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Summer temperatures in Texas prisons can often exceed 100 degrees, and lawyers have argued those conditions constitute cruel and unusual punishment for incarcerated Texans.
A federal trial underway this week in Austin could decide whether the state must provide air conditioning to all inmates.
A group of scientists from the University of Texas at Austin and MD Anderson Cancer Center have developed a potential chemotherapy drug that may prompt a person’s immune system to attack cancer cells as if they were infected by a virus. The work on the drug started a decade ago and likely has years to go before it would be available. Reporter Olivia Aldridge joins the show to talk about the progress researchers have made so far.
Plus, the lifestyles of Austin’s rich and famous…cats? A catio tour raising awareness about local birds.
Someone asked ATXPlained “Who is behind these sometimes clever signs reminding you to be safe on the road?” KUT’s Samuel King has that story.
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The full transcript of this episode of Austin Signal is available on the KUT & KUTX Studio website. The transcript is also available as subtitles or captions on some podcast apps.
Jerry Quijano [00:00:08] Summer temperatures in Texas prisons can often exceed 100 degrees, and lawyers have argued these conditions constitute cruel and unusual punishment for incarcerated Texans. A federal trial underway this weekend in Austin Court could decide whether Texas must provide air conditioning to all inmates, and a group of scientists with UT Austin and MD Anderson Cancer Center have developed a potential chemotherapy drug that may prompt a person’s immune system to attack cancer cells as if they were infected by a virus. The work on the drug started a decade ago and still has many years to go. We’ll tell you about the progress they’ve made so far, coming up on today’s show.
KUT Announcer: Laurie Gallardo [00:00:43] The Austin Signal is a production of KUT News, hosted by Jerry Quijano.
Jerry Quijano [00:00:48] Plus the lifestyles of Austin’s rich and famous cats, a catio tour raising awareness about local birds. That’s up next, right here on Austin Signal. Howdy out there, thank you for tuning in to Austin Signal. We are coming to you from community powered public radio. This is KUT News. It is Tuesday, excuse me, Thursday, the second day of April. This is not April Fool’s Day joke. It really is Thursday. And I’m Jerry Quijano, I’m glad you’re with us. We started the day with a bit of good news. Lots of rain for lots of Austinites and people here in central Texas. And even better news, rain continues into the weekend. Right now, the National Weather Service is forecasting a 100% chance of showers on Saturday and some rain sticking with us through Sunday night, followed by some cooler than normal temperatures. So make the most of it, take it in, and thanks for spending part of the day here with us. This is Austin Signal. A trial happening this week in an Austin federal courtroom could decide whether the state of Texas must provide air conditioning inside its prisons. Temperatures inside can eclipse the triple-digit mark on some sweltering Texas days. Conditions that lawyers have argued for decades constitute cruel and unusual punishment for incarcerated Texans. KUT’s government accountability reporter, Andrew Weber, is covering the trial. He’s with us now to tell us more. Welcome back, Andrew. Thanks, Drew. So tell us first, what’s the argument being made against the Texas Department of Criminal Justice?
Andrew Weber [00:02:28] It’s a really simple argument. Basically, lawyers are saying that the heat in these prisons, which regularly tops 90 degrees in the summer, that’s according to our former colleague Lauren McGaughy’s work, is unconstitutional. That it’s cruel and unusual punishment. And that the state hasn’t really done anything in a sort of holistic way to address those conditions and that people have died because of it. Uh, and so this trial is going on this week, plaintiffs are calling witnesses and presented arguments and next week, the state will, will do the same. And then it will be, uh, decided by, by a federal judge, whether that’s the case. So this week I was in court, I spoke with, um, one of the attorneys who’s trying this case, Brandon Duke. And he’s said that, yeah, TDCJ has done something to address some units. Uh, but that he’s in his view that the, the, state is kind of trying to slow walk this.
Brandon Duke [00:03:25] They’ve chosen basically the slowest, least efficient process that will take a significant number of years longer to air condition the system.
Jerry Quijano [00:03:33] What has TDCJ said that they’ve done to provide air conditioning so far?
Andrew Weber [00:03:37] Like I said, they have air conditioned some units. It’s kind of been interesting this week hearing testimony from the former head of the agency and the current head, where they basically say, yeah, AC would stop people dying in prisons because they’re so hot, but they’ve said that they’re also trying to do their best with what they have. So far, since 2018, they’ve air-conditioned 15,000 units. And they have a plan to do that for 40,000 more units, but plaintiff’s attorneys say it’s not moving fast enough.
Jerry Quijano [00:04:12] Well, the state agency says that providing AC to all inmates is one of many quote competing priorities or what are some of those other priorities?
Andrew Weber [00:04:19] Yeah, security is one, obviously it’s a prison, and there’s also maintenance. Some of these buildings, one of these building is, and I didn’t realize this until this week when I started covering it, was built in 1850. Oh, dang. Yeah. So there’s a lot of upkeep that is non-AC related. Also there’s healthcare, obviously. You have to take care of people in the custody of the state, but the biggest obstacle as the state sees it. Is cost. This would cost $1.5 billion to put AC in all of its units, and that’s 10 times the amount, more than 10 times the amount that they get from the state legislature.
Jerry Quijano [00:04:56] The trial is being overseen by U.S. District Judge Robert Pittman. What do his previous ruling signal about his position on this matter?
Andrew Weber [00:05:04] Plainly unconstitutional is what he called it. That was in a ruling last year, almost a year to the date. And this was basically plaintiffs wanted to immediately order the state to do this. He said, no, let’s take this to trial. And in that ruling, he said, you know, the state is admitting that these conditions are dangerous and they’re not doing enough to address it.
Jerry Quijano [00:05:25] The trial has also garnered the attention of Austinite and filmmaker Richard Link later. How did he get connected to this cause?
Andrew Weber [00:05:31] Yeah, the 2011 movie, Bernie, which is a deeply Texan movie that is also a very, very dark comedy. After that movie, he sort of connected with Bernie’s story. He’s advocated for him, and he helps sort of spur this lawsuit that started with Bernie. And since then, he’s been moved to an air-conditioned unit. But a lot of other folks have joined because this is a very novel case because it would require all prison units to have air conditioning. I spoke with him Tuesday outside the courtroom.
Richard Linklater [00:06:02] I think they felt legally they didn’t have to, but morally they probably should have. You know, think of the millions and millions of hours of suffering. Think of all the deaths, all the illness. Not just for the incarcerated, but the state employees who work there.
Jerry Quijano [00:06:20] Okay Andrew, about 20 seconds left. If the judge does indeed rule against TDCJ, how soon could we see change inside Texas prisons?
Andrew Weber [00:06:27] Unclear. Plaintiffs want it by 2029, but this will likely go to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals.
Jerry Quijano [00:06:32] Alrighty, we have been chatting with Andrew Weber, he is KUT’s Government Accountability Reporter. We’re going to have a link to his reporting in today’s show notes and at KUT.org slash Signal. Andrew, thanks to you. Appreciate you, too. Cancer Research at UT Austin and MD Anderson Cancer Center has taken another step forward. This time, researchers say the secret may be tricking the immune system. For more about that, we are speaking with KUT’s healthcare reporter, Olivia Aldridge. Howdy, Olivia. Hi. So tell us, what have these researchers found exactly?
Olivia Aldridge [00:07:15] Essentially, they discovered that this new chemotherapy agent that they were testing appeared to be causing immune cells to attack cancer just as they would a cell infected by a virus, which could open up a lot of possibilities for how the science community approaches cancer research and treatment.
Jerry Quijano [00:07:33] And your story features one Jonathan Sessler. Tell us a little bit about him.
Olivia Aldridge [00:07:37] Yes, he has led this team of chemists at UT. They’ve been testing this potential chemotherapy drug, which they’re calling Compound One. It essentially stresses cancer cells by causing this buildup of toxic molecules. I’m simplifying it, but.
Jerry Quijano [00:07:54] Thank you
Olivia Aldridge [00:07:55] During their experiments with mice, they saw something unexpected happening though that they didn’t anticipate, which was that in these mice, their immune cells were forming a response and attacking pre-treated cancer cells. This is notable because cancer usually is really good at evading our immune responses. The immune system doesn’t attack its own cells usually. So how do you make the immune system see these cancer cells as a threat? And what the researchers believe is happening with compound one is it’s triggering the immune cells to activate genes that are Associated with a protein that recognizes viruses. So it’s a similar response as you’d see if you’re infected with something like COVID-19
Jerry Quijano [00:08:36] Okay, okay, so chemo therapy traditionally has weakened the immune system because it kills those dangerous cells, but also kills healthy cells. So as I understand it, this compound one is helping to better aim the chemo where it needs to go, I guess? Sort of. Okay.
Olivia Aldridge [00:08:52] Chemo is good at attacking cells that are dividing really quickly, cancer cells do that, but so do some types of healthy cells that includes immune cells and hair cells. So chemo can weaken your immune defenses at the same time as it’s killing the cancer. The questions that Dr. Sessler and these other scientists at UT have is, if we can calibrate the right dose of chemo, in certain cases, maybe a lower dose, can we preserve those immune defenses while priming the immune system to actually attack the cancer? Their hypothesis at this stage is that maybe there are other chemo agents that could do this too, not just this one compound. And they imagine that this method could potentially work in combination with other types of established immunotherapy out there that focus on activating the immune system in cancer patients.
Jerry Quijano [00:09:43] And this is something he’s been working on for at least a decade, correct?
Olivia Aldridge [00:09:47] That’s right.
Jerry Quijano [00:09:47] Okay, and and they published their findings recently in a peer-reviewed journal That means other folks in the field can try to build on what they’re currently doing, correct?
Olivia Aldridge [00:09:56] Yes. So it’s been 10 years, but it’s still early research. Right now they have promising results and experiments done on mice. So, it’s a long way from being applied in a clinical setting with actual cancer patients. But they want others in the chemistry and oncology communities to take a look and test their hypothesis and also maybe look at any observations from their own clinical practices that might align with these findings.
Jerry Quijano [00:10:22] Okay, so it sounds like there’s still a fair amount of work to be done in the development of this chemotherapy drug. So now I’m going to ask you the obvious question. How long before people might be able to actually use this?
Olivia Aldridge [00:10:34] They told me they’re thinking about it like probably another 10 years. OK. But you know, this is a kind of a good example of how all of this research that happens at UT and MD Anderson all the time happens. This is this is what’s going on behind the scene with medical research. And it’s all happening right here in our backyard.
Jerry Quijano [00:10:54] Very cool. We have been speaking to KUT’s healthcare reporter, Olivia Aldridge. We’re gonna have a link to her story in our podcast, Show Notes, and at kut.org slash signal. Some great photos in there of scientists looking like scientists, you know. If I was gonna have a photo of me doing a journalism, it would be what I’m doing right now, talking to this microphone. So check out that story, as well as the reporting from Andrew. Olivia, thanks for talking with us. And thank you out there for spending part of your Thursday. Yes, it’s Thursday here with us on Austin Signal. We are proud to be community powered public radio. Coming up after the break, we’re gonna take you on a catio tour of Austin. What’s more Austin than a catiotour? Well, come find out. That is coming up next. It’s right here on Austin signal. This is Austin Signal, welcome back. Every year billions of migrating birds pass through Texas, but not all of them make it to their destination. That’s for many reasons, but one of them is cats. They are adorable, yes, but prolific hunters, and it’s estimated that each year they kill more than two billion birds across the United States. An Austin Bird Conservation Nonprofit hosts an event aimed at preventing some of these deaths. Sean Saldana from the Texas Standard takes us on a caddio tour.
Sean Saldana [00:12:36] I’m in Jacob Smigel’s backyard, and we’re standing in front of a 10-foot wooden frame that is covered in wire. It’s got about 10,000 staples in it that I put in there, too. There’s a slanted middle roof, a catwalk that extends out to a nearby tree, and a tiny pet door for his three kitties. I feel like I know people who wouldn’t invest this much in their children, much less their cats. You know, I didn’t want to go overboard. What he’s showing me is a catio, an outdoor but enclosed space for cats. It’s the same concept as yard time for prisoners, and Smygle introduced me to one of the inmates. Hi Quinn.
Brandon Duke [00:13:15] She’s pushing.
Sean Saldana [00:13:15] Microphone away. Quinn is a six-month-old tabby who was sunbathing for our entire interview like a total diva. And there are about a dozen people here to see her and this massive catio, like Rebecca Wells and her friend Lexi Somerville.
Rebecca Wells [00:13:30] We both have orange cats, which we have a theory. I don’t know if you’ve heard of the orange cat theory.
Sean Saldana [00:13:34] Yeah, they all share a brain cell.
Rebecca Wells [00:13:36] Yes, exactly!
Sean Saldana [00:13:38] But Smygle and his family are the final stop on a citywide tour put on by Travis Audubon, where Kaylee Zazoula is program director. If anyone is listening to this and they think, why does Travis Audobon hate cats, what would your response to that be?
Lexi Somerville [00:13:53] We love cats. We think cats are great pets. This is us trying to speak to cat owners and think about the effects that keeping your cats outdoors can have on wildlife.
Sean Saldana [00:14:07] They do this event because it’s impossible for cats like Quinn to turn off their hunting instinct. She thinks my fuzzy microphone is a toy. Oh, she’s biting it. Cats are known to hunt more than 2,000 species, and have been linked to the extinction of 40 types of birds.
Grant Sizemore [00:14:24] Cats would be particularly problematic for species that spend time near the ground. So think larks barrows here in central Texas or ground nesting birds in particular.
Sean Saldana [00:14:37] Grant Sizemore is with the American Bird Conservancy, and he explains that cats don’t even need to kill to disrupt an ecosystem. They do this through something called the ecology of fear.
Grant Sizemore [00:14:49] When a cat is nearby a nest, even if the cat doesn’t directly attack that nest, it causes a change in the behavior of the adult bird.
Sean Saldana [00:14:57] When cats are around, birds have to focus on not getting eaten, which takes time away from other activities.
Grant Sizemore [00:15:04] And they’re not spending that time feeding their young.
Sean Saldana [00:15:06] This year’s Catio Tour had an estimated 350 attendees, like Rachel and Jonah Jackson.
Rachel Jackson [00:15:11] We have three cats, they’re all named after food. There is Marshmallow, Peanut, and Rotten Banana.
Sean Saldana [00:15:18] That’s cute that you’ve named your cat Rotten.
Rachel Jackson [00:15:22] I was going to say, we had trouble with her and then she grew into her name.
Sean Saldana [00:15:27] The Jacksons are not birders. They are catio-curious, and they are using today to gather inspiration.
Jonah Jackson [00:15:33] We have a little pergola in the backyard and it’s just occurring to me that maybe we could route them over there and run them around, you know.
Sean Saldana [00:15:39] The Jacksons are just looking for a home project and to keep their kitties safe. Because cats that spend time outdoors sometimes wander off and turn into lunch. It protects them from coyotes, which we have a lot of. Nicolette Pink is married to Jacob Smeigel, whose catio we’ve been admiring. She told me about a Bengal cat they once had. Anytime he could, he would slip out of the house and explore the shrubby limestone of central Texas. Then one day, he didn’t come back.
Nicolette Pink [00:16:06] The Bengal met his fate.
Sean Saldana [00:16:08] Oh, really?
Nicolette Pink [00:16:09] Oh, I’m so sorry to hear.
Sean Saldana [00:16:12] Catios make sure that kitties like Quinn and her twin sister Clover can enjoy the outdoors and stay safe. And if it weren’t for this event, neither of them would be here right now.
Nicolette Pink [00:16:21] I met the foster for these about four years ago on the catio tour. She came here. I met her. I kept her in the back of my mind because I knew she rescued. And then when I was ready to get more cats, I reached out to her and we adopted these two from her.
Sean Saldana [00:16:36] Quinn and Clover barely acknowledge the crowd. Inside the catio, they are just relaxing. Outside, they’re ruthless predators and easy prey. In Austin, I’m Sean Saldana.
Jerry Quijano [00:16:57] Traffic is one of the constants of life here in Austin, and now the surrounding area too. That’s just the way it is. But every so often, there’s something that breaks the monotony of the brake lights. A sign off in the distance that reads, Baby Yoda uses a car seat. Be safe, he will. Baby Yoda is actually here in studio, but I’m not gonna talk to him anymore because someone asked our ATXplain project, who is behind these? Sometimes clever signs reminding you to be safe on the road. Former KUT reporter Samuel King has the story.
Samuel King [00:17:35] Like many Austinites, UT student Evan Hearn spends a lot of time on the road. I live up north.
Evan Hearn [00:17:41] And so I’m a student and I have a couple jobs. So I’m constantly either in the car or on the bus, you know, going one way or another.
Samuel King [00:17:50] All that time on the road, stuck in traffic, could make Hearn and other drivers go mad.
Evan Hearn [00:17:55] You know you hate
Samuel King [00:17:56] everything about your life in that moment you hate everybody around you but then it appears like a beacon of call sign reminding you that you’re not a candle so don’t drive lit or designate a driver be vo the
Evan Hearn [00:18:07] Around the holidays there’s always like some sort of pun that they do like it’s a really there’s always like no offense to the guy but it’s they’re really lame like sort of dad puns that they that they do about like Easter or like Christmas or the Fourth of July or whatever
Samuel King [00:18:20] Evan wondered who is behind the messages on the electronic signs along Austin’s roads. Who is this mythical, omniscient person or dad algorithm who spits out bad jokes and good advice?
Evan Hearn [00:18:31] If the sign is telling me, like if the sign is calling me out on my bad driving, I should probably calm down. I’m gonna get home eventually, so.
Samuel King [00:18:39] Well, who that person is, and it is a person, not a robot, yet, depends on the road. The big highways, it’s someone from TxDOT. On the toll roads, it could be someone from the Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority. On city streets like Lamar and Cesar Chavez, it’s a team from the city of Austin. Engineer Joshua Batpuria is on that team. He isn’t a dad, but he takes pride in his dad joke.
Joshua Batpuria [00:19:03] I enjoy it, but my coworkers sometimes get a little bit tired of it, so they just retreat to their corner. Oh, so you make bad jokes in person, too. I do, I do. Only the best reach the signs, I would say. Or worse, it depends on how you define it.
Samuel King [00:19:18] Thankfully, he doesn’t always have the final say. It’s a group effort. There’s a whole team whose job it is to come up with these signs.
Joshua Batpuria [00:19:24] We would come up with something simple that everybody understands like a Drake reference or Matthew McConaughey reference and from there we would just come up a rhyme or something simple that we could be like oh this is a quick 15 words that people would laugh at but then it would also stick the memory in their head.
Samuel King [00:19:40] It’s harder than it sounds. In 2017, the city asked people to come up with their own signs. And while 15 submissions made the cut, hundreds more were rejected, including one saying, cars don’t cuddle. Leave some room. And everyone yearns for signaled turns. Joshua’s boss, Jen Duthie, says it’s not always fun and games. Duthy says even the signs with jokes actually serve a serious purpose. They remind people the signs are there. And they often display serious messages like the recent signs aimed at reducing traffic fatality.
Jen Duthie [00:20:14] So we do get questions sometimes, you know, why are we putting these somewhat silly messages up there, but they always have a key point that we’re trying to get across.
Samuel King [00:20:23] Even if you haven’t eaten at El Arroyo on West Fifth, you probably know their other claim to fame, funny signs. And they apparently felt Bapuria and the other road sign artists were edging in on their turf. El Arroyo made one of their signs that said, who’s the intern trying to steal our marquee thunder?
Joshua Batpuria [00:20:41] And I was just like minorly offended because on the one hand I was like, we’re not a textile intern, I work with signals, I’m an engineer. On the other hand, I was, like, hey, I got featured on a lot of
Samuel King [00:20:53] a little bit, so I’ll take that as a win. If the jokes get you to notice the signs, then maybe you’ll get the message they’re trying to get across. After learning the method behind the madness, Evan Hearn sure thinks so.
Evan Hearn [00:21:04] We can agree that objectively people who block the box are the worst kind of people, so maybe by seeing the sign they will sort of rethink what they’re doing, so that’s like an actual impactful, like impactful in the real world sort of situation.
Samuel King [00:21:23] Samuel King, KUT News.
Jerry Quijano [00:21:35] That story was originally part of an ATXplained live show back at the Paramount Theater. Our next one with brand new stories is coming up on May 21st. This one is happening at the Bass Concert Hall. You can get your tickets at TexasPerformingArts.org and I gotta say that the anticipation is beginning to build in the newsroom about this upcoming show. Now I don’t have any permission to tell you anything about what’s going to happen EXCEPT that it’s gonna be a great night, a community here in Austin. If you’ve never been to an A.T. Explained live show, it is, first off, it’s just a really great night of storytelling, but I feel, and I hear so many people saying I feel better connected to my community after I go to one of these shows. And if you just heard Sam’s story right there, you know why that is. You just get that connection to the person, and when you go to an AT Explained Live Show, you get that collection to your entire community. Again, the show is happening May 21st. Get your tickets at texasperformingarts.org. Well, that is it for today’s show. We’re gonna have more about the stories that we shared with you in our podcast Show Notes, and you can always find more from us at kut.org slash signal. Rayna Sevilla is our technical director, Kristen Cabrera is our managing producer, and I’m your host, Jerry Quijano. Thank you for being with us. Have a great day.
This transcript was transcribed by AI, and lightly edited by a human. Accuracy may vary. This text may be revised in the future.
