The latest state government news from The Texas Tribune.
It was a bad Election Night for residents of the largest city in McLennan County. After years of regional dominance, their congressional seat belongs to Bryan, halfway to Houston; their state senate seat is 86 miles away in Granbury; and one of their House seats has moved three counties east, to Centerville. Full Story
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To the list of things that Rick Perry shows contempt for — Barack Obama’s leadership abilities, excessive federal regulation, coyotes that interrupt his morning jog — add this surprising one: George W. Bush’s ideological disposition. The governor seems to go out of his way to criticize his predecessor as insufficiently conservative. Bush, for his part, makes no mention of Perry in his memoir. "There's certainly no love lost between these two men," says UT presidential scholar Bruce Buchanan. Full Story
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Spending more to improve prison mental and physical health care could improve public health in the free world, according to findings of researchers at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston and the University of Oxford in England. Full Story
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The Sunset Advisory Commission's staff report on the Railroad Commission, released today, recommends getting rid of the agency and replacing it with a similar entity headed by five part-time gubernatorial appointees. Full Story
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The conservative leader speaks out on his role in the race for Texas House speaker and why current GOP Speaker Joe Straus has a "high bar" to meet to get re-elected. Full Story
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The long-awaited Sunset Advisory Commission staff report on the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality is out — and it ducks some of the most controversial questions surrounding the agency. Full Story
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For the 17th event in our TribLive series, I interviewed the mayor of Houston about why Bill White lost, how a state budget shortfall and ballooning federal debt impact urban areas and whether it's possible for the fourth-largest city in the United States to go green. Full Story
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The former budget-slashing Texas House member and current executive director of the Texas Public Policy Foundation on how she reads the mood out there, what reductions in state spending should be on the table, whether cost-shifting to local school districts is a plausible option, why lawmakers should forget about new sources of revenue, the trouble with Medicaid and what members of the Republican near-supermajority in the Legislature must do to keep the confidence of voters — and get re-elected. Full Story
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The State Board of Education is scheduled to vote Friday on approving the purchase of new textbooks at a cost of almost half a billion dollars. But state legislators are facing a budget gap of as much as $28 billion in the next biennium, and some observers fear that textbook spending could be on the chopping block. Nathan Bernier of KUT News reports. Full Story
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The former Texas House member and current director of the Texas Public Policy Foundation on how lawmakers should address the state's multibillion-dollar budget shortfall. Full Story
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In this week's TribCast, Evan, Ross, Elise and Ben discuss the latest in the race for House speaker, ongoing budget woes and how governing may prove a lot harder than campaigning come January. Full Story
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State Sen. Dan Patrick issued a release saying he would host a sit-down meeting of the three candidates for speaker in a "neutral" location. But House Speaker Joe Straus' office says it never agreed to to the meet-up. Full Story
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Both GOP challengers to House Speaker Joe Straus, R-San Antonio, are distancing themselves from activist efforts to emphasize the speaker's Jewish faith. Full Story
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Former Arkansas Gov. and current Fox News host Mike Huckabee waded into the speaker's race today. His pick: state Rep. Ken Paxton, R-McKinney. Full Story
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This week marks the final meeting of the State Board of Education before former chair Don McLeroy's GOP primary opponent, Thomas Ratliff, takes his seat. But the unapologetic creationist and skeptic of the church-state wall says you haven't seen the last of him yet. “Oh, gosh, no,” he says. “I’m thinking that maybe God’s got something else for me to do.” Full Story
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If major-party leaders are not willing to make tough-love decisions on the ballooning national debt, and if the Tea Partiers are not willing to endorse painful measures, the American people must ask them, "Okay, what is your solution?" Full Story
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More than 800 scientists, doctors and cancer fighters are gathering in Austin this week for the Innovation in Cancer Prevention and Research Conference. The topic of conversation? The research made possible by grants from the Cancer Prevention Research Institute of Texas. Full Story
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Ten candidates signed up to run for Edmund Kuempel's seat in the Texas House, a group that includes seven Republicans, two Democrats and a Libertarian. Full Story
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Lawmakers want state agencies to cut another 2 to 3 percent from their current budgets — on top of the 5 percent cuts that were already ordered. The Legislative Budget Board — comprised of members of both the House and Senate, along with the lieutenant governor and the speaker of the House — also adopted a spending cap for the next budget. Full Story
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For this week's installment of our non-scientific survey of political and policy insiders on issues of the moment, we asked two main questions: "Do you think Joe Straus will win another term as Speaker of the House next year, or do you think it will be someone else?" and "Should the Senate keep or abandon its practice of requiring approval from two-thirds of the senators before raising an issue for debate and approval?" And we asked an open-ended third: "How do you think the election outcomes will affect the legislative session ahead?" Full Story
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