Independent News Drop

KELI From Inkwell, this is the Amarillo News Drop. It's Thursday, July twenty-third. The time is five p.m. central. I'm Keli, with Hast.

HAST Good evening. We're tracking power costs, higher education funding, and a shake that woke up the Panhandle early this morning.

KELI Let's start with the earthquake. The U.S. Geological Survey recorded a five-point-zero magnitude quake southeast of Spearman around dawn today. Most of the Panhandle felt it. USGS said it was centered in Ochiltree County, shallow enough that people across a wide area reported the tremor. No immediate reports of structural damage, but it was strong enough that it woke residents across several counties and got calls into emergency lines. If you felt it, that's what it was.

HAST That's rare up here. We don't see fives very often in the Panhandle.

KELI Right. Spearman sits on the edge of some oil and gas activity, and seismologists have tied increased seismic activity in parts of the Texas Panhandle to injection wells used in energy production over the past decade. The state Railroad Commission monitors those operations. Today's quake will likely prompt USGS to issue a statement tying it to known fault or injection patterns, and the Railroad Commission may review permits in that area. Watch for that statement within the next forty-eight hours.

HAST Moving to Austin. The state's higher education agency is recommending a significant shift in how Texas funds its public universities. Right now, the system spreads money based mostly on enrollment. The agency's proposal would tie a bigger share of state funding to student success—graduation rates, job placement, persistence between semesters. That's a continuing conversation at the Capitol. Universities like those in the Texas Tech and West Texas A&M systems would see their funding formulas rewritten if lawmakers move forward.

KELI The counter-read here is straightforward: most coverage will frame this as "universities get rewarded for success," which sounds clean. The structural thing underneath is that this shifts risk from the state to the schools. If a campus serves high numbers of first-generation or low-income students, their graduation rates may lag enrollment, so their funding could drop even if enrollment grows. Schools serving wealthier areas or transfer students from community colleges will likely see funding go up faster. The prediction: within two weeks, you'll see statements from WTAMU and Tech pushing back on the weighting, or from community college groups warning this could cut feeder-school enrollment.

HAST On the national stage, President Trump and twenty-three Republican governors announced a pledge today to shield consumers from utility rate hikes tied to artificial intelligence data center expansion. The Ratepayer Protection Pledge is aimed at keeping electricity costs flat as AI demand surges. Texas Governor Greg Abbott was among the signers. Demand for power at data centers is expected to climb sharply over the next five to ten years, and utilities across the country are already planning rate increases to upgrade infrastructure.

KELI One traffic note before we close: westbound I-40 at Exit 76, the Airport Boulevard off-ramp, is closed today for mill and fill operations. Expect detours if you're heading that direction.

HAST Before we go, one date marker. Fourteen years ago today, July twenty-third, two thousand twelve, the sun emitted an unusually large coronal mass ejection—a solar storm—that passed through Earth's orbit but missed the planet by nine days. Had it hit, scientists estimated it would have caused two-point-six trillion dollars in damage to electrical equipment worldwide.

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

KELI Before we close, a word from Inkwell. There's an essay at Gil's Intelligent Version on what actually happened in 1914 — and how a real historical instinct curdled into false certainty the moment someone tried to measure it to the inch.

HAST It's called The Witness and the Ruler. At inkwell dot wiki, slash giv.