting is also due to APD counting several incidents of use of force separately during the same interaction, leading to discrepancies in documentation. One recommendation from Engel on how to mitigate that confusion is to change the terminology for incidents from “response to resistance” to “use of force.”
At the CPRC meeting on June 20, longtime justice advocate Kathy Mitchell said changing the “response to resistance” data set to a “use of force” data set made a cleaner distinction: “If force was used, it goes into the data set.”
“That’s what a lot of this report is about. It’s about the level of subjectivity that’s in that decision to report those level four instances where somebody isn’t clearly (hurt).”
During its meeting, the CPRC also discussed a closed case for training – an incident in which a drunk person on Sixth Street was thrown to the ground by an APD officer during an arrest, which the Office of Police Oversight reviewed, decided was within law and policy, and Chief Lisa Davis decided not to discipline for. “That was the system working as it should, actually,” Mitchell said. “I mean, I don’t agree with the outcome, but there’s a debate here about what it means to de-escalate.” In that instance, the case was dismissed because the officers used a whistle and shouted “Austin Police” before using force. Mitchell said that in her opinion, blowing the whistle was not proper de-escalation: “This is not a high threat situation. Time, space and communication is what de-escalation is about.”
The incident is an example of one where, Mitchell suggested, an officer could choose not to report a use of force because it didn’t rise to the level of “resistance.”
— Lina Fisher
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ELSEWHERE IN THE NEWS
Now that the dust has (kinda) settled, KXAN has the city’s take on the recently-ended state legislative session.
KVUE has some startling news about residential real estate sales in Austin.
KUT investigates the claim that a “rain dome” is preventing precipitation in our fair city.
And, if you’re looking for something to do this weekend, the Austin Chronicle has a nice piece on the African American Book Festival that is taking place.
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