Early Voting Begins Monday

Suddenly the election is upon us. Early Voting begins here in Harris County, Texas, on Monday, October 21. I put out a letter to my precinct already, but I thought I’d share most of that info here for people interested in getting more informed about their ballot.

I’m going mostly to HarrisCountyGOP.org (the Republican site for the county) and HarrisVotes.com (the County Clerk’s website) for information.

 

VOTER INFORMATION

Early Voting starts Monday, October 21, and runs through Friday, November 1. Hours are 7:00 AM to 7:00 PM daily except Sunday, October 27, 12 Noon to 7:00 PM.

Polling Locations: https://www.harrisvotes.com/Vote-Centers This page allows you to toggle from Early Voting to Election Day. You can put in your address to bring up locations near you. You can vote at any polling location for both Early Voting and Election Day.

For Election Day, Tuesday, November 5, 7:00 AM to 7:00 PM. Again, use the link to polling locations above.

Sample Ballot: https://www.harrisvotes.com/Voter/Whats-on-my-Ballot

The GOP recommendation is to vote early this year, preferably in the first week of Early Voting. This is against my normal pattern, but I plan to do it. (I do enjoy seeing many of my precinct voter at the polls on Election Day, though.) The reasoning is that you want to bank your vote; if you were to get sick or have an emergency come up on Election Day, you might miss your chance to vote. Also, campaigns will target voters who haven’t yet voted during that last week of campaigning. If you’ve already voted, they don’t have to spend time and money resources reaching out to you—which may mean you’ll get fewer texts and emails (one can hope).

The short version of my recommendations,
plus there are some nonpartisan races
at the bottom of the ballot.

 

BALLOT RECOMMENDATIONS

This year there is no question that we should vote Republican TOP TO BOTTOM.

To highlight a few races, I strongly endorse Donald Trump for President and Ted Cruz for US Senate. (I was trying to get a post out about why good church-going Christians ought to vote for Donald Trump. I didn’t finish before this became more urgent. So that should come out early next week, rather than at the end of the week as is my usual pattern.)

I got this meme as a screenshot on my phone on September 2,
probably on Facebook. I can't locate the source I got it from
or the originator, but I like it.

Our US Congressman for CD38, Wesley Hunt has had a good voting record, and we should definitely keep him.

Lower on the ballot, after the judges, comes the Harris County District Attorney race; the DA is the prosecutor for the county. This is possibly (besides for president) the race most likely to affect our daily lives. Democrat DA Kim Ogg was not radical enough for the Democrats; she thought we were letting too many violent felons back out onto the streets—many on no-bail bonds. And she also didn’t rubber stamp corruption in the County Judge’s office. So the Democrats primaried her to put in Sean Terre, a truly radical anti-public-safety candidate. Fortunately, we have an extraordinary candidate in Dan Simons. We need him. If you’d like to hear his story, he spoke at the Cypress Texas Tea Party in July, which you can view here. His website is https://danforda.com/. (By the way, you can look for all candidate websites on the HCRP website here.)

Dan Simons, candidate for Harris County District Attorney,
screenshot from here

Railroad Commissioner Christi Craddick has been reliable, and we want to keep her.

For Texas Supreme Court, we vetted the candidates well in the Primary (I wrote in more detail on these races in February), so I endorse Republican candidates Jimmy Blacklock for Place 2, John Devine for Place 4, Jane Bland for Place 6.

Our state supreme court structure is divided into two parts: The Texas Supreme Court covers civil cases and issues. The Court of Criminal Appeals is essentially the Supreme Court for criminal cases. Again, I endorse the Republicans: Gina Parker for Place 7, Lee Finley for Place 8.

Our State Senator for SD7, Paul Bettencourt, continues to be an excellent representative for us.

For State Rep. for HD 138, Lacey Hull has been a mostly reliable and sometimes strong conservative, and we definitely want to keep her.

Then we get into more Judicial Races. Here are the Appeals Court District races:

·        Jennifer Caughey for 1^st  Court of Appeals District, Place 2

·        Andrew Johnson for 1^st Court of Appeals District, Place 6

·        Clint Morgan, 1^st Court of Appeals District, Place 7

·        Kristin M. Guiney, 1^st Court of Appeals District Place 8

·        Susanna Dokupil, 1^st Court of Appeals District, Place 9

·        Chad Bridges, 14^th Court of Appeals District, Place 3

·        Tonya McLaughlin, 14^th Court of Appeals District, Place 4

·        Maritza Michele Antu, 14^th Court of Appeals District, Place 5

·        Katy Boatman, 14^th Court of Appeals District, Place 6

·        Brad Hart, 14^th Court of Appeals District Place 8

I won’t list all the district judges. There are many. These are the court judges within Harris County. I will highlight Michael Landrum, who has been a judge before and has been reliably conservative for a very long time. We want him back in. Video of him and two others, Lee Kathryn Shuchart and Brian Staley, speaking at the Cypress Texas Tea Party in July is here.

There are a handful of races in which we did not get a conservative candidate. Only a Democrat appears on the ballot. It won’t make a difference, but I am leaving those blank on my ballot.

There are a few other county offices:

·        Jacqueline Lucci Smith for County Attorney

·        Mike Knox for Sherrif (his talk at the Tea Party during the Primary season is here)

·        Steve Radack for County Tax Assessor-Collector

·        Danielle Dick for Harris County School Trustee, Position 3, At Large

·        James Lombardino for Justice of the Peace, Precinct 5, Place 1 (Tea Party video from January here)

·        Terry Allbritton for Constable, Precinct 5   

last half of page 4 of the ballot

NONPARTISAN ISSUES AND RACES

At the very bottom, there are some nonpartisan things on the ballot. 

Harris County Flood Control District, Proposition A: this raises property taxes to $0.04897 per $100 of property valuation, a right of $0.01581 per $100. The purpose is to maintain infrastructure, not to build new infrastructure. This wasn’t on my radar until I looked at my sample ballot. I’m leaning toward voting against, because I’m against any tax increase, pending further information. I’m asking around to make sure I’m not missing anything.

 

Lone Star College Trustee

·        District 1: Michael (Mike) Stoma spoke at the Cypress Texas Tea Party meeting October 17. No video, but I was there and got to hear him. He is the incumbent, and has served as the board president in the past term. They have a budget surplus and have been working well with Cy-Fair ISD to bring dual credit programs, including many certifications, to high school students. He has my vote.

·      District 2: I do not know either candidate in this race: Daniel “Danny” Meza or Ernestine Pierce. She is the incumbent, having served the past 6 years. Info on both here. He links to a Facebook page with no posts. She links to her website, here. While I’m not endorsing, I expect to vote for Ernestine Pierce.

·        District 3: Mike Sullivan is unopposed. I would vote for him, if there was a way to do so.

 

Harris County Emergency Services District 9

·        This is the very last race on the ballot. In this race, vote for none, one, or two candidates. The board handles our fire stations in the area. Harris County Republican Party Local Government has endorsed Jaime H. Martinez and David Farrington. Jaime was a potential school board candidate last year. He’s reliably conservative, although he didn’t reach the top four candidates we were vetting. I’m happy to see him find another way to serve the community. And David Farrington is a long-time local conservative. I served with him on the SD7 Platform Committee last spring. They both get my vote.

Sampling the Ballot, Part II

This is a simple, mostly non-partisan, off-year election. And yet we couldn’t get through the ballot in a single post. Sorry about that. Anyway, yesterday we covered Texas state propositions and Harris County propositions. What’s left on my local ballot are school board trustee elections.

School Board

There are four positions on the ballot for Cy-Fair Independent School District. Sometimes they’re called trustees, sometimes board members. CFISD had a “board candidate forum,” which is about two hours with the candidates, if you’d like to see for yourself. But on the ballot they are “trustee candidates.” It’s a “board of trustees,” so that includes it all, I guess.

To begin, I’m not a fan of our school board. I’m not a fan of public education, so add that in. But here we are, in one of the most conservative counties, in one of the most conservative states, in a section of the county that is among the most conservative sections. But our school board is notoriously tied to liberal policies, educational associations (not a good thing), and cronyism. Most of the board has been supported by a PAC, with rather large money, considering that school board positions are unpaid.

The other side will point out that they get awards—they are the most efficient; they are best liked by administrators. They are efficient because CFISD gets a lower per student allotment from the state than other school districts nearby and across the state, and they are required by law to balance the budget. So they are forced to be efficient. But let’s give props for that. If administrators like them, it might be just that they’re giving them everything they want, but that may not reflect at all on the classroom outcome.

In the forum, these six candidates appeared: Thomas Jackson, Christine Hartley, Darcy Mingoia (all current board members), Natalie Blasingame, Debbie Blackshear, and Pam Redd. There are four positions. Incumbents Thomas Jackson and Christin Hartley run unopposed for positions 1 and 2 respectively. Darcy Mingoia is running again for position 3 and is challenged by Dr. Natalie Blasingame. And the position 4 trustee is not running again, so the new candidates are Debbie Blackshear and Pam Redd. Positions 5, 6, and 7—John Ogletree, Don Ryan, and Bob Covey—are not up for re-election this year.

The easy way is to go in order. But I won’t; I’m starting with position 3. In addition to the forum, which I watched online after the fact, I saw them both in person at the most recent Tea Party meeting. I wrote about Darcy Mingoia last time she ran, in 2012. She was not my choice. She seems to be a decent person, more interested in the business end than the details of the classroom.

Darcy Mingoia, CFISD candidate, position 4
photo from Cypress Tea Party Facebook page

Last time around I was bothered that she (and nearly every candidate) got the order of priorities wrong. I think you’re accountable to the taxpayers and parents. The job is to get the best education possible for the money budgeted. You will want a good environment and good teachers in order to accomplish that. But doing the bidding of a teachers’ organization is the wrong approach. This time that question didn’t seem very relevant. She said, “Obviously we’re accountable to the taxpayers. But…” She’s certain they’re doing a very good job, and this is one of the best school districts around.

You lose me there. We looked at the school district info when we moved here and decided where to live. It was highly rated. But two years in, we found it so intolerable we pulled our kids out to homeschool for the duration (ten years). I haven’t been that tuned in to schools since, but we have a granddaughter in the local elementary school right now. It’s a new school, but it was built like all the others with open classrooms—even though that has been discredited everywhere for decades and has been proven painfully troublesome here in this district. It’s cheaper to build large rooms without walls. No matter that children have to remain quiet at all times, to avoid disturbing the other classes within earshot. Having a teacher or guest read a book aloud is iffy (I know from experience). 

Also, the elementary school still tells teachers whether a student is performing at grade level or below grade level. But if your child came in performing two grades above grade level, you don’t get any kind of grade to let you know they’re still progressing. I found the program for gifted students sub-par for high school, middle school, and elementary school. It appears that is still the case. (I want to add here that we're quite pleased with our granddaughter's main teacher; I haven't met her other teacher, but the parents have, and teachers are not a problem for us this year.)

Natalie Blasingame, CFISD candidate, position 4
photo from Cypress Tea Party Facebook page

Natalie Blasingame at least addressed the gifted challenge. She is in favor of adding options. Her big thing is dual-language schools—not to be confused with bilingual education, which is a way of teaching non-English students until they learn enough English to be more mainstreamed. Dual-language is an immersion program for teaching additional languages to English-speaking students. Her daughter attends a dual-language program, but it was not available in our district, so she goes elsewhere. (We’re watching a friend try this out in another state.)

She answered my question about gifted students by saying, the way it happens is by dealing with each student individually. Now, that is something that the schools truly need. I don’t know how they get there. But Dr. Blasingame has been an educator—a teacher, assistant principal, principal, and assistant superintendent. She at least knows the challenges from the trenches, and has looked at options. I think she would be the only board member with an education background, and I believe they said the first board member ever to have been an educator in the district.

So, in the Position 3 race, I’m voting for Natalie Blasingame.

Now, for the others. The short answer is, I’m not voting for anyone else.

Of course unopposed positions will get in without my vote. But they will do it without my feeling forced to say, “What a great job you’re doing!”

You may want to disagree. When Thomas Jackson first ran, it was with PAC money, and in connection with Mr. Ogletree, whom I see as the enemy of parents and taxpayers on the board. So I did not favor him. However, he presented himself well at the forum that year—and again in this year’s forum. He’s data oriented and very reasonable. I was leaning toward giving him my vote, but I was reminded that he was instrumental in pushing for the $1.2 Billion bond last year. That’s an incredibly sized bond, and was going to building more open classroom schools, and for a great many things that aren’t capital expenditures. I voted against it. It passed nevertheless (they almost always do).

Christine Hartley also ran with PAC money, and attached herself to other PAC candidates. I wasn’t convinced then that she was what our schools needed, and I’m sticking with that impression. I think she must make an incredible PTO president or Band Mom. She’s a pleasant person with a lot of energy. But she resents anything that challenges the god that is public schools: school choice, charter schools, private schools, homeschools. So, she may not be aware she declared me an enemy, but I recognized the categorization. So, again, she’s not getting my vote.

The Position 4 race has two newcomers. These are non-partisan positions. But I have been told that Pam Redd is considered a weak Democrat (has voted in at least one Democrat primary, but not a long steady record of doing so). Debbie Blackshear votes Republican. She spoke at a Tea Party meeting last month (which I missed). Pam Redd didn’t show; she later told our Tea Party president that she’d had a previous commitment. But that’s not what she’d said when she was scheduled to speak, and she didn’t get back to him to let him know she wouldn't make it. Since the main ways of reaching the public in person are at the forum and at our Tea Party, she blew off an important opportunity.

So Debbie Blackshear ought to be an obvious choice. But I found her unimpressive at the forum. And a friend suggested that some other business connections make her suspicious. I don’t know enough to be certain. It may turn out, if she wins, I will know her better upon re-election. But for now I’m not willing to give her a vote.

Here’s a little additional impression from the forum. School choice is important to pretty much any parent who has a slightly non-standard child: smart, shy, slow, active, reading challenged, etc. A parent can’t wait through a bad year in hopes the next year will be better. A parent has to get the child out of something that isn’t working and into something that might be a better fit.

There is one small “choice” option in this huge district: Windfern High School of Choice. They talked about it a lot. Two of the candidates (Christine Hartley and Pam Redd, I believe) have had a child go there.

There are three Windfern schools. Two of them are alternative schools—where students get sent as an option other than dropping out. Fighting, or other major infractions, or failure to do the work—students get sent to Windfern. It’s not their choice. But that is not the same Windfern—which is 1500 feet away from the other two.

This “choice” school is for 11^th and 12^th grade students who are struggling to keep up and graduate, and might do better in smaller classes with more personal attention; or it’s for accelerated graduates, those who want to graduate early. The emphasis is on getting graduated. The set-up is more like a community college (according to the website). A student has to be recommended to the school by a faculty member from their assigned school. It is unlikely that any child that isn’t trying to graduate early would know about it or ask for it; they get directed there.

There are 250-400 students in this school of choice. There are 113,689 students in the district this year. So, that’s .2-.3.5% of the students. There’s a “choice” for 2 or 3 students out of a thousand. So, almost no one has any “choice.” And what there is doesn’t compare to my homeschool, for example.

If that is this board’s idea of plenty of choice, we need people who think differently.

Sampling the Ballot, Part I

There’s an election coming up, first Tuesday of November. In our area, early voting is already underway. So I’m getting down to the nitty-gritty of deciding how to vote.

page 1 of the
Harris County Sample Ballot

We’re outside of Houston, by about a mile, so I’m not going to make any decision about the mayoral race or other city positions. But I can point out a couple of things. 

The mayor, as well as city council races are non-partisan. That is, the candidates don’t run from a party, with a primary putting up a chosen candidate. The candidates themselves, however, generally have a strong party affiliation. And Houston hasn’t had a Republican mayor since 1938.

When we moved here, it was Mayor Lee Brown. He was what you would expect from a liberal mayor. Not good. Then came Mayor Bill White. He ran as a businessman, a man who would come in and improve budgeting, and get things done more efficiently. But he was pretty much just disappointing, as the city announced itself to be a sanctuary city to illegal aliens, and made pretty much no progress against debt. 

Then we got Mayor Anise Parker, who ran as a businesswoman. She sounded sensible. You’re supposed to vote for the best person. I don’t vote in Houston city elections, but she seemed reasonable, and I wasn’t against her. As soon as she was elected, the news announced how remarkable it was that a lesbian had been elected. 

During her campaign her sexual orientation had not been an issue. Suddenly it was. And she conducted her administration as an activist for homosexuality. HERO (the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance), Prop 1 on the city ballot, is an example—which you must vote AGAINST if you're in Houston; it adds no equal rights protections to anyone, but does take away the right to believe women and children are put at risk if men are allowed in their bathrooms. If you followed that issue, you know Mayor Parker threw out tens of thousands of signatures intended to put it on the ballot, rather than just going along with her. And she subpoenaed pastors for their sermons and communications to see if they said anything about LGBT issues. She was legally slapped down for that.

So now, maybe it’s time to forget about who appears to be the best person, cross off everyone that is a Democrat, a liberal, or a progressive (or any other code word). And from whomever is left, find the best conservative and vote for that person. I don’t know who you should decide on in the city; I didn’t examine them all. But I am aware Bill King got endorsements from State Senator Paul Bettencourt (the tax man), and current City Council (District G) Member Oliver Pennington. Bettencourt has also endorsed Sandie Mullins Moger for that District G position. 

Any more research is up to you. You might note that, if the Houston Chronicle gives an endorsement, it’s likely that is a liberal/progressive decision, unless they didn’t have a liberal alternative.

So, now to my local ballot—in three parts: state propositions, county propositions, and local school board.

State Propositions

A couple of these I followed through the legislative session, and I’m in favor of those. That is Prop 1, which increases the homestead exemption for property taxes, from $15 to $25. The wording on the ballot is long. It also allows for the full exemption for elderly or disabled. It might be better if it were a percentage, rather than a set amount. But we’ll take what we get. There's a detail about property taxation rates being held at a set rate upon disability or retirement. This will make it so they get the full exemption, even though that's a change to their set agreement. So, I’m voting YES on Prop 1.

Prop 2 extends the homestead exemption in Prop 1 to the surviving spouse of a disabled veteran who died before this homestead exemption law went into place—so that such a spouse isn’t the only category of homeowner left out.  So I’m voting YES on Prop 2 as well.

I also followed Prop 6, which recognizes the right to hunt, fish, and harvest wildlife according to conservation laws. That ought to be a given, but here it is, now, in our state constitution. So, I’m voting YES on Prop 6.

From here on I know less, so these are my thoughts. If you know more, please share with the rest of us.

Prop 3 is intended to allow statewide elected officials to live somewhere other than in the capital, which is Austin. I don’t know much background about this. I don’t see it as a problem. If a person lives in, say San Antonio, an hour from the capital, and is willing to commute each day they are needed in Austin, I don’t see that as a problem. Lots of people commute for an hour a day. Austin is a high cost living area. Choosing maybe Round Rock, nearby but more suburban, seems reasonable. Maybe there’s something more to this than I’m thinking of. But it seems to me, being in the office, and available as needed, is what is relevant, not where one pays for one’s housing. So, I’m voting YES on Prop 3.

Prop 4 allows the legislature to allow the charitable foundations of professional sports teams to hold raffles. I’m not convinced this is an essential role for our legislature. Maybe there are arguments in favor, but they haven’t reached me. So, I’m voting NO on Prop 4.

Prop 5 authorizes small counties—population less than 7,500—to perform private road construction and maintenance. The key detail here seems to be “private.” Many roads in a rural county are likely to be private—to and from farms or ranches, or began that way. It may be that it is in the county’s interest to make sure such roads are maintained. In a large county, maintaining private roads could seem suspicious for a government to take on. But in these small places, I think it is probably not going to be a sign of corruption. So, feel free to disagree, but I’m voting YES on Prop 5.

Prop 7 dedicates taxes and revenues from automobile sales, use, and rental to the state highway fund, for non-toll roads, and to reduce transportation-related debt. I usually start with any tax as a no. But this is not a new tax, but a dedication of taxes already received for this specific purpose. It seems reasonable, since the revenue sources are related to the use. So, feel free to disagree, but I’m voting YES on Prop 7.

Other than the occasional flyer in the mail for some particular proposition, I haven’t found many opinion sources on these. But the Conservative Coalition of Harris County, a group of citizens that study the issues and candidates and give their recommendations, shows the percentage of their group and the way they are learning:

State Proposition	For	Against
Prop 1	100%	0%
Prop 2	100%	0%
Prop 3	90%	10%
Prop 4	10%	90%
Prop 5	70%	30%
Prop 6	80%	20%
Prop 7	80%	20%

Harris County Propositions

Word of warning for the voter: The ballot will have two Prop 1s, Prop 2s, Prop 3s, and Prop 4s. (The City of Houston has and additional Prop 1, 2, and 3.) So read carefully and make sure you know where you are on the ballot. All of the Harris County propositions are for issuing bonds. The CCHC group are 100% against all four. However, I talked with one of them afterward—after he had gotten a response from the county commissioner’s office, and he may change.

County Proposition One will issue $700 Million in bonds for road improvement. According to word passed on to me, the county hasn’t raised taxes for roads in 17 years. With the growth in the county, it might be sensible to go along with these road improvement bonds. It’s hard to plan without funds to draw from, so it might be more efficient to fund through a bond.

Still, you might be interested to know that Harris County’s per capita debt of $543 is moderately high compared to other large Texas counties. Bexar, Travis, and Denton Counties are higher. Dallas, Tarrant, Collin, and El Paso Counties are lower. The highest was Denton County at $816; the lowest was Dallas County at $44 (data from Texas Transparency site). 

So, while my default position is No until convinced otherwise, and I’m am a bit torn, I will probably vote YES on County Prop One.

County Prop Two is $60 Million in bonds for parks. I don’t think this is maintenance of current parks; I think it is for new parks, but I may be wrong. It’s hard to imagine how the land could be found for several new parks. Not the little parks that are provided in new subdivisions, but big public parks, like Cullen Park or Bear Creek Park. Personally, I’m satisfied with the existing parks. So, feel free to disagree, but I think I’ll vote NO on County Prop Two.

County Prop Three is $24 Million in bonds for a much larger veterinary health and adoption center—a dog pound. The story is that the current one is too small, and this leads to quicker euthanization than a larger facility would have. The current clinic might be tight in capacity. However, their website currently claims that, while they don’t guarantee, they generally adopt out 100% of healthy dogs. So I’m not sure what would change with an additional $24 Million. I love dogs (cats are OK too). But I’m not convinced, so I’m voting NO on County Prop Three.

County Prop Four is $64 Million in bonds for flood control. I don’t know what flood control, not already in place, is needed to be planned ahead for, using bonds, rather than as needed funds. I’m in favor of flood control. I’m pleased with how quickly and efficiently floods get taken care of here. But I’m not convinced this additional funding is needed at this time. So, I’m voting NO on County Prop Four.

We have yet to get to the Cy-Fair ISD School Board. But this is enough for a day. So we'll do a Part II tomorrow.