Thank you to Capital Factory for sponsoring EFF-Austin. Capital Factory is the center of gravity for entrepreneurs in Texas. They meet the best entrepreneurs in Texas and introduce them to their first investors, employees, mentors and customers. To sign up for a Capital Factory coworking membership, click here.

BIO:
Our speaker this month is Kathy Mitchell. Kathy is a former EFF-Austin board member and a Senior Advisor at Equity Action. Previously she was the policy coordinator for Just Liberty, a Texas charitable 501(c)(4) corporation engaged in criminal justice reform at the state and local level. Just Liberty led the George Floyd Act coalition in the 2021 legislative session, lead advocacy for the Sandra Bland Act in the prior two sessions, as well as the long-term fight to finally eliminate the failed Driver Responsibility program. Just Liberty was a founding member of the Texas Electronic Privacy Coalition and Ms. Mitchell was active at the Capitol in the effort to require a warrant for cell location data. She was appointed to the City of Austin’s Reimagine Public Safety Task Force and later to the Police Academy Review Panel. She has more than 30 years experience as a public interest advocate on a range of topics including privacy and government records. She served as VP of Policy for the ACLU of Texas for a decade.

TALK SUMMARY:
In the upcoming 89th regular session of the Texas Legislature (89R), the Texas State House will be considering HB 1709, one of the first major pieces of state and national legislation that is going to make a serious attempting at establishing a regulatory framework for the use of artificial intelligence. Come join EFF-Austin and Kathy Mitchell as we discuss the good, the bad, and the ugly in this bill, and how you can get involved in the effort to amend this bill to get the citizens of Texas the best possible legislation by Sine Die (session's end).

HOW TO ATTEND:
Capital Factory is located at 701 Brazos Street, on the 1st floor of the Omni Hotel. We are in the Apollo meeting room. To locate Apollo, locate Capital Factory's main event room off the Omni lobby, Voltron, Suite 150. Once inside, there should be someone at the desk to direct you to our meetup, but, if no one is there, proceed to the left past the kitchen and down the hallway, Apollo is right around the corner. You may also message us on this event or message us at @EFFaustin on Twitter or @effaustin on Mastodon if you are having trouble finding us. Please note that the room will be locked and EFF-Austin will not have access until 10-15 minutes before 7:00pm CST. We will try to have someone in the Omni lobby earlier than that in front of the Voltron doors to greet you if you arrive early, but otherwise just wait in the lobby until you are let in.

Talk will be livestreamed at https://www.youtube.com/user/austintechlive and will later be archived at https://www.youtube.com/user/effaustin. Questions for the speaker from virtual attendees may be submitted via the Youtube livestream chat, our Twitter account, @EFFaustin, our Mastodon account, @effaustin, or our Bluesky account, @effaustin.bsky.social.

Parking for the Omni Garage can be validated at the Capital Factory front desk inside room Voltron, Suite 150, reducing the cost to $8. If no one is at the desk, check with EFF-Austin meetup organizers, we can provide you with one. Attendees must park after 5pm and leave before 10pm to receive the discount, otherwise they will be charged full price, which is $3.25 for every 30 minutes. Affordable street park is also available nearby. Details: https://capitalfactory.com/parking/

AFTER PARTY:
Join us for the discussion from 7:00PM-9:00PM, followed by drinks and camaraderie from 9:00PM-10:00PM in the Omni Hotel lobby.