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March 18th, 2023:

Asking the feds to stop the TEA takeover

Mar 18th, 2023
by Charles Kuffner.
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Can’t hurt to ask.

U.S. Rep Sheila Jackson Lee said Thursday she is seeking federal government intervention to halt the Texas Education Agency’s takeover of the Houston Independent School District.

Jackson Lee said she has been in contact with the White House frequently over the past years and is now speaking to President Joe Biden’s assistant secretary and the U.S. Office of Civil Rights

“I truly believe that this is a clearly defined matter of discrimination,” Jackson Lee said, adding that other districts have faired similarly to HISD but are not facing takeovers.

Wheatley High School, which received failing grades from the TEA for seven consecutive years, is at the center of the debate over the HISD takeover. While the TEA takeover remained in legal limbo for over three years due to a lawsuit from the district, Wheatley High School has since earned a C grade.

The TEA has said the performance of Wheatley High School is not the only reason for its decision to take over the district. TEA Director Mike Morath pointed to a corruption scandal in which trustees admitted to accepting kickbacks from district vendors as well as a state conservatorship the TEA had placed over HISD for over two consecutive years.

Lee said she has also been speaking with fellow members of Congress, and has distributed a letter criticizing the takeover.

The story notes that the Chron has not yet seen a copy of the letter; I’d have linked to it if there had been a link in the piece. I have previously suggested that federal intervention is the only possible means of stopping this now, given that passing a new law would take far too long and has at best an uncertain chance of happening. That doesn’t mean I think it has a good chance of success, or that the state would sit idly by if it did happen. My best guess is that the Education Department will review Rep. Jackson Lee’s letter but is unlikely to take action, unless they see a clear justification for it.

On that score, I will note that in a world where we still had a fully functioning Voting Rights Act, the TEA would almost certainly have had to get preclearance to sideline the elected Board of Trustees as they will be doing. (This thought is not original to me, I saw it mentioned somewhere else, maybe on Twitter, but I don’t remember where.) That doesn’t mean the takeover couldn’t have happened, just that it would have required more effort on the TEA’s part, or perhaps that the TEA would have gone about it differently. I will also note that if this is the scandal in question, it involved one Trustee who hasn’t been on the Board since 2020. It’s a thing that happened, but we should acknowledge that no current Trustees – you know, the ones who are going to be replaced – were involved.

UPDATE: The Greater Houston Coalition for Justice has filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Education regarding the takeover. I’ll post separately about that but wanted to acknowledge it this morning.

SCOTx denies pre-election challenge to San Antonio marijuana reform referendum

Mar 18th, 2023
by Charles Kuffner.
4 comments

First the voters will vote, then as needed the lawsuits will happen.

The Texas Supreme Court ruled Friday that any legal challenges to a proposed charter amendment on policing reforms must wait until after voters weigh in on the measure in the May municipal election.

While the court did not expressly deny the idea that the charter amendment could violate a state law prohibiting multi-subject charter amendments, Justice Jane Bland wrote that “voters injured by an election irregularity have remedies to address their injury after the election.”

The proposal brought forth by Act 4 SA and other progressive groups seeks to decriminalize marijuana and abortion, ban police chokeholds and no-knock warrants, expand the city’s cite-and-release program for nonviolent, low-level offenders, and create a city justice director to oversee the implementation of those changes.

The measure will be on the May 6 ballot as Proposition A.

Bland also suggested that an effort by three Northside councilmen to skip the City Council vote approving the measure for the ballot could have an impact on its future. Manny Pelaez (D8), John Courage (D9) and Clayton Perry (D10) left the dais shortly before the pro forma vote in February, viewing the measure as unenforceable.

“Sufficient post-election remedies exist that permit the voter to challenge any infirmity in the proposed amendment and its placement on the ballot — after the voters have had their say,” Bland wrote.

[…]

Council approved the ballot 7-0 in the absence of the three council members.

That move triggered a second challenge from TAL’s lawyers, which petitioned the court to remove the charter amendment from the May ballot on the grounds that the San Antonio City Charter prescribes a 10-day delay for ordinances that pass with fewer than eight votes to go into effect. That deadline was Feb. 17, a day after the council vote.

“Our role is to facilitate elections, not to stymie them, and to review the consequences of those elections as the Legislature prescribes,” Bland wrote. “We can readily do so in this instance through a post-election challenge.”

A dissenting opinion from Justice Evan Young pointed to the decision of the three councilmen who were absent from the vote as a pivotal move.

“None of the Court’s stated reasons apply here because they all depend on the same mistaken premise: the existence of a lawfully ordered special election,” Young wrote.

Young noted that in order to hold a special election, a city council must order it at least 78 days beforehand.

“The city council clearly failed to follow that binding legal requirement here,” wrote Young, who was joined by Justices John Devine and Jimmy Blacklock.

In a written response to TAL’s petition, outside lawyers for the San Antonio City Council argued that the city’s 10-day delay doesn’t apply to putting the Justice Charter on the ballot because Texas Election Code supersedes the city’s authority on the matter. The election code doesn’t stipulate the margin by which measures setting an election must be approved, the lawyers wrote.

See here and here for the background. I believe this was the correct ruling, and I agree with Justice Bland’s reasoning. I also think this proposition will face some significant legal headwinds if it does pass, but that’s a fight for another day. Until then, we’ll see how it goes in May. The Current has more.

Harris County creates reproductive health access fund

Mar 18th, 2023
by Charles Kuffner.
Comments are off for this post

Good.

In a bid to protect residents’ already restricted access to reproductive health care, Harris County officials voted to approve a proposed fund to go toward Harris County Public Health and smaller community organizations at Tuesday’s Commissioners Court meeting.

The reproductive health care access fund passed on a 4 to 1 vote, with Republican Precinct 3 Commissioner Tom Ramsey at odds with his Democratic counterparts.

This fund will allocate $6 million in federal dollars from the American Rescue Plan to assist Harris County Public Health and the partner organizations in providing reproductive care – including contraception, family planning education, preconception health screenings, and STI testing and treatment – to a minimum of 20,000 residents, said County Judge Lina Hidalgo.

It would not include abortion funding or related pregnancy termination services, as Texas has a total ban on abortion even in cases of rape or incest, allowing it only if continuing the pregnancy puts the mother’s life in danger.

The total amount will be distributed in three parts, with $1.1 million going toward expansions for Harris County Public Health’s services, $4.2 million to funding care at the partner organizations, and the remaining $700,000 for operating expenses for these partner organizations and the county’s health facilities.

This fund is a response to Hidalgo’s resolution passed last year following the Dobbs decision, which overturned Roe v. Wade, making abortion illegal in in most states, said Precinct 1 Commissioner Rodney Ellis, who accompanied Hidalgo at a press conference held on Monday at Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast’s headquarters.

“There is only so much we can do to stop these draconian, dangerous laws,” Ellis said. “But we can use the resources and power we have in Harris County for residents to access health care services they need to make decisions about their health, family and future. That is what this fund will do.”

Here’s a preview story in the Chron about this action. Because this was onetime grant money, the fund is in place for two years, and after that Commissioners Court will either have to pay for it themselves or find other sources for it. That’s a problem for Future Them; this will address a real need in the here and now, and that’s what matters. Here are a couple of tweets from Judge Hidalgo about it. Good job to the four members of the Court who made this happen.