State Rep. John Zerwas, a budget conferee, said Monday he’s relatively confident that a rider stipulating the Legislature’s preferred Medicaid reform terms for any deal with the federal government would stick to the 2014-15 budget.
Emily Ramshaw
Emily Ramshaw was the editor-in-chief of The Texas Tribune from 2016 to 2020. During her tenure, the Tribune — billed “one of the nonprofit news sector’s runaway success stories” — won a Peabody Award, several national Murrow Awards and top honors from the Online News Association.
Before joining the Tribune in 2010 as one of its founding reporters, Ramshaw spent six years at The Dallas Morning News, where she broke national stories about sexual abuse inside Texas’ youth lock-ups, reported from inside a West Texas polygamist compound and uncovered “fight clubs” inside state institutions for the disabled. The Texas APME named Ramshaw its 2008 star reporter of the year. In 2016, she was named to the board of the Pulitzer Prizes.
A native of Washington, D.C., and the product of two journalist parents, Ramshaw graduated from Northwestern University in 2003 with dual degrees in journalism and American history.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
Drone Surveillance Measure Soars Through House
UPDATED: State Rep. Lance Gooden’s bill to prevent unmanned drones from capturing indiscriminate surveillance won approval in the lower chamber on Friday.
Posted in
Bidness As Usual
House Disclosure Bill Won’t Get a Vote
UPDATED: Rep. Giovanni Capriglione’s bill to require legislators to disclose their business contracts with government entities won’t get a vote in the House — unless he can tack it onto an Ethics Commission reform bill.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
King Pulls Measure on Public Integrity Unit Oversight
State Rep. Phil King on Tuesday pulled an amendment that would transfer power over the state’s public integrity away from Travis County DA Rosemary Lehmberg. But King said he has the support to attach it to future bills.
Posted in
Economy
House Gives Early OK to Franchise Tax Measure
UPDATED: The House’s most sweeping attempt at tax reform this year passed on a preliminary vote on Tuesday after hours of at times acrimonious debate. House Bill 500 which would spend an estimated $667 million over the next biennium.
Posted in
Energy
Bill Would End Environmental Compliance History Program
A program that gives the public information about the compliance history of facilities overseen by the state’s environmental agency would end under a bill House lawmakers will consider this week.
Posted in
Health care
Hotze to File Suit Over Federal Health Reform
UPDATED: The Supreme Court’s ruling that penalties under the Affordable Care Act qualify as taxes has opened the door to another constitutional challenge, Houston physician and Republican donor Steve Hotze said Tuesday. And he’s filing suit.
Posted in
Health care
Big Tobacco Beats Small Tobacco on Tax Vote
Small cigarette manufacturers would face new state fees on their sales under a measure that passed the Texas House in a preliminary vote on Monday — a big win for Big Tobacco.
Posted in
State Government
UIL: Disqualified Student Didn’t Make Religious Gesture
UPDATED: The University Interscholastic League has determined that a student’s disqualification from a track meet had everything to do with the athlete’s disrespectful behavior and nothing to do with his religious beliefs.
Posted in
Health care
Public, Private Hospitals to Negotiate Financing With Dewhurst
UPDATED: Officials from more than a dozen hospital systems will gather at the Capitol with Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst on Friday to try to iron out a solution to how they are reimbursed for uncompensated care.
