The Harris County Sheriff's Office acknowledged Tuesday that deputies were assigned to watch two brothers who filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the department over their arrest during a 2002 drug raid.Sheriff's Capt. John Martin said one or two members of the department's investigative support unit conducted surveillance on Erik and Sean Ibarra for five or six hours over a three-day period last October.
While Martin and First Assistant County Attorney John Barnhill said the unit did nothing illegal, the Ibarras are threatening to sue.
South Texas College of Law professor Adam Gershowitz said the department's actions may have opened the door for a harassment or invasion of privacy lawsuit.
"It certainly doesn't make it good policy or acceptable just because it's not criminal," Gershowitz said.
I think "vindictive" might be a good descriptor here. The only possible reason to be doing this is to hope, however vainly, that you can catch them doing something illegal - moderately suspicious or embarassing will do in a pinch if you're doing video surveillance - and use it at trial to attack their character. Does any of that sound like a good use of public resources?
Lloyd Kelley, the brothers' attorney, said he was preparing to sue on behalf of the Ibarras and other people who sued the department and believe they were trailed by deputies."I just don't see how the sheriff's department can continue this kind of reign of terror," Kelley said.
Martin dismissed Kelley's accusations, describing the surveillance as a routine step in preparing for trial.
He said he was not sure what the deputies were looking for, other than "background information." Nothing useful came from the surveillance, beyond confirmation of the Ibarras' address, he added.
Oh, spare me. I just said what they were looking for. You can call it "background information" if you want, but that doesn't change anything.
He said the unit has conducted similar operations in the past for the county attorney's office, usually in workers' compensation cases. He said he could not say how much was spent on surveillance of the Ibarras because it was part of the unit's normal operations."We're not talking about some long, drawn-out, resource-intensive operation," he said.
Barnhill said the county attorney's office did not request the surveillance in this case. He said the office has 10 investigators who handle that work, though the sheriff's department may have assisted once or twice.
Translation: Mike Stafford, who has enough problems of his own to worry about, wants no part of these shenanigans. You're on your own, bubba.
Gershowitz said it was normal for attorneys to gather background information before trial, but it would be unusual for the person or entity being sued to do the spying."It just sort of looks bad," he said. "They may have had the best of intentions, although it's hard to see that, but it looks inappropriate."
Houston City Councilman Adrian Garcia, who is running for sheriff as a Democrat, said the department abused its authority.
Garcia is holding a press conference this afternoon, so I imagine he'll have a lot more to say about this. Here's KTRK video about this story, from Monday and yesterday. You can count on there being more to this as well.
The Mayor's proposed budget for 2009 has something for everyone, which no doubt also means something for everyone to complain about.
Mayor Bill White unveiled a record $4 billion budget proposal Tuesday, calling for a sharp increase in spending on public safety while cutting the property tax rate by a half-cent.The mayor's fiscal 2009 budget also would, if approved, create a dedicated set-aside of tax revenues to pay for drainage improvements, fund the addition of 150 police officers and add 50,000 homes to the curbside recycling program.
"Because we've enjoyed strong economic growth, and because we're running City Hall more efficiently, we can afford a tax rate cut of half a penny per $100 of valuation to bring our tax rate down," White said.
City revenue is projected to be $4.07 billion in the new fiscal year, which begins July 1. That would be an increase of 6.7 percent over the current fiscal year.
For the first time, the general fund -- the part of the budget paid for by property and sales taxes, fees and fines -- will top $2 billion. The remainder of the budget is made up of user fees for water, sewer, the airports and entertainment facilities.
"It's a big budget we have, but the citizens can be sure we have gone through it with a fine-toothed comb," White said. "Wherever we can find savings, we try to squeeze out savings, which is one reason we are able to deliver far more services with a lower tax rate."
The budget would provide an additional $105 million for police, fire and EMS. Public safety spending makes up 58 percent of the general fund.
I can't wait to hear the complaints from certain factions that both the tax cut and the increase in spending on police are too small. Why, if only we'd budget like the federal government has been doing these past few years, we could have more of each and have enough money left over to fund an invasion and occupation of Galveston. You just have to think outside the box a little, and not worry too much about what will happen after you're term-limited out.
New to this year's budget is a dedicated funding source for drainage improvements. Subject to council approval, 0.3 cents of every $100 in property value would be dedicated to flooding projects.The rate would rise gradually, reaching 0.75 cent by 2017.
Next year, the set-aside could raise $2.6 million.
The city has scheduled $211 million in capital drainage improvements in its current five-year capital plan.
In his Looking Forward to 2008 essay, Noel Freeman called for the city "to set the budget for drainage infrastructure maintenance and improvements at no less than $100 million for FY2009 and to set a five year plan to increase that number to $150 million by FY2013". I don't know about the first part of that, but it would seem that the second condition has been more than met. Putting more resources into drainage improvements, especially as the city continues to densify, is a very good thing in my book.
Question: What ever happened to municipal Wi-Fi?Answer: Not much.
Unless you want to count Earthlink's announcement today that it will discontinue its municipal wireless network in Philadelphia, an experiment once touted as a new model of low-cost, public wireless access in cities.
After it became clear that the project would cost more than Earthlink had originally anticipated, the company sought to sell the $17 million network to a nonprofit group.
That effort fell through "due to unresolved issues among the city, Wireless Philadelphia and the nonprofit," Earthlink said. Wireless Philadelphia is the organization in charge of managing the network. Earthlink did not say which nonprofit it had approached.
Earthlink said it would ask a federal judge to allow it to remove its equipment from city streetlights and cap its liability for the failed project at $1 million.
Well, with Houston out of the picture, this is more of academic interest than anything else. Sort of the end of an era, really. Glenn Fleischmann sums it up.
If someone offered you $17m of outdated equipment on a network that never worked to specification that wasn't completed, and that already had known high annual costs, and which a private firm gave up as a bad job that they couldn't turn a dime on--would you take that deal? No. EarthLink will ultimately have to pay much more than $1m, I predict, and I suspect some of the settlement will leave gear in selected neighborhoods behind for more modest networking purposes. It's not going to be as easy as releasing a press release, although I haven't read the contract's provisions for this set of circumstances, and I'm not a lawyer.The failure in Philadelphia, and EarthLink's exiting the entire muni-Fi business, represents the end of a bad model in which a company agreed to assume all risk and costs associated with building a public access network. When the assumptions were that networks would be cheaper and easier to build in 2005, and that citizens in many larger cities had few affordable broadband options, it made some sense to build a network on spec.
Three years into this, however, it's clear that that capital investment is 2 to 3 times higher than what was anticipated to reach a level of service quality that people will expect; that, when presented with potential competition, DSL and cable operators will slash prices and offer cheap 1-year or "lifetime" rates with long-term contracts; and that wireless broadband delivered via Wi-Fi isn't the best of ideas for indoor service.
If it contributed even in some small way to getting DSL and cable operators to slash prices and offer cheap longterm rates, then this was not a complete failure, though I suppose that's not of much comfort to EarthLink. Whether wi-fi was the best way to deliver this or not, I still think it's a worthy goal to make ubiquitous connectivity a reality. Dwight always thought it should be considered by cities to be a utility and delivered as a public service for free. Maybe that would have been a better way to go, assuming a reasonable cost model was possible. Maybe that will still happen in some form some day. For now, we've got some bubbles and that's about it. Thanks to Mr. Crap on Twitter (see, I told you this thing was more useful than you'd think) for the heads up.
I know this will be a shock to everyone who drives in Houston, but so far the high price of gasoline does not appear to be having any effect on how fast people drive.
If drivers are slowing down to save money in response to soaring gasoline prices, the evidence was hard to find on the road last week in Houston.Despite the fact that fuel efficiency for most automobiles drops sharply at speeds above 60 mph, a two-day visual survey showed sports cars, luxury cars, clunkers, motorcycles -- even a school bus -- motoring along at speeds that were neither economical nor environmentally friendly.
[...]
"You have to get where you're going," he said.
To check whether fuel costs had lightened motorists' feet as well as their wallets, a pair of Chronicle reporters and a photographer gassed up ($3.60 a gallon, regular) and hit the road Wednesday and Thursday afternoons with the cruise control set at 60 mph.
We covered all but two of the radial freeways, driving between downtown and Beltway 8, plus all of Loop 610, much of Texas 225 and half of the Sam Houston Tollway.
The tally: 1,021 vehicles passed us, and we passed 16, a ratio of about 64-to-1. On Thursday we were skunked 478-to-0.
We chose 60 mph because, according to the U.S. Department of Energy, most cars get their best mileage between 30 mph and 60 mph and because the legal speed limits on most of the area's freeways and tollway system are 60 mph and 65 mph.
[...]
About half the drivers seemed to be going only a little faster than we were, but the other half were really flying, so the average probably was around 70 mph.
Many of those in the biggest hurry drove some of the least thrifty vehicles, including pickups, SUVs and 18-wheelers.
Boy howdy is that even less of a shock. Knock me over with a feather, ya know?
Just a guess here, but I'd bet that a lot of people really haven't internalized the concept that increased speed means worse gas mileage. According to the government, which provides a handy if somewhat generic chart, "you can assume that each 5 mph you drive over 60 mph is like paying an additional $0.20 per gallon for gas". That's based on gas at $3.51 a gallon, so with prices already higher than that, you're sailing past $4 a gallon as well. I think people know at some level that faster driving means less fuel economy, but I doubt many of them have numbers in their head to make it tangible. You tell me - does putting it in these terms change your perception?
By the way, if anyone out there drives an RV, the effect is even more pronounced for those vehicles. You'll see your fuel economy cut in half as you go from 45 MPH to 70. Ouch.
For those who didn't hear -- or believe -- him the first time, Gov. Perry said again today that he is running for reelection in 2010.He told reporters at a public event in Fredericksburg that he is like the chief executive of a successful corporation and definitely planned to seek a third full term.
"I look at it like this, is that if Texas were a corporation -- and we would be one of the most efficient, most successful corporations in the world -- and if you're a stockholder in that corporation, why in the world would you want to change your CEO when things are going well?" he said, according to the Associated Press.
I like Brown Bess' comment that at the 2006 shareholders' meeting, 61% of them voted for a different CEO. Perry was fortunate that his opposition that year was fractured. He won't be so lucky next time.
By the way, not that I consider these things to be representative of anything, but it's still amusing to see that no one defended Perry in the comments to that post. I know he claims not to pay attention to things like his approval ratings, but you have to figure his advisers are aware of them. I wonder how they plan to deal with it if he really is serious about ginning it up again in 2010. Do they believe his "successful CEO" schtick? I have a hard time imagining it, but stranger things have happened.
When I snapped a picture of David Adickes' latest installation, on I-10 just north of downtown, I assumed (Adickes being a Presidential-sculpture guy and all) that all four of the giant heads on display belonged to US Presidents. I see now that this was a wrong assumption. Page 53 of the May edition of 002 Magazine has the explanation:
These four men are nicknamed "Mount Rush Hour," Adickes tells us, "but its real title is Tribute to American Statesmanship. I define a statesman as someone who cares more for the country than his/her own political career. And Lawd knows, we need some. The four figures: Washington, Lincoln, Houston, and Stephen F. Austin were truly statesmen."
OK then. My identification of the two on the left as Franklin Pierce and Martin Van Buren didn't make much sense from that perspective, so I'm glad to have this cleared up. And a tip of the hat to Jeff N for not being as blinkered as I was and calling the Sam Houston bust correctly.
Yet another story in the Chron about the effect of the bad economy and higher prices on ordinary Americans.
Amid a tottering economy, rising inflation, increasing unemployment and a housing market meltdown, waiters, beauticians and pet groomers report that customers are growing tightfisted.It is hard to determine just how much people are cutting back on tipping, but the stakes are huge.
The restaurant industry in the U.S. employs 13.1 million people, making it the nation's third-largest employer, behind the federal government and the health-care industry, according to the National Restaurant Association, a trade organization.
Many others work for carwashes, nail salons, taxi companies and in other jobs in which tips play a role in their wages.
The slowdown in tips is another blow for increasingly squeezed service workers who often don't have much of a cushion to fall back on when times get tough. Some restaurants have closed in recent months or have begun scaling back and laying off employees.
[...]
On a typical Saturday night, Brian Best once earned as much as $200 in tips as a server at Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. at Universal CityWalk in Hollywood. Since the fall, Best's tip take has slid to about $120 on a weekend night.
"People just don't have the money. They will go out to eat, but won't tip as much," Best said.
He now receives 10 percent to 15 percent of what his customers spend at the eatery, down from 15 percent to 20 percent before the economy's nose dive.
"I am hanging out a lot less at clubs and bars. I don't have the money," Best said.
Remember the "Trickle-Down Effect"? It would seem to be at play here. I just hope we all can hold on till January 21, because we're not going to get any help before then.
This is encouraging news.
In a sign that Democratic frontrunner Barack Obama is not prepared to concede Texas to the Republicans in the fall, his campaign announced an intensive voter registration effort beginning [Saturday] in the state's four largest media markets -- Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Austin and San Antonio.The kickoff will be a training effort for volunteers to seek out the unregistered Texans who fit the profile of a Democratic voter. The effort could affect several down-ballot races, including a couple of Tarrant County state House contests, Democratic analyst Kelly Fero said Friday.
"Texas is definitely in play, more so down the ballot in state Senate and House races than in the presidential," said Fero, who's not aligned in this year's presidential sweepstakes. "But the presidential race will significantly shape some of the down-ballot races and create a tide that could sweep incumbents out of office and challengers into office."
The smart money back in March held that once the Democratic primary ended, whoever got the presidential nomination would need Texas only for its deep-pocket donors. The drive to register new Democratic-leaning voters, being conducted in all 50 states and the District of Columbia, might mean the GOP can't have Texas' 34 electoral votes that easily. But state Republican Party spokesman Hans Klingler brushed aside the notion that any Democratic presidential nominee has achance to take Texas this year. The state has been rock-solid Republican in every presidential race since 1980.
"As [then-Democratic gubernatorial candidate] Tony Sanchez showed in 2002, you can spend millions of dollars on voter registration in Texas and still come up double-digits behind the Republicans in Texas," Klingler said.
Hey, if the state GOP wants to act as if it's still 2002 out there, they are more than welcome to be my guest. The rest of us know better.
The downballot race issue is one worth keeping in mind. My concern is that whatever new voters Obama will turn out in November will primarily be people who are there to vote for him, and don't have much interest in other races. The big dropoff in the primary from the Presidential race to the Senate and other statewide races is a potential danger sign. I don't think it's necessarily going to be a problem - at the very least, I know there will be money spent in Harris County to push the straight-ticket-Democratic message - but it is something to pay attention to. A boost in turnout is only beneficial if it helps all candidates.
Speaking of turnout boosts, this BOR diary, which builds off the models created by Poblano, shows how various turnout scenarios radically change the landscape for Obama. I'm hesitant to invest too much in this - we all remember how new voters were going to carry Kinky Friedman to the Governor's mansion in 2006, right? - but it's hard to see record-breaking primary turnouts in state after state (Indiana, like Texas, had more Democratic votes cast in their primary than John Kerry received in the 2004 general election) and not believe that this time it's different. Read it and see what you think.
Finally, check out Matt Stoller on the network Obama has built nationwide. There's a lot there to feel good about, and more than a little to be queasy about. Either way, there's a lot to think about.
Farmers Branch. Irving. Now Carrolton.
A newly elected mayor near Dallas says his top priority will be ridding his suburb of illegal immigrants, the same focus that has drawn national attention in a neighboring city.But Ron Branson said Carrollton will not simply copy the blueprint of Farmers Branch, where an ordinance barring apartment rentals to most illegal immigrants has been put on hold by a federal judge.
"I do not want to rubber-stamp what they did," Branson said in today's editions of The Dallas Morning News. "We want to make sure we're not profiling, we're following the law, and take advantage of ordinance opportunities."
The victory by Branson in Saturday's election gives Dallas neighboring suburbs with mayors who share a common goal of driving out illegal immigrants in their cities.
Is there something in the water up there? I just don't understand the obsession with this issue. And I know it's all tied up in anxiety about the war and the economy, because we had about the same number of undocumented immigrants in 2004 and 2005, back when the nation was still obsessed with gay marriage. But that "issue" ran its course, and we needed some other scapegoat for these more uncertain times, and so here we are, at least until the next batch of undesireables come along.
I hope some economist or sociologist is keeping track of these immigrant-hostile towns and doing a study on how they fare in the wake of these policies. It seems likely to me that their immediate effect will be to make their demographics older and whiter, as non-immigrant Hispanics who rightly perceive these policies to be threatening to themselves leave along with the undocumented folks that they hope to drive out. That doesn't strike me as being a good thing for the local economies, but who knows, maybe they'll draw new white-flight residents to counterbalance that. Like I said, I hope someone is studying this to see what happens with these places.
It should be noted that even though the anti-immigrant candidate won in Carrolton, it wasn't necessarily about that issue.
[Carrolton Mayor Becky] Miller had led by 9 percentage points in early voting, but those ballots were cast at least a day before a Dallas Morning News story delved into her background. She wound up losing by 9 percentage points.[...]
Mrs. Miller had accused Mr. Branson of "dirty politics" for questioning her statements to colleagues that her brother died in Vietnam.
The mayor, who is white, gave Mr. Branson a soldier's name, but a check showed the young man was black and had been born within four months of her, so he couldn't have been her brother.
Mrs. Miller later said she deliberately misled Mr. Branson out of anger over his prying.
After her father said there was no brother who had died in Vietnam, she said her father has Alzheimer's disease. Later, she said the "brother" was actually an unrelated young man raised by her family. She declined to provide his name, citing painful circumstances.
Checks then raised questions about Mrs. Miller's statements that she sang professionally for Linda Ronstadt and Jackson Browne, had ties to the Eagles frontman Don Henley and attended Western Kentucky University.
Spokesmen said the three singers didn't know her, and a Western Kentucky official said the school had no record of her attendance there.
Mrs. Miller has since said she's not surprised the singers didn't remember her after 30 years. She insists that she did attend the college briefly.
Uh, yeah, sure. If you haven't figured out by now that being a public official with a phony resume is a recipe for disaster, I will have no sympathy for you when you lose. Even if it's to a xenophobe.
I've gone and drunk the Twitter Kool-Aid, so those of you who can't get enough of me and want to know what sort of thing I consider too trivial to blog about, there you have it. It's oddly addictive, and more useful than I'd have thought. Ginger has some good thoughts on what makes Twitter worthwhile.
Anyway, the URL is http://twitter.com/kuff if you want to follow me. I'll probably put one of their widgets on the sidebar at some point, and I'm open to suggestions as to what else might be useful - maybe even this, if I get motivated. Let me know what you think.
From the home office in Orlando, Florida, home of the 2008 BlackBerry Wireless Enterprise Symposium, I bring you the best of the Texas Progressive Alliance for the past week. Click on for the goodies.
MORE...Three words: Unassisted triple play!
Indians second baseman Asdrubal Cabrera turned the 14th unassisted triple play in major league history, accomplishing the feat Monday night in the second game of a doubleheader against Toronto.Cabrera made a diving catch on a line drive by Lyle Overbay, touched second base and then tagged out Marco Scutaro to quickly end the fifth inning.
Colorado shortstop Troy Tulowitzki made the last unassisted triple play in the majors, on April 29, 2007, against Atlanta. Oakland second baseman Randy Velarde last turned the trick in the AL, on May 29, 2000, against the Yankees.
This was the record third unassisted triple play by a Cleveland fielder.
Indians shortstop Neal Ball made the first one in history, in 1909. Cleveland second baseman Bill Wambsganss turned the only one in the World Series, in 1920 during a Game 5 win over Brooklyn.
The Indians also have been victimized three such times. The last player to pull an unassisted triple play against them -- Ron Hansen, in 1968 for Washington -- is now an advance scout for Philadelphia and was at Progressive Field to see Cabrera's feat.
"First one I've ever seen from the stands," Hansen said. "That kid is a real good fielder and has a great future.
"On a play like that, it's just reaction and he reacted right."
Awesome. It's stuff like this that makes you remember what a great game this is. Way to go, Asdrubal!
As we know, school districts are sounding the alarm about their rising costs and the lack of capability they've been given to deal with those costs. Here's more about this problem.
Unless a fix is enacted during next year's legislative session, school districts will be faced with difficult choices, including closing campuses and firing teachers, said Mike Falick, president of the Spring Branch school board."It's an untenable system. No business in the world would be able to survive with fuel, health insurance and salary increases and a flat revenue source," Falick said. "It's not sustainable.
Some school districts eventually will face "insolvency, some in a shorter time than others," he said.
Humble Independent School District is about two years away from insolvency, Superintendent Guy Sconzo said. It will cover a $7 million budget deficit this year and a projected $23 million deficit next year by dipping into its $53 million reserve fund.
Humble ISD has cut spending by $17.5 million since 2002, Sconzo said, but is struggling with inflation and enrollment growth. Each new student costs the district about $6,800, but it gets only $4,937 from all sources to educate that student, he said.
"As we reduce more, we get on the road of becoming Minimum ISD. We will be able to comply and meet state laws and regulations, but we can't do anything more than that because we can't afford to," Sconzo said.
It's going to take pressure from places like Humble to make something happen on this. People move to the suburbs for the schools. They're not going to like being told that those schools can't afford to do things they expect them to do.
House Speaker Tom Craddick, R-Midland, said inflation has had a significant impact on public schools in his home district, especially in transportation and energy costs."For more than 60 years we have generally required school districts to cut spending or raise taxes to deal with inflationary pressures," he said. "I continue to believe that a long-term solution for public school finance will require updating the distribution formulas and re-evaluating these long-standing practices."
Craddick appointed a special legislative panel to explore education problems and said he expects they will be a high legislative priority in 2009.
[...]
Money for public schools is pegged on what districts were getting per student in 2006, called "target revenue" in school finance jargon, and officials complain those amounts are arbitrary, punishing some districts and rewarding others without rhyme or reason.
School officials also are miffed that the state benefits from rising property values. Instead of school districts keeping extra revenue from appraisal increases, the state subtracts that amount from its education funding to those districts. The only extra money for school districts goes to cover student enrollment increases.
Developing a permanent cost-of-living index to help schools cope with annual inflation will be a top priority next year, said Rep. Dan Branch, R-Dallas, chairman of the House Select Committee on Higher and Public Education Finance.
Lawmakers also will consider allowing tax revenue from property value increases to stay in school districts, he said.
Some school officials contend the state should spend at least $4 billion of a projected $10.7 billion budget surplus next year on public education.
Yes, remember the surplus? Some of that is fueled by increased sales tax revenue, some by taxes on oil, and some by rising property tax revenues. In a system that wasn't designed to fail, the schools would be able to benefit from this. Speaker Craddick may say that he recognizes the schools' need for ways to deal with inflationary pressures, but he's never been a friend to the public schools, and I have serious doubts about his willingness to actually fix what's broken here. It would be much better to have another Speaker in place so we don't have to depend on whatever largesse he may have.
The parade was over, and Tom Jones had parked his eye-catching ride, Swamp Mutha, inside the Art Car Museum.He and two friends sat on the curb in front of the museum, reveling in the afterglow of their pet public art exhibition -- Houston's Art Car Parade.
As they shot the breeze just after 2 a.m., a speeding Pontiac crested the railroad tracks on Heights Boulevard. The driver was going so fast when he hit a parked Toyota Camry 50 feet away that Jones' friend Dion Laurent only had time to think one word.
"No."
The parked car launched into them, flinging Laurent against the fence and pinning Jones and his other friend.
"They were in agony," Laurent said, shuddering.
Jones, a pillar of the Art Car community and curator for the Art Car Museum, died Sunday morning from internal injuries. The other two men survived.
What a tragic end to Art Car Parade Weekend. A memorial for Tom Jones on Flickr is here. My sincere condolences go out to Tom Jones' family and friends, along with my thanks to Jones for everything he did to make these weekends the special and unique experience that they are.
At this point in the overviews, I've basically covered the races where I think the candidates have a good chance to affect their vote totals in a significant way. The remaining races, for County Attorney, District Clerk, and Harris County Department of Education Trustee, will I believe primarily be determined by the Presidential vote. Not completely, of course - as we saw in the introduction, even the judicial races have a certain amount of variance. No race is beyond at least some measure of control by the candidates, but some have more than others.
And of those "others", I believe the County Attorney race has the greatest potential for breaking away from the pack. Democrat Vince Ryan, who served in the County Attorney's office in the 80s and who unsuccessfully ran for County Judge in 1994, has some name recognition for being a three-term City Council member, from 1987 to 1993. (He was also in the news last month for suing his former employer; that may or may not be to his ultimate political benefit, but it did get him in the news, which other candidates in these races will have a hard time doing.) He should be able to do enough fundraising to get his name out there more. As the trick to these races is making sure that the voters who should be supporting you go far enough down the ballot to find you, that will help him.
Ryan also has a couple of decent campaign issues to work with, thanks in part to Sheriff Tommy Thomas. I mentioned before that Harris County Judge candidate David Mincberg sent out a press release criticizing County Judge Ed Emmett for the amount of money that was spent defending the Sheriff's office in the Ibarra lawsuit. That same criticism can and really should be made against County Attorney Mike Stafford, since the issues that were singled out by Federal District Judge Kenneth Hoyt were about how Stafford handled the case. Similarly, it was Stafford who signed off on Sheriff Thomas' 14-day email retention policy, which State district Judge David J. Bernal ruled violated state law. Both of those incidents give Ryan the opportunity to question Stafford's judgment and competence, while tying him to Tommy Thomas and Chuck Rosenthal, two of the biggest albatrosses in county politics this year.
For a normally low-profile office for which there usually isn't much competition - Stafford was unopposed in 2004 after winning a special 2002 election to fill the unexpired term of his predecessor, Michael Fleming, who himself was unopposed in 2000 after winning a close race against Sylvia Garcia in 1996 - that's good news for a challenger. As for Stafford, let me take a moment to explain what the County Attorney does:
The Harris County Attorney's Office was the first County Attorney's Office in the State of Texas to be created solely to serve a major urban county's civil law needs. The Harris County Attorney's Office represents the County and its elected officials in all civil matters and also serves as the legal representative for several separate legal entities that operate within Harris County, including the Harris County Hospital District, the Harris County Flood Control District, the Harris County Appraisal District, the Texas Department of Protective and Regulatory Services, and the Greater 911 Emergency Network.
If I'm Michael Stafford and I can't get someone from, say, the Flood Control District or the 911 Network to say something nice about me and what my office did to help them that I can put on a mailer, then I deserve to lose. Ryan may have issues to club Stafford with, but those issues aren't "his" in the public's mind right now; they're mostly Tommy Thomas' problems. Assuming his unopposed campaign last time didn't make him complacent about raising and hoarding contributions, he ought to be able to get a head start in defining himself to the voters and give them a positive impression before Ryan can make him look bad. I'll be surprised if he doesn't try something like that.
Basically, I think if this race gains a higher profile through Mike Stafford being in the news, or through successful fundraising on Vince Ryan's part, it's good for Ryan. If the race remains obscure, it's better for Stafford. None of it may matter - the Presidential coattails may well be the determining factor - but I think there's a decent chance that we'll hear some things from this campaign. As with many of these countywide races, that will be the first time in awhile for the County Attorney. If nothing else comes out of this year's election, being able to focus even a little more than we normally do on those offices is a net positive.
PREVIOUSLY:
Introduction
District Attorney
County Judge
Sheriff
Tax Assessor
The folks in the food business are feeling the pinch.
Restaurants across town are facing the same problem this Mother's Day, one of the busiest dining-out days of the year: a reluctance to pass on their higher costs to customers who themselves are dealing with higher food and fuel costs.Instead, they tighten their belts and get innovative: bake their own bread, grow their own eggplant, use fewer high-end ingredients, reward employees for being less wasteful and buy smarter.
Wholesale food prices have shot up about 8 percent in the last year, the highest jump in three decades, according to the National Restaurant Association.
The rising cost of fuel, corn and soybeans are among the reasons. Chicken and pork prices are expected to spike soon.
All this has chefs, cooks and owners improvising.
Three weeks ago, Mia Bella owner Youssef Nafaa began baking his own bread, after watching his wholesale bread prices rise.
And Patrenella's executive chef, Ryan Hildebrand, is growing more of his own vegetables.
When he came to the Heights-area Italian restaurant a year ago, a vegetable garden already was in place.
But with the price of some vegetables shooting up, Hildebrand is making the garden a more integral part of the restaurant.
"It definitely saves us money," he said. "It's not big enough to supply all the volume we go through, but it supplements us. I try to make all the specials garden-driven."
[...]
Tracy Vaught, owner of Backstreet Cafe, Hugo's and Prego and co-operator of Trevisio in the Texas Medical Center, said her crews are updating cost sheets and holding themselves more accountable for errors in cooking, service and administration.
"Mistakes cost a lot of money," she said.
In January, Vaught launched a profit-sharing program for her managers tied to them saving her restaurants money, and "it's working like a charm," she said.
Vaught has raised some menu prices "in targeted ways, but not across the board and very modestly."
Open City will raise its menu prices very gradually, 3 to 5 percent, every few weeks, Aly said.
"We tell owners not to be afraid of a menu price increase if it's done correctly, and the perception of value and quality is still there," said Chris Tripoli, president of A'La Carte Foodservice Consulting Group.
It's easier for a customer to accept a somewhat higher price than a smaller portion or lower quality, he maintained.
I'm not sure I agree about the portion size issue. I suppose it depends on the restaurant and the portion size in question. I think there's plenty of places that could serve ten percent less food with each entree, and nobody would notice or have much grounds for complaint. Not cutting back on quality I agree with, but quantity? Maybe this will finally be the solution to America's obesity problems. Hey, you never know.
While I mostly agree with this list of the Top 10 Worst Sports Franchises, I can't really take seriously any list that would overlook the Philadelphia Phillies. The Twins, for all of Calvin Griffith's penny-pinching, have had far more postseason success, including two World Series titles since 1987, than the Phils may ever have. The Boston Bruins may be a lousy hockey team now, but any organization whose description includes the words "Up until 1997, the Bruins made the playoffs in 30 consecutive seasons" just doesn't make the cut in my mind. Not a bad effort overall, but with that one big glaring omission.
Ever wonder why your feet hurt? Apparently, shoes are the problem. Not just stiletto heels, mind you - pretty much all shoes, including and especially shoes designed to cushion the feet, are problematic.
Last year, researchers at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, published a study titled "Shod Versus Unshod: The Emergence of Forefoot Pathology in Modern Humans?" in the podiatry journal The Foot. The study examined 180 modern humans from three different population groups (Sotho, Zulu, and European), comparing their feet to one another's, as well as to the feet of 2,000-year-old skeletons. The researchers concluded that, prior to the invention of shoes, people had healthier feet. Among the modern subjects, the Zulu population, which often goes barefoot, had the healthiest feet while the Europeans--i.e., the habitual shoe-wearers--had the unhealthiest. One of the lead researchers, Dr. Bernhard Zipfel, when commenting on his findings, lamented that the American Podiatric Medical Association does not "actively encourage outdoor barefoot walking for healthy individuals. This flies in the face of the increasing scientific evidence, including our study, that most of the commercially available footwear is not good for the feet."Okay, so shoes can be less than comfortable. If you've ever suffered through a wedding in four-inch heels or patent-leather dress shoes, you've probably figured this out. But does that really mean we don't walk correctly? (Yes.) I mean, don't we instinctively know how to walk? (Yes, sort of.) Isn't walking totally natural? Yes--but shoes aren't.
"Natural gait is biomechanically impossible for any shoe-wearing person," wrote Dr. William A. Rossi in a 1999 article in Podiatry Management. "It took 4 million years to develop our unique human foot and our consequent distinctive form of gait, a remarkable feat of bioengineering. Yet, in only a few thousand years, and with one carelessly designed instrument, our shoes, we have warped the pure anatomical form of human gait, obstructing its engineering efficiency, afflicting it with strains and stresses and denying it its natural grace of form and ease of movement head to foot." In other words: Feet good. Shoes bad.
[...]
Here's another example: If you wear high heels for a long time, your tendons shorten--and then it's only comfortable for you to wear high heels. One saleswoman I spoke to at a running-shoe store described how, each summer, the store is flooded with young women complaining of a painful tingling in the soles of their feet--what she calls "flip-flop-itis," which is the result of women's suddenly switching from heeled winter boots to summer flip-flops. This is the shoe paradox: We've come to believe that shoes, not bare feet, are natural and comfortable, when in fact wearing shoes simply creates the need for wearing shoes.
Okay, but what about a good pair of athletic shoes? After all, they swaddle your foot in padding to protect you from the unforgiving concrete. But that padding? That's no good for you either. Consider a paper titled "Athletic Footwear: Unsafe Due to Perceptual Illusions," published in a 1991 issue of Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise. "Wearers of expensive running shoes that are promoted as having additional features that protect (e.g., more cushioning, 'pronation correction') are injured significantly more frequently than runners wearing inexpensive shoes (costing less than $40)." According to another study, people in expensive cushioned running shoes were twice as likely to suffer an injury--31.9 injuries per 1,000 kilometers, as compared with 14.3--than were people who went running in hard-soled shoes.
Fascinating stuff. Check it out.
The rising price of gasoline has many effects.
Soaring gasoline and food prices and the nation's housing crisis have local sports fans reconsidering how they will spend their money this summer.For now, most fans aren't ready to part with season tickets, but the threat of $4-a-gallon gasoline has some rethinking how many times they will visit the ballpark this summer, the peak of the baseball season.
"When fuel goes up, so does everything else," said John Heyde of Montgomery, who is retired from the U.S. Coast Guard. "My pension stays the same. I have to cut someplace, so I watch more games on TV. Other people like me that are retired aren't going to games like we used to. We used to be diehard all the time."
To offset the price of going to games, fans say they are willing to make sacrifices elsewhere, including cutting back on what they spend once in the ballpark. Others, like the McKee family, are getting creative by using the city's mass transportation system, carpooling in groups to save on fuel and parking, and searching for discount tickets.
Good thing the various stadia are all easily accessible by the city's mass transit system, no? That's something that Sugar Land could not have offered the Dynamo.
When it comes to sports, consumers often have an open-wallet policy, said Dr. Merrill J. Melnick, a sports sociologist at The College at Brockport (N.Y.)."When fans decide where they want to cut costs, denying themselves access to sports events might be real low on their list," Melnick said. "The real identified fan isn't going to let the pump determine whether they root for their favorite team. It seems to me that's one area they are less likely to cut corners. The identification between a fan and a favorite team is a very strong bond."
But, Melnick added, if gasoline reaches $4 a gallon, "that might put a fans' loyalty to the test."
I forget who said it, but someone on the Baseball Prospectus noted that a feature of modern stadia is their smaller capacity. They're designed to cater more towards high-end customers and less towards the bleacher bums; thus the explosion of luxury suites and field-level seats with extra amenities like waiters for refreshments. You'd think this sort of season-ticket holder would be less sensitive to the price of gasoline, since they're already paying a fortune to be at the game. If so, then I figure baseball at least will mostly weather this storm, though it may cause attendance figures to level off or decline a bit.
The fear of a slowdown in consumer spending hasn't affected the city's four major professional teams, with the Astros, Texans, Rockets and Dynamo reporting increases in season-ticket sales. The Dynamo, coming off back-to-back Major League Soccer titles, had a 25-percent increase from 2007 to this season, team president and general manager Oliver Luck said.Luck credits affordable tickets -- the average price to watch a game at Robertson Stadium is $18 -- for the increase.
"We're fairly inexpensive," he said. "I think the fact we are affordable is a blessing for some families."
Cheap seats will always be a draw. And as noted, assuming the downtown stadium ever gets built, being a stop on two rail lines won't hurt them, either.
Despite a bad review from the Government Accounting Office, the so-called "virtual fence" managed to impress some Congressfolk recently.
Sections of Texas' border with Mexico eventually could be secured by the same kind of high-tech "virtual fence" that's been deployed in Arizona, key legislators said Friday after touring the state-of-the-art surveillance network.The comments by two subcommittee chairmen with the House Homeland Security Committee -- Reps. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Houston, and Christopher Carney, D-Pa.-- followed an inspection tour Friday of the $20.6 million virtual fence near Sasabe, Ariz.
The project links high-tech surveillance towers, cameras, radar, ground sensors and unmanned aerial drones along a 28-mile section of the 1,947-mile international border.
"In Texas, there is an outcry and a great deal of conflict over installing physical barriers along the border," said Jackson Lee, chairman of the panel's subcommittee on transportation security and infrastructure protection. "What I have seen here today can be a very effective 21st century tool to secure our borders."
Carney, the chairman of the panel's oversight subcommittee, called the virtual fence "a tremendous concept" that's ready for eventual deployment elsewhere along the border "once we make sure the bugs are ironed out."
Carney, who toured the area with Jackson Lee and five other lawmakers, said the virtual fence was best suited for sparsely inhabited stretches along the border. "If we can ever get the technology to match the dedication of the Border Patrol personnel here, we'll have an impenetrable border," he said.
[...]
Jackson Lee said the lawmakers' inspection tour turned her from a skeptic into a believer that the blend of high-tech surveillance and targeted deployment of Border Patrol agents could intercept illegal immigrants and drug traffickers.
Flaws in the system have been slashed from 53 to just four, she said.
"I've changed my assessment because the technology did not work -- and now it does," she said.
I remain skeptical for now. I'll say again that given a choice between this and a physical fence, this "virtual" concept is a million times better, and likely to be a lot cheaper as well. It's still not a fix for what's actually broken with our immigration system, and as such I think it's a mis-prioritization of our resources. But if it helps to appease the fence fetishists out there, it's less objectionable than some other options. That's the best I can say about it at this time.
I love stories about demographics.
By 2050, the area between Houston, San Antonio and Dallas-Fort Worth will become a single "mega-region" containing 70 percent of the state's population, city planning experts said at a national forum on Friday.Experts attending the Washington conference, dubbed America 2050, said the Texas mega-region, which will be one of 10 in the U.S., will house 24.5 million of the state's projected 35 million residents.
I wish the definition of this region were more precise. I presume it really means the Houston, San Antonio, and D/FW metro areas; if it does, then ten of the state's 15 most populous counties, accounting for a bit more than half of the total population, are in it. And that doesn't include runnerup counties like Brazoria, Bell, McClennan, Ellis, and Wichita (see here for an Excel spreadsheet with populations by county as of 2004). My guess is we're already at about 60 to 65% of the whole enchilada as it is.
[Regional Planning] Association president Bob Yaro said the Texas Triangle is different from the nation's other regions.Large swaths of undeveloped land, he said, exist between the metropolitan areas in Texas, unlike Southern California or the Northeast.
Because the distances between the Texas cities are too great for automobile commuting and too small for cost-effective air links, he said, high-speed rail should be an important new approach.
If there's some way that private companies could make money off of it, they would be interested in building a high-speed rail network, said Thomas Donohue, president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. But he added that the prospect of profit seems unlikely unless the firms are allowed to use existing rail lines. That, he said, "ain't going to happen because we're having enough trouble moving freight."
True enough, though of course there is another option, that of government investment in such a rail network. Wasn't the Trans Texas Corridor supposed to have a rail component? I'm not sure if that's gotten lost amid the shouting over toll roads or if it's been quietly dropped; the point I'm making is that just as investing in roads is an asset to managing growth, so may investing in alternate forms of transportation be. It doesn't have to be all or nothing.
Yaro said he was impressed by Metro's light-rail project."The fact that Houston's there, moving ahead with this thing in what has been until recently the most automobile-dominated place in the country is really a big step forward," he said.
Some of us certainly think so. We still have a long way to go with it, though.
You don't need subtitles to enjoy this pro-bike-riding ad from Hungary:
But if you really want to know what they're saying, Ezra has a translation.
Now here's the real question: What kind of a reaction do you think an ad like this would get in Houston?
The Chron had a story yesterday about an "Innocence Summit", which focused on matters of wrongful convictions and what can and must be done about them. The first thing to remember here is that this isn't an abstract issue:
Nine wrongfully convicted men who spent a collective 148 years in Texas prisons met with a select group of prosecutors, judges and police chiefs in the Senate chamber Thursday to urge the state to establish a commission to investigate claims of innocence."I'm crying out for mercy today for someone who may still be in prison," said James Curtis Giles, who served 10 years in prison for rape before DNA testing proved him innocent.
[...]
Alejandro Hernandez said he spent 13 years in prison for murder based on a faulty police photo lineup. He said some innocent people could avoid conviction if a person not involved in the investigation handled photo lineups so they would not know which person was the suspect.
Billy Smith fought for five years to have the DNA test that exonerated him and prompted his release from prison after serving 19 years of a life sentence for rape that was based solely on a bad eyewitness identification. He said the state needs to provide better compensation for people who have been wrongfully convicted.
"I'm a victim. Make no mistake about that," Smith said.
Grits has two informative reports from the summit, which offer some hope for movement on the issue, plus a post of changes to lineup procedures in Dallas, which will help prevent future injustices.
New York criminal defense lawyer Barry Scheck, who directs the Innocence Project that has represented many of those freed in Texas, said "enormous progress has been made" in Texas.Scheck praised Houston Police Chief Harold Hurtt for making major improvements in the Houston crime lab. But Scheck said every police department in Texas needs to be improving its handling of eyewitness identifications as well as the collection of DNA evidence.
Hurtt said the state should consider funding regional crime labs so that the police are not in charge of them and they can be run on a more professional and efficient basis.
It always comes down to money - or really, given our current state of surplus, to how we prioritize spending that money - doesn't it? If we devoted one tenth of the resources to things like independent regional crime labs that we did to building more prisons, we wouldn't need to hold Innocence Summits. We'd finally be able to say that we really are doing the best we can to prevent these tragedies. And by the way, an independent crime lab has been a campaign theme of Clarence Bradford since he first announced his candidacy.
Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins said efforts by his office to review innocence claims have restored confidence in the criminal justice system locally. Watkins said that several years ago drug dealers knew Dallas juries would not convict them because of a police evidence-planting scandal.Watkins said one of his prosecutors recently was worried he could not get a conviction in a murder case because of publicity surrounding the wrongful-conviction release of 27-year inmate James Lee Woodard. But he said the jury took only five minutes to convict because confidence in the Dallas criminal justice system has been restored.
Maybe you have confidence in the criminal justice system, but if you've noticed that the vast majority of the people who are now being released from prison after being exonerated by DNA evidence are people of color, you might understand why not everyone shares that confidence.
State Sen. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, has been leading the effort to have an "innocence commission" formed in Texas. Ellis told the gathering that he has asked Gov. Rick Perry and other state leaders to establish such a commission but has not heard back from them.Perry's top criminal justice adviser, Mary Anne Wiley, said the governor shares Ellis' concerns on issues such as improving the legal defense for people on trial and separating control of crime laboratories from the control of police departments. But she said he does not want to create another layer of government in the criminal justice system.
I'm sorry, but if the best Rick Perry can do is wring his hands and fret about "another layer of government", whatever that means, then it's a lie to say he shares Sen. Ellis' concerns. If he actually did share those concerns, he'd want to do something about them. Until such time, he remains part of the problem. And if you read through Grits' posts, you'll see that the Governor's intransigence is putting him increasingly at odds with members of his own party. Ensuring that the guilty are convicted and the innocent are not is not and should not be a partisan issue.
We have a second announced candidate for State Sen. Kyle Janek's soon-to-be-open seat.
Houston lawyer Grant Harpold has announced that he will run to replace outgoing State Sen. Kyle Janek.Harpold, a Republican precinct chairman, said if elected, he will pursue GOP stances on lower taxes, smaller government and immigration.
He has lived in the district since 1992 and never has held public office.
"I feel I can have some new ideas on these issues," he said. "Perhaps, new ideas and new ways."
Houston money manager Austen Furse, a Republican, also has started to campaign for the seat.
Furse seems to have lined up a fair amount of establishment support so far. I don't see Harpold being more likely to win than he is.
State Rep. Charlie Howard, R-Sugar Land, and Gary Polland, former Harris County Republican Party chair, are two others who have expressed interest in the race.On the Democratic side, State Rep. Scott Hochberg, of Houston, is among possible contenders.
"I would expect one or more will surface by the end of the month," said Gerry Birnberg, chairman of the Harris County Democratic Party. "We will have a viable candidate for that position."
For all the speculation about this race so far, the only Democratic name I've heard has been Hochberg's, and I think it's safe to say he will only run in a non-November election, so he doesn't have to give up his House seat unless he wins. I'm sure there are other people thinking about this, but no chatter about them has reached my ears or Inbox.
Jay Aiyer, who is an immigration attorney, has a suggestion for the process of verifying eligibility to work.
The reality is that the overwhelming numbers of businesses never knowingly hire anyone they believe is here illegally. They are required by law to inspect employment authorization and to determine if a person can legally work. One problem is that there is no realistic way to verify the authenticity of documents.A possible solution would be to invest in a workable national database that can accurately determine the work authorization of workers. Instead, the government has decided to step up arrests and detention that cost millions more.
Programs like the "E-Verify" program are still too error-prone to be of assistance, and current law doesn't even require such verification. Moreover, while businesses must visually inspect documents, they run the risk of being accused of discrimination if they ask too many questions. Additionally, the documents themselves often can be easily duplicated and forged, making it even more difficult.
Businesses have a duty to inspect work authorization documents and maintain an "employment eligibility verification form" known as an I-9. For the most part, the majority of employers try their best to comply. But the federal government should not place the entire burden of enforcement on them. Instead the government needs to bring employers in as partners.
We all recognize that there are some employers out there who collude with document vendors to their advantage. That is where ICE's resources should be targeted -- not in random raids.
All businesses should conduct regular audits of their own hiring policies and procedures to make sure that all employees are properly filling out I-9 documents. However, federal authorities need to recognize that businesses ought to be encouraged and applauded for a self-audit process without potential penalties from ICE.
I'm a lot more skeptical of self-enforcing processes for businesses these days, given how things have been with the Bush administration. Still, there's a lot here that makes sense, and I do agree that the random-raids method of keeping businesses in line is not helpful. At the very least, I'd like to see more of the debate be along these lines. It's about finding practical solutions that can garner support across the spectrum.
And now for a little weekend frivolity: The Top 10 Feathered-Hair Wearers Of All Time. I might try to work up an argument for including some other people on this august list, but I'm laughing too hard at the pictures to muster the strength. Those of you who are too young to remember this era, all I can tell you is that you had to be there. It's amazing what can seem like a good idea at the time. Enjoy!
Kelly Siegler, a longtime prosecutor at the Harris County District Attorney's Office who lost her bid for the top job there in April's primary elections, resigned today.Siegler, 45, who had worked at the office since 1987, submitted her resignation letter to District Attorney Ken Magidson early this afternoon. It takes effect immediately.
Siegler said she is looking forward to working as a special prosecutor, trying a capital murder case in Wharton County this summer.
Siegler will work alongside Wharton County District Attorney Josh McCown as they prosecute an illegal hunter in the shooting death of Texas Parks and Wildlife game warden Justin Hurst, 34, following a car chase and shootout last year.
"This opportunity came up to work on the case in Wharton County, which is basically home to me," said Siegler, a Matagorda County native. "It's what I love doing. It's what I'm good at."
Siegler has no plans beyond that just yet. She said she would love to work as a special prosecutor on other cases. She has also received job offers from civil law firms and other district attorney's offices, she said.
Asked if she could pursue a career as a criminal defense lawyer, Siegler said, "Never say never."
Siegler's resignation came as a surprise, said Scott Durfee, general counsel and spokesman for the district attorney's office.
It's not a surprise to me, anyway - I'd have thought it would be too uncomfortable for her to stay after losing the primary, regardless of what happens in November, and once you realize that, why wait? As for Siegler becoming a defense attorney, I'll let Mark Bennett handle that. I can't say I'm sorry that Kelly Siegler won't be our next DA, but I do respect the work she's done, and I wish her well in whatever she does do next. Good luck to you, Kelly.
The Chron hits all the right notes on the Harris County jail overcrowding problem.
Holding 10,245 inmates as of midnight Tuesday, the Harris County Jail is so crowded that Sheriff Tommy Thomas has already sent 600 inmates to a lockup in Louisiana and will be sending 1,130 more to facilities in that state.The Texas Commission on Jail Standards recently found the Harris County Jail in compliance with all applicable standards. However, the jail is certified to hold only 9,400 inmates, almost 2,000 fewer than have been recently crowded into its four facilities.
The overcrowding endangers inmates' health. Recently 80 inmates contracted chickenpox or shingles, which share a common virus. The prisoners were quarantined for 21 days and denied visitors. The spread of tuberculosis is a constant worry.
For about 17 inmates per year, detention in the Harris County Jail is a death sentence. They die most often from the failure to receive medication and treatment for illness in a timely fashion.
Some die during violent encounters with their jailers, who are frequently understaffed. Others are badly beaten but survive. Most of the deceased were never convicted of the crime with which they had been charged.
A large part of the jail overcrowding problem resides with the elected judges here. They don't make good use of pre-trial release and other jail diversion programs that allow minor, nonviolent offenders to return to their jobs and families while awaiting trial.
Some judges set up defendants to fail, making the terms of their probation so onerous that successful completion is unlikely. A minor infraction can send a probationer back to jail and then to prison to serve a long sentence.
The Legislature is also to blame. Over the years it has made too many minor offenses felonies. Judges are allowed to set high, unattainable bail, dooming many indigent inmates to months or years of jail time before they have a chance to make their case in court.
Voters in November rejected a bond issue to expand the jail by 2,500 beds, rejecting the notion of placing more Harris County residents needlessly and pointlessly behind bars. That leaves the criminal justice system here with the duty to reduce jail overcrowding by decreasing the number of inmates.
The only thing that needs to be added is that just as the voters took corrective action last year by rejecting the jail bond, they have that chance again this year in November, when many of the judges who are a big part of the problem are up for re-election. I hope that when the Chron gets around to doing its endorsements this fall, the editorial board will remember what it said in the spring.
UPDATE: Grits has more.
On the heels of that Rasmussen poll showing him within four points of Sen. John Cornyn, a second poll has confirmed that Rick Noriega is running a close race.
Research 2000 for Daily Kos. 5/5-7. Likely voters. MoE 4% (9/24-26/07 results)Cornyn (R) 48 (51)
Noriega (D) 44 (35)
That is nothing short of astounding. And lest anyone worry that it's an outlier, these numbers confirm a Rasmussen poll from earlier this week:Rasmussen. 5/1. Likely voters. MoE 4% (No trend lines)
Cornyn (R) 47
Noriega (D) 43
I also pitted McCain against both Obama and Clinton, and here, the results are a little less encouraging:McCain (R) 52
Obama (D) 39McCain (R) 53
Clinton (D) 38
The crosstabs are very interesting, and offer some tantalizing suggestions for this year's election. The first thing to notice is that Noriega does as well among Democrats as Cornyn does among Republicans - indeed, he does a smidge better (Dems go 82-11 for Noriega, Repubs 81-13 for Cornyn) - while independents are split evenly. This is further evidence of the hypothesis that the GOP's built-in advantage in Texas has eroded from about nine points to perhaps half that. That's a gap that can be bridged.
This Presidential poll is the best showing I've seen yet for McCain in Texas; his previous high-water mark was a 51-42 lead over Obama in March. The crosstabs tell an interesting story there, too, as McCain does significantly better among Republicans (83-6 versus Obama, 84-5 against Clinton) than either Democrat does among Dems (79-15 for Obama, 79-16 for Clinton). I believe that will even out once the nomination is finalized. McCain also does better among independents, which he is likely to continue to do, though if the Dems spend some money portraying McCain as four more years of Bush (whose approval rating among indies in this poll is 31-69), that ought to get narrowed.
So we now have two polls showing a close race. The more national interest in this matchup, the better. The next step is closing the fundraising gap. Here's the ActBlue page if you want to help with that.
UPDATE: Noriega liveblogs on Kos. And here's more reaction to the first poll.
Christof brings news of an update to the downtown alignment of the Harrisburg and Southeast rail lines, which have undergone some major alterations and solved a lot of previously noted problems, though in doing so made numerous compromises that will still cause concern. A couple of points:
One good thing about this alignment is that it works well for westward expansion. The tracks will join over Buffalo Bayou, at I-45 between the Hobby Center and Bayou Place. For now, this is where trains will change direction. But these tracks will point directly towards the city courts and Houston Avenue, where the future Inner Katy Line (also authorized by voters in 2003) could head towards Washington Avenue and/or the Heights on its way to the Northwest Transit Center.
That's exciting to hear. It's time to start talking about expanding the system in that direction. I've got some ideas about where I'd like to see the eventual Inner Katy line go, which I'll present in a later post. For now, I'm just glad to see that it would naturally tie into the existing east-west line in downtown, which as we can see from Christof's map would make Minute Maid, the Toyota Center, the (if it ever gets built) Dynamo Stadium, and Discovery Green all easily rail-accessible.
Another compromise: the Main Street line is relatively fast and very reliable because the trains have their own lanes and have traffic signal priority. That won't be true for this line. Like buses do now, the trains will share the curb lanes with cars, both turns and through traffic. [update, prompted by a question from Highway6 in the forums: the track will be on the south side of each street, that is, in the left lane of Capitol and the right lane of Rusk] And the signals will be operated as they are on Capitol and Rusk today: trains will find the lights are sometimes green and sometimes red, and they will stop or go accordingly. There is no doubt that this will slow trains down and throw off schedules: for example, a line of stopped cars in the left lane on one block would force the train to hold in the previous block until the cars moved. It might also be a safety issue, but that's not as clear. In theory, the trains would act like buses, obeying traffic laws and mixing with cars. That avoids accidents that occur because motorists don't expect a train that moves differently than they do, and it does not require unusual turn restrictions. But motorists not used to the area -- like suburbanites going a ballgame or festival -- could get unnerved and drive unexpectedly.
Not having dedicated right-of-way for this part of those lines is disappointing but understandable - I figure it'll be cheaper this way, if nothing else. It's a short enough stretch that the hit on schedule reliability won't be that bad - the vast majority of the time, that trip will have a duration within a reasonably tight range, making it predictable enough. Having the train share a lane with vehicular traffic isn't a big deal - Portland's light rail line does the same thing in places. It's not optimal, but for the relatively small fraction of the route that this represents, it's not a showstopper.
So what we have now may the best we can do, but it deserves scrutiny. Since this exact alignment wasn't included in the previous Draft or Final Environment Impact Statements, it will be included in an upcoming Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement, with a public hearing to follow. In other words, there's still time to have a say, and you can start in our forums.
So if you don't like what Metro has done here, you can tell them so, and maybe get them to do a little further tinkering. Speak up, or lose the right to bitch about it later. A more comprehensive updated map of the entire system can be found in Christof's previous post.
As we know, one of the arguments for abolishing the penny (and the nickel) is the high cost of manufacturing them, due to the rising prices of zinc and copper. Congress has tried but not succeeded in passing a law to give the US Mint more flexibility to change the composition of these coins, and now they're trying again.
Surging prices for copper, zinc and nickel have some in Congress trying to bring back the steel-made pennies of World War II, and maybe using steel for nickels, as well.Copper and nickel prices have tripled since 2003 and the price of zinc has quadrupled, said Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., whose subcommittee oversees the U.S. Mint.
Keeping the coin content means "contributing to our national debt by almost as much as the coin is worth," Gutierrez said.
A penny, which consists of 97.5% zinc and 2.5% copper, cost 1.26 cents to make as of Tuesday. And a nickel -- 75% copper and the rest nickel -- cost 7.7 cents, based on current commodity prices, according to the Mint.
[...]
On Tuesday, the House debated a bill that directs the Treasury secretary to "prescribe" -- suggest -- a new, more economical composition of the nickel and the penny. A vote was delayed because of Republican procedural moves and is expected later in the week.
Unsaid in the legislation is the Constitution's delegation of power to Congress "to coin money (and) regulate the value thereof."
The Bush administration, like others before, chafes at that.
Just a few hours before the House vote, Mint Director Edmund Moy told House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank, D-Mass., that the Treasury Department opposes the bill as "too prescriptive" in part because it does not explicitly delegate the power to decide the new coin composition.
The bill also gives the public and the metal industry too little time to weigh in on the new coin composition, he said.
"We can't wholeheartedly support that bill," Moy said in a telephone interview. Moy said he could not say whether President Bush would veto the House version in the unlikely event that it survived the Senate.
Sen. Wayne Allard, R-Colo., who is retiring at the end of the year, is expected to present the Senate with a version more acceptable to the administration in the next few weeks.
I guess I'm not sure why a President would care so much about how the Mint does its business. Perhaps the Allard bill will help me understand once I see the differences. Anyone know more about this?
BOR has a nice roundup of editorials from state newspapers about the recent voter ID ruling by the Supreme Court and the sure-to-follow effort by the State Lege to pass a similar law here. For the most part, they get it (though as Vince noted, not all of them do). One in particular to highlight is the Lufkin Daily News, which makes the case against about as succinctly as one can:
There are plenty of real problems to tackle - including a severe shortage of prison guards, an alarmingly high drop-out rate among high school students and inadequate funding for highway maintenance and construction, to name just three.
Yes, yes, and yes. The nature of Texas' biennial Legislative season ensures that there are too many worthy (and unworthy) agenda items fighting for a very limited window of opportunity to become law. Time spent on voter ID legislation is time not spent - time that cannot be spent within the 20 weeks of the session - on real problems that should have a higher priority. That the Republican leadership in Texas will choose to put voter ID over more pressing matters like those named by the Lufkin paper tells you a lot about what they stand for. And I'll say it again, if that strikes you as a bad thing, you can do something about it. It's our choice, just as it's their choice.
If I were still living on Staten Island, this guy would be my soon-to-be-former Congressman.
Speculation on the political future of Rep. Vito Fossella (R-Staten Island/Brooklyn) is running rampant today after he acknowledged that he is the father of a 3-year-old daughter with divorcee Laura Fay, the retired Air Force lieutenant colonel who picked him up from an Alexandria, Va., jail last week after he was busted for DWI."I have had a relationship with Laura Fay, with whom I have a three year old daughter," the married Fossella said in a prepared statement e-mailed to reporters by consultant Susan Del Percio. "My personal failings and imperfections have caused enormous pain to the people I love and I am truly sorry."
Ms. Del Percio said Fossella would not personally address the media today.
Fossella and his wife, Mary Pat, have three children.
Former GOP Borough President Guy Molinari, who has been among those advising Fossella since the scandal broke exactly one week ago, said that confronting the issue of the child he has with Ms. Fay had been "overwhelming" for Fossella.
"He's in a very difficult mood," said Molinari, who used to hold the congressional seat that Fossella sits in. "He's just in a period of trying to do the right thing."
I'm guessing the right thing would have included not driving drunk, not fathering a child out of wedlock, and not lying about it after getting busted, but it's a tad late for all that. I'll have to ask my dad what he's hearing about this from his buddies back home.
Anyway. Chalk up another tough-to-defend open seat for the Republicans, as if they didn't have enough of those. Daily Kos and Julia, who like me has roots on the Island, have more.
Christine has now been blogging for eight years. In Internet time, that's approximately since the dawn of the Paleocene epoch. Speaking as someone who's been at it for a mere 6.5 years, all I can say is "We are not worthy". Happy blogiversary, Christine!
One possible option for dealing with the overcrowded jails, at least until a more permanent solution can be implemented: Ship some inmates to Galveston.
Harris County Judge Ed Emmett said he planned to speak with Galveston County Judge James Yarbrough about using his empty 500-bed lockup."If we've got a jail next door, it sure would make a lot of sense if we could do it," Emmett said.
[...]
Galveston County vacated its old jail in 2006, after building a new one as part of a $99 million criminal justice complex.
Yarbrough said the old facility was in fine shape and met all state standards when it was operational, but was too small for the 900 to 1,000 inmates that Galveston County had been holding in recent years.
Both county judges said it was too early to estimate what it would cost to lease and staff the Galveston jail. Yarbrough said he probably would not be able to provide detention officers, so Harris County would have to use its own guards or pay a private contractor. But he said he would offer the best deal he could arrange.
"We can't just give it to them, but certainly Harris County's been a good friend on a whole number of fronts," Yarbrough said. "We certainly would, hopefully, make a fair deal for everybody."
Note that this is only a solution if jailers are provided by Harris County. Given that the county has had problems hiring enough jailers for its own lockups, that may be an obstacle. Or it may just make it too damn expensive. In any event, it's just another Band-Aid fix that doesn't address the root cause of the problem. It's better than outsourcing to Louisiana, but it's still not the right answer.
The TSU-Dynamo Stadium marriage is inching closer to reality.
Two weeks after he first expressed interest in the project and a couple of meetings and phone conversations later, newly appointed TSU athletic director Charles McClelland said the school is willing to invest in the construction of the 22,000-capacity stadium in exchange for the rights to use it."My understanding of the proposal is that the Houston Dynamo and Texas Southern University would share the use of the stadium, including some signage, so it would be the home of Texas Southern University athletics and football program," McClelland said Wednesday, two days after meeting with a city official involved in the stadium negotiations. "We're interested and understand that there has to be a financial commitment from the university, but we are very pleased with the direction of the talks and hope to be able to come to a resolution in the near future."
While McClelland declined to disclose the size or range of the financial commitment because of the ongoing nature of the talks, he is confident the range that has been discussed is "within the capability of the university."
Andy Icken, the city's deputy director of public works, who is heading negotiations on a stadium deal, said he discussed TSU's interest in entering the soccer stadium deal at a meeting Monday.
TSU's proposal makes sense because the Tigers could use the stadium for their football games and the city could rely on TSU's financial participation as a way to keep additional tax dollars from being spent on the facility, Icken said.
"If we can make it happen, we will," Icken said. "We have nothing other than discussions going on at this point."
As I said before, I think this makes a lot of sense, and would be a win for everyone involved. I hope they can make it happen.
The first thing you have to come to grips with in discussing the race for Harris County Tax Assessor is that Paul Bettencourt got almost 25,000 more votes than George W. Bush did in Harris County in 2004. No other candidate in a contested race did that; indeed, no other candidate in a contested race topped the President. Bettencourt, more than any other candidate on the ballot, was successful at getting people who otherwise voted Democratic to push the button for him.
For that reason, I believe he'll be the hardest candidate for the Democrats to knock off this year. He's already got a history of getting crossover support, which despite Harris County's long-term Republican tilt is likely going to be necessary for survival. While he's been about as visible as his colleagues in countywide executive offices, he doesn't have the baggage that Chuck Rosenthal had and Tommy Thomas has. Despite his outspokenness on various partisan issues and his position of leadership within the Harris County GOP, he has somehow managed to maintain some distance between his party identity and his elected office.
It stands to reason, then, that one of the keys for Diane Trautman if she hopes to beat him in the election is to narrow that gap. If being a Republican is a liability this year, as evidence suggests it is, then she needs to make sure the voters know he's a Republican. In particular, to make sure Democratic and Democratic-leaning voters know that Bettencourt stands against them on matters like voter ID, and that he stands with Dan Patrick on matters of taxation, which in turn means shifting the burden to those who are less well-off. If she can limit him to mostly Republican support, she can work on getting her own crossovers. At the very least, she can begin to hope that the expected Democratic wave will lift her to victory.
Trautman may be able to benefit from some synergy with other campaigns as well. David Mincberg has identified reforming the Harris County Appraisal District (HCAD) as an issue for his campaign. That will give Trautman an opportunity to note that while Bettencourt is forever complaining about appraisal increases for average homeowners, HCAD (and, to be fair, pretty much every other appraisal district in the state) does a terrible job of fairly assessing the value of commercial properties, which in turn lets them shoulder a disporportionately small share of the overall tax burden, and that this is something Bettencourt never talks about. Matters of ethics that will be and have been raised by Mincberg and the other camapaigns will dovetail nicely with her professional background. Having a coordinated campaign for the county will benefit her.
And if I were in charge of that coordinated campaign, I'd do what I could to boost Trautman's profile and ensure her campaign has the resources it needs. Not so much from a strategic viewpoint - of the races discussed so far, I expect this one to drive the discourse the least - but from a public policy perspective. Taking out Bettencourt would reap sizable rewards; it would deal a big blow to the appraisal caps movement, and would put a much friendlier face in charge of Harris County's voter rolls, one who might put more effort into registering voters than purging them. That's got to be worth some kind of investment in her candidacy. I've mentioned this in conversation with various people, but I have no idea if anything will happen along these lines.
As for Bettencourt, I presume he'll keep doing what he's always done, which among other things has consistently gotten him a decent amount of generally positive press. Of the incumbents who have been elected to their office before (Tommy Thomas and Mike Stafford are the others), he has the least baggage and the best justification for simply running on his record. I don't think I'd do anything too fancy if I were him, just keep my name out there and tout my accomplishments as often as possible. If that's going to work for anyone this year, it will work for him.
PREVIOUSLY:
Last Friday the Statesman wrote a story about Capitol employees who earn a part-time wage but are listed as full-time and receive the same health insurance and pension benefits as full-time employees.
Capitol insiders say that hiring employees as full-time workers while paying them part-time salaries is a longstanding practice at the Legislature, a way to get benefits for workers who otherwise would not qualify for them.It costs taxpayers a minimum of $284 a month for health insurance for a full-time worker, according to calculations from the Employees Retirement System of Texas. And it costs much more to pay higher retirement benefits that the additional years of service can bring.
Even so, some lawmakers argue that the practice is legal and that any questions about it are off-base. Under House rules, each lawmaker is allowed to hire whom they want on whatever schedule they want. Thirty-three of the House's approximately 700 employees make less than $600 a month -- the amount lawmakers earn, according to House payroll records for February.
House Speaker Tom Craddick said he has ordered the House General Investigating and Ethics Committee and the state attorney general to look into the practice. Last week, subpoenas went to House officials for personnel records as part of a preliminary investigation by the Travis County district attorney's office.
"If some legislators are paying employees with taxpayer dollars who are performing little or no work, that is an egregious misuse of state money," Craddick said in a statement to the American-Statesman. "It must be stopped immediately and with full restitution made."
Lawmakers who have made such hires defend them, saying it is difficult to hire good workers for a part-time Legislature, which meets only five months every other year. Furthermore, they said, they have limited budgets with which to hire professional staff.
"That was part of the discussion when I hired him," Rep. Craig Eiland, D-Galveston, said of his deal with Zbranek. " 'I can't pay you too much. It's just $300 a month. The insurance and benefits make up a little more.' "
At least one lawmaker chalked up the inquiries to House politics, a charge Craddick's office denies.
Rep. Byron Cook, R-Corsicana, who hired Fazio, challenged Craddick's leadership a year ago as part of a power play that continues now with several announced candidates to unseat him. The issues concerning the employees are likely to fuel that dispute.
"If there's a target here, it's me because of the issues I've had with the leadership," Cook said, referring to Craddick. " This is generated by one source and one source only, and that has to have come in a whisper from the speaker's office.
"I have nothing to hide."
Other lawmakers said the blame rests with House administration officials.
"If there was anything wrong ... the House Administration Committee should have told me. They review everything we do," said Rep. Jim Dunnam, D-Waco, who has three full-time, low-paid workers on his staff, including Wise. Dunnam also said he hired former state Rep. Dale Tillery in a similar case several years ago.
But Rep. Tony Goolsby, R-Dallas, who chairs the House Administration Committee, which oversees personnel issues, said lawmakers -- not his committee or House officials -- are responsible for running their offices according to state rules.
"That's up to them," he said. "That's the way the rules are written at present."
In case it's not clear from this excerpt, all of the lawmakers cited for this practice are opponents of House Speaker Tom Craddick, whose letter to the Statesman led to the article. This has, not surprisingly, caused a huge fight to break out. Phillip Martin, who worked as a House staffer in 2007, gives some context:
1. There's nothing illegal or unethical about any of this. All hires of House employees are public record. The Speaker's office -- though they deny it -- receives copies of each and every one of these hires. This practice has been long-standing and well understood; for Craddick to feign surprise is total crap.2. There's nothing fiscally irresponsible about any of this. The $284 monthly cost of paying for health benefits for these hires doesn't amount to squat in the face of a $10-billion surplus. And considering that the children of state employees -- including Craddick's own daughter -- also receive health benefits, then I don't see any monetary significance to this alleged "revelation."
3. Craddick is responsible for the oversight of all House employees. Moreover, the Speaker ultimately oversees the office of House Administration -- at least, if he wants to claim responsibility that Denise Davis was an employee of the Speaker's office, then the same thing applies to the employees in the Payroll and Personnel department of House Administration. Either Craddick is responsible for this, or he's not. Or, he's just a political hypocrite waging war because...I don't even know why.
4. Staffers are paid meager wages. Like all state employees (except State Senate staffers), House staffers barely get paid what they deserve. They accept 50-70% of their "market value" in order to help serve the people of Texas, and part-time workers will accept even less. Craddick and Mike Ward may have cherry-picked some admittedly extreme examples, but there are dozens more who are hard-working, barely getting-by staffers just trying to help out. Waging war on them is going to backfire.
The obviously political nature of Craddick's actions is laid out clearly by Harvey Kronberg:
In his press release on May 2, General Investigating Committee Chairman Larry Phillips said, "On April 7, 2008, Speaker Tom Craddick's office notified the House General & Investigating Committee..."Three weeks later, the Speaker's office apparently formally notified the three members referred to the General Investigating Committee of their problem with an Austin American Statesman story by Mike Ward.
The speaker's office apparently elected to ignore the more traditional House practice of notifying members about possible improprieties and offering the members an opportunity to cure any problems. Instead, these "issues" that Phillips knew about in early April went public in a May news story along with referrals to the Travis County District Attorney's office.
We have asked the Speaker's office if they can cite any precedent where House resources were used by a Speaker to publicly damage sitting House members. Development of this story required co-ordination between the House Business Office, House Accounting and possibly even the Legislature's law firm, the Legislative Council.
Kronberg got a reply that didn't actually address the question, which he subsequently published. He continues:
It appears that Chairman Goolsby has also taken some liberties with "part time" employees.For instance, lobbyist Jennifer Shelley Rodriguez appears as a full time employee on Goolsby's Monthly Financial Statement from January to March of 2004. In January and February, her full time status earned her $500 a month. In March, she pulled down only $326.09. Rodriguez, the daughter of former Senator and current lobbyist Dan Shelley appears to have been a registered lobbyist in 2004 with at least 14 clients.
Again, according to the Monthly Financial Statement received by each House member, another full time employee making $500/month was Jennifer Fein. She held this status from September 2005 to January 2006.
In 2003, before SB1370 was passed, Goolsby had Eric Goldberg as a full time $500 month employee from January 20, 2003 to May 10 of the same year.
And finally, Ernest Stromberger, former executive director of Independent Insurance Agents of America shows up for 20 hours a week from December 2, 2002 to January 8, 2003.
We identified these issues and requested comment from Goolsby but had received none as of press time.
The point is not that Tony Goolsby did anything malevolent. The point is that if the chair of House Administration did not know he was acting improperly according to the Speaker's standards, it is silly to presume that members submitting their vouchers to him for approval would know they were doing anything improper.
Frankly, it is doubtful whether most of Mr. Craddick's leadership team can survive the same coordinated scrutiny directed towards Dunnam, Eiland, Cook and Coleman. If their cases are to be referred to the General Investigating Committee and the Travis County District Attorney, then so should Goolsby and other names that are already finding their way to this observer.
The Lone Star Project has more on Goolsby's part-time-pay, full-time-benefit hires, and QR has a <a href="http://www.quorumreport.com/downloadit.cf