Vice President, Communications
Merrill helps Texans better understand the research, data and policy choices shaping the state's future. Before joining Texas 2036, she spent more than three decades advising Fortune 500 companies, trade associations and nonprofits across Texas on strategic communications and public affairs.
Last week, Gov. Greg Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and Speaker Dustin Burrows issued joint instructions to state agencies preparing Legislative Appropriations Requests for the 2028–29 biennium. The directive was clear: as the starting point for budget deliberations, each agency must reduce its base appropriation request by 3%. For most agencies, meeting that target will…
Around the turn of this century, a small solar array sat to the side of the Decker Creek Power Plant in northeast Austin with the capacity to generate 0.3 megawatts (MW) of solar power. This capacity represented a fraction of the nearly two million megawatt-hours (MWh) generated annually with natural gas across the property. And…
Statewide, 45% of Texas students met grade-level expectations in math (3-8 math & Algebra I EOC) this spring, and 55% of Texas students met grade-level expectations in reading (3-8 reading & English I & English II). But those numbers conceal a wide range of performance across the state’s 20 Education Service Center regions. That range…
Corporate philanthropy has long carried an image problem. Too often, it is framed as a tax strategy or a marketing tactic, something adjacent to the real work of building a company rather than integral to it. That framing is not only limiting. In today’s environment, it may be genuinely costly. The most competitive, resilient and…
When a Texan walks into a doctor’s office, they expect their care to be guided by their health needs, not by corporate ownership structures they can’t see. As hospital systems grow through mergers and acquisitions, ownership structures become harder to track, referral incentives become harder to detect, and consolidation becomes harder to address. When a…
Nuclear fission — the splitting of atoms to release heat and drive a chain reaction — is as fascinating as it is powerful. Today, nuclear power plants provide 20% of total U.S. electricity. Nuclear power continues to play a critical role in Texas’ “all of the above and below” energy portfolio, supplying nearly a tenth…