The seven-member Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles today unanimously rejected death-row inmate Hank Skinner’s request for a reprieve from his execution, which is scheduled for Wednesday.
TribBlog: Pardons Board Rejects Skinner Request
Posted in
Public Education
TribBlog: SBOE vs. the Media
The State Board of Education accuses unnamed “media” of “erroneously” reporting its removal of Thomas Jefferson from state world history standards. Trouble is, the board statement is guilty of the same alleged lack of context, and it follows a pattern.
Posted in
Health care
TribBlog: Neugebauer Shouted “Baby Killer”
“I have apologized to Mr. Stupak and also apologize to my colleagues for the manner in which I expressed my disappointment about the bill,” says U.S. Rep. Randy Neugebauer, R-Lubbock.
Posted inState Government
The Brief: March 22, 2010
As the inboxes of reporters across the nation pinged with the sound of press releases, Congress got rowdy last night and passed healthcare legislation with a 219-214 vote in the House. Here’s a digest of the Texas highlights.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
Data App: Even More Payroll
We’ve added 14 school districts (from Aldine to San Antonio) and five counties (Bexar, Dallas, Harris, Tarrant and Travis) to our government payroll app — an addition of 140,000 public employees earning roughly $6 billion.
Posted in
Politics
The First Corporate Ad
The first political ads bought by a corporation in Texas appeared in East Texas newspapers just weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court effectively ended the state’s ban on that kind of spending. They challenged the Republican bona fides of state Rep. Chuck Hopson of Jacksonville, a Democrat who switched parties in November and ran in a three-way GOP primary.
Posted in
Demographics
Spillover Politics
Leaders from one end of the Texas-Mexico border to the other want Gov. Rick Perry to tone down the scary rhetoric and get real about solving problems in their hometowns. And, by the way, they would like to be consulted about security plans that affect their communities. “We know what’s going on on the border,” says Laredo Mayor Raul Salinas. “Our needs were not taken into consideration.”
Posted in
Energy
Investing in Efficiency
Texans have always been far better at making energy than saving it. But if a proposal before the Public Utility Commission gets approved this year, buildings and appliances would need to become much more energy efficient by 2014. Electric providers across the state would be required to offset 50 percent of their customers’ growth in usage with energy-efficiency measures — well above the current 20 percent requirement set by the Legislature.
Posted inState Government
That Didn’t Take Long
The first political ads bought by a corporation in Texas appeared in East Texas newspapers just weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court effectively ended the state’s ban on that kind of spending.
