Grissom on what happens — and doesn’t — when police don’t analyze evidence taken from rape victims, Dehn with video highlights of the Senate debate over photo voter ID, Aguilar on the more than three dozen immigration-related bills waiting for attention in the Legislature, M. Smith on what to do with empty school buildings, Ramshaw on what will happen to hospitals if Medicaid managed care is expanded, C. Smith on how the state’s budget cuts could affect churches and other faith-based organizations, Philpott’s report for the Trib and KUT News on how the tight state budget could affect mental health care, yours truly on why the initial budget proposal isn’t really a plan for state spending, Stiles with a searchable database of the latest campaign finance reports, and Galbraith on the rising use of coal and wind to generate electricity in Texas: The best of our best from January 24 to 28, 2011.
TribWeek: In Case You Missed It
Posted in
State Government
TribBlog: Texas Senate Committees Names
Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst appointed senators to committees late this afternoon
Posted in
Demographics
TribBlog: El Paso Lawmakers Denounce Perry’s Request
Gov. Rick Perry’s request that lawmakers work to abolish “sanctuary cities” in Texas could potentially increase crime in spots across the border from Mexico, according to lawmakers who met in El Paso today to denounce the governor’s request.
Posted in
Demographics
TribBlog: DPS: No, Really, Don’t Go to Mexico
In case you were planning any trips to violence-ridden Mexico, the director of the Texas Department of Public Safety says don’t — again.
Posted inState Government
The Midday Brief: Jan. 28, 2011
Your afternoon reading: nursing homes at risk, and Susan Combs hints at lite guv
Posted inState Government
The Brief: Jan. 28, 2011
Settle in, because voter ID’s not going anywhere anytime soon.
Posted in
Higher Education
Business: Hands Off Public Education
Lawmakers will soon take an ax to the state budget, but business leaders are hoping one big-ticket item will be spared. At its annual conference in Austin this week, the Texas Association of Business sounded warnings about potential cuts to public education. Erika Aguilar of KUT News reports.
Posted in
Politics
Fair Game?
Are families out of bounds in politics? A newspaper columnist’s recent unflattering piece on Anita Perry has what passes for a Royal Court at the Capitol debating that question.
Posted in
Energy
Bill Neiman Discusses Native Seeds
Bill Neiman, owner of Native American Seed in Junction, Texas, talks about how his career focus evolved from conventional landscapes to native plants.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
Testing the Evidence
In police departments across Texas, tens of thousands of rape kits have been sitting on the shelves of property storage rooms for years — thanks to strained budgets, overworked crime labs and a law enforcement philosophy that such kits are primarily useful as evidence if a stranger committed the assault. Victims’ rights advocates and some lawmakers say they’ll work to pass legislation this year to take that evidence out of storage and create a DNA database that would help track rapists and perhaps even identify those who have been wrongly convicted. “I think we owe it to every person who has been raped,” says state Sen. Wendy Davis, D-Fort Worth.
