Austin Signal

We’ve all seen it: People speeding down Mopac or neighborhood streets in Austin. Maybe you’ve thought, “shouldn’t they be getting a speeding ticket?” Well, new data shows Austin Police may be handing out more of those.

Austin’s Live Music Fund is about to grant another round of funding after two years of controversy and complaints over the how those funding decisions are made.

Speaking of music, you can’t pin down local band The Animeros to just one genre. They span beyond bolero, psychedelic, and cumbia, and their music will get you out on the dance floor. We’ll talk with a couple of band members from our sister station KUTX’s Artist of the Month.

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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.

Jennifer Stayton [00:00:09] We’ve all seen it, people speeding down Mopac or neighborhood streets in Austin, and maybe you thought, shouldn’t they be getting a ticket? Well, new data show Austin Police may be handing out more of those. And Austin’s Live Music Fund is about to give out another round of grants after two years of controversy and complaints over how those funding decisions are made. More about those stories coming up on today’s show.

KUT Announcer: Laurie Gallardo [00:00:32] The Austin Signal is a production of KUT News, hosted by Jennifer Staton.

Jennifer Stayton [00:00:37] And speaking of music, you can’t pin down the local band, the Animeros, to just one genre. They span beyond Bolero, psychedelic, and cumbia, and their music will definitely get you out on the dance floor. We’ll talk with a couple of band members from our sister station, KUTX’s Artist of the Month. That is up next on Austin Signal. Stay with us. Hello, this is Austin Signal coming to you from KUT News. I’m your host for today, Jennifer Staton. It’s the 26th day of February. Thank you for making us part of your Thursday. So tell me if you’ve ever seen this happen. Maybe you’re seeing it right now if you’re listening to us in your car, you’re driving down Mopac or maybe on a street in your neighborhood and somebody zooms by in their car or truck going pretty fast and you think That person should be getting a speeding ticket. Well, it seems the Austin Police Department has bumped up its traffic enforcement. As KUT’s Luz Moreno-Lazano reports, new data show APD has increased how much it stops and tickets back.

Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:01:51] Bad drivers. When Austin Police Chief Lisa Davis took on the role in 2024, she promised changes. Among her top priorities was making streets safer for everyone. For her, that meant getting more police back on patrol and increasing traffic enforcement. Last summer, Davis announced a reorganization of the department that added dozens of officers back to those patrol shifts.

Chief Lisa Davis [00:02:13] I think having those people here on patrol, the sector commanders are again able to think of uncommitted time where the officers aren’t responding to calls for service, they’re able to do this proactive work which includes traffic enforcement.

Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:02:26] Traffic enforcement can mean speeding, distracted driving, running red lights, and driving without car insurance. Davis says the department can assign officers to areas where crashes, aggressive driving, or other traffic concerns frequently happen like the department did in 2024 along Ranch Road 2222. And she thinks the refocus on traffic enforcement is working. According to city data, speeding tickets issued by APD have increased nearly 200% from 2024 to 2025.

Chief Lisa Davis [00:02:54] I think it’s important for people to understand that speeding kills and, you know, when you’re speeding down these roads, you’ve got to take into consideration the other people on the roads and you are going to see APD out on these roads.

Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:03:06] APD has also issued more tickets in 2025 than in 2024 for distracted driving, expired registration, and driving without car insurance. But there is some concern that more traffic patrols means less of something else. Rebecca Bernhardt is a longtime member of the city’s Public Safety Commission.

Rebecca Bernhardt [00:03:24] If the police department has a smaller number of officers than they’d like to have. And there was definitely some, how do you say it? Robbing Peter to pay Paul going on in the sense that, you know, investigative units, right? Units that investigate family violence and sexual assault and violent crimes. She says moving those people from their specialty units to help with patrol comes at a cost. So yes, it makes a difference and it can help. There are a lot of other things that can make a difference, and can help

Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:03:57] Bernhardt would like to see the city reignite its Vision Zero program that was adopted in 2015. The plan hopes to greatly reduce the number of people injured or killed in traffic crashes through tools like safer street design. Those are things like protected bike lanes, upgraded pedestrian beacons and crosswalks, and adding speed bumps and roundabouts to city roads. A recent city audit on speed reduction efforts showed some designs can work, but not on all roads. Sam Socklow is with the city auditor’s office.

Sam Socklow [00:04:26] Speed cushions are effective at lowering speeds, but they’re not suitable for all road settings such as those with higher traffic volumes. Enforcement is vital in these settings, but it has remained limited in Austin for the past several years, as APD has had limited traffic enforcement capacity.

Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:04:40] Chief Davis agrees that traffic enforcement has lagged as the department has struggled with staffing. But after some restructuring last year and the ongoing recruitment efforts, she says APD is in a better position to tackle traffic and other issues. One of her goals is reinstating the department’s motorcycle unit. Those officers help with traffic enforcement and other traffic control tasks like protests.

Chief Lisa Davis [00:05:01] Think just having that unit in existence, along with the auxiliary group of officers that are trained and have the equipment in the sectors, we’ll be able to take a look at it from not only the individual sectors taking note of their own problem areas, but an overall city-wide view.

Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:05:22] Davis says APD is taking traffic enforcement very seriously, so she says drivers should continue to expect to see Austin police officers out and ready to sight. I’m Luz Moreno Lozano in Austin.

Jennifer Stayton [00:05:40] Live music is without a doubt one of the things that keeps Austin Austin but being a musician in this city can be a struggle and there are some efforts to help with their work. The winners of seven million dollars in grant funding from the City of Austin’s live music fund will be announced in March. It’ll be the first time money has been doled out from the fund in two years after an overhaul of the way artists and venues are graded for selection. We’re learning more about that scoring process thanks to the latest story from Andrea Ball. She’s the growth and development reporter for the Austin Current, KUT’s collaborator on the Austin Signal and a partner with KUT newsroom in covering Austin. Andrea, thanks for coming in today. Thank you. So the city of Austin has long funded grants for artists and musicians. The live music fund itself has been around since 2019. And remind us. Where the money comes from for the live music fund.

Andrea Ball [00:06:38] Yeah, well, it comes from the hotel tax, a hotel occupancy tax when somebody comes to visit, your parents come over, whatever, a portion of that tax comes to the city, and they have devoted a certain portion of it.

Jennifer Stayton [00:06:53] All right, so the live music fund was approved in 2019, but okay, think 2019, we all know what happened just the next year. How did the pandemic affect the rollout of this live?

Andrea Ball [00:07:05] Music fund. Yeah, I mean it just delayed everything. They were not able to fund music in the traditional way that they can now and so they were using money to do grants and emergency funding, relief funding, all that stuff for people who were, you know, trapped in their houses and couldn’t do their jobs.

Jennifer Stayton [00:07:25] So we fast forward to 2023, the pandemic’s kind of winding down, the funds revving back up, but there were complaints about the applications and the process in 2023. What were those complaints?

Andrea Ball [00:07:41] So the money has to go to some kind of project that really elevates tourism in the community. It’s not solely based on that, but that’s what the money is, it’s hotel tax. And so that first year, the city was sort of thinking, okay, like projects and events and things that people would come to, kind of. And individual artists who were like, I wanna make art, I don’t wanna. Have a big event or necessarily even attend one as a showcased artist or whatever. And so they felt the application was really not geared toward artists making art.

Jennifer Stayton [00:08:18] So there’s a little bit of attention since the money was coming from a tourism funded operation. The city thought it should go to tourism, but musicians thought it should go creation of our art.

Andrea Ball [00:08:30] Right, and it’s a balance, you know, and I think they’ve tried to, that next year, they tried to open that up some, but yeah, I mean, you have to use the money in the required way.

Jennifer Stayton [00:08:40] All right, so you mentioned the next year. So the fund application process changed then in 2024. So tell us what was different about that year from.

Andrea Ball [00:08:50] 2023. Oh my god, it was wildly different. It was different in the way that they did open it up more for like, okay, you can record albums and have studio time, stuff like that. And you can use the money for that and different types of things that they had not really emphasized before. But at the time, they were very focused on equity and rooting out, you know, historical, historic racism in the system. And so they wanted to give opportunities to people who were marginalized and not really included in the conversation as much. So they knew that DEI conversations at that time were on fire. They couldn’t talk about race. So they designed questions with what they thought were related issues such as poverty. Did you have a bank account? Have you had a loan? Do you have a non-English-Spanish speaker or whatever in your home? That kind of stuff. And so they did that. They’re trying to get at some of the same issues without asking those questions.

Jennifer Stayton [00:09:53] Questions directly. A common thing. So there were still, though, complaints and problems with the process in 2024. What were the issues that came up once those 2024 grants were recorded.

Andrea Ball [00:10:08] Many. First of all, some people thought people of color were like, you think people of color don’t have bank accounts? Also, these census tracts that you’re using are outdated. There’s a lot of big homes there now, that kind of thing, because the census is always behind. People felt like this was so much more about their individual wealth or not individual wealth. That’s really what they were talking about. They weren’t like I don’t want this marginalized community. They really were just like I’m sorry I have health insurance. Am I supposed to be punished for that? So Andrea, let’s talk a little

Jennifer Stayton [00:10:48] bit about how these applications were reviewed and scored. Was there a panel? Who was looking over the applications and deciding who was getting the money?

Andrea Ball [00:10:57] Yeah, Jennifer, this is so interesting because the arts community also gets hotel tax. Like, so we’re talking about like dancers and filmmakers and stuff, and they get hotel tax money. But that traditionally is done through applications, but panels, human people like out there talking about, do we wanna fund this type of thing? What is our priority, that sort of thing. Because the live music fund was really getting moving after the intensity of the pandemic. They had been using, they, the city had been using automation to go through these relief funds and make it fast, you know, faster than just human reviews. So when they started the actual grant process in 2023, they used automation. And so this is the only fund that does that in that group. So no humans reviewing the applications. It was all automation. What does that even mean? So you fill out- Like scanning. Yes, I mean, it’s something called Submittable. Like it’s an online thingy. And so, but there is human review and this is how that works. So you put your application, you hit your button and it goes to Submittal. Submittaable grades it based on the way you answer the questions. So if you answered a question which would get you extra points saying, I have used ASL interpreters at my event, you’d get extra points for that. But you have to give documentation showing that happened, which could be like a video, you know, any kind of program, that kind of thing. And so the reviewers basically had to go and look to see if the evidence was there. And a lot of people did not necessarily keep those records or attach them or whatever. So the humans have to go in and subtract points that Submittable already gave them. So it’s really saying, okay, you said this, did you show me this? And then if there was a confusion about it, they’d get a second person in and try to determine if that counted.

Jennifer Stayton [00:13:06] Andrea, the city is just about to announce the next round of funding winners. They’re going to announce it in March. How was the grading process changed for 2025 applications based on everything that you’ve just been describing for?

Andrea Ball [00:13:19] And now it’s totally different. They heard from people, you know, they paused the grants in 2025 because a new department was created to have all the arts under them instead of all these different departments. And they took that year to say, all right, we got a new vision, the city manager wants us to have a strategic view, we’re going to stop everything. We’re going have town halls and we’re gonna talk to people and all that stuff. And they heard what I was just telling you. About feeling left out and punished for not being more economically disadvantaged. So this year, they still have some elements of, do you have some accessibility features in your work? A lot of it, I think half of it is based on career accomplishments. There are still the same types of things like, hey, what’s your tourism marketing thing look like, whatever. But really it and they have smaller grants available to And I believe they have a grant that, or at least some consideration for emerging artists. So you’re not like, oh, this person is brand new compared to someone who’s been here 40 years. Do I have to compare them? And how do you do that?

Jennifer Stayton [00:14:29] We’ve been chatting with Andrea Ball, she’s the growth and development reporter for the Austin Current, KUT’s collaborator on the Austin Signal, and a partner with KUT Newsroom and covering Austin. Andrea, thank you so much for coming in and talking about the Live Music Fund. Always a pleasure. And coming up, some music that’ll get you moving. We’ll hear from KUTX’s artist of the month, the Animeros, just ahead on Austin Signal. Stay tuned. This is the Austin Signal, welcome back. We’ve almost finished with the second month of 2026, but we’ve still got some time left to highlight February’s KUTX Artist of the Month. This month, our sister station, KUTx, is highlighting the Animeros, who are looking to transition you from your nice comfy seat onto the dance floor with their mix of bolero, cumbia, and salsa. Joining us today are a couple of members from the band percussionist Nick Tazo and bassist Nicola Sanchez. Thanks for talking with us on Austin Signal.

Nick Tazo [00:15:33] Thanks for having us. Yeah.

Jennifer Stayton [00:15:35] Your band now is made up of some members who are in other Austin bands, so tell us about yourselves and why did you wanna form this new band?

Nicola Sanchez [00:15:45] Well, most of us have been on the Latin music scene and just the Austin music scene in general for the last, you know, 10, 15 years. And a big part of what we wanted to do with this band was just kind of put together a smaller unit that would be kind of easier to get together. Sometimes when you have a large group, eight, nine, 10 guys, it can be a little tricky to get the ball rolling. So the idea was let’s get a little smaller unit together in it. Has kind of taken off in ways we never expected.

Jennifer Stayton [00:16:18] So Austin has a vibrant Latin music scene that seems to foster a lot of fusion with other genres and breed new projects like the Anamero. So I’m curious, what do you think it is about Austin’s music scene that makes collaborations like this possible?

Nick Tazo [00:16:35] Austin has, in my opinion, the greatest original music scene of any city. Everybody is out there writing new music, putting their stamp on it, trying to do something new and fresh, and in the Latin genre specifically, we have just such a wide variety of different Latin acts and everybody, different influences, whether it’s like you know, Mexican music or Colombian or Brazilian, there’s just so much. And then as the group of musicians all commingle and get together, those new and interesting sounds or similar influences start to pop up and it’s just, it’s a really, really fun place to be.

Jennifer Stayton [00:17:30] All right, so I don’t, we’re all sitting together in a room, don’t wanna make it awkward, but tell me, what do you like most about working with this specific group of musicians in the animatos?

Nicola Sanchez [00:17:41] Personally, I just really love that we can get things going very quickly. Um, last summer, or actually the summer before last 20, uh, 24, we were in the studio with, uh our, uh good friend, Dan Auerbach of the black keys and we were in there and we had maybe about seven or eight songs prepared, but the rest of them, we, we just kind of wrote on the spot and kind of Spitfire back and forth, so we came out with 20 tunes from that session. So yeah, I think that’s that personally, that’s probably my favorite part is that we can just get, get things going very quickly and kind of bounce ideas off of each other.

Nick Tazo [00:18:20] Yeah, the three of us that are the core of the band, we speak the same language and we all bring really different kind of skillsets to it. And it’s great because we do, I think we’ve done a really great job of one person bringing something, bringing an idea or a pattern or a groove, and then the other two guys instantly know how to apply their stamp to it and it becomes something very quickly.

Jennifer Stayton [00:18:45] So it’s sounding like that when you’re studio together, it’s a pretty intense experience. When you’re practicing, you’re rehearsing, you’re creating new music, like all of this is going on at the same time. Kind of on a more personal level, what have you learned about each other, like when you were in that setting?

Nicola Sanchez [00:19:02] Well, I’ve learned that I can trust all these guys deeply, you know, sometimes you get into a studio scenario and it takes a long time to get through it. Maybe people get flustered or whatever, but I know these guys can keep their heads cool and we can just plow through, even if situations arise like, okay, maybe that isn’t how we envisioned it. Let’s, let’s pivot and just knowing that these guys have my back and I’ve got theirs is a real important thing.

Jennifer Stayton [00:19:46] So the Animenos debut album is set to be released later this year. Tell us a little bit about it and what we can expect to hear.

Nick Tazo [00:19:53] Well, as Niko mentioned earlier, it’s produced by Dan Auerbach of The Black Keys on his record label, E.T.I. Sound. Very, very lucky. He heard us from a sidewalk. We were playing a rooftop gig and he heard us down on the sidewalk and…

Jennifer Stayton [00:20:11] So literally he was just walking by and he heard you guys like from above.

Nick Tazo [00:20:14] Yes. And I joke frequently that it’s very good he couldn’t see us, because that might have not inspired him to sign us. However, we’ve put out four singles from that record so far, and with two more to come, at least two more come, and then it’s gonna be a compilation of the 10 or 11 or 12, maybe, best songs from that session we did a year and a half ago.

Jennifer Stayton [00:20:40] How do you pick the songs? Like do you fall in love with all the songs or do you sort of, can you keep them at a distance and say, yeah, that one’s good. No, maybe not that one. How do do you, how do you?

Nicola Sanchez [00:20:50] I think they’re all very different in their own ways, so we’re happy with any of them being included, really. There’s some obvious standouts. When we started the group, it was very much instrumental, and we’ve been trying to add more vocal stuff to the mix, so I feel like the vocal stuff is obviously in the hat. But the other ones, there’s one that I don’t know if I can even say the name of it yet, but I hope it makes the record because it’s very cinematic and I feel like we’ll be getting calls from Tarantino or whoever else to score their films.

Jennifer Stayton [00:21:41] You heard it here first. Film fame awaits. So you guys are performing later on in studio when a, and you have a residency this month. You’ve had one at Seaboy. So can people still catch y’all there? Is that still going on? I know the month’s almost over.

Nick Tazo [00:21:56] Absolutely. This Thursday, the 26th, is our final residency evening at Sea Boys. It’s been a fantastic month at personally my favorite club in town, and every week has gotten just bigger and better, and we have a lot of special guests coming out on Thursday, including my good friend Otis Wilkins of Otis the Destroyer and the Otis-Wilkins Project, as well as our friend Jaime Ospina of Superfonicos. And Wyatt Quarter of Big Wise Brass Band. So lots of guests coming out to hit the stage with us. We’re gonna play some surprising covers people might not expect. We’re going to have a really fun time with this last one.

Jennifer Stayton [00:22:34] Well, that sounds like an awesome show. So beyond Thursday, tell us about some other places where people can catch y’all in the next few weeks.

Nicola Sanchez [00:22:40] Uh, we’re doing Antones on March 7, so that, that’ll be, uh, the next kind of big one before South By, and then, you know, South By will be playing all over town, so.

Nick Tazo [00:22:53] Yeah, South By is going to be very busy for us. Lots of opportunities to see us. And you’ll be able to find all of those at theanimettos.com.

Jennifer Stayton [00:23:00] Awesome Nick Tazo and Nicola Sanchez of the Anumeros. They are the KUTX artists of the month for February. Thank you both for coming in. It’s been great to talk with you.

Nicola Sanchez [00:23:10] Thank you! Yeah, thanks so much for having us.

Jennifer Stayton [00:23:12] You can hear more from KUTX’s artist of the month, the animeros at KUTx.org. And that’s it for today on Austin Signal. We’ll have more about the stories and conversations we shared with you today in the podcast, Show Notes. And you can find more from us anytime. Just go to KUT.org slash signal. Rayna Sevilla is our technical director. Jerry Quijano is producing Austin Signal this week. I’m your host Jennifer Staten, looking forward to being back with you again tomorrow. Thanks for being with us today on Austin Signal.

This transcript was transcribed by AI, and lightly edited by a human. Accuracy may vary. This text may be revised in the future.