Whatever the motivation among state lawmakers for passing House Bill 852, its real effect will be to make assessing the fair taxable value of residential property more difficult for tax appraisal districts and to do so in a way that mostly benefits developers of residential subdivisions.
Finally, the legislature took a long-needed step to start to fix the state's broken school finance system.
Sen. Kelly Hancock’s take-a-dog-to-lunch bill, which Gov. Greg Abbott signed into law June 4, is another of the assaults against local government control that have become a habit for the Texas Legislature.
Whatever else they might have accomplished during the recently ended 86th session of the Texas legislature, lawmakers seem to have definitively settled one of the weirder controversies blowing around Galveston Bay in recent years.
Galveston got a reprieve from having to deal with legislative restrictions on the local regulation of short-term rentals with the deaths in committee of House Bill 3778 and Senate Bill 1888.
The painting of a rainbow-themed crosswalk in front of Galveston City Hall is fitting for a town historically rich in diversity.
No disrespect to the USS Texas, but plans to spend $35 million to repair the old battleship are a little incongruous assessed in full context.
Many plans about Galveston’s future have come and many have gone over the past 20 or so years. Many of those past plans came and went without leaving much of a mark.
On this morning 75 years ago as dawn was breaking in Europe, members of what journalist Tom Brokaw would call The Greatest Generation boarded landing craft off the coast of France.
Galveston County Commissioners’ vote this week to create a mental health court is an encouraging step and should be commended.
Most everyone has heard it before. Millennials are selfish. They lack work ethic. They want to do things their way. They’re entitled. But is that really fair?
In our representative form of government, we elect people to gather in one place to give voice to the people of their respective communities.
Texas lawmakers did a commendable job this session patching some of the biggest holes the state’s courts had blown in open government laws.
It’s time again to start thinking about hurricanes. The season begins Saturday and runs through November.
A change, which Galveston’s Wharves Board of Trustees approved in a 4-3 vote, allows a simple majority to remove board officers — the chairman, vice chairman or secretary — for any reason or for no reason at all.
Population growth estimates the U.S. Census Bureau released earlier this month should be enough to keep government leaders and others interested in Galveston’s future up at night.
Many Americans will mark Memorial Day during the National Moment of Remembrance, a minute of silence begining at 3 p.m.
Galveston Housing Authority has an opportunity to correct at least two serious flaws in plans to replace 569 public housing units demolished in 2009 after being flooded during Hurricane Ike.
With Memorial Day weekend, the first big holiday of the summer season, about to arrive, now is a good time to review ways to stay safe in the Gulf of Mexico.
June 1 marks the official start of the Atlantic hurricane season.
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