Big Jolly Politics

politics in Harris County and Texas

Mayor Turner’s Hurricane Harvey Tax Increase

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Mayor Turner wants to raise your property taxes by 15.3{997ab4c1e65fa660c64e6dfea23d436a73c89d6254ad3ae72f887cf583448986} to pay for storm related debris removal. The Federal government has agreed to reimburse the City of Houston for debris removal.

This new Hurricane Harvey tax will be on the value of your home pre-flood. The Mayor is moving to institute the tax before your homes are revalued in January. Do not believe Channel 13 who rarely if ever gets anything right and is stating it is a 9{997ab4c1e65fa660c64e6dfea23d436a73c89d6254ad3ae72f887cf583448986} tax increase, pure fiction. The increase is 8.5 cents, which represents an increase of 15.3{997ab4c1e65fa660c64e6dfea23d436a73c89d6254ad3ae72f887cf583448986} on your property taxes.

There are three public hearings necessary to enact the tax. Here are the dates and times on the hearings;

September 26th, at 6:00pm October 3rd, at 6:00pm and October 11th at 9:00am.

All will be held at City Hall

I will be writing more on this shortly. Please mark your calendars and if your home flooded please come tell the Mayor and the Council how you feel about money grabs. You may want to ask the Mayor what happened to the 900 million dollars collected for the “Rain Tax”.

This was on my mind.

Houston City Council to Meet in the GRB

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The regularly scheduled Wednesday 9:00 a.m. Houston City Council meeting will be held in the George R. Brown Convention Center. Today, I drove past city hall and city workers appear to be pumping water out of the building. I can only imagine what the basement, parking garage, and ground floor look like post Harvey. I will attend tomorrow morning’s meeting at the GRB with several friends.

Houston has suffered a horrible blow. I am heartbroken as I look at the city where I was born and raised. I started the day delivering supplies to the GRB and helped secure food for some in the law enforcement community working really long hours. Many officers are staying in downtown hotels because they could not make it home to their families. Please hold Sergeant Perez’s family in your thoughts and prayers. He died as he attempted to report for duty while traveling from his home.

Big Jolly has written at length on the flooding issues over the years. This includes Stephen Costello’s rain tax, which has been much discussed here on this blog. I never supported this tax and often criticized the campaign as disingenuous and misleading.  The courts have agreed with me and have ruled the language misleading.

We have had lots of floods since the rain tax was implemented. Memorial Day, Tax Day, and now Harvey. The good folks of Meyerland have suffered greatly. They are not alone. There has never been an accounting of the hundreds of millions of dollars collected by Costello and Annise Parker’s rain tax and I intend to get one. We have asked many times with no answers.

Remember this guy . . .

Costello, rain tax author, is now Sylvester Turner’s spokesperson and expert on flooding issues in the city. Sylvester may want to rethink this appointment.

Further reading on flooding

Renew Houston-Prop1, and the Politics of Flooding

Downtown Houston Pachyderm Rebuild Houston guest tries to sell ice to Eskimos

Stephen Costello, the Flood Czar

Catherine Engelbrecht, the Downtown Pachyderm

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In the beginning of a change the patriot is a scarce man, and brave, and hated and scorned. When his cause succeeds, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a patriot.

Mark Twain

Catherine Engelbrecht visited the Downtown Pachyderm last week to give the hometown crowd an update on what was going on in her world. Let me just start by saying that Catherine looked and sounded great. I say this because her trials and tribulations have been well documented. Catherine’s story is important and I wanted to share her update with Big Jolly Politics readers.

Catherine spoke about the humble beginnings of True the Vote and the King Street Patriots. True the Vote was formed to ensure election integrity and filed for 501(c)(3) status in July 2010. True the Vote began as one of many projects for the King Street Patriots. King Street Patriots was created as an umbrella organization to support and defend American exceptionalism, constitutional governance, and civic duty and filed for 501(c)(4) status in July 2010.

King Street’s original location, in the parking lot of the old Northwest Mall, was always full of like-minded folks who wanted nothing more than functioning, effective, honest, and limited government. If you were running for office in 2010 and did not show up here, you likely lost in Harris County. It was the place to be. This was the hallmark of the Tea Party movement that swept over Houston and the United States.

The Tea Party movement is still very misunderstood. The progressive left always mischaracterized the movement for political purposes. Today, the movement is alive and well and Donald Trump certainly tapped into the movement’s core message. Many Tea Party leaders have become targets of the political establishment, democrats, and the progressive left. Catherine certainly was one of their biggest targets.

It is a horror story how Catherine, her family, her business, King Street Patriots, and True the Vote was attacked by the IRS, ATF, OSHA, and the FBI. Do not think for a second that democrats do not weaponize all federal agencies to use against their opponents because they do. The power of the federal government is massive and, when used for unlawful purposes, can be devastating. It helps if you have money and skill to fight back.  There are so many federal laws, rules, and regulations, that any one of us can become a target (e.g., Dinesh D’Souza).

The Obama administration used every branch of the government to attack its enemies and Catherine is the prime example. Catherine has withstood a full on assault by the federal government: her family’s business was raided by the FBI and ATF; her taxes were audited repeatedly; OSHA compliance officers were inspecting every aspect of her family’s machine shop; and the list of King Street Patriot attendees were demanded by IRS officials. Catherine never wanted to believe that any of these federal agencies could be used in such a way and thought this was coincidental at first. Now she knows better. The government’s request for membership lists and social media contacts taught her otherwise.

The litigation has been relentless and expensive. Catherine is in court to this day with the IRS. It is always a David and Goliath story with this type of litigation. Catherine has sought the records of the government agencies colluding against her. Transparency is something government agencies always fight against and there is a lot to hide.

The integrity of our electoral process was the focus of True the Vote long before it was fashionable. The narrative pushed by the democrats is that the Russians stole our elections, but any Bernie Sanders supporter can explain in great detail how democrats steal elections. The 2016 democratic primary between Hillary and Bernie was the definition of election fraud.

It was great to see an old friend fighting the good fight. I have been worried because I have seen bits and pieces of her fight and know there have been ups and downs for her in the process. Catherine is a strong person and I would take her to any fight. Catherine can use your support and here is a link if you would like to help with her expenses. I am going to send her some money and encourage you to do the same. Any amount will help! Litigating with the Federal Government is costly. Catherine spoke about Senator Cornyn and his support and help with the IRS. Thank you Senator Cornyn for helping my friend!

Catherine is an honest woman who has been treated badly, very badly, by our government. Her fight is our fight and for all those patriots who seek to fill the gap against tyranny. Catherine honors all freedom loving patriots through her deeds and action. I wanted her to know that her suffering is not unrecognized by her friends and neighbors in Houston and what she went through strengthened all of our resolve to win the day for justice, righteousness, and freedom.

Texas HD23 primary is one to watch for activist Republicans

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hd23 Wayne faircloth Mayes Middleton
Rep. Wayne Faircloth and Mayes Middleton

Primary challenges aren’t all that unusual in the Texas Republican Party but most of the time it is some fringe candidate with no chance of winning going up against an ‘establishment’ guy. In the race for Texas HD23, we do see an ‘establishment’ type in the form of Rep. Wayne Faircloth, who was first elected in 2014. But this time he has a very, very serious challenger by the name of Mayes Middleton. I suspect that Rep. Faircloth is in deep trouble.

Why? Because Faircloth has no grassroots or activist support. Truth is, he never has but he didn’t have a serious challenger in the 2014 primary and he was viewed as the best chance to take that seat from the Democrats after Craig Eiland retired. And it worked to everyone’s benefit as Galveston County was changing from blue to red. He hasn’t been a disaster for the party but neither has he been a leader. You can look at his committee assignments, bills authored and press statements to understand this.

You can also look at his campaign finance reports, which I did.

Faircloth Cont Exp COH Loans Median Number Cont
15-Jan-17 $153,698 $44,185 $183,670 $30,000 $500 95
15-Jul-17 $10,875 $43,241 $155,786 $30,000 $250 13

I included the January report to give a better representation of his fundraising ability and number of contributors. If you look at it casually, it looks like his fundraising is okay, not stellar but I’ve seen much worse. The problem comes when you look deeper. Here is what his report from January looks like if you break it down into something most of us can understand.

15-Jan-17 Contributions Median Number of Cont
In-Kind $77,173 $2,000 17
Entities $66,000 $500 57
Individuals $10,525 $250 21

So in reality, more than half of his reported contributions were In-Kind, mostly from large PAC’s including him in their mailers for the November 2016 election. That’s nice and helpful but it doesn’t allow you to direct your campaign. Plus, most of those organizations won’t be as big of players in a primary challenge.

As for the Entities, those are also PAC’s but they gave directly to his campaign. Again, those types of organizations usually aren’t in play in a primary because they need to mitigate their risk if their chosen candidate loses.

The most telling are the 21 Individual donations. Sure, he had some big name support (James Dannenbaum, Charles Butt, Tilman Fertitta) and it is possible that they could write much larger checks if they need to. The problem is that he had one, count ’em one, contribution under a $100. That’s a problem in a primary, where enthusiastic support is needed versus a general where it is more about a voter’s party choice.

Okay, enough about Rep. Faircloth. What about his challenger? Well, let’s take a look.

Middleton Cont Exp COH Loans Median Number Cont
15-Jul-17 $59,809 $36,790 $480,019 $485,000 $10 250

Obviously the first thing anyone is going to notice is that $485,000 loan. I don’t care who you are, that’s a lot of money. The second thing that the more observant are going to notice is that the numbers don’t balance. I mean, if you loan yourself $485k, raise $60k, spend $37k, you should have more than $480k on hand. Why? Beats me. I see this all the time and have never tried to figure out why. Perhaps you can.

More important for our purposes is the rest of the report. Recall from Rep. Faircloth’s report that 93{997ab4c1e65fa660c64e6dfea23d436a73c89d6254ad3ae72f887cf583448986} of his contributions were from Entities, not Individuals. Mr. Middleton, on the other hand, had one contribution from an Entity, that being Hoover Slovacek LLP for $500. Interestingly, that is the firm of the Harris County Republican Party Finance Chair Joe Slovacek.

Not that Mr. Middleton didn’t score a few big donors, he certainly did. Perennial large Republican donors Holly Frost, Windi Grimes and Wilkes Farris made large contributions. But they aren’t the story this time. The story is the number of smaller contributors and who they are. I’m not going to name them all but everyone knows Galveston County Tax Assessor Collector Cheryl Johnson. And then you have the Senate District Director for SD11 Scott Bowen. Further down the list you have the Texas SREC rep from SD11 Tanya Robertson. The activists in the district seem to have chosen a side.

And instead of one contribution under $100, Mr. Middleton has 179 individual contributors at $50 or less. Make fun of small donors all you want but if you give a guy $5 and you live in his district, you are going to vote for him.

Mr. Middleton also has the enthusiastic backing of the Empower Texans mail list, an important force in Republican primaries. Like I said earlier, I suspect that Rep. Faircloth is in trouble.

Now, to keep it light and simply because I find the society pages fun reading, here is a recap of Mr. Middleton’s wedding:

New Year’s Eve merger

Following their marriage in a small chapel on the Middleton family ranch in Liberty, Macy Shaver and Mayes Middleton led the parade to Tony’s for a no-holds-barred celebration that continued from one decade into the next. The champagne flowed into the wee morning hours as guests, numbering more than 250, danced to a 15-piece band, the restaurant large enough to accommodate all.

Guests grazed through a variety of food stations that included everything delicious under the sun from lobster and stone crabs to a Viennoise table laden with 20 different desserts. No typical wedding cake for this creative couple. The center of culinary attention was a colossal ice cream bombe 6-feet-tall.

 

 

Will the Houston-Galveston Area Ever Get the Protection of the Ike Dike?

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Without the Ike Dike, a direct hit in the Houston-Galveston area by a category 3 hurricane will result in a catastrophic loss of lives and property

ike dike

Hurricane Ike, which struck the Texas Gulf Coast just east of Galveston in September 2008, was the third most destructive hurricane to strike the United States. Ike left an estimated $24 billion of property damage, 82 deaths and 202 missing in its wake. Had the storm not taken a last minute turn to the north from its northwest track, it would have made a direct hit on Galveston and Houston and the storm surge would have been far more catastrophic to property and lives.

In the wake of Hurricane Ike, Texas A&M University at Galveston oceanographer William Merrell devised a plan that would protect homes and lives in the Houston-Galveston area from deadly hurricane storm surges. His plan was dubbed the “Ike Dike”.

Professor Merrell proposed an extension of the seawall all the way to the western end of Galveston Island and for a new sea wall on the Bolivar Peninsula east of Galveston Bay.  In order to protect Houston and other cities along Galveston Bay, Merrell proposed the construction of huge floodgates at the entrance to the bay, like those used in the Netherlands. He also called for smaller gates at San Louis Pass and the Intracoastal Waterway, both of which are west of Galveston Island.

Sounds like a solid plan, one that would protect several hundred thousand homes and people from those deadly and destructive storm surges.  But the Ike Dike was met with immediate opposition from environmentalists.

The econuts warned that the floodgates would interfere with the migration of sea life.  What a crock!  Those gates would only be closed upon the approach of a hurricane.  They would be open at all other times, thus allowing that precious sea life to migrate into the polluted waters of the Houston ship channel.  The econuts also opposed extension of the sea wall.  Instead, they proposed building up the sand dunes as a natural barrier against any storm surge.  Yeah right, that’ll work.

The environmentalists also say that developers are to blame for building homes and businesses within the storm surge areas.  Of course they are right.  But that’s no consolation for the people now living in the hundreds of thousands homes that are now sitting where they should never have been built.

The next opposition came from the bean counters.  They said that the estimated $5 billion it would cost to build the Ike Dike was unattainable.  Never mind that Hurricane Ike did $24 billion of property damage even though it came ashore in a far less populated area than Houston and Galveston.  $5 billion is too much?  Never mind that the feds spent $14.5 billion just within the city of on New Orleans to protect its citizens from the ravages of storm surge-induced flooding.

What did New Orleans have that Houston and Galveston did not have?  After Hurricane Ike we did not have the pictures New Orleans had showing heart-wrenching images of 16,000 poor souls trapped in the Super Dome under unimaginable inhumane conditions.

$5 billion is too much?  Along came the educated idiots at Rice University’s Baker Institute to throw a wrench into the Ike Dike plan.  They had the solution to the high cost of the proposed Ike Dike.  They recommended scrapping Merrell’s floodgates and sea wall extension in favor of one floodgate across the Houston ship channel.  That would protect Houston’s multibillion dollar petro-chemical complex.   But what about the homes and businesses siting in the path of a hurricane storm surge?

I am not an engineer or hydrologist.  Common sense tells me that the water from the storm surge won’t just stop once it reaches the ship channel floodgate.  It has to go somewhere.  It probably cannot recede.  Most likely the water will spread east and west, thereby flooding thousands of homes that might otherwise have been spared.

There has been a concerted effort in support of the Ike Dike on the part of public officials and prominent citizens from the cities within the Houston-Galveston area.  But here it is nine years after Hurricane Ike and no Ike Dike is in sight.  And by now the cost has probably tripled.

Will the Houston-Galveston area ever get the Ike Dike?  Yes, but I fear it won’t be until after the area has taken a direct hit from a category 3 hurricane and the catastrophic loss of lives and property left in its wake.

FURTHER INFO: Texas A&M’s IKE DIKE website

Special Session and the Governorship

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Competition is a good thing and when you have two conservatives vying to be governor, it could be really good. Abbott is described by one Texas lawmaker as scheduling a “conservative home run derby” with the announced special session. The winner will be conservatives all over Texas who have waited for years for such an opportunity. Governor Abbott is playing catch up with Republican primary voters and Abbott’s 20 item special session is his way of getting ahead of Dan Patrick. Two questions remain: (1) will it succeed and (2) will the mainstream media recognize the subtlety.

Democrats have wrongly accused Governor Abbott of becoming unhinged based on the content of his special session call. Democrats see Abbott’s conservative call as a liberal disaster. What they do not see is that Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick is planning to run against Abbott. Lt. Dan has been planning this since at least November 2016 when he and his political consultant Allen Blakemore openly discussed the opportunity at the Harris County Republican Party election night watch party. When all countywide republicans were defeated in one fell swoop in Harris County, Patrick saw opportunity.

Planning and success in politics requires opportunities, not unlike the business world. Darrell Royal once said, “Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.” Sports metaphors work in politics too.

When Dan Patrick wakes up in the morning, he sees the President of the United States in the mirror, not the Lieutenant Governor of Texas. Lt. Dan sees the Governor’s Mansion as his next step to the presidency. The governorship of Texas provides a very important fundraising platform. While only thirteen presidents served as governors, four of the six latest presidents were governors: Jimmy Carter (Georgia), Ronald Reagan (California), Bill Clinton (Arkansas), and George W. Bush (Texas).

Lt. Dan’s plan requires getting rid of Governor Abbott. Patrick’s team has already begun to portray Governor Abbott as a nice enough guy, but someone who is not moving the conservative agenda forward. If you are active in Republican circles you have heard Patrick’s “Abbott has failed to show leadership” narrative. Governor Abbott is behind because he actually believed Patrick when he said that he would not run against Abbott.

This plan is being executed on a number of fronts. The bathroom bill was nothing more than a ruse to put Lt. Dan to the right of the Governor, and to get back into the good graces of Steve Hotze. The quest is to win over Republican primary voters. This will confound the Texas media. Most of the media that covers statewide politics covers it from the prism of Austin. This is the last place this fight will occur. Conservative enclaves in Houston, Dallas, Fort Worth, and San Antonio are about to be wined and dined in a way we haven’t seen in quite some time. Lt. Dan has been on a statewide tour explaining his great leadership skills.

The orchestration of the death of the sunset bill was by design. This was done to bait Abbott into calling a special session and the Texas Freedom Caucus was used by Patrick to further his agenda. Don’t get me wrong, the Texas Freedom Caucus is a group of  liberty and freedom loving patriots who are all about smaller government, but they need to be careful of Lt. Dan as well. Watching Lt. Dan throw every Houston taxpayer under the bus on the pension bill should be a cautionary tale to all.

Before he killed the sunset bill, Lt. Dan had to wait until the pension bill (SB 2190) passed the house so his law enforcement union friends (e.g., HPOU) would continue to support him and line his pockets. Patrick has always closely aligned himself with this union, which handed out more money to legislators this session than Donald J. Trump trying to get a building built in Manhattan. I hope that Governor Abbott was smart enough to cut a deal of his own before he signed this horrific legislation. Once the pension bill passed, Abbott and Straus played into Patrick’s hands – now it will be a fight.

One winner in this fight: Texas conservatives. Strong conservative legislation makes folks choose sides. This will not be good for Straus and his Republican henchman. Republican primary voters are about to learn a lot about their state representatives. Speaker Straus and his liberal house leadership, including his democratic committee chairman, are about to be whipsawed in a way not seen in these parts in a long time. Straus is unlikely to survive and the heat of the July Texas special session summer will burn through until the Republican primary.

Governor Abbott finally woke up to realize that Patrick was putting him in a corner and Abbott is fighting back with his special session call. Folks forget that your opponent gets to throw punches too. It is great to see the governor fighting back and doing his best to prove his conservative bona fides. Again, conservatives for the win.

This game is probably over for now and (unfortunately) Lt. Dan will have an advantage in a 2018 Republican primary against Abbott. Remember, the goal is for Lt. Dan to be in position to primary Donald Trump in 2020 or step into his shoes if something should happen. I was reminded of Dan Patrick’s press conference to announce that he was not running for governor. I was also reminded that Kay Bailey Hutchison denied 18 times (six times on television) that she was running against Rick Perry before she did.

Competition is a good and the real winners here will be conservatives. We need more conservative competition for ideas in Texas and nationally, it is healthy for our Republic.