07/03/2009

Texas Baptists launch plan for Hispanic education
Texas Baptists say they want to do more than just pray about the problem of Hispanic youth dropping out of high school.

07/04/2009

Project Victory helps war's 'walking wounded' suffering from traumatic brain injuries
HOUSTON – Mark DeJaico hit rock bottom late last year at a Houston nightclub.

Mosquitoes primed, and some counties can't afford to fight them
Millions of mosquito eggs laid across southeast Texas after Hurricane Ike hit the coast last summer are waiting for the little bit of rain and hot summer days they need to hatch. That's got the man whose job it is to fight the bugs worried – he's already running out of money.

Galveston police hunt palm tree arsonist
GALVESTON – Galveston officials are investigating the torching of 30 palm trees in the last two months.

07/02/2009

Texas Legislature ends special session without toll-road bill
While the bill was a priority for the governor, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst said local transportation officials told Senate leaders the measure was not necessary.
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07/03/2009

Texas & Southwest briefs
Companies recall food

NORTH TEXAS
After wildfires damaged Ringgold Baptist Church and nearly destroyed the small town, the Rev. Eldon Earl Johnson and his wife rushed to help their congregation members and others who lost homes and cattle.

Southeast Texas pair arrested after kids found locked in tool shed
SEALY, Texas – A Southeast Texas couple was in jail Thursday after authorities found a half-dozen children locked and unsupervised in a tool shed behind an unlicensed day care center.

George W. Bush surprises small Oklahoma town with Fourth of July visit
WOODWARD, Okla. – When the middle-of-nowhere town of Woodward invited George W. Bush to its Fourth of July celebration, no one really expected the former president to accept. But he did.

07/02/2009

Couple jailed after children found in shed behind daycare center near Houston
A Southeast Texas couple was in jail Thursday after authorities found a half dozen children locked and unsupervised in tool shed behind an unlicensed daycare center.

More Texans paying child support with unemployment checks as economy suffers
In the last year, the amount of child support Texas collected from unemployment checks more than quadrupled. It's jumped 360 percent, to $11.5 million in May from $2.5 million in that month a year ago.

Perry formally applies for $4B in stimulus money for education
AUSTIN – On the last day to do so, Gov. Rick Perry formally applied Wednesday for $4 billion in federal stimulus money to fill gaps and boost state education needs.

Two false tornado reports alarm weather forecasters, draw FBI attention
Weather forecasters are alarmed by two recent deliberate false tornado reports in less than a week, raising the possibility that diverting their attention could make them miss real storms.

Texas death row inmate Rodney Reed loses another appeal
HOUSTON – Texas death row inmate Rodney Reed lost another appeal before the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, which on Wednesday rejected his claims that new evidence pointed to another man as the killer of a 19-year-old woman in Bastrop County 13 years ago.

Texas A&M faculty votes 'no confidence' on Chancellor Mike McKinney
COLLEGE STATION, Texas – The Texas A&M University faculty slapped system Chancellor Mike McKinney with a "no confidence" vote just weeks after the resignation of the university president and a suggestion that McKinney's job might be combined with the university president's to save money.

07/01/2009

Toll road bill faces tough fight in Texas Legislature's special session
Gov. Rick Perry's special session effort to win new approval for public-private toll roads in Texas may be hitting the skids.

06/30/2009

North Texas gang crackdown nets 66 arrests in six-day operation
he crackdown is part of a three-year-old national push by U.S. Immigration and Custom Enforcement to target transnational gangs, ICE said Tuesday in announcing the arrests. The foreign-born came from Mexico, El Salvador, Honduras and Laos.

07/01/2009

Perry sets short special session agenda so legislators can leave town for 4th of July
AUSTIN – State lawmakers will be back in the Capitol today for a special session called by Gov. Rick Perry, who says he purposely kept the agenda short to help lawmakers get out of town by the July 4 weekend.

3 charged with illegally accessing hospital records of slain Arkansas anchorwoman
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. – Prosecutors have charged an Arkansas doctor and two former hospital workers with illegally accessing the patient records of a Little Rock television news anchorwoman brought to the hospital after being viciously attacked at her home.

Briefs
Imprisoned judge's resignation accepted

06/30/2009

Crime blog: State calls rebuttal witnesses in hearing to possibly commute Texas death row inmate's sentence
Defense attorneys Robbie McClung and Richard Franklin are trying to persuade jurors that Robertson's abusive home life as a child and drug use are mitigating factors.

Nowitzki's ex-girlfriend extradited to Missouri
Taylor, who has been in custody in Jefferson County since May 13, posted $50,000 bail and was transferred Monday to face a probation violation in Missouri, a Jefferson County jail official said.

Killer known as 'Son of Sam' forms unlikely bond with Houston advocate for crime victims
HOUSTON – The letters are unfailingly polite, the carefully crafted correspondence of a man with too much time on his hands.

San Antonio doubles size of its famed River Walk
SAN ANTONIO – A $72 million overhaul has doubled the size of San Antonio's River Walk, transforming the weed-choked eyesore north of the downtown into a 1 ½-mile manicured waterway with whimsical art, benches and fountains that can be passed on foot or by water taxi en route to upriver attractions.

06/28/2009

Many want Gov. Perry to add to special session's agenda
Advocates for unfinished business, ranging from expansion of the Children's Health Insurance Program to lowering homeowners insurance, are disappointed the governor won't tackle what they see as pressing needs.
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06/30/2009

Scientists take the plunge in search for whale sharks
NEW ORLEANS – A commercial fishing boat captain who spotted dozens of the world's biggest fish off Louisiana's coast turned his boat into a research vessel for a week this month, taking scientists and photographers to look for whale sharks. RESULTS

Candidate for regional EPA post faces opposition
A former Texas official turned industry lobbyist faces opposition in his bid to become President Barack Obama's top environmental appointee in Texas and four adjacent states.

Administration making plans to bolster U.S.-Mexico border with National Guard volunteers
WASHINGTON – The Obama administration is developing plans to seek up to 1,500 National Guard volunteers to step up the military's anti-drug efforts along the Mexican border, senior administration officials said Monday.

06/29/2009

Arizona border killings tied to rogue citizen patrol group spark new fear
ARIVACA, Ariz. – The home-invasion killings last month of a man and his 10-year-old daughter have terrified this small town near the Mexican border, in part because authorities have tied them to a rogue group of citizen border patrols.

06/28/2009

Crash ends 3 generations of Frisco family
"Two complete families got wiped out," said Robin Bellemore, who lives across the street from Shelby Hayes and her husband, Scott, both of whom were only children. Shelby's mother, Cindy Olson, was widowed and lived in the Denton County town of Crossroads.

4 Frisco family members killed in Oklahoma crash
The Hayes family was just minutes away from their destination in Missouri when a tractor trailer rig slammed into a line of stopped cars, including theirs. The accident happened on Interstate 44 outside of Miami, Okla., near the border with Missouri and Kansas.
Download: Site of the crash

Governors eager to prove they're on the job
COLUMBIA, S.C. – Texas Gov. Rick Perry was raising money at campaign headquarters when an Associated Press reporter called his staff to ask what he was doing. An hour later, he walked into AP's statehouse bureau to show he was at work in Austin and not, say, in South America for a romantic rendezvous.

State set to move convicts back from county lockups
AUSTIN – Texas prison officials plan to cancel contracts to house up to 1,900 state convicts in county lockups because the number of convicts in state prisons has fallen.

AT A GLANCE NEW ORLEANS
NEW ORLEANS – Three hundred feet above the business district, workers cleaning the gigantic roof of the Louisiana Superdome played it cool as temperatures in the city reached triple digits in recent days.

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