The Texas governor doesn't agree that his corporate-handout
fund needs an audit—because he and two other GOP pols already monitor
it.
Dana Liebelson | Mother Jones
20 March 2013
snip
Perry maintains that the fund gives Texas a competitive edge and has brought more than 56,000 new jobs to the state and generated more than $14.7 billion in capital investment. But the watchdog group Texans for Public Justice found that by the end of 2010, companies getting cash from the fund were only creating about 37 percent of the number of jobs promised. The administration has lowered standards in the past so that companies could create fewer jobs than they had promised, and it has canceled contracts after criticism over companies such as Bank of America's Countrywide, which continued to be an Enterprise grantee as it collapsed and laid off thousands of workers nationwide.
snip
"Perry's
office is basically accommodating a process by which taxpayer money is
transferred to corporations, not invested in state infrastructure," says
Matt Angle, the director of the Lone Star Project, a political action
committee devoted to strategic communications and research for
Democrats. He would like to see Enterprise funds start going to
education, family planning, and roads. (In 2011, Perry cut $5.4 billion
in state funding from public schools, and he is turning down $100
billion to expand Medicaid while also shuttering 53 family planning
clinics.)"
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Showing posts with label Texas Business. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Texas Business. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 20, 2013
Monday, December 19, 2011
Growth of large private water companies brings higher water rates, little recourse for consumers
Jeremy Schwartz and Eric Dexheimer
Austin American-Statesman
17 Dec 2011
Over the past decade, multistate water utilities have expanded aggressively in Texas, drawn by the state's booming population and welcoming regulatory environment. A September report prepared by utility analysts for Robert W. Baird & Co., a financial management company, identified Texas water regulators as the most generous in the country for private water companies. Today, three out-of-state corporations own about 500 Texas water systems that serve more than 250,000 residents.
For residents living outside cities served by private utility companies, the state environmental commission is charged with setting "just and reasonable" water rates based on a company's cost of doing business plus a guaranteed profit. In exchange, the companies enjoy a monopoly on their service area.
Yet critics say the agency is unprepared to handle the recent influx of corporations that have exploited a regulatory system more accustomed to handling rural mom-and-pop operations. Meanwhile, Texas laws provide fewer consumer protections to residents facing water rate increases than electricity and gas ratepayers.
"We are in the midst of a transformation in this state, and the state is ill-prepared to move into that transition," said Sen. Kirk Watson, D-Austin, who co-chairs a legislative subcommittee to investigate the rates charged by investor-owned water utilities. "It feels like it's happening at warp speed."
The whole story:
Austin American-Statesman
17 Dec 2011
Over the past decade, multistate water utilities have expanded aggressively in Texas, drawn by the state's booming population and welcoming regulatory environment. A September report prepared by utility analysts for Robert W. Baird & Co., a financial management company, identified Texas water regulators as the most generous in the country for private water companies. Today, three out-of-state corporations own about 500 Texas water systems that serve more than 250,000 residents.
For residents living outside cities served by private utility companies, the state environmental commission is charged with setting "just and reasonable" water rates based on a company's cost of doing business plus a guaranteed profit. In exchange, the companies enjoy a monopoly on their service area.
Yet critics say the agency is unprepared to handle the recent influx of corporations that have exploited a regulatory system more accustomed to handling rural mom-and-pop operations. Meanwhile, Texas laws provide fewer consumer protections to residents facing water rate increases than electricity and gas ratepayers.
"We are in the midst of a transformation in this state, and the state is ill-prepared to move into that transition," said Sen. Kirk Watson, D-Austin, who co-chairs a legislative subcommittee to investigate the rates charged by investor-owned water utilities. "It feels like it's happening at warp speed."
The whole story:
Friday, July 22, 2011
Grassroots group to rally for Dublin Dr Pepper
Barry Shlachter | Fort Worth Star-Telegram
21 July 2011
barry@star-telegram.com
A bunch of Dublin Dr Pepper fans have a message for Dr Pepper Snapple Group and the rest of corporate America: Don't mess with small towns and their equally small businesses.
A grassroots group led by video producer Mike Simpson is organizing a July 30 rally in support of the tiny Dr Pepper bottler, which is being sued by the brand owner, which says it violated trademarked labeling designs and sold its sugar-sweetened beverage beyond its franchise's boundaries.
Fans of the embattled bottler are asked to gather outside the brick-walled plant on Elm Street at 10 a.m. to be part of a video to be placed on YouTube. Signs are optional.
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