WEEKLY REPORT
April 13, 2012
Texas oil and gas boom may help ease state budget crunch
The combined forces of high oil prices and improved drilling technology have produced a gush of unexpected tax dollars from oil and gas wells across Texas.
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A million Texas children remain without insurance
More than a million Texas children remain without health insurance, and those kids are not getting the care they need.
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OPINION: Years of tuition shell games clobber students, families
President Renu Khator and the UH Board of Regents found a way to hold down costs and avoid a tuition increase next year.
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OPINION: Let’s help Texas children succeed
It’s time to help Texas schoolchildren aspire to succeed. It’s time for more Texans to graduate and to do so career- and college-ready.
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Texas accused of ignoring FDA on stem cell rules
Texas’ proposed adult stem cell regulations, up for approval this week, are under fire for circumventing the Food and Drug Administrationand making the experimental therapy commercially available before it’s been proven safe and effective.
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Super PAC adds more Texas lawmakers to target list
A Houston-based Super PAC targeting congressional incumbents from both major political parties is drawing a bead on Texas lawmakers.
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ALEC: What It Does and Why Three Major Corporations Cut Ties
Last week, Coca-Cola, Kraft and accounting-software giant Intuit announced they were ending their membership in a conservative nonprofit group called the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).
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Has advocacy group been lobbying, campaigning on the sly?
Deepening the fracture between traditional Republicans and a loud but increasingly bitter fringe, the Midland-backed Empower Texans advocacy group and leader Michael Quinn Sullivan were accused of lobbying and campaigning but not reporting it.
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Wages in Texas rose 6.2 percent in the 12-month period, compared with 5.3 percent nationally, says the bureau’s Quarterly County Wages and Employment Report.
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Border lawmaker says area is no war zone
A state senator took issue Thursday with characterizing the entire U.S.-Mexico border as a war zone, bristling at a top agricultural official’s assertions that America’s food supply could be threatened because farmers are being run off their land by drug smugglers.
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Court’s sales tax decision could hit state budget
A pending decision from state District Judge John Dietz could open the door for oil and gas companies to avoid paying sales tax on extraction equipment. And that could open a big hole in the Texas budget.
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Editorial: Texas Ethics Commission needs sharper teeth
The Texas Sunset Commission recently released its report on the Texas Ethics Commission, and it says what we already knew: Instead of going after the big fish, the TEC spends too much time catching minnows . The commission’s report provides some good guidance for reforming the TEC, but if Texas wants a strong ethics commission, it will need one with teeth.
(View complete article here.)
David Alameel kicks off campaign today in West Dallas
Dentist turned politician David Alameel on Thursday will formally begin his quest for the newly-created District 33 seat in Congress.
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Texas Dental Board is Accused of Ineptitude
Texas toddlers being held in restraints as dentists at corporate-run clinics performed unnecessary root canals were among the dental horror stories told Wednesday at a House Public Health Committee hearing at the state Capitol.
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Watchdog group, others doubt effectiveness of dental board
Patients, dentists and lawyers told a Texas legislative committee Wednesday that the state agency that regulates dentists does a weak job of protecting the public from bad care.
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UT goes tobacco-free to preserve research funding
Spurred by a desire to preserve its access to millions of state dollars in cancer research funding, the University of Texas said Wednesday that it has gone tobacco-free on all of its properties.
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