Feedback: June 26, 2026

Booze of Austin

Dear Editor,

Best of Austin has two categories that seem inconsistent. Radio Coffee & Beer was voted Best Coffee. It seems like the category should be limited to coffeehouses, the kind without booze. Speaking of booze, Cosmic was voted Best Place for Sober Socializing. Again, another coffee and alcohol spot. It really seems like the coffee aspect of Best Coffee is being disregarded for fun venues. It would be nice for the Chronicle to separate the coffee category for the coffee drinkers. I personally voted for Epoch Coffee, which makes a delicious oat milk cappuccino. If there are such categories as Best Steak, Best Burger, and Best Veggie Burger, why can’t we expand the coffee category? What about Best Local Roaster, or Best Matcha? It’s such a slight to the small, local coffee shops that serve, get this, coffee. Another thought: Maybe the sober nominees could be limited to alcohol-free places. I don’t want to go to a coffee shop where people are getting drunk.

Laura Quenon

Eat the Rich

Dear Editor,

The reason we constantly have a shortfall in funding everything from social services to our public schools is that we are taxing the wrong people. Way past time to go after the multimillionaires, billionaires, and yes, now even trillionaires that are sucking all the money out of our economy and giving nothing back.

Gary Elander

Hanging on the Telephone

Dear Editor,

Texas House Bill 1481, otherwise referred to as the phone ban, has had little to no impact within schools. I am a high school student heading into my junior year. At the start of sophomore year House Bill 1481 was introduced, resulting in a two-week crackdown of phone usage at school. For the following weeks, phone usage increased within schools, until it was back to normal. 

The lack of attention from staff renders the bill obsolete. The effort required from staff is simply too much to be mixed in with other responsibilities. The only time the bill could possibly be enforced was during lunch, and even then it required staff such as counselors to ignore other responsibilities such as handling lines or managing rowdier students.

School social life flows through phones and personal devices, ranging from group Google docs to MacBooks with iMessage downloaded. Snapchat and other talking apps that can only be found on personal devices are one of the largest social influences in school, giving students many more chances to connect with each other. Taking away those opportunities has had the opposite effect of what the bill intended.

The most effective solution for reducing screen time happened inside the classroom.  The usage of “Cell Hotels,” or cubicles to put your phone into when entering class, have been much more effective for me personally. The ability to put your phone [away] and being able to take it back has put much less pressure on students, and allowed students to continue to communicate in school.

Dylan Hopkins

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