Craft breweries and the Texas Beer Alliance, which represents major-brand beer distributors, joined forces to lobby the Senate Business and Commerce Committee on Tuesday, but not all distributing groups are on board.
Elena Schneider
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Energy
Water Planners Floating Several Reservoir Projects
Reservoir projects are inching forward throughout Texas as an answer to the drought, but environmentalists argue that they are unnecessary and expensive.
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Bidness As Usual
Lawmakers Slam Disclosure Bill — and Rebuke Freshman Who Filed It
Rep. Giovanni Capriglione got a rude awakening in his transparency bill’s hearing before the House State Affairs Committee on Wednesday when members suggested his legislation was a political “vendetta.”
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Health care
GOP Lawmakers Say They’ll Stick With Perry on Medicaid Expansion
Two key Republicans legislators — both of them doctors — say they’re sticking with Gov. Rick Perry’s position that Texas will reject the Medicaid expansion provision of federal health reform.
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Health care
Trauma Professionals Plead for More Funding
Ambulance drivers, nurses and trauma surgeons lobbied lawmakers on Tuesday to allocate more funds to emergency services.
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Energy
Bill Could Bring Dairy Farming Back to El Paso
State Rep. Mary González, D-Clint, wants to bring dairy farming back to her district by repealing a decade-old ban on the practice, the result of longstanding concerns over bovine tuberculosis.
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Public Education
Bill Targets Domestic Partnerships in School District’s Health Plan
Pflugerville ISD made history last year when the board of trustees approved health benefits for domestic partners of its employees. In response, Rep. Drew Springer, R-Muenster, has filed a bill to cut the district’s health care funding.
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Public Education
Reducing School Tests Draws Support in Hearing
More than 100 witnesses signed up to testify before the House Public Education Committee Tuesday on a massive bill restructuring student testing, graduation requirements and the public school accountability system in the state.
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Politics
Patterson Doesn’t Rule Out Backing Statewide Property Tax
In a candid TribLive interview on Thursday, Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson explained his opinions on gun control, immigration and a statewide property tax. He also evaluated his potential competition in the 2014 race for lieutenant governor.
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Demographics
Norquist Wants to “Unite Center Right” on Immigration
Anti-tax advocate Grover Norquist said Wednesday that Republicans are not the anti-immigrant party, and that a few loud “bullfrogs” have created “a completely bizarre view of where the modern conservative movement is” on immigration reform.
