Latest news with #LeagueofCities
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
City Manager Jonathan Hayes named Home Rule Hero
BAY COUNTY, Fla. (WMBB) – Panama City's City Manager, Jonathan Hayes, has received a statewide honor for his work in Tallahassee. Florida's League of Cities has given him the Home Rule Hero Award. The Home Rule Hero Award goes to someone who effectively advocates for their city on issues concerning residents. Hayes lobbied lawmakers about three major bills. One involved the elimination of Community Redevelopment Agencies, or CRAs. Another involved eliminating or reducing TDC bed tax revenues, and the third was the elimination of property taxes. Hayes says he was concerned about the effects these bills could have on Panama City. 'There's always a question of, you know, what are the unintended consequences? So, you know, affecting the CRAs in a negative way, reducing the ability for us to market our state through our tourist development councils and some of those tourism efforts, and then elimination of property taxes, which really fund a lot of our operations here locally. Again, some of the basics of police, fire, and infrastructure,' Panama City City Manager Johnathan Hayes said. Panama City commissioners instructed Hayes to write a letter to Senator Jay Trumbull and Representative Griff Griffitts, voicing their concerns. All three of the bills are still undecided, as the legislature is technically still in session until lawmakers pass a state budget. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
12-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
VP Vance: Austin used ‘some pretty smart policies' to addressing housing affordability
AUSTIN (KXAN) — In a speech before local policy makers Monday, Vice President JD Vance urged leaders at the National League of Cities to prioritize housing reform. During that speech, he pointed to efforts in Austin. Vice President JD Vance speaks at League of Cities conference 'We want Americans to be able to afford the American dream of home ownership, because we know that when people own their homes, it makes them a stakeholder. It makes them a stakeholder in their neighborhoods, in their cities, and ultimately, of course, in this country,' Vance said. Vance talked about the challenges people are facing now to buy or even rent a home. He pointed to inflation and then pivoted to zoning. 'The reality you all know is that zoning is an area where federal authority is actually quite limited, and I'm sure none of you want the federal government in the business of mandating how cities and towns handle local laws, and that's certainly not what we want to do either,' Vance said. 'What are we getting?' We pulled the data from 264 HOME initiative applications That's where the vice president used the city of Austin as an example. Our city has implemented several zoning changes with the goal of increasing housing supply over the past few years. Those changes include: Three units: Bumping the number of units 'by right' allowed on a single-family lot to three Tiny homes: Patching loopholes in Austin's land development code to more easily allow for tiny homes to be considered a unit on a lot zoned as single-family House size limits: Setting 'size constraints' to force smaller units Minimum lot size: Dropping minimum lot size requirements from 5,750 square feet to 1,800 square feet You may know those changes better as HOME phase one and HOME phase two. Austin has also made zoning changes like eliminating parking requirements. 'We've got to actually make it easier to build homes, and in particular, I think the city of Austin has done a pretty interesting job, because in Austin, you saw this massive increase of people moving in, the cost of housing skyrocketed, but then Austin implemented some pretty smart policies and brought down the cost of housing, and it's one of the few major American cities where you see the cost of housing leveling off or even coming down,' Vance said. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
12-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Vice President JD Vance to tour manufacturing plant in Bay City
LANSING, Mich. (WLNS) — Vice President JD Vance will be traveling to Michigan's thumb region to tour a manufacturing plant. VP Vance and Kelly Loeffler, the Administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration, will be visiting Bay City on March 13 to tour the manufacturing facility. Vice President JD Vance speaks at League of Cities conference Following the tour, Vice President Vance and Administrator Loeffler will deliver remarks 'highlighting America's industrial resurgence'. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
10-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
VP Vance asks local leaders to comply with immigration laws, gets pushback
Vice President JD Vance spoke to thousands of local government leaders at the National League of Cities conference in Washington, D.C., Monday afternoon, where he called on them to follow new federal law aimed at curbing illegal immigration. Vance began his speech by addressing the current American housing crisis, citing a study that showed house sale levels to be the lowest in 30 years. 'The average income it takes to buy a new house is nearly two times the average salary of your typical American family — not the average American worker, but the combined incomes of a husband and wife," Vance said. This finding coincides with over three-quarters of Americans who believe housing affordability is a pressing and growing issue, per a survey by Data for Progress. While Vance said some of this cost can be reduced by slashing unnecessary regulatory fees at the local level, since these fees account for over 20% of the cost of a new home, he believes the most effective way the U.S. could reduce housing costs would be to decrease demand. 'While we've made it a little hard to build homes in this country for the last four years, we've also unfortunately made it too easy for people to compete with American citizens for the precious homes that are in the country to begin with,' Vance said. He continued, 'If you allow 20 million people to compete with American citizens for the cost of homes, you're going to have a large and frankly completely preventable spike in the demand for housing.' Vance then referenced a recent trip he'd taken to the southern border and described a conversation he'd had with local border patrol in Eagle Pass, Texas. 'They told me in just a matter of weeks their small border had gone from 1,500 daily encounters to less than 30,' Vance said. The mayor of Eagle Pass told Vance that a high influx of illegal immigrants was 'incredibly stressful' on the town's local resources, hospitals and schools. Vance then compared the U.S. housing crisis to other countries that allow mass immigration. 'You see a very consistent relationship between a massive increase in immigration and a massive increase in housing prices, and we have to be honest about that,' he said. This statement was met by yelling in the audience from a woman later identified as Mary Lupien, a city council member in Rochester. Vance addressed Lupien, saying, 'I see one of our nice representatives out here wants to actually continue to flood the country with illegal immigrants, making your communities unaffordable. But ma'am, with all respect, one of the reasons we're doing what we're doing is because we want to make it more affordable for Americans to live.' Vance referenced a similar housing crisis in the U.K., which Matthew Goodwin, a British political commentator, described in an article for The Spectator. In 2022, the British government set a goal to build 300,000 homes, and by the time 2023 rolled around, they'd built a little over 204,000. While they were close to the target, Goodwin wrote that Britain experienced a net in-migration rate of 745,000. 'We should be able to talk about how immigration is fueling the housing crisis, driving up house prices and making many homes unaffordable for British families and British workers,' Goodwin said. Vance echoed Goodwin's call to have open and honest conversations about all aspects of immigration. 'The reason why we care about border security is because we want your communities to be safer, we want them to be more affordable, we want there to be less drugs in our country, and we want your citizens to live the American dream,' Vance said. 'It is the birthright of every single one of our citizens, and we're going to fight for it every single day.' Vance acknowledged the wide range of opinions sitting in his audience and encouraged local leaders to voice their concerns over federal policy by reaching out to state and federal lawmakers. Then he added, 'While we have immigration laws in the books, we will enforce them, and expect our local municipalities to help us.' 'It is not up to local cities to choose which federal laws they're going to enforce,' he continued. 'We can't do immigration enforcement with sanctuary cities. We've got to have everybody respecting the law, and that is going to be one of the major policy focuses of the Trump administration.'
Yahoo
10-03-2025
- Yahoo
Baton Rouge man accused of killing his grandmother, hurting others accepts plea deal
BATON ROUGE, La. (Louisiana First) — A Baton Rouge man accused of killing his grandmother and injuring others during a 2021 crime spree accepted a plea deal Monday. East Baton Rouge District Attorney Hillar Moore said Aaron Morgan, 32, took several plea deals totaling 120 years. Morgan faced charges of one count each of manslaughter and armed robbery and 5 counts of attempted first-degree murder. 'All parties involved believe that this was an appropriate and just verdict,' Moore said. Morgan went on a crime spree that left his grandmother dead in Baton Rouge on Aug. 1, 2021. Arrest documents said two people, his mother and grandmother, were stabbed on John Newcombe Avenue, multiple people were shot during carjacking attempts on Highland Road and one person was shot in their car on Jefferson Highway. He reportedly pointed a gun at police officers and attempted to get inside an apartment while armed. Baton Rouge man sentenced to 30 months for fatal accidental shooting PHOTOS: 132-year-old wreck of 'one of the safest ships afloat' discovered in Lake Superior Louisiana couple accused of stealing pension from elderly veteran Vice President JD Vance speaks at League of Cities conference Full music schedule out for 2025 Festival International de Louisiane 1 hurt in Baton Rouge shooting Monday afternoon, officials say Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
