Here are the stories on Texas Standard for Tuesday, Oct. 17, 2023:
U.S. House now weeks without a speaker as Republican infighting continues
The United States House of Representatives is two weeks into a historic moment of its own after the Republican-led chamber voted to remove its speaker and has failed to approve a new leader.
A vote could come later today for far-right Republican Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio. Will the vote wrap things up or kick off another prolonged process? The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley professor Álvaro Corral joins the Standard with more.
How a Texas constitutional amendment would aid childcare centers
This November, Texas voters will decide whether certain childcare centers could receive a property tax exemption, aiding a sector that has seen increased financial struggles in recent years.
Proposition 2 is one of 14 constitutional amendments that will be on the Nov. 7 ballot.
Joining the Standard with more is Fort Worth Star-Telegram reporter Lina Ruiz.
Inequities plague Texas’ school funding system
Texas lawmakers are back in Austin for another attempt at passing school vouchers. At the heart of the debate is a decision about how Texas should fund education. The state’s current school funding system is so complicated and convoluted that very few people understand it.
Texas Public Radio’s Camille Phillips reports lingering inequities are hiding underneath that confusion.
The state of the Texas Rangers/Houston Astros matchup
It’s a first for Texas: the state’s two pro baseball teams, the Astros and the Rangers, have even non-baseball fans rooting hard for the home team. Two games in, what’s Major League Baseball’s first All-Texas league championship looking like?
The Standard gets us an update from The Athletic’s Cody Stavenhagen.
Before 2011, the military forced out thousands of LGBTQ+ troops. Now some are suing.
Before 2011, tens of thousands of people were forced out of the military due to their sexual orientation – many with so-called “bad paper” discharges. The Pentagon now says it will upgrade some of those discharges, but a lawsuit is insisting it do even more.
Andrew Dyer reports for the American Homefront Project.
Latino musician discovered by Frank Sinatra hailed from Dallas
Hispanic Heritage Month may have just wrapped up, but it’s always a good time to share stories about important and influential Texans.
Consider the Latino musician Frank Sinatra discovered in a famous West Hollywood nightclub in the 1960s. Dacia Garcia reports that musician’s journey started decades earlier in Dallas. She shares this story as part of our partnership with the Voces Oral History Center.
Austinites in the path of wider I-35 prepare to be pushed out
Big changes are revving up for I-35 from Ben White Boulevard in Austin all the way to U.S. 290 East. TxDOT is planning to add four lanes. The upper decks, almost fifty years old, will be torn down. I-35’s footprint will grow by more than fifty acres, gobbling up property along the way.
As KUT’s Nathan Bernier reports, more than 100 homes and businesses are now on a fast-track to demolition.
All this, plus the Texas Newsroom’s state roundup and Wells Dunbar with the Talk of Texas.
