The Texas legislative session kicked off this week, and lawmakers have a $32.7 billion surplus to work with. What are they going to do with it? I’ve got an idea. It’s just an IT line item in a budget request, and it would only cost 0.018% of that surplus. But it’s meaningful, and it could…
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Sprinkles or M&Ms? One scoop or two? Cup or cone? These are tough questions, and even though we’ve got global problems on our minds these days, dessert is still important. Good ice cream can make the world a little more manageable. Here in Houston, we’re lucky to have ice cream weather year-round, and we’ve got…
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The Chevron Marathon is this weekend, bringing 27,000 runners from around the world to Houston. Each runner carries with them unique reasons that keep them moving through busy weeks and bad weather. Some common motivators are improving cardiovascular health, getting to know your city, socializing with a running community, and the satisfaction of setting and…
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About a year ago, when the Covid-19 pandemic forced us out of our office, the January Advisors team adopted some new practices to adjust to remote work. We now start and end the day with a team check-in. The primary objective of these meetings (called “standup” and “sitdown”) is to update everyone on our work…
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In the United States, incarcerated people are five times more likely to contract COVID-19 and three times more likely to die of COVID-19 than the general population. In response to the pandemic, activists are calling for officials to reduce the jail population in order to keep everyone safe. With a cash bail system, many people…
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Public art can bring a neighborhood together. Murals especially can help create a stronger sense of place. They can also be used to raise awareness about important social issues facing a community. If you’ve ventured outside onto the streets of Houston lately, you might have seen a few new bright yellow murals urging residents to…
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On March 18, 2020, the Texas Supreme Court put a temporary stay on eviction proceedings across the state. That temporary stay expires today, and there are no indictions that it will be extended. While this stay prevented nearly all evictions during this two month period, it allowed landlords to continue filing eviction cases. This means…
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Earlier in March, as the COVID-19 public health crisis was starting to unfold in the United States, we released our study of twenty years of evictions in Houston in Harris County. This study examined some of the basic metrics in eviction court records, such as the number of cases filed, the number of judgments in…
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It takes a lot of guts to take a good thing, and try to make it better. Back in 2017, El Paso was already on the right track to ending homelessness. They had a nearly complete list of everyone experiencing homelessness in the community. They had partners in the community who reported information, but it…
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We recently did a webinar with Jamey Caruthers, senior staff attorney at Children At Risk, about how to use data to fight human trafficking. Human trafficking is a huge problem in Texas, especially in Houston, and Children At Risk is leading the charge in helping to write and pass laws that increase penalties for perpetrators while…
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