Off the Kuff | Knowledge Is Good

The next wave of curbside recycling

Posted on October 27, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

From last week, some good news for those of who that still don’t have the 96-gallon wheeled recycling bins.

Houston will roll out its biweekly, automated curbside recycling service to 70,000 additional residences throughout the city just in time for Thanksgiving, the Department of Solid Waste Management announced [last] Friday.

The expansion will bring service to a total 210,000 households – more than half of the residences in the department’s service area, spokeswoman Sandra Jackson said. The automated curbside service will be extended to 60,000 more residences in the spring.

“Residents have let us know loud and clear through their participation and support that this is a program they want,” Mayor Annise Parker said in a statement. “This is a significant step in a larger plan to expand recycling citywide.”

The program began in 2009 with 10,000 households.

Letters concerning the program will be mailed to new participating residences. Wheeled 96-gallon containers will be delivered beginning the week of Oct. 28. Collection will begin the week of Nov. 25.

The press release from the city Solid Waste Department, along with a list of included neighborhoods, is here. Council approved this expansion earlier in the month. This expansion and another one for an additional 60,000 houses in the spring were built into the Mayor’s budget, thus bringing us closer to the goal of having all houses receive recycling service without imposing a garbage fee. That approach is certainly open to debate – I’d have been willing to pay a monthly fee, or to support a pay-as-you-throw fee designed to minimize landfill-bound waste – but it’s what we’ve got. Still in the works is the One Bin For All plan, for which RFQs were issued in June. The deadline for those submissions was August 22, and it occurs to me that I haven’t seen or heard anything on it since then. I’ll need to follow up on that. In any event, the march towards more curbside recycling continues. Check and see if your neighborhood is on the list if it wasn’t already receiving the service.

Posted in Elsewhere in Houston | Tagged Annise Parker, Houston, One Bin For All, recycling, solid waste, Solid Waste Management Department | 2 Comments

It’s about not wanting people to vote

Posted on October 27, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

Why take us back to the 1950s when we can go all the way back to the 1850s?

Should voters be able choose their U.S. senators?

Ask Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst or Sen. Dan Patrick and the answer is a resounding “No.”

The two Republicans – both vying for the lieutenant governor seat – recently voiced support to strip voters of the ability to elect U.S. senators and hand over that power back to state lawmakers. It would require repealing the 17th Amendment, which for the last 100 years has provided for the direct election of senators by voters.

Dewhurst and Patrick this month said a repeal is warranted to temper the federal government’s influence and because senators in Washington are out of touch with their state legislatures.

Even though there is no realistic chance of Congress taking action to repeal the power of the people to elect senators, the topic has become somewhat of a litmus test for tea party supporters the last couple years; a number of Republicans across the country – including Gov. Rick Perry and Sen. Ted Cruz – have endorsed the notion.

The repeal rhetoric has seeped into an already heated lieutenant governor’s campaign, where all four candidates are dueling to win over the most conservative part of the state’s Republican base.

“If you look at the lieutenant governor’s race, this fits perfectly into the narrative because it’s been all about the drive to win the most conservative members of the Republican primary electorate,” said Mark Jones, a Rice University political science professor. “The 17th Amendment reform has been a rallying point in the tea party movement for the past few years, but it’s pure symbolic politics because there is no possibility whatsoever we’re going to repeal the 17th Amendment.”

The U.S. Constitution originally sought to buttress state power by allowing legislatures to pick senators. The idea gave way to a culture of corruption, with allegations of special interests bribing lawmakers for senate appointments.

Ratified in 1913, the 17th Amendment was tailored to end backroom deals and cronyism.

There’s so much irony here it’s almost hard to know where to begin. Besides being anti-(small d) democratic, putting this power in the hands of a state legislature would make it a complete exercise in insiderism. The Tea Party claims to be grassroots-driven; this would be the antithesis of that. And let’s be clear, as the story notes, if this had existed in Texas in 2012, our junior Senator would be one David Dewhurst. I get why he supports this, but why Cruz does is a bit less clear. At least, it’s unclear until you realize that it’s all of a piece with the efforts to restrict voting, via voter ID and more stringent voter registration laws and smaller windows for early voting and whatever else they haven’t thought up yet. They don’t want people to vote – most of them, anyway – so they work to prevent them from voting. The fact that the 17th Amendment isn’t going anywhere shouldn’t obscure the fact that Dan Patrick and David Dewhurst support this scaling-back of democracy. The one consolation is that people seem to be able to see through it. I just hope they remember that next November.

Posted in Election 2014 | Tagged Constitution, Dan Patrick, David Dewhurst, Election 2014, Lite Gov, Senate, Texas, The Lege | 3 Comments

Bayou Greenways project moving along

Posted on October 27, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

Work is underway, land is being acquired, and money is being raised.

Now, the Houston Parks Board and its public partners hope to revive some of the city’s natural treasures through Bayou Greenways 2020, a 150-mile trail system that, once complete, will wind along the bayous long seen as an interruption to Houston’s urban sprawl.

The initiative is at the heart of a bond package approved by voters last November that will provide $100 million in matching funds to double the number of trails to link existing park space and neighborhoods along the city’s many bayous.

While other bayou improvement projects in recent years have focused on public art, cafes and festival space, the Greenways initiative is about trails, native grasses and flood-resilient trees.

“This is very simple,” said [Roksan] Okan-Vick, president of the nonprofit Houston Parks Board that is leading the public-private project. “We will commit to keep it as natural as possible and meander a sensitively designed, single line of trail that connects to the neighborhoods whenever possible.”

[…]

As opportunities arise to buy grasslands or wooded lots, Okan-Vick said, up to 1,200 acres of new, small nature parks could jut from the trails.

She pointed to a city map with yellow ovals dotted over stretches of six bayous, marking the Greenways projects slated for next year. They include trails along White Oak Bayou between Antoine and Hollister, as well as connecting Brays Bayou trails between Mason Park and the University of Houston.

Another 21 red ovals highlighted areas where land must be acquired or trails built before the 2020 deadline.

The nonprofit has already acquired land along the bayous to complete 20 miles of the 80-mile trail expansion, breaking ground earlier this year on three smaller projects along Brays and White Oak bayous.

That last paragraph refers to the MKT to White Oak trail connection, which will connect two existing bike trails. The Parks Board is about 60% of the way towards raising its goal of $115 million by 2020, which will be matched by funds from the city that were approved in last year’s election. Fifty million of the funds raised by the Parks Board come from the Kinder Foundation, but they with a condition that Council agreed to last week.

The Kinder Foundation is poised to donate $50 million to the Bayou Greenways 2020 initiative to connect Houston parks and double the length of the city’s public trails, but there’s a catch. The City Council first must turn over maintenance of the park lands to a nonprofit because of concerns that the city will not adequately maintain the newly developed properties.

The council is expected to approve the agreement partnering the city with the nonprofit Houston Parks Board, which would manage the maintenance of bayou trails with public funds.

The move is, in part, intended to dispel concerns from private donors who worry whether the city will have enough revenue and political support for the proper upkeep of the signature trail system once it is completed.

[…]

Supporters of the greenways project say the agreement before the council will provide assurance to taxpayers and donors that future city leaders cannot undercut their vision by simply moving or slashing city maintenance funds.

“Parks departments have tended to bear the brunt of tough times,” said Andy Icken, Houston’s chief development officer. “This creates a dedicated fund that is more resilient.”

The legal agreement is structured differently from the Buffalo Bayou or Discovery Green projects, but the practical effects are similar.

Under the proposed arrangement, the city agrees to pay the park board up to $10 million a year for maintenance. Although the nonprofit likely will hire private companies and Harris County Flood Control to do some work, the city parks department would be the preferred contractor for the bulk of it, essentially bringing much of the funding back to city coffers.

Additionally, the agreement includes an annual 20 percent contingency fund the board can use for capital improvement projects, such as installing new lights or replacing aging trails, or for disaster recovery after flooding or hurricanes. The board would be required to present an annual report to the City Council on its plans and return any contingency money not spent within the year, Icken said.

If everything goes to plan, the city eventually will make money off the deal. An in-house analysis found that by 2020, when the trails are projected to be complete, the city would be collecting $20 million to $30 million more in property tax revenue than it is today because the improved bayous are expected to raise nearby property values faster.

Council did approve the agreement, so here we are. I’m excited about what this will mean for the city. Houston’s national reputation has improved considerably in recent years, but we’re still considered a flat and visually unappealing place, usually compared unfavorably to cities with hills and more varied terrain like Austin and San Antonio. I figure a project like this can go a long way towards dispelling the idea that there’s not much to look at in Houston beyond the skylines. Swamplot and Houston Politics have more.

Posted in Elsewhere in Houston | Tagged Annise Parker, Bayou Greenway Initiative, bike trails, Election 2012, Houston, Houston City Council, Houston Parks Board, Kinder Foundation, Parks By You, Roksan Okun-Vick | Comments Off

Saturday video break: Boldly going forward

Posted on October 26, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

This past week, a life-size cutout of Captain Kirk appeared in my office. That’s as good a reason as any for this:

I love the classics, don’t you?

Posted in Music | Tagged Star Trek, television, videos | Comments Off

From the “Judges Behaving Badly” files

Posted on October 26, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

We’ll start with now-former Judge Elizabeth Coker:

An East Texas state district judge who had been accused of sending text messages to coach a prosecutor during a trial, being biased against some attorneys and improperly meeting with jurors has resigned as part of an agreement with a state judicial commission.

Elizabeth E. Coker did not admit to guilt or fault as part of her agreement with the State Commission on Judicial Conduct. The commission announced Monday that Coker had taken an immediate leave of absence and her resignation will take effect Dec. 6. The agreement also prevents her from ever being a judge again in Texas.

Coker had been a judge since 1998. She oversaw proceedings in Polk, San Jacinto and Trinity counties. Her father and grandfather had also been judges who presided over the same counties.

[…]

The commission said that during an August 2012 child abuse trial Coker presided over, the judge sent text messages to Polk County prosecutor Kaycee Jones, suggesting questions that Jones should relay to the prosecutor handling the case.

Coker was also accused of suggesting that a witness review a videotaped interview he gave to law enforcement to refresh his memory and rehabilitate his testimony and of discussing legal issues pertinent to the case “in an unsuccessful effort to assist the State (to) obtain a guilty verdict in the case.”

The defendant ended up being acquitted of a felony charge of injury to a child.

The commission also alleged Coker might have engaged in other improper communications and meetings with Jones and other prosecutors in Polk and San Jacinto counties and certain defense attorneys regarding pending cases in her courtroom.

“Judge Coker allegedly exhibited a bias in favor or certain attorneys and a prejudice against others in both her judicial rulings and her court appointment; and Judge Coker allegedly met with jurors in an inappropriate manner, outside the presence of counsel, while the jurors were deliberating in one or more criminal trials,” the commission said.

In addition, the commission alleged Coker “may not have been candid and truthful” in testimony before the panel about whether she tried to influence the testimony of a witness who spoke to the commission.

That’s quite the sorry litany of bad judicial behavior. About the only thing I can think of that she could have done to make it worse would have been to bet on the outcome of the cases before her. Personally, I think she got off too lightly – I think disbarment would have been a fitting punishment. But at least she’ll never don the robes again.

The prosecutor Coker texted is now herself a judge, and is facing her own inquiry for her role in that incident.

While the state judicial commission’s investigation into alleged improprieties by State District Judge Elizabeth Coker ended Monday with her resignation, the focus may now shift to any possible complicity by fellow judge and former prosecutor, Kaycee Jones.

Coker’s voluntary agreement to resign alludes to complaints that she “engaged in improper ex parte text communications with Jones,” who served as a Polk County assistant district attorney for 10 years until this year becoming the 411th state district judge.

On Tuesday, Jones could not be reached for comment. But in a previously written letter to the Texas Bar Association’s disciplinary counsel, Jones said that during her tenure as prosecutor she improperly utilized clandestine text messages sent from the bench by Coker.

Jones acknowledged passing along the texts, designed to bolster the prosecution’s case, to the lead prosecutor during a child abuse trial. “It was wrong and I knew better,” she wrote.

Jones’ name was prominently mentioned three times in Coker’s resignation agreement. The signed document refers to the so-called “texting and judging” incident as well as allegations of other improper communiques and meetings between Jones and Coker involving additional cases that were not specified.

Apparently, her boss at the time in the DA’s office made her promise to never do it again, but that ain’t good enough. Jones’ formal hearing is in March, but honestly, unless she has something better to say for herself, she should just save us all the time and trouble and submit her resignation. I don’t see how she can be trusted as a judge given her appallingly bad judgment.

Those two are known to be bad apples. Here in Harris County, we have an accusation of bad behavior against a Family Court judge.

State District Court Judge Denise Pratt is under investigation, accused of backdating court records to make it appear that she issued rulings and filed court documents sooner than she actually did, according to county officials.

Allegations against the 311th family court judge, raised by a Houston-area family lawyer in a criminal complaint filed with the Harris County District Attorney’s Office and the State Commission on Judicial Conduct, already have led to the resignation of Pratt’s court clerk.

Webster-based family lawyer Greg Enos, whose criminal complaint last year against a Galveston County court-at-law judge sparked an investigation by the state attorney general and multiple indictments that led to the judge’s suspension and subsequent resignation, said he delivered his complaint against Pratt to First Assistant District Attorney Belinda Hill on Monday. Enos said he believes the office has already launched an investigation.

A spokesman for the district attorney’s office said he “can’t confirm or deny” whether any investigation is underway, but county and other sources say the office is looking into it and already has contacted attorneys to arrange interviews.

The concerns Enos is raising also have touched off an investigation by the Harris County District Clerk, the official keeper of all court records.

District Clerk Chris Daniel said he looked into two of the six cases Enos included in his complaint, which led to the resignation on Monday of Pratt’s lead clerk, a well-liked, 25-year employee of the District Clerk’s office.

Daniel said he found records were postdated or mis-marked in those two cases, and that he is looking into a seventh one that another family lawyer brought to his attention.

An inaccurate timestamp or missing signature on a court document not only erodes “the integrity of the record,” Daniel said, but can have an impact on appeals and other legal processes.

“If you have the wrong date on a document, then statutorily you can run out of time to appeal a case, and that’s where the most damage is,” he said.

[…]

Several lawyers involved in the cases Enos cites in his complaint said they never have experienced such problems with a judge.

Marcia Zimmerman, a 30-year veteran family lawyer based in Clear Lake, said she resorted to filing a motion after waiting for months on a ruling from Pratt. When the ruling finally came in, she was surprised to see the date listed was months before she had filed her motion.

“I don’t think any of us believed the ruling was actually made before the petition for writ of mandamus because, why would she rule and not tell anybody?” Zimmerman said, noting that Pratt also missed two scheduled hearings.

Family lawyer Robert Clark said he had a similar experience, arguing a case in January and then waiting five months for a ruling from Pratt that the official court record now says was issued on Jan. 30, the day before the two-day trial actually ended.

“The thing is, it’s had a seriously adverse affect on the child in this case and my client,” Clark said. “This is just egregious.”

The DA’s office doesn’t comment on these matters so we don’t know for sure what’s going on with Judge Pratt, but the main charges against her are serious and could lead to a felony arrest if there’s sufficient evidence to bear them out. As things stand now, she would be up for re-election in 2014, though as was the case with our old buddy Chuck Rosenthal, whose name was dropped at the end of the story, she might come under pressure from the local GOP to not file. The filing deadline in December 9, and I daresay that regardless of what is being said officially about her case, we’ll have a pretty good idea of whether or not she’s in real trouble by then.

Posted in Crime and Punishment | Tagged Chris Daniel, Chuck Rosenthal, Denise Pratt, District Attorney, District Clerk, Election 2014, Elizabeth Coker, Harris County, judicial races, Kaycee Jones, Polk County, San Jacinto County, State Commission on Judicial Conduct, text messages, Trinity County | 3 Comments

Another way the Affordable Care Act will benefit Texans

Posted on October 26, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

Thousands of people in the high-risk pool will get better coverage at lower prices, thanks to Obamacare.

It’s constitutional – deal with it

At year’s end, Texas will shut down its high-risk insurance pool for some of the state’s sickest residents, pushing participants to find private coverage in the federal health insurance marketplace created under the federal Affordable Care Act. And patient advocates say those participants should focus on making the transition sooner rather than later to ensure that they don’t experience a lapse in coverage or lose access to current health care providers and services.

“Pool policyholders who are in the middle of treatment will especially need to be sure the network offered by their replacement health plan includes their treatment team,” Steven Browning, executive director of the Texas Health Insurance Pool, said in an email.

The high-risk pool is financed mainly by patient premiums and assessments paid by health insurance companies and HMOs, along with some funding from federal grant programs. Since 1998, it has provided high-priced coverage to Texans with pre-existing conditions who can’t find coverage elsewhere. The state has deemed the high-risk pool obsolete, as the Affordable Care Act prohibits insurance companies participating in the federal marketplace, which launched on Oct. 1, from denying coverage to Texans with pre-existing conditions. Gov. Rick Perry signed Senate Bill 1367 in June, scheduling the pool’s abolishment.

The pool will close Jan. 1, and the 23,000 people currently participating in the pool must sign up for coverage on the insurance exchange by Dec. 15 or find coverage elsewhere to avoid a lapse in care.

[…]

With many of the health plan options in the federal marketplace being cheaper than the high-risk pool and covering additional benefits, Stacey Pogue, a senior policy analyst for the left-leaning Center for Public Policy Priorities, said the situation presents an opportunity for Texans in the pool.

“I think that people are going to have many more options and many better options in the marketplace than they do in the health pool today,” Pogue said. “There is not going to be a person who will be better off financially outside the pool than they would be if the pool stayed open.”

As a condition of the pool, Texans generally pay twice the market rate for coverage, said Pogue. They’ll probably see their health care costs halved in the marketplace, she said, because insurers aren’t allowed to charge people with pre-existing conditions more than other consumers. The marketplace also offers tax credits to help purchase a health plan to everyone who makes 100 percent to 400 percent of the federal poverty line — $11,490 to $45,960 annual income for an individual or $22,550 to $94,200 for a family of four.

Pogue said health plans offered in the federal marketplace could also raise the level of care patients receive, as they must cover “essential health benefits,” some of which, such as maternity care, aren’t covered in the pool.

She doesn’t expect there to be major issues with people meeting the Dec. 15 deadline either, she said, because many high-risk pool policyholders have health conditions that require them to deal with their health insurance on a consistent basis and are more likely to interact with their health care provider.

Remember, if Ted Cruz had his way, all of these people would be worse off today. Note that since the high-risk pool has been shut down, they wouldn’t be able to get any coverage at all if the “defund Obamacare” hostage-taking had succeeded. Given that in the end, every Texas Republican voted against the debt ceiling/CR deal, you can plausibly state that every single Texas Republican in Congress voted to take health insurance away from each of these 23,000 people. Note to Wendy Davis, Battleground Texas, et al: You really need to make sure you reach out to each of these people and let them know that. ThinkProgress and Juanita have more.

Posted in The great state of Texas | Tagged Congress, Election 2014, health care, health insurance, high risk pool, insurance exchanges, Ted Cruz, Texas, The Lege, Wendy Davis | 1 Comment

Annise Parker is in your Internets

Posted on October 26, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

She’s in mine, anyway. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but an awful lot of the websites I surf to now feature a familiar face looking back at me:

Here’s another:

Clearly, she’s seeking to dominate the liberal nerd humor vote. Of course, there are Facebook ads:

Facebook is the one place I’ve seen other ads. Ben Hall has placed a few, mostly touting his Facebook page. I know some other candidates have spent money on Facebook ads, but as yet I’ve not seen them.

You know how at the bottom of articles on some websites there’s a listing of “related” stories that you might want to read, that are mostly sponsored links? She’s there, too.

And not just in the Chronicle:

Even out in LaLa Land:

Too bad they can’t control the stories they get associated with. Some of them might be hard to compete with for clicks.

Anyway. Web advertising is hardly new, though this particular tactic is one I don’t recall seeing before. They’ve clearly done a good job of targeting, since it’s hardly a coincidence all these things appeared for my benefit. I don’t know how expensive this is – clearly, Team Parker dropped a decent amount of cash on it – but it seems likely to me that doing this on a perhaps more modest scale would be viable for many campaigns. Of course, I’m assuming people take notice of these things, never mind click on them. Have you been noticing these ads? What do you think about them?

Posted in Election 2013 | Tagged advertising, Annise Parker, Election 2013, Facebook, Houston, Internet, Mayor | 7 Comments

Friday random ten: Because I said so, that’s why

Posted on October 25, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

Back to normal randomness this week, as I find myself themeless.

1. March E.W. Scripps – Trinity University Wind Symphony
2. Lucky Ball And Chain – They Might Be Giants
3. Jump In The River – Sinead O’Connor
4. Vivaldi: Double Mandolin Concerto – Yo-Yo Ma and Bobby McFerrin
5. Lithium – Nirvana
6. My Old School – Miles Cool
7. Blood Count – Joe Henderson
8. The Magnificent Seven – Joe Grushecky and The Houserockers
9. Why Can’t It Wait Till Morning? – Phil Collins
10. Vx Fx Dx – Michelle Shocked

That’s the kind of random I like. Happy Friday, y’all.

Posted in Music | Tagged Friday random ten | Comments Off

Up to the judge in the abortion lawsuit trial

Posted on October 25, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

We expect a quick ruling.

With days remaining until new abortion regulations take effect in Texas, attorneys for abortion providers and the state of Texas presented their final arguments Wednesday on whether those restrictions meet constitutional muster.

“The result is much more obvious to each side than it is to me,” said U.S. District Judge Lee Yeakel, who is presiding over a case in which the abortion providers’ attorneys are seeking to block two of the provisions state lawmakers approved in July. “I recognize the clock is ticking toward October the 29th. I think both sides raised strong issues, and I will get a final judgment out as quickly as I can get a final judgment out.”

The plaintiffs, who represent the majority of abortion providers in Texas, including four Planned Parenthood affiliates, Whole Woman’s Health and other independent abortion providers, have asked the court for an injunction to block the implementation of two provisions in House Bill 2 that would take effect Oct. 29: a requirement that doctors who perform abortion have active admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the facility, and that doctors follow the FDA regimen, rather than a commonly used evidenced-based protocol, for drug-induced abortions.

Yeakel will be the first judge — but probably not the last — to rule on whether the provisions are constitutional. Yeakel, who gave no specific indication Wednesday on when he would rule, said Monday that he expects that whichever side is disappointed with his ruling to appeal the decision, probably all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

See here and here for more on trial testimony. I won’t be surprised if Judge Yeakel issues his ruling today, but it may wait till Monday. Whatever the case, and however he rules, it’s going to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which based on past history probably already has its opinion upholding the law written and ready to be handed down. Just keep reminding yourself that the ultimate remedy is at the ballot box.

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged abortion, Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, lawsuit, Senate, special session, Texas, The Lege | Comments Off

Mostly good news for Apollo

Posted on October 25, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

That’s the story so far.

Terry Grier

A three-year, multimillion-dollar experiment to improve 20 struggling HISD schools yielded big gains in math and limited progress in reading, according to partial results of a study released Wednesday.

Now, Superintendent Terry Grier and the school board face decisions over what, if any, changes to make to the district’s nationally watched Apollo program, particularly to improve students’ literacy skills and perhaps to reduce the price tag.

“You’ve got to keep trying different things on Apollo,” said the researcher, Harvard University economist Roland Fryer. “We are not all the way there yet. Even if we were all the way there, I bet you can do it … cheaper.”

[…]

“We’ve had a lot of success with this – it far exceeded my expectations – but we have 282 schools,” Grier said, acknowledging complaints that Apollo was too narrowly focused.

Grier said he’d like to focus on helping younger students before they fall too far behind and on cutting costs to reach more children across the district. The superintendent’s ideas include year-round kindergarten for some, tutoring before fourth grade and less expensive online tutoring.

Fryer, who helped design the Apollo program, plans to release his final study on Nov. 1.

He shared a nine-page executive summary and presented an overview of his findings, which mirrored his earlier research, in Houston Wednesday.

“The bottom line is, math is very encouraging,” Fryer said. “Reading is still puzzling to me. It’s puzzling to a lot of people.”

In math, the stubborn achievement gap between minority and white students is on pace to close this year at the Apollo elementary schools, Fryer found. For older students, the gap in math performance has closed by roughly half.

In reading, Fryer said, the gains were significantly less, with the achievement gap narrowing by 10 percent to 20 percent.

School Zone has a copy of Dr. Fryer’s executive summary. Cost is definitely an issue – as the story notes, the HISD tax rate hike is due in part to the district paying for a continuation of Apollo out of general revenue. Initial funding came from grants and private donors. If this is to be sustainable going forward, HISD will need to get the cost of the program under control. It’s worth it to pay for a program that works, but ideally it would be district-wide, and it’s far from clear if that can be affordable. As for private donations, I wonder if the data Dr. Fryer has now provided is satisfactory to the Houston Endowment, which has been sitting on a $3 million check. I think there’s a lot here to be optimistic about, but as always it will come down to what we can and are willing to pay for. Hair Balls has more.

Posted in School days | Tagged budget, HISD, HISD Board of Trustees, Houston, property taxes, Roland Fryer, schools, Terry Grier | 1 Comment

No, Texans!

Posted on October 25, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

If you regularly see Metro buses around town, you might have noticed that during the football season they will sometimes display “GO TEXANS!” on their marquees, rotating with their route information. They display similar messages for other local teams during their seasons as well. Harris County Treasurer Orlando Sanchez wants them to stop doing that.

It’s nothing personal against the Houston Texans, the Astros, Rockets or Dynamo. Harris County Treasurer Orlando Sanchez just wants Metro to stop picking winners and losers with its digital bus marquees.

This spring, after Sanchez raised concerns, the Metro board of directors adopted a policy with pre-approved messages for display on the destination signs on the fronts and sides of its buses, including ones covering five “major” local sporting teams. Some of the messages, such as “Happy Holidays,” are appropriate, Sanchez said, but others, such as “Go Texans,” are not.

“We have great athletic teams, there’s a lot of great things in this city, but it’s troubling when an appointed, non-answerable board of directors of a publicly funded institution like Metro gets to pick and choose what corporations get to have their name placed on our infrastructure,” Sanchez said, noting that he has only seen the “Go Texans” message.

The complaint is similar to one Sanchez had a few years ago when the back halves of some Houston Police Department patrol cars were made to look like Yellow Cab taxis for what was supposed to be a public service announcement to deter drunken driving. The so-called wraps included the local Yellow Cab phone number.

That inspired the former Houston city councilman and unsuccessful mayoral candidate, who said he plans to seek a third term as treasurer next year, to submit an inquiry to the U.S. Department of Transportation, which sided with him and – in an April 2011 letter – thanked him for his “efforts to prevent government waste, fraud and abuse.”

First let me say “Hey, look! It’s a story involving Harris County Treasurer Orlando Sanchez!” I sometimes forget the guy exists. As a longtime proponent of Metro selling ads on its buses and light rail cars, I can see his point about this. This space has value, and Metro’s giving it away for free.

That said, my overall reaction to reading this story is “Really? What’s the big deal?” Metro was never going to sell ad space on the bus marquees – some people don’t want them to have ads on the exterior of their buses at all – so the value argument falls short. I see this as just basic civic boosterism. It’s hardly unusual for public officials to publicly state support for local sports teams – I’m pretty sure that if Orlando Sanchez had been elected Mayor in 2003, he’d have been out there leading the cheers for the Astros in 2005 as they made their run to the World Series – and I’ve never known that to be controversial, with the exception of the Mayor of a two-sports team town like New York openly favoring one team over the other. And for what it’s worth, Metro has used its buses and trains to promote things other than the Texans, such as the Houston Zoo and the Museum of Natural Science. Perhaps Sanchez would object to those as well, I don’t know. Again, I gotta say, what’s the big deal?

Posted in Planes, Trains, and Automobiles | Tagged buses, Harris County Treasurer, Houston, Houston Museum of Natural Science, Houston Texans, Houston Zoo, light rail, Metro, Orlando Sanchez | 3 Comments

Steve Stockman does something I support

Posted on October 25, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

I know, I’m as shocked as you are.

Texas Rep. Steve Stockman, R-Friendswood, has recently backed a bill to require federal officials to comply with state marijuana laws, which was introduced in April and has since garnered support from Congressmen on both sides of the aisle.

The Respect State Marijuana Laws Act of 2013, introduced by California Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, a Republican, would bar federal drug enforcement agents from penalizing any person abiding by the marijuana laws in their own state.

The law “shall not apply to any person acting in compliance with State laws” — that is, people who are in compliance with their state laws regarding possession, manufacture or use of marijuana will not be subjected to federal penalties.

Twenty-one states and Washington, D.C. have already legalized medical marijuana, and both Washington and Colorado legalized marijuana for both medicinal and recreational use.

Stockman became the 19th sponsor of the bill, according to this website that you might not want to click if you’re at work. Let’s be perfectly clear about this: Steve Stockman is a whackjob, a terrible Congressman, and a reprehensible human being. Nothing about this changes any of that, but it does show that even a reprehensible whackjob can occasionally land on the right side of a public policy matter, even if as PDiddie notes it will have zero effect in his home state. And while I approve of the basic idea in this bill, I am fully aware of the bad history behind the “leave it to the states” argument. I’d much rather see a bill that simply scaled back federal enforcement of marijuana laws, as a prelude to a larger scaling back of the out of control “war on drugs”. But I don’t think we can get to that today, even with polling data showing much greater acceptance of decriminalization. I see that as a multi-step process, with the RSML Act of 2013 being the first step. More states need to take action, and the debate needs a wider airing at the federal level, possibly – hopefully – in the 2016 Presidential election. In the meantime, I support this effort, even if I don’t care for some of the people pushing it. Politics is like that, and you have to start somewhere. Grits and Texpatriate have more.

Posted in National news | Tagged Colorado, Congress, drugs, marijuana, polls, Steve Stockman, Texas, Washington | Comments Off

EV Day 3 – Where the early votes are

Posted on October 24, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

Three days into early voting and the numbers continue to be strong, with a third consecutive day of in-person totals topping 5,000. Here are all the daily totals:

2013
2011
2009
2007

Some people, like Campos, have been trying to get a handle on what this might mean for African-American turnout in particular, since Ben Hall – and Ronald Green and Andrew Burks – are counting on good A-A turnout to varying degrees for their electoral success. As a starting point for that discussion, let’s take a look at the early vote share at locations in predominantly African-Americans locations:


Year  HD131  HD139  HD141  HD142  HD146  HD147  Total
=====================================================
2013   1.9%   3.4%   4.8%   3.7%   9.2%   4.0%  27.0%
2011   0.8%   3.0%   4.8%   2.8%  10.7%   4.6%  26.7%
2009   2.6%   3.1%   5.1%   3.2%   8.1%   4.0%  26.1%
2007   2.4%   3.8%   5.2%   2.9%   9.6%   4.6%  28.5%

The numbers above represent the share of the vote cast at the early vote location or locations in the specified State Rep districts. For the three previous cycles I calculated this based on final EV totals, and for this year I used the totals so far. This year doesn’t look a whole lot different from the last three cycles if you ask me. Obviously, this is a rough measure so don’t put too much stock in it, but it’s clear there’s no big surge relative to the rest of the county. Which brings up a second point, that we may be seeing an increase in non-Houston voters, which would mean that these totals are in fact higher where it matters. To that end, let’s look at the locations that are primarily or entirely outside city limits:


Year   HD126  HD128  HD130  HD132  HD135  HD144  HD150  Total
=============================================================
2013    4.0%   2.7%   4.6%   2.4%   2.2%   1.3%   1.0%  18.2%
2011    2.9%   2.2%   4.6%   1.4%   2.2%   2.0%   1.0%  16.3%
2009    4.2%   2.2%   3.2%   1.4%   1.7%   1.3%   0.9%  14.9%
2007    5.0%   5.9%   1.3%   1.5%   5.5%   1.0%   1.0%  21.1%

Up a bit from the previous two cycles but down from 2007. City turnout was roughly the same in 2007 and 2011, but city turnout as a share of total county turnout differed:

2011 – 73.6% of Harris County vote came from city of Houston voters.
2009 – 69.5% of Harris County vote came from city of Houston voters.
2007 – 63.6% of Harris County vote came from city of Houston voters.

I suspect 2009 broke the pattern because of stronger Election Day turnout. In any event, as with African-American turnout I don’t see anything terribly out of whack with past elections. Again, this is a rough measure, and we won’t know for sure what things look like till we see that first set of results on Election Day evening. There may be surprises lurking – there almost always are – but nothing that stands out to me based on the numbers we’ve seen so far.

Posted in Election 2013 | Tagged early voting, Election 2007, Election 2009, Election 2011, Election 2013, Harris County, Houston, turnout | 2 Comments

Burns not running in SD10

Posted on October 24, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

Bummer.

Joel Burns

Fort Worth City Councilman Joel Burns announced on Wednesday that he will not run to succeed Wendy Davis in the state Senate.

Burns, who replaced Davis on the City Council in 2007, had emerged as a top Democratic contender for the Senate seat after Davis announced her bid for governor earlier this month. But in an email to supporters on Wednesday, first reported by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Burns said he will not enter the race.

“After many weeks of thought and consideration, my next steps have became very clear to me,” Burns wrote in the email, which he also posted on his Facebook page. “And I want to share with you — my many friends, neighbors and supporters — my decision: Quite simply, the job I most want is the one I already have.”

Burns was my first choice to run for the seat, so I’m disappointed by this. There are other candidates that had been looking at this, so I’m sure someone will step up and run. It was never going to be an easy hold, and if Joel Burns didn’t think he was the right candidate at this time, then so be it.

One more thing:

The fight to replace Davis will be one of the state’s most closely watched races next year. Without her seat, which Davis has won twice in a swing district that leans Republican, Democrats would be left with only 11 seats in the Senate, bringing Republicans within one seat of the two-thirds majority needed in the chamber to bring legislation to the floor for a vote.

The original version of this story said that the loss of Davis’ seat would give the Rs the numbers they needed to overcome the two thirds rule, assuming it still means something in 2015. What Davis gave the Dems was a cushion, but even if we lose her seat the numbers are still there to block bills as needed, and if allowed. I’ve seen some confusion on this point elsewhere, so let me assert my authority here as someone who has a degree in math: 11/31 > 1/3. Put another way, 20/31 < 2/3. It's not that complicated.

Posted in Election 2014 | Tagged Election 2014, Joel Burns, SD10, Senate, Texas, two thirds rule, Wendy Davis | 1 Comment

Voter ID litigation moving again

Posted on October 24, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

From Texas Redistricting last week:

The Texas voter ID litigation geared back up today, with the court setting a number of new or revised deadlines now that the government shutdown is over.

Responses to motions by True the Vote and the Texas Association of Hispanic County Judges and County Commissioners to intervene are now due October 30.

The parties joint discovery plan is now due November 4.

And the court will hold the initial case conference – originally set for October 25 – onNovember 15 at 9:00 a.m. in Corpus Christi.

In addition, the State of Texas advised at this morning’s status conference that it would be filing a motion to dismiss the litigation and that the parties had agreed to the following schedule for briefing the motion:

State’s motion to dismiss due October 25.

Responses from the plaintiffs due November 22.

State’s reply due December 6.

The case had been in limbo due to the shutdown, with the Justice Department asking for a stay early on, and the entire federal court system facing the possibility of running out of funds if it had dragged on much longer. Fortunately, in the end the schedule wasn’t greatly affected, and as you can see things will be moving along pretty quickly. I’ve been assuming all along that the experience of this year’s election will factor into the litigation. I’d been focusing on the number of provisional ballots as one possible piece of evidence, but there will likely be some good stories about unexpected hassles at the ballot box, too. We’ll see how that goes.

On a separate but not unrelated note, the plaintiffs in the voter registration litigation have asked for a full review of the three-judge panel’s refusal to issue an injunction against that law while litigation is ongoing. I doubt they’ll get any relief, but it doesn’t hurt to ask. Whether they’ll then ask SCOTUS for same if the full Fifth Circuit declines is unclear.

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged Election 2013, Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, Justice Department, lawsuit, Texas, voter ID, voter registration, Voting Rights Act | Comments Off

Texas blog roundup for the week of October 21

Posted on October 24, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

The Texas Progressive Alliance is old enough to remember when everyone who ran for public office did so on a premise of making it work better as it brings you this week’s roundup.

Continue reading →

Posted in Blog stuff | Tagged blog roundup, TPA | Comments Off

Interview with County Judge Ed Emmett

Posted on October 23, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

Judge Ed Emmett

In addition to all of the races for local office and the nine constitutional amendments, there are two county referenda on the ballot this fall. One is the Astrodome proposition, with which I trust you are familiar. The other is for the joint inmate processing facility, which will allow the county to more efficiently deal with inmates that expect to be released shortly or that need to be handed off to mental health professionals, and the city to close its dilapidated jails. It will also serve to connect inmates being released from county custody with mental health, housing, and substance abuse services. This is a plan that’s been a long time coming and has broad support as well as the Chronicle’s endorsement. I wanted to ask a few questions about it make sure we all knew what it was about, so I visited with County Judge Ed Emmett and asked him my questions. It’s a fairly short conversation – this is a straightforward issue, not at all complicated – and here it is:

Ed Emmett interview

You can see all of my interviews as well as finance reports and other information on candidates on my 2013 Election page.

Posted in Election 2013 | Tagged bond referendum, Ed Emmett, Election 2013, Harris County, Houston, interviews, jails | Comments Off

The party-switchers of Bexar County

Posted on October 23, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

Nice.

Carlo Key

A Bexar County judge elected during the “red tide” of 2010 is switching parties.

Standing at the foot of the Bexar County Courthouse steps, County Court-at-Law No. 11 Judge Carlo Key said Monday he is joining the Democratic Party and will seek reelection as a Democrat in November 2014.

“Make no mistake, I did not leave the Republican Party, it left me,” said Key, flanked by high-ranking Democrats. “My principles have led me to the Democratic Party, and my only hope is that more people of principle will follow me.”

While he’s been mulling the decision for several weeks, it was the recent federal government shutdown that caused Key to seriously consider switching parties.

[…]

A native of Marshall, Key, 38, was an attorney before he joined the wave of Republican judges who won seats in 2010, when all but one of the new county judges elected that year were Republicans. Key is a 2002 graduate of the Baylor Law School.

He has pitted himself against the law enforcement community by forbidding testimony that a horizontal gaze nystagmus test – in which an officer uses a pen or finger to track involuntary eye movements — indicates intoxication. This summer, Key learned he would face a challenger in the Republican primaries — Julie Wright, a prosecutor married to a police officer.

His announcement came just days after another Bexar County Republican left the party. Last week, Therese Huntzinger, 55, announced she will run for district attorney after recasting herself as a Democrat. Huntzinger, a criminal defense attorney who could face 15-year incumbent DA Susan Reed in the general election, ran unsuccessfully as a Republican for a district judge seat in 1998.

Bexar County Democratic Party Chair Manuel Medina said two other judges who attended a recent Democratic Party event could also make the switch in the near future, and U.S. Congressman Joaquín Castro said he expects more to follow Key and Huntzinger.

“The Republican Party is catering to such a narrow ideological base,” he said, “and many Texans are realizing that the Democratic Party is a better choice. The Texas Republican Party is going backward in respect to Latino issues. This is just the tip of the iceberg.”

I tend to agree with Texpatriate that this says more about the state of the Bexar County GOP than it does about the state party. We’ve seen this movie before – it happened here in Harris County in the 90s as the GOP was taking over the judiciary, and in Dallas County after the 2006 Democratic wave. There’s already the usual rumblings on the R side about moving away from partisan elections of judges, which will only grow louder if Bexar and especially Harris have blue sweeps. You already now how I feel about that so I’ll spare you a rehash, I’ll just say again that there was no comparable level of angst during the red tide of the 90s, in Harris and elsewhere. I’ll stipulate that partisan judicial elections are not the optimal system, I’ll freely admit that some good judges are at risk of losing, I just don’t plan to feel sorry for anyone.

By the way, Judge Key has said that he didn’t make the switch for political advantage, but because he felt he “had” to do it. I don’t doubt his feelings about this, and frankly I hope there’s a lot more like him who feel that way, but I do think he’ll be better off as a Dem in Bexar County in 2014 and beyond. Consider it a nice alignment of the personal and the political.

Also of interest is the bit about the challenger to longtime Bexar County DA Susan Reed. This earlier story has some background on Therese Huntzinger.

In 1989, as a young prosecutor, she defied an order from then-DA Fred Rodriguez that she give up her pursuit of a witness-tampering indictment against one of Rodriguez’s friends and political sugar daddies. When Rodriguez responded by firing her, she filed a whistle-blower lawsuit against him and won a settlement from Bexar County.

Her dramatic fight against Rodriguez attracted the attention of “60 Minutes” and the Lifetime Network, which flirted with the idea of creating a movie about her life. The issue also helped Rodriguez’s 1990 challenger, Steve Hilbig, knock off the incumbent district attorney.

When Hilbig took office, he instantly made Huntzinger part of his prosecutorial team.

[…]

[DA Susan Reed] faced a serious general-election challenge in 2010 from well-funded defense attorney Nico LaHood, but a race against Huntzinger would present the brassy DA with a whole new set of messaging challenges.

For one thing, Reed wouldn’t be able to argue, as she did with LaHood, that Huntzinger lacks prosecutorial experience. Huntzinger has 13 years of work in the district attorney’s office on her résumé, in addition to 15 years as a defense lawyer.

More importantly, Reed will be unable to deflect criticism of her own record by making the election a referendum on her challenger, as she did in 2010, when she verbally pummeled LaHood over his 1994 bust for aggravated delivery of Ecstasy.

Huntzinger said her roots in the Democratic Party extend back to her grandfather, who was a union leader in the stockyards. But her whistle-blowing crusade against Rodriguez, a Democrat, and subsequent work in the office of Hilbig, a Republican, prompted local Republicans to draft her to run for district judge in 1998.

“I stepped out of my Democratic shoes for that race, I lost, and I’m fitting back into them,” Huntzinger said.

Huntzinger suggests that Texas would be better off with nonpartisan judicial and DA races but adds that she has determined in recent years that the Democratic Party is a “better fit” for her. Huntzinger is open about being a lesbian, and the GOP’s negative stance on same-sex relationships has surely been a factor in her break from the party.

Huntzinger contends that even some Republican loyalists are eager to see a change in the district attorney’s office.

“(Reed) believes that you’ve got to bring your toothbrush to the courtroom for every single case and expect to get hit with a hammer,” Huntzinger said. “Well, there’s more to prosecuting than that.”

That ought to be a race worth watching. In the meantime, I submit to you that regardless of what may be going on in Bexar County, this story is related to these two.

State Rep. Steve Toth, R-The Woodlands, said on Monday he will run to replace state Sen. Tommy Williams, R-The Woodlands, who announced his resignation earlier this month.

In a press release announcing his candidacy, Toth, a Tea Party conservative, emphasized the need for “conservative advocates” like U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz who will “go against the tide and stand for what is right no matter the consequences.”

“As Ted Cruz has courageously demonstrated, simply being a conservative vote is no longer enough,” Toth said.

We’re a ways away from seeing switches at anything but the urban county level, but the more tightly the GOP binds itself to Ted Cruz and his blinkered, unbending zealotry, the closer that day comes. A statement from the TDP is beneath the fold, and BOR, EoW, and PDiddie have more.

Continue reading →

Posted in Election 2014 | Tagged Bexar County, Carlo Key, District Attorney, Election 2010, Election 2014, HD15, judicial races, party switching, SD04, Senate, Steve Toth, straight ticket voting, Susan Reed, Texas, The Lege, Therese Huntzinger | 1 Comment

Chron profile of Ben Hall

Posted on October 23, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

As promised from last week.

Ben Hall

When Ben Hall left the city attorney’s office in December 1994 after three years as a confidante to and attack dog for Mayor Bob Lanier, observers assumed the ambitious 38-year-old’s path would lead back to City Hall someday.

Some thought the self-described “reliably controversial” barrister’s confrontational style was a liability, that he should keep a low profile for a while. Others said Hall could succeed Lanier in just a few years if he kept his name in front of voters.

Hall, the top challenger to Mayor Annise Parker, who is seeking a final two-year term on Nov. 5, acknowledged that he had mapped out the road back to 901 Bagby himself.

“One thing I think any political person should have is financial independence so that they are not tempted to be swayed by idle temptation,” Hall said then, “and so this will help me in my financial independence.”

“This” was a job with renowned trial attorney John O’Quinn’s firm. Nearly 19 years and plenty of big-ticket victories later, the “South Carolina country boy” has certainly achieved the financial independence he sought.

Hall’s name identification with voters had faded by the time he launched his candidacy in January, but he has used his checkbook to make up the deficit. About $2.2 million of the $2.7 million he had raised as of late last month came from his own pocket.

The Chron’s profile of Mayor Parker was the previous Sunday; I blogged about it here. Hall does have a good story to tell – in many candidates, it would be a very compelling story. In Hall, however, I’ve never felt like that story has ever connected to a clear idea of what kind of Mayor he would be. I’ve read his press releases, I’ve critiqued his crimefighting plan, I’ve done an interview with him, but I still don’t have a clear picture of what he would do on big issues like budget, pensions, and quality of life. He’s clearly a smart guy, and I believe he’s genuinely motivated to make Houston a better place. But after all this time, I still don’t know how he would go about it.

Posted in Election 2013 | Tagged Annise Parker, Ben Hall, Election 2013, Houston, Mayor | 2 Comments

Redistricting trial set for July

Posted on October 23, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

The San Antonio federal court has set a date in July of 2014 to resolve the litigation relating to the 2011 and 2013 redistrictings.

A federal three-judge panel in San Antonio on Friday issued a schedule for the case, mostly granting state attorneys’ wishes to have the claims regarding 2011 and 2013 redistricting maps argued in one trial. The Department of Justice and civil rights groups who waged the legal challenge, claiming the maps discriminate against minorities, had asked for a bifurcated trial process.

The trial is set to start on July 14, 2014 and “will continue day to day until complete,” U.S. District Judge Orlando Garcia wrote. The scheduling order also set a variety of pre-trial deadlines

According to the filing, the trial will first dive into remaining issues from 2011 redistricting maps and then pivot to Section 3 claims related to those plans. From there, the court will take up evidence about redistricting maps passed by the Legislature over the summer, followed by arguments over Section 3 relief based on that set of election boundaries.

Texas Redistricting noted a week earlier that the state wanted a single trial for both 2011 and 2013 but the plaintiffs wanted two separate ones; the Justice Department proposed a schedule that was a bit of a hybrid. While the state got what it wanted schedule-wise – it made the reasonable point that the two-trial schedule, with the second trial in September, could wind up interfering with the 2016 election cycle, given the inevitability of appeals and the December of 2015 filing deadline – the plaintiffs got their wish to litigate 2011 and 2013 issues separately. Their point about the players being different in each cycle – Burt Solomons was the Redistricting Committee Chair in 2011, but he retired from the Lege after that session – carried weight as the court ruled that the two would be done sequentially rather than at once.

Here’s the schedule of events as we now know them:

April 2 – Deadline for dispositive motions.

May 14 – Deadline to complete supplementation of discovery.

June 2 – Deadline for bench briefs on section 3 relief and for pre-trial disclosures.

July 2 at 8:30 a.m. – Pretrial conference.

The length of the trial is not set, with the court saying it “would continue from day to day until complete.” Mark your calendars and get ready for the action.

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged Burt Solomons, Congress, Election 2016, Justice Department, lawsuit, redistricting, Texas, The Lege, Voting Rights Act | Comments Off

Interview with Kevin Hoffman

Posted on October 22, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

Kevin Hoffman

My second and final interview for HCC Trustee in District 1 and for candidates this cycle is with Kevin Hoffman. Hoffman has a diverse background, working in the energy industry after previously working non-profit theater companies as a department head. He is heavily involved in neighborhood activities as the former President of Near Northside Super Neighborhood Council #51 and a former board member of the Lindale Park Civic Club and the Metro Solutions, North Corridor Community Advisory Board, among others. He is also active in Democratic politics as President of the Greater Heights Democratic Club and Treasurer of the Houston Stonewall Young Democrats. Hoffman ran against Trustee Yolanda Navarro Flores in 2007 and lost by only a few hundred votes. Here’s the interview:

Kevin Hoffman interview

You can see all of my interviews as well as finance reports and other information on candidates on my 2013 Election page.

Posted in Election 2013 | Tagged Election 2007, Election 2013, HCC, Houston, interviews, Kevin Hoffman | Comments Off

First day EV totals

Posted on October 22, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

It was pretty brisk, with higher turnout than any of the previous three elections. Here are the relevant daily totals:

2013
2011
2009
2007

And here are the numbers for each for day one:


Year   In person  By Mail   Total
=================================
2013       5,025    8,560  13,585
2011       2,557    2,079   4,636
2009       4,089    2,073   6,162
2007       1,681      957   2,638

I suspect some of this is behavior-shifting, but still, that’s quite an upturn. The Astrodome referendum is probably helping some, but we won’t know till the end how much it drove non-Houston votes versus Houston votes. Another big difference this year is in the total number of mail ballots sent as of Day One:

2013 – 28,620
2011 – 12,041
2009 – 17,413
2007 – 11,646

We’ll see if the in-person pace keeps up. I probably won’t post daily updates on this, but will check in with it periodically, when there’s something interesting to say. I’ll hold off on making any turnout projections till the end of week one. If you voted today, how did it go? I voted at the end of the day at the West Gray Multi-Service Center. There was no line, but there were other people voting while I was there. Let us know what it was like at your location. And speaking of such things, here’s simple image view of the early voting schedule and locations, put together by my friend Robert Nagle for for people who don’t like PDFs.

Posted in Election 2013 | Tagged absentee ballots, Astrodome, early voting, Election 2007, Election 2009, Election 2011, Election 2013, Houston, turnout | 3 Comments

Lawsuit against abortion restrictions goes to trial

Posted on October 22, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

Here we go.

Seeking to block the state of Texas from implementing new abortion regulations, plaintiffs representing abortion providers argued Monday in a federal court that the state’s law violates the constitutional right of women to access the procedure. But the state’s attorneys defended Texas’ right to enact laws that advance protections for the life of a fetus.

U.S. District Judge Lee Yeakel, who presided over the hearing, in which arguments are scheduled to wrap up on Tuesday, was clear about what the court’s role was. “This court’s job is not to rule on whether women should be allowed abortions,” said Yeakel, “but to rule on whether or not this statute comes within the existing constitutional confine.”

Given the significance of the law, Yeakel said he’d like to make a decision as soon as possible after arguments conclude.

The plaintiffs, who represent the majority of abortion providers in Texas, including four Planned Parenthood affiliates, Whole Woman’s Health and other independent abortion providers, asked the court for a preliminary injunction to block the implementation of two provisions in House Bill 2 that would take effect Oct. 29: a requirement that doctors who perform abortion have active admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the facility, and that doctors follow the FDA regimen, rather than a commonly used evidenced-based protocol, for drug-induced abortions. The plaintiffs argued that both of these provisions present an undue burden on women attempting to access abortion and are therefore unconstitutional.

The attorney general’s office argued that these provisions were not approved just to protect the safety of the mother. They were also enacted to advance the state’s interest in promoting and protecting fetal life, one state attorney said at the hearing. The burden of proof lies on the plaintiffs, the attorney said, as the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Casey v. Planned Parenthood allows the state to enact laws that advance its interest in protecting fetal life, so long as it does not create an undue burden on the patient. The court could not overturn the provisions in whole, the state’s attorney argued, because a severability clause in the law requires doctors and patients who believe their constitutional rights have been violated by the law to individually seek exclusion from its provisions.

The state’s attorneys also argued it was not possible to prove — as the plaintiffs allege in the case — that one in three abortion facilities would not be able to perform abortions or that 22,000 women would be prevented from accessing the service until the law took effect.

Yeakel recognized the divisiveness of the issue and said he expects whichever side is disappointed with his ruling to appeal the decision, probably all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. “I would be shocked if whoever was displeased by my ruling did not appeal,” he said.

The lawsuit was filed less than a month ago. You can see all the relevant information about the lawsuit here. I don’t really have much to add to this. We know what the stakes are, and we know where this is going. In the end, what will ultimately make a difference is winning more elections. Remind yourself of that every day between now and next November. If you like following this sort of story on Twitter, the hashtags #FightBackTX and HB2 are for you. You might also want to follow the likes of @andreagrimes; @RHRealityCheck; @scATX, the handle for Jessica Luther; and @ReproRights, the Center for Reproductive Rights, who is leading the litigation. Their press release is here, and there’s more from RH Reality Check, BOR, Think Progress, and the Chron.

Posted in Legal matters | Tagged abortion, Center for Reproductive Rights, Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, Greg Abbott, lawsuit, Planned Parenthood, SCOTUS, special session, Texas, The Lege, Travis County | 1 Comment

Chron overview of District I

Posted on October 22, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

The Chron covers the District I race.

CM James Rodriguez

The contrasts in this eastside, heavily-Latino council district are dramatic: from the gleaming George R. Brown Convention Center in the heart of downtown, to older neighborhoods lacking modern street drainage where vacant lots become clandestine dump sites.

Four candidates are campaigning to represent a historic slice of central Houston they all agree has both huge potential and a long list of improvements. The near completion of a multimillion-dollar extension of Metro’s light rail passenger line into the district holds the promise of increased economic development, as well as an anticipated influx of travelers who will use the $156 million international terminal under construction at William Hobby Airport.

Demographics explain some of the challenges facing District I and its 180,000 residents.

The average household income of $36,900 annually is $6,000 lower than the citywide average of $42,960. Educational attainment, while improving, is still low with 45 percent of residents lacking a high school diploma. The district is 77 percent Hispanic, the highest concentration of Latinos in any of the council districts, and, not surprisingly, Spanish is the primary language in 68 percent of the homes.

The incumbent, James Rodriguez, is term-limited. The election is Nov. 5.

The ballot features a longtime community worker/activist turned county jailer, a City Council aide with a decade of experience in the district office, and a private businessman with years of managing large city and school district building projects. Rounding out the race is a grass-roots candidate, who polled a surprising 35 percent of the vote against the well-financed incumbent in the 2011 election.

I interviewed all four candidates in this race – Robert Gallegos, Graci Garces, Ben Mendez, Leticia Ablaza. All but Ablaza also did at least one Q&A with Texpatriate or Texas Leftist; you can find those links on my 2013 Election page. The Chron endorsed Garces in the race.

I found the comment about Ablaza and her “surprising” 35% against CM Rodriguez in 2011 to be interesting. As we know, 2011 was a pretty good year to run against an incumbent Council member, as two of them lost and three others at the citywide level (Mayor Parker, CM Costello, CM Noriega) were re-elected with 55% or less. In all these cases, the incumbent had multiple opponents, so even though the not-incumbent vote was 45% or more, it was split multiple ways, often among candidates with minimal resources. A possibly useful comparison is in District H, where like CM Rodriguez, CM Ed Gonzalez had a lone opponent. Here’s how those races compared:


Dist  Candidate      Votes     Pct
==================================
H     E Gonzalez     4,347  68.24%
H     P Rodriguez    2,023  31.76%

I     J Rodriguez    4,050  64.46%
I     L Ablaza       2,233  35.54%

So Patricia Rodriguez, who as far as I could tell in 2011 ran no campaign and raised $500 on the one finance report she filed, received 31.76% of the vote. Leticia Ablaza, who did run a campaign and who raised over $7,500 on the two reports she filed, received 35.54%. You tell me if that qualifies as a surprise. I will further note that neither CM Rodriguez nor CM Gonzalez had an opponent in November 2009 (CM Gonzalez of course won a special election in a June 2009 runoff to succeed now-Sheriff Adrian Garcia), but the undervote in each case (see page 6) was 36.52% for Gonzalez and 37.56% for Rodriguez. Again, you tell me what it all means.

To put this all another way, suppose there had been a third candidate in District I in 2011, and suppose that candidate had been of the no-name, no-campaign variety. How do you think the final outcome would have differed? Would you expect it to be something like 65-33-2, 63-35-2, 65-25-10, 55-35-10, or something else? I’ll say this much – if Leticia Ablaza matches her 2011 percentage, she’s not just a lock for the runoff, she’s almost surely leading the pack. I think that’s certainly possible, but I have no idea how likely it is. We’ll know soon enough.

Posted in Election 2013 | Tagged Ben Mendez, District H, District I, Ed Gonzalez, Election 2009, Election 2011, Election 2013, Graci Garces, Houston, Houston City Council, James Rodriguez, Leticia Ablaza, Patricia Rodriguez, Robert Gallegos | 5 Comments

Interview with Zeph Capo

Posted on October 21, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

Zeph Capo

Early voting starts today, and so this is my last week of presenting interviews. The last frontier is the HCC Board of Trustees, and I have two interviews, both in District 1 where scandal-marred incumbent Yolanda Navarro Flores faces two opponents. First up is Zeph Capo. Capo is a former classroom teacher who is now vice-president and legislative director for the Houston Federation of Teachers and a national trainer for the American Federation of Teachers. He has also served on the HISD Career and Technology Advisory Committee, HISD Alternative Certification Program Advisory Committee, and Greater Houston Partnership Higher Education Committee, among others. He is also active in the HCDP, serving as SDEC Executive Committee member for Senate District 15. Here’s the interview:

Zeph Capo interview

You can see all of my interviews as well as finance reports and other information on candidates on my 2013 Election page.

Posted in Election 2013 | Tagged Election 2013, HCC, Houston, interviews, Zeph Capo | Comments Off

Early voting starts today

Posted on October 21, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

Today we arrive at the more action-oriented part of the election cycle, in which voting actually happens. Early voting starts today and runs through next Friday, November 1. Here’s the schedule and map of locations for Harris County. Check with your County Clerk or Election Administrator for locations elsewhere. Hours for early voting this Monday through Friday are 8 to 4:30, and next week will be 7 AM to 7 PM.

As you know, I like to track the daily early voting numbers, to get a feel for who might be voting and what final turnout might look like. My last daily EV total post from 2011 is the reference point for the start of early voting this year. For your convenience, here are daily totals from previous years:

2011
2009
2007

I’m sure I will come back to these links frequently. In the meantime, feel free to make your guesses about turnout, results, or whatever else you’d like to prognosticate on in the comments.

Of course the big difference this year is that the voter ID law is currently in effect. Litigation is ongoing – I’ll have a separate post on where that stands later this week – but as there were no motions filed for an injunction or restraining order against it for this November election, you will need to bring the kind of ID the state has mandated with you. Got ID Texas is a great resource for that, and Sen. Leticia Van de Putte wrote a good guide to the law, mirrored on BOR. A press release from the Harris County Clerk is beneath the fold. If there’s one message you need to take from this, it’s that no matter what they tell you, CAST YOUR VOTE! If they tell you that you need to bring ID later on to (in Harris County’s case) a Tax Assessor’s office so your vote will not be considered provisional, do it. But under no circumstances should you walk away without voting, and if anyone tells you otherwise, call the County Clerk, the Secretary of State, and if you’re a Democrat the HCDP to let them know about it.

We don’t know what the effect of the voter ID law will be on turnout and composition of the electorate. One thing I know I’ll be watching for is the amount and location of provisional votes. I believe one reason why there wasn’t an injunction sought against the voter ID law was that the plaintiffs wanted to see what those numbers looked like, too. Maybe this will turn out to be less of a big deal than we fear, and maybe it will be worse. One way or another, we’ll find out.

So go forth and vote. If you do vote today, please leave a comment telling us where you voted, how crowded it was, and what your observations were regarding voter ID enforcement. Happy voting!

Continue reading →

Posted in Election 2013 | Tagged early voting, Election 2007, Election 2009, Election 2011, Election 2013, Harris County, Harris County Clerk, Harris County Tax Assessor, Houston, lawsuit, Leticia Van De Putte, Secretary of State, turnout, voter ID | Comments Off

Third public meeting for I-45 widening

Posted on October 21, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

From the I-45 Coalition, via the inbox:

TxDOT is starting to roll again on the I-45 project!

TxDOT has just scheduled the 3^rd round of public meetings to be held Thursday, Nov 14 at Aldine Ninth Grade School, 10650 North Freeway & Tuesday, Nov 19 at Jeff Davis High School, 1101 Quitman. Both meetings will be open house format from 5:30 pm to 7:30 pm.

As a brief recap to remind you where we are … because it has been a while:

TxDOT wants to ‘improve’ the I-45 Corridor to alleviate current traffic and plan for future traffic.

1)      TxDOT held its 1st Public Scoping meeting in November 2011 to hear from the public on what to do in the I-45 corridor.

After analyzing the input from the public from that meeting:

2)      TxDOT held its 2nd Public Scoping meeting in October 2012. TxDOT broke the project into 3 segments: Segment 1 (Beltway 8 to 610); Segment 2 (610 to I-10); and Segment 3 (Downtown Loop System).

Each segment had 6 Preliminary Alternatives for a total of 18 alternatives for all 3 segments. TxDOT was to determine the 3 most popular alternatives for each segment (for a total of 9) from evaluating the responses from the public.

Supposedly, “Within 2 months following each meeting, a report from TxDOT summarizing public comments and responses will be made available to the public”.

After the 1st Public meeting, it took 10 months for the public comments to be available. After the 2^nd Public Meeting, it took TxDOT a full year to post the comments .. it just went up this week!

TxDOT has also just announced the 3^rd Public Meeting in November 2013 (mentioned above).

3) This 3rd Public Meeting – is where they will announce the 3 alternatives for each segment (for a total of 9) and we, the public, will choose the final “winner” in each segment. So this is a VERY IMPORTANT MEETING! The results from this meeting will determine how & where the I-45 corridor will proceed! Please mark your calendars now & plan to attend in November! I do not know which 3 alternatives in each segment received the most favorable input at this time. However, within the next 30 days, the I-45 Coalition will be evaluating all comments to determine which alternatives appear to be most favored.

You can find all the details of the 1^st Public Meeting & the 2^nd Public Meeting on TxDOT’s website for this project – www.IH45Northandmore.com.

PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE plan on attending either of the two upcoming meetings (they both should be identical) so you can (1) hear firsthand from TxDOT what they say are the 3 favored alternatives in each segment & (2) make an informed decision as to what you feel should be the final alternative!

If you made a comment & submitted it to TxDOT after the 2^nd Public meeting, I would suggest that you check to make sure your comment is ‘on the record’, by going to TxDOT’s website & checking. All comments are indexed, so it should be easy to find. If it is not recorded, or not accurate, please let me know.

If you are not on the I-45 Coalition email list, please add your name by going to www.I-45Coalition.org and sign up. You can also find us on Facebook. Once on our list, we will notify you of any updates, meetings or changes to the project. Also if you would like to attend our Steering Committee meetings, just let us know!

Please get involved and/or stay involved! This is important. These decisions will affect you, your family, your home or business & your neighborhood. If you ever use I-45 or have any concerns about what will or will not be done on I-45 … you need to be involved!

See here for the most recent update, which was a year ago. As always, if you can make it to these meetings, please do so.

Posted in Planes, Trains, and Automobiles | Tagged activism, construction, Houston, I-45, TxDOT | 1 Comment

Endorsement watch: For the joint processing center

Posted on October 21, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

An easy call.

[V]oters should consider themselves fortunate that they can easily cut $25 million in unnecessary spending from the city’s annual budget by voting for the Joint Processing Center on Election Day.

The overlapping criminal justice duties of Houston and Harris County have been the target of the good governance crowd for several years, but the time is finally right to end this duplication of services. The once-combative relationship between the county and city has turned into a cooperative swoon. Both sides are ready to let the experts at the Harris County Sheriff’s Office deal with prisoners and give the sheriff a facility that fits the needs of a changing culture in criminal justice. It is a deal that benefits everyone, especially taxpayers.

The new processing center would let Houston close its jails and send prisoners directly to the county, freeing up police officers to patrol the streets. Most of those prisoners already could be sent to the county under the law. The remaining folks would either stay in the new processing center’s 72-hour beds for Class C misdemeanors or the city’s new sobering center for public intoxication cases.

[…]

Voters in 2007 and 2009 rejected similar initiatives for a central processing center, scared off by sticker shock and the prospect of adding even more jail cells. The county and city have learned from their past errors, and this year’s bond proposal costs less than half of the 2009 plan, with only additional short-term beds.

The $70 million bond for the Joint Processing Center is a smart investment, eliminating unnecessary overlap between the city and county. It sets city-county relations in the right direction. We hope to soon see our courts get on the right track, as well.

I’ve got an interview with County Judge Ed Emmett set to run on Wednesday in which he says he isn’t aware of any opposition to this proposition. For good reason, I think – it’s a win all around, probably why it polls well. The Chron suggests that maybe the presence of this center will encourage greater use of personal recognizance bonds. I don’t know if the judges will make that connection or not, but this is worth supporting regardless.

Posted in Election 2013 | Tagged bail, bond referendum, Ed Emmett, Election 2013, Harris County, Harris County Sheriff, Houston, jails | 1 Comment

Weekend link dump for October 20

Posted on October 20, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

I’m old enough to remember when people inserted random words on Usenet posts in a (joking?) attempt to confuse NSA surveillance routines. The past is never dead…

Cheating the lines at Disneyland is now harder to do.

Dodos apparently lasted longer than we once thought.

Kids today, and their online-TV-watching ways.

That probably isn’t a spider bite that’s bothering you.

Celebrity Gymnastics, because sure, why not.

RIP, Joseph Gomer, Tuskegee Airman.

We need better government IT, which means we need to be willing to pay for it.

Don’t blame Washington, DC for all the crazy people that get sent there by the voters.

Nerd overload.

Thanks for breaking the Constitution, teabaggers.

From the How Quickly They Forget files.

And from the Some Things, Sadly, Never Change department.

“[T]here has been a movement under way for some years among right-wing economists and activists not merely to default on the debt, but even to repudiate it.”

I still don’t get the smart watch thing. We all understand that a two-way wrist radio is just a portable speakerphone, right? Imagine how much more annoying those public cellphone conversations will be.

“The plain fact is that those who have paralyzed government over the Affordable Care Act today feed at the trough of government health-care subsidies, while seeking to exclude others from sharing the bounty. This is simple selfishness in action.”

They’re coming for your birth control. Never forget that.

Mazel tov, Abby and Sarah! May you have many happy years together.

Credit where credit is due: Charles Krauthammer makes a simple yet effective point in service of a good cause.

“There is no serious argument for Republican governance right now, even if you prefer conservative policies over liberal ones. These people are just too dangerously incompetent to be trusted with power.”

Why do asthma inhalers cost so much?

What Ta-Nehisi says.

Judge Richard Posner regrets his decision to uphold Indiana’s voter ID law. Better late than never, I guess.

“I don’t know where the next dollars are coming from. It was like they ignored us, like they don’t care, like we don’t exist.”

Really racist political cartoons. Many are from long ago, but some are not. Some of them, wow. If Pat Oliphant is still drawing a paycheck from any newspaper or syndicate in America, we should all be ashamed.

RIP, Tom Foley, former Speaker of the House.

If we must start up with the tedious “grand bargain” stuff again, can we at least talk about this kind of “grand bargain”? Thanks.

Posted in Blog stuff | Tagged linkdump | Comments Off

RIP, Bum Phillips

Posted on October 20, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

A sad day in Houston.

Oail Andrew “Bum” Phillips Jr., who spent half his adult life as a football coach and every waking moment as the personification of all things Texan, died Friday at his ranch in Goliad.

Phillips was three weeks past his 90th birthday and more than three decades removed from his heyday as head coach of the Oilers from 1975 through 1980. But he will be remembered as the personification of a time, a place and a team that remains deep in the hearts of everyone who saw them play.

The end came on a cool autumn football weekend as Houston’s current pro team, the Texans, prepares to play Sunday with his son, Wade, serving as defensive coordinator. Family members said Wade Phillips visited with his father before rejoining the team for its trip to Kansas City.

“Bum is gone to Heaven-loved and will be missed by all -great Dad,Coach, and Christian,” Wade Phillips, whose Twitter handle is @sonofbum, tweeted shortly after 10 p.m.

Bum Phillips was a product of a family that traced its roots to Texas’ frontier past, and he did his job dressed in boots, jeans and a white Stetson – except at the Astrodome, since his mama told him it was impolite to wear a hat indoors.

He was, said one admirer, the “Will Rogers of the NFL,” justly famous for such sayings as, “There’s two kinds of coaches: them that’s been fired, and them that’s gonna be fired.”

But it was his relationship with his players – and theirs to him – and his ability to relate to fans that cemented his place among the legends of Texas football coaches with the likes of Darrell Royal, Tom Landry and Gordon Wood.

“Bum Phillips’ Oilers succeeded in a way that will never be measured by percentages and trophies,” wrote former Chronicle columnist Ed Fowler in a book about the team. “They symbolized a city rather than merely representing it.”

They called it “Luv Ya Blue,” and from 1978 through 1980, it was the biggest thing in Houston sports. In truth, the city has not seen anything to top it.

There’s a ton more out there – here, here, here, and here for starters, but if you only read one other thing about Bum Phillips, make it Dale Robertson’s column, which includes many of Phillips’ famous quotes. Sometimes, sports icons don’t live up to their billing. Sometimes you find out, often years later, that they weren’t at all the person you thought they were from what you’d seen and heard. If anyone had anything bad to say about Bum Phillips, I’ve not seen it. By every account I’ve come across, he was exactly who he seemed to be. He will be missed. Rest in peace, Bum Phillips.

Posted in Other sports | Tagged Astrodome, Bum Phillips, football, Houston, Houston Oilers, NFL, obituaries | Comments Off

Chron overview of Controller’s race

Posted on October 20, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

It’s an interesting race.

City Controller Ronald Green

On paper, City Controller Ron Green would appear to have been ripe for a bevy of challengers in November.

The city’s elected financial watchdog owes tens of thousands of dollars to the IRS, was criticized for lavish spending while on trips for city business and has publicized ties to a known felon.

Yet, those issues have hardly been discussed by his sole opponent, Bill Frazer, during Green’s campaign for a third and final term.

Instead, the two men have debated qualifications. Frazer, a first-time candidate for any office, argues that despite four years in office, Green does not have the financial background to do the job.

“I don’t think it’s going to do me any good to drag that up now,” Frazer said of Green’s previously publicized troubles. “I think it will take focus off the race. I’m more focused in on what needs to get done.”

Green contends his personal finances and the other issues raised during his first two terms are irrelevant, saying he already has addressed the concerns publicly and is making payments to the IRS.

“I’m proud of the fact that someone else with financial knowledge is even interested in the office, because I do believe it is a very valuable office,” Green said.

My interview with Controller Ronald Green is here, and with Bill Frazer is here. Both also did Texpatriate Q&As, here and here. The Chron endorsed Frazer. As I’ve said, I think this race is Green’s to lose – Frazer has run a creditable race, but I don’t think he’s well known enough to win. What are your thoughts? If you support Frazer, have you voted for Green in the past? Leave a comment and let us know.

Posted in Election 2013 | Tagged Bill Frazer, Election 2013, Houston, Houston City Controller, Ronald Green | 2 Comments

Let’s not get the private high speed rail line bogged down in politics

Posted on October 20, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

I’m always interested in stories about the Texas high speed rail line.

The company, Texas Central High-Speed Railway, drew attention last year when it announced plans to develop a high-speed rail line without public subsidies. Texas transportation officials took the project seriously, noting the pedigree of the investors: Japanese financiers behind a profitable bullet train line in Japan. Interest has only increased in recent months as the company has added former Texas Rangers president Tom Schieffer and Peter Cannito, former president of the New York-based MTA Metro-North Railroad, as senior advisers.

At the recent Texas Tribune Festival, Texas Central High-Speed Railway President Robert Eckels provided new details about the timeline for the company’s plans.

“We expect to go out in the field after the first of the year with our notice of intent and our environmental impact statement,” said Eckels, a former state legislator and Harris County judge.

[…]

While Republicans may favor the company’s free-market focus, that doesn’t mean the project won’t be completely free of public costs. During this year’s legislative sessions, some lawmakers opposed the allocation of any new transportation resources unless they were dedicated to road construction and maintenance.

“We don’t want operations subsidies,” Eckels said. “We do need regulatory help. We may need help with infrastructure relating to our project.”

Democrats may find themselves questioning whether low-income Texans will be priced out of the service if tickets are priced to cover expenses and make a profit without subsidies.

And both Democrats and Republicans may feel a sense of déjà vu as they draw questions about whether Texas Central High-Speed Railway should be permitted to acquire private Texans’ property. Though the firm hopes to develop most of the line along current freight line rights-of-way, Eckels acknowledged that those won’t cover the entire route. The idea of a foreign-backed private company employing eminent domain for a major transportation project could draw comparisons to the Trans-Texas Corridor, a political headache of a project that lawmakers had to repeatedly declare dead in order to appease angry voters.

See here and here for some background. I think it would be a useful debate to have about operations subsidies for inter-city rail transit like this. Given the tens of billions we are told we need to spend to ensure sufficient road capacity for our growing state, it may well be the case that building and partially subsidizing the operation of a bunch of rail lines is no more expensive and more scalable. For better or worse, we’re not going to have that debate, and as a private venture like the Texas Central High-Speed Railway is likely to be the only kind of rail we get built here, I’m happy to see it make progress towards that goal. I hope the Legislature will be open to hearing what Texas Central needs, and finds a sensible way to work with them to overcome obstacles. It is possible, maybe likely, there will be some Trans-Texas Corridor-style backlash against this, but I’m reasonably optimistic there won’t be. Texas Central is an idea that originated in the private sector rather than with Rick Perry, and from what I’ve seen they’ve been engaging with locals, whereas the TTC was basically an edict from above. There is a foreign company involved so there’s always room for paranoia, but this project is much smaller in scope and shouldn’t require that much in the way of right-of-way acquisition. We’ll see if that makes a difference. By the way, speaking of foreign companies, it is my understanding that Central Japan Railway Company, referenced in this linked story is not an investor in Texas Central High-Speed Railway. The two are cooperating in this effort, but one does not have a direct financial stake in the other. Whether that will have an effect on public and/or legislative opinion of this I couldn’t say, but we should at least all be clear on the facts.

Posted in Planes, Trains, and Automobiles | Tagged Central Japan Railway, high speed rail, Robert Eckels, Texas, Texas Central High-Speed Railway, The Lege, Trans Texas Corridor | Comments Off

Endorsement watch: For Calvert

Posted on October 20, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

The Chron’s second endorsement on Friday, and what should be their last for the regular election, was for Rogene Calvert in At Large #3.

Rogene Gee Calvert

Experience is valuable on Houston City Council. Council members often spend their first two-year term learning the basics of job: Figuring out who the players are, learning how various departments and budgets work and getting a handle on knotty problems such as the pension mess. By the time that council members really understand how things work, they’ve served six years and are term-limited out of office.

Rogene Gee Calvert, running for At-Large Position 3, wouldn’t face that learning curve. She already knows her way around City Hall. She served as a director of volunteers under Mayor Bill White, steering the massive volunteer efforts that surrounded Katrina, and was chief of staff for former council member Gordon Quan.

Right off the bat, she’d be ready to get more bang for taxpayer bucks. Houston, she says, should eliminate redundancy by combining services and sharing buildings with entities such as Harris County, Houston Independent School District and METRO. And the city needs to do a better job of getting state and federal grants.

[…]

Calvert is uniquely ready to get to work, and to tackle a broad range of issues. She’d make a great city council member. Vote for Calvert.

As you know, I’ve been critical of the Chron in years past for being lackadaisical about endorsements. They do seem to do better in odd-numbered years, and this year they got them all done before the start of early voting. Kudos for that. As for this endorsement, Calvert is indeed a strong candidate in a deep field – really, most of the races this year have multiple good choices; nobody should be complaining about picking among nonentities or least-of-evils this year. My interview with Rogene Gee Calvert is here. I encourage you to listen to all the interviews I did with At Large #3 candidates, for which links are on my 2013 Election page. Four of the six candidates also did Q&As with Texpatriate and one with Texas Leftist, and those links are there as well.

One more thing:

In a strong field of competitors, Roland Chavez, a retired City of Houston firefighter, also stands out. Our city desperately needs to renegotiate its unsustainable pension deal with firefighters, and Chavez, who used to represent the firefighters’ union in those negotiations, could bring useful insights.

In my interviews, Chavez was one of a small number of candidates to specifically say they opposed Mayor Parker’s efforts to get legislation passed that would subject the firefighters’ pension fund to meet and confer requirements. Given the Chron’s obsession with pensions and their tireless efforts to bend the local legislative delegation to their will, I find that a most curious thing for them to say. Perhaps, to paraphrase Paul Simon, they hear what they want to hear and disregard the rest. Greg has more.

Posted in Election 2013 | Tagged At Large #3, Election 2013, endorsements, HFD, HFRRF, Houston, Houston City Council, pension fund, Rogene Calvert, Roland Chavez | Comments Off

Saturday video break: Happy anniversary

Posted on October 19, 2013 by Charles Kuffner

Old school anniversary celebration:

And hey, look: A cover version!

Nothing like a rousing anniversary song, is there?

Posted in Music | Tagged television, videos | Comments Off

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