The House Committee on Public Education will hold a hearing Tuesday April 16th, 2013 on Debbie Riddle’s bill HB 945. HB 945 requires the assets, liabilities and contracts of the board be transferred to Commissioners Court in trust for the component school districts. I’m wondering if the programs and services provided by HCDE for a [...]
Harris County Department of Education should remain open
April 4, 2013 By 14 Comments
For several years in Harris County Republican circles, there has been a movement to eliminate the Harris County Department of Education. As I noted earlier, this year State Rep. Debbie Riddle has filed a bill in the state legislature to do just that. The question is: is she right? Should the Harris County Department of [...]
Harris County Department of Education PR disaster
February 26, 2013 By
Geez, Louise. I mean, when you cover politics you pretty much expect to shake your head once in a while. But there’s headshaking and then there is HEADSHAKING. What I witnessed at the Harris County Department of Education board meeting today definitely falls in the HEADSHAKING category. Shortly after the prayer and pledges, citizen watchdog [...]
Rep. Debbie Riddle files bill to eliminate the Harris County Department of Education
February 8, 2013 By
State Rep. Debbie Riddle (R-150) filed HB945 this week. If enacted, it would abolish the Harris County Department of Education, transferring control of the assets to the Harris County Commissioners Court, and giving the commissioners one year to liquidate them. From the bill: SECTION 1. (a) Each county board of education, board of county school [...]
Roy Morales at the Downtown Houston Pachyderm Club
October 26, 2012 By
It might be time for the Downtown Houston Pachyderm Club to issue pads and a helmet to their speakers. Or, if you are scheduled to speak there, you might want to bring your own. Harris County Department of Education Trustee Roy Morales could have used a bit of protection during his speech yesterday. Just kidding! [...]
HCDE Trustees Morales, Wolfe continue feud
October 25, 2012 By
In my report on the Harris County Department of Education’s Board of Trustees vote against a tax rate increase, I chose not to focus on the feud between two trustees: Roy Morales and Mike Wolfe. First off, blog posts should be as short as possible and secondly, the main thrust of that post was that [...]
Harris County Department of Education holds line on tax increase
October 24, 2012 By
Although the meeting was contentious, in the end the Harris County Department of Education Board of Trustees voted along party lines 5-2 to not raise the tax rate above the Effective Tax Rate. In technical terms, that means that the board did not raise taxes this year. In non-technical terms, the rate went up by [...]
Harris County Department of Education Tax Vote
October 22, 2012 By
Tomorrow at 3:00 pm, the Harris County Department of Education Board of Trustees will vote on a proposed tax rate increase. As I noted here, the increase will raise revenues at least 8 percent, with the stated purpose of the increased revenue being to build a new for-profit business involving cloud computing. One of the [...]
Harris County Department of Education Tax Increase Hearing
October 10, 2012 By
I’ve been to many governmental entity meetings over the years, so I can’t say that the Harris County Department of Education tax increase hearing that I attended yesterday was the worst. But it does rank somewhere in the bottom 100 or so. Good grief, these people have the power, yes POWER, to raise your taxes, [...]
Steve Radack to Harris County Republicans: get off your butt and do something
September 21, 2012 By
Harris County Precinct 3 Commissioner Steve Radack was the featured speaker at the Downtown Houston Pachyderm Club yesterday. He talked about a wide range of subjects but his warning about the November election is the one that stuck with me because I’ve been saying the same thing. We must overcome the weakness of the Harris [...]
