Starting to Start
Week three. Speaker race, over. House, kumbayahed. Two-thirds rule, guarded condition. Senate, patching things up. Revenue estimate, ouch. Base budget, tight. President, sworn in, twice. Full Story
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Gloomy, but Still in the Black
You remember when Speaker Tom Craddick said the state was sitting on a $15 billion budget surplus? Full Story
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Money and Time
U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, raised $1.7 million during the three months ending June 30 and got to the mid-year mark with $9.3 million in the campaign account. Full Story
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Surprised?
By now, Texas businesses were supposed to have already filed returns and written checks for the newish business margins tax. They got a one-month reprieve from Comptroller Susan Combs, who decided the level of confusion was high enough to give everyone another month to calculate and pay up. Full Story
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Gusher!
While other states are facing deficits large and small, the Texas Legislature will start its next session with a surplus of almost $15 billion, according to House Speaker Tom Craddick. Full Story
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The Other Season to Greet
You think they decorate the malls too early? Here's our version: There are only 90 money-raising, commercial-running, attack-mailing, town hall-squabbling, sign-stealing, robo-calling, finger-pointing, voter-abusing days left until the Texas primary elections. Full Story
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Who Done It?
Six Fort Worth Republicans are asking for an investigation of automated phone calls they say might have swung the results of a special election earlier this month. Full Story
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A Very Expensive Footnote
Democrat Mikal Watts — having spent $947,505 "exploring" a run for the U.S. Senate — decided not to run after all. That removes one serious opponent for U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, but the Texas Republican will still face opposition a year from now — probably state Rep. Rick Noriega, D-Houston. Full Story
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England's New Flag
Rep. Kirk England of Grand Prairie is switching parties, saying he'll seek reelection as a Democrat. There hasn't been a party switch in the Texas Legislature in a decade, and it's been a long, long time since a legislator left the Republicans for the Democrats and survived the switch. Full Story
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The Speaker Thing
Start with a follow-up to last week's story about the powers of the House Speaker, and the attempts to get Attorney General Greg Abbott to referee. The issue is now in the hands of the lawyers, mostly, and that means there is a large stack of briefs to go through. Full Story
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Survivor: Austin
House Speaker Tom Craddick had the tenacity to withstand a three-day siege at the end of the legislative session, but it cost him some of his own supporters in the House. The question now is whether the next elections will replace enough of the rebels for him to hold on for a fourth term. Full Story
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Unexpected Endings
A House committee bungled its votes on divorce and abortion bills, killing a couple of the session's most controversial issues. Full Story
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Catch and Release
Corrections to a tax bill could save thousands of small businesses in Texas from the gross receipts tax approved by lawmakers a year ago. Lawmakers might raise the minimum revenue requirements, letting more companies escape the new levy. Full Story
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Crunch City
When this last break of the legislative session is over next week, there will be seven weeks left in the 80th regular session of the Texas Legislature. And you know, even if you're new to this, that the rules start killing things before the last day. Full Story
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Record Spending, Record Restraint
A $150.1 billion state budget is on its way to the full House, which already approved another $14.2 billion spending plan for school finance. Those bills, along with a "supplement" appropriations bill to patch thin spots in the current budget, would bring state spending for the next two years to about $164.3 billion, up from $144.6 billion in the current budget. Full Story
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Bummer, Dude
Pity Tom Pauken. The Dallas lawyer tapped to head a task force on property tax reform turned in his report in January, with plenty of time for lawmakers to work on it. The governor listed property tax reform as a priority in all of his pre-session interviews with reporters. The Guv mentioned it again in his state of the state speech. Full Story
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Wanna Bet?
Legislation that would expand legal gambling on two fronts while also funding a quarter of a million college scholarships could go to voters if two-thirds of the Texas Legislature approves. Full Story
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Need to Hide Something Big?
Ask Gov. Rick Perry for advice. He managed to bury headline-grabbing proposals for the sale of the state lottery, a $3 billion war on cancer, $100 million for border security, a $2.5 billion tax rebate, and health care for up to two million of the state's working poor behind a vaccine for pre-teen girls against a sexually transmitted disease. Full Story
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Real Soon Now
The last act, usually, of the "fixin' to fixin' to" phase of every legislative session is the governor's State of the State speech. They're hard to remember, for the most part, because the Legislature has a tradition of listening politely, clapping a lot, and then ignoring some or all of the items on a given governor's wish list. But some of it gets into the wiring, and into the ears of lawmakers and even, sometimes, the public. Full Story
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Big Mo and Little Mo
Gov. Rick Perry's appraisal reforms don't have nearly the momentum of last year's school finance package, though both came out of task forces headed by political figures and comprised of business folks. School finance was hard to crack, but the Legislature wasn't split on the need to do something. This time, you'll find disagreement on the nature of the problem and the proposed solutions. This package will be harder to pass. Full Story