You gotta feel sorry for the San Antonio ISD school board president. He wants to increase spending — but “the downside to all this is having to go to the voters… That’s what’s really troubling us.” Yep, it’s a real hassle, having to get voters to approve more taxes and spending just one year after voters said no to a similar proposal.

Superintendent Jennings Teel and Navasota ISD trustees were chastised by teachers at a school board meeting on Monday. The teachers claimed that the group had dealt with them in a caviler manner and had exhibited generally poor decision making abilities. The merit of those allegations is subjective and therefore difficult to validate what is not is Mr. Teel’s resolve to keep taxes low.

Taxpayers in Clear Creek Independent School District, in Galveston County, are facing a $9.2 million tax hike. The superintendent, with a straight face, tells the local newspaper the schools have “exercised significant restraint.” Sounds nice, but that’s not what the record shows. School revenues are have risen 60 percent since 2001, even though the district only has 18 percent more students. Where’s the money going? Hint: not the classroom.

As part of an effort to trim the county budget, Dallas County Sheriff Lupe Valdez is cutting condiments from the budget. Prisoners will have to go without mustard, ketchup, sweeteners and jelly — saving taxpayers $150,000. Her office might also charge inmates for pickles, trimming another $84,000. But considering the county asked her to find $6 million in cuts, Sheriff Lupe is going to have to do better than that.

Taxpayers in Midland and Odessa — along with the rest of us — are shelling out big bucks for a new “performing arts” center to be built between the two cities. The facility, which is described as standing “90 feet tall at its center, far surpassing the height of the nearby Highway 191 overpass on Farm-to-Market Road 1788,” is expected to cost $89 million.

Conservatives in Texas often talk about how wasteful our government school system can be, yet we rarely find a gem as perfectly flawed as two stories that appeared recently in the Houston Chronicle. On May 1, the Chronicle breathlessly reported “Spring Branch ISD facing insolvency” – you can almost hear the exclamation points. A month and a half later, the paper glowingly reported “Spring Branch ISD; Free summer camp focused on France.” A free French summer camp, while facing insolvency?

Readers of the Houston Chronicle’s website now have a nifty tool: browse the pay of nearly every public employee in Houston and Harris County. Topping the payroll at $442,556 is HISD superintendent Abelardo Saavedra. Coming in a distant second is the “Chancellor Emeritus” of the Houston Community College, Bruce Leslie, making $336,583.