Institutions vital to child protection in Austin are seriously understaffed. — It’s getting easier to abuse or molest a child in Austin and get away with it. Key elements of the criminal justice system and child protection system that used to serve as a check on abusers are under strain amid a mix of policy changes and staff shortages. Turnover at…

11 Oath Keepers members are accused of conspiring to oppose the transfer of presidential power by force. — A federal court in Washington on Thursday unsealed charges of seditious conspiracy against 11 defendants, including two Texans, the first such charges brought in connection with the breach at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. Although federal agents have arrested more than 700 people in connection with the events…

The Austin mayor pays more in property tax than the average Austinite earns in a year. — Under rates that he sets in part himself, Austin Mayor Steve Adler pays annual property tax of nearly $100,000 for his residences at a downtown high-rise-more than most Austinites earn in a full year. According to tax records, the mayor owes $97,629 for two condominiums for the year 2021, and…

3 ways to engage constructively in a toxic environment — Governing a big city or a state is hard work and requires tough choices on a daily basis. Officials rely on their training and expertise to make decisions, but many decisions also boil down to a matter of values or preferences. For example, programming a traffic light might appear to…

The Austin Police Department makes fewer traffic stops than law enforcement in neighboring cities, according to data compiled by the San Antonio Express-News and Houston Chronicle. APD conducted 72,054 traffic stops in 2020, an average of about 43 per officer, or about one stop per officer every 8–9 days. That…

Politicians like Texas State Rep. Ryan Guillen are increasingly without a political home. — Texas Republicans today celebrated the defection of State Representative Ryan Guillen, a conservative Democrat from Rio Grande City who will now run for reelection as a Republican. Guillen said, “I feel that my fiscally conservative, pro-business, and pro-life values are no longer in step with the Democratic Party of today.”…

The costs of goods and services rose at above-normal rates again in October, according to new federal economic data released Tuesday and Wednesday. The Producer Price Index tracked by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which measures wholesale prices, grew 0.6% in October. That puts the index on two straight months…

Texas law enforcement agencies reported a 60% increase in gun-related domestic violence incidents in the first year of the pandemic, according to an analysis of crime data published by the Texas Council on Family Violence. The report says, “An estimated 232,319 family violence victims contacted the police between March 2019…

The Travis County District Attorney’s Office has announced a data and research partnership with Arizona State University and Johns Hopkins University as part of an effort to prevent and assess the risk of homicide in cases of intimate partner violence. According to the CDC’s National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence…