Travis County Commissioners Court
October 14, 2008
Citizens Communication
Citizens communication is first. This gives citizens an opportunity to address the Commissioners court for any matter not on the agenda. Gus pena is first, followed by anne borman.
>> good morning, judge, gus pena. Speaking for a couple of senior citizens that asked me to direct some comments to this elected body and also to the city council. We are here about the bailout. A -- a money amount has been mentioned of $700 billion. My understanding is from the senator james webb of virginia it's more than that, but they cut it down to not concern the taxpayers and americans as much as we should be. If the united states of america and the president and all of the elected officials in washington can support a bailout for banks, they should be able to support a bailout for the poor, the needy and the have-nots. One of the things that I'm very concerned about, I grew up in east Austin. My dad was political, he helped a lot of people get elected, governors, et cetera. We are seeing apathy, not sympathy for those in need. As we know the gap widens between the haves and have-nots much one of the things that I want to talk about here today is the need for continuum of funding for social service agencies as we know now, I told the city council and I told y'all this back in November or December, we're in a recession, we need to deal with it. Everywhere I go, people tell me why can't you do something about the economy? I said look I'm -- I'm nobody. I'm just an advocate. But call your elected officials, see what they did do. The issue is this, we have the combined charities now. I urge all employees as a former Travis County employee, I worked for the state, city, federal county governments. We all had our combined federal campaign charities there at the i.r.s. And veterans administration. Give as much as you can because this money will go to the needy. The most needy in these troubled times. You are going to see more difficult times. Give to the organizations that do a lot of good work. Like, for example, to serve the senior citizens, the family elder care, Karen langley the director, dan prewitt, meals on wheels and more. Feed the senior citizens, programs that help the poor because a lot of people are going to be without jobs. The city of Austin came out, I heard mayor will wynn state, I'm not going to current or quote, but I heard that there might be possible reduction in force. What reduction in force, rif does, it takes people out of their jobs, put them into the ranks of unemployed they will have to seek help from the social service agencies, further burdens the amount of money that they have to have. They are hurting right now, I know you have phone calls about money for social services. Please, continue the good work on helping the social service agencies be funded to help the poor, needy, have dallas nots. Rif's do not do any good. It hurts the community. We already have unemployment lower than what the officials are telling you. Healthy food, I said this last week, I continue to say it. We thank the central texans, Austin, Travis County residents for donating food to the food banks, et cetera. But please remember vegetables and fruits so that the senior citizens, the youth have can have a healthy diet. A lot of them on special needs. Senator james webb will be in Austin to talk on the veterans program. I thank him and you all for your continued support. Ms. Boreman is next, followed by johnny reeferseed.
>> hi judge, commissions, george. My name is anne boreman I represent the 4 h capital americorps program. We were here last week to commemorate 4 h week. I'm here today as a cheerleader and advocate not only for 4 h, but for after school programs because 4 h capital is that, we provide science enrichment for students in the after school or out of school time environment, those criticals hours from 3:00 to 6:00 p.m. Where kid need enrichment, supervision and connection with adults and to keep them off the streets and out of trouble. So -- so 4 h capital does that. I am also a -- an executive committee member with the central Texas after school network or ctn for short. And ctn is a -- is a group of big -- bigger group of after school providers and professionals who serve kids in the out of school time hours. And ctn is not only 4 h, it is 21st century after school programs with aisd, manor i.s.d., georgetown i.s.d., we are boys and girls club, we are ymca, we are ywca, theater action project, youth interactive, extend care for kids, abracoodle, Austin film society. I could go on. We're a growing network, out there, dedicated. We want to bring awareness to the need for after school. This week is lights on after school. This event happens every year. The date for lights on after school this year is October 16th, which is Thursday. This is nine years of -- of trying to highlight the need for quality after school programs around the nation. 6th year, this marks the 6th year that ctn has hosted an event called the breakfast of champions, going to be in conjunction with lights on after school this year. Going to be in the morning, 8:00 to 10:30 a.m. At the Round Rock performing arts center. 5800 mcneil road. And you are all are invited if you -- you should have received invitations and I'm here to give you a personal invitation because we would really like to recognize the support that you've had and the impact that you've had in -- in helping support after school programs, so that is coming up Thursday. So please, you know, come out. If you are able. And join us for this growing event. It's just getting bigger and bigger every year. We are so excited about that. If you need more information, please go to the web at www.ctnweb.org. That's ctanweb.org. There's a link right there in the front page on breakfast of champion I don't knows, you will find out more information about our organization about ctan.
>> thank you, ms. Gorman. Mr. Reeferseed.
>> thank you.
>> that reminds me, I have a running joke with dr. Ron paul, stop following me around. But anyway last night at the campo meeting, state senator kirk watson earned part of his ongoing treasonous bribery by canceling citizen input on agenda number 7. That's what we were all there for. Sense were silence and ignored as usual. Not unlike the nationwide rejection of the criminal bankster bailout. Our lock step controlled media are unanimous, by the way, in promoting this boondoggle without a peep of dissents. Not unlike the hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayers money we waste on criminal wars against islam. Don't waist your vote by voting for tweede ledy or dumber. Neither party is representing the silent and vocal and the vocal overwhelming majority who do not want to spend untold hundreds of billions of their taxpayers dollars for the criminal bankster bailout who do want freedom for farmers, doctors, police, et cetera to do their jobs. Legalize hemp, marijuana, ob/gyn dr. Ron paul has thrown his support, by the way, behind constitution party nominee chuck baldwin. We texans can vote for chuck baldwin. We have to look on the approved write in votes. But it's impossible or useless for us to try to write in dr. Ron paul. But if you want to back somebody with his basic ideas in mind and concern for the constitution, obviously, we want to follow the constitution party nominees his name is chuck baldwin. He's a great man and worthy of some attention which the media typically does not give anybody. They didn't give us permission to vote for ross perot if you can remember until he was actually winning. Then they decided to kind of put him on t.v. He was backed out of it. Scared off of it by papa bush, that's a whole other story. They never give us permission to support dr. Ron paul, even though he's a great statesman, he's been married to the same woman over 50 years. He's five years in the armed services as a flight surgeon and as a -- in the national guard. I mean, he knows what all of these things are. In fact the first quarter of this year more -- more veterans have given more money to dr. Paul's campaign than all of the other candidates combined. I don't know what that tells you, but I'm putting my vote behind the people who fight for our country and who put their lives on the line. They know to support dr. Paul. Because -- because he's obviously been supporting the -- the veterans and the mia-pow thing for years and years. Chuck baldwin is his choice and mine. Chuck baldwin constitutional party nominee, thank you very much all of y'all.
>> thank you. Anybody else for citizens communication? Whether you signed in or not?
>> good morning. I'm jennifer gale. Good morning, judge Sam Biscoe. Chairman of the capital metro transportation authority, precinct 4 Commissioner Margaret Gomez, Gerald Daugherty, Commissioner sarah eckhardt and my Commissioner Ron Davis, good luck in your reelection attempt. Happy halloween, everybody. Everyone is going to be breaking open the pumpkins and baking apple -- I'm sorry, pumpkin pie and baking pumpkin seeds. Putting faces on those -- our vegetables. But a lot of our pumpkins are finding this halloween that they are going completely out of their gourd. So I hope that you enjoy your halloween. We have a very serious problem, nearly 16 months our bus operators have gone without a contract. I am asking for an intervention here because this state agency is autonomous. And it's not doing its job. It needs to put pressure on star trans to get the people negotiating with the union. Our bus operators have not gotten the pay that they normally would have gotten. Which means that they weren't able to invest, which is probably a good thing. Giving -- given our republicanism is tearing our nation apart. The idea that we can somehow put money, gamble on our future with the stock market, thank goodness we didn't have our social security money in there, like republicans have asked us. But this idea that the democrats are following republicanism. We had richard nixon who -- who helped sponsor the burglary of the watergate. We had Gerald ford tripping his way through his pregnancy, thinking it was a big joke. Then we had trickle down economics from our president reagan, which helped set up the caste system in the united states where we are completely separated from one another. Have no idea how other people are living. Now you have total contempt for the homeless where people no longer are asked to give money, are told not to give money to the homeless, that ought to teach them a lesson. These people are mentally ill. They are sick. We are not doing anything about them. We turned our back on the mentally ill back in the 60s. Back when this type of republicanism started. Then of course we had george bush I and then for some reason we are -- we elected his son. And we have seen what we've had to go through during the last eight years. So for god's sakes, get out there and vote this month.
>> [buzzer sounding] your life depends on it. I had an awful lot more to say in my short little speech, but thank you, Travis County, I will send that to you judge Biscoe.
>> thank you very much.
>> thanks.
The Closed Caption log for this Commissioners Court agenda item is provided by Travis County Internet Services. Since this file is derived from the Closed Captions created during live cablecasts, there are occasional spelling and grammatical errors. This Closed Caption log is not an official record the Commissioners Court Meeting and cannot be relied on for official purposes. For official records please contact the County Clerk at (512) 854-4722.
Last Modified:
Tuesday, October 14, 2008 1:38 PM