Daily News - The Austin Chronicle (2024)

More Funny Numbers From Strayhorn

Have you seen Carole Keeton Rylander McLellan Strayhorn's new TV ad? The one that claims her mayoral opponents, City Council Members Lee Leffingwell and Brewster McCracken, just “sat while millions intended for traffic improvement vanished” from Capital Metro?As is so often the case in political ads – especially those from Strayhorn – it would be shocking if it weren’t completely untrue. View it below – commentary follows.With this ad, Strayhorn shows she’s either a liar or completely ignorant of city politics and Capital Metro affairs. She claims in the ad that $85 million to $110 million of Capital Metro money is “gone.” Um, no it’s not.

Take That, Brachiosaur Sauropod, Pleurocoelus!

It's been a bad week for the "Young Earth" crowd: First State Board of Education Chair Don Mcleroy has his nomination implode beneath him, leaving Gov. Rick Perry searching for a replacement nominee. Then the House designates a brand new state dinosaur (which, of course, implies they believe that dinosaurs existed.)As befits such a weighty issue, HCR 16 author Rep. Charlie Geren, R-Fort Worth, was flanked by two dinosaurs (Rep. Mark Homer, D-Paris, sporting a charming green ensemble, and Rep. Tuffy Hamilton, R-Mauriceville, resplendent in purple with red spots.)So why the change? In 1997, the 75th Legislature declared Brachiosaur Sauropod, Pleurocoelus, as the official Lone Star State Dinosaur after it bones were found in the state. But in 2007, as any paleontologist worth their salt knows, those bones were re-identified as being from Paluxysaurus Jonesi. Of course, legislators were eager to correct this basal titanosauriform-related goof. And, you know, any excuse to wear a dinosaur suit on the floor.

The Hustle For Mayor: Carole Keeton Strayhorn

It's the devastating denouement of the Hustle's five-part interview series. Here, we try to get a handle on the enigma that is Carole Keeton Strayhorn. This is the one you've been waiting for![video-1]

The Power to Change

As the ongoing hullabaloo over the Austin sound ordinance in regards to live outdoor music at restaurants has only reiterated, music is politics here in the Live Music Capital. Since the general economic downturn has dominated most political discussions, OTR polled the mayoral candidates – Mayor Pro Tem Brewster McCracken,City Council member Lee Leffingwell, David Buttross, and Josiah Ingalls – on issues facing the local music scene, beginning with his favorite Mojo magazine inquiries. Representatives for Carole Keeton Strayhorn did not return to requests for comment.Last great show you saw?Leffingwell: Dale Watson at the Broken Spoke.McCracken: Bruce Robison, two-stepping with my wife on my birthday.Buttross: My nine-month-old son swaying to music on the radio and/or attending one of many Christian music concerts.Ingalls: Jen FosterRecord that changed your life?Leffingwell: Willie Nelson, StardustMcCracken: The Beatles, RevolverButtross: Marc Cohn, “True Companion”Ingalls: Reba McEntire, What If It’s You

Hot Damn, Travis County Is Voting!

All right, Austin, you've apparently met my challenge. I said I wasn't going to provide daily early voting turnout updates unless you gave me reason to do so. And you have.Early voting in this year's municipal elections – dominated by Austin's city council races – is trending noticeably higher than last year's, I suspect due to the race for mayor. The three-day numbers, with 2008 numbers in parentheses:Day 1: 1,922 (1,765)
Day 2: 2,368 (1,685)
Day 3: 2,580 (1,803)2009 3-day total: 6,870
2008 3-day total: 5,253Bear in mind, that's still puny compared to what I know you could be doing: In last year's presidential election, the first three days saw 51,548 show up (possibly more than we'll see in total for this election).But hey, this is progress. Surely we can beat that paltry 8.25% turnout from last year.Go vote!

Save the Teachers

So imagine you're trying to save a failing steelworks, and you hire all the best steelworkers you can, and they start edging towards a profit, but suddenly your investors say, "Hey, we like the idea of a profit, but you've got to sack 75% of all those really talented steelworkers you've hired."Replace "steelworks" with "school", "steelworkers" with "teachers", and "profit" with "academically acceptable status" and you've got the Texas school accountability system. So Rep. Dawnna Dukes, D-Austin, got an amendment added to House Bill 3 that dumps the requirement that when a school is re-purposed, no matter what the current staff have achieved, 75% of the teachers must go, removing an incentive for good staff to stay. "They did not want to be the last man standing, God forbid, if that school closed," Dukes said. The new version gives principals leeway to keep their qualified staff.So how does she feel about the bill? "This was a good day for us," she said. With both House and Senate having some variant of language making the reforms effective immediately, there's definitely some hope for Pearce Middle School, which risks closure this year. "This bill is definitely not a dark cloud," she added.

Obama on Crack

President Barack Obama supports the adoption of a one-to-one crack-to-powder cocaine sentencing scheme, Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer told a Congressional subcommittee this morning, which would finally, officially, kill the infamous 100-to-one sentencing disparity on the books since the 1980s. Obama believes Congress should "completely eliminate the sentencing disparity," Breuer told the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs. "[C]riminal laws should be tough, smart, and fair, and perceived as such by the American public."

House Voter ID Language Released

House Elections Committee chair Todd Smith has released a draft of what he hopes will be a compromise bill on voter ID.After doing a quick read of the bill, some differences between Troy Fraser's version that passed the Senate include:• provisions for voter education on the new ID requirements
• training for poll workers
• a report to the Lege on what demographic groups are affected
• language specifying that there is no guarantee that a provisional ballot will be counted
• the law wouldn't take effect until 2013
• the creation of signature verification committees that would check affidavit signatures against registration records
• the bill would not take effect unless the Lege appropriates $7.5 million to fund voter registration efforts

Dukes: Stop Killing Schools

With 27 amendments down and 23 (and growing) to go, the House is wading through HB 3, the big school accountability bill.Rep. Dawnna Dukes, D-Austin, had an amendment that would strip away school closures, instead instructing the commissioner to "pursue interventions and sanctions". It got loud when Chairman Rob Eissler, R-The Woodlands, started defending mandatory school closures, and suggested that the closure of Johnston High School is part of what motivated Webb Middle School to really knuckle down to avoid closure.Big mistake trying to lecture Dukes on this issue, because both schools are in her district. "Let me correct you," said a fuming Dukes. "We didn't get busy because of the closure." Teachers were working hard well before then: The reality is that, since 40% of teachers from a closed campus cannot find a job in their district, the closure system penalizes good teachers that do try to save their schools.To say she was putting some emphasis on her point is putting it lightly (as fellow Chronicle writer Lee Nichols pointed out, he could hear her in the back corridor.) When Eissler got her amendment tabled, she immediately started working on another amendment that may save those qualified teachers.