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Pretta Stallworth

I don’t see any issue with HCC campaign contributions and the Maldonado vote

Mar 7th, 2023
by Charles Kuffner.
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I appreciate the reporting in this story, but ultimately I think it’s a nothingburger.

The four trustees who voted to extend Houston Community College Chancellor Cesar Maldonado’s contract received a combined $78,000 in campaign donations from a political action committee whose chair was found expressing interest in the renewal effort, according to records obtained by the Houston Chronicle.

Questions have arisen about the potential involvement of Jonathan Day from the Houston Business Education Coalition, after a voicemail recording surfaced where a man identifying himself as Day asked to speak to Chairwoman Cynthia Lenton-Gary about the issue.

Maldonado’s contract extension still failed, with five trustees – including Lenton-Gary – voting Wednesday against re-signing. (Lenton-Gary’s available campaign finance filings do not show any contributions from the PAC.)

“I’d be very interested in talking with you briefly about the pending issues with the renewal of the chancellor’s current arrangement with the college,” Day, naming himself as the chair of the coalition, said in the voicemail. “Please give me a call at your convenience.”

The recording signaled a more drawn-out fight over Maldonado’s contract than was previously known: Conversations about the pending deal had largely taken place behind closed doors in executive session. But several administrative problems in Maldonado’s nine years as chancellor were part of the fight. Two of the trustees who voted against the renewal afterward cited steep declines in admission as well as lawsuits brought under the chancellor’s tenure – including one alleging discrimination against Black employees – as some of their personal reasons for opposing his continued leadership.

Trustees Monica Flores Richart, Eva L. Loredo, Charlene Ward Johnson and Adriana Tamez voted in favor of the extension. While they each reported campaign contributions from the business education PAC, all four denied financial influence in their decision making. Day also denied any ethical conflict occurred.

“We’re people who pay taxes, we have an interest in the performance of the college,” Day said in a phone interview. “That’s materially affected by the selection of the chancellor, the chief executive officer. We of course have an interest in that. I think it would be very disappointing if the business community here in Houston was not vitally involved in that kind of a matter at the college.”

[…]

The five trustees who voted against Maldonado’s contract extension did not offer any reasons immediately after the Wednesday vote, nor did the chancellor react. He did not respond to requests for comment.

In a letter issued to the HCC community, however, Maldonado cited several gains in student achievement and building a financial reserve of $256 million as some of his biggest accomplishments.

“I am proud of my service as chancellor of HCC and of the many accomplishments, awards, and recognitions we have achieved together since May 2014,” Maldonado said. “The best is yet to come and we must all keep advancing the institution’s goals – keeping true to our North Star, the ultimate student experience, which shines bright and guides us from good to great in every aspect of our college’s service.”

But in separate phone calls, two trustees pointed to a number of management issues in Maldonado’s administration as their reasons for voting ‘no.’ One of those is a systemwide decline in enrollment, with more than 12,000 students lost between fall 2019 and fall 2020 – although system officials say they expect more than 30-percent increase in enrollment growth through 2035.

“I voted not to renew chancellor’s contract because of the precipitous decline in enrollment, underperforming campuses, poor fiscal management, absence of a turnaround plan and an astounding number of lawsuits involving current and former personnel,” District IV Trustee Reagan Flowers said. “I fundamentally believe that we need to move this institution in a new forward direction under different leadership.”

One of those lawsuits is seeking $100 million from the system. Filed in 2020 on behalf of hundreds of current and former Black employees, the suit alleges that 90 percent of the longtime black professionals at the community college have either been terminated or demoted since Maldonado arrived, compared with 10 percent of white employees who have been displaced. Hispanic hires and promotions, however, have increased by 50 percent, according to court documents.

The plaintiff’s attorneys also claim that Maldonado used a list of tactics to undermine and get rid of black employees, including padding their personnel files with false complaints to be used as reasons to fire them, using the word “transformation” as a code word for getting rid of black employees, placing doubt on black employees’ claims, and forcing black employees to take leaves of absence without cause in order to use those as grounds for termination.

[…]

Several of the trustees with donations from the PAC said they took issue with any claims that their votes were cast under financial influences. Richart said she received many perspectives and opinions on the matter of Maldonado’s contract, but the decision was hers alone.

“As a Trustee bound by law, ethics rules, HCC bylaws and policies, and my own moral code, I made this decision, as I have all other decisions as Trustee, based on the best interest of the College,” she said. “To suggest otherwise is an insult to not only me, but each one of my colleagues who have received campaign contributions from individuals and groups who care about the future of HCC and Houston.”

See here for the background. It’s very easy to slide into whataboutism when arguing about the ethics of campaign contributions, so let me just say that I found the case for possible shenanigans here to be unpersuasive. You can feel however you want to feel about Mr. Day and his PAC – I’d have to take a deeper look at their donation history, but it would not surprise me if I viewed them unfavorably, given the context. Lobbyists lobby, it’s what they do. That includes lobbyists for causes and organizations that most of us here support. As far as this example goes, put me down as in agreement with what Trustee Richart says.

The thing here is that there’s a perfectly good case for casting either vote on this matter. I thought it made sense to move on from Chancellor Maldonado, for reasons mostly in line with those of Trustee Flowers. Against that, it’s clear that he did a lot of good work – read the comments on my previous post for a strong defense of Maldonado – and retained the confidence of a significant portion of the HCC community. I don’t see any reason at this time to doubt the sincerity of anyone’s vote. I’m happy to have this phone call come to light – more sunlight, please do bring it on – I just don’t think it made any difference. If there’s more evidence out there to suggest otherwise, let’s hear it. For now, I have no issues with what happened.

January 2023 campaign finance reports: HCC

Feb 9th, 2023
by Charles Kuffner.
Comments are off for this post

Previously: City of Houston, Harris County, HISD

As with HISD, I last checked in on HCC Trustee campaign finance reports was last January. Three of these people will be on the ballot if they all run again, but we’ll see about that.

Monica Flores Richart – Dist 1
Charlene Ward Johnson – Dist 2
Adriana Tamez – Dist 3
Reagan Flowers – Dist 4
Robert Glaser – Dist 5
Dave Wilson – Dist 6
Cynthia Lenton-Gary – Dist 7
Eva Loredo – Dist 8
Pretta VanDible Stallworth – Dist 9


Dist  Candidate     Raised      Spent     Loan     On Hand
==========================================================
1       Richart          0          0        0       2,608
2       Johnson      1,585      2,781    5,000       1,196
3         Tamez          0        127        0      10,980
4       Flowers          0        991        0       2,199
5        Glaser          0          0    4,000       8,292
6        Wilson          0          0        0           0
7   Lenton-Gary          0          0        0           0
8        Loredo          0      1,427    7,000       4,777
9    Stallworth          0          0        0           0

Reagan Flowers, Robert Glaser, and Pretta VanDible Stallworth are the Trustees whose terms are up this year. Glaser is the interesting case, given the lawsuit alleging sexual harassment against him. I still don’t know where that stands despite the previous agenda item to discuss a possible settlement. HCC campaigns are small dollar and low profile, so it’s not like he’d face months of having his name dragged through the mud if he runs again. But he still might decide to go away quietly, because who needs this trouble? It could go either way.

Charlene Ward Johnson, who won a special election runoff last June to fill the remainder of Rhonda Skillern-Jones’ term, is the only person to raise any money in the last six months. Glaser’s cash on hand total is exactly the same as it was in last January’s report, meaning he has neither raised nor spent any money in the past year

Reagan Flowers closed out her state campaign finance account after her unsuccessful run for HD147, so she doesn’t have any further funds at her disposal.

That’s it for the January finance reports. The July 2023 ones will tell us more about where the election is this year. Let me know what you think.

Chron story on HCC redistricting

Jan 27th, 2023
by Charles Kuffner.
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This focuses on one district, which seems to be the main and possibly only point of contention in the process. I’d like to know more than what was in this story.

Reagan Flowers

Houston Community College trustee Reagan Flowers had to receive special permission to hold a forum last week at Emancipation Park because it’s not in her district, but she and many other Third Ward community members think it should be.

Ten years after HCC last redistricted and divided Third Ward between two tracts, Flowers is trying to put the historic, majority-Black neighborhood squarely back into District 4. She faces an uphill battle, as other trustees would see changes to their own districts if Third Ward is pieced back together.

HCC’s District 4 currently represents the Medical Center, Museum District, Sunnyside and Third Ward’s south part. The northernmost part was absorbed into its eastern neighbor, District 3, in the last redistricting, Flowers said.

“It’s caused this divide where we can’t speak with one voice when it comes to Houston Community College,” she said. “That doesn’t necessarily support the culture, the history of Third Ward.”

District 3, which encompasses parts of east and southeast Houston, counted the lowest population among HCC districts in 2010 and 2020. Districts have to be redrawn when the population of the most populous district — now District 4, in west Houston — exceeds the population of the least populous district by more than 10 percent, based on the most recent major Census updates.

HCC’s first proposal for redistricting, based on the 2020 U.S. Census, mostly left District 4 alone. Still, community members hoping to regain the northern part of Third Ward face resistance because a change would cause them to shed another part of their district — and District 3 is already looking for more space to expand in order to balance the district populations.

[…]

Third Ward residents have long lamented a pattern of division in their neighborhood. The Museum District, Midtown and what is now East Downtown were formerly considered Third Ward.

HCC appears to be the only governing body that splits Third Ward — and in doing so excludes some of their most well-known spots, including Jack Yates High School, Emancipation Park, Cuney Homes and Project Row Houses.

While HISD, City Hall and Houston Super Neighborhoods currently keep Third Ward intact, some worry HCC’s current and proposed maps could set a precedent for others to follow their lead.

“It’s dangerous ground,” said Flowers, whose term expires at the end of the year. “What’s happening with HCC and District 3 is very disrespectful to the Black community and the Third Ward, and it doesn’t have to be.”

See here and here for the background. I wish the story had included comments from other Trustees as well, especially District 3 Trustee Adriana Tamez, since moving the Third Ward back into District 4 would have a big effect on her. If you look at all of the maps that have been proposed (downloadable PDF), any significant changes to Districts 3 and 4 would also affect District 9, and so it would have been nice for the story to have a comment from its Trustee, Pretta VanDible Stallworth, as well.

I had the chance to talk to Trustee Flowers about this. She told me that Plan 2C, which you can find on page 31 of that PDF, accomplishes what she is advocating, but she does not currently have the support to get it passed. Map 1, which is in that presentation and also viewable here, is the one that is set to pass. But there’s still time, and if this is something you care about, you can contact your Trustee and let them know it. The public hearing on the redistricting proposal will be February 15, as noted before.

As I said about HISD redistricting, I don’t think anyone is trying to screw the Third Ward here. The fact is that Harris County’s population is shifting westward you can see the demographic data in that PDF download – and District 3 is in need of more population. Moving the Third Ward out of 3 increases that need, and that has to come from somewhere, which affects more people. Redistricting is always nuanced and multi-dimensional, and in the end it’s zero-sum. All you can do is make your case and do your best to minimize the negative effects on everyone involved.

A too-early look at who’s running for Houston city offices in 2023

Nov 26th, 2022
by Charles Kuffner.
2 comments

Because it’s never not election season.

With the midterm elections behind us, city election season is now heating up. Next November, Houston will elect a new mayor, a new controller and 16 City Council members.

The campaigns actually got underway long before the midterm elections were over. State Sen. John Whitmire, the longest serving member of the Texas Senate, announced his plans to run for mayor way back in November 2021. Chris Hollins, the former Harris County clerk, announced in February, and former City Councilmember Amanda Edwards launched her campaign in March.

Those announcements, and the millions of dollars the mayoral candidates collectively have raised for their bids so far, have set Houston off on its earliest start to campaign season to date.

As the candidates start making more public appearances and vying for voters’ attention, here’s your early primer on city elections, and who is running so far:

[…]

Mayor Sylvester Turner is serving out his second and final term, which means Houston will elect a new mayor in 2023. Voters also will decide 16 spots on City Council — 11 members representing geographic districts, and five members elected citywide in at-large seats — to round out the City Hall horseshoe.

City Controller Chris Brown also is term-limited, meaning the city will have a new controller as well. The controller is the city’s independently elected financial watchdog.

Six council members face term limits, meaning their seats will be open. Ten council members are eligible for re-election and presumably running.

They have a list of the Council members who are not term-limited, as well as a list of people who claim they are running for something at this time. We’ll get some idea of who is serious and who is just a name when the January finance reports come out. From past experience, nothing is truly set in stone until the filing deadline, and we’re a long way away from that.

One more name that is out there as a potential Mayoral candidate is former Metro chair Gilbert Garcia. Don’t be surprised to hear of other names, though at this point it’s not very likely there will be any more high-profile names.

The incumbent Council members who are term limited include Dave Martin (District E), Karla Cisneros (H), Robert Gallegos (I), Mike Knox (At Large #1), David Robinson (AL #2), and Michael Kubosh (AL #3). I expect there to be a lot of At Large candidates, assuming At Large seats are still a thing next November.

There are also races for HISD and HCC boards of trustees. In HISD, Kathy Blueford-Daniels (District II), Dani Hernandez (III), Patricia Allen (IV), and Judith Cruz (VIII) are up for re-election. In HCC, the candidates whose terms are up are Reagan Flowers (Distrct 4), Robert Glaser (5), and Pretta VanDible Stallworth (9). Glaser is under accusation of sexual harassment, and as such I have to think there’s a decent chance he’ll choose not to run again. That is 100% fact-free speculation on my part, so take it for what it’s worth.

This is the situation as it stands now. As I said, we’ll know more when we see the January finance reports. If you know of someone not listed in the Chron story who’s running for something next year, please let us know in the comments.

January 2022 campaign finance reports: HCC

Apr 1st, 2022
by Charles Kuffner.
Comments are off for this post

Previously: City of Houston, HISD

If HISD campaign finance reports are less sexy than city of Houston finance reports, then HCC finance reports are like HISD finance reports wearing thermal underwear. Nevertheless, we persist.

Monica Flores Richart – Dist 1
Adriana Tamez – Dist 3
Reagan Flowers – Dist 4
Robert Glaser – Dist 5
Dave Wilson – Dist 6
Cynthia Lenton-Gary – Dist 7
Eva Loredo – Dist 8
Pretta VanDible Stallworth – Dist 9


Dist  Candidate     Raised      Spent     Loan     On Hand
==========================================================
1       Richart          0          0        0       2,608
3         Tamez      9,775     15,040        0      12,641
4       Flowers      8,561     18,440        0       2,985
5        Glaser          0          0    4,000       8,292
6        Wilson          0     14,879        0           0
7   Lenton-Gary          0          0        0           0
8        Loredo     10,589      6,418    7,000       8,520
9    Stallworth          0          0        0           0

The July 2021 reports are here, and the 30 day reports for November are here. As you might expect, all the action comes from the trustees who were on the ballot in November.

Dave Wilson sigh is now listed in the HCC campaign finance reports system as “David Wilson”, which I’m pretty sure is new. I’d say for sure, but there are no past reports for him that I can find, even though he’d been a trustee before and has been a candidate for trustee many times. Every other incumbent has every single finance report for their time in office available through this interface, but not Wilson. I don’t know if this is because of a quirk in their reporting system that can’t handle trustee with discontinuous service time or if they just forgot that he used to be there. Either way this is all we get.

As is usually the case, Wilson doesn’t raise money, he just spends whatever he spends out of personal funds. He has normal looking expenditures for mail, yard signs, advertising, and campaign consulting. I guess because he was technically unopposed, he didn’t have to dip into his usual bag of tricks.

I didn’t spend much time looking at the other reports. About $15K of Reagan Flowers’ expenditures was a transfer to her state campaign account. Perhaps she’ll move some funds back now if she has them left over; we’ll see that in the next July report if so.

The next finance reports of interest will be for the special election in District 2 in May. I’ll check on those at the 30 day point. I will also have interviews with the candidates in that race the week after next.

July 2021 campaign finance reports: HCC

Aug 16th, 2021
by Charles Kuffner.
2 comments

PREVIOUSLY: Congress, Harris County, Houston, HISD

Last but not least, we have the HCC Trustees, three of whom are on this year’s ballot. HCC trustees serve six-year terms, so one-third of them are up each time around.

Monica Flores Richart – Dist 1
Rhonda Skillern-Jones – Dist 2
Adriana Tamez – Dist 3
Reagan Flowers – Dist 4
Robert Glaser – Dist 5
John Hansen – Dist 6
Cynthia Lenton-Gary – Dist 7
Eva Loredo – Dist 8
Pretta VanDible Stallworth – Dist 9


Dist  Candidate     Raised      Spent     Loan     On Hand
==========================================================
3         Tamez          0        127        0       2,694
6        Hansen          0          0    5,000       8,136
8        Loredo          0         76    7,000       2,731

1       Richart          0          0        0       2,608
2       S-Jones          0        198        0          27
4       Flowers     12,895      1,824        0      13,410
5        Glaser          0          0    5,000       8,292
7   Lenton-Gary          0          0        0           0
9    Stallworth          0          0        0           0

As with HISD, the table is separated by those who are on the ballot and those who are not. The search tool for their reports does include non-incumbent candidates when they are present, but at least as of when I checked there weren’t any. I’m told there’s at least one potential opponent for someone out there now, and I’m sure someone will post a link in the comments as they did for the HISD reports. I don’t have a good way of knowing about that situation, so I just limit myself to what I can reasonably know, and that’s who has filed what. (*)

And that means just the incumbents, and what they have filed doesn’t amount to much. Not a big surprise, as HCC trustee races are among the lowest-dollar races out there. Other than Reagan Flowers, no one raised a dime this past period. I’m sure things will look different on the 30-day reports, but for now this is what you’ve got. And that completes our tour of the July finance reports. Hope you’ve enjoyed it.

(*) As before, I should take this opportunity to note that I can claim some measure of credit for these reports being publicly available at all. Someday, when I am asked what I managed to do with my life, I will be able to include that on the ledger.

July 2018 campaign finance reports: HCC

Aug 22nd, 2018
by Charles Kuffner.
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We come to the end of the campaign finance reports for July. I’ll try to do the 30 day finance reports for Congress and the Lege, but in the meantime here are reports for the HCC Trustees:

Adriana Tamez
Carolyn Evans-Shabazz
Dave Wilson
Eva Loredo
John Hansen
Neeta Sane
Pretta VanDible Stallworth
Robert Glaser
Zeph Capo


Dist  Name             Raised    Spent    Loans   On Hand
=========================================================
3     Tamez                 0      267        0     5,701
4     Evans-Shabazz     5,600    4,134        0     1,653
2     Wilson                0        0   12,782         0
8     Loredo              700       70        0       255
6     Hansen                2        0    5,000     8,928
7     Sane                  0    3,823        0    11,319
9     Stallworth       14,175    2,758        0         0
5     Glaser                0        0    5,000     1,125
1     Capo                  0        0        0     2,064

The weird order to the reports is due to the idiosyncratic way that one accesses HCC finance reports – basically, things are sorted in alphabetical order by first name, so that’s how I prepared this. Sorry, even I have limits. As was the case with the HISD reports, there hasn’t been much fundraising activity for HCC, which isn’t that surprising given that there usually isn’t that much fundraising activity even when there are elections coming up. The main thing you need to know is that 2019 is the year we get the chance to rid ourselves of the stain that is Dave Wilson. Zeph Capo and Neeta Sane will also be on the ballot, but the race that matters is in District 2. Wilson spends his own money on his political endeavors, so pay no attention to his Raised and On Hand totals. Just be prepared to support his eventual opponent (hopefully there will be just one), and never forget this lesson in Why Every Election Matters.

Santos, Lira, and Stallworth win runoffs

Dec 10th, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
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Congratulations to all, and on to 2018.

Elizabeth Santos

Two current educators, Elizabeth Santos and Sergio Lira, won seats on the Houston ISD school board, according to preliminary results from Saturday’s runoff election.

Voters also chose Pretta VanDible Stallworth, a business consultant and adjunct professor, to fill the final seat on the Houston Community College board, based on the unofficial results.

[…]

Santos, an English literature teacher at Northside High School, appeared to cruise to victory over Gretchen Himsl, a policy analyst for Children at Risk, an education and child-welfare advocacy nonprofit. She would represent District I on Houston’s northwest and north sides.

Santos campaigned on allocating more funding for teachers and classroom instruction, emphasizing the community schools model and offering a diverse voice from the district’s east side, which is largely Latino. The 35-year-old Houston ISD schools graduate had the endorsement and financial backing of the largest national and local teachers unions.

Sergio Lira

“It’s been incredibly special to me, to be able to really anchor myself inside the community,” Santos said. “Not everyone has had their voice heard in this district, and to be able to have that voice, that’s one thing I’m absolutely hopeful and excited about.”

In November’s three-candidate general election for District I, Santos earned 45 percent of the vote, with Himsl receiving 34 percent.

Lira, an assistant principal at Bellaire High School, looked to score a come-from-behind victory Saturday after finishing in second in the general election for District III, which represents the district’s southeast side. Challenger Jesse Rodriguez earned 40 percent of the general election vote to Lira’s 34 percent.

Lira, 56, emphasized his experience as an educator on the campaign trail, contrasting it Rodriguez, a customer care manager and volunteer radio host.

You can see the numbers here. Both boards have their work cut out for them. The stakes are especially high for HISD, as they try to stave off intervention from the TEA. Best of luck to all the winners, now let’s get to work.

Runoff Day for HISD and HCC is tomorrow

Dec 8th, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
Comments are off for this post

From the inbox:

Saturday, December 9, is Election Day for voters in Houston Community College District IX and HISD Trustee Districts I and III. Polls will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Voters must vote at their designated Election Day polling location which can be found by using the “Find Your Poll” lookup on www.HarrisVotes.com. Eligible voters are not required to have voted in the November General and Special Elections to vote in the Joint Runoff Elections.

An estimated 90,000 registered voters meet the requirement to vote in the Houston Community College Trustee District IX which is located in Southwest and South-central Houston. There are 78,000 eligible voters in the Houston ISD Trustee District I which is located in Northwest Houston. There are 55,000 eligible voters in Houston ISD Trustee District III which is located in Southeast Houston.

“To be eligible to vote in a particular contest on the Runoff Election ballot, you must be registered to vote in the district which is up for election,” stressed Harris County Clerk Stan Stanart.

To find your Election Day polling location, view a personal sample ballot, or review a list of acceptable forms of identification to vote at the polls, voters may visit www.HarrisVotes.com or call the Harris County Clerk’s office at 713.755.6965.

Here’s a brief Chron story about the runoffs. If you didn’t already know who the candidates are, it won’t tell you much. Early voting has been light – there were 3,725 ballots cast as of the end of the EV period in all three races combined. For the first time in a long time, I’ll be voting on Election Day, as my new work location and the smaller number of EV locations made it difficult for me to get to a polling place. I’ll have the race results on Sunday. Good luck to all the candidates.

Endorsement watch: HISD and HCC runoffs

Nov 30th, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
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In two of the three runoffs on the ballot, the Chron endorsed candidates who did not make the cut. As early voting begins for the runoffs, they make their new choices and reiterate the one they got right.

Houston Community College System, trustee, District IX: Pretta VanDible Stallworth

Experience as a teacher in higher education combined with previous tenure on the HCC board sets apart Pretta VanDible Stallworth. An impressive résumé and firm grasp of the HCC board duties should earn her the seat being vacated by Chris Oliver, who pleaded guilty to federal bribery charges in May.

VanDible Stallworth, 59, has worked as an adjunct professor at Bellhaven College and guest professor at DeVry University. She also served on the HCC board from 1989-1993. Her position as chaplain for Senate 13 District PAC also demonstrates a healthy ability to reflect the values of her community. While we’ve expressed a cautiousness about VanDible Stallworth’s belief that the board should be more involved with reviewing contracts, her education and experience makes her the best candidate in this race.

Gretchen Himsl

Houston ISD, trustee, District I: Gretchen Himsl

Houston Independent School District, the seventh-largest public school system in the nation and the largest in Texas, is at a crossroads. The school district is facing a takeover by the state for failure to improve about a dozen schools. This drastic step would mean that Houston voters would lose the right to elect officials to govern the school system, which educates 216,000 of our children, and for which we pay local property taxes. The district also faced a budgetary shortfall even before Hurricane Harvey cut a path of destruction across the district and damaged many of its schools.

These are hard issues, and voters need to elect the candidate best qualified to deal with the complexity.

Two candidates are in a runoff for trustee of District I, a position that was ably held by Anna Eastman for eight years: Elizabeth Santos, a schoolteacher, and Gretchen Himsl, who works at Children At Risk, a Houston nonprofit.

Both have demonstrated a commitment to students through their actions for many years, Santos in the classroom and Himsl in the policymaking and volunteer world. Both women care deeply about public education.

The two candidates also agree on several policy points, including the need to rein in high-stakes testing.

But the similarities stop there. The two candidates bring markedly different skill sets to the table. Himsl is a policy wonk and volunteer. Santos is a passionate educator and advocate.

At a time when the future of the entire district has been brought into question, voters should pick someone with the skills to analyze and articulate the policies that can save HISD – and the ability to implement them as solutions. That candidate is Gretchen Himsl.

Sergio Lira

Houston ISD, trustee, District III – Unexpired Term: Sergio Lira

We endorsed Sergio Lira during the general election and again encourage voters to pick him to fill the seat previously held by longtime trustee Manuel Rodriguez Jr., who passed away in July.

Lira, 56, has spent nearly his entire career as an educator in this southeast district, although he currently serves as an assistant principal at Bellaire High School. He has direct experience turning around underperforming campuses and was awarded “Teacher of the Year” when he taught in elementary schools. In addition to his classroom and administrative experience, Lira also has an impressive list of credentials: a master’s in education management, a certificate from the Superintendent Certification program and a doctorate of education in educational leadership from the University of Houston-Clear Lake College of Education.

My interviews with the HISD candidates from earlier:

Gretchen Himsl
Elizabeth Santos

Sergio Lira
Jesse Rodriguez

I did not get the chance to interview the candidates in HCC IX. Early voting began yesterday, and runs through Tuesday, with Runoff Day on Saturday, December 9. Which, if you live in my neck of the woods, is the same day as Lights in the Heights. So vote early, it will be much more convenient.

Early voting for HISD and HCC runoffs begins today

Nov 29th, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
1 comment

From the inbox:

Harris County Clerk Stan Stanart announced today that nine Early Voting locations will open starting Nov. 29 where eligible voters may cast a ballot during the early voting period for theDecember 9, 2017 Joint Runoff Election. The Early Voting Period for the Runoff Election runs from Nov. 29 to Dec. 2 and resumes Dec. 4 to Dec. 5.

“To find out if you reside in one of the three districts where an election is taking place and view your individual sample ballot,  you may visit www.HarrisVotes.com,” advised Stanart, Harris County Clerk and Chief Election Official. “In this instance, the districts in play do not overlap. So all eligible voters will see only one contest on their ballot.” 

County Clerk Stanart encourages voters to review the early voting schedule before heading to the poll to confirm the address of the early voting location.  In the conduct of non-countywide elections, only available early voting sites within or near each district are utilized in a Runoff Election.   

“To be eligible to vote in a particular contest on the Runoff Election ballot, you must be registered to vote in the district which is up for election,” emphasized Stanart. “Qualified voters of one of these districts, may vote in the Runoff, even if they did not vote in the November Election.”

An estimated 90,000 registered voters meet the requirement to vote in the Houston Community College Trustee District IX race, 78,000 in the Houston ISD Trustee District I race and 55,000 in Houston ISD Trustee District III race.  The Joint Runoff Election is being held because no candidate received over fifty-percent of the votes on November 7 in these three districts.

Voters may find the complete Early Voting Schedule, view a personal sample ballot, or review the list of acceptable forms of identification to vote at the poll at www.HarrisVotes.com.  Voters may also call 713.755.6965 for election information.

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Harris County, Texas – Early Voting Locations
December 9, 2017 Joint Runoff Election

Location Address City Zip
Harris County Administration Building 1001 Preston Street, 4th Floor Houston 77002
Moody Park Community Center 3725 Fulton Street Houston 77009
HCCS Southeast College 6960 Rustic Street, Parking Garage Houston 77087
Young Neighborhood Library 5107 Griggs Road Houston 77021
Fiesta Mart 8130 Kirby Drive Houston 77054
Metropolitan Multi-Service Center 1475 West Gray Street Houston 77019
Sunnyside Multi-Purpose Center 9314 Cullen Boulevard Houston 77051
Hiram Clarke Multi-Service Center 3810 West Fuqua Street Houston 77045
Hardy Senior Center 11901 West Hardy Road Houston 77076

As noted before, only some of us have cause to vote. If you’re not in HCC 9 or HISD I or III, all of which are highlighted in the embedded map, you’re off the hook. For the lucky few who do get to vote, note that early voting is only six days (no voting on Sunday), so make your plan to get out there.

Early voting set for HISD and HCC runoffs

Nov 20th, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
2 comments

Here’s the schedule and locations. Note that while the early vote period covers a week, from Wednesday, November 29 through Tuesday, December 5, there are only six days to vote, as there is no voting on Sunday the 3rd. Runoff Day itself is Saturday, December 9, which may be a bit complicated in my neck of the woods as that is also the date for Lights in the Heights. Won’t be the first time I’ll spend the better part of that evening refreshing the harrisvotes.com webpage on my laptop.

Anyway. For the most part, the regular early voting locations in HISD I and III and HCC 9 will be open, along with the Harris County Administration Building downtown and the Metropolitan Multi-Service Center on West Gray, because that’s where Heights people like to vote. If you’re not in one of those districts you’re off the hook thanks to there being no city races on the ballot. For the same reason, we can expect turnout to be pretty light. I can throw one number at you: In the 2005 runoff for HISD I, when there was an At Large Council race but not a Mayor’s race, Natasha Kamrani defeated Anne Flores Santiago with 3,026 total votes being cast. I’d draw the over/under line at that level, with fewer votes in HISD III and maybe about the same in HCC 9. Make your plan to vote if you’re in one of these districts, the EV period will begin and end before you know it.

My thoughts following the 2017 election

Nov 9th, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
8 comments

1. Turnout in Houston was considerably higher than anyone predicted. Adding in Fort Bend to Harris yields 101,178 voters. Harris County had 149,730. The Houston share of Harris County was 66.43%, which is lower than I expected as well.

2. Early voting in odd years is not the same as early voting in even years. In even years, a significant majority of voters are showing up before Election Day. In odd years, Election Day still reigns supreme. In Harris County, 59.49% of the total vote was cast on Election Day. For the Houston part of Harris County, that total was 58.74% of the vote. It’s not clear to me why this is the case, but if I had to guess I’d say that the presence of big well-funded campaigns is a big part of the reason people vote early, because they are being told to vote during the early process. In the absence of such campaigns, people don’t think about voting before Election Day nearly as much. Just a guess, but one that will inform how I think about the next odd year election.

3. After the 2015 election, the HISD Board of Trustees had four men and five women. After the 2017 election, it will have one man and eight women. It will also be all Democratic, as the three Republican men who served in districts V, VI, and VII have all been succeeded by Democratic women. Let that sink in for a minute.

4. A lot will be said about the national election results and what that means for Democrats and Republicans going into 2018. We haven’t really had an election that has been cast in that light – unlike the 2015/2016 cycle, for example, there have been no special legislative elections. I think you have to look at the 2017 HISD results as a piece of that puzzle, even if they weren’t run as Dem-versus-GOP referenda. The Democratic candidates won the three formerly Republican-held Trustee seats because more Democrats showed up to vote. I don’t want to over-dramatize that, but it has to mean at least a little something.

5. Of course, if one wants to be cynical, it could mean that the TEA will have more reason to drop the hammer on HISD if one or more of the Improvement Required schools fails to meet standards. Who at the state level will care about disbanding an all-Democratic Board of Trustees?

6. In the runup to Tuesday, the lower-than-usual turnout projections were cited as a reason why the city bond issues might have trouble. This was going to be a weird year with no city elections, and Harvey caused a lot of disruption, but the main piece of logic underpinning that was the assumption that lower turnout = a more Republican electorate, which in turn would be dangerous for the bonds. Remember, while no one officially opposed the pension bonds, the Harris County GOP and associated conservative groups did oppose the other bonds. It turned out there was no cause for alarm, as all the issues passed by huge margins. While I think that Republicans were more favorably inclined to the bond referenda than we may have given them credit for, this needs to be a reminder that sometimes it’s Republican voters who don’t show up in the expected numbers. The HISD results point to that. If we want to draw an inference for 2018, it’s that overall turnout doesn’t have to be huge for Democrats to have a good year. Who is motivated to vote matters.

7. There will be three runoffs on the menu for December, two in HISD (District I, Elizabeth Santos versus Gretchen Himsl, and District III, Jesse Rodriguez versus Sergio Lira) and one in HCC. One quick thought about that:

Meanwhile, Eugene “Gene” Pack and Pretta VanDible Stallworth were the top vote-getters in a three-way contest for an open seat in District IX. Pack, a retired auto broker, narrowly edged out Stallworth, a business consultant, for the top spot. But both fell short of the 50 percent threshold needed to avoid a runoff. David Jaroszewski, a professor, was well behind.

Earlier Tuesday night, Pack expressed optimism that his early lead indicated voters endorsed him as an “outsider.”

“They’re tired of the direction the board has been going in,” he said.

Maybe, but with all due respect I’d suggest that Pack’s strong showing was a combination of his simple name and top spot on the ballot. My advice for the runoff to Pretta Stallworth is to make sure the voters there know that Pack is a Trump-supporting Republican. I’d guess that would outweigh any valorization of “outsider” status.

8. Finally, the Chron is in a scolding mood.

The ballot featured neither president, nor governor nor mayor, but Tuesday’s election was one of the most important to face Houstonians in decades.

So how did we respond? By not participating. Turnout – at less than 10 percent – was abysmally low.

By approving a $1 billion pension obligation bond, voters set City Hall on track to financial reforms that will cut expenses and, hopefully, usher our city out of a 16-year fiscal crisis. Months of negotiations, years of failed efforts, all came down to this vote – and the vast majority of Houstonians couldn’t be bothered to weigh in.

The immediate issues at City Hall – or Commissioner’s Court or school board – often have a greater impact on American’s everyday lives, yet the local issues have a way of getting lost in the cacophony of national politics. Blame it on media consolidation or the spread of Facebook and Twitter, but our government loses a core of its representative nature when elections that deserve all the attention of a professional sporting event pass with the fanfare of a Little League game.

Something has to change in our civic culture. Easier voting processes. Making Election Day a national holiday. Better promotion efforts. Local officials and nonprofits need to start work now on improving this atrocious turnout.

Actually, we know exactly what drives turnout in Houston municipal elections: the combination of a contested Mayor’s race and a controversial ballot proposition. This year had neither. But you know, one reason why those factors I cited generate turnout is that a lot of money gets spent by the campaigns to entice, encourage, and enrage people to go vote. Maybe what we need when faced with a low key slate like this is a dedicated source of funding to simulate a more exciting election year. How we can accomplish that is left as an exercise for the reader. Oh, and if we’re casting about for blame, I’ll just note that pre-Tuesday coverage from the Chron included one lame overview of the HISD races, and exactly nothing about the HCC ones. Maybe the lack of interest from voters was a reflection of that.

2017 results: HISD and HCC

Nov 8th, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
Comments are off for this post

There were still precincts to be counted as I was writing this so there are a couple of races where I’ll have to equivocate, but here’s what happened in the local races that had actual candidates in them. Let’s start with the easier one, the HCC races:

– Trustees Carolyn Evans-Shabazz (73%) and Robert Glaser (58%) led from the get go and cruised to easy wins.

– In District 9, Gene Pack (42%) and Pretta VanDible Stallworth (37%) will head into a runoff for the right to succeed Chris Oliver.

In HISD, there are a couple of clear results, and a couple that I’ll have to update in the morning:

– Incumbent Trustees Wanda Adams (68%) and Anne Sung (60%) were easily re-elected.

– Jesse Rodriguez (41%) and Sergio Lira (32%) were going into overtime in Distric III, while Elizabeth Santos (45%) and Gretchen Himsl (33%) were doing the same in I. Given how the District I race has gone so far, I expect it to get a little nasty for the runoff.

– Sue Deigaard (53%) appeared to be headed for a clear win in her four-way race. As of this drafting, 37 of 56 precincts had reported, but Deigaard had 4,502 votes out of 8,446 total. If the remaining 19 precincts have a proportional amount of votes in them as the first 37, a little back-of-the-envelope math suggests she’d need about 43.4% of those votes to stay in the majority and win outright. I’d say those are pretty good odds, but we’ll see.

– The race that will have everyone up way past their bedtimes is in District VI, where with 35 of 40 precincts counted, incumbent Holly Flynn Vilaseca had 50.04% of the vote – she had 3,119 out of 6,233, which puts her five votes into a majority. Either she squeaks out a clean win – she was a pinch over 50% in early and absentee voting and a slightly smaller pinch under it on Tuesday – or she goes into a runoff with a substantial lead. Good position to be in, but boy I know what I’d prefer.

UPDATE: At 12:46 AM, the final results were posted, and Holly Flynn Vilaseca wound up with 50.38% of the vote, putting her back in office without a runoff. Here’s the Chron story.

30 day campaign finance reports – HCC

Oct 22nd, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
3 comments

One more time with the 30 day reports. July reports are here.

Carolyn Evans-Shabazz
Robert Glaser
Pretta VanDible Stallworth
David Jaroszewski


Dist  Name             Raised    Spent    Loans   On Hand
=========================================================
4     Evans-Shabazz     1,148      527        0     3,079
5     Glaser                0      200    5,000     8,239
9     Stallworth            0      713        0         0
9     Jaroszewski       1,000       84        0         0

Aaaaaaaand that’s it. Again, only people who are running for office must file 30 day reports, so all the incumbents other than Evans-Shabazz and Glaser are off the hook. I don’t know why Manny Barrera, DC Caldwell, Victoria Bryant, and Gene Pack don’t have reports available – perhaps they didn’t file one for whatever the reason, and perhaps they did but the system doesn’t reflect it. These puny numbers are not surprising, as these races seldom draw much in the way of fundraising, but they highlight the main issue with HCC elections in general: Nobody knows anything about the candidates, in part because the candidates don’t have the resources to communicate with the voters. We need to be prepared for the possibility of random results when all is said and done here.

Endorsement watch: HCC

Oct 20th, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
Comments are off for this post

The Chron wraps up their endorsements for November.

Carolyn Evans-Shabazz

HCCS, Trustee, District IV: Carolyn Evans-Shabazz

The ideal candidate for this seat would be someone with a bold vision for HCC who is capable of collaborating with existing board members. It would be a candidate free from controversy. That candidate is not in this race. So instead we encourage voters to find the best candidate via the process of elimination.

That should lead voters, however reluctantly, to incumbent Carolyn Evans-Shabazz.

Appointed to the Board of Trustees in May 2015 to represent District IV, which includes Sunnyside and the Third Ward, Evans-Shabazz has carved out a leadership role on the board, chairing the success committee, which works on issues such as homelessness and food insecurity on campus. Off the board, she serves on the NAACP-Houston branch executive committee.

[…]

Robert Glaser

HCCS, Trustee, District V: Robert Glaser

Incumbent Robert Glaser deserves a second term representing this diverse district that extends from West University to Bellaire to Memorial to Beltway 8.

Glaser, 56, points to HCC’s progress during the past four years. The community college has hired a new chancellor, reduced its overall bond debt and kept taxes level. In addition, tuition rates have been frozen for the last three years while faculty and staff have received raises. Still, the businessman sees room for much improvement.

[…]

HCCS, Trustee, District IX: David Jaroszewski

A lawyer and interim dean of academic studies at Lee College in Baytown, David Jaroszewski stands out as one of the few candidates for HCC with a clear vision about the role that community colleges should play, and how properly run boards help them achieve those goals.

The former PTO president has extensive experience in community college systems and understands the difference between governing and managing. He also expressed a dedicated focus on boosting HCC’s retention rate.

But Jaroszewski, 64, earned our endorsement when he said: “The board should not be inserting themselves into the procurement process.”

That’s what voters should want to hear.

Pretta VanDible Stallworth previously served on the HCC board from 1989-1993 and has been a adjunct professor at Bellhaven College and guest professor at DeVry University. Well-positioned to reflect the values of the community, the chaplain for Senate 13 District PAC would have likely earned our endorsement except for her position on a key point: Stallworth believes that the board should be better trained and then given more responsibility with respect to reviewing contracts for compliance with HCC policies.

My interview with Carolyn Evans-Shabazz is here, and my interview with Robert Glaser is here. I’ve taken my guesses at turnout for HISD, but with six-year cycles and frequently unopposed incumbents, there’s not much data there to try the same thing for HCC. I suspect these numbers will be pretty low, with more undervotes than in HISD. I hope people are paying attention, that’s all I can say.

Endorsement watch: HGLBT Political Caucus, CVPE, and GPS

Sep 13th, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
1 comment

From the inbox:

The Houston GLBT Political Caucus PAC met on September 9, 2017. At the meeting the membership voted to endorse the following candidates:

Kara DeRocha for HISD School Board Trustee – District V

Holly Maria Flynn Vilaseca for HISD School Board Trustee – District VI

Anne Sung for HISD School Board Trustee – District VII

Dr. Carolyn Evans-Shabazz for HCC Trustee – District IV

Pretta Vandible Stallworth for HCC Trustee – District IX

We also voted to endorse the following propositions:

Propositions A, B, C, D and E

The Houston GLBT Political Caucus PAC will hold a public forum on September 22, 2017 at 7pm at Bering Memorial United Methodist Church in Montrose, Room 217A & B. (Enter through the North Entrance on Hawthorne Street where the parking lot is located.) The public forum will highlight Elizabeth Santos, Gretchen Himsl and Monica Flores Richart, candidates for HISD School Board Trustee – District I. The membership will take an endorsement vote at the end of the public forum. The Membership will also vote on the recommendation of the screening committee in the HISD School Board race for District III.

I was just saying that we are only now beginning to see campaign activity again post-Harvey, and a part of that is the group endorsement process. The GLBT Caucus endorsements hit my mailbox late on Sunday, and on Monday I found out about a couple of others that have come out. Here’s Community Voices for Public Education:

Elizabeth Santos in HISD District 1
Kara DeRocha in HISD District 5
Holly Flynn Vilaseca in HISD District 6
Anne Sung in HISD District 7

CVPE members voted to not endorse in District 9 and will screen HISD District 3 candidates in the near future.

Yes, everyone is going to have to go over this again once the filing deadline comes for District III, which was extended to allow people enough time to make the decision to run following Manuel Rodriguez’s death. I am aware of one candidate in District III so far, and I am sure there will be others.

One more set of endorsements, from Houstonians for Great Public Schools:

District I – Gretchen Himsl

District V – Sue Deigaard

District VI – Holly Maria Flynn Vilaseca

District VII – Anne Sung

District IX – Wanda Adams

I’ll post more as I see them. I suppose it’s well past time for me to create an Election 2017 page to track all this, too.

The HCC lineup

Sep 12th, 2017
by Charles Kuffner.
2 comments

When I published the July finance reports for HCC trustees, I noted that the only reports available were for incumbents. There was no way to tell who might be challenging the two trustees up for re-election (Carolyn Evans-Shabazz and Robert Glaser) or who might be vying to succeed the convicted Chris Oliver. Thankfully, the Board Information – Trustee Elections page now has all of the candidates listed, so let’s take a look at who’s running for what.

District IV

Carolyn Evans-Shabazz
Manny Barrera
Daniel “DC” Caldwell, I

Evans-Shabazz is the incumbent. She was appointed to the seat in 2015 to fill in for Carroll Robinson, who had stepped down to run for Houston City Controller. She was unopposed that November for the rest of that term, so this is her first election for a full term. She also ran for City Council At Large #5 in 2013 and received about 31% of the vote in a three-way race against CM Jack Christie.

Barrera you know from his comments here. He ran for City Council in District J against CM Mike Laster, finishing third in a field of four. He previously ran for the HCC Board in 2007 for position VII, finishing third against eventual winner Neeta Sane. He’s an attorney and longtime watchdog/critic of HCC, as a bit of Googling will tell you. I couldn’t find a campaign webpage for him.

According to that LinkedIn profile I found, Daniel Caldwell is a former GOP precinct chair in Tarrant County who ran for Dallas City Council in 2015. Going from his LinkedIn profile, I found this website for him and his HCC campaign. I doubt he can get elected in this African-American district, but if Dave Wilson can (dishonestly) do it, I suppose anything is possible.

District V

Victoria Bryant‌‌
Robert Glaser‌

Glaser is the incumbent here. He won in 2013 to fill out the term of Richard Schechter, who had resigned. I didn’t do interviews for HCC that year, but he did fill out a Q&A for Texas Leftist that year. I’ve corresponded with him quite a bit, and he’s been helpful answering various questions I’ve had about what goes on at HCC.

Bryant ran for HISD in the 2016 special election to fill Harvin Moore’s seat; she finished third behind eventual winner Anne Sung and John Luman. Here’s the interview I did with her for that race. Bryant is a Republican, Glaser is a Democrat. This seat has been Democratic since at least Schechter’s election in 2005 – I can’t find results from 1999, the previous time this seat would have been up – but this is a weird year, with likely very low turnout, so it is very much the case that anything can happen.

District IX

Eugene “Gene” Pack
David Jaroszewski
Pretta Vandible Stallworth

Eugene Pack appears to have three different profiles on Facebook. I have no idea what’s up with that. He also appears to be a Republican – in fact, he’s listed as the Vice Chairman of the Texas Federation for Republican Outreach (warning: autoplay Trump video), which is a group I’d never heard of before googling around for this guy. You have to search for “Gene Pack” to find that page; I found it before I found that Facebook photo, so I’m pretty sure this is the same guy.

David Jaroszewski is as far as I can tell an attorney with an office in Baytown, who also teaches at Lee College; he’s the Director of the Paralegal Studies Program. He has no clearly identifying web presence that I can find, but you can see him doing some lectures on YouTube.

Pretta Stallworth is the co-President of a 501(c)3 called Parents for Public Schools Houston; here’s their webpage. I can’t say I’ve heard of this group – the one name I recognize on their board is Hugo Mojica, who has run unsuccessfully for Houston City Council and HISD in District I. All things being equal, I’d say she has the kind of profile to be the favorite in this district, but again, this is a weird year and I have no idea how many people will have a clue about who any of these people are. I sure hope the Chron and black media like The Defender and KCOH do some reporting on this race. It would suck to go from Chris Oliver to a complete cipher for the next six years.