metro region? In socio-economic terms, it's the city, in glowing business development terms, its the metro. In a recent Prosperity Index report, SA ranked #151 out of 250 U.S. cities; in Governance and Foresight metrics, we ranked "below average". Why is this the case after all the boosterism in being a "rich culture" and "Military City, USA"?
We lack transparency and accountability. Under a minority-majority policy Council the past 50 yrs, and having had the "best city Manager in the country" for 14 yrs, SA went downhill in socio-economic terms. Why did this happen?
The more things change, the more they remain the same.
Very well thought out piece Philip, and well written too. Our economy has changed, especially with the loss of Texas Titans of Industry who started businesses here and grew them exponentially and it appears, that unlike Dallas, Austin and Houston, we have not adapted as well to the changes in our economy.
I think water is a similar issue to the budget. The time horizon for water capacity is basically generational, at least decade plus. Debt incurred today is tomorrow's problem, just as water drawdowns are usually tomorrow's problem. Until you end up like Corpus Christi
Thank you for the article. I was born in San Antonio and have spent about 49 of my 50 years of life here. I am a software engineer by profession who works 100% remote. My children attend school in SAISD. One thing I would note is that there is also a national trend in declining birth rates over the past decade and a large number of charter schools in San Antonio that are also contributing factors to the school closures. But the point is taken that Austin and Dallas may offset this better because they import young families and I wonder if they have as many charter schools.
Great article. Appreciate you seeing today’s problem is not today’s making but a long process. What I kept hoping to see was some ideas to change things, redirect direction, and fix the situation. I have ideas but might be too controversial for print, but I’ll give this for free: renewed sense of urgency. How long did Broadway improvements drag on? St Marys? South Alamo - twice. And so on. Its time for this city to start a project and finish before the affected businesses go out of business
Nice write up and facts! San Antonio will NEVER get out of that poor city category as long as they believe tourism is the answer. It is not! Minimum wage with today’s prices = 3rd poorest city! SA needs industry, lots of it. With skilled jobs, medical could be one but we only have two medical centers, the original and stone oak. Nothing extra no research centers, pharmaceutical, nothing that would be big money. Data centers only big during implementation construction phase then guess what the computers just run with little human interaction. 600+jobs to 45 jobs, Amazon, Walmart lots of mediocre paying jobs. Our airport is a far cry of what it could bring. Jet Blue, Frontier here one day gone the next, still zero high paying jobs. New arenas, new stadiums, new Alamo not bringing in money. Basketball, football , baseball, soccer no big money jobs, again minimum wage. There is a giant airfield where Kelly was, are they afraid the west side will become big money profitable? They were afraid of the east moving on up and it shows. Dallas, Houston has big money why? Maybe SA stops dangling free electricity for data centers, no taxes for first 10 years, and free money to investors! Let them invest in us not us getting sucked into bonds, and repayments that never happen. SA is a big beautiful landscape with culture, and it’s affordable right now compared to others. Stop giving out incentives, we have not benefited. Wasn’t Microsoft in stone oak or somewhere in SA. Free electricity for a business that cannot live without electricity it’s an Information Technology business. Where are they and their high paying jobs now? What are we giving to Amazon? Tourism is not gonna take SA out of the poor category and we continue to pump big money into that money pit!
Excellent article. Full of hard truths. The water issue deserves its own feature article in the future. We have a plentiful supply of aquifer water. The scarcity is only created by the consent decree limiting us to using less than 10% of the aquifer water available. The aquifer today has more water than it did in the 1950s when the population in SA was only 350,000 people. And no, that is not because we have found other water sources. It's because the aquifer is massive. SAWS is increasing rates so more and more lawns will die and become brown eyesores. Who wants to live in a dead zone? We need to hit the reset button on the consent decree and save our dying city.
metro region? In socio-economic terms, it's the city, in glowing business development terms, its the metro. In a recent Prosperity Index report, SA ranked #151 out of 250 U.S. cities; in Governance and Foresight metrics, we ranked "below average". Why is this the case after all the boosterism in being a "rich culture" and "Military City, USA"?
We lack transparency and accountability. Under a minority-majority policy Council the past 50 yrs, and having had the "best city Manager in the country" for 14 yrs, SA went downhill in socio-economic terms. Why did this happen?
The more things change, the more they remain the same.
No city in Texas would benefit more from useful rail service than San Antonio. And no city would benefit more from accepting its stature *as* a city. It’s a vertex on the Texas Triangle with the strongest underlying culture of any of them (Houston, of course, has many, but that’s beside the point).
Its hard to get a job at major business in San Antonio at the middle or higher tiers. The obstacles are security clearances, nepotism, tribalism, H-1B, narrow creditialism and byzantine HR entirely online. Can't knock on any doors.
Is "San Antonio" the city or the
metro region? In socio-economic terms, it's the city, in glowing business development terms, its the metro. In a recent Prosperity Index report, SA ranked #151 out of 250 U.S. cities; in Governance and Foresight metrics, we ranked "below average". Why is this the case after all the boosterism in being a "rich culture" and "Military City, USA"?
We lack transparency and accountability. Under a minority-majority policy Council the past 50 yrs, and having had the "best city Manager in the country" for 14 yrs, SA went downhill in socio-economic terms. Why did this happen?
The more things change, the more they remain the same.
Very well thought out piece Philip, and well written too. Our economy has changed, especially with the loss of Texas Titans of Industry who started businesses here and grew them exponentially and it appears, that unlike Dallas, Austin and Houston, we have not adapted as well to the changes in our economy.
Well said
You also have the water issue, which does not bode well.
I think water is a similar issue to the budget. The time horizon for water capacity is basically generational, at least decade plus. Debt incurred today is tomorrow's problem, just as water drawdowns are usually tomorrow's problem. Until you end up like Corpus Christi
And this was an interesting article! San Antonio is a national treasure. Thanks for sharing.
Thank you for the article. I was born in San Antonio and have spent about 49 of my 50 years of life here. I am a software engineer by profession who works 100% remote. My children attend school in SAISD. One thing I would note is that there is also a national trend in declining birth rates over the past decade and a large number of charter schools in San Antonio that are also contributing factors to the school closures. But the point is taken that Austin and Dallas may offset this better because they import young families and I wonder if they have as many charter schools.
Great article. Appreciate you seeing today’s problem is not today’s making but a long process. What I kept hoping to see was some ideas to change things, redirect direction, and fix the situation. I have ideas but might be too controversial for print, but I’ll give this for free: renewed sense of urgency. How long did Broadway improvements drag on? St Marys? South Alamo - twice. And so on. Its time for this city to start a project and finish before the affected businesses go out of business
Nice write up and facts! San Antonio will NEVER get out of that poor city category as long as they believe tourism is the answer. It is not! Minimum wage with today’s prices = 3rd poorest city! SA needs industry, lots of it. With skilled jobs, medical could be one but we only have two medical centers, the original and stone oak. Nothing extra no research centers, pharmaceutical, nothing that would be big money. Data centers only big during implementation construction phase then guess what the computers just run with little human interaction. 600+jobs to 45 jobs, Amazon, Walmart lots of mediocre paying jobs. Our airport is a far cry of what it could bring. Jet Blue, Frontier here one day gone the next, still zero high paying jobs. New arenas, new stadiums, new Alamo not bringing in money. Basketball, football , baseball, soccer no big money jobs, again minimum wage. There is a giant airfield where Kelly was, are they afraid the west side will become big money profitable? They were afraid of the east moving on up and it shows. Dallas, Houston has big money why? Maybe SA stops dangling free electricity for data centers, no taxes for first 10 years, and free money to investors! Let them invest in us not us getting sucked into bonds, and repayments that never happen. SA is a big beautiful landscape with culture, and it’s affordable right now compared to others. Stop giving out incentives, we have not benefited. Wasn’t Microsoft in stone oak or somewhere in SA. Free electricity for a business that cannot live without electricity it’s an Information Technology business. Where are they and their high paying jobs now? What are we giving to Amazon? Tourism is not gonna take SA out of the poor category and we continue to pump big money into that money pit!
Excellent article. Full of hard truths. The water issue deserves its own feature article in the future. We have a plentiful supply of aquifer water. The scarcity is only created by the consent decree limiting us to using less than 10% of the aquifer water available. The aquifer today has more water than it did in the 1950s when the population in SA was only 350,000 people. And no, that is not because we have found other water sources. It's because the aquifer is massive. SAWS is increasing rates so more and more lawns will die and become brown eyesores. Who wants to live in a dead zone? We need to hit the reset button on the consent decree and save our dying city.
We have a water issue upcoming. So much to talk about—plenty of areas for improvement!
Is "San Antonio" the city or the
metro region? In socio-economic terms, it's the city, in glowing business development terms, its the metro. In a recent Prosperity Index report, SA ranked #151 out of 250 U.S. cities; in Governance and Foresight metrics, we ranked "below average". Why is this the case after all the boosterism in being a "rich culture" and "Military City, USA"?
We lack transparency and accountability. Under a minority-majority policy Council the past 50 yrs, and having had the "best city Manager in the country" for 14 yrs, SA went downhill in socio-economic terms. Why did this happen?
The more things change, the more they remain the same.
No city in Texas would benefit more from useful rail service than San Antonio. And no city would benefit more from accepting its stature *as* a city. It’s a vertex on the Texas Triangle with the strongest underlying culture of any of them (Houston, of course, has many, but that’s beside the point).
Low tax/low service is just not going to cut it.
Its hard to get a job at major business in San Antonio at the middle or higher tiers. The obstacles are security clearances, nepotism, tribalism, H-1B, narrow creditialism and byzantine HR entirely online. Can't knock on any doors.