#nurse gu's legal name is nurse gu
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at the center of gotham, lies its oldest public hospital — gotham general. it’s staff are kind and compassionate, if a little intolerant of bullshit. the city may not care about the crimes that occur in it but the people certainly do. gotham’s emergency services are renowned throughout the nation as one of the best.
the ER nurses at gotham general love to gossip and their latest is about how their ever-reliable EMT bernard dowd, who'll rush into burning buildings if he thinks he can save one more person, who smiles so brightly and brings them cupcakes on his days off but has such sad eyes, seems so lonely. they determinedly decide to find a date for him. maybe dr. zacharia thomas, their latest trauma surgeon? yes, yes! he's only a few years older, bernard knows him, they get along, and most importantly, he's got a stable job. he'll be perfect for their bernard!
and then, literally only days after they decide to set up dr. zacharia and bernard on a date, head trauma nurse marissa santos comes running in with a copy of gotham daily, clutched in her hand.
"look! look! nakita mo ba ang balita?" she whisper-yells, "did you see the news?!"
instantly they're all crowding around her, trying to see the paper. covering the front page is a blurry photo of a black-haired man engaged in a passionate game of tonsil-hockey with someone who is unmistakably their youngest EMT. he's still wearing his uniform for christ's sake! in the largest font known to man, "WAYNE'S NEW PARAMOUR?" is written at the top.
"he's dating the wayne ceo!" marissa gushes excitedly.
"isn't he a little too old for bernard?" someone pipes up from the back.
"not the father, you idiot! the son! timothy!"
that's way better than their candidate. everyone is stoked. by nightfall, everyone in the ER knows that bernard dowd is dating timothy drake-wayne, the youngest ceo wayne enterprises has ever had.
when bear stops by, at around 2 in the morning, dropping of the last patient from his shift, he's immediately accosted by the nurses.
"whoa! hey!" he exclaims as they lead him to the nurse's station and sit him down in a chair, "what's going on?"
marissa slams the paper down in front of him, "spill."
bernard groans and turns cherry red, "oh my god tita. don't you guys have patients to attend to?"
"already taken care of." nurse gu says.
"what about mr. gomez, the one with third degree burns that just came in?" bernard tries desperately.
"dr. zacharia is already on it." dr. esperanza responds, "so spill."
their youngest tries one last time, "how do you even know if that's me?"
"there are like 10 blonde people in the EMT department and considering all of them are older than you and none of them seem to have the three ear piercings that kid in this picture does, we're gonna have to assume it's you." dr. farah nasim, one half of the head of the ER, says.
bernard turns on her with a betrayed look.
"sorry kid," she snorts, "also, you're still wearing your uniform in the photo. it says 'dowd' on the shoulder."
"im too old to be bossed around like this." he mutters before sighing, "alright what'd'ya want to know?"
"tell us everything!" marissa says, "how did you two meet?"
"we were friends in high school and we fell out of touch after junior year. he hit me up on insta 6 months ago and we reconnected."
"oh my god!! they're high school sweethearts!" nurse gu squeals, "that's so cute!"
"tell us more! who asked who out?"
"okay well, technically he asked me out but he didn't know he was asking me out. but we went on this date at this restaurant and it got attacked by some villain and red robin, but he was going by robin at the time, rescued. so i told robin, 'hey if i make it out of this, tell tim drake, i would've liked to finish our date'. and then, tim, shows up at my door the next day and says 'i don't know what this feeling i get when i'm near you is, but i'd like to find out'. and the rest is history."
"bernard, what the hell?" dr. esperanza says shocked, "that's the most rom-com-esque story i've ever heard."
"what?" bernard blushes, "no it's not."
"bear," esperanza says slowly, "he showed up at your door and said 'i don't know what this feeling i get when i'm near you is, but i want to find out.' that is something straight out of the notebook."
"no, no! he's such a dork!" bernard assures them frantically, "he does this thing, when he laughs too hard, he snorts and it sets him off again and it just keeps going. and you should've seen him in high school, the biggest skater boy to ever exist. he's teaching me..."
and bernard goes on and on for the next 15 minutes, trailing off only when he notices them all smiling at him.
"what?" he says shyly.
"you're in love with him, aren't you?" dr. farah says.
bernard chokes, "what?! no! ...maybe?"
everyone shares a look between each other. marissa steps forward, "well on behalf of the gotham general ER staff, i can assure you, we all approve."
"thank you?"
"bring him around sometime!" nurse gu says, "we'd all like to meet him."
"why? so you can give him the shovel talk?"
"of course!" dr. farah says, smiling widely, "he’s dating our youngest! we have to threaten him!"
bernard's voice is suspiciously wet when says a few moments later, "thanks guys."
and so on it goes for the next few months until marissa comes back after her break, deathly pale. everyone worries but she refuses to tell anyone what's wrong. and then a few weeks later, nurse gu goes on his break and comes back shocked. and then a month later, dr. zacharia comes back from a quick step outside, lips sealed shut.
and on it goes until there is one glaring truth the gotham general ER night staff cannot ignore:
bernard dowd is dating red robin. open relationship or cheating, to be determined.
a year after the news about tim drake and bernard had been released, and half a year after the, what the staff has taken to calling it, Red Robin Scandal™ began, dr. farah calls a night staff meeting.
the staff meeting is boring as usual until the end when dr. farah opens the conversation to the staff to voice their concerns.
"are we going to talk about the elephant in the room?" dr. esperanza asks.
"i think bernard might be cheating on his boyfriend!" marissa blurts out before slapping her hands over her mouth, horrified.
“oh thank god.” esperanza sighs.
"wait you saw them too?" nurse gu asks.
"in the narrow walkway," dr. zacharia starts.
"between the ER and jacobson building." dr. esperanza finishes.
"exactly!" marissa says.
"i caught them in the parking lot once." dr. farah admits, mouth pressed into a grim line, "they were pressed up against the fence in the back — y'know where the light doesn't shine? — kissing each other like they'd just come back from world war 2."
"ay, how could that boy be so stupid?" marissa sighs, "getting caught up with a vigilante?"
"maybe it's like polyamory?" esperanza says, ever hopeful.
"whatever it is," farah says, "he should know better than to get involved with those people. we have to talk to him."
they pull bernard into an unused conference room, just the 5 of them, 3 weeks later.
"hey, hey!" bernard exclaims as they shove him into a chair, "what's going on?"
nobody speaks.
"guys?"
"are you cheating on tim drake?"
"what?"
"are you cheating on tim drake?" marissa repeats.
"no! why would you think that?"
"everyone on the night staff has caught you kissing red robin at least once. wanna try that again?" farah says.
bernard sighs, "is that what this is about? doc, i swear to god, i'm not cheating on tim."
"so he knows?" zacharia asks.
"yes zach, tim knows about me and red robin."
"and he's okay with it?"
"yes. tim doesn't mind me dating both of them." bernard says, a smile playing on his lips.
nobody speaks for a while.
"so..." bernard breaks the silence first, "are we good here? do you approve?"
"no." esperanza says, "we don't approve."
"what?"
"he's no good for you." nurse gu says.
"you don't even know him." bernard says incredulously.
"oh and you do?" zacharia says scathingly, "he's a vigilante bear. how much do you really know?"
"more than you zach!"
pleadingly bernard turns toward farah, "c'mon doc, you don't agree do you?"
"you know, when you first started dating tim drake, i had my reservations. rich people and all that. but i figured with all that money, if you ever got roped into rich people problems, tim's money would help out. you'd be taken care of and he clearly loves you, so i didn't mind too much."
"but this..." farah trails off, "i can't accept this."
turning towards marissa, "tita, please."
"don't do that, bear. wag kang tanga. it's not good to be with him."
"he loves me! is that not enough?" bernard near-yells, "i thought that's what you wanted. someone who loves me!"
"enough to quit being a vigilante?" esperanza asks.
"quit being a vigilante? are you guys hearing yourself?" bernard asks angrily, "he saves the city on a near-nightly basis and you want me to ask him to give it all up because what? he's dating me?"
"so let him save the city without you." nurse gu says, "why does he need to drag you into it?"
"he's not dragging me into anything! i am a full consenting adult! i chose him! what’s so different about what he and i do anyway?"
“well for one, our job is legal. and two, there are safety measures put in place so that you don’t get hurt. so that your coworkers don’t get hurt. your man walks into the joker’s lair with an inch of kevlar and a prayer on his lips.” zacharia says.
nurse gu sighs, "look. nobody here is mad at him for saving the city. everyone here knows somebody who has been saved by the bats. but the deal is that they save the city and they don't drag anybody else into it."
"the bats, whoever they are? they chose that life. for whatever reason, they chose that life and all the dangers that go with it. you’re not stupid bear, don’t get involved with whatever he has going on. pick literally anyone else.” farah says.
“you need a third person that badly? take zach! the ER was planning on setting you up with him before we found out about tim, anyway.”
“what?” zacharia says, rounding on nurse gu.
“you know what?” bernard says, pinching the bridge of his nose tiredly, “ i don’t have to explain myself to you guys.”
“you can’t marry him.” marissa says.
“who said anything about marriage? i’m 22!”
“you clearly love tim. you two seem like you’re going to last a while and if you love red robin they way you love tim, them somewhere along those years of being together then you’re going to start thinking of marriage. what then? how are you going to explain red robin to the people you love?”
“we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.”
“look, bernard,” farah says gently, “we’re not doing this cause we don’t want you to be happy. you mean a lot to me, i think of you as my son. we just-”
“you’re not my mom.” bernard snaps out, “you’re not my mom, you’re not my aunt, my uncle, my brother. you guys aren’t anything to me!”
he turns and walks away.
“farah do something.” marissa hisses.
“let him go. he said he’s an adult right? then let him make his choices.”
“but,” she says, raising her voice so bernard can hear her, “if anything goes wrong, and i mean anything at all, i hope he knows that adults don’t have to do everything by themselves. that they can ask people for help.”
bernard’s hands still on the doorknob. “thank you.” he says voice rough, “nothing will happen, but thank you for the offer.” and he walks out the door.
bernard dowd, is 22 year old EMT that has too much heart and not enough brain. he’ll rush into burning buildings if he thinks he has even a minute chance of saving someone. he’s kind and he’s sweet and more importantly, he’s dating timothy drake-wayne, ceo of wayne enterprises.
if you ask the ER night staff at gotham general, after a lot of prodding, they might tell you that bernard dowd was one of the youngest EMTs to ever join the gotham county emergency medical services. they might tell you that bernard dowd has been wondering if he should become an AEMT or a paramedic. they might tell you that as the major receiver for all patients, bernard saw them all the time and imprinted on them like a baby duck. and if you’re really close they might, tell you the ER’s biggest secret: bernard dowd is dating both timothy drake-wayne and red robin. or they might just let you walk in on them making out behind the ER. whatever comes first really.
(if you get close enough to a certain group of people on the ER night staff, they’ll tell you that bernard dowd has two hands and he uses them to hold onto his boyfriends.
they’ll tell you that tim drake is a nice boy and they’re a little worried about their bernard fitting into the circles a wayne walks in, but he’s a nice boy who clearly loves bernard, so they’re not too worried.
they’ll tell you that that red robin character is no good for their bernard and has no business getting so close to their youngest. that red robin is going to get bernard into trouble one day, the kind of trouble that you don’t come back from.
and if you get really close to them, they’ll tell you over lunch breaks and muttered whispers, that both boys are going to break their youngest’s heart. and that if they had to pick, red robin will do it first. that their bernard loves a little too deeply and that they're worried that it’ll break bernard.
but they’re not too worried, they say. because bernard has them and if that bastard red robin breaks his heart, then they’ll pick up the pieces, they’ll sew him back together if they have to. after all, bernard stitches up half of gotham every night, this is the least they could do.)
#oh my god#what the fuck is this?#literally wrote this in a fugue state#this is not proofread#this is my ugliest first draft#my dumbest version if you will#why is this 2k#anyway#nurse gu's legal name is nurse gu#esperanza is gorgeous. like drop dead gorgeous. the best damn anesthesiologist you've ever seen. the yin to zacharia's yang.#farah is the smartest woman you will ever know and can give ten backhanded compliments w/o the other person realizing#marissa santos is filipino. bc filipinos are the backbone of our nursing industry#also she will cut a bitch. gives bear a plate of lumpia every week. is the reason bear is passable in tagalog#zacharia is your everyday indian. he is my sweet boy#he would've formed a crush on bear if he thought about for more than two seconds but alas#he is married to the job#also they mean well and they do raise some serious point but bc tim is also red robin it kinda... falls flat?#tagging time#tim drake#bernard dowd#timbern#dc#what should this be called#concerned friends try to save man afflicted by love au
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Okay so two tiny stories about what happened with my idiot brother. First if all: He went on an insane rant after the episode about Lindsay and her cheating on pregnant Mel and how that was the same shit that happened in s1. Which I fully agree. He has a lot of feelings about the sam plot, not one of them is good. Except, he didn’t go on his rant to me but instead on one of the poor new nurses/interns at the hospital. The poor girl didn’t even know who or what he was talking about because the idiot slipped up a few times and said words like ‘my Brian/my Justin, How will i be able to watch Gus deal with this’ and so on, so it kind of sounded like he was talking about a friend. And he kept going on and on and the poor girl was GIVING HIM ADVICE! And also listening as if she was getting some amazing gossip. Only for one of the other nurses to walk in that does know him and before she left the room she pointed to him and went ‘and don’t pay attention to anything he says. He’s talking about a tv show not real people’ and the new nurse looked at him all shocked and this moron looks at her and goes ‘if it makes you feel better, they are real to me’
And then the second little story: he called our mom and left her multiple texts and voice memos and majority of them were about Brian and his cancer. But she’s a smart woman, so she didn’t answer. However he found a brand new victim. Our uncle. He called him and started talking about Brian and Justin as if they were his friends and i can hear the conversation because it’s on speaker and our uncle goes ‘(his name) is this about that show that your mom warned me about? That she specifically told me to not let you talk to me about it because you’re acting weird about it?’ And he goes ‘off the record? Yes, and i AM worried! AND FOR A GOOD REASON! Bri Bri has cancer and even though he’s doing better, cancer is cancer! And it’s scary. And then there’s Justin and theyre getting closer and closer and I can tell that Brian is seconds away from saying I love you. He’s changed so much this season. But on the record? I have no clue what show you’re talking about, never heard of it, so don’t even think about telling on me to mom’ And then the next thing that we hear is our mom on the phone going ‘(his name), youre on speaker. And you promised youd try and act normal about this show’ and this moron went ‘sorry, wrong number’ and then hung up. This man is an actual legal adult.
DEAR SWEET ANON! I AM DYING OF LAUGHTER.
“if it makes you feel better, they are real to me” I AM DEAD.
HE WAS ON SPEAKER AND YOUR MOM WAS THERE. Busted! I came back from the dead just to die again at “sorry, wrong number.”
HE IS TOO MUCH. He is what I would be like if I didn’t have any embarrassment. My post doc screens intakes for my practice and we were joking around about how everyone should submit a list of celebrities they could not be a therapist to because they know too much about them (and because of where we work this is a legit concern). My post doc asked who I could not be a therapist to and I had to say a currently famous person rather than Gale Harold because how the fuck would I explain who Gale is to me? Your brother would just launch right into it! And good for him.
#ask winderlylandchime#dear sweet anon#queer as folk#a straight man watches qaf us 2000 in the year of our lord 2023
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DOSSIER CHEAT SHEET
[For Main verse.]
LEGAL NAME: Thera Pardalis (current), previously Therese (Thera) Landsend. (Plus assorted aliases.)
NICKNAME[S]: (person/verse dependent) Kid, Sissy, Hjarta Mitt, Oh-no, That Bitch, and Lookout It's Her.
DATE OF BIRTH: Equivalent of June 6th, 35BC.
SEX: Female.
PLACE OF BIRTH: Lands End, Cornwall.
CURRENTLY LIVING: Verse dependent. Often NYC, but see this tag.
SPOKEN LANGUAGES: English, Cornish, French, Spanish, Greek, Italian, German, Arabic, some Russian, Portuguese, Japanese, Mandarin Chinese but better at Cantonese. A few others at the 'awkward tourist' conversational stage. Most of these she can stumble on sometimes because she first learned them so long ago.
EDUCATION: Degrees in: Archaeology (mostly Greek, Celtic and Egyptian), linguistics, veterinary nursing, crime scene forensics, environmental studies. Also aviation, dance, business college, assorted others.
HAIR COLOR: Brown.
EYE COLOR: Blue-grey.
HEIGHT: 5’ 8" (1.73m).
WEIGHT: 132lbs (60kg).
FAMILY INFORMATION
SIBLING[S]: None.
PARENT[S]: Branek (father), Mabyn (mother) both well and truly deceased.
RELATIVE[S]: All 'found family'; Gaia, Aphrodite, Ares, Strife. Verse dependent, Frigga Allmother.
CHILDREN: None of her own. Verse dependent, Priscilla Kimbleton (ward, circa 1820s), Evie and Rota Coulson, Chiara London (babysat, 2014-ish?).
PET[S]: None of her own. Verse dependent, Gus' Godmother.
RELATIONSHIP INFORMATION
SEXUAL ORIENTATION: Male attracted. Leans toward demisexual - maybe call it semi-demi?
RELATIONSHIP STATUS: Verse dependent.
SINCE WHEN: Verse dependent.
TAGGED BY: Stole it from @iobartach
TAGGING: Steal it!
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GENERAL INFORMATION
Full Legal Name: Edward Jay Tonks
Nickname(s): Ted, Teddy, Teddy Bear
Age: 20
Gender & Pronouns: Cisgender male & he/him
Allegiance: Neutral
Status: Muggleborn
Sexuality: Heterosexual
Date of Birth: September 27th, 1957
Zodiac Sign: Libra
Hogwarts House: Hufflepuff
APPEARANCE
Faceclaim: Casey Deidrick
Height: 6'5"
Weight: 189 lbs
Hair Color: Dark brown
Eye Color: Light brown
Noticeable Features: Ted has a very expressive face--- more times than not he wears his emotions on his sleeve for everybody to see.
Typical Outfit or General Fashion Sense: Comfort is the main goal when it comes to Ted’s wardrobe. Having a little sister has likely helped his fashion...well, at least put it in a better place than it would be if Ted was left to fend for himself all the time. Jeans are his usual go to, paired with any hoodie due to the fact that Ted doesn’t like to be cold. He doesn’t go shopping all too often, so if it fits and it’s still one piece than it usually does the trick.
HISTORY
Hometown: Brighton
Financial Status: Lower class
Spoken Languages: English and enough Italian to get by thanks to his next door neighbor.
Dream Job: Healer
Vices: Gambling and smoking.
FAMILY BACKGROUND
Mother: Ava Tonks née Ball
Father: Harris Tonks
Sibling(s): Angela ‘Angie’ Tonks (age 14)
Pet(s): Plenty of stray cats have stayed and left the Tonks residence over the years. At the moment there are three--- Gus (has stayed with them 10 years now), Ginger (has stayed with them for six years) and their newest addition Midnight who arrived over the last summer. Ted has his own personal cat he brings with him every year to Hogwarts named Bailey.
Grandparent(s): Francis Tonks and Sherry Tonks are on his father’s side. Jerry Ball and Lily Ball are on his mother’s side.
Cousin(s): Ted has one uncle and one aunt who both have children, leaving him with four cousins and another on the way in a few months.
MAGICAL ABILITIES
Wand: Alder, Unicorn Hair, and 13 inches.
Patronus: Arctic Fox
Boggart: Ted would see his mother’s body--- pale and lifeless on the ground. There would be marks on her arm from the needle in her left hand. It was a life she left behind, but sometimes Ted worries while he’s away at school.
OWLS: Charms (Outstanding), Care for Magical Creatures (Outstanding), Defense Against the Dark Arts (Exceeds Expectations), Potions (Acceptable), Transfiguration (Exceeds Expectations), and Herbology (Acceptable).
BIOGRAPHY
Anyone who reads frequently has always told Ted the first book of the series is always the best, and in his case that would be also be true. At least the very beginning of his life was easier compared to the later years.
Edward Tonks was born in the beginning of fall--- his father was working that evening when his wife was rushed in by the next door neighbor. The delivery of their first child was pretty easy and Ted was brought home by two parents who couldn’t be more excited. Ava and Harris Tonks doted over their only child. He was picked up the second he started crying and managed to talk his parents into letting him bring home whatever stray cat he found around town on his way home from school. All around it was pretty normal life, at least compared to what Ted knew.
Years later were when things started to get harder. Finding out he was a wizard was pretty easy in comparison to the things which followed afterwards. The family was excited when another addition was expected to come--- a little sister. Ted was thrilled to have a sibling, and it really was a good thing which happened to the family. The slip up about the affair Harris Tonks was having during his wife’s pregnancy was what made Ted’s life take a total new turn.
Ava didn’t waste any time taking her two children from the luxury they had off from Harris’ salary as a doctor and moved them into a crummy apartment in a section of town Ted couldn’t say he exactly favored. At almost seven years old Ted wasn’t about to argue--- he knew his mom was upset and wanted to do his best to make things better. He couldn’t forgive his father for betraying his mother, so he wasn’t upset it was his mom he was living with. Days mixed with one another--- school and coming home to watch Angie while his mother was working. As he got older his friends complained he could never come out with them, but Ted knew he didn’t have any other option. He wasn’t about to complain, however--- he doubted his mom wanted to work long hours into the night just to get up early each day and do it all over again.
Things weren’t exactly easy, but over the years they became manageable. The refrigerator usually had food in it to last the week, and if not their upstairs neighbors who had god only knows how many children were always willing to share the meals they made. They already had an army to feed, so if Ted had to sneak upstairs with Angie to get something to eat it was never a big deal.
When his Hogwarts letter arrived Ted was thrilled--- even though he would be leaving his neighbors to watch his younger sister while his mother was working. Ted promised he would write as much as he could, but he couldn’t turn down an opportunity like learning magic. It was almost impossible to even imagine--- him, Edward Tonks, was a wizard. There was nothing exceptional about him, and yet he had the ability to use magic. It was almost like a dream.
Hogwarts was better than the muggle school he went to, even though it didn’t take him anytime at all to learn many didn’t like people born of muggle parents. Ted was hardly about to let it bother him--- he’s been made fun of for being poor ever since he started going to school. What else could people throw at him?
The following years at school treated Ted fairly well. He made friends around him easily--- being a naturally friendly person who liked to make others happy had it’s advantages. The disaster didn’t happen until the summer before his seventh year. Ted had been away all year at school and came home to his sister saying their mom had been acting different. Not seeing it at first the Hufflepuff dismissed it until Ava insisted she needed to stay home from work more frequently and then would be out until late. Ted needed to pick up a job that summer when the bills started to slip--- Angie told him she would work too but Ted absolutely refused to let his little sister go out and work. He wanted her to have a childhood--- something every kid deserved.
One night Ted came home late from working to find the bathroom light on. Knocking on the door he didn’t get an answer. Knocking more lead to more silence and after busting down the door Ted was horrified. Hours later both Ted and his younger sister were in the hospital with their mother--- heroin the doctors said it was. She was lucky, and a few days later the whole family was home again. Ted had to watch his mother and didn’t want to go back to school--- he almost didn’t had it not been for both women in his life insisting on it. They’d be fine. They had the money Ted worked for over the summer and the money Ava had from picking back up work--- she was working to be a Nurse at the local hospital.
However, that wasn’t enough. Ted wasn’t exactly the party type, but a few nights before he had to go back to school he went out with one of the girls who lived upstairs from him. All of his life had been for everyone else. Not that Ted minded it--- he loved caring for his friends and family, but he wanted a night to himself without worrying about anyone. He had a pretty girl on his arm for a few hours before he entered a smoky room with a group of people sitting around a table. Poker it looked like, and while Ted didn’t have much to gamble he was a bit drunk (something which rarely happened) and didn’t take any time to light up a cigarette and join. Hours later Ted was walking out with more money than he had ever seen--- enough for his sister to buy herself new stuff for school and the bills to be paid for the next few months. It made it easier for Ted to leave to Hogwarts for his seventh year, though the worry wasn’t entirely gone.
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News and useful information on POS and POS Hardware.
On Tuesday at the state Capitol, Governor Greg Abbott signed into law two bills aimed at strengthening the electric grid and reforming the agencies that regulate it. It was the culmination of the Legislature’s response to a devastating winter storm that crippled the state’s energy system and killed as many as 700 Texans, according to a recent Buzzfeed investigation.
Before signing the bills, Abbott confidently declared that “everything that needed to be done was done to fix the power grid in Texas.”
But for all the self-congratulation among state leaders this week, grid reform was but a minor feature of the legislative session. Republicans spent most of their time passing through extreme legislation that all but bans abortions, permits most anyone to carry a handgun without a license, restricts how race and history can be taught in Texas classrooms, punishes budget cuts in urban police deparments, and on and on.
The laws Abbott signed will require power plants to weatherize their facilities against extreme weather conditions, increase coordination between regulatory agencies, overhaul the leadership of those agencies, and institute a statewide weather alert system, among other things. The reforms are substantial—but energy experts warn that they go nowhere near far enough to actually prevent another winter catastrophe. Legislators went easy (again) on the natural gas industry. Senate Bill 3, the most comprehensive of the reforms, requires power generators and transmission line operators to weatherize their facilities. Despite the fact that natural gas supply disruptions were the biggest contributor to February’s grid meltdown, the law requires only gas facilities deemed to be “critical” to weatherize, a determination that will be made by the industry-friendly Railroad Commission.
A provision that would have helped fund backup power generators for critical water, electric, and health care facilities—including nursing homes and dialysis centers—was removed from SB3. And although hundreds of Texans were hospitalized for carbon monoxide poisoning, legislators didn’t consider joining 38 other states in requiring homes to have carbon monoxide detectors.
The law will take effect in six months. However, lawmakers declined to set a deadline for when regulators must begin actually enforcing the law. House Democrats proposed an amendment to establish a six-month deadline for enforcement after the regulatory agencies create their weatherization rules. But the bill’s architect, Representative Chris Paddie, R-Marshall, opposed the idea, citing “financial and operational concerns,” and the proposal was voted down. Another amendment to make penalties mandatory also failed.
A bill to reform the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT)—which politicians like Abbott blamed for the blackouts—will politicize board appointments by putting the governor, lieutenant governor, and House speaker in charge of the process. Another bill to strengthen the maligned Public Utility Commission, which oversees ERCOT, emerged from behind closed doors in much weaker form. The law currently requires all three commissioners to be “well informed and qualified in the field of public utilities and utility regulation.” That’s a reasonable expectation for regulators of the country’s second-largest electricity market, but legislators ultimately decided that applied to just two commissioners.
Overall, the Legislature failed to provide any relief to Texans who were devastated by the storm. A Senate amendment that would have provided direct relief aid to Texans was ultimately stripped out. Lawmakers did, however, manage to pass $6.5 billion in state bonds to stabilize natural gas and electric utilities that were hit by huge price spikes. The cost will be passed on to utility customers through a surcharge on their monthly bills, which means ordinary Texans will be paying a few extra bucks each month for at least the next couple decades.
For Abbott and other top Republicans, the 87th legislative session was all about political posturing ahead of a primary, where Abbott will be challenged by a former tea party senator, as well as the GOP party chair who spent the last weekend of session at a QAnon convention in Dallas. And Abbott’s camp believes it got what it needed. “It’s an excellent session,” Dave Carney, Abbott’s chief political strategist, told the Dallas Morning News. “We had a great number of items that are attractive to Republicans and independents. We’re in great shape.”
Still, there was much ballyhoo among Republicans after they failed to pass a number of conservative priorities, including their restrictive voting bill Senate Bill 7 (which was killed after House Democrats broke quorum). Republicans also ran out of time to wrap efforts to limit “taxpayer-funded” lobbying and pass so-called anti-censorship measures against big tech social media platforms. Abbott has already signaled that he’ll call a special session to bring up the “election integrity” legislation up again, along with what is sure to be a menagerie of other right-wing bugbears. —Justin Miller
Wrong on Crime
Texas is a collection of myths, one of which has recently framed the state as a national leader on “bipartisan criminal justice reform.” Like most good delusions, there’s a kernel of truth there. Decades ago, lawmakers faced having to spend billions on building new prisons because of dramatically rising rates of incarceration. Instead, the state’s GOP-dominated Legislature reduced the prison population and mothballed several old lockups—mostly by reforming probation departments and funding more alternatives to prison, like substance use treatment programs and drug courts.
Protestors in Austin call to defund the police after the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 30, 2020. Gus Bova
While Texas conservatives have called the state “emblematic of the growing movement to be both tough and smart on crime,” lawmakers here have failed to do much else in recent years beyond avoiding billions in new prison spending. Even as traditionally tough-on-crime neighbors like Oklahoma relax drug laws, similar reforms fail in Texas session after session; despite a growing legalization movement across the country, the state still has some of the nation’s harshest marijuana laws on the books. Texas lawmakers named legislation after Sandra Bland in 2017 but have repeatedly failed to pass police reforms that would have prevented her violent roadside arrest in the first place. This session was no different: On the heels of the international movement sparked by the murder of George Floyd, a bipartisan coalition of Texas lawmakers vowed to push a series of reforms aimed at a “compassionate, common sense approach to justice.” Almost all of the reforms they proffered failed or were watered down.
While the Texas House took these issues at least somewhat seriously this session, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick’s Senate remained a killing field for bills aimed at reforming the criminal legal system. Meanwhile, conservative lawmakers rammed through other regressive measures —such as Governor Greg Abbott’s priority to punish cities that reduce funding for law enforcement, ensuring Texas police budgets remain bloated in perpetuity. Scott Henson is a writer and advocate for criminal justice reform who has tried to bridge the right and left on prison and policing issues at the Texas Legislature since the 1990s; he recently published a particularly bleak outlook on the 87th session, calling it part of broader “lurch toward totalitarianism.” At the very least, this session should kill any notion of Texas as a national leader when it comes to reforming criminal punishment and mass incarceration. —Michael Barajas
Labored Away
Essential workers, despite a year of being praised as “heroes” on billboards around the country, did not receive a hero’s treatment during Texas’ 87th legislative session. For instance, most state employees were denied a wage increase, extending a yearslong trend. Among the snubbed were workers at state-supported living centers, where employees who care for Texans with disabilities often earn less than $25,000 annually. The living centers, like nursing homes, were slammed with deadly COVID-19 outbreaks last year. The Legislature also declined to pass significant reform to its unemployment system, which failed spectacularly to provide prompt benefits to out-of-work Texans during the pandemic. El Paso state Representative Mary González, a Democrat, proposed a bill to create a public-facing database of employers who’ve committed wage theft, but the measure died for the fifth straight session.
“Essential workers, who risked everything to keep Texas going through [an] unprecedented pandemic and winter storm fallout, were hailed as heroes,” says Texas AFL-CIO President Rick Levy. “But as we survey where the legislative session ended up, all that is a foggy memory.” —Gus Bova
Corporate Immunity
State lawmakers passed two bills this session that would protect companies from lawsuits when they cause the death or injury of a person. House Bill 19 would make it more difficult to sue trucking companies after their drivers hurt or kill someone in a wreck. Senate Bill 6 would strengthen lawsuit protections during pandemics for nursing homes, which came under fire for failing to protect residents from COVID-19. State Representative Jeff Leach, a Republican from Allen, is carrying both House Bill 19 and the House companion for Senate Bill 6. Both bills have passed through the Legislature and await the governor’s signature.
A fatal accident near Major Drive in Beaumont, Texas, taken on September 20, 2018. Guiseppe Barranco /The Beaumont Enterprise via AP
In 2020, Leach received approximately $1 million in campaign contributions from the Texans for Lawsuit Reform PAC. For decades, the group has sought to erode plaintiff’s rights to sue as part of a larger movement known as tort reform. Texans for Lawsuit Reform and its allies have successfully lowered lawsuit risk for doctors, auto manufacturers, apartment owners, and others. If Governor Greg Abbott signs these bills into law, the group will count two more victories. —Christopher Collins
Indigenous People’s Day
Since 1977, a national movement to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous People’s Day has been growing across the United States. So far, Austin, Dallas, El Paso County, San Marcos, San Antonio, and Houston all recognize the holiday. Texas, however, does not. This session, the Texas House and Senate wrestled over whether or not to replace the day, ultimately deciding to opt for a Indigenous Peoples’ Week that will occur on the second week of October for the next 10 years. The final version of the resolution was passed unanimously by both the House and Senate.
The resolution recognizes that Indigenous people “built empires, constructed sophisticated cities, and developed elaborate trade networks and complex social systems.” Indigenous Peoples’ Week is intended to raise awareness about the rich heritage and contributions that Indigenous nations have made to Texas and the country. The governor has until June 20 to sign the bill into law. —Pauly Denetclaw
This article was first published on this site.
We trust you found the article above useful and/or interesting. Similar content can be found on our blog: southtxpointofsale.com
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On Tuesday at the state Capitol, Governor Greg Abbott signed into law two bills aimed at strengthening the electric grid and reforming the agencies that regulate it. It was the culmination of the Legislature’s response to a devastating winter storm that crippled the state’s energy system and killed as many as 700 Texans, according to a recent Buzzfeed investigation.
Before signing the bills, Abbott confidently declared that “everything that needed to be done was done to fix the power grid in Texas.”
But for all the self-congratulation among state leaders this week, grid reform was but a minor feature of the legislative session. Republicans spent most of their time passing through extreme legislation that all but bans abortions, permits most anyone to carry a handgun without a license, restricts how race and history can be taught in Texas classrooms, punishes budget cuts in urban police deparments, and on and on.
The laws Abbott signed will require power plants to weatherize their facilities against extreme weather conditions, increase coordination between regulatory agencies, overhaul the leadership of those agencies, and institute a statewide weather alert system, among other things. The reforms are substantial—but energy experts warn that they go nowhere near far enough to actually prevent another winter catastrophe. Legislators went easy (again) on the natural gas industry. Senate Bill 3, the most comprehensive of the reforms, requires power generators and transmission line operators to weatherize their facilities. Despite the fact that natural gas supply disruptions were the biggest contributor to February’s grid meltdown, the law requires only gas facilities deemed to be “critical” to weatherize, a determination that will be made by the industry-friendly Railroad Commission.
A provision that would have helped fund backup power generators for critical water, electric, and health care facilities—including nursing homes and dialysis centers—was removed from SB3. And although hundreds of Texans were hospitalized for carbon monoxide poisoning, legislators didn’t consider joining 38 other states in requiring homes to have carbon monoxide detectors.
The law will take effect in six months. However, lawmakers declined to set a deadline for when regulators must begin actually enforcing the law. House Democrats proposed an amendment to establish a six-month deadline for enforcement after the regulatory agencies create their weatherization rules. But the bill’s architect, Representative Chris Paddie, R-Marshall, opposed the idea, citing “financial and operational concerns,” and the proposal was voted down. Another amendment to make penalties mandatory also failed.
A bill to reform the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT)—which politicians like Abbott blamed for the blackouts—will politicize board appointments by putting the governor, lieutenant governor, and House speaker in charge of the process. Another bill to strengthen the maligned Public Utility Commission, which oversees ERCOT, emerged from behind closed doors in much weaker form. The law currently requires all three commissioners to be “well informed and qualified in the field of public utilities and utility regulation.” That’s a reasonable expectation for regulators of the country’s second-largest electricity market, but legislators ultimately decided that applied to just two commissioners.
Overall, the Legislature failed to provide any relief to Texans who were devastated by the storm. A Senate amendment that would have provided direct relief aid to Texans was ultimately stripped out. Lawmakers did, however, manage to pass $6.5 billion in state bonds to stabilize natural gas and electric utilities that were hit by huge price spikes. The cost will be passed on to utility customers through a surcharge on their monthly bills, which means ordinary Texans will be paying a few extra bucks each month for at least the next couple decades.
For Abbott and other top Republicans, the 87th legislative session was all about political posturing ahead of a primary, where Abbott will be challenged by a former tea party senator, as well as the GOP party chair who spent the last weekend of session at a QAnon convention in Dallas. And Abbott’s camp believes it got what it needed. “It’s an excellent session,” Dave Carney, Abbott’s chief political strategist, told the Dallas Morning News. “We had a great number of items that are attractive to Republicans and independents. We’re in great shape.”
Still, there was much ballyhoo among Republicans after they failed to pass a number of conservative priorities, including their restrictive voting bill Senate Bill 7 (which was killed after House Democrats broke quorum). Republicans also ran out of time to wrap efforts to limit “taxpayer-funded” lobbying and pass so-called anti-censorship measures against big tech social media platforms. Abbott has already signaled that he’ll call a special session to bring up the “election integrity” legislation up again, along with what is sure to be a menagerie of other right-wing bugbears. —Justin Miller
Wrong on Crime
Texas is a collection of myths, one of which has recently framed the state as a national leader on “bipartisan criminal justice reform.” Like most good delusions, there’s a kernel of truth there. Decades ago, lawmakers faced having to spend billions on building new prisons because of dramatically rising rates of incarceration. Instead, the state’s GOP-dominated Legislature reduced the prison population and mothballed several old lockups—mostly by reforming probation departments and funding more alternatives to prison, like substance use treatment programs and drug courts.
Protestors in Austin call to defund the police after the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 30, 2020. Gus Bova
While Texas conservatives have called the state “emblematic of the growing movement to be both tough and smart on crime,” lawmakers here have failed to do much else in recent years beyond avoiding billions in new prison spending. Even as traditionally tough-on-crime neighbors like Oklahoma relax drug laws, similar reforms fail in Texas session after session; despite a growing legalization movement across the country, the state still has some of the nation’s harshest marijuana laws on the books. Texas lawmakers named legislation after Sandra Bland in 2017 but have repeatedly failed to pass police reforms that would have prevented her violent roadside arrest in the first place. This session was no different: On the heels of the international movement sparked by the murder of George Floyd, a bipartisan coalition of Texas lawmakers vowed to push a series of reforms aimed at a “compassionate, common sense approach to justice.” Almost all of the reforms they proffered failed or were watered down.
While the Texas House took these issues at least somewhat seriously this session, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick’s Senate remained a killing field for bills aimed at reforming the criminal legal system. Meanwhile, conservative lawmakers rammed through other regressive measures —such as Governor Greg Abbott’s priority to punish cities that reduce funding for law enforcement, ensuring Texas police budgets remain bloated in perpetuity. Scott Henson is a writer and advocate for criminal justice reform who has tried to bridge the right and left on prison and policing issues at the Texas Legislature since the 1990s; he recently published a particularly bleak outlook on the 87th session, calling it part of broader “lurch toward totalitarianism.” At the very least, this session should kill any notion of Texas as a national leader when it comes to reforming criminal punishment and mass incarceration. —Michael Barajas
Labored Away
Essential workers, despite a year of being praised as “heroes” on billboards around the country, did not receive a hero’s treatment during Texas’ 87th legislative session. For instance, most state employees were denied a wage increase, extending a yearslong trend. Among the snubbed were workers at state-supported living centers, where employees who care for Texans with disabilities often earn less than $25,000 annually. The living centers, like nursing homes, were slammed with deadly COVID-19 outbreaks last year. The Legislature also declined to pass significant reform to its unemployment system, which failed spectacularly to provide prompt benefits to out-of-work Texans during the pandemic. El Paso state Representative Mary González, a Democrat, proposed a bill to create a public-facing database of employers who’ve committed wage theft, but the measure died for the fifth straight session.
“Essential workers, who risked everything to keep Texas going through [an] unprecedented pandemic and winter storm fallout, were hailed as heroes,” says Texas AFL-CIO President Rick Levy. “But as we survey where the legislative session ended up, all that is a foggy memory.” —Gus Bova
Corporate Immunity
State lawmakers passed two bills this session that would protect companies from lawsuits when they cause the death or injury of a person. House Bill 19 would make it more difficult to sue trucking companies after their drivers hurt or kill someone in a wreck. Senate Bill 6 would strengthen lawsuit protections during pandemics for nursing homes, which came under fire for failing to protect residents from COVID-19. State Representative Jeff Leach, a Republican from Allen, is carrying both House Bill 19 and the House companion for Senate Bill 6. Both bills have passed through the Legislature and await the governor’s signature.
A fatal accident near Major Drive in Beaumont, Texas, taken on September 20, 2018. Guiseppe Barranco /The Beaumont Enterprise via AP
In 2020, Leach received approximately $1 million in campaign contributions from the Texans for Lawsuit Reform PAC. For decades, the group has sought to erode plaintiff’s rights to sue as part of a larger movement known as tort reform. Texans for Lawsuit Reform and its allies have successfully lowered lawsuit risk for doctors, auto manufacturers, apartment owners, and others. If Governor Greg Abbott signs these bills into law, the group will count two more victories. —Christopher Collins
Indigenous People’s Day
Since 1977, a national movement to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous People’s Day has been growing across the United States. So far, Austin, Dallas, El Paso County, San Marcos, San Antonio, and Houston all recognize the holiday. Texas, however, does not. This session, the Texas House and Senate wrestled over whether or not to replace the day, ultimately deciding to opt for a Indigenous Peoples’ Week that will occur on the second week of October for the next 10 years. The final version of the resolution was passed unanimously by both the House and Senate.
The resolution recognizes that Indigenous people “built empires, constructed sophisticated cities, and developed elaborate trade networks and complex social systems.” Indigenous Peoples’ Week is intended to raise awareness about the rich heritage and contributions that Indigenous nations have made to Texas and the country. The governor has until June 20 to sign the bill into law. —Pauly Denetclaw
This article was first published on this site.
We trust you found the article above useful and/or interesting. Similar content can be found on our blog: southtxpointofsale.com
Please let me have your feedback below in the comments section.
Let us know which subjects we should write about for you in future.
youtube
#Point of Sale#clover Pos Reviews#Clover Support#lightspeed Pos Reviews#shopkeep App#shopkeep Pos#shopkeep Support#toast Pos Support#toast Restaurant Pos#touchbistro Reviews#touchbistro Support
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Text
News and useful information on POS and POS Hardware.
On Tuesday at the state Capitol, Governor Greg Abbott signed into law two bills aimed at strengthening the electric grid and reforming the agencies that regulate it. It was the culmination of the Legislature’s response to a devastating winter storm that crippled the state’s energy system and killed as many as 700 Texans, according to a recent Buzzfeed investigation.
Before signing the bills, Abbott confidently declared that “everything that needed to be done was done to fix the power grid in Texas.”
But for all the self-congratulation among state leaders this week, grid reform was but a minor feature of the legislative session. Republicans spent most of their time passing through extreme legislation that all but bans abortions, permits most anyone to carry a handgun without a license, restricts how race and history can be taught in Texas classrooms, punishes budget cuts in urban police deparments, and on and on.
The laws Abbott signed will require power plants to weatherize their facilities against extreme weather conditions, increase coordination between regulatory agencies, overhaul the leadership of those agencies, and institute a statewide weather alert system, among other things. The reforms are substantial—but energy experts warn that they go nowhere near far enough to actually prevent another winter catastrophe. Legislators went easy (again) on the natural gas industry. Senate Bill 3, the most comprehensive of the reforms, requires power generators and transmission line operators to weatherize their facilities. Despite the fact that natural gas supply disruptions were the biggest contributor to February’s grid meltdown, the law requires only gas facilities deemed to be “critical” to weatherize, a determination that will be made by the industry-friendly Railroad Commission.
A provision that would have helped fund backup power generators for critical water, electric, and health care facilities—including nursing homes and dialysis centers—was removed from SB3. And although hundreds of Texans were hospitalized for carbon monoxide poisoning, legislators didn’t consider joining 38 other states in requiring homes to have carbon monoxide detectors.
The law will take effect in six months. However, lawmakers declined to set a deadline for when regulators must begin actually enforcing the law. House Democrats proposed an amendment to establish a six-month deadline for enforcement after the regulatory agencies create their weatherization rules. But the bill’s architect, Representative Chris Paddie, R-Marshall, opposed the idea, citing “financial and operational concerns,” and the proposal was voted down. Another amendment to make penalties mandatory also failed.
A bill to reform the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT)—which politicians like Abbott blamed for the blackouts—will politicize board appointments by putting the governor, lieutenant governor, and House speaker in charge of the process. Another bill to strengthen the maligned Public Utility Commission, which oversees ERCOT, emerged from behind closed doors in much weaker form. The law currently requires all three commissioners to be “well informed and qualified in the field of public utilities and utility regulation.” That’s a reasonable expectation for regulators of the country’s second-largest electricity market, but legislators ultimately decided that applied to just two commissioners.
Overall, the Legislature failed to provide any relief to Texans who were devastated by the storm. A Senate amendment that would have provided direct relief aid to Texans was ultimately stripped out. Lawmakers did, however, manage to pass $6.5 billion in state bonds to stabilize natural gas and electric utilities that were hit by huge price spikes. The cost will be passed on to utility customers through a surcharge on their monthly bills, which means ordinary Texans will be paying a few extra bucks each month for at least the next couple decades.
For Abbott and other top Republicans, the 87th legislative session was all about political posturing ahead of a primary, where Abbott will be challenged by a former tea party senator, as well as the GOP party chair who spent the last weekend of session at a QAnon convention in Dallas. And Abbott’s camp believes it got what it needed. “It’s an excellent session,” Dave Carney, Abbott’s chief political strategist, told the Dallas Morning News. “We had a great number of items that are attractive to Republicans and independents. We’re in great shape.”
Still, there was much ballyhoo among Republicans after they failed to pass a number of conservative priorities, including their restrictive voting bill Senate Bill 7 (which was killed after House Democrats broke quorum). Republicans also ran out of time to wrap efforts to limit “taxpayer-funded” lobbying and pass so-called anti-censorship measures against big tech social media platforms. Abbott has already signaled that he’ll call a special session to bring up the “election integrity” legislation up again, along with what is sure to be a menagerie of other right-wing bugbears. —Justin Miller
Wrong on Crime
Texas is a collection of myths, one of which has recently framed the state as a national leader on “bipartisan criminal justice reform.” Like most good delusions, there’s a kernel of truth there. Decades ago, lawmakers faced having to spend billions on building new prisons because of dramatically rising rates of incarceration. Instead, the state’s GOP-dominated Legislature reduced the prison population and mothballed several old lockups—mostly by reforming probation departments and funding more alternatives to prison, like substance use treatment programs and drug courts.
Protestors in Austin call to defund the police after the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 30, 2020. Gus Bova
While Texas conservatives have called the state “emblematic of the growing movement to be both tough and smart on crime,” lawmakers here have failed to do much else in recent years beyond avoiding billions in new prison spending. Even as traditionally tough-on-crime neighbors like Oklahoma relax drug laws, similar reforms fail in Texas session after session; despite a growing legalization movement across the country, the state still has some of the nation’s harshest marijuana laws on the books. Texas lawmakers named legislation after Sandra Bland in 2017 but have repeatedly failed to pass police reforms that would have prevented her violent roadside arrest in the first place. This session was no different: On the heels of the international movement sparked by the murder of George Floyd, a bipartisan coalition of Texas lawmakers vowed to push a series of reforms aimed at a “compassionate, common sense approach to justice.” Almost all of the reforms they proffered failed or were watered down.
While the Texas House took these issues at least somewhat seriously this session, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick’s Senate remained a killing field for bills aimed at reforming the criminal legal system. Meanwhile, conservative lawmakers rammed through other regressive measures —such as Governor Greg Abbott’s priority to punish cities that reduce funding for law enforcement, ensuring Texas police budgets remain bloated in perpetuity. Scott Henson is a writer and advocate for criminal justice reform who has tried to bridge the right and left on prison and policing issues at the Texas Legislature since the 1990s; he recently published a particularly bleak outlook on the 87th session, calling it part of broader “lurch toward totalitarianism.” At the very least, this session should kill any notion of Texas as a national leader when it comes to reforming criminal punishment and mass incarceration. —Michael Barajas
Labored Away
Essential workers, despite a year of being praised as “heroes” on billboards around the country, did not receive a hero’s treatment during Texas’ 87th legislative session. For instance, most state employees were denied a wage increase, extending a yearslong trend. Among the snubbed were workers at state-supported living centers, where employees who care for Texans with disabilities often earn less than $25,000 annually. The living centers, like nursing homes, were slammed with deadly COVID-19 outbreaks last year. The Legislature also declined to pass significant reform to its unemployment system, which failed spectacularly to provide prompt benefits to out-of-work Texans during the pandemic. El Paso state Representative Mary González, a Democrat, proposed a bill to create a public-facing database of employers who’ve committed wage theft, but the measure died for the fifth straight session.
“Essential workers, who risked everything to keep Texas going through [an] unprecedented pandemic and winter storm fallout, were hailed as heroes,” says Texas AFL-CIO President Rick Levy. “But as we survey where the legislative session ended up, all that is a foggy memory.” —Gus Bova
Corporate Immunity
State lawmakers passed two bills this session that would protect companies from lawsuits when they cause the death or injury of a person. House Bill 19 would make it more difficult to sue trucking companies after their drivers hurt or kill someone in a wreck. Senate Bill 6 would strengthen lawsuit protections during pandemics for nursing homes, which came under fire for failing to protect residents from COVID-19. State Representative Jeff Leach, a Republican from Allen, is carrying both House Bill 19 and the House companion for Senate Bill 6. Both bills have passed through the Legislature and await the governor’s signature.
A fatal accident near Major Drive in Beaumont, Texas, taken on September 20, 2018. Guiseppe Barranco /The Beaumont Enterprise via AP
In 2020, Leach received approximately $1 million in campaign contributions from the Texans for Lawsuit Reform PAC. For decades, the group has sought to erode plaintiff’s rights to sue as part of a larger movement known as tort reform. Texans for Lawsuit Reform and its allies have successfully lowered lawsuit risk for doctors, auto manufacturers, apartment owners, and others. If Governor Greg Abbott signs these bills into law, the group will count two more victories. —Christopher Collins
Indigenous People’s Day
Since 1977, a national movement to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous People’s Day has been growing across the United States. So far, Austin, Dallas, El Paso County, San Marcos, San Antonio, and Houston all recognize the holiday. Texas, however, does not. This session, the Texas House and Senate wrestled over whether or not to replace the day, ultimately deciding to opt for a Indigenous Peoples’ Week that will occur on the second week of October for the next 10 years. The final version of the resolution was passed unanimously by both the House and Senate.
The resolution recognizes that Indigenous people “built empires, constructed sophisticated cities, and developed elaborate trade networks and complex social systems.” Indigenous Peoples’ Week is intended to raise awareness about the rich heritage and contributions that Indigenous nations have made to Texas and the country. The governor has until June 20 to sign the bill into law. —Pauly Denetclaw
This article was first published on this site.
We trust you found the article above useful and/or interesting. Similar content can be found on our blog: southtxpointofsale.com
Please let me have your feedback below in the comments section.
Let us know which subjects we should write about for you in future.
youtube
#Point of Sale#clover Pos Reviews#Clover Support#lightspeed Pos Reviews#shopkeep App#shopkeep Pos#shopkeep Support#toast Pos Support#toast Restaurant Pos#touchbistro Reviews#touchbistro Support
0 notes
Text
News and useful information on POS and POS Hardware.
On Tuesday at the state Capitol, Governor Greg Abbott signed into law two bills aimed at strengthening the electric grid and reforming the agencies that regulate it. It was the culmination of the Legislature’s response to a devastating winter storm that crippled the state’s energy system and killed as many as 700 Texans, according to a recent Buzzfeed investigation.
Before signing the bills, Abbott confidently declared that “everything that needed to be done was done to fix the power grid in Texas.”
But for all the self-congratulation among state leaders this week, grid reform was but a minor feature of the legislative session. Republicans spent most of their time passing through extreme legislation that all but bans abortions, permits most anyone to carry a handgun without a license, restricts how race and history can be taught in Texas classrooms, punishes budget cuts in urban police deparments, and on and on.
The laws Abbott signed will require power plants to weatherize their facilities against extreme weather conditions, increase coordination between regulatory agencies, overhaul the leadership of those agencies, and institute a statewide weather alert system, among other things. The reforms are substantial—but energy experts warn that they go nowhere near far enough to actually prevent another winter catastrophe. Legislators went easy (again) on the natural gas industry. Senate Bill 3, the most comprehensive of the reforms, requires power generators and transmission line operators to weatherize their facilities. Despite the fact that natural gas supply disruptions were the biggest contributor to February’s grid meltdown, the law requires only gas facilities deemed to be “critical” to weatherize, a determination that will be made by the industry-friendly Railroad Commission.
A provision that would have helped fund backup power generators for critical water, electric, and health care facilities—including nursing homes and dialysis centers—was removed from SB3. And although hundreds of Texans were hospitalized for carbon monoxide poisoning, legislators didn’t consider joining 38 other states in requiring homes to have carbon monoxide detectors.
The law will take effect in six months. However, lawmakers declined to set a deadline for when regulators must begin actually enforcing the law. House Democrats proposed an amendment to establish a six-month deadline for enforcement after the regulatory agencies create their weatherization rules. But the bill’s architect, Representative Chris Paddie, R-Marshall, opposed the idea, citing “financial and operational concerns,” and the proposal was voted down. Another amendment to make penalties mandatory also failed.
A bill to reform the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT)—which politicians like Abbott blamed for the blackouts—will politicize board appointments by putting the governor, lieutenant governor, and House speaker in charge of the process. Another bill to strengthen the maligned Public Utility Commission, which oversees ERCOT, emerged from behind closed doors in much weaker form. The law currently requires all three commissioners to be “well informed and qualified in the field of public utilities and utility regulation.” That’s a reasonable expectation for regulators of the country’s second-largest electricity market, but legislators ultimately decided that applied to just two commissioners.
Overall, the Legislature failed to provide any relief to Texans who were devastated by the storm. A Senate amendment that would have provided direct relief aid to Texans was ultimately stripped out. Lawmakers did, however, manage to pass $6.5 billion in state bonds to stabilize natural gas and electric utilities that were hit by huge price spikes. The cost will be passed on to utility customers through a surcharge on their monthly bills, which means ordinary Texans will be paying a few extra bucks each month for at least the next couple decades.
For Abbott and other top Republicans, the 87th legislative session was all about political posturing ahead of a primary, where Abbott will be challenged by a former tea party senator, as well as the GOP party chair who spent the last weekend of session at a QAnon convention in Dallas. And Abbott’s camp believes it got what it needed. “It’s an excellent session,” Dave Carney, Abbott’s chief political strategist, told the Dallas Morning News. “We had a great number of items that are attractive to Republicans and independents. We’re in great shape.”
Still, there was much ballyhoo among Republicans after they failed to pass a number of conservative priorities, including their restrictive voting bill Senate Bill 7 (which was killed after House Democrats broke quorum). Republicans also ran out of time to wrap efforts to limit “taxpayer-funded” lobbying and pass so-called anti-censorship measures against big tech social media platforms. Abbott has already signaled that he’ll call a special session to bring up the “election integrity” legislation up again, along with what is sure to be a menagerie of other right-wing bugbears. —Justin Miller
Wrong on Crime
Texas is a collection of myths, one of which has recently framed the state as a national leader on “bipartisan criminal justice reform.” Like most good delusions, there’s a kernel of truth there. Decades ago, lawmakers faced having to spend billions on building new prisons because of dramatically rising rates of incarceration. Instead, the state’s GOP-dominated Legislature reduced the prison population and mothballed several old lockups—mostly by reforming probation departments and funding more alternatives to prison, like substance use treatment programs and drug courts.
Protestors in Austin call to defund the police after the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 30, 2020. Gus Bova
While Texas conservatives have called the state “emblematic of the growing movement to be both tough and smart on crime,” lawmakers here have failed to do much else in recent years beyond avoiding billions in new prison spending. Even as traditionally tough-on-crime neighbors like Oklahoma relax drug laws, similar reforms fail in Texas session after session; despite a growing legalization movement across the country, the state still has some of the nation’s harshest marijuana laws on the books. Texas lawmakers named legislation after Sandra Bland in 2017 but have repeatedly failed to pass police reforms that would have prevented her violent roadside arrest in the first place. This session was no different: On the heels of the international movement sparked by the murder of George Floyd, a bipartisan coalition of Texas lawmakers vowed to push a series of reforms aimed at a “compassionate, common sense approach to justice.” Almost all of the reforms they proffered failed or were watered down.
While the Texas House took these issues at least somewhat seriously this session, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick’s Senate remained a killing field for bills aimed at reforming the criminal legal system. Meanwhile, conservative lawmakers rammed through other regressive measures —such as Governor Greg Abbott’s priority to punish cities that reduce funding for law enforcement, ensuring Texas police budgets remain bloated in perpetuity. Scott Henson is a writer and advocate for criminal justice reform who has tried to bridge the right and left on prison and policing issues at the Texas Legislature since the 1990s; he recently published a particularly bleak outlook on the 87th session, calling it part of broader “lurch toward totalitarianism.” At the very least, this session should kill any notion of Texas as a national leader when it comes to reforming criminal punishment and mass incarceration. —Michael Barajas
Labored Away
Essential workers, despite a year of being praised as “heroes” on billboards around the country, did not receive a hero’s treatment during Texas’ 87th legislative session. For instance, most state employees were denied a wage increase, extending a yearslong trend. Among the snubbed were workers at state-supported living centers, where employees who care for Texans with disabilities often earn less than $25,000 annually. The living centers, like nursing homes, were slammed with deadly COVID-19 outbreaks last year. The Legislature also declined to pass significant reform to its unemployment system, which failed spectacularly to provide prompt benefits to out-of-work Texans during the pandemic. El Paso state Representative Mary González, a Democrat, proposed a bill to create a public-facing database of employers who’ve committed wage theft, but the measure died for the fifth straight session.
“Essential workers, who risked everything to keep Texas going through [an] unprecedented pandemic and winter storm fallout, were hailed as heroes,” says Texas AFL-CIO President Rick Levy. “But as we survey where the legislative session ended up, all that is a foggy memory.” —Gus Bova
Corporate Immunity
State lawmakers passed two bills this session that would protect companies from lawsuits when they cause the death or injury of a person. House Bill 19 would make it more difficult to sue trucking companies after their drivers hurt or kill someone in a wreck. Senate Bill 6 would strengthen lawsuit protections during pandemics for nursing homes, which came under fire for failing to protect residents from COVID-19. State Representative Jeff Leach, a Republican from Allen, is carrying both House Bill 19 and the House companion for Senate Bill 6. Both bills have passed through the Legislature and await the governor’s signature.
A fatal accident near Major Drive in Beaumont, Texas, taken on September 20, 2018. Guiseppe Barranco /The Beaumont Enterprise via AP
In 2020, Leach received approximately $1 million in campaign contributions from the Texans for Lawsuit Reform PAC. For decades, the group has sought to erode plaintiff’s rights to sue as part of a larger movement known as tort reform. Texans for Lawsuit Reform and its allies have successfully lowered lawsuit risk for doctors, auto manufacturers, apartment owners, and others. If Governor Greg Abbott signs these bills into law, the group will count two more victories. —Christopher Collins
Indigenous People’s Day
Since 1977, a national movement to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous People’s Day has been growing across the United States. So far, Austin, Dallas, El Paso County, San Marcos, San Antonio, and Houston all recognize the holiday. Texas, however, does not. This session, the Texas House and Senate wrestled over whether or not to replace the day, ultimately deciding to opt for a Indigenous Peoples’ Week that will occur on the second week of October for the next 10 years. The final version of the resolution was passed unanimously by both the House and Senate.
The resolution recognizes that Indigenous people “built empires, constructed sophisticated cities, and developed elaborate trade networks and complex social systems.” Indigenous Peoples’ Week is intended to raise awareness about the rich heritage and contributions that Indigenous nations have made to Texas and the country. The governor has until June 20 to sign the bill into law. —Pauly Denetclaw
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As economy tries to recover, Trump's latest moves won't help
President Donald Trump's latest economic policies are the opposite of the emergency aid that Corporate America and Wall Street are clamoring for.
Trump may be calculating that tougher stances on immigration and trade could score him points in November. But they could backfire by making it harder for the economy to recover from this historic recession.
Trump is suddenly ramping up trade fights with two of the nation's biggest trading partners -- threatening to slap tariffs on goods like chocolate and butter from Europe, and reportedly pushing to reimpose tariffs on aluminum imports from Canada. Meanwhile, Trump this week also extended immigration restrictions, which could make it harder for businesses to find the skilled foreign workers they rely on.
All of this is happening during a drumbeat of bad coronavirus news, as infections surge in several areas.
Stocks tumbled Wednesday on concerns about the European tariff threat and the pandemic.
"This is exactly the wrong move at the wrong time. We're inching toward the same mistakes we made during the Great Depression," said Joe Brusuelas, chief economist at RSM International.
Economists agree the Great Depression was worsened by tariff policies -- namely, the Smoot-Hawley Act of 1930, which imposed tariffs on all countries that shipped products to America. Trading partners promptly retaliated by slapping tariffs on US goods.
"For many of us, Smoot-Hawley was a joke in 'Ferris Bueller's Day Off.' This is not a joke. This is very serious," Brusuelas said. "It would be a significant policy error that would put at risk the nascent recovery."
Trump's tariff threats are part of a US-European battle over government subsidies to aircraft makers. The World Trade Organization ruled in 2018 that the European Union helped Airbus with unfair subsidies, clearing the path for new tariffs from the United States. The Trump administration signaled this week it plans to retaliate by slapping tariffs on $3.1 billion of goods from Europe, including olives, chocolate, gin and yogurt.
But these tariffs would only add to the vast uncertainty in the world economy right now. The International Monetary Fund on Wednesday downgraded its global growth forecast, warning of a contraction of nearly 5% in 2020.
"This is not the time to engage in a trade war and [we] simply cannot believe that the WTO can't come up with a better solution," Win Thin, global head of currency strategy at Brown Brothers Harriman, wrote in a note to clients Wednesday.
'Like a bad horror movie'
The Trump administration is also pushing Canada to impose quotas to slow aluminum exports -- or else it will snap back a 10% tariff on the metal, Politico reported.
"Bringing back these tariffs would be like a bad horror movie," Neil Herrington, senior vice president for the Americas at the US Chamber of Commerce, said in a statement on Tuesday.
Although tariffs could help aluminum makers, they would add to the pain for the already-struggling auto industry.
"If anything, it's more likely to hurt American businesses than help them," said Gus Faucher, chief economist at PNC. "It's going to raise costs for producers and consumers."
The US-China trade war has already showed protectionism can depress business spending, dampen confidence and scramble supply chains. That's not to mention the blow it deals to the S&P 500, as companies like Nike and Apple generate a big chunk of their sales from overseas.
While US tariffs on Canada would have a relatively small impact on the economy, "certainly that's not what you want to be doing when you're trying to climb out of a steep recession," Faucher said.
'Shortsighted' immigration policies
Likewise, it's an odd time to crack down on immigration. Yet the Trump administration introduced new restrictions on visas that allow immigrants to temporarily work in the United States.
Trump signed an immigration proclamation in April that targeted people outside the United States trying to legally migrate to the country. That order was set to lapse -- but it will now be extended until the end of 2020 and expanded to include some guest worker visas.
The proclamation cited a desire to "protect unemployed Americans from the threat of competition for scarce jobs from new lawful permanent residents."
But economists warned restricting immigration is another policy error, especially during a pandemic.
"We're in the midst of a medical crisis. The last thing we want to do is discourage skilled workers from coming to the United States and helping us solve the problems we have," Faucher said.
Even before the pandemic, the US economy was growing too slowly in part because of an aging population. Underlying labor force growth is as weak as it has been since the end of World War II, according to Faucher. That in turn makes it harder to pay for the retirement of Baby Boomers.
"I'm concerned this is shortsighted," Faucher said.
Thomas Donohue, CEO of the US Chamber of Commerce, slammed the policy as a "severe and sweeping attempt to restrict legal immigration."
"Putting up a 'not welcome' sign for engineers, IT experts, doctors, nurses and other workers won't help our country, it will hold us back," Donohue said in comments that echoed criticism from the Business Roundtable.
Return of populism -- just in time for November
Taken together, the immigration and trade policies threaten to offset some of the enormous positives from the unprecedented stimulus unleashed by Congress and the White House.
Economists have largely applauded the emergency aid, which included stimulus checks to households and forgivable loans to small businesses.
"I give the administration high marks on the first rounds of aid," RSM's Brusuelas said. "But the threat of sparking a transatlantic trade war is not in the spirit of what they've done since the beginning of the pandemic."
That's why analysts say the moves are more about politics, than economics.
The latest polls show Trump badly trailing Joe Biden nationally and behind in must-win Rust Belt states.
"These two issues -- immigration and tariffs -- are crucial for Trump's reelection," Greg Valliere, chief US policy strategist at AGF Investments, wrote in a note to clients Wednesday. "He needs to show testosterone on both fronts...Trump's populist base demands jobs -- and protectionism."
But the risk is that by bowing to his base, Trump hinders the recovery that is required to win reelection.
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EU Internet Advocates Launch Campaign to Stop Dangerous Copyright Filtering Proposal
New Post has been published on https://universeinform.com/2017/03/10/eu-internet-advocates-launch-campaign-to-stop-dangerous-copyright-filtering-proposal/
EU Internet Advocates Launch Campaign to Stop Dangerous Copyright Filtering Proposal
In the wake of the ECU Fee’s risky inspiration to require person-generated content platforms to clear out user uploads for copyright infringement,
European virtual rights advocates are calling on Internet users at some point of Europe to arise for freedom of expression on-line by means of urging their MEP (Member of Eu Parliament) to prevent the #CensorshipMachine and “keep the meme.”
Final year, the EU Fee released a proposed Directive on Copyright Inside the virtual Unmarried Marketplace, Article 13 of which might require all online provider provides that “keep and offer to the public get right of entry to to massive amounts of works or different challenge-count uploaded via their users” to reach agreements with rights holders to maintain allegedly infringing content material off their websites – together with via imposing content material filtering technologies.
We’ve talked at duration about the dangers of this proposal and the problems with filtering the Internet for copyright infringement. For one element, it’s extremely risky for honest use and loose expression online.
This week, two Ecu-based corporations are calling on Net customers to get up for their rights to lawfully use copyrighted works and to name on the ECU Parliament to take away Article 13 from the proposed directive.
Bits of Freedom, a Netherlands-based totally business enterprise, released a campaign internet site where you can “shop the meme” by way of contacting an MEP and urging them to delete Article 13. The website calls attention to the proposed directive’s impact on popular criminal uses of copyrighted content, “like the parody, citations and –oh, noes! – memes,” and presents a handy tool for entering into touch together with your MEP.
Concurrently, the activist group Xnet, with an assist from EFF, EDRi, and numerous other virtual rights businesses released this video highlighting how Article thirteen might provide copyright holders the capability to censor a wide swath of online expression
Digital rights advocates aren’t the handiest ones seeing problems with this notion. Article 13 has been criticized by means of lectures and educational research facilities, and individuals of the EC U’s startup community as properly. And in advance this month,
And critical committee charged with reviewing the proposal, the EU Parliament Committee on the Internal Marketplace and Patron Safety, criticized Article 13 as “incompatible with the restricted legal responsibility regime” presently in impact Within the Eu under the e-Commerce Directive, regulation the committee refers to as “exceptionally useful
The committee’s file warns of Article 13’s “negative influences at the digital economic system [and] Internet freedoms of consumers, ” as well as its capability effect on Marketplace entry for online offerings. The Committee also criticized the concept’s call to enforce technological filtering answers,
Explaining “[t]he use of filtering probably harms the pastimes of customers, as there are numerous valid makes use off of copyright content material that filtering technologies are frequently no longer advanced enough to deal with
Suggestion Writing Primer
Periodically, a Solopreneur consultant must write a proposal. Some businesses, mainly government entities, will publicly announce that a venture is available and request bids that should be submitted in Concept form.
Now and again, a Solopreneur may additionally receive a request to post a proposal (RFP) from an unknown celebration. Experience will ultimately train you to no longer reply to a surprise RFP.
Perpetually, a surprising RFP is despatched by way of a phantom customer who is either fishing for pricing information or in search of to acquire extra proposals when it has already been determined who might be employed for the project in the query, however, company policy mandates that a positive number of proposals ought to be reviewed.
publish proposals simplest after you’ve got spoken with the choice-maker and acquired an invite. If you’ve set it up proper, the Idea will serve as an affirmation letter that spells out task information which has been formerly mentioned and agreed-upon.
an invitation to jot down a proposal is an opportunity with the intention to shine. Show off yourself, your logo, and your know-how and write a powerful record that well-known shows your analytic prowess, writing capacity, practicality, and creativity.
Observe the requirements
If there’s a written RFP, Examine the necessities and make be aware of the submission on the line cut-off date. Is the venture a good suit on your agency? Do you’ve got time to write down a worth Idea? If you meet with the customer beforehand to talk about the undertaking, take exact notes and verify that you recognize the desires, specifications,
And expectancies concerned. Do you’ve got the know-how and resources to do the activity? Are you able to obtain the goals within the timeframe? Can you do the task inside the price range? should you sub-agreement training session and if so, will you be able to make an income from the venture?
Deliver an out on online of the current state of affairs that has given upward thrust to the need for the project.
Kingdom the dreams of the undertaking, expected consequences, or deliverables.
Describe why you and your enterprise are uniquely qualified to effectively entire the undertaking.
Gift your proposed technique for achieving the challenge objectives and goals.
Element the timeline and cost (the justification of your proposed price).
Fortify the benefits associated with attaining the challenge goals, effects, or deliverables.
Eventually, make certain that your Suggestion addresses all elements of the RFP or consumer desires. Take a look at your spelling and grammar. Cross and think about examples of proposals; discover a format that visually communicates you and your logo and makes that your template. If tough reproduction needs to be submitted, print your file on an accurate paper stock.
How Do I Find a Precise Political Marketing campaign Manager
Nearly each high-quality Marketing campaign has a wonderful political Campaign Supervisor status in the back of it. Aside from the candidate, the Campaign Manager is the maximum essential character on the team,
Accountable no longer handiest for the everyday operations of the Marketing campaign, but also for a big part of the large image making plans and strategy.
Small local campaigns regularly have a hard time finding a certified and available Marketing campaign Manager. frequently, their solution is to have the candidate serve as his own Campaign Manager, guiding a crew of volunteers, family, and pals. This is a huge mistake.
Each Campaign needs a Supervisor that isn’t always the candidate, although the Manager is best a volunteer or component-time staff member. Applicants want to shake hands, make speeches, and ask for donations… They can not do the one’s jobs if they are also seeking to run the everyday operations of the Marketing campaign.
Where, then, can a small, nearby Marketing campaign Find a talented Manager? Right here are a few locations to start the quest:-Managers of Beyond Elections – communicate to former Applicants for the workplace you’re in search of, as well as Applicants and politicians in your place to find out who’s walking the smaller campaigns in your network and whether or not they are available.
Managers of Beyond Elections – communicate to former Applicants for the workplace you’re in search of, as well as Applicants and politicians in your place to find out who’s walking the smaller campaigns in your network and whether or not they are available.
Your neighborhood Political Party – name your neighborhood Birthday party headquarters and ask who they would recommend. often, political operatives with just a few campaigns below their belt preserve a courting with neighborhood Party workplaces seeking new opportunities.
-Recent University Graduates – test together with your local University’s political science department (each undergrad and graduate applications) to look in the event that they recognize anybody who might be interested in getting their fat wet in a Campaign control role. You would be amazed what number of poli sci majors in University additionally have sizable volunteer Marketing campaign enjoy by the time they graduate.
Friends of the Candidate – at the same time as it’s far often greater appropriate to have a political Marketing campaign Manager who has Marketing campaign enjoy, it isn’t always continually viable to discover a person who has enjoy and is to be had. beneath these occasions
E-Marketing campaign should are searching for out a friend of the candidate who’s organized, assured, and willing to learn to serve as Marketing campaign Supervisor, probably with ongoing recommend from paid consultants.
The Marketing campaign should are searching for out a friend of the candidate who’s organized, assured, and willing to learn to serve as Marketing campaign Supervisor, probably with ongoing recommend from paid consultants.
Finding an outstanding political Campaign Supervisor is a hard assignment for campaigns without great exposure or lots of cash, but it may be executed. Ask around,
Speak to previous Applicants and modern-day politicians, and take into account your local University campus. Notably, remember the fact that letting the candidate serve as his or her own Campaign Manager is usually a recipe for the problem.
Father or mother Nurses Healthcare Advocates
In state-of-the-art advanced global, the technology and logistics of health care can be a complicated issue for many humans. The Guardian Nurses Healthcare Advocates are doing their component to make fitness care just a little less perplexing for the ones in want.
Mom or dad Nurses Healthcare Advocates assist their communities with fitness care plans and the fitness care machine. Advocates are available to patients of every age and races, regardless of the patient’s circumstance.
Those advocates do their component to assist folks that need assist maximum find affordable care, remarkable assets, and proper coverage.
The Parent Nurses Healthcare Advocates become based in 2003 by using Betty Lengthy, RN, MHA. Some months later, her advocacy grew with the addition of three nurses helping ten clients. This group becomes examined in 2005 via 7,500 police officers with a pilot program via Regulation Enforcement health Benefits in an effort to decide the impact of nursing advocacy on fitness care prices.
The enterprise changed into publicized in 2006 through their inclusion inside the Pennsylvania Small Enterprise Centers’ Consumer Exposition entitled, We Suggest Commercial enterprise, applauded as considered one of Pennsylvania’s high-quality small groups.
The same year, the Regulation Enforcement health Benefits organization multiplied their courting with them as a result of just about million greenbacks in claims’ financial savings all through the pilot program.
Due to the fact 2006, a number of Pennsylvania-based totally corporations and unions have signed directly to take advantage of the bdd5b54adb3c84011c7516ef3ab47e54 provided by Betty Long’s advocacy institution. Mom or dad Nurses has become a certified Girls’
Enterprise Agency. Lengthy herself has been praised for her true deeds and powerful Business management, nominated for Small Enterprise Affiliation’s annual Entrepreneur of the yr Award and commemorated through Glamour Magazine and Tag Heuer North America for her correct works in the network.
affected person advocates sit down in on health practitioner’s appointments, and may help stressed patients sift through the medical jargon and insurance lingo to discover the nice course of treatment. These advocates come from the medical area and are well-versed in the world of fitness care.
Former nurses and fitness care employees are best applicants for patient advocacy positions, with the experience had to apprehend physician commands and help discern out coverage claims.
Because of their fitness care enjoy the affected person advocates operating with the Dad or mom Nurses Healthcare Advocates often have sources no longer available to contributors of the lay community
With connections to insurance companies and understanding knowledge of nearby specialists, the Mum or dad Nurses Healthcare Advocates can provide records and more that can not be determined everywhere else.
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News and useful information on POS and POS Hardware.
On Tuesday at the state Capitol, Governor Greg Abbott signed into law two bills aimed at strengthening the electric grid and reforming the agencies that regulate it. It was the culmination of the Legislature’s response to a devastating winter storm that crippled the state’s energy system and killed as many as 700 Texans, according to a recent Buzzfeed investigation.
Before signing the bills, Abbott confidently declared that “everything that needed to be done was done to fix the power grid in Texas.”
But for all the self-congratulation among state leaders this week, grid reform was but a minor feature of the legislative session. Republicans spent most of their time passing through extreme legislation that all but bans abortions, permits most anyone to carry a handgun without a license, restricts how race and history can be taught in Texas classrooms, punishes budget cuts in urban police deparments, and on and on.
The laws Abbott signed will require power plants to weatherize their facilities against extreme weather conditions, increase coordination between regulatory agencies, overhaul the leadership of those agencies, and institute a statewide weather alert system, among other things. The reforms are substantial—but energy experts warn that they go nowhere near far enough to actually prevent another winter catastrophe. Legislators went easy (again) on the natural gas industry. Senate Bill 3, the most comprehensive of the reforms, requires power generators and transmission line operators to weatherize their facilities. Despite the fact that natural gas supply disruptions were the biggest contributor to February’s grid meltdown, the law requires only gas facilities deemed to be “critical” to weatherize, a determination that will be made by the industry-friendly Railroad Commission.
A provision that would have helped fund backup power generators for critical water, electric, and health care facilities—including nursing homes and dialysis centers—was removed from SB3. And although hundreds of Texans were hospitalized for carbon monoxide poisoning, legislators didn’t consider joining 38 other states in requiring homes to have carbon monoxide detectors.
The law will take effect in six months. However, lawmakers declined to set a deadline for when regulators must begin actually enforcing the law. House Democrats proposed an amendment to establish a six-month deadline for enforcement after the regulatory agencies create their weatherization rules. But the bill’s architect, Representative Chris Paddie, R-Marshall, opposed the idea, citing “financial and operational concerns,” and the proposal was voted down. Another amendment to make penalties mandatory also failed.
A bill to reform the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT)—which politicians like Abbott blamed for the blackouts—will politicize board appointments by putting the governor, lieutenant governor, and House speaker in charge of the process. Another bill to strengthen the maligned Public Utility Commission, which oversees ERCOT, emerged from behind closed doors in much weaker form. The law currently requires all three commissioners to be “well informed and qualified in the field of public utilities and utility regulation.” That’s a reasonable expectation for regulators of the country’s second-largest electricity market, but legislators ultimately decided that applied to just two commissioners.
Overall, the Legislature failed to provide any relief to Texans who were devastated by the storm. A Senate amendment that would have provided direct relief aid to Texans was ultimately stripped out. Lawmakers did, however, manage to pass $6.5 billion in state bonds to stabilize natural gas and electric utilities that were hit by huge price spikes. The cost will be passed on to utility customers through a surcharge on their monthly bills, which means ordinary Texans will be paying a few extra bucks each month for at least the next couple decades.
For Abbott and other top Republicans, the 87th legislative session was all about political posturing ahead of a primary, where Abbott will be challenged by a former tea party senator, as well as the GOP party chair who spent the last weekend of session at a QAnon convention in Dallas. And Abbott’s camp believes it got what it needed. “It’s an excellent session,” Dave Carney, Abbott’s chief political strategist, told the Dallas Morning News. “We had a great number of items that are attractive to Republicans and independents. We’re in great shape.”
Still, there was much ballyhoo among Republicans after they failed to pass a number of conservative priorities, including their restrictive voting bill Senate Bill 7 (which was killed after House Democrats broke quorum). Republicans also ran out of time to wrap efforts to limit “taxpayer-funded” lobbying and pass so-called anti-censorship measures against big tech social media platforms. Abbott has already signaled that he’ll call a special session to bring up the “election integrity” legislation up again, along with what is sure to be a menagerie of other right-wing bugbears. —Justin Miller
Wrong on Crime
Texas is a collection of myths, one of which has recently framed the state as a national leader on “bipartisan criminal justice reform.” Like most good delusions, there’s a kernel of truth there. Decades ago, lawmakers faced having to spend billions on building new prisons because of dramatically rising rates of incarceration. Instead, the state’s GOP-dominated Legislature reduced the prison population and mothballed several old lockups—mostly by reforming probation departments and funding more alternatives to prison, like substance use treatment programs and drug courts.
Protestors in Austin call to defund the police after the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 30, 2020. Gus Bova
While Texas conservatives have called the state “emblematic of the growing movement to be both tough and smart on crime,” lawmakers here have failed to do much else in recent years beyond avoiding billions in new prison spending. Even as traditionally tough-on-crime neighbors like Oklahoma relax drug laws, similar reforms fail in Texas session after session; despite a growing legalization movement across the country, the state still has some of the nation’s harshest marijuana laws on the books. Texas lawmakers named legislation after Sandra Bland in 2017 but have repeatedly failed to pass police reforms that would have prevented her violent roadside arrest in the first place. This session was no different: On the heels of the international movement sparked by the murder of George Floyd, a bipartisan coalition of Texas lawmakers vowed to push a series of reforms aimed at a “compassionate, common sense approach to justice.” Almost all of the reforms they proffered failed or were watered down.
While the Texas House took these issues at least somewhat seriously this session, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick’s Senate remained a killing field for bills aimed at reforming the criminal legal system. Meanwhile, conservative lawmakers rammed through other regressive measures —such as Governor Greg Abbott’s priority to punish cities that reduce funding for law enforcement, ensuring Texas police budgets remain bloated in perpetuity. Scott Henson is a writer and advocate for criminal justice reform who has tried to bridge the right and left on prison and policing issues at the Texas Legislature since the 1990s; he recently published a particularly bleak outlook on the 87th session, calling it part of broader “lurch toward totalitarianism.” At the very least, this session should kill any notion of Texas as a national leader when it comes to reforming criminal punishment and mass incarceration. —Michael Barajas
Labored Away
Essential workers, despite a year of being praised as “heroes” on billboards around the country, did not receive a hero’s treatment during Texas’ 87th legislative session. For instance, most state employees were denied a wage increase, extending a yearslong trend. Among the snubbed were workers at state-supported living centers, where employees who care for Texans with disabilities often earn less than $25,000 annually. The living centers, like nursing homes, were slammed with deadly COVID-19 outbreaks last year. The Legislature also declined to pass significant reform to its unemployment system, which failed spectacularly to provide prompt benefits to out-of-work Texans during the pandemic. El Paso state Representative Mary González, a Democrat, proposed a bill to create a public-facing database of employers who’ve committed wage theft, but the measure died for the fifth straight session.
“Essential workers, who risked everything to keep Texas going through [an] unprecedented pandemic and winter storm fallout, were hailed as heroes,” says Texas AFL-CIO President Rick Levy. “But as we survey where the legislative session ended up, all that is a foggy memory.” —Gus Bova
Corporate Immunity
State lawmakers passed two bills this session that would protect companies from lawsuits when they cause the death or injury of a person. House Bill 19 would make it more difficult to sue trucking companies after their drivers hurt or kill someone in a wreck. Senate Bill 6 would strengthen lawsuit protections during pandemics for nursing homes, which came under fire for failing to protect residents from COVID-19. State Representative Jeff Leach, a Republican from Allen, is carrying both House Bill 19 and the House companion for Senate Bill 6. Both bills have passed through the Legislature and await the governor’s signature.
A fatal accident near Major Drive in Beaumont, Texas, taken on September 20, 2018. Guiseppe Barranco /The Beaumont Enterprise via AP
In 2020, Leach received approximately $1 million in campaign contributions from the Texans for Lawsuit Reform PAC. For decades, the group has sought to erode plaintiff’s rights to sue as part of a larger movement known as tort reform. Texans for Lawsuit Reform and its allies have successfully lowered lawsuit risk for doctors, auto manufacturers, apartment owners, and others. If Governor Greg Abbott signs these bills into law, the group will count two more victories. —Christopher Collins
Indigenous People’s Day
Since 1977, a national movement to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous People’s Day has been growing across the United States. So far, Austin, Dallas, El Paso County, San Marcos, San Antonio, and Houston all recognize the holiday. Texas, however, does not. This session, the Texas House and Senate wrestled over whether or not to replace the day, ultimately deciding to opt for a Indigenous Peoples’ Week that will occur on the second week of October for the next 10 years. The final version of the resolution was passed unanimously by both the House and Senate.
The resolution recognizes that Indigenous people “built empires, constructed sophisticated cities, and developed elaborate trade networks and complex social systems.” Indigenous Peoples’ Week is intended to raise awareness about the rich heritage and contributions that Indigenous nations have made to Texas and the country. The governor has until June 20 to sign the bill into law. —Pauly Denetclaw
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On Tuesday at the state Capitol, Governor Greg Abbott signed into law two bills aimed at strengthening the electric grid and reforming the agencies that regulate it. It was the culmination of the Legislature’s response to a devastating winter storm that crippled the state’s energy system and killed as many as 700 Texans, according to a recent Buzzfeed investigation.
Before signing the bills, Abbott confidently declared that “everything that needed to be done was done to fix the power grid in Texas.”
But for all the self-congratulation among state leaders this week, grid reform was but a minor feature of the legislative session. Republicans spent most of their time passing through extreme legislation that all but bans abortions, permits most anyone to carry a handgun without a license, restricts how race and history can be taught in Texas classrooms, punishes budget cuts in urban police deparments, and on and on.
The laws Abbott signed will require power plants to weatherize their facilities against extreme weather conditions, increase coordination between regulatory agencies, overhaul the leadership of those agencies, and institute a statewide weather alert system, among other things. The reforms are substantial—but energy experts warn that they go nowhere near far enough to actually prevent another winter catastrophe. Legislators went easy (again) on the natural gas industry. Senate Bill 3, the most comprehensive of the reforms, requires power generators and transmission line operators to weatherize their facilities. Despite the fact that natural gas supply disruptions were the biggest contributor to February’s grid meltdown, the law requires only gas facilities deemed to be “critical” to weatherize, a determination that will be made by the industry-friendly Railroad Commission.
A provision that would have helped fund backup power generators for critical water, electric, and health care facilities—including nursing homes and dialysis centers—was removed from SB3. And although hundreds of Texans were hospitalized for carbon monoxide poisoning, legislators didn’t consider joining 38 other states in requiring homes to have carbon monoxide detectors.
The law will take effect in six months. However, lawmakers declined to set a deadline for when regulators must begin actually enforcing the law. House Democrats proposed an amendment to establish a six-month deadline for enforcement after the regulatory agencies create their weatherization rules. But the bill’s architect, Representative Chris Paddie, R-Marshall, opposed the idea, citing “financial and operational concerns,” and the proposal was voted down. Another amendment to make penalties mandatory also failed.
A bill to reform the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT)—which politicians like Abbott blamed for the blackouts—will politicize board appointments by putting the governor, lieutenant governor, and House speaker in charge of the process. Another bill to strengthen the maligned Public Utility Commission, which oversees ERCOT, emerged from behind closed doors in much weaker form. The law currently requires all three commissioners to be “well informed and qualified in the field of public utilities and utility regulation.” That’s a reasonable expectation for regulators of the country’s second-largest electricity market, but legislators ultimately decided that applied to just two commissioners.
Overall, the Legislature failed to provide any relief to Texans who were devastated by the storm. A Senate amendment that would have provided direct relief aid to Texans was ultimately stripped out. Lawmakers did, however, manage to pass $6.5 billion in state bonds to stabilize natural gas and electric utilities that were hit by huge price spikes. The cost will be passed on to utility customers through a surcharge on their monthly bills, which means ordinary Texans will be paying a few extra bucks each month for at least the next couple decades.
For Abbott and other top Republicans, the 87th legislative session was all about political posturing ahead of a primary, where Abbott will be challenged by a former tea party senator, as well as the GOP party chair who spent the last weekend of session at a QAnon convention in Dallas. And Abbott’s camp believes it got what it needed. “It’s an excellent session,” Dave Carney, Abbott’s chief political strategist, told the Dallas Morning News. “We had a great number of items that are attractive to Republicans and independents. We’re in great shape.”
Still, there was much ballyhoo among Republicans after they failed to pass a number of conservative priorities, including their restrictive voting bill Senate Bill 7 (which was killed after House Democrats broke quorum). Republicans also ran out of time to wrap efforts to limit “taxpayer-funded” lobbying and pass so-called anti-censorship measures against big tech social media platforms. Abbott has already signaled that he’ll call a special session to bring up the “election integrity” legislation up again, along with what is sure to be a menagerie of other right-wing bugbears. —Justin Miller
Wrong on Crime
Texas is a collection of myths, one of which has recently framed the state as a national leader on “bipartisan criminal justice reform.” Like most good delusions, there’s a kernel of truth there. Decades ago, lawmakers faced having to spend billions on building new prisons because of dramatically rising rates of incarceration. Instead, the state’s GOP-dominated Legislature reduced the prison population and mothballed several old lockups—mostly by reforming probation departments and funding more alternatives to prison, like substance use treatment programs and drug courts.
Protestors in Austin call to defund the police after the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 30, 2020. Gus Bova
While Texas conservatives have called the state “emblematic of the growing movement to be both tough and smart on crime,” lawmakers here have failed to do much else in recent years beyond avoiding billions in new prison spending. Even as traditionally tough-on-crime neighbors like Oklahoma relax drug laws, similar reforms fail in Texas session after session; despite a growing legalization movement across the country, the state still has some of the nation’s harshest marijuana laws on the books. Texas lawmakers named legislation after Sandra Bland in 2017 but have repeatedly failed to pass police reforms that would have prevented her violent roadside arrest in the first place. This session was no different: On the heels of the international movement sparked by the murder of George Floyd, a bipartisan coalition of Texas lawmakers vowed to push a series of reforms aimed at a “compassionate, common sense approach to justice.” Almost all of the reforms they proffered failed or were watered down.
While the Texas House took these issues at least somewhat seriously this session, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick’s Senate remained a killing field for bills aimed at reforming the criminal legal system. Meanwhile, conservative lawmakers rammed through other regressive measures —such as Governor Greg Abbott’s priority to punish cities that reduce funding for law enforcement, ensuring Texas police budgets remain bloated in perpetuity. Scott Henson is a writer and advocate for criminal justice reform who has tried to bridge the right and left on prison and policing issues at the Texas Legislature since the 1990s; he recently published a particularly bleak outlook on the 87th session, calling it part of broader “lurch toward totalitarianism.” At the very least, this session should kill any notion of Texas as a national leader when it comes to reforming criminal punishment and mass incarceration. —Michael Barajas
Labored Away
Essential workers, despite a year of being praised as “heroes” on billboards around the country, did not receive a hero’s treatment during Texas’ 87th legislative session. For instance, most state employees were denied a wage increase, extending a yearslong trend. Among the snubbed were workers at state-supported living centers, where employees who care for Texans with disabilities often earn less than $25,000 annually. The living centers, like nursing homes, were slammed with deadly COVID-19 outbreaks last year. The Legislature also declined to pass significant reform to its unemployment system, which failed spectacularly to provide prompt benefits to out-of-work Texans during the pandemic. El Paso state Representative Mary González, a Democrat, proposed a bill to create a public-facing database of employers who’ve committed wage theft, but the measure died for the fifth straight session.
“Essential workers, who risked everything to keep Texas going through [an] unprecedented pandemic and winter storm fallout, were hailed as heroes,” says Texas AFL-CIO President Rick Levy. “But as we survey where the legislative session ended up, all that is a foggy memory.” —Gus Bova
Corporate Immunity
State lawmakers passed two bills this session that would protect companies from lawsuits when they cause the death or injury of a person. House Bill 19 would make it more difficult to sue trucking companies after their drivers hurt or kill someone in a wreck. Senate Bill 6 would strengthen lawsuit protections during pandemics for nursing homes, which came under fire for failing to protect residents from COVID-19. State Representative Jeff Leach, a Republican from Allen, is carrying both House Bill 19 and the House companion for Senate Bill 6. Both bills have passed through the Legislature and await the governor’s signature.
A fatal accident near Major Drive in Beaumont, Texas, taken on September 20, 2018. Guiseppe Barranco /The Beaumont Enterprise via AP
In 2020, Leach received approximately $1 million in campaign contributions from the Texans for Lawsuit Reform PAC. For decades, the group has sought to erode plaintiff’s rights to sue as part of a larger movement known as tort reform. Texans for Lawsuit Reform and its allies have successfully lowered lawsuit risk for doctors, auto manufacturers, apartment owners, and others. If Governor Greg Abbott signs these bills into law, the group will count two more victories. —Christopher Collins
Indigenous People’s Day
Since 1977, a national movement to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous People’s Day has been growing across the United States. So far, Austin, Dallas, El Paso County, San Marcos, San Antonio, and Houston all recognize the holiday. Texas, however, does not. This session, the Texas House and Senate wrestled over whether or not to replace the day, ultimately deciding to opt for a Indigenous Peoples’ Week that will occur on the second week of October for the next 10 years. The final version of the resolution was passed unanimously by both the House and Senate.
The resolution recognizes that Indigenous people “built empires, constructed sophisticated cities, and developed elaborate trade networks and complex social systems.” Indigenous Peoples’ Week is intended to raise awareness about the rich heritage and contributions that Indigenous nations have made to Texas and the country. The governor has until June 20 to sign the bill into law. —Pauly Denetclaw
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On Tuesday at the state Capitol, Governor Greg Abbott signed into law two bills aimed at strengthening the electric grid and reforming the agencies that regulate it. It was the culmination of the Legislature’s response to a devastating winter storm that crippled the state’s energy system and killed as many as 700 Texans, according to a recent Buzzfeed investigation.
Before signing the bills, Abbott confidently declared that “everything that needed to be done was done to fix the power grid in Texas.”
But for all the self-congratulation among state leaders this week, grid reform was but a minor feature of the legislative session. Republicans spent most of their time passing through extreme legislation that all but bans abortions, permits most anyone to carry a handgun without a license, restricts how race and history can be taught in Texas classrooms, punishes budget cuts in urban police deparments, and on and on.
The laws Abbott signed will require power plants to weatherize their facilities against extreme weather conditions, increase coordination between regulatory agencies, overhaul the leadership of those agencies, and institute a statewide weather alert system, among other things. The reforms are substantial—but energy experts warn that they go nowhere near far enough to actually prevent another winter catastrophe. Legislators went easy (again) on the natural gas industry. Senate Bill 3, the most comprehensive of the reforms, requires power generators and transmission line operators to weatherize their facilities. Despite the fact that natural gas supply disruptions were the biggest contributor to February’s grid meltdown, the law requires only gas facilities deemed to be “critical” to weatherize, a determination that will be made by the industry-friendly Railroad Commission.
A provision that would have helped fund backup power generators for critical water, electric, and health care facilities—including nursing homes and dialysis centers—was removed from SB3. And although hundreds of Texans were hospitalized for carbon monoxide poisoning, legislators didn’t consider joining 38 other states in requiring homes to have carbon monoxide detectors.
The law will take effect in six months. However, lawmakers declined to set a deadline for when regulators must begin actually enforcing the law. House Democrats proposed an amendment to establish a six-month deadline for enforcement after the regulatory agencies create their weatherization rules. But the bill’s architect, Representative Chris Paddie, R-Marshall, opposed the idea, citing “financial and operational concerns,” and the proposal was voted down. Another amendment to make penalties mandatory also failed.
A bill to reform the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT)—which politicians like Abbott blamed for the blackouts—will politicize board appointments by putting the governor, lieutenant governor, and House speaker in charge of the process. Another bill to strengthen the maligned Public Utility Commission, which oversees ERCOT, emerged from behind closed doors in much weaker form. The law currently requires all three commissioners to be “well informed and qualified in the field of public utilities and utility regulation.” That’s a reasonable expectation for regulators of the country’s second-largest electricity market, but legislators ultimately decided that applied to just two commissioners.
Overall, the Legislature failed to provide any relief to Texans who were devastated by the storm. A Senate amendment that would have provided direct relief aid to Texans was ultimately stripped out. Lawmakers did, however, manage to pass $6.5 billion in state bonds to stabilize natural gas and electric utilities that were hit by huge price spikes. The cost will be passed on to utility customers through a surcharge on their monthly bills, which means ordinary Texans will be paying a few extra bucks each month for at least the next couple decades.
For Abbott and other top Republicans, the 87th legislative session was all about political posturing ahead of a primary, where Abbott will be challenged by a former tea party senator, as well as the GOP party chair who spent the last weekend of session at a QAnon convention in Dallas. And Abbott’s camp believes it got what it needed. “It’s an excellent session,” Dave Carney, Abbott’s chief political strategist, told the Dallas Morning News. “We had a great number of items that are attractive to Republicans and independents. We’re in great shape.”
Still, there was much ballyhoo among Republicans after they failed to pass a number of conservative priorities, including their restrictive voting bill Senate Bill 7 (which was killed after House Democrats broke quorum). Republicans also ran out of time to wrap efforts to limit “taxpayer-funded” lobbying and pass so-called anti-censorship measures against big tech social media platforms. Abbott has already signaled that he’ll call a special session to bring up the “election integrity” legislation up again, along with what is sure to be a menagerie of other right-wing bugbears. —Justin Miller
Wrong on Crime
Texas is a collection of myths, one of which has recently framed the state as a national leader on “bipartisan criminal justice reform.” Like most good delusions, there’s a kernel of truth there. Decades ago, lawmakers faced having to spend billions on building new prisons because of dramatically rising rates of incarceration. Instead, the state’s GOP-dominated Legislature reduced the prison population and mothballed several old lockups—mostly by reforming probation departments and funding more alternatives to prison, like substance use treatment programs and drug courts.
Protestors in Austin call to defund the police after the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 30, 2020. Gus Bova
While Texas conservatives have called the state “emblematic of the growing movement to be both tough and smart on crime,” lawmakers here have failed to do much else in recent years beyond avoiding billions in new prison spending. Even as traditionally tough-on-crime neighbors like Oklahoma relax drug laws, similar reforms fail in Texas session after session; despite a growing legalization movement across the country, the state still has some of the nation’s harshest marijuana laws on the books. Texas lawmakers named legislation after Sandra Bland in 2017 but have repeatedly failed to pass police reforms that would have prevented her violent roadside arrest in the first place. This session was no different: On the heels of the international movement sparked by the murder of George Floyd, a bipartisan coalition of Texas lawmakers vowed to push a series of reforms aimed at a “compassionate, common sense approach to justice.” Almost all of the reforms they proffered failed or were watered down.
While the Texas House took these issues at least somewhat seriously this session, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick’s Senate remained a killing field for bills aimed at reforming the criminal legal system. Meanwhile, conservative lawmakers rammed through other regressive measures —such as Governor Greg Abbott’s priority to punish cities that reduce funding for law enforcement, ensuring Texas police budgets remain bloated in perpetuity. Scott Henson is a writer and advocate for criminal justice reform who has tried to bridge the right and left on prison and policing issues at the Texas Legislature since the 1990s; he recently published a particularly bleak outlook on the 87th session, calling it part of broader “lurch toward totalitarianism.” At the very least, this session should kill any notion of Texas as a national leader when it comes to reforming criminal punishment and mass incarceration. —Michael Barajas
Labored Away
Essential workers, despite a year of being praised as “heroes” on billboards around the country, did not receive a hero’s treatment during Texas’ 87th legislative session. For instance, most state employees were denied a wage increase, extending a yearslong trend. Among the snubbed were workers at state-supported living centers, where employees who care for Texans with disabilities often earn less than $25,000 annually. The living centers, like nursing homes, were slammed with deadly COVID-19 outbreaks last year. The Legislature also declined to pass significant reform to its unemployment system, which failed spectacularly to provide prompt benefits to out-of-work Texans during the pandemic. El Paso state Representative Mary González, a Democrat, proposed a bill to create a public-facing database of employers who’ve committed wage theft, but the measure died for the fifth straight session.
“Essential workers, who risked everything to keep Texas going through [an] unprecedented pandemic and winter storm fallout, were hailed as heroes,” says Texas AFL-CIO President Rick Levy. “But as we survey where the legislative session ended up, all that is a foggy memory.” —Gus Bova
Corporate Immunity
State lawmakers passed two bills this session that would protect companies from lawsuits when they cause the death or injury of a person. House Bill 19 would make it more difficult to sue trucking companies after their drivers hurt or kill someone in a wreck. Senate Bill 6 would strengthen lawsuit protections during pandemics for nursing homes, which came under fire for failing to protect residents from COVID-19. State Representative Jeff Leach, a Republican from Allen, is carrying both House Bill 19 and the House companion for Senate Bill 6. Both bills have passed through the Legislature and await the governor’s signature.
A fatal accident near Major Drive in Beaumont, Texas, taken on September 20, 2018. Guiseppe Barranco /The Beaumont Enterprise via AP
In 2020, Leach received approximately $1 million in campaign contributions from the Texans for Lawsuit Reform PAC. For decades, the group has sought to erode plaintiff’s rights to sue as part of a larger movement known as tort reform. Texans for Lawsuit Reform and its allies have successfully lowered lawsuit risk for doctors, auto manufacturers, apartment owners, and others. If Governor Greg Abbott signs these bills into law, the group will count two more victories. —Christopher Collins
Indigenous People’s Day
Since 1977, a national movement to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous People’s Day has been growing across the United States. So far, Austin, Dallas, El Paso County, San Marcos, San Antonio, and Houston all recognize the holiday. Texas, however, does not. This session, the Texas House and Senate wrestled over whether or not to replace the day, ultimately deciding to opt for a Indigenous Peoples’ Week that will occur on the second week of October for the next 10 years. The final version of the resolution was passed unanimously by both the House and Senate.
The resolution recognizes that Indigenous people “built empires, constructed sophisticated cities, and developed elaborate trade networks and complex social systems.” Indigenous Peoples’ Week is intended to raise awareness about the rich heritage and contributions that Indigenous nations have made to Texas and the country. The governor has until June 20 to sign the bill into law. —Pauly Denetclaw
This article was first published on this site.
We trust you found the article above useful and/or interesting. Similar content can be found on our blog: southtxpointofsale.com
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Text
News and useful information on POS and POS Hardware.
On Tuesday at the state Capitol, Governor Greg Abbott signed into law two bills aimed at strengthening the electric grid and reforming the agencies that regulate it. It was the culmination of the Legislature’s response to a devastating winter storm that crippled the state’s energy system and killed as many as 700 Texans, according to a recent Buzzfeed investigation.
Before signing the bills, Abbott confidently declared that “everything that needed to be done was done to fix the power grid in Texas.”
But for all the self-congratulation among state leaders this week, grid reform was but a minor feature of the legislative session. Republicans spent most of their time passing through extreme legislation that all but bans abortions, permits most anyone to carry a handgun without a license, restricts how race and history can be taught in Texas classrooms, punishes budget cuts in urban police deparments, and on and on.
The laws Abbott signed will require power plants to weatherize their facilities against extreme weather conditions, increase coordination between regulatory agencies, overhaul the leadership of those agencies, and institute a statewide weather alert system, among other things. The reforms are substantial—but energy experts warn that they go nowhere near far enough to actually prevent another winter catastrophe. Legislators went easy (again) on the natural gas industry. Senate Bill 3, the most comprehensive of the reforms, requires power generators and transmission line operators to weatherize their facilities. Despite the fact that natural gas supply disruptions were the biggest contributor to February’s grid meltdown, the law requires only gas facilities deemed to be “critical” to weatherize, a determination that will be made by the industry-friendly Railroad Commission.
A provision that would have helped fund backup power generators for critical water, electric, and health care facilities—including nursing homes and dialysis centers—was removed from SB3. And although hundreds of Texans were hospitalized for carbon monoxide poisoning, legislators didn’t consider joining 38 other states in requiring homes to have carbon monoxide detectors.
The law will take effect in six months. However, lawmakers declined to set a deadline for when regulators must begin actually enforcing the law. House Democrats proposed an amendment to establish a six-month deadline for enforcement after the regulatory agencies create their weatherization rules. But the bill’s architect, Representative Chris Paddie, R-Marshall, opposed the idea, citing “financial and operational concerns,” and the proposal was voted down. Another amendment to make penalties mandatory also failed.
A bill to reform the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT)—which politicians like Abbott blamed for the blackouts—will politicize board appointments by putting the governor, lieutenant governor, and House speaker in charge of the process. Another bill to strengthen the maligned Public Utility Commission, which oversees ERCOT, emerged from behind closed doors in much weaker form. The law currently requires all three commissioners to be “well informed and qualified in the field of public utilities and utility regulation.” That’s a reasonable expectation for regulators of the country’s second-largest electricity market, but legislators ultimately decided that applied to just two commissioners.
Overall, the Legislature failed to provide any relief to Texans who were devastated by the storm. A Senate amendment that would have provided direct relief aid to Texans was ultimately stripped out. Lawmakers did, however, manage to pass $6.5 billion in state bonds to stabilize natural gas and electric utilities that were hit by huge price spikes. The cost will be passed on to utility customers through a surcharge on their monthly bills, which means ordinary Texans will be paying a few extra bucks each month for at least the next couple decades.
For Abbott and other top Republicans, the 87th legislative session was all about political posturing ahead of a primary, where Abbott will be challenged by a former tea party senator, as well as the GOP party chair who spent the last weekend of session at a QAnon convention in Dallas. And Abbott’s camp believes it got what it needed. “It’s an excellent session,” Dave Carney, Abbott’s chief political strategist, told the Dallas Morning News. “We had a great number of items that are attractive to Republicans and independents. We’re in great shape.”
Still, there was much ballyhoo among Republicans after they failed to pass a number of conservative priorities, including their restrictive voting bill Senate Bill 7 (which was killed after House Democrats broke quorum). Republicans also ran out of time to wrap efforts to limit “taxpayer-funded” lobbying and pass so-called anti-censorship measures against big tech social media platforms. Abbott has already signaled that he’ll call a special session to bring up the “election integrity” legislation up again, along with what is sure to be a menagerie of other right-wing bugbears. —Justin Miller
Wrong on Crime
Texas is a collection of myths, one of which has recently framed the state as a national leader on “bipartisan criminal justice reform.” Like most good delusions, there’s a kernel of truth there. Decades ago, lawmakers faced having to spend billions on building new prisons because of dramatically rising rates of incarceration. Instead, the state’s GOP-dominated Legislature reduced the prison population and mothballed several old lockups—mostly by reforming probation departments and funding more alternatives to prison, like substance use treatment programs and drug courts.
Protestors in Austin call to defund the police after the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 30, 2020. Gus Bova
While Texas conservatives have called the state “emblematic of the growing movement to be both tough and smart on crime,” lawmakers here have failed to do much else in recent years beyond avoiding billions in new prison spending. Even as traditionally tough-on-crime neighbors like Oklahoma relax drug laws, similar reforms fail in Texas session after session; despite a growing legalization movement across the country, the state still has some of the nation’s harshest marijuana laws on the books. Texas lawmakers named legislation after Sandra Bland in 2017 but have repeatedly failed to pass police reforms that would have prevented her violent roadside arrest in the first place. This session was no different: On the heels of the international movement sparked by the murder of George Floyd, a bipartisan coalition of Texas lawmakers vowed to push a series of reforms aimed at a “compassionate, common sense approach to justice.” Almost all of the reforms they proffered failed or were watered down.
While the Texas House took these issues at least somewhat seriously this session, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick’s Senate remained a killing field for bills aimed at reforming the criminal legal system. Meanwhile, conservative lawmakers rammed through other regressive measures —such as Governor Greg Abbott’s priority to punish cities that reduce funding for law enforcement, ensuring Texas police budgets remain bloated in perpetuity. Scott Henson is a writer and advocate for criminal justice reform who has tried to bridge the right and left on prison and policing issues at the Texas Legislature since the 1990s; he recently published a particularly bleak outlook on the 87th session, calling it part of broader “lurch toward totalitarianism.” At the very least, this session should kill any notion of Texas as a national leader when it comes to reforming criminal punishment and mass incarceration. —Michael Barajas
Labored Away
Essential workers, despite a year of being praised as “heroes” on billboards around the country, did not receive a hero’s treatment during Texas’ 87th legislative session. For instance, most state employees were denied a wage increase, extending a yearslong trend. Among the snubbed were workers at state-supported living centers, where employees who care for Texans with disabilities often earn less than $25,000 annually. The living centers, like nursing homes, were slammed with deadly COVID-19 outbreaks last year. The Legislature also declined to pass significant reform to its unemployment system, which failed spectacularly to provide prompt benefits to out-of-work Texans during the pandemic. El Paso state Representative Mary González, a Democrat, proposed a bill to create a public-facing database of employers who’ve committed wage theft, but the measure died for the fifth straight session.
“Essential workers, who risked everything to keep Texas going through [an] unprecedented pandemic and winter storm fallout, were hailed as heroes,” says Texas AFL-CIO President Rick Levy. “But as we survey where the legislative session ended up, all that is a foggy memory.” —Gus Bova
Corporate Immunity
State lawmakers passed two bills this session that would protect companies from lawsuits when they cause the death or injury of a person. House Bill 19 would make it more difficult to sue trucking companies after their drivers hurt or kill someone in a wreck. Senate Bill 6 would strengthen lawsuit protections during pandemics for nursing homes, which came under fire for failing to protect residents from COVID-19. State Representative Jeff Leach, a Republican from Allen, is carrying both House Bill 19 and the House companion for Senate Bill 6. Both bills have passed through the Legislature and await the governor’s signature.
A fatal accident near Major Drive in Beaumont, Texas, taken on September 20, 2018. Guiseppe Barranco /The Beaumont Enterprise via AP
In 2020, Leach received approximately $1 million in campaign contributions from the Texans for Lawsuit Reform PAC. For decades, the group has sought to erode plaintiff’s rights to sue as part of a larger movement known as tort reform. Texans for Lawsuit Reform and its allies have successfully lowered lawsuit risk for doctors, auto manufacturers, apartment owners, and others. If Governor Greg Abbott signs these bills into law, the group will count two more victories. —Christopher Collins
Indigenous People’s Day
Since 1977, a national movement to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous People’s Day has been growing across the United States. So far, Austin, Dallas, El Paso County, San Marcos, San Antonio, and Houston all recognize the holiday. Texas, however, does not. This session, the Texas House and Senate wrestled over whether or not to replace the day, ultimately deciding to opt for a Indigenous Peoples’ Week that will occur on the second week of October for the next 10 years. The final version of the resolution was passed unanimously by both the House and Senate.
The resolution recognizes that Indigenous people “built empires, constructed sophisticated cities, and developed elaborate trade networks and complex social systems.” Indigenous Peoples’ Week is intended to raise awareness about the rich heritage and contributions that Indigenous nations have made to Texas and the country. The governor has until June 20 to sign the bill into law. —Pauly Denetclaw
This article was first published on this site.
We trust you found the article above useful and/or interesting. Similar content can be found on our blog: southtxpointofsale.com
Please let me have your feedback below in the comments section.
Let us know which subjects we should write about for you in future.
youtube
#Point of Sale#clover Pos Reviews#Clover Support#lightspeed Pos Reviews#shopkeep App#shopkeep Pos#shopkeep Support#toast Pos Support#toast Restaurant Pos#touchbistro Reviews#touchbistro Support
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