Rural Texas Newsclips 6.10.2024
News stories from Rural Texas that you need to Read!
TXLEGE
Why a showdown looms between Republicans at next session of Texas House: "This is going to be a war"
A political showdown looms between Republicans when the next legislative session begins in January at the Texas House. It comes after current Speaker of the House Dade Phelan survived a bruising and expensive primary runoff and then expressed confidence he would remain speaker next year.
Don't get confused: Abbott and the school choice coalition killed funding for public schools and teachers
(This article was published on January 5th at the start of the campaign season but worth a re-read based on the outcome of the 2024 elections and as the misinformation continues.)
Campaign season is in full force. So, let the games begin with the seriously misleading political messaging floating around, mainly targeted at our Rural Republicans who killed the school voucher proposals. Abbott and his school choice cronies are putting out misinformation on social media (and maybe mailers are coming soon) with this claim — candidate X “voted to stop a bill that included $6 billion in funding for public schools and teacher pay raises, more money for school security, and an end to the STARR test”.
POLITICS
Meet Trump’s New Christian Kingpin
Tim Dunn stands on the stage of his Midland, Texas, church with a wry smile on his face. He’s preparing to preach about his favorite subjects: Jesus and Peter Parker. Dunn is a fracking magnate who is also a member of the “pulpit team” at Midland Bible Church, a Rapture-forward congregation that worships in a modern building a stone’s throw from Dunn’s mansion on the north edge of town — where dense suburbs yield to a scrub desert of greasewood and mesquite, pockmarked by the seesawing derricks of the West Texas oil patch.
Brandon Herrera to request recount in primary runoff against U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales
YouTuber Brandon Herrera will request a recount Friday in his Republican primary runoff election against U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales. Herrera told The Texas Tribune he will request recounts in Bexar, El Paso, Medina and Uvalde counties after trailing Gonzales by 407 votes in a race that drew national attention as a fight between the more moderate and more conservative wings of the Republican party.
EDUCATION
Steve Allison: Abbott needs to call special session to fund public schools
Can we trust Gov. Greg Abbott to take the necessary action to address the pressing funding issues facing our public schools? He alone holds the power to call a special session to do so. The answer to frustrating issues that impact our public schools was provided in 1876: It’s the document that our governor, lieutenant governor, and each state senator and representative took an oath to preserve and protect. Yet through purely political actions and inaction, there continues to be disregard for Article 7, Section 1 of the Texas Constitution, which states: “It shall be the duty of the Legislature of the State to establish and make suitable provision for the support and maintenance of an effective system of public free schools.”
Texas House runoffs bring wave of GOP incumbent defeats, give Abbott votes for school vouchers
A wave of Republican incumbents were swept out of the Texas House in Tuesday's primary runoffs, including a handful who opposed school vouchers last fall, handing Gov. Greg Abbott a tentative majority in the lower chamber on his signature issue. With most ballots counted across the state, six of the eight GOP House members who were forced into overtime appeared to lose their runoffs, continuing a surge of anti-establishment energy that had already led to the ouster of nine House Republicans in the March primary.
HEALTHCARE
Rural Texas nursing program aims to help recruit and retain nurses
A new state program is trying to help address the nursing shortage in rural Texas communities. On Monday, Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller and the Texas Department of Agriculture (TDA) announced applications are open for the Rural Nursing Recruitment & Retention Program (RNRR). This comes a few weeks after Gov. Greg Abbott announced $17 million in grant funding awarded to rural hospitals by the Texas Health and Human Services Commission.
Despite pressure, Amarillo City Council punts on abortion travel ban petition
The Amarillo City Council on Tuesday declined to immediately approve a voter-approved petition that demands the Texas Panhandle city adopt a so-called abortion travel ban, once again slowing a movement that has swept through similar conservative cities and counties. The council now has less than a month to decide whether to accept, amend, or reject the petition supported by anti-abortion activists. If the council ultimately rejects the petition or heavily amends it, supporters are expected to ask voters to have the final say in November.
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
America’s Farmers Counting on Farm Bill Passage
America’s farmers and ranchers are counting on Congress to pass a new, modernized farm bill. That was the message delivered by the chair of American Farm Bureau’s Young Farmers & Ranchers Committee, Kevin Lussier, who testified today before the Senate Agriculture Subcommittee on Commodities, Risk Management and Trade. Kevin is a third-generation farmer from Hawthorne, Florida, where he and his wife operate a dairy farm and serve as members of Florida Farm Bureau. “The future of American dairy farming depends on investment in the next generation. By increasing access to credit and enhancing risk management programs, we can ensure that the next generation of farmers have the tools and resources we need to thrive,” Lussier told lawmakers. “I urge the committee to consider these vital programs and to take action to support young farmers across the country by passing a bipartisan farm bill this year. Young farmers like us cannot afford continued delays by Congress.”
TFB: House farm bill moves forward
After more than 12 hours of discussion, the House Agriculture Committee voted 33-21 to advance its version of the farm bill, the Farm, Food, and National Security Act of 2024, out of committee Thursday evening. All 29 republicans and four democrats on the committee voted in favor of the food and farm legislation
Texas cattle numbers hit lowest since 1961 amid ongoing drought and rising costs
A report released by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) found cattle numbers in Texas decreased by 4% from the previous year (2023). This marked the fourth consecutive year for the nation’s overall cattle supply to drop raising concerns about the beef industry. So why are the numbers down and what may compound the problem even further in the future? “In Texas, the cattle numbers are the lowest they’ve been since 1961,” says Matt Garner, executive director of the RANGE. “In the U.S. they’re the lowest they’ve been since 1951.”
Q&A: What Can Murals Do for Main Street?
Amanda Lewis is the founder and executive director of Trillium Project, a public arts nonprofit in Portsmouth, Ohio. (A town we’ve talked about before, as it happens.) Enjoy our conversation about Main Street murals and making a living as a small-town artist.
Op-Ed: Mexico’s Disregard for US Water Treaty Has Texas Farmers on the Brink
I’ve been farming 38 years in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas. This year represents an unfortunate first for me. I planted crops without irrigation water. Why? Because Mexico is not delivering water it owes the U.S., according to a long-standing agreement. I only planted half my farm this year. I’ve had to let go of some employees entirely and reduce the work hours of others in anticipation of financial losses.
Despite Texas’ “aggressive” well-plugging program, there’s still a backlog of orphaned oil and gas wells
After a century and a half of oil and gas production in the United States, the nonprofit environmental watchdog Climate Tracker published a sobering report in 2020: Some 2.6 million unplugged onshore wells lay scattered across the country. Plugging all those derelict holes, from the rocky Appalachian hill country of western Pennsylvania to the dry plains of West Texas and the tundra of Alaska, and countless points between, might cost as much as $280 billion. And that figure from the report did not include undocumented wells — the ones that have vanished from the books, if they were ever recorded in the first place. Carbon Tracker’s estimate of the number of undocumented onshore wells was also striking: 1.2 million.
Bitcoin in the Permian? Data centers test Texas grid
The nation’s most prolific oil region is becoming a hub for industries that could be a major strain on the Texas electrical grid: bitcoin mining and data centers. The migration of those technologies into the Permian Basin is occurring as the oil and gas industry is also trying to electrify much of its equipment to meet net-zero goals, setting up a clash that could test the region’s already overloaded power system.