Travis County Commissioners Court
January 19, 2010,
Citizen's Communication
Citizen's communication is first.
this item gives residents an opportunity to address the court on any matter not on the agenda for up to three minutes.
gus pena has signed in, as has dan monsur.
and morris priest.
>> good morning, gus pena, proud east Austin native.
number one, please donate to hatian relief efforts.
please open up your hearts, pocketbooks.
send whatever you can.
it is most appreciated by them and also.
also same token, don't forget to help the poor and needy in our country and and city of Austin.
judge, you were one of our speakers, comments were made about how we need to strongly intervene in the middle school level.
by that time we lose a lot of students to dropout rate.
i think you made appropriate comments over there, judge.
our efforts should be strong prevention, intervention in the elementry level, specifically in the prek level.
when I served with the Austin independent dropout prevention in 98-99 those were specific comments to the in you superintendent and all the board members, start at the elementry level so they can succeed and grasp the subject material and not be knowledgeable partially about math, et cetera, once they go into the junior high and middle school and they can chief excellence in subject matters.
i'd like to commend judge evans, we have known each other since I was a bailiff in 1990 and I received employment here at Travis County in the district courts.
judge evans is a good judge and deals with excessive truancy and dropouts and gives kids alternatives for staying in school and helps parents provide a safe atmosphere for students so they can succeed in school and not dropout.
dropouts cost the county, city, state and federal budgets immensely.
you see it here in Travis County judge.
i know you are looking at me because you know I'm right about that.
i dropped out of johnson high school and went to the marine corps in vietnam and went back because I had a good principal, good mom and strong brother who probably would have kicked my you know what if I didn't go back.
i graduated proudly from johnson high school.
we need the mechanism to work for our kids.
i commend justice of the peace herb evans for this outstanding endeavor.
veterans, please suspect the veterans.
nobody lights to fight in a war.
thank god somebody knows how to.
when we get the veterans back, they suffer ptsd, homelessness, health problems, mental health issues.
we need to help and support them.
whatever your position is on the war, nobody likes war, ploo esshow your appreciation and thank you them for their service to your country and other countries.
last item, red river clinic, a lot of people, I'll wrap up, they help alleviate the emergency level.
you have to be in the hospital district to get the services there.
so not a god idea.
thank you very much.
have a good idea.
>> thank you.
dan mansur is second.
>> judge, Commissioners.
>> good morning.
>> my pleasure to introduce dr.
harry dare.
he is our clinic medical director for the employees wellness and health in Travis County.
he comes to us from occupational and urgent care clinic where he served as medical director.
his 25 years of practice experience starting in london where he received his medical degree, then came to the u.s.
and practiced.
has received his master's in public health with a focus on health promotion, mph degree.
received a mba from that same south carolina institution that we sometimes play in basketball.
dr.
deer is board certified in preventive public health.
occupational health and family practice.
so dr.
deer is a good addition to our clinics.
he will be taking over the day-to-day operation, which I'm very pleased about.
so I'm glad to introduce him to the court and to our employees.
>> welcome.
>> thank you.
>> any comments?
>> I'd just like to thank Travis County for giving me this opportunity to improve the wellness of the employees.
the major diseases that are affecting americans and texans now are related to the three health behaviors, smoking, lack of exercise, and nutrition.
we hope to dress that in the clinics and make our employees the healthiest employees in the state, and hopefully the nation.
>> thank you so much for your help and expertise.
>> you have been with us how long?
>> four weeks.
>> with a full month behind you, doctor, it will be down hill after that.
>> wanted to be sure he was going to hang around.
>> thank you.
>> thank you.
>> looking forward to working with you.
>> thank you.
>> mr.
priest.
>> thank you, judge.
this Wednesday, we will be having a workshop at the thompson center, room 2.102, on the corner of dan keeten, 26 and red river, right by lbj library.
that will be tomorrow.
work session starts at four p.m.
campo meeting at six p.m.
met a lot of people this weekend gorge skaggs, director of revolution now, an enlightened group, peggy, venerable Texas director of americans for prosperity, another great organization.
businessman, adrian murray, president fort worth 9-12 project.
also a couple of representatives one from tyler and one from center wayne and leo great speeches at the capital this weekend along with pastor.
a lot of activity and drives underway.
basically a lot of people in our government, not only at national level but at the state level, that are educating and going through legal reform process, whether it be another, this weekend a great victory getting nebraska to pull out of the healthcare, the corner huske rerks kick back plan.
also working on the louisiana purchase, that part of the healthcare plan that people don't hear a lot about.
obama's plan was pretty much like the txi permit, it was so egregious that even 13 attorney generallies decided to take issue with it.
but these organizations, one I think is a great one, www.912 ftw.org, it is a pretty much a we the people organization.
there were so many groups there, I can't even go through the literature that described all of the things that people are doing to make changes.
i know if you have problem with your local officials, I called the chairman of the house, the senate and federal level, many organizations, fema, parks and wildlife department, many state and federal organizations.
i heard from all of them, from Friday of last week through Wednesday.
every one of them were really enformtive.
they gave issues.
i know one of the things on txi, I figured Texas dot would give a waiver or variance and it wount matter about the armies corps of engineers.
i think the information now radon levels coming from the ground, I think we will be able to stop the txi based on input this week.
regardless of what the army corps or anyone else says.
>> thank you, mr.
priest.
those are the with united nations that --those with are the ones that signed in for citizens communication.
>> let me say a couple of things on citizen communication.
that is really would like for those that are lessen to us today, excuse me, as you know we have a a very devastating situation in haniti --hait i.
those folks do need some relief.
there are special venues that have been set aside where by persons able to send monies to different venues to ensure that relief is realized in haiti, however, there may be persons in Travis County with loved ones here not necessarily from haiti but have a relationship with the folks in haiti, so I'm wondering if hss, when you hear this particular citizen communication if there are any way possible for us to in Travis County, to make sure that the citizens of Travis County have an opportunity to continue having input into the relief factor for the folks that have been devastated by the earthquake in hait i.
i'm basically calling out publicly to see what Travis County can do as maybe the citizens of Travis County, what we can do as residents of Travis County, what we may be able to do to offer assistance to that devastated country.
thank you.
and hopefully share.
maybe we can get some type of connectivity there.
thank you.
>> thank you.
>> send money, the news reports say.
Travis County did an outstanding job in command communications, combined charities this year, more thans 200,000.
if each of us were to send ten, 25, 50, the aggregate amount would make a big difference.
many of those with financial ability to do a lot more are doing so.
and that is a good sign.
but we should invite our county employees as well as county residents to assist in this huge effort.
>> tremendous.
>> right.
>> sherry next week could be here to make expound a little bit, sherry flemming, executive manager.
>> why don't you chat with sherry, see if we can have an organized effort.
>> that is what I'm suggesting.
>> she is sitting there listening to us.
welcoming the opportunity to pick up another project.
>> thank you.
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, January 19, 2010 4:03 PM
