This Week In Austin ...
During this past election year, change has been the mantra. This was true in Austin this week as well as the 81st Legislative Session opened. A new Speaker of the House, Joe Straus of San Antonio, was easily elected by his colleagues. One unfortunate change is that the comptroller announced her new revenue estimate. The new estimate is $9.1 billion lower than the previous legislative session. This means that we will have to fight even harder for our share of the state budget.
One thing that did not change this week is that we worked hard to represent DCCCD in Austin. Dr. Lassiter, Trustee Boyle and Justin Lonon visited the offices of the 21 members who comprise our delegation. We delivered a plant to them that can brighten their offices and can serve as a daily reminder of DCCCD. Additionally, we took the opportunity to remind them of our legislative priorities. A DCCCD legislative update will be sent out community-wide in the next week or so. In the meantime, as a reminder, our legislative priorities can be found at http://www.dcccd.edu/governmentalaffairs.
With a new speaker in place, the House seems poised to get down to business. Speaker Straus has pledged to bring back a nonpartisan atmosphere to the House. Straus was supported by a number of our North Texas legislators, which should be beneficial to us at the committee level.
The normally collegial Senate was fraught with conflict this week as some members successfully pushed to make an exception to the long-standing two-thirds rule. The rule has been in place since at least the 1950s and allows 11 of the 31 senators to block debate on any bill. Republican members were able to carve out an exception to this rule for a voter-ID proposal that they have been able to pass in previous sessions. Many have cautioned that this maneuver will have a long-term impact on the Senate’s business.
Both chambers of the legislature are primarily in recess for inauguration festivities next week. Once they get back to business the leadership will begin to prepare committee assignments.
We have begun monitoring a number of proposed bills that could have an impact on community colleges. In the next update we will provide you a link to review our tracking list.
Because of the current economic climate, this will be a tough legislative session. As the session unfolds we will call upon many in the DCCCD family to support our efforts.
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