WEEKLY REPORT

March 9, 2012

Students need longer school day to be competitive

Economics and education are hopelessly tangled. Grinding poverty hinders many students from succeeding in school. But strengthening our economy and lifting these kids out of poverty demands a well-educated work force. This toxic combination of low socioeconomic status and low educational attainment plays out like a vicious cycle.

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Carlisle, educators agree on equalizing school funding

For Anette Carlisle, the Texas Legislature needs to tackle the huge inequities in public education funding formulas.

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Texas economy showing more signs of recovery

The evidence continues to grow that the Texas economy is improving.

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Texas companies announced fewer mass layoffs in2011

Texas employers and their workers endured fewer mass layoffs in 2011 than in any previous year since 2007, according to figures released Monday by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

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Medicaid program for Texas women shackled by politics

Gov. Rick Perry might have removed himself from this year’s Republican presidential primary race, but Texans would be smart to keep in mind that he’s still campaigning for the same causes he tried to bring to the fore in that heartfelt but ill-fated political effort.

Texas official frustrated by email barrage over women’s health funding

With a state-federal impasse threatening the future of a women’s health and contraception program, a barrage of critical emails from Planned Parenthood supporters prompted a frustrated response from Texas’ top social services official this week.

Poll: Voters Want to Keep Planned Parenthood in WHP

Fifty-nine percent of likely Texas voters oppose Gov. Rick Perry‘s efforts to keep Planned Parenthood out of the joint state-federal Women’s Health Program, while 38 percent approve, according to a new poll from Public Policy Polling.

Medicare cuts hurt smaller providers

For House-Senate negotiators, it was just the last piece in a political jigsaw puzzle. For Annette Iacono, vice president and general manager of a community lab in the Philadelphia suburbs, it “hit us in the solar plexus hard.”

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Mental health issues common among youth prisoners

More than half of the people in Texas’ youth prisons have a moderate or high need for mental health care, and officials should improve their early intervention efforts to help those young people before they end up behind bars, the head of a new state agency told lawmakers Tuesday.

Blue Cross files protest over loss of state health plan contract

Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas has filed a formal protest with the Employees Retirement System of Texas claiming the competitive process for awarding a $205 million health plan administration contract was flawed.

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Just What is a “Likely Voter”?

The prospect of a May 29 primary, with any necessary runoffs on July 31, has spawned much “conventional wisdom” about who will turn out for this election. Most of what you’ll hear comes from one campaign or the other, usually in a blatant — if understandable — attempt to paint their chances in the best light as a means of attracting donor dollars in what is already an extremely long campaign season. All this posturing raises the question: Given a survey of potential voters, how should we go about determining what the electorate might look like on Election Day?

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Texas’ contested voter ID law could shave voter rolls

The state’s contested voter ID law could provoke widespread complications in the upcoming presidential elections, with as many as 18 percent of all registered voters across Texas apparently lacking state government-issued photo IDs to match their voter registration cards, according to records obtained by the Houston Chronicle.

Second in command at TCEQ is lone applicant for top job

A former environmental adviser to Gov. Rick Perry is the lone applicant to run the state’s environmental agency after spending about 2½ years as the agency’s second in command.

BLOG: What Makes Gasoline Prices Go Up?

One-term Democrat J.M. Lozano plans to file to run as Republican

One-term Democrat J.M. Lozano plans to file this week as a Republican seeking the court-ordered 43rd state House District that includes Bee, Jim Wells, Kleberg and San Patricio counties.