Coming soon to a large pink state capitol building in this very state: A day-long seminar on slot machines and casinos and all that, especially as it pertains to the state budget.
Economy
Get the latest on jobs, business, growth, and policy shaping the state’s economy with in-depth reporting from The Texas Tribune.
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Economy
Work in Progress
The latest employment numbers show that more Texans than ever before have jobs, but the state is still struggling with its highest unemployment rate since 1987. Ben Philpott of KUT News and the Tribune reports on the good and bad news in the latest stats.
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Economy
TribBlog: Unemployment Up, But So is Employment
The number of Texans working was up in April, but so was the number of people looking for work.
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Economy
Ready, Set, Grow
The economic slump is still being felt around Texas and the country, but industries and data are reporting positive signs. KUT’s Mose Buchele reports on what to make of potential green shoots.
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Economy
TribBlog: Dewhurst Predicts No Tax Hikes or Gaming
The state won’t need new taxes or expanded legal gambling to cover a budget shortfall next session, but higher fees and more budget cuts are a possibility, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst said at this morning’s TribLive interview in Austin.
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Economy
TribBlog: $18 Billion Dollar Budget Hole
Texas lawmakers have been fishing for ideas on how to fill a looming budget deficit when they return to Austin in 2011. Based on new projections out today, they’re gonna need a bigger boat.
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Economy
Benefits and Drawbacks
The insurance plan for state employees will have a $140.4 million shortfall next year — and that’s the least of its problems. The projected shortfall for the two years after that is $880 million, and it will take another $476 million to replenish the legally required contingency fund. The Employee Retirement System and state leaders are surprisingly mellow about the red ink, saying growth in the cost of health benefits has actually stabilized at around 9 percent. But steady and large increases in costs threaten to erode the program, leaving policymakers to consider cuts in benefits, to negotiate lower prices or to find vast amounts of new money.
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Economy
TribBlog: An Off-Track Bet
The Speaker doesn’t have anyone studying gambling in advance of the next legislative session, and a leading Democrat says legislators ought to get together on their own to consider the issue.
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Economy
The Shell Game
If history is any guide, the Legislature will turn to accounting illusions to mask large portions of a budget shortfall of at least $11 billion. Trouble is, such trickery is a bet on the economy roaring back to life — and that’s no sure thing.
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Criminal Justice
TribWeek: In Case You Missed It
E. Smith interviews Gov. Rick Perry for the Trib and Newsweek, Philpott dissects the state’s budget mess in a weeklong series, Hamilton looks at whether Bill White is or was a trial lawyer, M. Smith finds experts all over the state anxiously watching a court case over who owns the water under our feet, Aguilar reports on the battle between Fort Stockton and Clayton Williams Jr. over water in West Texas, Ramshaw finds a population too disabled to get on by itself but not disabled enough to get state help and Miller spends a day with a young man and his mother coping with that situation, Ramsey peeks in on software that lets the government know whether its e-mail messages are getting read and who’s reading what, a highway commissioner reveals just how big a hole Texas has in its road budget, Grissom does the math on the state’s border cameras and learns they cost Texans about $153,800 per arrest, and E. Smith interviews Karen Hughes on the difference between corporate and political P.R. — and whether there’s such a thing as “Obama Derangement Syndrome.” The best of our best from April 19 to April 23, 2010.