Keep Austin Corporate

It looks like the Statesman has published a story on the Austin proposition 4 fortune cookie political ads that I covered over a week ago.

The Statesman reports:

Ronald Cheng, owner of a local Chinatown restaurant, concocted the cookie idea based on his support for the proposal's inclusion of $5 million for an Asian American resource center.

According to the Statesman article, the prop 4 fortune cookies cost an extra $240.00, which was paid by S&L Warehouse, a proposition 4 supporter. The article also reports that many restaurants that received the cookies were unaware of the message inside.

Tim Sorrels, deputy commisioner of the had this to say:

We've never looked at this, so I can't say the law is crystal clear

Maybe there is more to this than I initially thought ... I'll post any updates as I find them. I may have voted for prop 4 out of simple ignorance, but now that I know what it is, I don't support. Austin has more public and private support for the arts than any city I have ever lived in, and I see no reason to throw another $35M of city tax dollars at projects with limited minority appeal.