Look back at some of the best Texas Tribune reads of 2024

By Zach Despart

In December, all five members of the Gunter City Council quit after a fight over a railroad development spiraled into political mudslinging. The fight in many ways mirrored the problems our national politics face. From the story:

The origins of the crisis can be traced back to a warm evening in May, when the council unanimously and without discussion approved a development agreement with BNSF Railway that would clear the way for a 949-acre rail facility, the largest development in the history of Gunter. The city had not told residents this was coming; officials never posted details on the city website, nor sought any public input.

Residents, many of whom recently moved to Gunter because it offered a quiet country life, were furious. Their outrage fueled mistrust, which in turn sowed conspiracy. Over the next seven months, the dispute over the rail yard metastasized into a bitter power struggle that mirrored the coarsening of national politics — knee-jerk allegations that opponents have committed crimes, a refusal to compromise and an inability to agree on a shared truth.

The symptoms of this civic collapse are ones that ail many local communities: a council out of touch with constituents, a populist mayor angling for more power, public meetings where angry residents cross the line into abuse, and a vacuum of reliable information filled by social media.

"It’s a mess," said Jason Padgett, a former Gunter school board member. "If I could solve the problem with the snap of my fingers, it’d probably be to elect new council members and a new mayor, and start fresh. … I’m just praying for the community."

By Jeremy Schwartz

Granbury ISD school member Courtney Gore ran on a far-right platform. After she was elected, she found no signs of the pervasive indoctrination she had feared. Now she faces intense backlash. From the story:

Children were not being sexualized, and she could find no examples of critical race theory, an advanced academic concept that examines systemic racism. She’d examined curriculum related to social-emotional learning, which has come under attack by Christian conservatives who say it encourages children to question gender roles and prioritizes feelings over biblical teachings. Instead, Gore found the materials taught children “how to be a good friend, a good human.”

Gore rushed to share the news with the hard-liners who had encouraged her to run for the seat. She expected them to be as relieved and excited as she had been. But she said they were indifferent, even dismissive, because “it didn’t fit the narrative that they were trying to push.”

So, in the spring of 2022, Gore went public with a series of Facebook posts. She told residents that her backers were using divisive rhetoric to manipulate the community’s emotions. They were interested not in improving public education but rather in sowing distrust, Gore said.

"I’m over the political agenda, hypocrisy bs," Gore wrote. "I took part in it myself. I refuse to participate in it any longer. It’s not serving our party. We have to do better."

By Jayme Lozano

Texas Tribune journalist Jayme Lozano Carver has written about health care for years. But when she experienced her own crisis, her perception of the challenges Panhandle women face shifted. From the essay:

For more than a year, I knew something was wrong. Crippling migraines radiated through my skull, I would get dizzy standing up, and I felt like I was being ripped apart from the inside during my period. Every month, my husband offered to take me to the emergency room after I doubled over in pain. I usually objected, convinced I’d be brushed off because, well, periods are supposed to hurt.

As it turns out, periods aren’t supposed to hurt that bad. A cyst the size of a peach was growing in my ovary, and they found an even bigger fibroid was on the back of my uterus. An urgent care doctor said I had to find an OB-GYN. I likely needed a hysterectomy, she said.

"You’re done having kids, right?" she asked.

I had told her 10 minutes before that I didn’t have any children yet.

I’m 33. My husband, Johnathon, and I married in 2022, after five years together. The doctor’s words cut especially deep because this was the year we wanted to start a family.

My body was frozen, but my mind was racing. What does this mean? Am I in danger? She said hysterectomy. I have to be in danger.

By Berenice Garcia, Uriel J. García, Jakob Maurer, Alejandro Serrano, Juan A. Lozano and Elliot Spagat

The Texas Tribune and The Associated Press visited five locations along the 1,254-mile span to separate the facts from the political narrative during a heated election year. We found that the election-year political rhetoric didn’t match the reality. From the story:

The judge tells two men who appear on camera in orange jumpsuits from a prison in Edinburg that they will be turned over to federal authorities for deportation. One pleads for an urgent transfer, claiming he’s been threatened by violent jail gangs.

"I’m scared," he says, to no avail. "I want to make it to Mexico to see my kids, my grandkids. They’re little."

He went on, "I don’t know how to read. I don’t know how to write. I just came not knowing what would happen. Please forgive me. I will never again…"

The judge tells the man that he’ll likely be removed from the jail and turned over to the federal government the next day.

by Lexi Churchill, James Barragán, Vianna Davila and Natalia Contreras

Mary Howard-Elley believed that politicians need to secure the border and make sure that noncitizens can’t vote. But she was shocked to learn that her registration had been canceled due to citizenship suspicions, and at how tough it was to get reinstated. From the story:

The retired Transportation Security Administration agent was confused by how the county could come to that conclusion. And she seethed at the idea that anyone would question the citizenship of a former federal employee with the "whitest name you could have."

The elections office in Montgomery County, just north of Houston, had sent Howard-Elley a letter in late January saying that she had been flagged after she indicated that she was not a U.S. citizen in response to a jury summons. She had 30 days to provide the county proof of citizenship or she would be removed from the voter rolls, according to the letter.

"Who is allowing people to do this to United States citizens? I understand we have a problem with immigration, but come on now," Howard-Elley said in an interview.

By Alejandra Martinez

The fertilizer was promoted as an environmental win-win for years. An untold number of farmers and ranchers across Texas have spread it on their land, and there’s no government agency testing for it. From the story:

Tony Coleman recognizes the signs all too well. A cow drools strings of saliva. Then it starts to limp, each step slower. Then it grows stiff.

Then it’s quick. There’s nothing to be done. The cow dies.

Since early 2023, the Grandview rancher has watched more than 35 of his 150 Black Angus cattle perish. July was especially brutal. In the span of a week, Coleman lost a 3-week-old calf; a cow; and Little Red, a strong bull full of spirit, leaving Coleman with nothing but unanswered questions.

"This is destroying our lives," Coleman said. "You never know what you're going to get every day when you get down here."

By Zach Despart, Yuriko Schumacher and Uriel J. García

Texas has never disclosed where it has built its border wall. So The Texas Tribune requested records, interviewed landowners and traveled the Rio Grande to compile a first-of-its-kind look at the $3.1 billion in construction. From the story:

The 50 miles constructed through November, totaling 6% of the 805 miles the state has designated for building, are far from the endless barrier Abbott often presents the wall to be in video clips he shares on social media. The wall is not a singular structure, but dozens of fragmented sections scattered across six counties, some no wider than a city block and others more than 70 miles apart. Each mile of construction costs between $17 million and $41 million per mile, depending on terrain, according to state engineers.

By Emily Foxhall

An encounter between a hobbyist beekeeper and a legislative aide for a rookie state lawmaker led to the “bee bill,” which in 2012 created a tax break that helped explode the bee population in Texas. From the story:

Some tips that entomologist Molly Keck recently gave 26 aspiring beekeepers: Beetles might eat the pollen patties meant to feed their bees. Bees might get cranky when it’s overcast. If people drive too long with bees that aren’t properly sealed, the bees might escape into the car.

A student giggled nervously.

Keck, 42, has tight, blonde curls and an upbeat personality and works for the Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service in San Antonio. She started teaching Beekeeping 101 around a dozen years ago — when a new Texas law made it possible for people with relatively small tracts of land to get big property tax cuts if they keep bees. After that, interest in beekeeping "really kind of exploded," Keck said.

By Kate McGee

University president Walter Wendler’s plan to promote “Panhandle values” has conservatives cheering. But he’s not without critics. From the story:

Over the past few years, conservative lawmakers and activists across the country have increasingly railed against higher education. In their view, universities have lost their way, taken over by a mob of far-left administrators, faculty and students pushing liberal agendas and silencing conservative perspectives. The University of Texas at Austin, Texas A&M University, and Texas Tech University have recently found themselves the targets of such criticisms.

Wendler has presented himself as the answer. During his seven years as university president, the 73-year-old has found a fertile breeding ground within the largely conservative Christian Texas Panhandle to sow a different vision for public higher education, one that has caught the attention of state leaders, conservative advocacy groups and donors across the region and state.

"He's voicing something that a segment of the Panhandle is saying, 'Amen, brother,'" said Gary Byrd, a psychology professor who has been at the school since the early 1970s.

By Carlos Nogueras Ramos

No one knows how much water sits beneath the desert of Terlingua. Residents worry their wells will run dry, as developers and local officials cheer the tourism boom. From the story:

A plume of dust trailed the pickup truck that drove through a maze of caliche roads. The driver and passenger were familiar with the route. Rick and Georganne Bradbury, husband and wife, have navigated it twice a month for four years to deliver hundreds of gallons of water to one of their favorite customers, an art gallery manager with three kids.

Coffee in hand, that customer, Shannon Montague, approached the water haulers from the entrance of her single-wide trailer home to greet them.

Rick pulled out a 40-foot hose, hooking one end to a gasoline-powered pump while Georganne dangled the other, a custom-made spout, inside Montague’s water tank. The engine sputtered to life, gushing water until it replenished the 750-gallon tank.

“What would we do without you?” Montague said.

Disclosure: BNSF Railway Company, Facebook, Texas A&M AgriLife, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service, Texas A&M University, Texas Tech University and University of Texas at Austin have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.