Independent News Drop

KELI From Inkwell, this is the Amarillo News Drop. It's Friday, July twenty-fourth. The time is two a.m. Central. I'm Keli, with Hast.

HAST Early morning shift. Let's move through what's ahead.

KELI Twenty-three Republican governors signed what President Trump is calling the Ratepayer Protection Pledge Thursday, a commitment meant to keep electricity costs from spiking as artificial intelligence data centers expand across the country and demand for power grows with them. The pledge is four months old now, and here's the structural piece listeners should watch: the pledge itself contains no enforcement mechanism, no penalties for rate increases, and no funding guarantee tied to it. What it does is create political cover for states that host data centers while their utility commissions raise rates anyway. The counter-read you'll hear elsewhere is that Trump is shielding consumers from AI's power costs. The reality is he's signaling to governors that they can sign on and still approve rate hikes under the guise of infrastructure necessity. Check in thirty to sixty days whether any state that signed experiences a utility rate decision. That'll tell you whether the pledge functioned as protection or as political messaging.

HAST Staying with the state for a moment. The Texas higher education agency is recommending lawmakers revamp how they fund public universities. Right now the system rewards enrollment. The agency says it should reward outcomes—graduation rates, job placement, whether students from low-income backgrounds finish their degrees.

KELI That's a shift that would ripple through places like West Texas A&M and Tech.

HAST It would. Campuses that graduate more students per dollar spent would see more state money flow their way.

KELI Closer to home, the City of Amarillo began reconstruction work on Georgia Street Thursday affecting access to the City View neighborhood. Temporary pavement work is underway, and the city expects the project wrapped by Tuesday, July twenty-eighth. If you live in or regularly drive through that area, plan for detours.

HAST Quick fuel note. Gas prices climbed again. AAA Texas reports the statewide average for regular unleaded hit three seventy-one per gallon on Thursday. That's sixteen cents higher than last week and ninety-three cents above where it was a year ago. Crude oil's the main driver.

KELI Back-to-school season is ramping up. Amarillo-area schools and vendors are running supply events and registration drives next week and beyond. Check MyHighPlains for the full calendar if you've got kids heading back in August.

HAST One music note before we close. Beverly de la Bretonne, a beloved Amarillo music teacher, turned ninety yesterday. She learned piano by ear as a toddler, listening to her older sister practice, and spent decades shaping young musicians across the Panhandle.

KELI On this day in nineteen seventy-four, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ordered President Richard Nixon to surrender subpoenaed White House tapes to the Watergate special prosecutor, rejecting his claim of executive privilege.

HAST That's the Amarillo News Drop. We'll be back this evening. From Inkwell.

KELI Before we close, a word from Inkwell. A principle from Gil's Intelligent Version worth borrowing: where a source genuinely leaves a question open, an honest translation preserves the ambiguity instead of quietly deciding for you.

HAST They call it The Refused Verdict. At inkwell dot wiki, slash giv.