Senator Eliot Shapleigh - El Paso, Texas

Lawyers for several phone companies, Time Warner Cable and cellular carrier Sprint Nextel Corp., told the PUC that they are close to reaching a compromise that would change the Texas Universal Service Fund and the phone tax that supports it.

The contrasting way Adams and Benjamin Franklin were received in 1770s France — a time when a fledgling union of colonies was desperately seeking a powerful ally against Great Britain — demonstrated what happens when we don't understand the world around us.

The next UT chancellor, many agreed, should be a respected academic with political savvy and sharp managerial skills, someone who can work with college presidents and professors as well as lawmakers and donors.

Laws kicked up a fuss when he put together the water board agenda, listing discussion of “holding pen for wetbacks” on it. He was referring to a proposed detention center. State Rep. Eddie Rodriguez, D-Austin, whose district includes Mustang Ridge, and Austin City Council Member Mike Martinez called a news conference to denounce the display of bigotry and call for Laws to resign.

Prison might be the best option for some, but experts on the root causes of youth crime say there are smarter ways to turn wayward kids' lives around. At a recent Children's Defense Fund conference in Houston, specialists from around the country criticized the Texas education and juvenile justice systems for putting too much emphasis on get-tough tactics and too little on prevention.

"Poverty is everywhere in America, but it is interesting that in states with the highest concentrations of poverty, the congressional delegations seem least interested in supporting initiatives that fight poverty," John Bouman, Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law president, said.

The news that more than 1 in 100 adults in our country are behind bars shocked many Americans, but it shouldn't have come as a surprise.

Many Texas officials, including myself, were opposed to the EPA's lowering the ozone standard from the current level of 85 parts per billion to 75 ppb. It's not that we don't want further air quality improvements, but the health benefits of lowering the current standard are debatable.

Employees overwhelmed by their workload are leaving the Health and Human Services Commission in droves. With fewer experienced workers on staff, applications are piling up, and the state is failing to handle them as quickly as required by the federal government. Since September, Texas has hired 1,010 employees known as eligibility workers; 733 resigned in the same period.

The concept calls for multi-city compacts that would form around specific rail corridors and target private partners for financing. This might be the type of focused, politically nimble effort needed to expedite rail links that would otherwise remain on the drawing board.

Charles Laws, 75, apologized Thursday for using the derogatory term but defied calls from state lawmakers and officials in nearby Austin for him to resign as Mustang Ridge's mayor pro tem and as general manager of a local water supply company.

This move is a kick to the shorts of Wisconsin. This is up there with stealing their cheese. Bowling is as important to Wisconsin as chili, Willie, and the death penalty are to Texas. Bowling is the very lifeblood of Wisconsin. Everybody bowls in Wisconsin. If you're capable of sucking in air in Wisconsin, you bowl.

Local leaders called Thursday for the resignation of a local water supply company's general manager after he characterized a proposed detention facility south of Austin as "a holding pen for wetbacks."

Whether Texas goes into recession depends on "the severity of the national recession, should we have one," said Dale Craymer, chief economist of the Texas Taxpayers and Research Association.

Since the founding of our nation, the American home has been a sacred and protected place. Unfortunately, if the symbol of the American Dream is our home, for many it is gone. For at least three years, Texas has been a national leader in home foreclosures.

Should creationism win out, textbooks throughout the country–not just Texas–will challenge the theory of evolution in science curricula

While hard figures are hard to come by, evidence from nonprofit credit and mortgage counselors suggests that the number of people using these so-called "pay day loans" is growing as the U.S. housing crisis deepens, a negative sign for economic recovery.

Getting your property appraisal lowered could be a little easier, and a lot faster, this year with an online dispute resolution program offered by the Harris County Appraisal District.

The chancellor also told senators that the state needs to ensure that students in community colleges — increasingly the entry point to post-secondary education for Texans — can transfer to four-year schools with adequate financial aid. He said proposals to link some of the funding for colleges and universities to course completion rates, graduation rates and other benchmarks have merit but would need to be phased in gradually and carefully.

Texas House Speaker Tom Craddick testified Thursday that he never read the letter he signed suggesting that harm might come to the reputation of a North Texas fishing tour company operator unless he and a longtime friend were given their money back after the fishing trip they had arranged in 2006 was canceled because of weather.