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Tuesday, June 1, 2021 || Denton, Texas || Vol. 117, No. 303 ||
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By Lucinda [email protected]
For the first time since its in-ception, the Denton Community
Chorus is launching a scholarship program.
Director Tim McGaugh said that in spite of the pandemic
shuttering the group’s rehearsals and concerts,
leaders decided it was time to make a financial contribution to
the city that has nurtured it.
“We were thinking about ways to get our name out there, and we
have so many longtime members who have passed on,” McGaugh said.
“It was time to establish a memorial scholarship.”
The community chorus was
founded in 1970. It’s a group that mostly banks on the love of
music and singing, inviting people to join without an audition and
welcoming them even if they’re worried about their ability and
can’t read music. Today, the chorus has 20 to 25 voic-es, and the
group plans to start re-hearsing again in September.
Like a lot of civic groups, the cho-
rus has struggled in the past few sea-sons to attract and keep
members. McGaugh said the busy pace of life is probably a factor,
but he wonders if people know there’s a community choir for anyone
who loves to sing.
After the nonprofit decided to of-fer a $500 scholarship to a
Denton
For the love of singing
DentonCommunityChorusrepaysstudentwithmemorialscholarship
Jeff Woo/DRCFrom left, Denton Community Chorus board members
Marian Wagner, Steve Latham, Tim McGaugh and Stephanie Tatalos are
pictured at First Christian Church in Denton, where they will begin
rehearsing again later this year. This year also marks a first: The
chorus founded a memorial scholarship to be given to a graduating
Denton ISD choir student.
By Paul [email protected]
The construction of a $29 million Denton Municipal Electric
substation at West Hickory and South Bonnie Brae streets, planned
for years, could begin by January.
“The project is currently in the solic-itation phase,” said Mark
Zimmerer, an electrical engineer for DME. “We are in the very
beginning phases, but we hope to have a contract in place by
Novem-ber of this year and start construction by Jan. 24.”
Named the Hickory Substation, the facility is being built in a
neighborhood filled with numerous apartments and renters, including
many students be-
cause of the neighborhood’s proximity to the University of North
Texas.
“I am against having a substation so close to where people
live,” Denton City Council member Deb Armintor said. “It will be
just a stone’s throw from the bedrooms of children and people of
all ages. The Cement City neighborhood is a very diverse
neighborhood with people of all different ages and back-grounds,
where you have organically affordable housing.”
On South Bonnie Brae is an electric substation that’s been
online for de-cades, adjacent to a convenience store. Zimmerer said
the West Hickory sub-station will replace that one.
Hickory Substation work could begin by January
Courtesy art/Sears, Chuck
A rendering shows a proposed design for Denton Municipal
Electric’s Hickory Substation on West Hickory and Bonnie Brae
streets.
By Patrick Svitek and James BarragánTheTexasTribune
AUSTIN — Before Sunday, some Texas Republicans were declaring
this legislative session the most conserva-tive in the state’s
recent history.
They had notched long-sought breakthroughs expanding gun rights
and restricting abortion, and while some argued even more could
have been done, few disputed they had am-ple achievements to
tout.
But a massive asterisk fell upon the session for Republicans
late Sunday night, when House Democrats broke quorum and killed
Senate Bill 7, a GOP priority bill to tighten election laws in the
state, which opponents say would have restricted voting rights,
particu-larly for people of color and the elder-ly and disabled.
That move left several other bills that were pending final
ap-proval dead on the final day lawmakers could pass legislation,
including a bill identified as a priority by Gov. Greg Ab-bott that
would have made it harder for people arrested to bond out of jail
with-out cash.
“Texans shouldn’t have to pay the consequences of these members’
ac-tions — or in this case, inaction — es-pecially at a time when a
majority of Texans have exhibited clear and express support for
making our elections stron-ger and more secure,” House Speaker
By Gromer Jeffers Jr.TheDallasMorningNews
AUSTIN — The mad scramble during the final weeks of the Texas
leg-islative session can be torturous, but that’s how most Texans
who are paying attention like it.
The 140-day dash is a unique part of Lone Star history, with
Texans opt-ing for lawmakers to gather once every two years in
Austin to conduct their business. The only requirement for these
part-time legislators is to approve a state budget. The rest of the
action is left to necessity and politics.
Texas is in a group of 26 states whose legislatures the National
Con-ference of State Legislatures describe as hybrid, meaning that
lawmakers spend
two-thirds of their time being elected officials and aren’t paid
enough to make that work their career. But Texas, given its size,
is closer to the four small states, North Dakota, South Dakota,
Wyo-ming and Montana, as extreme cases of citizen lawmakers.
California, Michigan, New York and Pennsylvania have full-time
career leg-islators.
With so many bills being rushed to the governor before the
session ends, there’s a legitimate question about whether it’s time
for Texas lawmakers to meet more often. Texas is a huge state with
a large, complex economy. Its growth presents challenges in ur-ban
and rural areas, and there are constant concerns about the poor
and
underprivileged populations.There have been obscure
proposals
in the Legislature to require lawmak-ers to meet more often, but
they nev-er go anywhere. The current meeting schedule and the
part-time salaries of lawmakers are outlined in the Texas
Constitution. It would take a vote of the people to change the
system.
“It’s embedded in the ideology of small government,” said SMU
political scientist Cal Jillson. “If the Legislature is not in
town, they can’t be doing mischief.”
Can meeting so infrequently provide the stability needed for
such a complex state?
Here are six things that would occur if the Texas Legislature
met on a full-time basis.
Lawmakers can be more nimble for problem-solving
If the winter storm that caused cat-astrophic power outages had
occurred in 2020 instead of February, the Legis-lature would have
had to wait longer to develop legislation to fix the grid. That’s
unless Texas Gov. Greg Abbott called them to Austin for a special
session, one of his unique powers.
Problems don’t always occur to complement the Texas
Legislature’s meeting schedule. If lawmakers met even once a year,
they could quickly re-spond to situations that unfold between
traditional legislative sessions.
Government will get biggerHaving the legislators meet more
often will cost money. A 30-day special session typically runs
about $1 million. Moving to a full-time session could be quite
expensive. More disturbing would be increasing the pay of
lawmak-ers from $7,200 a year to something closer to a full-time
salary. They also receive a $221 per diem.
A full-time session could mean more staff and more money for
expenses. Can you live with the Texas Legislature be-ing more like
Congress? How about Austin becoming Washington, D.C.?
Needed proposals are enacted sooner
It often takes several sessions for
Dems add asterisk to GOP’s claim on
sessionVotingbilldefeatmarsRepublicans’‘mostconservative’Legislatureclaim
See LEGISLATURE on 5A
What would happen if Texas Legislature went full-time?
See FULL-TIME on 5A
See SUBSTATION on 6A
ViewournewcalendaronPage 1C
andlearnhowtopromoteyourownlocalevents
See CHORUS on 5A
