There is a new Senate Select Committee on Transportation Funding, set up by Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst to oversee highway improvements — including, specifically, “roads targeted for conversion from paved to unpaved.” Tommy Williams, R-The Woodlands, will chair; Robert Nichols, R-Jacksonville (and a former highway commissioner), was named vice chairman.

Dewhurst appointed Sen. Jane Nelson, R-Flower Mound, to chair the Sunset Advisory Commission, and appointed Sens. Juan “Chuy” Hinojosa, D-McAllen, and Charles Schwertner, R-Georgetown, to that panel. 

Becky Motal, general manager of the Lower Colorado River Authority, will retire at the end of the year. She’s been in that job in July 2011. LCRA has been under fire during the drought, trying to balance competing interests from Central Texas to the Gulf of Mexico.

Kevin Patteson is the new executive director at the Texas Water Development Board. He is currently the director of the state’s Office of State-Federal Relations and is a former assistant general counsel to Gov. Rick Perry. 

William Briggs and Daniel Bravo take over as the new CFO and COO, respectively, at the Texas Department of Assistive and Rehabilitative Services. Briggs, a CPA, has worked in state government accounting for more than 30 years. Bravo was in charge of regional administrative services at the state’s Health and Human Services Commission. 

Allison Castle, the governor’s director of communications, is leaving for the Texas Department of Insurance, where she will become deputy commissioner for public affairs. 

Sen. Ken Paxton, R-McKinney, picked up an endorsement from the Texas Home School Coalition Association in his bid for attorney general. 

Gov. Rick Perry appointed:

• Jodie Baggett of Ozona and Katie Stavinoha of The Woodlands to the Texas Lottery Commission. Baggett is a partner in a family-owned ranching operation; Stavinoha is a former public affairs director for Koch Companies Public Sector and served as a spokesperson for several state agencies before that. 

• Harold Hahn, chairman and CEO of Rocky Mountain Mortgage, to chair the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. He had been the vice chairman. The governor chose Robert Jenkins Jr. of Austin — president of ABC Home and Commercial Services — to be vice chairman.

• Jason Hester of Leander, Johnny Lovejoy II of San Antonio and Randall County Sheriff Joel Richardson of Canyon to the exas Commission on Law Enforcement. Hester is a major at the Texas Department of Public Safety and Lovejoy is president and CEO of Lovejoy & Associates.

• Catherine Rodewald of Dallas, retired president of Prudential Asset Resources, to the Texas Commission of Licensing and Regulation.