| Good afternoon.
I'm State Representative Garnet Coleman, and I'm proud to represent the people of Texas and especially my community in Houston, Texas.
The state of our great State is strong, because Texans are a wonderfully diverse people. The people of Texas deserve a government that works for them, the same way they work for their families.
Those of us who serve in public office have a responsibility to work together to solve problems - to fix the things that are broken. Because when politicians engage in partisanship and political posturing, hard working middle class Texans pay the price.
So instead of a speech outlining the state of the Republican primary for Governor, let's take a moment to discuss the state of our state.
Last week, our President observed that Americans are tired of that old politics - that the ground has shifted under the feet of those who offer the same old tired ideas.
Unfortunately, there has been too much political posturing and too little cooperation in Austin.
Too many things are broken, and today, the Governor failed to propose solutions to fix many of the things that have been broken during his tenure as Governor.
One in four children has no health insurance, and we can do better.
Today, the Governor didn't say a word about the Children's Health Insurance Program, and if we fail to use available federal dollars for children's health care, our tax dollars will keep getting shipped off to help children in other states.
Whether we are Democrats, Republicans or Independents, surely we can agree that we can no longer afford to ignore the health of 1.5 million uninsured Texas children.
Many Texans can't pay for tuition at state universities, and we can do better.
Today, after college tuition has doubled since 2003, the Governor essentially acknowledged the failure of the tuition deregulation policy he and his fellow partisans imposed on us six years ago.
However, the Governor's so-called tuition freeze proposal is a fake freeze that is about as solid as a Texas ice storm that melts in tomorrow's sunshine.
Perry's tuition scheme is, at best, a misleading attempt that doesn't lower the cost of college. Tuition would continue to increase for each incoming freshman class. Even though an individual student would pay the same tuition for four years, his little sister would still pay more by the time she started college.
Our public school funding system is broken, and we can do better.
Today, the Governor offered no plan to help local school districts suffering from his 2006 plan that froze all school funding, forcing hundreds of local school districts to cut programs or ask voters to raise local taxes to meet rising costs and growing student populations.
And at a time when a third of our teachers leave the classroom within five years, he offered no real incentive to keep hard working teachers in the classroom, where they are forced to teach to the test instead of teaching our children how to learn.
Education is one investment that doesn't lose value in tough economic times, and it's time for the state to meet its responsibility to fix a system that's broken.
Texans pay the highest insurance rates in the nation and some of the highest utility rates in the country, and we must do better.
Today, the Governor specifically rejected attempts to control utility rates and didn't say a word about insurance rates that must be reformed.
In these tough economic times, we can not afford to ignore the burden that outrageous utility bills and insurance premiums place on so many Texas families - especially those on fixed incomes.
And he didn't mention the fact that the State unemployment fund has been mismanaged and doesn't have enough funds to help those who are being laid off in this recession, including many jobs that have been lost due to layoffs at places like Toyota, Vaught, Countrywide Mortgage and other businesses the Governor recruited with his enterprise fund giveaways.
The Governor did talk about reducing the burden of small business taxes today, but he didn't mention that he was the one, along with his fellow partisans, who imposed the small business tax in the first place, and used that money to reward his contributors and cronies with property tax breaks that failed to provide real tax relief to most Texans.
With the economy faltering, Texans expect more than political posturing from our leaders. I remain hopeful that the Legislature will reach across party lines to fix the things that are broken - the things the Governor ignored today.
Together, we must develop solutions to the meat and potato issues that people talk about every evening at the dinner table - the things we must do better.
Provide health insurance coverage for every child.
Lower the cost of college
Invest in our children's classrooms
Lower insurance and utility rates
Make a real investment in clean, renewable energy sources
We can meet these needs without increasing taxes, provided state government's priorities are the priorities that offer every Texan an opportunity to succeed and contribute their talents to make the state of our state even stronger.
We can afford no less, because we can't afford to shortchange our future. |
