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Election Day is tomorrow, and lots of attention will be focused on statewide and national races tied to Texas. We’ll tell you why a small GOP delegation wants every ballot in Texas to be counted by hand.
The Dog’s Head development has become a contentious issue in Austin this year. How we got here and what comes next for the project.
What we know about the plane that crashed after departing from Austin on Sunday.
Wheatsville Co-Op’s location on Guadalupe recently shuttered its doors, and a longtime staple of the store and the neighborhood is heading for greener pastures.
Plus: An Austin newcomer wants to hear your recommendations about the spaces, performances and good bites that set the city apart.
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] Election day is tomorrow, and lots of attention will be focused on statewide and national races tied to Texas. We’ll tell you why a small GOP delegation wants every ballot in Texas to be counted by hand. And Dog’s Head has become a contentious issue in Austin this year. How we got here, and what comes next for the project. And what we know about the plane that crashed after departing from Austin yesterday. That is coming up on today’s show.
Neena Satija [00:00:32] The Austin Signal is a production of KUT News, hosted by Jerry Quijano.
Jerry Quijano [00:00:37] Wheatsville Co-op’s location on Guadalupe recently shuttered their doors, and the longtime staple of the store and the neighborhood is heading for greener pastures. We’re gonna tell you about the figure and where it’s headed. Plus, Ella is new to Austin. She wants your recommendations about the spaces, performances, and the good bites that set the city apart. Those stories and more up next on Austin Signal. Thank you. Howdy out there, this is Austin Signal. I’m your host Jerry Keconnell. It is the second day of November. Thank you for making us part of your day. Well, election day is tomorrow, but a group of Republicans in a small county in the Texas panhandle are seeking to change the way ballots in the state are counted. Members of the Potter County GOP last week filed a federal lawsuit looking for every ballot in Texas to be hand counted. The Texas Newsroom’s investigative reporter and editor, Nina Satija, is with us now to tell us more about the suit. Nina, welcome back to the show.
Neena Satija [00:01:39] Thanks for having me, Jerry.
Jerry Quijano [00:01:40] Okay, so tell us about this lawsuit. What exactly is the GOP party asking for and what’s their rationale for the ask?
Neena Satija [00:01:48] So what they’re asking for is right now, when you vote in Potter County and most other counties, including here in Travis County, we use electronic voting machines. And those voting machines spit out a paper ballot. It’s kind of like a receipt. That’s just kind of for if anything goes wrong later on, they have that as a physical sort of security to make sure that votes don’t get miscounted or that there aren’t problems. But otherwise, everything is done pretty much electronically. And what the Potter County GOP is saying is, we don’t trust that process. We don’t the voting machines. We don’t trust the electronic vote tally. We think everyone should have to use the paper record that’s spit out by these voting machines and that election officials should have to count those by hand.
Jerry Quijano [00:02:27] Have they given any reason for their distrust in those machines?
Neena Satija [00:02:31] Yes, they are concerned that these machines could be hacked or tampered with. They’ve noted that some of the parts may be made in foreign countries. Now this is all really common of voting machines or pretty much any type of machinery we have here in America, not all of it’s made in America. And this also echoes claims from President Donald Trump that the voting machines were tampered with, that they were hacked, that there are problems with them. He made these claims after losing the 2020 election. So this is certainly a continuation of that narrative.
Jerry Quijano [00:02:58] And do we have any evidence, at least here in Texas, that these machines have been tampered with in the past?
Neena Satija [00:03:04] We don’t have any evidence of that, certainly not any widespread evidence. And it was all those claims were debunked back in 2020 as well.
Jerry Quijano [00:03:10] Okay, if this lawsuit were to be successful, how would this affect the process of certifying the election?
Neena Satija [00:03:16] It’s unlikely I’ll note that it will be successful, but on the off chance that it is, it would have a pretty big impact. It’s focused on federal races because it was filed in federal court. So obviously the most high profile of those races is the race between James Talerico and Ken Paxton. Now, if this were to come up, and if this lawsuit were to be successful then the only way to certify that race, which means to essentially finalize the election results and allow the winner to take office, that could only happen if all of these paper ballots were hand counted. But again, that’s only if the losses succeeds, which right now is pretty unlikely.
Jerry Quijano [00:03:50] Why is it unlikely? Who have you spoken to?
Neena Satija [00:03:53] Well, so I spoke to some voting rights experts who said that the claims in the lawsuit are pretty vague right now. Usually if a judge is gonna take action like making a major change to election procedure on the eve of the election or right after the election, it’s because actual harm has been done. In this case, the Potter County GOP is just saying, we’re worried something like this might happen. Their lawsuit actually says specifically, we’re not alleging this has happened in the past, we’re just worried that it might. So that’s one big reason. And they also have not actually filed what’s called a request for a preliminary injunction, calling for immediate response from powder county or election administrators. So that’s another signal that it’s kind of hard to imagine that this could happen right away, but they could file that at any time. They could file after the election. And I think the concern from voting rights advocates is it’s certainly a way to continue this narrative that voting is unsafe, that the machines are unsafe when there’s no evidence of that.
Jerry Quijano [00:04:50] So Election Day is coming up tomorrow, what happens next?
Neena Satija [00:04:54] This case? Well, first of all, Potter County has, I believe, about 20, maybe a little less than 20 days now to respond. And so again, unless the GOP, unless plan is for it to ask for a preliminary injunction or something that would speed the case along, and the judge were to grant that, probably nothing at this point. Again, I think the concern is more that it’s just a way of sowing more distrust in the election process.
Jerry Quijano [00:05:18] All right, we have been speaking with the Texas newsrooms, Nina Satija, we’ll have a link to her reporting in today’s podcast show notes. Nina, thank you for your time.
Neena Satija [00:05:25] Thank you.
Jerry Quijano [00:05:35] The dog’s head development has got lots of folks talking and now with the Muni golf course deal coming into play, it got us wondering about how these deals and how we got here specifically and how voters might think about them when it comes to election day tomorrow. To give us more insight into it, we’ve got Andrea Ball with us. She is the enterprise investigative reporter for Austin Kern. Andrea, thank you for being back with us.
Andrea Ball [00:05:59] Thank you for having me.
Jerry Quijano [00:06:01] Of course, so before we get into all the nitty gritty details. Can you just remind us, give us a little primer, what is dog’s head?
Andrea Ball [00:06:09] Yeah, Dog’s Head is a 2,600-acre piece of land in southeast Austin. It has been slated recently for large development. It’s been empty for a very long time. It’s right by the Colorado River, so it’s an environmentally sensitive area. That land has been used for decades as a mining and gravel pit. Basically, there’s huge holes in there, but there’s also a lot of beautiful land that goes right up to the river.
Jerry Quijano [00:06:37] I’ve been in Austin since 2018, development is just a natural part of what’s going on here in town, so why has this particular issue become so contentious?
Andrea Ball [00:06:46] I think, look, there’s always going to be people who fight development, right? That’s just going to happen. But in this particular case, there was a lot of conversation happening outside the public eye. And so the first time anybody heard about it, who is not in the inner circle of City Hall, it was people who found out in, you know, I think it was May 17th or something like that. And that was a work session. And then two days later… The council passed the annexation and the development plan that gives kind of broad strokes about how that land could be used. And people felt angry and misled, and they felt cut out of the process.
Jerry Quijano [00:07:30] You also wrote recently about Muny, the municipal golf course. We were talking about that a few weeks ago on Austin Signal. Are there any similarities between Muny and between the dogs had development?
Andrea Ball [00:07:41] Well, there has been a lot of conversation about how little time people had to absorb and digest the dog’s head plan before it was developed. And there’s not a ton of time that people are getting to weigh in on Muni. One of the differences is that Muni, as part of this agreement with the city that they hope to reach. It’s not just that 141 acres that everyone, you know, that is a beloved civil rights monument, essentially. It’s also including another 190 acres that could be developed, and that’s what they’re all working on. So the Muni situation is not getting a ton of time, but it’s gotten more than Dog’s Head did before things. So they’re doing things more slowly. Than they did for Dog’s Head. And so I think that people are having that conversation of why, is this a difference between West Austin and East Austin? I can’t say that. I don’t know what happened, but that is the perception of things happening behind closed doors and things happening for special people and not special people. That’s the perception of song.
Jerry Quijano [00:09:07] You have a really cool timeline of Dog’s Head covering the entire saga over at Austin Current. What’s happened more recently regarding Dog’s head?
Andrea Ball [00:09:15] Yeah. Well, first of all, I want to give a shout out to my editor, Liz Pagano, who put together that timeline and just did a remarkable job. I hope people go and look at it because it’s such a good timeline. So I think the most recent thing that blew up was a filing with the state saying that Amazon plans to build 1.2 million square feet of a building for its robotics division there. That’s more than, you know, 20 NFL football fields. And so it’s been filed originally under something called Project Toaster. People have been talking about Project Toast, like that’s just the name of what they call it or whatever. So now to know that people have become even more concerned, like, well, what’s going there? Cause we don’t know. And I’m sure everything’s not nailed down on Endeavor’s part, but it has just been so controversial because people have felt like. They don’t know what’s coming next. They don’t have as much of a voice as they want, and they feel like the city council is gonna do whatever they want. So what’s happening now is in the next few months, the city will be briefing the community and the environmental commission will get another look at this, the planning commission, some other groups, and then in March, the city counsel will, that’s the big day. Whether they decide that they’re going to accept the regulating plan and just move forward, let everybody move forward.
Jerry Quijano [00:10:51] Election day is coming up tomorrow. You mentioned there that council members were able to vote on this. Not everyday regular citizens were able vote on the dog’s head development. Is this something that voters are going to be having on their mind as they head to the polls tomorrow?
Andrea Ball [00:11:05] I mean, I think so. Whoever knows what a voter is thinking, right? We all have different priorities and what we think is important. But whenever I put something on Reddit or on our website, it just gets a huge reaction from people. And when, I mean if I write something on reddit at all, like anything, tons of people will read it and usually comment. And what they are saying is, butt them all out. They’re all corrupt. Nobody has any evidence of corruption, you know, but that’s the sentiment. But then there’s like a lot of other folks, you know, who are like, what’s dog’s head? So it really just depends. But some people have this on their mind.
Jerry Quijano [00:11:51] It’s the the dog’s head project has been picking up steam over the course of 2026 and there are more deadlines ahead in 2027 you laid out some of those out for us ultimately what could become of the area that is dogs had in the future.
Andrea Ball [00:12:04] Yeah, I mean, we really don’t know because the plans that have gone to the county, like the presentations, you know, they’ve said business, industry, thousands of homes, affordable housing, a lot of different things. The first thing we see is a big Amazon manufacturing site. So now everybody’s thinking, God, what’s going to happen next? And we don’t. You know, that’s just the flagship tenant. But it has made people more curious about what’s gonna be there. And we just don’t know.
Jerry Quijano [00:12:41] All right, we have been speaking with Andrea Ball. She is the Enterprise Investigative Reporter at Austin Current, our reporting partners covering the city of Austin. Andrea, thank you for your time.
Andrea Ball [00:12:49] Thank you for having me.
Jerry Quijano [00:12:52] The National Transportation Safety Board is providing a few details about a private jet that crashed in Florida yesterday after departing from Austin Berks from International Airport. All nine people on board were killed, but authorities have not yet publicly identified those victims, and at least one person on the ground was also injured. During a briefing today, officials said that they were looking at the weather as a possible cause of the crash and said there was some evidence of breakup of the before impact. Crews with the NTSB are gathering wreckage from a debris field about half a mile long. Hundreds of residents were evacuated from that neighborhood in Palm Beach County. This is a developing story and one that the KUT newsroom will continue following. And when we have those updates, we’ll have them for you on the Kut app, online at kut.org and right here on Austin Signal. We have more show coming up for you after this short break. Thank you for tuning in and making us part of your day. This is Austin Signal, welcome back to the show. Austin is a big city, and even if you’ve lived here for years, it can be hard to keep track of everything that there is to do here. But consider what all of that looks like through a newcomer’s eyes. We got a question for our ATXplain project from one new Austinite looking for some help. KUT’s Matt Largie wants you to help us help her.
Matt Largey [00:14:27] Ella Hedekin grew up in San Diego. She moved to Texas to go to Baylor. Stayed after graduation.
Ella Hedekin [00:14:33] Two years after school in Waco was kind of enough, so I transitioned over to Austin and it has been unreal amazing. I can’t believe I live here.
Matt Largey [00:14:43] She’s still new to Austin, moved here in July. Got a little place with a roommate in Hyde Park. She teaches third grade. Like she said, living in Austin has been great so far, but she’s got a problem.
Ella Hedekin [00:14:55] I have felt kind of like positively overwhelmed with how many things there are to do. Here I feel like whenever I have a free second it’s like, oh my gosh there’s so many restaurants to choose from, there’s many parks, there are so many fun places to go that I kind of get analysis paralysis and I don’t know where to start.
Matt Largey [00:15:15] It’s not the worst problem to have, but when you’re new to a place like Austin, it can be really hard to figure out what to do, what to see, where to go, and where not to go. So she came to A.T. Explained with a question. As a newbie in Austin, where do you start? There’s so many things especially coming from a place like Waco no offense to Waco
Ella Hedekin [00:15:37] There were super fun things to do there, honestly, and I had my fun things, but it was kind of easier to find them.
Matt Largey [00:15:44] Yeah, she’s already been to the obvious places, Barton Springs, a bunch of restaurants, but she wants some guidance from people who’ve been here more than a minute. So, we’re turning to you, dear listener. We want your recommendations. But, there are some rules, some criteria, specific things Ella is looking for, like restaurants. Are you an adventurous eater?
Ella Hedekin [00:16:07] Yes, I would say.
Matt Largey [00:16:09] Yeah, there’s like kind of nothing you won’t try at least.
Ella Hedekin [00:16:12] Yeah, I’m not like great with spicy food, but I’ll try it. Okay. I’m kind of excited to like try any if you put the food in front of me.
Matt Largey [00:16:20] But not just restaurants.
Ella Hedekin [00:16:22] Also, like parks, I’ve been to a few fun swimming holes, but I’m interested in kind of those little outdoor gems.
Matt Largey [00:16:31] Uh… Watercraft
Ella Hedekin [00:16:33] I don’t have, like, watercraft, but I love to be in the water, like being from San Diego, anything that involves water, I love, kayaking, paddle boarding, tubing, love to tube. I feel like that’s sort of traditionally been out of my budget, like to jet ski, but I would do it, yeah.
Matt Largey [00:16:56] She wants to know about performances. She used to be a dancer, so she loves dance. But there are some restrictions. Stand-up comedy.
Ella Hedekin [00:17:04] I’m not a fan.
Matt Largey [00:17:05] Really? Yeah.
Matt Largey [00:17:07] Okay!
Ella Hedekin [00:17:08] I know it’s very big, especially here. I just have never really.
Matt Largey [00:17:13] Did you just find it cringy?
Ella Hedekin [00:17:14] I do, yeah.
Matt Largey [00:17:15] Yeah
Ella Hedekin [00:17:16] I think clips of it are fun. I don’t think I could handle, like.
Matt Largey [00:17:21] You don’t want to sit through a whole.
Ella Hedekin [00:17:21] I don’t plan to get in first.
Matt Largey [00:17:23] Yeah, okay. All right. That’s fair enough. What about spectator sports?
Ella Hedekin [00:17:26] Yeah, sports. Love that.
Matt Largey [00:17:29] Like hockey or no.
Ella Hedekin [00:17:31] Don’t love that. No hockey. Oh my gosh. I thought of something else. That’s okay.
Matt Largey [00:17:35] Yeah, of course.
Ella Hedekin [00:17:36] Kind of like yearly events, if there’s like, is there a yearly festival that’s fun to go to? All those fun community things. We can be out meeting people, enjoying the culture, the vibe.
Matt Largey [00:17:52] So outdoor places, performances, sports, restaurants, community festivals, what are your go-to Austin things? Like when you want to show someone a good time in Austin, where do you go? One more thing, remember Ella’s a teacher, only a few years out of college. So there’s a budget.
Ella Hedekin [00:18:11] Um, yeah, I would say, like, $50 maximum. Okay, alright.
Jerry Quijano [00:18:19] So let’s welcome Ella to Austin, help her out. Where should she go? Go to kut.org slash Ella, that’s E-L-L A, to record your ideas. We’ll report back what we hear in a few weeks. I’m Matt Largie in Austin.
Jerry Quijano [00:18:43] And the next ATX playing live show is fast approaching. That’s a good one for Ella to check out. It’s happening December 9th at Bass Concert Hall. We’ve got a link to more information about the show and tickets in today’s podcast, Show Notes. Well, the Wheatsville Co-op on Guadalupe has closed after 45 years in business. Texas standards, Sean Saldana was there as the community said goodbye. And watch the Godzilla-like sculpture get pulled down from its roof.
Sean Saldana [00:19:15] Dozens of people are standing around the Wheatsville parking lot on a cloudy morning just past 10 a.m. And we’re all watching a crew load a giant green dinosaur onto the bed of a truck.
Trevor Moore [00:19:25] It just always seems to have been part of the community.
Sean Saldana [00:19:29] Trevor Moore is here today with his daughter.
Trevor Moore [00:19:31] It’s kind of sad to see it have to close, but something else will come in, so progress. The sculpture is called…
Sean Saldana [00:19:37] Mangesaurus and it looks a lot like Godzilla. It’s bright green showing its teeth and its tongue is sticking out as if it’s preparing to devour something. In a past life he was the mascot for a local pizza chain. The restaurant changed locations and didn’t have space for him so Wheatsville offered to temporarily house him on its roof. And when the pizza chain eventually shut down, Mangesaurs stayed. He spent nearly two decades on top of the co-op becoming an iconic landmark in central Austin. And not everybody is taking his departure well. And I’m Mad! Max Gardner is here today with his father John.
John Gardner [00:20:15] We’re super sad. This grocery store has been here most of the time. I’ve been in Austin I have my childhood home was a block away and we used to walk up to this grocery store
Sean Saldana [00:20:25] Wheatsville is not going out of business. There is another location six miles away on South Lamar that will stay open. General manager Tanya Carney says the shop on Guadalupe shut down due to declining sales, rising rent, and construction in the area that interrupts business operations.
Tanya Carney [00:20:41] It’s been really difficult to remain a sustainable grocery store here as far as the economic pressure that I’m sure a lot of local businesses are facing.
Sean Saldana [00:20:51] On its final day, Wheatsville, Guadalupe served dinosaur cookies and marked all non-alcoholic items 30% off. The store’s closure was especially emotional for people because Wheatsfield isn’t a standard grocery chain with shareholders and a large corporate structure. It’s a co-op, meaning everyday Austinites can buy a lifetime equity share and have a say in how the company is run.
Mary Jade O’Connor [00:21:13] It’s more than a grocery store, it’s community, sorry.
Sean Saldana [00:21:19] Mary Jade O’Connor is on Wheatfield’s board. She’s still processing the loss.
Mary Jade O’Connor [00:21:24] I’m grieving. I mean, it’s a grieving process. It’s like seeing an old friend die. I think death is a pretty good…
Sean Saldana [00:21:31] For this because you know it’s coming and then at when you know what’s coming the question is like all right what do I do until then? Be with people.
Sean Saldana [00:21:42] At this point, the store is just hours away from shutting down for good. The employees at the Guadalupe location were all offered jobs in Wheatsville, South Lamar. One of the people transferring is Caleb Morton. How are you? He’s agreed to let me interview him as he checks customers out. And today only, he’s offering everybody a special deal.
Caleb Morton [00:22:01] Basically, when they buy a Wiesel anniversary t-shirt, they get a free cup of coffee down south at South Amar for a whole year.
Sean Saldana [00:22:09] The store’s closure isn’t a surprise to anybody. It was first announced in 2024. The entire staff has had years to prepare for this.
Caleb Morton [00:22:17] Probably cry today, but I’ve had my time to process
Caleb Morton [00:22:20] I don’t know.
Caleb Morton [00:22:23] Plus, we all still have jobs down south, so it’s not like we lost our job. Just moving from our childhood home to another home.
Sean Saldana [00:22:31] But the childhood home is a special place.
Caleb Morton [00:22:34] It’s very much so, it’s where I spent my fun, pure pleasant years at one point, so, uh, it’s just sad, somber, happy, joyful, cheerful. Do you want to buy a t-shirt today?
Sean Saldana [00:22:50] The customer agrees. One t-shirt and free coffee for a year. Half-lif. Wheatsville, Guadalupe is gone and there is no way to replace a childhood home. But the most iconic part of the store is still alive. Mangesaurus now sits in the produce section of Wheatsfield South Lamar. I’m Sean Saldana in Austin.
Jerry Quijano [00:23:15] And that is it for us today here on Austin Signal. Our team is Karoline Pfeil, Alexandra Hart, Kristen Cabrera, and I’m your host, Jerry Quijano. We’ll be back with you tomorrow. We’ll talk to you then.
This transcript was transcribed by AI, and lightly edited by a human. Accuracy may vary. This text may be revised in the future.
