PHI Air Medical’s Cedar Creek base expanded its advanced emergency transport services in 2025, adding several respiratory, cardiac and trauma-care capabilities—some for the first time in Central Texas.

What’s happening: Company spokesperson Georgia Harris announced April 14 that the Cedar Creek base added new in-flight care services for critically ill patients, including those experiencing severe respiratory distress, pulmonary hypertension or organ failure.

The details: The Cedar Creek base became the first air medical service in Central Texas to provide routine, independent transports involving inhaled epoprostenol, which can help patients with severe respiratory failure.

The base also added high-flow nasal cannula, inhaled nitric oxide and extracorporeal membrane oxygenation transport services for patients with respiratory or organ failure—the first known in the Austin area.

One more thing: Bastrop County residents pay no out-of-pocket flight costs when picked up in a seven-county service area through an agreement with Bastrop County Emergency Services District No. 3.

Espadas de Brazil Bar & Brazilian Steakhouse is now serving an authentic Brazilian rodízio, or all-you-can-eat, experience in the former Stem & Stone space—which closed late last year.

What's special about it? The restaurant’s churrasco, a Brazilian barbecue style, features large cuts of meat seasoned with coarse salt, cooked over an open flame on metal skewers and served tableside. 

Something to note: Owner Robinson Figueiredo said reservations are encouraged and can be booked online.

What else? Espadas de Brazil’s food truck at Boring Bodega is now closed, but Figueiredo told Community Impact it will remain available for catering services. 

• Opened June 4
• 1507 Chestnut St., Bastrop

The Texas Education Agency released results June 10 from this year’s State of Texas Assessment of Academic Readiness end-of-course exams.

The overview: High school students who took the year-end exams this spring made gains in all subjects, TEA data shows. Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath said students’ academic progress was due to “focused instruction and high expectations” in the classroom.

What you need to know: Individual STAAR results are shared through the state assessment portal. Each Texas student receives a unique access code for their results. Families can find the code on the first page of their child’s report card or contact their school, according to the TEA.

Texas public school students in third through 12th grade take the exam each spring, and it is used to measure student progress and teacher performance.

What's next: The TEA is scheduled to release STAAR scores for third- through eighth-grade students June 16.

Texas must protect residential consumers from paying for the infrastructure needed to power new data centers, Gov. Greg Abbott said in a June 10 order aimed at balancing the rapid growth of data centers with the needs of residents and communities.

The big picture: The governor directed state regulators to ensure data center companies do not pass infrastructure costs on to ratepayers, urging lawmakers to tighten regulations on data centers’ water use and repeal certain tax exemptions that benefit the industry.

Abbott’s order comes as Texas grapples with how to manage the data center boom amid climbing electric demand and looming water shortages. It is the first time the Republican governor has publicly called to restrict data center growth.

The context: As communities across Texas consider new data center projects, reporting shows that some residents are pushing back, raising concerns about the large facilities’ water usage, potential strain on the electric grid and impacts on local neighborhoods.

What they're saying: In response, state agencies called protecting consumers from rising electric costs "our top priority."