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Texas News
AROUND 90% OF TEXAS BEACHES INFESTED WITH POOP, STUDY SAYS
THOSE LOOKING FOR A PLACE TO SWIM THAT ISN'T THE EQUIVALENT TO TAKING A DIP IN A
PUBLIC TOILET SHOULD HEAD TO SOUTH PADRE, THE REPORT SAID.
By Michael Karlis on Fri, Jul 7, 2023 at 4:03 pm
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Shutterstock / Artistic Operations
The water at Cole Park in Corpus Christi was infested with feces 54% of the time
it was tested, according to the report.
With record temperatures scorching Texas this summer, many folks are heading to
the coast to cool off. However, the next time you do, there's a good chance
you'll be jumping into water infested with poop, according to a new study.
In 2022, 55 of 61 Texas beaches tested by environmental regulators were found to
be unsafe due to high levels of fecal contamination in the water on at least one
occasion, according to Safe for Swimming?, an annual report issued by
the Environment Texas Research and Policy Center.
Most of the contaminated beaches were located in the Corpus Christi and
Galveston areas, according to the analysis.
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To determine which beaches were awash with excrement, Environment Texas checked
how often fecal bacteria levels at various beaches exceeded the Environmental
Protection Agency’s “Beach Action Value,” associated with an estimated illness
rate of 32 out of 1,000 swimmers.
Researchers found that 90% of Texas beaches tested last year had the possibility
of making swimmers sick because of fecal contaminants.
“Even as Texans are back to enjoying the fresh sea breeze and splash of waves at
the beach, pollution is still plaguing too many of the places where we swim,”
Environment Texas Executive Director Luke Metzger said in a statement. “Now is
the time to fix our water infrastructure and stop the flow of pathogens to our
beaches.”
Coming in as the shittiest beach on Environment Texas' list is Cole Park, which
was unsafe 54% of the 50 days it was tested in 2022. Ropes Park slid out of
first place from last year’s report, taking the literal No. 2 slot. Its water
was deemed unsafe 41% of the days it was tested. Meanwhile, Poenisch Park took
the honor as the third-worst beach in Texas with its waters deemed unsafe 38% of
the time.
Texas isn’t an anomaly, though. Turns out 84% of the beaches tested on the Gulf
Coast had at least one unsafe swimming day due to fecal bacteria in 2022 — more
than any other region in the U.S.
So, are Texans just massive dumps in the water? Not exactly.
Those high contamination levels in ocean water are largely caused by polluted
runoff — think cow poop flowing into streams and rivers following heavy rain —
and by sewage overflows from aging waterworks. As of press time, both Houston
and Corpus Christi are under federal decrees to upgrade their sewer systems due
to thousands of clean water violations since 2016, according to the report.
Texans looking for a place to swim that isn’t equivalent to taking a dip in a
public toilet should look towards South Padre. Beaches there had far fewer dirty
water days on average than those around Corpus Christi and Galveston, the report
said.
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TAGS:
* Poop on Texas beaches,
* unsafe Texas beaches report,
* Corpus Christi,
* Galveston,
* South Padre Island,
* Texas coast news
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
MICHAEL KARLIS
Contact Us
Michael Karlis is a Staff Writer at the San Antonio Current. He is a graduate of
American University in Washington, D.C., whose work has been featured in Salon,
Alternet, Creative Loafing Tampa Bay, Orlando Weekly, NewsBreak, 420 Magazine
and Mexico Travel Today. He reports primarily on breaking news, politics...
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Texas News
TEXAS HOUSE AND SENATE REACH A DEAL ON HOW TO CUT PROPERTY TAXES
THE DEAL WOULD CHANNEL $12 BILLION TO REDUCE THE SCHOOL PROPERTY TAX RATE FOR
HOMEOWNERS AND BUSINESS PROPERTIES, INCREASE THE HOMESTEAD EXEMPTION, AND CREATE
A PILOT PROGRAM TO REDUCE TAXES ON CERTAIN RESIDENTIAL AND COMMERCIAL
PROPERTIES.
By Karen Brooks Harper and Joshua Fechter, The Texas Tribune on Mon, Jul 10,
2023 at 2:04 pm
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Texas Tribune / Eli Hartman
A roofing crew begins to shingle a home under construction in the Pavilion Park
development in north Midland on March 14, 2022.
After a monthslong standoff among Texas’ top Republicans, state GOP lawmakers
finally struck a deal Monday on how to cut Texans’ property taxes.
The $18 billion compromise between the Texas House and Senate — which includes
more than $5 billion approved for relief in 2019 — would give increased tax
relief for the state’s 5.7 million homeowners and create a tax-credit pilot
program for non-homesteaded properties. It would also cut taxes to small
businesses and send billions of dollars to school districts so they can cut
their tax rates across the board, according to details made public by state
leaders Monday.
The proposal must clear both chambers before it heads to Gov. Greg Abbott’s
desk. Abbott said he looks forward to approving it.
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“I promised during my campaign that the state would return to property taxpayers
at least half of the largest budget surplus we have ever had,” Abbott said in a
statement after Monday’s announcement. “Today’s agreement between the House and
the Senate is a step toward delivering on that promise. I look forward to this
legislation reaching my desk, so I can sign into law the largest property tax
cut in Texas history.”
Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said the last week of negotiations among himself, Texas
House Speaker Dade Phelan and members of both chambers “made the difference.”
“It has been a long road, but this is a great day for all property owners,”
Patrick said. “It may have taken overtime, but the process has produced a great
bill for homeowners and businesses.”
According to Phelan's office, the legislation, expected to be passed this week,
includes more than $12 billion to reduce the school property tax rate for
homeowners and business properties; an increase to the homestead exemption from
$40,000 to $100,000; and savings on the franchise tax for small businesses. It
would also include a so-called “circuit breaker” program for residential and
commercial properties valued at $5 million and under. The program would be
piloted for three years.
“Reducing property taxes, providing relief to small-business owners, and
reforming our appraisal system will ensure economic growth and prosperity, and
this agreement is a significant victory for all Texans,” Phelan said in a
statement.
The new property tax relief bill, a franchise tax relief bill and the
constitutional amendment required to enact the cuts were filed in the House on
Monday. Similar proposals were expected to be filed by the Senate later in the
day.
The deal marks the end of a stalemate among the state’s top Republicans that
lasted nearly seven months as they butted heads over how to dole out $12.3
billion in new tax breaks budgeted by lawmakers earlier this year.
Republicans came to Austin this year with a nearly $33 billion surplus and big
promises to use a big chunk of it to provide tax relief to Texas property
owners, who pay some of the highest property taxes in the nation. But for most
of the year, the heads of the House and Senate — Phelan and Patrick — couldn’t
come to terms on how to do it.
The main dividing line came over whether homeowners or business owners would get
a bigger tax break. Phelan and House lawmakers wanted to send the entire $12.3
billion to school districts to lower their tax rates, a kind of tax cut referred
to as “tax rate compression.” Doing that would result in across-the-board cuts
for all property owners, but it would most benefit business owners.
Abbott and conservative tax-cut warriors saw the proposal as a way to put the
state on a path to eventually eliminating the school maintenance and operations
tax, the bulk of the school property tax that pays for day-to-day school
expenses like teacher salaries. But as the weeks dragged on, Abbott’s support
for a compression-only tax-cut proposal seemed to wane as he encouraged House
and Senate leaders to come to a deal and send him a bill.
Patrick and Senate tax-cut writers agreed with the House on allocating $12.3
billion for property tax cuts but wanted to use only 70% of that amount for tax
rate compression so they could use the rest to pay for a boost to the state’s
school district homestead exemption, the amount of a home’s value that can’t be
taxed to pay for public schools. Patrick and state Sen. Paul Bettencourt, a
Houston Republican and Patrick’s lieutenant on the tax-cut issue, pushed for
raising the exemption from $40,000 to $100,000.
An earlier proposal sought by the House to put a tighter cap on how much taxable
property values can rise each year — also known as an appraisal cap — appears to
have been left out of the final deal. Instead, the new plan includes a pilot
tax-savings program known as a “circuit breaker,” which calculates how much a
person should pay in property taxes based on their income levels.
Those tax-credit programs provide targeted relief to certain residents, like
seniors, when their tax bills take up too much of their income. Details of the
plan that would be included in the Texas Legislature’s new proposal were not
immediately released Monday morning.
Circuit breaker programs “are not as simple [as appraisal caps] but they will
deliver benefits to the [low-income] people you are concerned about, without
also throwing tons of money at your wealthiest homeowners,” Richard Auxier,
senior policy associate at the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, told The Texas
Tribune earlier this year.
Texas doesn’t have an income tax or a statewide property tax, which would help
verify a person’s income and make such a program easier to administer. An idea
to implement a circuit breaker program died in the 1990s because it came with
enormous administrative costs in the absence of an income tax, according to
Every Texan, a progressive think tank in Austin.
Other states have a version of this type of program. Half of those are part of
the income tax or property tax systems, while others are treated as rebates,
according to an analysis by Every Texan. A successful program in Texas would
likely need to be a rebate-style program, the analysis says.
With previous House plans being criticized for being more beneficial to wealthy
homeowners and businesses than for lower-income Texans, the circuit-breaker
pilot appears to be the most novel addition to Monday’s deal.
For much of this year, Phelan and state Rep. Morgan Meyer, a Dallas Republican
and the House’s chief tax-cut writer, sought to tighten the state’s appraisal
cap and extend the benefit to business owners — a push that came in response to
complaints from residential and commercial property owners whose property values
dramatically increased in recent years amid the state’s red-hot housing market
and booming economy.
Housing and tax policy experts warned that such a proposal would have all kinds
of nasty side effects without ultimately cutting tax bills and was a non-starter
for Patrick and Senate Republicans.
While some circuit-breaker programs are targeted to renters or other specific
groups of taxpayers, it was unclear Monday morning how exactly the Texas plan
would work or who it would benefit most.
Absent from either chamber’s previous proposals was any targeted tax relief for
the state’s 3.7 million renter households. House Democrats last week unveiled
their own tax-cut package that would give tenants a cash refund equaling up to
10% of the rent they paid the previous year. But Republicans didn’t include
anything like that in the package released on Monday.
Republicans and some tax policy experts argue that renters will benefit from the
compression portion of the tax-cut package because landlords won’t pass as much
in property taxes onto their tenants — thus resulting in smaller rent increases.
But others say demand for the state’s red-hot rental market and a dearth of
supply to meet that demand, not property taxes, have driven rent increases in
recent years.
Correction, July 10, 2023 at 1:45 p.m.: An earlier version of this story
incorrectly stated that the $18 billion package for property tax cuts announced
Monday includes more than $5 billion approved for relief in 2021. The latter
amount was approved by the Texas Legislature in 2019.
This article originally appeared in the Texas Tribune.
The Texas Tribune is a member-supported, nonpartisan newsroom informing and
engaging Texans on state politics and policy. Learn more at texastribune.org.
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Texas News
WITH NEW FEDERAL FOOD STAMP LIMITS COMING, ADVOCATES MOBILIZE TO INFORM TEXAS
RECIPIENTS
A REQUIREMENT TO WORK 80 HOURS A MONTH, STARTING IN SEPTEMBER, COULD AFFECT
44,000 TEXANS OVER AGE 49. MEANWHILE, ATTENTION IN CONGRESS SHIFTS TO THE FARM
BILL’S SIGNIFICANT IMPACT ON FOOD STAMP POLICY.
By Matthew Choi, The Texas Tribune on Sun, Jul 9, 2023 at 9:16 am
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WASHINGTON — Tens of thousands of Texans are set to face new barriers to
accessing food stamps under this spring’s deal to raise the federal debt limit,
but fresh efforts are underway to help more Texans avoid hunger.
Food advocates and lawmakers are mobilizing to inform lower-income residents
about new rules that could cut their access to the Supplemental Nutrition
Assistance Program, commonly known as food stamps. Under legislation brokered
between Congress and the White House, starting this summer more middle-aged SNAP
participants will have to find jobs to continue with the program.
Democrats are also hoping to stave off efforts from the right to further
restrict access to the program as Congress tackles the farm bill, the massive
legislative package that includes a wide range of food and agricultural
priorities, from food security to trade protections to keep U.S. farmers
internationally competitive.
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Under the new work requirements, SNAP participants ages 51 and under without
dependents or disabilities will have to work at least 80 hours a month beginning
in early September to continue using food stamps. The age increases to 53 in
October and 55 in 2024.
SNAP already has federal work requirements — generally at least 80 hours a month
— for adults under 49 who don’t have disabilities or dependents to receive
full-time benefits. Although there are plenty of exceptions to the work
requirements, 44,000 Texans could see their SNAP access vanish if they don’t
work the required hours, according to the left-leaning Center on Budget and
Policy Priorities.
Democrats condemned the work requirement as unnecessary, ineffective and aimed
at undermining the SNAP program. Texans in that age range who can’t work or have
to work irregularly to take care of older relatives or disabled adult children
would not be exempt from the work requirements, and many will be blindsided by
the change, they say.
“Taking some 50- to 55-year-olds off SNAP is just wrong. And it’s nuts to me,
that that’s the price that Republicans wanted paid to get the debt ceiling
raised,” said U.S. Rep. Greg Casar, D-Austin. Casar is a labor activist who
voted against the debt ceiling agreement because of the work requirement, though
he acknowledged the economic need to raise the debt ceiling.
Despite the ire from the left, there’s slim political chance of rehashing the
work requirement. Republicans won’t entertain rescinding one of their long-term
policy priorities, and most Democrats have little interest in relitigating a
deal brokered by their president.
Groups that work with food-insecure Texans say the byzantine system for
food-assistance programs makes it difficult for participants to keep up with new
rules.
“There’s definitely people who are on SNAP right now who will be affected by
this, and they may not know that this is coming,” said Kathy Green, director of
state and federal strategy at AARP.
Green said AARP will likely work with food banks and other food-security groups
to make sure participants are aware of policy changes made hundreds of miles
away in Washington.
But regardless of outreach efforts, Katherine Byers, government relations
officer at the Houston Food Bank, said “of course” many participants will be
blindsided when the new work requirement takes effect and their benefits get
slashed.
Republicans argue that work requirements are necessary to ensure that SNAP
benefits don’t get abused and that participants can wean off the program and get
back on their feet. To Republicans, 54 is a perfectly workable age, and there
are ample exemptions in place to protect those who have legitimate reasons not
to work.
“An expanded work requirement for working-age, able-bodied adults is a
reasonable condition for receiving SNAP benefits,” said U.S. Rep. Monica De La
Cruz, R-McAllen, who sits on the Agriculture Committee, which oversees
food-assistance programs. “Getting South Texans back in the workforce is a win.”
As part of the debt ceiling deal, the work requirement does not apply to SNAP
participants who are experiencing homelessness. Military veterans could also be
exempt, as well as adults 24 and under who were in foster care on their 18th
birthday.
But Democrats and food-security advocates point out that the majority of SNAP
participants already work, and those who don’t may be exempt because they’re
caring for elderly or disabled family members. Almost 80% of SNAP-participating
households had at least one income earner before the pandemic, according to the
Census Bureau.
“Unpaid caregivers who are taking care of aging parents, maybe children with
extreme special needs that they have not been able to help them function in a
school environment, these folks can’t go to work,” Byers said. “Or if they are
working, they’re losing hours, they don’t have PTO. So if they take off enough
work for their illness or the person they’re caring for, they’re going to get
fired.”
The increased paperwork to report working hours could deter participants,
endangering their benefits, said Casar, who was dismayed that Republicans used
the debt ceiling negotiations to push work requirements — using the U.S.
economy’s health as leverage.
Congress generally issues major changes to SNAP in the farm bill, which is up
for renewal this year.
The farm bill usually passes with bipartisan support, and the House Agriculture
Committee’s Republican chair, Rep. Glenn Thompson of Pennsylvania, said he wants
to continue that tradition. Although Thompson supports work requirements, last
month he defended food stamps during a committee hearing as necessary to helping
the most vulnerable Americans bounce back from hard times.
But the nation is more politically divided than the last time Congress passed
the farm bill, in 2018, and more than 200 members of the House have never voted
on a farm bill. None of the four Texans on the Agriculture Committee — Casar; De
La Cruz; Republican Ronny Jackson, of Amarillo; and Democrat Jasmine Crockett,
of Dallas — were in Congress in 2018.
And with several far-right Republicans demonstrating a willingness to bring
Congress to a standstill to rein in federal spending, a multibillion-dollar
agriculture and social services package could be politically bitter for some
newer members. Programs normally covered by the farm bill are expected to cost
$725 billion over the next five years at current baseline spending, according to
the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service. The majority of that spending
would go toward the package’s nutrition title, particularly SNAP.
Unlike federal spending that is doled out on an annual basis, SNAP funding
depends on how many eligible participants have signed up. Cutting SNAP funding
would mean limiting new sign-ups or reducing the benefits each participant can
receive. The average Texas SNAP participant gets $265 per month — or just under
$9 per day.
Under Thompson, Republicans on the committee are hoping to improve the program’s
efficiency with new technology, encourage healthier eating habits by restricting
junk food purchases and target criminal organizations that steal SNAP benefits
from participants.
Casar agrees with the need to tackle criminal organizations scamming SNAP
participants and hopes to expand eligibility to workers while they are on
strike. Food advocates also want benefits to include hot, ready-made meals. They
oppose Republican efforts to limit eligible foods to promote healthier eating,
arguing that better access to low-cost, healthy food is a more effective way to
encourage nutritious diets.
“Just creating a list of things that folks can’t buy with SNAP is not going to
help them eat more nutritiously. Period,” Byers said.
But expanding benefits could be challenging as House Republicans use their
majority to demand more reductions in federal spending. The debt ceiling deal
capped future federal discretionary spending for the next fiscal year at current
levels, and House Appropriations Chair Kay Granger, R-Fort Worth, said she’d try
to drop spending down to fiscal year 2022 levels.
“A cost-neutral bill will mean that any new spending has to come from cutting
other parts of the farm bill, and I think lawmakers on both sides of the aisle
are really resisting the idea of cuts to farm bill funding,” said Celia Cole,
CEO of Feeding Texas.
Congress has until the end of September to renew the farm bill before funding
begins to peter out.
This article originally appeared in the Texas Tribune.
The Texas Tribune is a member-supported, nonpartisan newsroom informing and
engaging Texans on state politics and policy. Learn more at texastribune.org.
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TEXAS BANS HOMEOWNERS’ ASSOCIATIONS FROM DISCRIMINATING AGAINST RENTERS WHO
RECEIVE FEDERAL HOUSING AID
STATE LAWMAKERS PASSED THE LAW AFTER A NORTH TEXAS HOMEOWNERS’ ASSOCIATION
BARRED LANDLORDS FROM RENTING TO SECTION 8 TENANTS. MOST OF THE AFFECTED TENANTS
IN THAT NEIGHBORHOOD WERE BLACK.
By Joshua Fechter, The Texas Tribune on Sat, Jul 8, 2023 at 9:08 am
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Texas Tribune / Emil Lippe
Clouds roll through the sky over the Providence Creek Village neighborhood in
Providence Village on June 30, 2022.
In a rare, friendly move to low-income renters, Texas lawmakers this year
outlawed a form of discrimination that allowed homeowners associations to ban
some tenants from their neighborhoods.
The move — spearheaded by state Rep. Chris Turner, a Grand Prairie Democrat —
was aimed squarely at a North Texas neighborhood that tried to oust poorer
tenants who get assistance from the federal housing choice voucher program and
keep new ones from taking their place. The voucher program, known as Section 8,
pays a portion of a low-income household’s rent.
The Providence Homeowners Association enacted a rule last summer that barred
landlords from renting to Section 8 tenants, which would have left the entire
town of Providence Village — a town of about 7,700 people about an hour’s drive
north of Dallas — off-limits to those renters. Critics saw the rule as blatant
racial discrimination given that the overwhelming majority of the neighborhood’s
Section 8 renter households were Black.
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That proved too hostile to low-income tenants even for the Republican-dominated
Texas Legislature. Texas is one of the few states that explicitly allows
landlords to reject renters if they receive housing vouchers. Just this year,
lawmakers barred cities from creating local ordinances that protect tenants
facing eviction.
But barring Section 8 tenants from entire neighborhoods crossed a line for a lot
of Republicans in the state Capitol. Democrats and enough Republicans in the
Texas House joined forces during the regular legislative session to approve
Turner’s bill outlawing the practice, and the bill cleared the Senate with all
but six Republican votes. It helped, Turner said, that the bill had backing from
groups like Texas Realtors and the Texas Apartment Association as well as
housing advocates and groups representing neighborhood associations.
Come Sept. 1, the practice will be illegal.
“Just the facts of what inspired this legislation are so egregious that it
really spoke to the need for legislation to end this type of overt
discrimination,” Turner said. “I think that it's very clear what the
discriminatory effect is of a policy like this.”
The Providence HOA board enacted the policy last June as the neighborhood blamed
Section 8 tenants for a perceived uptick in local criminal activity. Tempers had
flared on social media and even led to at least one physical confrontation
between neighbors.
Two months later, the HOA agreed to pause the policy as the U.S. Department of
Housing and Urban Development launched an investigation into whether the HOA had
violated the federal Fair Housing Act, which explicitly prohibits discrimination
based on race. That investigation is ongoing.
The HOA policy threatened to displace more than 170 families from the
majority-white enclave. Of those households, more than three-quarters were Black
— and most households were headed by women.
Turner’s bill “sends a very strong message to the homeowners association that
they’re not allowed to do this,” said Laura Beshara, a civil rights lawyer
representing some of the Providence tenants.
Facing a hostile environment and uncertainty over whether they could ultimately
stay in the neighborhood, dozens of families moved out. Of the 171 voucher
households that lived in Providence at the time of the ban, less than 100
remain, according to figures provided by the Dallas and Denton housing
authorities.
The Texas Tribune found that two other North Texas HOAs had policies banning
Section 8 tenants.
Voucher holders continued to move to Providence after the ban was paused. Thirty
families moved into the neighborhood during the past year, according to the
Dallas housing authority.
In a statement Friday, the Providence HOA board said they would comply with the
law. The board recently adopted rental and leasing rules that do not include the
Section 8 ban.
“We will continue to fight for our homeowners every day because every resident
deserves security and comfort in their home and community,” the board said.
Finding affordable housing has become increasingly difficult for low-income
families in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex as Texas’ economy booms and more
people move to the region, driving up housing demand and rent prices.
Dallas alone faces a shortfall of 33,660 rental units that are affordable for
households making 50% of the area median income or less, according to a recent
report by the Dallas nonprofit Child Poverty Action Lab. That shortage is
expected to grow to 83,500 by the end of the decade, the report found.
Even if a low-income family gets a housing choice voucher, Texas landlords don’t
have to rent to them — and are less likely to now given the demand for the
state’s rental housing, housing advocates say.
A 2020 report by Inclusive Communities Project found that out of 1,413 rental
properties surveyed in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, only 226 accepted vouchers —
mostly in areas that are poor and Black. The organization dubbed 18 suburbs,
nearly all majority-white, “voucher no-go zones” — places where no landlord
surveyed would rent to voucher holders.
That makes it difficult for low-income families to move to areas with better job
opportunities and better schools, said Ann Lott, Inclusive Communities Project’s
executive director. That HOAs can no longer ban Section 8 households in Texas is
a win, she said.
“When you see occupancy rates as high as it is and the market is as hard as it
is, it becomes increasingly difficult to find landlords who will take Section
8,” Lott said. “This is a big victory for us.”
Disclosure: Texas Apartment Association has been a financial supporter of The
Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part
by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial
supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of
them here.
This article originally appeared in the Texas Tribune.
The Texas Tribune is a member-supported, nonpartisan newsroom informing and
engaging Texans on state politics and policy. Learn more at texastribune.org.
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Texas News
GUNMAN IN 2019 EL PASO MASS SHOOTING RECEIVES 90 LIFE SENTENCES
PATRICK CRUSIUS PLEADED GUILTY AND WAS SENTENCED FRIDAY IN FEDERAL COURT. HE
STILL FACES STATE CHARGES, AND THE LOCAL DISTRICT ATTORNEY SAYS HE INTENDS TO
SEEK THE DEATH PENALTY.
By Uriel J. García, The Texas Tribune on Fri, Jul 7, 2023 at 2:10 pm
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click to enlarge
Texas Tribune / Joel Angel Juarez
A memorial at Ponder Park in El Paso honors the victims of the 2019 Walmart
shooting. On Friday, the shooter received 90 life sentences in an El Paso
federal court.
EL PASO — The 24-year-old gunman who killed 23 people and injured 22 others in
August 2019 at a Walmart in his attempt “to shoot as many Mexicans as possible”
was sentenced in federal court to 90 consecutive life sentences Friday for his
hate crimes. Patrick Crusius of Allen will die in prison.
Crusius sat quietly next to his lawyer, Joe Spencer. He had his arms crossed and
didn’t make a statement after the judge asked if he had anything to say.
Spencer told the audience that since the gunman was a child he struggled with
his mental health. He was eventually diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder,
Spencer said. His symptoms include trouble processing feelings and hearing
voices in his head. And since childhood he has felt a presence that is not
there, Spencer said.
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“Mental illness doesn’t always mean they’re going to hurt themselves or others,”
Spencer said. “But some mental illnesses can be debilitating.”
As the gunman grew up, he had violent thoughts about hurting other people,
including his therapist and family members, Spencer said. When his mother found
out he had purchased a firearm, she contacted the police asking officers to
confiscate it because she worried he would harm himself, Spencer said, but
police refused because he was an adult and had purchased the gun legally.
Before he committed the shooting, Crusius researched online whether he could
enter a mental institution without health insurance, Spencer added.
On Aug. 2, 2019, Spencer said, his client couldn’t control his violent thoughts
anymore and drove to El Paso.
“He lost all contact with reality,” Spencer said. “Patrick acted with his broken
brain cemented in delusions.”
Ian Martinez Hanna, the federal prosecutor, said that the gunman’s mental health
problems were no excuse. Hanna said the gunman had every opportunity to stop
himself.
Even with his mental illness, “there’s no indication that he lacked the
capability that he understood what he was doing,” Hanna said.
“Let’s not make any mistake about it, he’s dangerous,” Hanna said. “In his
mission to sell hate and to divide, he failed.”
A federal indictment issued on July 9, 2020, charged the gunman with 90 counts,
including a hate crime resulting in death, a hate crime involving an attempt to
kill and the use of a firearm to commit murder. Crusius has been in custody
since the Aug. 3, 2019, shooting and pleaded guilty earlier this year.
He drove more than 600 miles from his home in Allen, north of Dallas, to El Paso
and began shooting people in the parking lot of a Walmart that was busy with
back-to-school shoppers. Then he entered the store and continuing his rampage.
The 23 victims who died and 22 others he wounded were mostly Mexican Americans
and Mexican citizens from El Paso and Ciudad Juárez. One of the victims was a
66-year-old German man, Alexander Gerhard Hoffmann, who moved to Mexico in the
1980s, married a woman from Juárez and settled there.
The victims ranged in age from 15 to 90 years old. It is common for residents of
both cities to travel daily back and forth for work, school, visiting family and
shopping.
According to the indictment, the gunman uploaded a document to the internet
explaining his motive: “This attack is a response to the Hispanic invasion of
Texas. They are the instigators, not me. I am simply defending my country from
cultural and ethnic replacement brought on by the invasion.”
Before and after the mass shooting in El Paso, some Texas politicians have
described the growing number of migrants arriving at the Texas-Mexico border —
many of them asylum-seekers fleeing violence and harsh poverty in Central and
South America — as an “invasion.” The “ethnic replacement” the gunman wrote
about comes from a debunked conspiracy theory that people of color and
immigrants are looking to replace white Americans.
The gunman still faces state charges. El Paso District Attorney Bill Hicks said
Thursday that he plans to seek the death penalty after a trial expected to
happen in 2024 or 2025.
On Wednesday and Thursday, the gunman heard from more than 30 relatives of the
people he killed. Some relatives asked prosecutors to read their statements in
court. Some of them referred to the shooter as an “evil parasite” and a
“monster.” Some wished him to rot in his prison cell.
On Thursday, Harry Dean Reckard, whose 63-year-old mother was killed in the
shooting, spent part of his birthday in court confronting his mother’s killer.
The gunman had his head down when Reckard told him, “Look at me, man. You’re
young and pathetic.”
Crusius shrugged when Reckard noted that he has smiled and rolled his eyes as
family members gave their statements.
“Do you sleep good at night?” Reckard asked him.
The gunman shook his head.
Reckard asked the gunman if he was a white supremacist. Again he shook his head
no.
“Are you sorry for what you did?” Reckard asked him.
The gunman nodded yes.
Margaret Juarez, who lost her 90-year-old father, Luis Juarez, in the shooting —
her mother, Martha Juarez, was wounded — berated him for his beliefs about
immigrants on Thursday and gave him a quick history lesson.
“Native Americans and Mexicans were already here before your American settler
homies rolled in,” she told him. “Think about that when you say you’re defending
your country.”
Disclosure: Walmart Stores Inc. has been a financial supporter of The Texas
Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by
donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters
play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete list of them here.
This article originally appeared in the Texas Tribune.
The Texas Tribune is a member-supported, nonpartisan newsroom informing and
engaging Texans on state politics and policy. Learn more at texastribune.org.
Subscribe to SA Current newsletters.
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| Twitter
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AS TEXAS LAWMAKERS TUSSLE OVER PROPERTY TAX RELIEF, IT’S UNCLEAR WHETHER RENTERS
WILL BENEFIT
TEXAS’ TOP REPUBLICANS ARE FIGHTING OVER HOW TO SPLIT PROPERTY TAX CUTS BETWEEN
BUSINESSES AND HOMEOWNERS. DEMOCRATS WANT RENTERS TO SEE RELIEF, TOO.
By Joshua Fechter, The Texas Tribune on Thu, Jul 6, 2023 at 12:02 pm
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Wikimedia
Property taxes make up about 20% of every rent dollar paid by Texas tenants,
according to figures provided by the Texas Apartment Association.
As a deal to cut Texas’ high property taxes continues to evade
Republicanlawmakers, Democrats in the Legislature unveiled a long-shot tax-cut
proposal Thursday that targets relief to a group of taxpayers who have been
largely left out of the debate: renters.
Tenants make up more than one-third of the state’s households. They pay, via
their monthly rent, one-quarter of the state’s school property taxes — which are
among the highest in the nation. Renters’ cost of living surged during the
COVID-19 pandemic as the state’s housing boom drove rents sky-high. But this
year, GOP lawmakers have all but ignored renters as they tussle over whether
homeowners or businesses should get a bigger break on their property taxes.
Democrats sought to change that Thursday by making tax relief for renters a
pillar of a four-pronged tax-cut package. Under the proposal, renters would get
a cash refund equalling up to 10% of the rent they paid the previous year.
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“ You can’t talk about property tax reductions without talking about every
Texan, not only homeowners, but also 3.8 million householders who rent their
homes,” said state Rep. John Bryant, a Dallas Democrat who helped craft the
package.
Under the proposals, landlords would submit documents to the state comptroller’s
office showing how much tenants paid in rent. The comptroller’s office would
then calculate the cash rebate, Bryant said. It wasn’t immediately clear how
long the program would last, but spending in the Democratic proposal is capped
at $3.8 billion.
Texas doesn’t give an explicit tax break to renters as several other states do —
and none of the GOP proposals for property tax relief include anything that
unquestionably benefits renters. Renters don’t own their own homes, so they
can’t claim homestead exemptions, the chunk of a home’s value that can’t be
taxed to pay for public schools. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and Senate Republicans
want to raise the state’s homestead exemption on school district taxes from
$40,000 to $100,000.
Some Republicans and tax policy experts have occasionally argued that renters
would see relief from rising rent bills if lawmakers send a certain amount of
money to school districts so they can lower their tax rates, a break legislators
call “tax rate compression.”
The chunk of $12.3 billion in property tax cuts that should be spent on
compression has been a sore spot and key dividing line between the state’s top
Republicans. House Speaker Dade Phelan wants to use all $12.3 billion on
compression while Patrick wants to use a little more than two-thirds on
compression and the rest on raising the homestead exemption.
Renters aren’t the only taxpayers who would see relief under House Democrats’
tax-cut package. Homeowners would see their homestead exemption climb to
$100,000 or 25% of their home’s appraised value — whichever is higher, though it
would be capped at $200,000. Democrats would set aside money to cut school
property tax rates, though not as much as Republicans in either chamber.
The tax-cut proposal put forth by Democrats also would boost the state’s basic
allotment — the base amount the state gives schools per student, which currently
sits at $6,160 and hasn’t changed since 2019 — by $1,000. That would translate
to a “permanent” $4,300 pay bump for teachers, Bryant said.
It’s difficult to measure how much renters would benefit from compression.
Property taxes make up about 20% of every rent dollar paid by Texas tenants,
according to figures provided by the Texas Apartment Association — though that
percentage can be higher in the state’s urban areas. If a landlord’s property
taxes don’t climb as quickly as a result of tax cuts, the thinking goes, their
tenants’ rents won’t rise as fast either. That effect will spread to the rest of
the market as landlords compete for renters, experts said.
“It wouldn’t necessarily happen immediately, but I think it would happen pretty
quickly,” said Adam Langley, associate director of tax policy at the Lincoln
Institute of Land Policy, a Massachusetts-based think tank.
But tax policy experts agree that it’s unlikely tenants would see their rents
fall as a result of tax cuts. And what a tenant would have paid in rent had it
not been for tax cuts is difficult, if not impossible, to prove, policy experts
acknowledge.
Tax cuts don’t necessarily guarantee that rents won’t climb as quickly, either.
Although property taxes make up the largest chunk of landlords’ overhead, other
costs to run a rental property — like property insurance, labor and maintenance
— also get passed along to renters, and those expenses can fluctuate and
contribute to higher rent bills.
“Property taxes are currently the single largest expense for rental housing
owners in Texas, and we welcome all efforts to address those rising costs,” said
Chris Newton, the Texas Apartment Association’s executive vice president. “It
will come as no surprise that other expenses that contribute to market rents,
such as insurance, building materials, equipment and labor, are also increasing
and have risen sharply over the past several years. Like property taxes, these
increasing expenses impact market rents.”
Ultimately, landlords charge rents based on what the market will allow —
regardless of how big of a tax cut they get.
“It really all comes down to supply and demand in each local market,” said Lynn
Krebs, a research economist at the Texas Real Estate Research Center at Texas
A&M University. “If the market is tight and there’s still not enough housing, as
is the case in many markets, it’s probably not going to matter.”
Higher property taxes can drive up rents in some instances. The estimated tax
bill for a South Dallas fourplex owned by landlord Nathaniel Barrett climbed by
more than a third this year, Barrett said — from about $7,500 last year to a
little more than $10,000. Barrett said he had to pass along that increase to his
tenants, who will pay $50 more a month than they did previously. But in most
instances, Barrett said, the market, not property taxes, drives rental costs.
If lawmakers want to provide meaningful tax relief to homeowners and renters
alike, they should loosen local restrictions that some housing advocates say get
in the way of building new housing, Barrett said — which would spread the
property tax burden among a greater number of households. Such measures died a
quiet death in the Legislature this year.
“We should be seeking to lower the value of property by making it easier to
build things,” Barrett said. “That is where that relief should come from.”
Asking rents in Texas’ major metro areas — including majority-renter cities like
Austin, Dallas and Houston — are well above where they were before the COVID-19
pandemic — anywhere from 19% higher in the Houston area to 37% higher in the
Austin region, according to Zillow rent data.
Renters aren’t as financially well-off as homeowners as a result. Across the
state’s major urban areas, about half of all renters — who are more likely to be
people of color and have lower incomes — are now considered “cost-burdened,”
meaning that they spend at least 30% of their income on keeping a roof over
their heads, according to the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard
University. By comparison, about one-fourth of homeowners in the state’s largest
metro areas are under similar financial strain.
Compression is not enough to provide substantial financial relief to the state’s
ailing renters, housing advocates argue.
“It’s not good enough,” said Ben Martin, research director for Texas Housers, a
housing advocacy group for low-income Texans. “Renters are in crisis. Where
rents are right now is too high for a lot of renters in the state of Texas. And
so saying that your rents are gonna go up not quite as much is not helpful. It’s
not meeting the crisis where it is.”
Bryant was skeptical that renters would see any benefit from tax rate
compression.
“It would provide a lot of help for the landlords, but they’re not going to pass
any savings along to renters,” Bryant said Thursday.
Other states have ways of giving direct property tax relief to renters.
Seventeen states and the District of Columbia have “circuit breaker” tax-cut
programs that give renters a credit or rebate when rents exceed a certain
percentage of their income, according to the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy.
Those programs, often tailored to seniors and low-income renters, assume that
property taxes make up a certain chunk of the rent bill and use that to
determine a refund to renters.
How Texas might implement such a program targeted at renters is unclear. Texas
doesn’t have an income tax, which many states use to determine whether renters
qualify for rebates and to distribute those refunds. But other states dole out
the money without using an income tax system.
It’s also unclear what appetite Republican lawmakers have for providing direct
renter relief, but Bryant said he thinks some Republicans would vote for it.
Nonetheless, House Democrats see urgency to find a way to bring some tax relief
to renters.
“We cannot ignore the fact that renters have been left out of this conversation
from the very beginning,” said state Rep. Christina Morales, a Houston Democrat.
“Renters deserve to receive their fair share of tax relief.”
Disclosure: Texas A&M University, the Texas Apartment Association and the Texas
comptroller of public accounts have been financial supporters of The Texas
Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by
donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters
play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete list of them here.
This article originally appeared in the Texas Tribune.
The Texas Tribune is a member-supported, nonpartisan newsroom informing and
engaging Texans on state politics and policy. Learn more at texastribune.org.
Subscribe to SA Current newsletters.
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Family of San Antonio woman shot by police during mental-health episode sues
city
By Michael Karlis
Jul 10, 2023
DWI arrests in San Antonio up nearly 20% since 2020
By Michael Karlis
Jul 10, 2023
State Sen. Roland Gutierrez of San Antonio enters Democratic primary to defeat
Ted Cruz
By Sanford Nowlin
Jul 10, 2023
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