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New state laws take effect today. What to know and what’s changing.
An Austinite is back in the country after being deported. Why was the U.S. citizen was deported in the first place, and how often does this happen?
Do you know how many sister cities Austin has the world over — or what a sister city even is? ATXplained has the answers.
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Jerry Quijano Bye. The start of September brings into effect a few new state laws, from a right to repair certain electronics to using some forms of gold and silver as legal tender. We’ve got what you need to know about those changes. And an Austinite is back in the country after he was deported to Mexico for some months. The man is a U.S. Citizen with the documentation to prove it. So why was he deported in the first place, and how often are other citizens forced out of the country? We’ve got more about these stories that’s coming up on today’s show.
Laurie Gallardo The Austin Signal is a production of KUT News, hosted by Jerry Quijano.
Jerry Quijano Plus, do you know how many sister cities Austin has? There’s one in Japan, Ireland, and Germany, to name a few. We’ve got the story of the community that’s been fostered with folks from around the world. That and more, coming up next right here on Austin Signal. Thank you. Howdy out there, this is Austin Signal. I’m your host, Jerry Kikano. Thank you for starting off the new month with us and thank you for listening to community-supported public radio. This is KUT News. It’s the first day of September and we are still expecting high temperatures to reach 100 today and for a few more days this month, no change there. There is some change as today marks the start of new laws taking effect here in Texas. Three of the most notable changes involve electronic repairs, residential solar cells, and the use of gold and silver as money. David Martin Davies from our Texas Newsroom partner station, Texas Public Radio in San Antonio, as a rundown of some of the new laws that go into effect today.
David Martin Davie If your mobile phone goes on the fritz, it’s now going to be easier and possibly cheaper to fix it under House Bill 2963. It creates a right to repair for personal electronic devices. Nathan Proctor is the Senior Director of the Right to Repair Campaign at the United States Public Interest Research Group.
Nathan Proctor This law is a major step forward. It allows Texans to get access to parts tools and other things you need to fix modern electronics.
David Martin Davies The law applies only to covered electronics first offered for sale in Texas on or after September 1st. It also exempts products including motor vehicles, appliances, game consoles, and farm equipment.
Nathan Proctor You know, we strongly advocate for the right to repair everything.
David Martin Davies Another new law attempts to rein in deceptive practices in the residential solar industry. Senate Bill 1036 requires solar retailers, including those selling door-to-door, to register with the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation. Ann Bedor is with Texas Appleseed and authored the report, How Harmful Marketing Practices Are Undermining the Potential of Residential Rooftop Solar.
Ann Bedor So salespeople can no longer be fly by night. They have to be associated with a particular solar provider and that company is also has to be registered and is accountable for their actions.
David Martin Davies The law also gives buyers certain cancelation rights. Padora says there were complaints from homeowners who say they were misled about savings, financial terms, and government incentives.
Ann Bedor We heard story after story of people in their 80s with $100,000 in solar panel loans, an investment that was likely to cause them incredible financial hardship if not totally break their finances and something that they would never really reap the benefits of.
David Martin Davies Using gold and silver as money in Texas gets a boost with House Bill 1056. This new law recognizes qualifying privately produced gold and silver as legal tender in Texas. Republican State Representative Mark D’Orazio of San Antonio authored the bill. In a hearing before the state legislature, he explained that this new law allows the use of gold as functional money.
Mark D’Orazio How am I supposed to buy groceries or put gas in my car with a gold bar? Fortunately, the technology is available today and allows you to pay for goods and services using the gold card through the convenience of a debit card.
David Martin Davies No one will be required to accept gold or silver, but Dorazio said the gold can be loaded onto a special debit card that performs like a typical credit card. It draws value from a gold account and is measured in dollars. Dorazios said using gold as legal tender is a hedge against inflation, avoids some taxes and shields privacy.
Mark D’Orazio The protection of our citizens’ rights and the American Dream is what this bill is really about. It does that by making gold and silver functional money.
David Martin Davies Durazio said the law may be tested in the courts, but he said he was confident it didn’t violate the U.S. Constitution’s prohibition on states minting their own money. I’m David Martin Davies in San Antonio.
Jerry Quijano 70 years ago, an idea was born. A vision of connecting cities around the world through friendship. If two cities could be partners or sisters, they could work together to create a more peaceful world. We got a question about Austin’s sister cities for our BTXplained project, KUT’s Luz Moreno Lozano has that answer.
Luz Moreno Lozano So right off the bat, the person who asked this question actually knows a lot about the answer, but she wants more people to know. From her hotel room back in June, Christy Bryant was on a Zoom call with me. She was in between sessions at some kind of sister cities related conference. But she was also there because Austin was welcoming another sister to the family, Greater Manchester and the United Kingdom.
Christy Bryant Actually, as of one hour ago, we now have 14 sister cities.
Luz Moreno Lozano So, a Tetra Dekaopolis, or a 14-some of Sister Cities. Christy and a delegation of volunteers signed this new Sister Cities agreement earlier this summer. Two cities that are thousands of miles apart, but share an interest in music and tech. Christy is a chair of a group called Austin Sister Cities International. She’s also our question asker. She’s been involved with the organization since she was in college at UT in the 1990s.
Christy Bryant I was studying Japanese and I knew somebody who was in the International Studies Department and she said, Christy, would you be interested in volunteering for a Japanese sister city organization? I’m like, what is that? What are you talking about? I have no idea what that is. Well, here we are.
Luz Moreno Lozano 30-Something years later, and it remains a program that not a lot of people are familiar with. So Christy thought it was time to change that, and she trusted us, our ATXplain project, with such a task. To understand Austin’s family of sisters, we have to go back to 1956. That’s when then President Dwight D. Eisenhower announced the People to People program. After World War II, Eisenhower wanted to restore international peace through understanding and mutual respect.
Christy Bryant Now, if we are going to have, take advantage of the assumption that all people want peace, then the problem is for people to get together.
Luz Moreno Lozano The idea was, if you know each other, you won’t go to war against each other.
Christy Bryant To work out not one method, but thousands of methods by which people can gradually learn a little bit more of each other.
Luz Moreno Lozano The People to People program eventually became better known as the Sister Cities program. Today, more than 2,000 U.S. Cities are linked to more than 1,800 foreign cities in more than 120 countries. I met Christy at Austin City Hall several weeks after our Zoom call. Out on the plaza, there’s a pretty big directional sign. Each arrow on the sign shows a direction and distance to each of Austin’s sister cities.
Christy Bryant We put this up in 2024. We had a lot of citizens, myself included, who had wanted something like this in front of City Hall for years and years. Every relationship is different.
Luz Moreno Lozano Sure, there’s periodic calls, planned visits, and email and text exchanges. But sisterhood is not defined by any one thing. Like any good relationship, it’s rooted in support.
Christy Bryant And since we’re volunteers, it’s really what our passion is and then finding those connections.
Luz Moreno Lozano Austin’s first sister city relationship began in 1968. Saltillo and Austin share a history as two capitals of Texas. Saltillo was a capital of the region when Texas was still part of Mexico. Austin would later become the capital of the Republic of Texas, their sisterhood started first as a delegation and slowly grew to include small business development and cross border trade. Eventually a partnership with the Bombedos or firefighters in Saltillo, Mexico was born. Some members of the Austin Fire Department were traveling there to train firefighters and learn Spanish. Billy Webb is one of the founding members of Austin Sister Cities International. He spent decades in the Austin fire department.
Billy Webb When I found out that there were some friends in the fire department who were making trips down there and helping with training down there, I was also an instructor, but he was speaking Spanish, I said, no, sign me up, I wanna go.
Luz Moreno Lozano That was in 1999. Over the years, Billy says he helped train Mexican firefighters to improve response in their region. Austin even donates some of their old fire equipment to Saltillo. In exchange, several Austin first responders, including Billy, were able to learn Spanish and understand a new culture. There’s also a wine project and even a student exchange program.
Billy Webb These are products of that relationship that wouldn’t exist otherwise. There’s plenty of other cities in Mexico that we’re not doing this with. There’s a plenty of cities in Germany, there’s plenty other cities.
Luz Moreno Lozano Since the program started in the late 60s, the organization has slowly grown. Aditi Joshi is the vice chair for Austin Sister Cities International. They say you can’t pick your family, but in this case, a lot of thought goes into who Austin’s sisters are going to be. When we build Sister City relationships, we’re going to build a sisterly relationship
Aditi Joshi We build sister city relationships in such a way that they’re mutually aligned and there are commonalities for growth. And she says there’s ways to measure that. So when we build a relationship with any city anywhere in the world, it has to align on, you know, arts, culture, music, entertainment, education, technology, healthcare. So, we can’t just go out and build.
Luz Moreno Lozano Relationship.” Aditi says there’s a two-year trial period that they call a friendship city status that helps find those similarities. Right now, Austin has a friendship city agreement with Florence, Italy.
Aditi Joshi Only one that does it, because we’re very intentional, we’re very serious about the way we build a relationship, because we want that relationship to stay on in the long term.
Luz Moreno Lozano She says these are just some of the things that bring sister cities together. Aditi is also chair of Austin’s sisterhood with Limerick, Ireland. So for Limerich and Austin…
Aditi Joshi Machine-starred restaurants. Yes, we’re both cities on a river, but guess what? We’re both cities that are growing. We want to make space for the younger population to stay and have career opportunities, and on the other side, we want to retain our talent.
Luz Moreno Lozano We want to grow our cities. Sisterhood can also be built on personal connections, people who grew up in another place but call Austin home now. Fernando Neri chairs a committee between Austin and Lima, Peru. He says that’s what got him involved. Fernando was born in Lima. He felt this was a chance to show a love for both his cities, Austin, where he’s for 26 years and his home city of Lima.
Fernando Neri It’s amazing what the power of love for your cities, and I’m saying cities because it’s both Austin and Lima in our case, can do.
Luz Moreno Lozano He says people can learn a lot about each other through things like annual events and discussions.
Fernando Neri It’s amazing how much in common cities have versus how different they are. But it’s a matter of like making those differences, something that is good. Like, yes, we might be different here, but we’re so alike on this part of life.
Luz Moreno Lozano Pramod Patel says the relationship he’s helped build with Pune, India had a similar start. He was born in Pune. He says it’s also known for its university, like Austin and UT, but one of its biggest similarities is live music.
Pramod Patel Pune has a very vibrant culture and music lover community. And then going further, like in drumming culture in Pune is so vibrant. It’s one of the identities of Pune. And of course, and on the similar lines again, music of all kinds of world cultures is welcomed in Austin.
Luz Moreno Lozano That is what inspired the creation of the group’s diversity band, which debuted after Austin signed a sister city agreement with Pune in 2019. Copeland’s Germany and Austin have been sister cities since the early 1990s.
Ralph Bendlin The history of this Sister Cities relationship is strongly tied to the school exchanges that have existed and still exist today.
Luz Moreno Lozano That’s Ralph Bendlin. He’s the chair of the Austin Copland Sister Cities Committee. Ralph is here in Austin. Christian Schmitz is Ralph’s counterpart in Copland.
Christian Schmitz People meet each other and learn to know each other and often remain friends for many years or lifetime.
Luz Moreno Lozano Christian is actually a child of the sister cityship. He came to Austin in 1994 in the student exchange program. Until this day, he has a relationship with the people he met here, like Ralph. He says that is what this program is all about.
Christian Schmitz This can really change your life and bring you brilliant memories and sometimes even can extend your family across the Atlantic. And that is something that is really amazing.
Luz Moreno Lozano I heard similar things from teams that run the Sister Cities programs with Adelaide, Australia, OE to Japan, and Angier France. It’s been almost 70 years since President Eisenhower announced his People to People program. This idea that two cities across the globe can be different, but in many ways the same. Inside City Hall, there is a line of flags against the east wall of the lobby that presents each sister city. They serve as a reminder that even thousands of miles and oceans apart, the world can be a better place when we take the time to understand each other. Here’s Christy Bryan again.
Christy Bryant We don’t all get a go experience in the other country, but when they’re coming here and we’re delivering that type of programming, we get to learn about their culture and our world becomes bigger. Our world can be so small, but the more that we learn about the world, we’re all the same, we’re human beings.
Luz Moreno Lozano I’m Luz Moreno-Luzano in Austin.
Jerry Quijano You can keep up with all the stories in our A.T. Explained series and subscribe to the podcast at atexplained.org. Our next A. T. Explain live show is coming up at Bass Concert Hall on December 9th. Information and tickets are at texasperformingarts.org and if you still can’t get enough, join KUT News for our first ever A.t. Explaine trivia night. That’s happening September 30th across the street from us here at Hole in the Wall. We’re gonna have details in today’s show notes. That is it for us here on Austin Signal. We’ll have the information about ATX Plain Trivia and more about the stories that we shared with you today in the show notes and at kut.org slash signal. The signal team is Jake Perlman, Alexandra Hart and Kristen Cabrera. I’m your host, Jerry Quijano. We will talk to you tomorrow. 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.
