By William Lutz on
4/29/2011 12:20 PM
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By William Lutz on
4/28/2011 1:51 AM
The Texas House of Representatives completed its debate on HB 150, the state house redistricting map. The final map passed to third reading 92-52. A final vote on third reading will likely occur Thursday. Most Republicans voted for the map, with most of the GOP opposition coming from East Texas. On quick glance of the map, 10 Republicans -- Reps. Leo Berman (R-Tyler), Erwin Cain (R-Sulphur Springs), Wayne Christian (R-Center), Joe Driver (R-Garland), Dan Flynn (R-Van), Linda Harper-Brown (R-Irving), Bryan Hughes (R-Mineola), George Lavender (R-Texarkana), Ken Paxton (R-McKinney), and Bill Zedler (R-Arlington) -- voted no. Democratic Reps. Ryan Guillen (D-Rio Grande City), J.M. Lozano (D-Kingsville), and Craig Eiland (D-Galveston) voted aye. And four other Democrats plus the speaker voted present.
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By William Lutz on
4/28/2011 1:47 AM
Earlier today, I predicted that the Texas House Redistricting Battle in 2011 would be between Republicans. And there were some East Texas Republicans who decided not to vote for the map.
That said, as the evening went on, deals got cut that likely added votes to the map.
The biggest breakthrough came when Rep. Burt Solomons (R-Carrollton) accepted Rep. John Smithee’s (R-Amarillo) consensus West Texas amendment.
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By William Lutz on
4/27/2011 10:58 PM
Two major revisions of the map got adopted.
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By William Lutz on
4/27/2011 10:19 PM
Speaker Joe Straus announced conferees on SB 18 -- the omnibus eminent domain and property rights bill. Straus appointed Reps. Charlie Geren (R-Fort Worth), Allan Ritter (R-Nederland), Ralph Sheffield (R-Temple), Rick Hardcastle (R-Vernon) and Rene Oliveira (D-Brownsville) to the subcommittee. This lineup contains some extremely strong proponents of private property rights. The House added several amendments to the bill that expanded the property rights provisions in the bill. Last week, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst appointed Sens. Craig Estes (R-Wichita Falls), Robert Duncan (R-Lubbock), John Whitmire (D-Houston), Eddie Lucio (D-Brownsville), and Chris Harris (R-Arlington) to the conference committee. SB 18 grants land-owners more rights when property is condemned for public use. It is strongly supported by Texas Agriculture interests.
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By William Lutz on
4/27/2011 5:39 PM
Right now, the House is slogging through the amendments to HB 150 – districts for the Texas House. Democrats are making their voting rights act arguments, intended more for the courts than for the members. A Republican House will not pass a Democratic map.
But the real story behind House redistricting is – unlike the 2001 map – the fight over the map is largely an intra-Republican fight. In 2001, almost all Republicans endorsed the Craddick-Marchant map, which sought to build a stable Republican House majority. The focus of the debate was the general election.
Today, the debate over redistricting focuses on the Republican primary.
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By William Lutz on
4/26/2011 5:36 PM
Here’s what had me scratching my head all week – the same people who defended the Democrats in 2009 when they shut down the entire calendar to stop voter ID are now attacking Rep. David Simpson (R-Longview) over his tactics to stall the so-called “Puppy Mill” bill.
When Republicans blasted the Democrats because they shut down the entire House to stop an essential ballot security bill, the Democrats responded that everything they did was expressly allowed by the rules of the Texas House of Representatives.
Well, the same can be said of Simpson.
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By William Lutz on
4/20/2011 7:38 PM
Sen. Steve Ogden (R-College Station) announced that the Senate's 2012-13 budget will be voted upon by the Senate Finance Committee tomorrow (Thursday). His budget balances, but requires the use of up to $3 billion in money from the Rainy Day fund to do so. The House agreed to spend Rainy Day Fund money to pay for current year expenses, but would not spend Rainy Day money for next year's budget.
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By William Lutz on
4/19/2011 6:42 PM
At today’s Senate Finance Committee hearing, Sen. Robert Duncan (R-Lubbock) unveiled $4.17 billion of cash management techniques (i.e. accounting maneuvers) and other changes to help balance the budget. In other words, Duncan actually came up with specific ideas to generate what some would call “non-tax revenue.”
His omnibus fiscal matters bill (SB 1811) is set for a vote tomorrow along with an omnibus school finance bill. On Thursday, Senate Finance is tentatively scheduled to consider an omnibus budget.
Duncan’s bill contains 20 articles. We’ll include a brief summary below, but we’ll also have a more complete discussion in our weekly issue.
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By William Lutz on
4/19/2011 12:06 PM
Today, the House Redistricting Committee approved a Texas House map (sending CSHB 150 to calendars) but made major changes to it along the way. All redistricting maps and proposed amendments can be viewed at the Texas Legislative Council's DistrictViewer web site. In this blog post, we will refer to the plan numbers on that web site.
Chairman Burt Solomons' (R-Carrollton) most recent substitute (and the starting point for today's discussion) was plan H134. The adopted amendments were all to that plan. Solomons said his amendment redrew Tarrant and Harris Counties to improve minority representation. He also evened out the population of districts in Bexar and Hidalgo Counties.
The following amendments to plan H134 were adopted:
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