While numerous Texas school districts divert resources to suing the state over the current finance system, new information has come to light about just how much administrative growth there has been in the last twenty years in our school districts. The Friedman...
Michele Samuelson
Down the ballot – vote against “civil service laws”
It seems amazing that even in the wake of the Wisconsin, where government unions have had a hand in bringing the state perilously close to a fiscal cliff, there is still a clamor for government unions. In Texas, a right-to-work state (meaning unions can exist but...
Big Bird Doesn’t Need Your Tax Dollars After All
There's a good chance that if you don't personally count yourself among those whose childhoods owed much to Cookie Monster, Reading Rainbow, and Mr. Rogers, you know someone who would. Along with learning to count to ten in Spanish before I could reliably do so in...
Government Transparency Victory at Fifth Circuit Court
Good news for taxpayers in Texas! Today, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit upheld the Texas Open Meetings Act. This is no small thing; for awhile now, the Open Meetings Act has been under attack from a number of local governments across the...
Deciding Against Gambling in Texas
The amount of regulation required for expanded gambling means expanded government.
Getting the Whole Truth About Taxation
In 1978, Texas voters approved a constitutional amendment to create truth-in-taxation and transparency in the calculation and process by which the governing body of a local government sets the annual property tax rate. Since 1978, the truth in taxation laws have...
Making College Affordable – For Real This Time
At the DNC Convention tonight (hey, I watch so you don't have to), a good number of the speakers talked about the joy of Pell grants and affordable college tuition. It's a real shame not one of them talked about how college tuition increased 15% between 2008 and...
Finding a Practical Way to Cut Spending Now
Today, the Texas Senate Finance Committee will meet to discuss whether changes need to be made to the existing state spending limitation to restrain the growth of future government spending to population growth plus inflation. Tax and expenditure limitation...
Stealth Tax Elections – in September
Thanks to a quirk of the Texas Tax Code, there are some tax hikes on the ballot - in September! We have quite a few tax and bond elections happening down ballot in November, but I caught wind today of two specific tax elections happening on September 1 and September...
Sticking College Kids with Yet Another Mandate
I believe in vaccinations. I think it's a good idea to take precautionary measures against potentially devastating diseases, particularly those that pass easily from person to person. But I squirm about government inserting itself and mandating vaccines, and I...