Houston rental property owners will now be required to provide operable air conditioning to renters.

What happened: During its Aug. 19 meeting, Houston City Council approved an ordinance that closes the loophole that used to allow property owners to use window screens as an exemption for providing air conditioning.
The new ordinance now requires A/C capable of maintaining an inside temperature 20 degrees lower than the outside temperature, or no higher than 80 degrees.

The debate: Council members Willie Davis and Twila Carter expressed concerns with the ordinance, saying that it could increase costs for residents. Davis said he is concerned it will lead to other issues for residents as well.

On the other hand, some council members spoke in support of the ordinance, with District C council member Joe Panzarella saying the ordinance is “asking for the bare minimum of livability in the city.”

Something to note: Enforcement will begin 90 days after Aug. 19.

Terry Black’s Barbecue has opened its first Houston location in the Heights.

What is it: The Central Texas-style barbecue restaurant is family-owned by siblings Christina, Mike and Mark Black in honor of their father, Terry Black. The Houston location features an indoor-outdoor dining space with tall ceilings, flexible seating and an elevated loft that can be used for semi-private events and gatherings.

At the center of the restaurant is a pit house that features six 1,000-gallon offset smokers fueled by post oak for guests to watch the barbecue process from the dining room. The restaurant will also offer VIP pit tours led by a pitmaster.

What’s on the menu: Terry Black’s serves its barbecue during lunch and dinner, with meats smoked low and slow before being hand-cut to order. The restaurant also prepares its sides from scratch daily.

Menu items include dino beef ribs, brisket, pork ribs, house-made sausages, chopped beef, macaroni and cheese, potato salad, coleslaw, cornbread muffins, mini pecan pie and banana pudding.

• 1329 N. Shepherd Drive, Houston

St. Luke’s Health will add its parent company to its name in October as it expands its partnership with Baylor School of Medicine, officials announced in an Aug. 17 news release.

Read all about it: The name addition aims to unite and emphasize the shared values between St. Luke’s Health and CommonSpirit Health, a faith-based healthcare provider that serves as a parent company for over 2,300 care sites in the nation, according to the release. 

The name change also aims to bridge the local and national networks.

Zooming out: Over the past year, Baylor School of Medicine and St. Luke’s have also expanded their partnership to invite more Baylor specialists to join St. Luke’s. 

Harris Health, the county’s public healthcare provider, proposed a tax rate increase for the upcoming fiscal year to the Commissioners Court Aug. 17.

The background: Victoria Nikitin, Harris Health’s chief financial officer, asked the court to consider a $0.1 increase to last year’s revenue rate. Harris Health also proposed receiving $10 million from the county, which would be broken into $6 million in “waived revenue” and a $4 million placeholder in operating expenses to support county services.

“This budget is a really tight one for us in the sense that we are still having a lot of processes that are in flight, related to technology and other strategic initiatives...but the majority of that is really due to inflation,” Nikitin said.

Stay tuned: If approved, the rate would go into effect Oct. 1, when the new fiscal year begins.

The Texas House State Affairs Committee heard from power grid officials; data center developers and industry representatives; local government officials; cybersecurity experts; and utility companies during an Aug. 19 hearing on the growth of data centers in the state. Dozens of Texas residents also testified about the impact of data centers in their communities.

The details: Pablo Vegas, CEO of the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, said it will take the grid operator several months to audit about 200 gigawatts of data center proposals. ERCOT will request information from all large and medium-sized data centers that are expected to use at least 25 megawatts of electricity.

ERCOT and the Public Utility Commission were ordered on Aug. 3 to audit all data centers seeking to connect to Texas’ power grid. They anticipate completing that audit in late November or early December, Vegas said.