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The Austin City Council has kicked off a long process focused on creating new rules and requirements for large-scale data centers. Some council members say it’s imperative to get a leg up, before any future construction takes hold.
The Austin Independent School District Board of Trustees is at risk of being taken over by state-selected appointees. So why would anyone be interested in running for a board seat? There are a few reasons.
When’s the last time you actually read work by William Shakespeare? A local group is working to bring the Bard’s word back to the masses with a competition called the Great Austin Shake Off.
Plus: The details on some some Dolly Parton tribute shows this weekend.
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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 The Austin City Council has kicked off a long process focused on creating new rules and requirements for large-scale data centers, things like how big they can sprawl and where they can be built. Some council members say it’s imperative to get a leg up before any future construction takes hold. And the Austin School District Board of Trustees is at risk of being taken over by state-selected appointees, so why would anyone be interested in running for a board seat? There’s a few reasons. We’ll share them with you coming up on today’s show.
Laurie Gallardo The Austin Signal is a production of KUT News, hosted by Jerry Quijano.
Jerry Quijano Have you ever heard of William Shakespeare? Well, of course you have, but when’s the last time you actually read some of his work? A local group is working to bring the bard’s word back to the masses, we’ve got that, plus some Dolly Parton tribute shows this weekend. That’s up next on Austin Signal. Howdy out there, this is Austin Signal, I’m your host Jerry Kikano, it is Friday the 28th of August, thanks for being with us. It’s the first day this week that we’re not under some sort of heat warning or advisory, but temperatures are expected to reach triple digits today and for quite a few days to come, so be safe out there and keep it tuned in right here to KUT News. Governor Greg Abbott has ordered a pause on new data center approvals until state regulators can audit their energy and water usage, but some of Abbott’s critics say the move does not go far enough and they’re asking the governor to call for a special legislative session to regulate those facilities. Meanwhile, in Austin, leaders here are also taking steps to regulate and potentially ban large data centers within city limits. KUT’s Luz Moreno Lozano has more about this week’s City Council vote.
Luz Moreno Lozano Before the City of Austin can begin to manage or even ban large-scale data centers, local rules must be written. The Austin City Council has initiated that process. They’re tasking staff with drafting new requirements for these types of facilities, including size, location, and environmental considerations. Ahead of the vote on Thursday, Mayor Kirk Watson said the council is aligned in protecting Austin residents, land, and utilities.
Kirk Watson To be legally viable, to be protective, and to be preventive, that is what we’re hoping to see to the fullest extent that the law allows a municipality to act under these circumstances.
Luz Moreno Lozano No large-scale data centers have been proposed in Austin, but city staff say they’ve gotten some inquiries indicating those facilities could be on the horizon. Austin’s land code does allow for what staff call traditional data centers. Those are facilities that use up to 20 megawatts of power. One megawatt is equivalent to powering up to 250 homes, per Austin Energy. But as artificial intelligence has exploded, developers across the country are building larger data centers that require more land, water, and electricity. Joy Harden is a city’s zoning officer. She says the city code doesn’t have specific rules or facilities that use more than 75 megawatts of power.
Joy Harden Data centers are getting much larger in size and capacity. Of course, not all data centers have the same impact. Each facility has different characteristics, capacity, physical size, and operational features.
Luz Moreno Lozano She says having a clear definition and framework will make it so the city can track, regulate, and even ban these kinds of centers. That could include creating standards for water, noise, heat, lighting, and site design. At Thursday’s meeting, several residents spoke in support of creating new regulations before a major data center is proposed. East Austin resident Brad Massingale was one of them.
Brad Massingale So we really need to get ahead of this and get some, a suite of ordinances, not just a blanket type of ban, because that’s upsetting it up for one lawsuit to strip that away.
Luz Moreno Lozano City staff plan to bring some proposed rules back to council for approval in phases. The first round of regulations could be ready for review by the end of the year. In the meantime, any large-scale data center projects proposed within the City would have to get council approval before moving forward. I’m Luz Moreno Lozano in Austin.
Jerry Quijano Austin ISD is primed for a state takeover, as we’ve been reporting here on Austin Signal. Two middle schools in the district received failing state accountability grades for the fifth year in a row. That means the Texas Education Agency could potentially appoint its own board of managers to oversee the district. With that comes the possibility of major shakeups in how the district operates. So why would people still be interested in running for school board? It’s a question that Andrea Ball looked into. She’s Enterprise and investigative reporter with our reporting partners, Austin Current. Andrea, welcome back to the show.
Andrea Ball Thank you for having me.
Jerry Quijano Okay so at this point it’s still up in the air whether the TEA will take control of AISD, but if they do that means they would appoint a board of managers. What exactly is that?
Andrea Ball So we don’t know for sure if, like what they will do. They could have the takeover, which would be, yes, a board of managers and probably a new trustee. And the board of manager basically acts as a board trustees where they make all the same decisions that these trustees make right now, including policies and budget stuff and things like that. So these people who would be appointed by TEA would make those decisions. The elected body, the elected trustees, would lose all their power. Some places consider them to be advisory in name, but people who have been through that say they don’t really do anything.
Jerry Quijano Yeah, so do we know anymore about what the AISD Board of Trustees’ role would be in this scenario? I mean, it’s still, I guess, really up in the air, it sounds like.
Andrea Ball We really don’t know. We just don’t if they’ll exist. We don’t now if there’s another option that the state will decide upon, like just a different type of intervention that would keep the board of trustees. We just know.
Jerry Quijano Okay, with all of those unknowns, the central question of your reporting is why candidates would still want to run for the AISD school board in this given scenario. So what did you hear from people?
Andrea Ball Yeah, it was really remarkable. They all said in some way, shape, or form, you can take our vote, you can’t take our voice. And what they meant by that, and all of them said it in one way or another, was that they’re elected. People will come to them and that they need to give voice to that. They might not get special privileges to be able to speak more intimately with the… Manager or the board of managers or the new superintendent or whatever, but in some places they get just typical public comment periods. So they will prioritize what people want to talk about, they strategize what and who and how long and all that sort of stuff, but they really just care about the schools. And they also know that at some point the intent of a takeover is to give it back to local control. And so that means local trustees, whoever’s elected at that time, will be phased back onto the board. And these candidates know they need to be informed. They’re gonna need smart people who are ready to tackle those issues at that.
Jerry Quijano Do they have to say anything about how AISD got themselves in this scenario, or what they might hope of, what the future might hold for the district?
Andrea Ball Yeah, a few were like, I just, this is crazy. Like we should not be in this situation. We could have prevented this a long time ago. Everybody has different opinions, you know, they shouldn’t have done this, they shouldn’t have done that. I would do this, I would that. But then you talk to people who are on that school board right now and they’re like, yeah, it’s really easy to blame us, but we’re the ones who are left holding the ball after years of problems, so don’t blame us.
Jerry Quijano You mentioned other folks that have found themselves in this situation, and your reporting also looks at how this has played out in other large districts that are under TEA control that includes Houston ISD and Fort Worth ISD. What has been the role of those districts’ boards in this situation?
Andrea Ball So it’s been really interesting because we look at Houston, who is now entering its fourth year of the takeover, and they’re probably going to transition out at the end of the school year. And they have not been given too many special privileges, but they are allowed to sit in the front row of the audience. They’re treated a little bit differently. They might get a teeny bit more time to speak on the podium like an average commenter or public comment situation. But they feel like, no, we don’t get any information ahead of time. We don’t the agenda any earlier than anybody else does in public. We don’t get any special respect or any kind of unusual privileges. But what they have learned to do in Houston throughout this time is to really leverage their community support. So they will have people in the community who will create these working groups who will get that agenda at like three days ahead of time and they will all spend time analyzing it like parties kind of in a way they will all like do this thing and so the trustees in Houston have learned you know that your power comes from your constituents and then you work in that way as opposed to okay I get to sit on the I’m going to try this.
Jerry Quijano We are a couple of months away from election season. What else are you going to be watching in the time between now and then?
Andrea Ball Yeah, well, we’re going to be watching what continues to happen with the budget. It’s still doing its thing. We are looking at how decisions are being made on how to look at how to use the space that is open now in these schools that have been closed. We will be looking at the improvements that the district says, look, we’ve been working toward improvements. Maybe we’ll get some signals that we’re not going to have a takeover. So we’ll be watching to see. And get any information on ahead of time of what’s actually going to be implemented.
Jerry Quijano Okay, that is Andrea Ball. She is the Enterprise and Investigative Reporter at Austin Current. We’ll have a link to her reporting in today’s show notes. Andrea, always great to talk with you. My pleasure. All right, let’s check in on a few of today’s headlines. Travis County is joining a federal lawsuit aimed at blocking the Trump administration’s new rules for ballot by mail voting. The lawsuit challenges an executive order to the president signed in March, requiring the U.S. Postal Service to only deliver mail-in or absentee ballots to people enrolled on a, quote, state-specific list of eligible voters. Travis County Clerk Diana Limon-Mercado said the new rules pose significant costs and challenges for the county just weeks before the first wave of mail-ins ballots are scheduled to go out. We got our first measurable rainfall for more than a month here in Austin yesterday, and the National Weather Service says there’s a chance we could see a bit more today. It is a small chance, only 20%, but it’s a change and it looks like it might be our best through next week. Despite the humidity, any rainfall is welcome. The weekly map out Thursday from the US Drought Monitor shows worsening conditions here in the area, raising the risk of wildfires. And Austin FC is on the West Coast this weekend for a matchup against Portland. The Verde and Black bowed out of Leagues Cup competition after losing to Mexican side Toluca. This is KUT. This is Austin Signal, welcome back. When was the last time that you read a play by William Shakespeare? Perhaps it was Julius Caesar in 10th grade English, or maybe you watched a school production of Romeo and Juliet. Well, if it’s been a while, there’s a group of Austinites who want to bring the bard back into your life. A few groups, actually. And last weekend, they faced off for a Shakespeare-themed smackdown called The Great Austin Shake-Off. KUT’s Olivia Aldridge went downtown to check out the show.
Olivia Aldridge Ladies and gentlemen, friends beyond the binary, happy Pride and welcome to the Great Austin Shake-Off!
Olivia Aldridge Who do you imagine shows up to a Shakespeare-themed event on a Saturday night? If you guessed the nerds from your local NPR station, you’d be right. I did bump into my boss, Ben Philpott, in the audience. But it was actually a full and diverse crowd at the Scottish Rite Theater, some young folks, some older, all having kind of a rowdy good time. One of the organizers behind the event was Stephanie Craniola, the artistic director for a local theater troupe called the Walking Shadow Shakespeare Project. She says bringing all these hooting, hollering Shakespeare fans together was kind of a dream come true.
Stephanie Craniola Just like to get a room of 250 people together who like Shakespeare for Shakespeare is huge.
Olivia Aldridge Clearly, she’s a fan of the bard. But Croniola is the first to say that if you’ve never really gotten it, maybe you struggled with Shakespeare back in school.
Stephanie Craniola It’s not your fault. Shakespeare is so much more than what you did in high school English. And I say that as a high school English teacher for a very long time, it is not the right venue to explore and experience Shakespeare. She wants people to experience the rawness of human nature through Shakespeare’s work. She says that’s what it’s all about. So you’ll see some speeches that are really funny. You’ll see some speeches that are really heartbreaking and sad, and you’ll some speeches that are so powerful. Crenola’s goal, when.
Olivia Alridge Started Walking Shadow was to make Shakespeare more accessible and relatable for diverse actors and audiences, with open casting and even thoughtful editing of the language in some cases. But she says there are other great approaches to Shakespeare in Austen too. That’s why Walking Shadow joined up with two other companies, Austin Shakespeare and the Barron’s Men to put on the great Austin Shake-Off.
Stephanie Craniola This is essentially a monolog competition inspired by the wholesome, friendly nature of the Great British Bake Off.
Olivia Aldridge On Saturday, each company sent a representative on stage to perform a monolog across several genres. Audience members voted for their favorites in each round. First up, the history round, where Rachel West of Walking Shadow stole the show with her bold and imperious take on Queen Margaret from Henry VI.
Rachel West Where are your mess of sons to back you now? The wanton Edward and the lusty George, and where’s that valiant crook-back prodigy Dickie? Your boy. Laughter
Olivia Aldridge Pablo Munoz-Evers also put on a strong showing for Walking Shadow in the drama round with his bilingual Romeo.
Pablo Munoz-Evers Banishment, be merciful, say death, for exile hath more terror in his look, much more than death, not say banishment. Fuera del recinto de Verona, el mundo no existe, solo el purgatorio, la tortura.
Olivia Aldridge But in the end, it was Austin Shakespeare that took the drama round with a cold-blooded speech from Julius Caesar. They took the comedy round too, when Skyler Ewing used a stuffed dog to sell a side-stitching monolog from Two Gentlemen of Verona.
Skyler Ewing All this oil! CRUEL!
Do not shed a tear, nor speak a word.
Olivia Aldridge The evening culminated in a final head-to-head between leaders of the three troops, each presented their own take on Hamlet’s existential dilemma, to be or not to be.
To be or not to be? Good question.
Olivia Aldridge Stephanie Croniola brought a golden deck of tarot cards to the stage, shuffling them like a person desperate for insight into fate’s plans.
Stephanie Croniola Whether it is noble or in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune or take arms against a sea of troubles and by opposing end them.
Olivia Aldridge But it was Lindsay Polinsky of the Barron’s Men who carried the final round with her classic rendition, complete with the group’s signature Elizabethan costuming.
Lindsay Polinsky To sleep perchance to dream. Hi. There’s the rug.
Olivia Aldridge Each group had their moments of glory, but there could only be one overall winner for the evening. In the end, it was Walking Shadow that carried the most votes. Croniola was delighted by the win.
Jerry Quijano0 I love winning. I grew up very competitive, so this is nice, but mostly I’m just glad everyone had fun.
Olivia Aldridge The real win, she says, was getting people together to celebrate the man, the myth, the legend, Billy Shakes and the money raised to support future Shakespeare productions. Crenola says to stay tuned for another Shake Off in 2027. For KUT’s Art Beat, I’m Olivia Aldridge in Austin. Parting is such sweet sorrow.
Jerry Quijano Alright, it is Friday. We’re wrapping up the show, but we wouldn’t send you off into the weekend without a look at where the art is All right KU tees our beat editor Stephanie Federico has a few recommendations for us and she’s with us in the studio now Howdy Stephanie
Stephanie Federico Hey, Jerry.
Jerry Quijano Okay, so let’s start with a little bit of sad news. This week, Dolly Parton passed away at the age of 80, and we’ve heard lots of stories about her on NPR, and even a story from you and Brigid Bandit here in Austin. So I know that Austinites are planning quite a few tributes to celebrate Dolly’s life. Tell us about a few of them.
Stephanie Federico Yeah, so tonight Swift’s Addict and Stoney’s Good Time Rant are both having tribute nights. Tomorrow, as you said, Bridget Bandit, her usual drag hoedown at Stoney will be all Dolly. And then Sunday, We Love Video is having a tribute and a costume contest, so that should be fun. And our Deidre Gott from KUTX is having, is hosting a karaoke at Hole in the Wall. It will all be Dolly themed.
Jerry Quijano Yeah, and she’s got a Dolly cutout that is over there on the KUTX side. She said that she’s gonna be taking the cutout to Hole in the Wall, so if you’d like a picture with that. And maybe you might even be able to see the rhinestone guitar that Dolly sent to Bridget Bandit. You had a story about that earlier this week that we shared on Austin Signal.
Stephanie Federico Yeah, she said she was going to bring it.
Jerry Quijano Okay, okay, lots of opportunities to celebrate the life of Dolly this weekend Yesterday we got a chance to talk with Jane Hervey the founder of Futurefront, Texas in case folks didn’t hear what they do Tell us a little bit about them
Stephanie Federico Yeah, they’re this arts nonprofit that has been putting on a festival showcasing independent film and music and art for the past 10 years. They want to showcase art that’s reflective of the community and provide a space for emerging artists in Austin. So they have a festival this weekend. It started last night, actually. And tonight, they are going to highlight some independent music. They’ll be over at Swan Dive and focus on local rap and electronic music. They’ll have a workshop on producing electronic music. And then tomorrow, Saturday, they’ll focus on independent film. So that’ll be at Laguna Gloria, and they’re gonna show 12 different films. And Sunday night is their closing night. They’re gonna have a pool party over at the Line Hotel. So that should be fun.
Jerry Quijano Very cool. Well, there’s another fest happening tomorrow, a music fest out at Radio East. Which one is that?
Stephanie Federico Yeah, it’s called MeadowFest 2026. This is the third annual concert to raise awareness and money for both the Sims Foundation and Out Youth. Both nonprofits help provide mental health services for folks, Sims Foundation for musicians, Out Youth for youth, obviously. So Tiny Desk winner, Cure for Paranoia will be there, Semaphunk is gonna be there and lots of others.
Jerry Quijano3 Mm-hmm.
Stephanie Federico The event was founded in the memory of an Anderson High School student, an aspiring musician who died by suicide a few years ago. And so the goal of this is to raise money for these organizations and to reduce stigma around mental health issues and prevent suicide among youth.
Jerry Quijano Okay, sounds like a good cause. And yeah, you mentioned Quentin there. We got a chance to talk to Quentin. They were the July artist of the month for KUTX, so you can check that out at kut.org slash signal. Also happening tomorrow, a show at Mass Gallery has a couple performances and a really cool name. What is it?
Stephanie Federico Yeah, it’s called In the Belly of the Beetle. And this really caught my attention. There are two performances, one at 7.30, one at 9, and this surrounds an artist named Leah Danzi. She is a painter in Austin. She’s also an art therapist. And in these performances, musicians and dancers will respond to some of her paintings. And the paintings explore the way insects inhabit and invade human designs. So she’s asking viewers to take insects seriously. If I can read a quote from the gallery, this really caught me. In Danzi’s painted world, human and more than human bodies tangle together as bellies, dirt, wings, mouths, a tender kind of decomposition where it is not always clear whether a body is being devoured or held. Here, survival is less about remaining intact than continuing in another form.
Jerry Quijano That took my breath away in just about 20 seconds there. Wow, that sounds really very descriptive. And I gotta say though, I gotta imagine that the insects feel like we’re inviting their designs. You know, it’s just so human-centric, but I guess that’s just what we are. So let’s finish out your list of recommendations. This is a book fest happening over the course of two days at Red Salmon Arts Casa de Resistencia Books. Tell us about this fest.
Stephanie Federico Yes, the first ever Austin Latinx and Microbook Festival. They’ll be celebrating the literacy and literature of Chicanx, Latinx, and indigenous writers and storytellers, they’re bringing in artists from all over Texas, from the Valley, Houston, San Antonio, West Texas. There’ll be readings and writing workshops as well as opportunities to get to know some local independent presses.
Jerry Quijano Mm-hmm. It sounds like a really great event. Carmen Tafoya is gonna be out there one of those days lots of great names so go out and support and You can we’d like to bring you some events that are happening every weekend but you can keep up with everything that’s going on in the Austin arts world by Subscribing to the KUT art beat newsletter. You can do that at KUT org slash newsletters That is Stephanie Federico. She is KUT’s art beat editor Stephanie. Thank you very much
Stephanie Federico Thanks, Jerry.
Jerry Quijano All right, thank you out there for spending the day and the week with us here on Austin Signal. We are now wrapping up. We have more from today’s stories in the podcast show notes and more from this week at kut.org slash signal. Jake Perlman is our technical director, Alexandra Hart is our producer, Kristen Cabrera is our managing producer, and Jimmy Moss is our showrunner. I’m your host Jerry Quijano, we’ll be back with you on Monday. Have a great, safe weekend.
This transcript was transcribed by AI, and lightly edited by a human. Accuracy may vary. This text may be revised in the future.
