Houston Chronicle. Oct. 20, 2015.
HERO bashing: Opponents’ “bathroom” argument about the equal right ordinance perverts the truth
Dan Patrick has been around Houston long enough for Houstonians to consider him a local figure, and he is, of course, but he’s also the lieutenant governor of Texas. As a statewide elected official he’s well aware that nine other Texas cities with populations of 100,000 or more provide their residents with the protections afforded by an equal rights ordinance similar to Houston’s. He’s also aware that not one of those cities - we repeat, not one - has experienced any problems with transgender women lurking in bathrooms waiting to attack little boys or girls. Nevertheless, Patrick is taking to the air waves this week to tell voters that “no woman should have to share a public restroom or locker room with a man.”
The lieutenant governor knows that the bathroom argument perverts the truth, which makes his ad campaign nothing more than cheap and cynical political opportunism. He has a few fences to mend with the tea party crowd that put him in office - they feel he wasn’t as obstinate and unyielding in Austin as he promised to be - and HERO opposition is a convenient opportunity for him to refresh his tea-party bona fides.
“The lieutenant governor must know it’s illegal now - and will always be - to enter the wrong restroom,” Richard Carlborn, spokesman for supporters of the ordinance, told the Chronicle. “The Houston Equal Rights Ordinance doesn’t change that. What’s shocking is that funders of those opposed to the equal rights ordinance want to roll back protections - in 2015 - of African-Americans, veterans, women and many other Houstonians.”
Patrick knows HERO does nothing to change the law, and Texans owner Bob McNair, City Council member Michael Kubosh, Harris County Commissioner Jack Cagle and other public figures who lend credence to the ridiculous bathroom claim ought to know it, as well.
What opponents should be concerned about - in addition to the city’s reputation for openness and fair treatment if the ordinance is overturned - is making common cause with individuals whose primary aim is to undermine growing social acceptance for Houstonians who are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender. That position was most baldly expressed a couple of months ago by one of the more outspoken HERO opponents, longtime conservative activist, Dr. Stephen Hotze.
“Drive them out of our city,” Hotze told a gathering of HERO opponents sponsored by former Harris County GOP Chairman Jared Woodfill, Tom Delay and others. “I don’t want them in our city. Send them back to San Francisco.”
Hotze went on to say - while waving a sword, no less - that HERO opponents should fight gays with the same ferocity that Allied soldiers fought Nazis, ignoring the fact that Nazis slaughtered gays, as well. His audience applauded.
That’s not Houston, and neither are the absurd and deceptive anti-HERO ads running these days, including Patrick’s. On Nov. 3, the real Houston, the open, accommodating, tolerant Houston, needs to stand up and let the nation know who we are. A YES vote on Proposition 1 sends that clear message.
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The Dallas Morning News. Oct. 23, 2015.
How Texas’ workers comp laws endanger many workers
So how much is a disabled arm worth? Depending on whether your company is in Texas’ workers’ compensation system or has bailed out, the answer could be anywhere from $100,000-plus to zilch.
Workers, however, won’t discover this injustice until they’re in dire need of medical help. Joe Becker, an Abilene trucker who herniated several discs in his back in 2012, worked for a company that had opted out of the state-run system. His benefits ended after two years, much sooner than they would have had his employer remained in the state system. Left to fend for himself, he’s now on the edge of being homeless.
Becker is one of many paying a steep price because their employer jettisoned the state’s workers comp system, according to an extensive analysis by ProPublica and NPR. Their findings, published in The Dallas Morning News last week, should give pause to other states considering similar measures.
Until recently, Texas had been the only state that didn’t mandate that companies be in the workers compensation system. Now Oklahoma allows companies to opt out, and Tennessee and South Carolina are considering similar measures. Texas lawyer Bill Minick, who runs an injured-worker consultancy called PartnerSource, is leading a national effort, along with several major companies, to get opt-out laws passed in a dozen states within the next decade.
This opt-out initiative may seem good for companies, but it’s problematic for workers. When Texas lawmakers last tried to reform the workers comp system in 2005, this newspaper advocated that lawmakers require companies to participate in the workers comp system. Lawmakers made other fixes, but the opt-out provision remained.
The ProPublica and NPR study underscores our concerns. They found that injured workers received lower benefits, faced more restrictions and had little recourse for denied medical aid if their employer had abandoned the workers compensation system. In some instances, injured workers could lose coverage if they violated safety rules, failed to seek help with a task, showed up late to medical appointments or even consulted their personal doctor.
Minick says opt-out systems save companies 40 to 90 percent because there are lower costs per claim, injured employees return to work faster and fewer claims are disputed. Whether injured workers get the benefits they need remains in dispute, however.
As a state, Texas must do more to make sure injured workers receive the treatment they need. The state-run system is far from perfect, but having more companies leave the system doesn’t seem to be the solution. Helping injured workers get back on their feet is a social contract. Financial concerns are important, but so, too, is the health of injured workers.
Texas needs to fix the workers comp system, and lawmakers should reconsider mandating employer participation. And let Texas’ experience serve as a lesson to others states considering opt outs.
The system must be strong, but it must also be fair.
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San Antonio Express-News. Oct. 21, 2015.
Women hurt in Texas war on abortion
Statements to the contrary, the issue is abortion in the state decision to boot Planned Parenthood from Medicaid funding. That highly edited video that falsely alleges abuses in how fetal tissue is donated is simply the pretext.
A brief review of the facts:
None of the Planned Parenthood clinics in Texas that receives Medicaid payments for services rendered performs abortions.
Planned Parenthood clinics generally in Texas don’t participate in fetal donation programs, though Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast did as part of a University of Texas Medical Branch study on miscarriages. A Houston clinic was one of those featured in the highly edited “sting” video, which has been criticized as misleading and, ultimately, untruthful.
Planned Parenthood clinics nationally never “profited” from fetal tissue. They charged $45 to $60 per specimen - but only at 1 percent of its affiliates.
Planned Parenthood - also facing a congressional push to defund it - announced recently that it would stop accepting any money for the tissue and simply donate it for medical research. There is nothing illegal about donating fetal tissue.
The kinds of services Medicaid funding makes possible at Planned Parenthood include breast and cervical cancer screenings and testing and treatment for sexually transmitted diseases. And causing more clinics to close will also mean more unwanted pregnancies of the kind that result in abortion.
These facts notwithstanding, Texas is kicking the organization out of Medicaid. It alleges acts of misconduct stemming from the secret - and discredited - videos, though only one Houston clinic was in the video.
This isn’t Texas’ first turn at defunding Planned Parenthood. It is simply trying to make the effort complete. If Texas can’t convince a court to overturn Roe v. Wade, which gives abortion constitutional protection, state leaders will ban abortion by other means.
This action cuts off about $300,000 in state money for Planned Parenthood, but Texas distributes about $2.8 million in federal Medicaid dollars, which the organization used to serve nearly 7,000 clients. The federal government must not allow the state to withhold these funds.
The target is clearly abortion. The casualties, however, will continue to be women’s health and their ability to avoid unwanted pregnancies.
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Corpus Christi Caller-Times. Oct. 14, 2015.
A fact about deportations: They’re people
The recent stories in the Caller-Times of young adult immigrants who grew up in this country, only to be deported or forced out by other circumstances, tore our hearts. They also demonstrated on a human level that immigration is more complex of an issue than our laws are designed to address and our politicians care to admit.
Consider Nancy Palencia, who after graduating with a bachelor’s degree spent a year cleaning houses because she didn’t have the documentation to verify that the person who earned the degree was her. Frustrated, she left for Mexico, an unfamiliar country to her despite having been born there. Knowing the language didn’t make it her real home.
She has earned a graduate scholarship to a school in London with a royal name, King’s College. She and her upward mobility are welcome across the Atlantic, but not in the United States where she ran afoul of immigration laws through no fault of her own.
Palencia is an individual and therefore unique, as is her story. But it has threads in common with thousands of other individuals more and less accomplished than she - also more and less desirable. To stereotype all young adult undocumented immigrants or native-born children of parents from Mexico as academically accomplished straight arrows whose only flaws are not their fault would be dishonest. But the college graduate who can’t prove it was he or she who earned that degree, or who can’t apply for a job commensurate to that degree, and whose choices are to leave the country or stagnate in a menial job is a recurring story.
And not nearly the saddest. One of the common threads among these young adults is seeing their families torn asunder, with some family members forced to leave while others stay - and family gatherings incomplete because some of their relatives can’t risk being caught arriving or returning.
It’s easy to blame undocumented immigrant parents as the root cause of their children’s predicaments for having brought them here as toddlers or for birthing and raising them here. Does what happens to their children as young adults serve the parents right?
Those who prefer easy answers to difficult questions might say yes. But yes is an answer that overlooks our complicity in creating the conditions that made the parents’ journey here under the radar worthwhile.
Also, no one can say honestly of children who grew up here thinking they belonged that it serves them right to be deported from the only country they know, to a land that is strange to them. That, too, is a recurring story.
What these recurring stories show us - or should show us - is that building a wall and deporting immediately all immigrants lacking documents are not serious answers. Shame on the crowd pleased by them - and by criticism of presidential candidate Jeb Bush for speaking Spanish, his Mexican-born wife’s first language. Also, shame on him for bandying her path to citizenship as the proper way as if it were a giant highway accessible to all.
The human toll exacted by our immigration laws point to the need for the U.S. and Mexico to collaborate on policies toward their shared border. Both countries need to do better by the people who cross it - and address the reasons those people are lured both directions. Neither country should be a lesser partner in this effort.
No amount of deportation will separate the cultures that have blended across the border for generations. That bridge has been crossed. Immigration policy needs to catch up to today’s realities.
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Fort Worth Star-Telegram. Oct. 22, 2015.
’Snow days’ will mean longer school hours
If the last few winters have taught North Texans anything, it’s that setting aside only two inclement weather makeup days in the school year might not be enough.
During the academic year that ended last spring, a February ice storm closed local schools for a day. Another, later that week, sent students home early.
In fact, some districts canceled as many as four days due to inclement weather in February and March alone.
But extending the school year to ensure that Texas public school students get the state-mandated 180 days of instruction isn’t popular with many parents, teachers and students alike. Neither is eliminating other student holidays, like Good Friday or Memorial Day.
So a recent change to state law that sets the minimum school year in minutes instead of days should be a welcome development.
Instead of 180 days, the Lone Star State now requires districts to provide at least 75,600 minutes of instruction during the academic year. (Each day is 420 minutes, including recess and lunch.)
The change gives districts more flexibility when it comes to setting their calendars. If extra days are needed, districts might choose to extend school hours for a few days to make up time lost due to weather delays or cancellations.
The Texas Education Agency released a guide instructing districts to keep records that prove they are meeting the minimum minute requirement. However, the law change won’t take effect until the 2016-2017 school year, so school have time yet to determine how they will arrange their calendars.
In theory, this is exactly the kind of innovation the state’s education system needs. It returns authority to those who are best equipped to make decisions for the diverse body of schools throughout the state: the district leaders.
But increasing local control should not come at a cost to children.
And it’s also fair to wonder whether an extra half-hour tacked on to the school day for a month will be productive instructional time.
Students are accustomed to their school days being a certain length. Their attention spans have a limit.
We trust that local districts will consider this when planning the calendar.
As Mansfield school Superintendent Jim Vaszauskas told trustees at a recent meeting, “this (change) could be a very, very good thing for schools.”
That’s probably true, as long as administrators ensure that student learning is top of mind, not the number of minutes in the day.
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