Now he and a few of the other Democrats on the floor are slow-talking the local calendar, causing a calendar that normally takes about three hours or so to take several days. The obvious intent of this action is an attempt to prevent the voter ID bill from being reached by midnight Tuesday (the deadline to pass general calendar bills on second reading).

Jason Moore, a State Republican Executive Committee member from Odessa, has sent a letter to Republican legislators calling on them to honor the Republican platform and stand up to the comptuer lobby's efforts to take textbook selection authority away from the elected State Board of Education. Basically, the computer lobby looks at the state's textbook budget and sees dollar signs. Computer companies want that money for themselves and are pushing bills allowing school districts to buy laptops with that money. But many computer lobby bills (including HB 4294 as it left the House) take textbook selection authority away from the elected State Board of Education and gives it to the appointed Commissioner of Education. The Republican plaform, by contrast, opposes replacing textbooks with laptops and supports keeping textbook selection with the elected State Board of Education. We reprint Moore's letter below:

"I, as a grassroots Republican, am deeply concerned with the content and effect that House Bill 4294 would have on Texas schoolchildren. I urge you to modify or reject this bill. Our Republican platform states "We oppose the replacement of textbooks by laptops" and "The SBOE must have sole authority over textbook content and state adoption, and this process must include public hearings." HB 4294 clearly and directly violates both of these provisions."

Sen. Rodney Ellis (D-Houston) and Rep. Myra Crownover (R-Denton) declared the statewide smoking ban dead for this session but declared they'll be back in 2011.

"We are disappointed today because we missed an opportunity for a healthier Texas," said Crownover. "Next session starts right now. We will work hard  ... I think this is an interesting issue because it's an education issue ... Second-hand smoke isn't an annoyance ... it literally kills people."

The Conference Committee on the state budget voted to restore 85 percent of the funding for Proclamation 2010. It also removed the rider directing the elected State Board of Education not to issue proclamation 2011 and 2012. What this means is the English Language Arts and Reading curriculum based on the new standards will likely enter Texas classrooms. It also means science books can be ordered that comply with the new standards.

LSR Managing Editor William Lutz will deliver a commentary on government-funded lobbying on WFAA's Inside Texas Politics with Brad Watson. The show airs at 9 am Sunday on Channel 8 in North Texas. The show is also usually archived at wfaa.com. Just search for "Inside Politics."

Twenty members of the State Republican Executive Committee have signed a statement to lawmakers taking issue with cutting off funding for State Board of Education-approved textbooks and otherwise taking authority away from the elected State Board of Education. We reprint in full below:

Commissioner of Education Robert Scott yesterday sent a very pointed letter to Speaker Joe Straus, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, and the budget conferees on the effects of de-funding the English, Language Arts, Reading, Spelling and Handwriting books ordered by the State Board of Education for use in classrooms in 2010.

Scott warns of serious consequences for children and the state's education system if the books are not funded. "We know that early reading instruction lays the foundation for future learning," Scott noted

Rep. Edmund Kuempel collapsed yesterday night in a Capitol elevator. After Dr. John Zerwas performed CPR, Kuempel was taken to Brackenridge Hospital. He is in intensive care. According to the Speaker's press office, the family has requested that people not visit the hospital during these critical first few days. For more information, see The Austin American-Statesman's blog.  Like the entire Capitol community, we at LSR wish Kuempel a full and speedy recovery.

Yesterday, we received a commentary by Texas Workforce Comission Charman Tom Pauken blasting the Obama administration's attempt to raise taxes on energy. The commentary's timing corresponds with the Electric Reliability Council of Texas's report estimating the added cost Texans would pay every month if carbon is limited. We reprint in full below.

by Tom Pauken

President Obama is proposing a wide array of tax hikes on the U.S. energy industry. If enacted, these massive tax increases would be a job-killer for Texas and a huge setback in our overall efforts to lessen our dependence on foreign energy.

The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) -- the state's electric grid operator -- released a study yesterday on the impact of federal cap-and-trade legislation. The study concludes that cap-and-trade would signficantly increase most Texans' electric bills.

Friday, the conference committee on the budget voted to direct the State Board of Education not to issue Proclamation 2011 or 2012. That means the conferees are -- once again -- trying to balance the budget by taking books out of the hands of children.

Here's the kicker: Proclamation 2012 doesn't even affect this biennium's budget and Proclamation 2011 may not. Meanwhile funding for the reading books in Proclamation 2010 is in limbo.

In a nutshell, this is not just about balancing the budget. There's a lot more going on here.

Chancellor Renu Khator -- meet KTRK's Wayne Dolcefino.

The new chancellor of the University of Houston system got a crash course in Houston-area politics this week, as one of the best known investigative reporters in the Houston area, KTRK's Wayne Dolcefino did an investigative series on travel and booze spending by U of H administrators. Specifically, Dolcefino documents university funds (including some tuition funds) being used to pay for booze and fancy travel. You can watch the stories in their entirety here. (Since publication of the KTRK story, U of H has changed its policies to ban use of tuition money for booze and business class travel.)

Sen. Troy Fraser's (R-Horseshoe Bay) and Rep. Patrick Rose's (D-Dripping Springs) SB 921 won approval in the House State Affairs Committee last night. The bill places open meetings, open records, and fair elections requirements on electric cooperatives. They were spawned by substantial controversy and a lawsuit over the expenses, compensation, and financial management practices of board and staff at the Pedernales Electric Cooperative -- the state's largest.

As a public service, the Lone Star Report's William Lutz will be live-blogging the House debate on the Texas Residential Construction Commission. This debate can be followed at this link:

http://www.scribblelive.com/Event/TRCC_Sunset_House_5609

Or by clicking the Read more link on this blog post.  We hope this is useful.

Today, the House will consider the sunset bill for the Texas Residential Construction Commission, which was created by a Republican legislature in 2003. I have attended just about every hearing related to this bill, from 2003 to the present, so I know it quite well. Here’s my question: What is conservative about creating a new state agency? What is conservative about levying a new tax on every home and builder?

Thanks to a concerted effort by socially conservative groups (most notably the Free Market Foundation), the House killed HB 710 today on third reading 71-73. The bill would have placed the elected State Board of Education under review by the Sunset Advisory Commission. The bill failed in spite of three last-minute "malfunctioning" voting machines that got recorded as yes votes.

I don't understand what possible problem Gov. Rick Perry and Rep. Yvonne Davis (D-Dallas) could possibly have with the good people of Washington and Walker Counties.

After all, Walker County is home to lots of cool pine trees, and a good number of our dangerous criminals are placed behind bars in Walker County so we don't have to deal with them in the rest of the state. And Washington County is the birthplace of the Republic of Texas and home to Blue Bell Ice Cream.

In 2003, the Texas Senate got rolled. Speaker Tom Craddick held the entire state budget hostage unless the senate swallowed tuition deregulation -- letting appointed, unaccountable university regents set tuition instead of legislators. Yesterday -- for the first time in six years -- the Senate got its say.

by Mark Lavergne

In this week's issue I wrote a story on bills that take power from the elected State Board of Education. Due to space, I had to leave a few out. Here are some other key bills that affect the SBOE:

The House Republican Caucus demonstrated its resolve to improve ballot integrity by circulating the following resolution on voter id:

We are closely monitoring the Voter ID bill and are fervently committed to advancing a Voter ID bill.

Our principles concerning what the bill must contain are clear, this bill must:

The House Transportation Committee has approved the Texas Department of Transportation Sunset bill 10-1. Rep. Jim Dunnam (D-Waco) was the only no vote.

Speaker Joe Straus has named the House's conferees on the appropriations bill. Straus named Reps. Jim Pitts (R-Waxahachie), Richard Raymond (D-Laredo), Ruth Jones McClendon (D-San Antonio), John Otto (R-Dayton), and John Zerwas (R-Fort Bend).

The Democrats (with help from a handful of Republicans) succeeded in passing the constitutional amendment taking the Permanent School Fund away from the elected State Board of Education, but it sure didn’t look pretty.
 

In my recent commentary on the Permanent School Fund, I wrote that the fund's staff uses state office buildings. Two years ago, the Permanent School Fund staff moved into leased space in the Wells Fargo Building on 15th Street. I regret the error.

That said, Adam Jones with the Texas Education Agency notes that the lease on the space was negotiated by the Texas Facilities Commission and that several federally-funded agency employees also office there and that the PSF has "by far the smallest staff and lowest operating cost of any major state fund (UTIMCO, ERS, TRA and the Comptroller’s Safekeeping Trust)." I appreciate the staff of the Texas Education Agency for providing this helpful information after seeing my initial post. Reponsibility for any mistakes in the prior column is entirely my own.

The bill's structure has many similarities to the one the Legislature set up for the University of Texas in the mid-1990s. Ever since then, UTIMCO (the corporation that manages the Permanent University Fund) has been a non-stop source of controversy at the Capitol.

Sen. John Carona's (R-Dallas) local options transportation funding plan was debated in the April 21 House Transportation Committee and was left pending. The House version is HB 9, sponsored by Rep. Vicki Truitt (R-Keller). The Senate version has already passed muster in the upper chamber the week prior.

Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst has named the senate's conferees on the state budget. The ten conferees are the folks who really write the state budget. They are Sens. Steve Ogden (R-College Station), Juan Hinojosa (D-McAllen), Florence Shapiro (R-Plano), Royce West (D-Dallas), and Tommy Williams (R-The Woodlands).

LSR is now on Twitter.  We have set up Twitter feeds that we encourage our subscribers and friends to follow. Whenever we update this blog we will post a notice to @LoneStarReport. In addition, LSR Managing Editor William Lutz has set up his own personal twitter feed @willlutz. We hope this provides a useful way for our subscribers and friends to keep up. And thanks for your patience while the print journalists at LSR learn how to operate all this new-fangled technology stuff.