Timeliness
This article is an example of timeliness because it is talking about something new that is happening in Austin now.
Texas Mutual fraud until suspended
A controversial agreement between the Travis County district attorney’s office and Texas Mutual Insurance, under which the company pays prosecutors to pursue its fraud cases, will be suspended — at least for now, officials said Wednesday.
The decision comes after a joint American-Statesman and Texas Tribune series exposed the unusual and cozy arrangement, which sparked concern and objections by some law makers and county leaders.
District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg said in a statement that a contract between her office and the mega-insurer — set to be renewed Thursday — will be placed on hold. The insurer will continue to finance the four-person fraud unit handling Texas Mutual’s cases through the end of the year “to avoid unnecessary hardship” on the county, the company said.
While pointing out that the agreement is legal, “nonetheless, understanding the perception questions that have been raised, my office is exploring how to continue our important work in the area of workers’ compensation insurance fraud,” Lehmberg said.
“I intend to ask a group of public officials to work with me to evaluate funding options and work through the issues,” she said in a statement.
In a letter to Lehmberg, Mary Nichols, Texas Mutual’s general counsel, wrote that the annual contract was being postponed “to provide time to study the agreement and consider amendments to its terms.”
In an email, Texas Mutual’s vice president for public affairs, Terry Frakes, said, “We welcome the opportunity to discuss the program with interested parties.”
Texas Mutual, the largest provider of workers’ compensation insurance in Texas, has contracted with the Travis County district attorney’s office since at least 2000. In fiscal 2014, the company authorized payments of $430,000 to the district attorney’s office to prosecute alleged “crimes committed against the company.”
As part of the arrangement, a team of 21 investigators employed by Texas Mutual — not sworn peace officers — conducts the probes and gathers the information for direct referral to the district attorney’s office.
Last week, Travis County commissioners considered providing more oversight of the agreement, but made no formal changes. Travis County Judge Sarah Eckhardt has expressed particular concerns about the agreement, calling it a “pay to play” setup by the Legislature.
Found at the Austin American Statesman
Proximity
This article is an example of proximity because it is talking about all the roads in Austin and how we may need to add more of redo roads that have already been built.
Report, former steer talk on traffic
The thick document from the U.S. Department of Transportation, in its opening paragraphs, lays out a tantalizing premise for Austinites — and tens of millions of other Americans — whose daily life is plagued by clogged urban roads and interstate highways.
“Can we imagine a future in which traffic jams decline? Yes,” Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx writes in “Beyond Traffic 2045, Trends and Choices,” a 322-page draft report that is the centerpiece of 11 forums around the country this fall. The fourth of those meetings, hosted by Austin Mayor Steve Adler and fashioned as a vehicle for regional perspectives on the way to a final version of the study, will occur Wednesday in North Austin.
The report, however, is a studiously neutral document, stuffed with statistics and potential transportation policies but largely free of polemics. The document isn’t an action plan, Foxx writes.
“‘Beyond Traffic’ is intended to open a national dialogue about what our country really needs and why we need it,” he said.
With President Barack Obama’s administration in its seventh year, and the public’s focus increasingly turning to who gets to next occupy the Oval Office, the question is what such an effort could accomplish at this point. Michael Morris, director of transportation for the North Central Texas Council of Governments in Arlington, points to Congress’ repeated and unsuccessful efforts over the past few years to pass a longterm transportation funding bill.
Transportation officials, eager to have the certainty of a multi-year federal game plan, have looked on in frustration while lawmakers, as Foxx notes in the report, passed 32 short-term transportation funding bills.
“I sense the federal government at the administration level is at its wit’s end to get back to a longer-term, six-year initiative,” Morris said. “If I were at the federal level, I’d say, ‘Let’s take the case directly to the people. We’ve been taking it to Congress, and it hasn’t materialized.’”
The challenge, the report says, is simple: take better care of exist ing transportation infrastructure, build what is “new and necessary,” and use emerging technology and better design to maximize use of both old and new transportation facilities. But as the report outlines, beneath that uncomplicated mission is a massive and tangled policy system challenged by explosive population growth concentrated in the country’s 11 most densely populated regions.
For example, one map in the report shows what roads would experience regular rush hour congestion in 2040. The map shows that slow traffic would seize the entire “Texas Triangle,” formed of Interstates 10, 35 and 45 as they connect Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston and San Antonio.
Absent wise policymaking in the short run and over the next three decades, the report envisions an America stifled by the inability to move Americans and the goods they need to live and work.
“The combination of those forces — inconsis tent, unreliable funding and static policies in an era of change — has left our transportation infrastructure in an increasingly deteriorated and fragile state,” the report says. “It has left the United States on the precipice of losing its historical advantage in moving people and things faster, safer and more reliably than any other nation in the world.”
Tim Lomax, a research fellow at the Texas A&M Transportation Institute and author of a series of urban mobility reports, said the administration might be issuing a late call for action on a subject that has remained on a back burner during Obama’s years in office.
“The administration is trying to resolve some issues before they turn over the keys to the next president, and one of those is transportation,” Lomax said. “It’s very clear there isn’t a consensus among the public on what sorts of projects and programs we want to have, and how to pay for them.”
Adler said he couldn’t exactly say what the federal agency has in mind, but that laying out the nation’s transportation problems in stark terms can’t be anything but good.
“The immediacy of the need to act on that challenge is coming into ever greater relief,” Adler said. “I do know that we have to focus people’s attention on this tsunami of traffic. We’re going to deal with this stuff head-on, and in creative ways.”
Contact Ben Wear at 512-445-3698.
WHAT THE FUTURE HOLDS
In 5 years: Online purchases could account for 10 percent of retail sales, up from 6.6 percent now, potentially taking some shoppers off the roads while adding more delivery truck trips.
In 10 years: U.S. fuel economy standards for new cars and trucks will increase to 54.5 miles per gallon, up from 30.8 miles per gallon in 2013.
In 15 years: The backlog of spending needed to maintain transit systems around the country will reach ›141 billion.
In 20 years: The number of robotic aircraft systems, or drones, is expected to reach 250,000.
In 25 years: Nearly 30,000 miles of U.S. highways will be clogged daily.
In30years:The U.S. population is expected to grow by 70 million—adding more than the current populations of Texas,New York and Florida combined.
SOURCE: ‘BEYOND TRAFFIC 2045’ U.S. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION
WHAT OTHER COMMUNITIES ARE DOING
DENVER outlined a specific strategy for building protected bike lanes in its downtown, as part of an effort to attract younger workers and the companies that employ them.A national study by the American Planning Association noted only 8 percent of millennials would prefer to live in a car-dependent suburb.
OREGON is looking at other ways of raising money for roads: Volunteers in a pilot program pay 1.5 cents per mile driven, then get a credit toward paying the state gas tax at the pump. If successful, charging per-mile fees instead of a gas tax could prevent transportation revenue from slipping as cars continue to get better gas mileage.
CHICAGO, the busiest U.S. rail hub, is in the midst of ›3.8 billion in improvements to build 50 miles of new track to relieve congested lines; add overpasses and underpasses to eliminate 25 road-level crossings; and make other improvements that so far have reduced the average rail travel time through the Chicago region from 48 hours to 32 hours.The funding comes from federal, state and local agencies as well as private rail carriers.
IF YOU GO
The BeyondTraffic forum starts at 1:30 p.m. Wednesdayat theAsian American Resource Center, 8401 Cameron Road in Austin.The eventwill be hosted byU.S.Transportation UndersecretaryPeterRogoff aswell asAustin MayorSteve Adler,Harris Countytransit officialTom Lambert and Waco transportation planning official ChristopherEvelia.
Found at the Austin American Statesman
Prominence
This article is an example of prominence because it is talking about something new that is happening in Afghan right now.
Fear grows another Afghan city could fall
KABUL, AFGHANISTAN — The test facing the Afghan government now is not just whether it can quickly mount a counterattack and retake Kunduz, the northern city that fell to the Taliban on Monday, but whether it can prevent a nearby provincial capital from falling as well.
The collapse of government forces in Kunduz against less numerous Taliban forces was prompting a crisis of confidence in neighboring province of Baghlan, where wealthier citizens and those with government connections have begun to leave for the relative safety of their hometowns.
In the midst of one of the gravest moments for the U.S.-backed government in Kabul, military leaders spoke for a third day about launching a decisive counterattack against the Taliban in Kunduz. But it was becoming clear that most of the reinforcements for such an attack had been waylaid in Baghlan.
The reinforcements “will not be able to reach Kunduz without a big fight,” said Ted Callahan, a Western security adviser based in northeastern Afghanistan.
The Taliban have proven in the last few days just how tight a grip they hold on a stretch of northern Baghlan that abuts Kunduz province. Reinforcements coming from either Kabul or the government stronghold in Mazar-i-Sharif must pass through the area to reach Kunduz city, and a number of convoys have been ambushed there.
It was not clear Wednesday whether the front line in the north was still in Kunduz or was rapidly shifting south into Baghlan. That, at least, was how residents of Baghlan’s provincial capital, Pul-i-Kumri, were feeling.
“It is true, people are evacuating the city today,” Zabihullah Rustami, a former member of the provincial council, said by telephone. He had done so himself, he said, relocating to his rural district to the east. “People who are enemies of the Taliban are leaving,” he said, and the city was rife with “rumors that the Taliban might attack and take over the city.”
Pul-i-Kumri, about 90 miles north of Kabul, could become the next flashpoint if the Taliban’s momentum in the north is not checked in the next few days.
Taliban fighters have been creeping up to the city’s outskirts over the last six months. Gun and mortar fire are frequently heard, and skirmishes have become regular occurrences on three sides of the city.
“In Pul-i-Kumri, the situation is not in the favor of the government,” Rustami said. “If any Taliban come out and shout ‘Allahu akbar,’ the city will fall. The Taliban are close to the city.”
In a worrisome sign, two units of the Afghan local police surrendered their bases just outside Pul-i-Kumri to the Taliban on Wednesday and joined the insurgents, while a third base there was overrun, according to Mohammad Leqaa, a former general who commanded police forces in several provinces. Other military units in the area were also said to have fled.
Leqaa estimated that as much as 10 percent of the city’s population left on Wednesday alone.
“The residents were influenced by waves of people fleeing Kunduz by way of Baghlan,” he said. “We tried to announce to people not to panic and don’t leave. They weren’t listening.”
Callahan, the security adviser, said he expected government forces to put up more of a fight in Puli-Kumri than they did in Kunduz.
Found at the Austin American Statesman
Impact
This article is an example of impact because if they two political parties keep going against each other and never come up with a agreement or solution it will affect everyone living in the US.
When both sides are turning deaf ears
1850s-style polarization leaves U.S. unable to act
Political polarization is a serious problem for the United States because it impedes steps necessary to solve mounting national problems. These problems include rising levels of government debt; illegal immigration; spending on entitlement programs; the deterioration of America’s roads, bridges, railways and airports; the impending failure of employee pension systems; and lackluster economic growth, not to mention various pressing international issues.
If the two parties cannot compromise to address these issues, then they will gradually grow to a point of crisis, at which point it may be too late to do very much about them.
Political polarization between the two parties has grown to a point that Americans have not seen since the 1890s — and perhaps not since the 1850s, when the nation was in the process of coming apart over the slavery issue.
Scholars have found that Republican voters and officeholders have become much more conservative since the 1970s, while Democrats have grown increasingly liberal. From the late 1930s into the 1960s, roughly half the members of the House and Senate were “moderates” as measured by their voting records.
The existence of a large body of moderates in Congress facilitated compromise and a fair degree of consensus between the two parties. Thus, it was necessary to craft bipartisan coalitions in order pass important legislation. All of the important legislative achievements of that era were passed with bipartisan majorities, including the Civil Rights Bill of 1964, Medicare and Medicaid (1965), the Kennedy tax cuts (1964), the highway bills of the 1950s, and the nation’s Cold War policies from the late 1940s through the mid-1960s. There were no threats of “government shutdowns” during that entire era.
Since that time, the number of moderates has steadily declined as the parties have moved in opposite ideological directions, dividing into liberal and conservative camps.
In the early 1980s the proportion of moderates in Congress dropped below 40 percent for the first time in the postwar era; by the late 1990s it had fallen below 20 percent. Today, fewer than 10 percent of the members of Congress can be called moderates on a liberal-conservative scale.
By the same process, the ideological distance between Democrats and Republicans has increased year by year. Students of public opinion have observed a similar pattern among voters: They are now sharply polarized, express strong dislike for the opposing party and its voters, and do not trust the government to enact policies in the public interest.
There was a time in America when parents feared that a son or daughter might marry someone of a different religious faith; today, they tend to worry more that a child might marry someone of a different political faith.
In addition, the various states in the union have moved in opposite political directions, some becoming safe havens for Democrats and others for Republicans. A polarized and distrustful political system will never yield the compromises needed to address the serious problems the country is now facing.
It is true that President Obama achieved some victories in this polarized environment, but at a high cost to his popularity and the Democratic Party’s standing in Congress. In addition, some of his signal achievements — such as his health care bill and the nuclear treaty with Iran — will be reversed as soon as a Republican president is elected.
It is hard to know exactly what has caused political polarization in America. To some extent, people “vote with their feet” and gradually separate into different jurisdictions based upon political views and lifestyle preferences. This process is aided by technology that allows citizens to communicate only to those already in agreement.
Over time in any political system, the rival “teams” will accumulate grievances against one another to the point where they lose any interest in communicating across party lines. This happened in the 1850s: We know what happened as a consequenceof that development. Things are not going to get that bad in America this time around — but they could get plenty bad if and when we have another serious recession or if the stock market loses 30 percent or 40 percent of its value. Sadly, it appears that as a nation we are no longer capable of making preparations for such events.
Found at the Austin American Statesman
Conflict
This article is an example of conflict because the community of Oklahoma was having arguments about getting the ten commandments monument removed while some wanted it to stay. There was also conflict about other religions not getting plaques of what they believed put up somewhere. So finally everyone agreed on the removal of it, which is an example of conflict because people who were in conflict came to a conclusion about the situation.
Ten commandments to be removed from Oklahoma Capitol
OKLAHOMA CITY — A 6-foot-tall granite monument of the Ten Commandments that has sat outside the Oklahoma State Capitol for several years is on its way out.
A panel that oversees artwork at the statehouse voted 7-1 on Tuesday to authorize the privately funded monument’s removal after the state’s highest court ruled that it violated the Oklahoma Constitution.
The Capitol Preservation Commission, which was named as a defendant in a lawsuit seeking the monument’s removal, voted to authorize the Office of Management and Enterprise Services to remove the one-ton monument.
“We’re going to meet with the builder who installed it and figure out the best way to remove it,” said OMES spokesman John Estus. “We’re also going to coordinate with the Oklahoma Highway Patrol to address some ongoing security concerns that they have.”
The monument has been a source of controversy since it was erected in 2012. Several groups have made requests to have their monuments installed, including a satanic church in New York that wants to erect a 7-foot-tall statue that depicts Satan as Baphomet, a goat-headed figure with horns, wings and a long beard. A Hindu leader, an animal rights group and the satirical Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster also made requests.
The original monument was smashed into pieces last year when someone drove a car across the Capitol lawn and crashed into it.
Found at the Austin American Statesman
Human Interest
This article is an example of human interest because it talks about all the drama that is going on with a murder and they peoples emotional struggle as they are trying to deal with how this murder got let out.
Presiding juror: We let family down
It seemed plain as day to Bill Wooden, the presiding juror in the Daniel Willis trial. From the first day of testimony, he had decided the former Bastrop County sheriff’s deputy was guilty of murder.
“He was guilty as hell,” Wooden said. “And we let him walk right out of there.”
Wooden, 45, was one of five men and seven women who became deadlocked last week in Willis’ trial for the on-duty shooting death of Yvette Smith last year. After deliberating for nearly 20 hours, each juror had become set in their judgment of Willis. Eight thought he was guilty. Four favored acquittal.
When reached by the American-Statesman, Wooden said the trial had taken its toll. The Bastrop mechanic said he hadcontemplated the trial over the weekend and shed a few tears.
“I felt like we let Yvette Smith’s family down,” Wooden said. “I felt like I let them down.”
As soon as he saw a patrol vehicle’s dashboard camera video that showed Willis opening fire just a second after yelling “police” at Smith, Wooden said he decided Willis was guilty of murder. And as he listened to statements from Willis in which he gave details about the moments leading up to the shooting, even surmising at one point that Smith had committed “suicide by cop,” Wooden grew angry.
“None of us would have had to go through this if he had been a man and admitted his mistake,” Wooden said.
On Feb. 16, 2014, then-Deputy Willis was responding to a domestic disturbance at a home on Zimmerman Avenue in Camp Swift. Willis was talking to the homeowner outside the residence when he received information from a dispatcher that someone inside the house had a gun and was loading it.
Willis retrieved an AR-15 assault weapon from his patrol vehicle and took up a position behind a car. When Smith opened the front door of the house, Willis stood up and fired.
The special prosecutor in the case, Forrest Sanderson, consistently said the facts in the case only supported one charge: murder.
“There is no question this defendant shot and killed another human being intentionally and knowingly, and by Texas law that is murder, unless there is some justification for it,” Sanderson said last week.
But throughout the trial, Willis’ defense had focused on the perception of danger. Defense attorney Robert McCabe’s expert witnesses argued that any police shooting is justified if officers feel their lives are in danger.
The defense also tried to show there was a possibility that Smith was armed, after witnesses said there was a struggle for a shotgun between Smith and a man inside the home.
The entire jury, though, agreed that Smith was unarmed when she opened the door to Willis, Wooden said.
But the four dissenting jurors — three women and one man — couldn’t be swayed in their belief that Willis had shot Smith twice under a reasonable belief that she posed a danger to his life.
In picking a jury of 12 and two alternates, Sanderson said his chief concern was people’s preconceived notions about police shootings.
Since Smith’s death, people’s opinions have become polarized about police shootings, Sanderson said, so he sought jurors he thought could look at the case objectively.
“It turned out to be a large percentage who were pretty opinionated,” Sanderson said.
McCabe wouldn’t discuss strategies in picking the jury because of Sanderson’s intentions to retry Willis on the murder charge.
But McCabe told the Statesman that he will ask the court to move the next trial out of Bastrop County.
“There’s been too much media coverage and too much local interest for Mr. Willis to get a fair trial in Bastrop,” he said.
Many recent cases of deadly police force have centered on the racial divide between mostly white officers involved in the deaths of mostly black suspects. Willis, 30, is white, and Smith, 47, was African-American.
But Wooden said he wasn’t aware of race playing a part in the jury’s deliberations, noting that six of the eight jurors in favor of Willis’ guilt were white. Only two of those jurors weren’t white.
“It could have been anyone of any color and he still would be guilty,” he said.
When they first began deliberating, the jury was split 6-6. By the end of the first day of deliberations, it had moved to 8-4 in favor of guilt.
No one changed their mind after that point, despite deliberating for another full day and the following morning.
Sanderson credited the jury for working hard and reviewing the extensive amount of video and audio evidence. But things got emotional in the jury room. Some shed tears, but no one ever raised their voices, Wooden said.
The experience did take a toll on Wooden, but it also gave him some perspective: On Monday, he quit his job as a mechanic — that he didn’t particularly enjoy — in part because of his experience at the trial.
“Life’s too short,” he said.
Found at the Austin American Statesman
Novelty
This article is an example of a novelty because it is a article about a random thing that people are attracted too, because it is something fun and interesting to read about.
Church's rainbow flag stolen a fifth time
As your prime provider of news about Cedar Park Unitarians, it troubles me to have to bring you this update.
First, some background. Back in August, I told you about what unfortunately had become the ongoing saga of Live Oak Unitarian Universalist Church’s unflagging effort to keep a rainbow flag — signifying support of the gay and trans-gender communities — on its sign at the church on El Salido Parkway in Cedar Park.
The flag had been stolen four times, and I was happy to be at the church on Aug. 23 as the congregation, undaunted, followed Rev. Joanna Fontaine Crawford to the curbside sign for the posting of the fifth flag. It was very upbeat and very uplifting to see folks not giving up on what they see as an important public display of their beliefs.
Regardless of whether you agree with their belief on this topic, you support their right to use a flag to proclaim their belief on any topic.
All went well, until it didn’t. The bad news came in a Saturday email from Crawford in which she told me the fifth flag disappeared the night before.
“The attached picture is all that was left of our flag after last night,” she told me. “Someone ripped it down, bent the flagpole and left a beer can.”
The apparent theft occurred during a youth overnight event at the church, which meant there were cars in the parking lot and kids in the building.
“I’m not surprised the kids didn’t hear anything, with it being out on the road,” Crawford said of the sign from which the flag was snatched. “But the nerviness is a little discomfiting, as is knowing that our kids were in the building while this was happening.”
The Unitarians, an optimistic bunch, are moving forward.
“Once we get the holder replaced, up goes another flag,” Crawford said, reporting that the church has “a pile of flags,” including a previously stolen one that turned up at a local school and was returned.
Crawford said the church is planning to make a statement at its services Oct. 11, which is National Coming Out Day.
“We are going to make a big deal, not only about people coming out with their own identities, but coming out as an ally and supporter” of folks who do that, Crawford said.
It seems to me the repeated flag thefts are a result of one of two possible motives: 1. Idiotic and intentional effort to deny the church’s right to display its beliefs. 2. Dumb prank.
I’m not sure which is worse. Cut it out.
One more thing that might be of interest to anyone thinking of stealing the next flag: The Williamson County sheriff’s office is using cameras to monitor the flag. They were in place last week but were needed elsewhere and gone by Friday.
“Well,” Crawford told me Tuesday, “that’s a bummer.”
But the cameras will be back when the next flag is posted. You have been warned. kherman@statesman.com ;
Found at the Austin American Statesman
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