Harold Cook asks a darned good question. As SCOTUS hears arguments on marriage equality this week, it reminds me of when the Texas Legislature voted for the state constitutional amendment prohibiting gay marriage in Texas eight years ago. Texas voters subsequently approved the measure that November by a 3-to-1 margin. I wonder if any of [...]
Posts Tagged ‘Joe Pickett’
The driverless car visits Austin
Anyone there get to see it? Google, which has been developing and touting the future of self-piloting cars, has parked a driverless car in front of the Hilton Hotel downtown, site of the three-day Texas Transportation Forum. The modified Lexus hybrid is equipped with all manner of sensors that allow it to be aware of [...]
White Ds and non-white Rs
A few points to make about this. White Democrats are an increasingly vanishing species in the Texas Legislature, where there will be only 10 when the new legislative session starts in early January. The face of the Legislature has undergone a dramatic transformation in the past 25 years, and the state’s rapidly changing demographics are [...]
We got those bad road blues
So many bad roads, so little funding to maintain them. Issues including traffic congestion, damage to vehicles from roads needing repair and costs incurred in accidents caused by insufficient safety features on roadways cost drivers in Texas $23 billion annually, according to a study released Tuesday by a national transportation research group. “Texas has fallen [...]
By the way, we have no money for roads
Just another issue we won’t be dealing with this session. During the next 20 years, the Texas Department of Transportation will need $315 billion to spend on the state’s roads and freeways for maintenance and construction just to keep traffic from getting worse, according to a report commissioned by the Texas Transportation Commission. The gasoline [...]
On the road to nowhere
Use your own favorite cliche for this. Texas soon will be shelling out more per year to pay back money it borrowed for road construction than it spends from its quickly vanishing pile of cash to build new highways. Legislative leaders characterize the state’s transportation funding as a crisis. Most Texans, they say, are unaware [...]
Raising the gas tax
This is long overdue. Members of the Texas Senate’s Transportation Committee said Tuesday that an increase in the 20-cents-per-gallon state fuel tax may be necessary to overcome a drastic shortage of money for new roads. “We are in the critical position in this state where we are growing and will need more roads. But we [...]
Special session starts tomorrow
The special session everyone knew was coming to address the disposition of several state agencies begins tomorrow. So far, at least, the agenda hasn’t changed from the original call. Gov. Rick Perry is being pressed to add issues ranging from children’s health care to voter identification to the agenda of the special session that begins [...]
Anti-Metro amendment officially dead
Good. State lawmakers today voted unanimously to kill a provision that could have complicated the Metropolitan Transit Authority’s light-rail plans. The House removed language from a local transportation bill for Austin that would have put limits on Metro’s authority to acquire property through condemnation. Rep. Joe Pickett, D-El Paso, quietly placed the provision in the [...]