 Good morning. My name is Jason Embry and I am a member of the LBJ Future Forum Board and I want to welcome you all and thank you all for being here this morning. Thank you for joining the Future Forum for our conversation, The Future of Texas. The Future Forum is an organization that brings together individuals with different backgrounds, experiences and points of view to discuss local, statewide, and national topics that affect us today. Our goal is to create civil, informed, and bipartisan discussions which is needed now more than ever perhaps. The Future Forum's events are made possible by our incredible members and sponsors, including Texas Monthly, Carbock Brewing, Austin Wine Merchant, and Joe Cook's catering. A special thanks to the Texas Tribune for co-sponsoring this this morning's conversation. If you are not a member, I strongly encourage you to sign up before you leave. Members enjoy the best of what Future Forum has to offer, including first access to events in happy hours, networking opportunities, and benefits at the LBJ Presidential Library. Upcoming events will explore the first anniversary of the Austin package bombings and the reflection of racial bias in the media on April 2nd, our 6th annual Easter Egg Roll on the lawn of the library, which is on Saturday, April 20th, and our annual Women in Leadership conversation slated for May. I'm incredibly excited to hear from our guests today, four of our esteemed state legislators speaking about what's ahead this legislative session. We have an excellent panel of legislators who have taken time out of their very busy schedules to be here, and we are very grateful for these four outstanding legislators. I also want to recognize one other member of the legislature who is in our audience this morning, Representative Vicki Goodwin from here in Austin. Member Lyce. Thank you, Representative, for being here this morning. Please keep in mind there will be time for questions at the end of the panel. And now I'll turn it over to Alana Rocha, multimedia reporter for the Texas Tribune, to introduce our guests and moderate our discussion. Good morning. Well, we'll get started with the panel introductions and then dive right into the questions. There's a lot to cover even at the stage in session. Seated next to me, Seated next to me, what do you guys want me to, they warned me, is a state representative Cheryl Cole, Democrat out of Austin here, first elected in 2018 to serve House District 46, which covers East Austin, Flugerville and Mainer. She's serving on three committees this session, county affairs, redistricting, and ways and means. You work as an accountant and attorney and you were the first African-American woman elected to the Austin City Council where she served for nine years, last three years Mayor Pro Tem. Welcome. Seated next to her is State Representative John Sirier, Republican out of Lockhart, where he served House District 17, which covers five counties east of Austin since 2015. This session, you're chairing the Committee on Cultural Recreation and Tourism. He's also a member of Juvenile Justice and Family Issues. Business owner and in 2017, you joined the Texas State Guard obtaining rank of captain. Seated next to him, State Representative Angie Chen Button, Republican who calls Richardson home. She's served House District 112 in the Dallas area since 2009 and currently serves as chairwoman of Urban Affairs, member also of the Higher Education Committee. With the background in public finance and management sciences, she worked for Texas Instruments and has held several community positions in the Metroplex. And last but not least, State Senator, State Senator, pardon me, Jose Menendez, Democratic lawmaker that's represented the San Antonio area in the legislature since 2001. In 2015, he moved over from the House to the Senate, Senate District 26, which covers a large swath of Bear County. This session, Senator Menendez has been appointed to sit on four committees, Administration, Business and Commerce, Intergovernmental Relations, Veterans Affairs and Border Security. He works as the Vice President of National Title Services. Let's start by thanking all the panelists for joining us this morning. Now, the 2018 midterms clearly changed the priorities of the session. Everybody keeps using the cliche bread and butter, whether the bread is the school finance and butters, property taxes, you decide. But let's start there, two big tough issues. All of you have experience working in local government, obviously, in your communities. Representative Cole, you sit on ways and means of the session. You have that background in local government. Is the state exhausting time and energy trying to regulate a tax that it doesn't set necessarily? I guess I don't know what you mean by doesn't set. I do think that there is definitely a drum beat in the community to deal with property taxes. And so I think that is a topic. It's just a question of how we deal with it and having served so long at the local government level. I understand the pain of unfunded mandates, the need for local control and want to try to bring a balance to the discussion. Representative Button, you've talked about the shift in local control. What are your concerns going into this issue? I mean, these are two tall orders and that are very much intertwined. Yeah. I'm so happy you asked me this question. And my point is that you've got to have a balance. There are some basic rules. For example, like recently real heated, it's about the short term rental. And you can see the perspective on both sides. It's very likely we're coming through my committee, so I'd like to address that. But then you got to have some basic standards, basic policies to level the playing field. But on the other hand, you do have to recognize the individual nature of the cities, just not the one size fit. Oh, actually, I'm so glad Representative, my friend, Gowin, and I call you as my friend, because even what we just met about two months ago, and I can tell she and I share a lot of comment, you know, sense. And we had a real good conversation the other day. For example, like in Austin, the so-called the second type of rental, which is like people buying the property. And then they use that property almost full time renting out for the short term vacation home like that versus somebody staying over there. And there's a lot of different issues. But then you look at cities like Gaviston, it's a vacation city and also Centennial to a certain degree. So how we can do a really a balanced approach, make sure we still have a basic standards throughout the entire state to maintain the quality, but also allow the local elected officials because they know their city the best and they are close, close, much closer than we are. And then for them to make a decision and it's kind of like, you know, kind of like it's an act, it's an art. OK, so it's not that easy to set a straight line, but we're working on that diligently and she can testify there. Representative Siria, you're nodding a lot. You represent a growing corridor east of Austin and San Antonio. What are the mayors and local government officials in your area telling you because obviously the Senate Property Tax Committee got an earful last week before that passed out of that committee? You know, it's obviously this was the big, big topic also to last session. I am very excited that we are taking on, like you said, it's two big issues with school finance and then property tax issue. And they are intertwined, definitely intertwined. I'm just glad that we're focused on that and all three groups are focused on from the governor, Senate and the House working together because this is the kind of issues that we do need to be working on. Some of the same concerns that even I had last session, I was a former county commissioner. So I understand, especially from a rural county, I understand what those pressures are and some of the, especially with a growing county and a growing district. But I think the big piece about property tax reform or what we're working on right now is that it's long term. I believe we need to be real careful about what is said because I know myself and others will be looking at our property tax bill and going, wait a minute, it didn't go down all this much or it actually went up a little. It's really a long term look because if we don't do something now in 20 years, 25 years, we're going to be really in trouble as a state. So it's really looking at and having the discussion and doing some policy right now that will help us, not in the short term, but in the long run. Is there a concern, just kind of the message here and the marketing that you might upset leaders within your district and then again, nobody is seeing tangible relief in their bills, Senator Menendez? Sure, obviously that has to be a genuine concern. I think what I loved hearing so far, I've been taking notes and so I love hearing not talking about unfunded mandates, local control, local officials know their city's best. I mean, I think the representatives are spot on and, you know, as a former councilman and someone who understands that you have to, you know, they're there in the community all the time. So one of the things they could easily do, if we start piling on and doing these things, making caps that are unreasonable, taking away their control, then it's in order to balance their budget. If they want to say, well, we can't keep that library open anymore, the swimming pools aren't going to be open anymore, the parks aren't going to be funded anymore. All of a sudden, well, and this is all thanks to your legislature. You know, so there's an ability for them to show the community that because the legislature chose to do things differently that we could end up paying a price politically. One of the things that I've been very appreciative of, I've been hearing that the House wants to handle public school finance first, and I think that's having the priorities in the right order. I think what I'd like to see us do is, so that's fine that the property tax reform, we all need to slow that train down. I get that, I agree. But if we don't get public education right, talk about really messing this state up. That's where, if you look at the common denominator of people in jail, it's low educational attainment. And the inverse is the same, high educational attainment means high socioeconomic attainment. So we have got to do public education first because then we'll know how much we need to pay for the system that we want. But a bill has yet to be filed on that front, and we're hearing it could be hundreds of pages long. Just this week we saw a Senate Finance Committee, I guess, or Tuesday, so yesterday, pass out a pay raises bill. There's some different schools of thought on, you know, the Senate having kind of just an across the board, $5,000 annual pay raise. The House might think differently as far as merit pay or as Dallas ISD has done, kind of putting the best teachers in the worst schools and getting better results. What do you think? This is them learning from my son, show and tell. Senator, you're absolutely right about we need to address the school finance first. And guess what? You're not allowed to take those out of the members' land. Well, I take it back and I reuse that every time. Recycle that, right. Speaker Dennis Bonnan, he has been so gracious, and he wants to remind everyone, you know that, you walk into the, you know, we have this little members' lunch. You can get some drinks or some light food once you get about to burn down, okay. And he has those cups for coffee and water and printed right here. School finance reform, the time is now to remind us. It's kind of like before you can drink this cup of coffee, you read this. So it's that important, okay. Then back to your question, actually, my husband and I, while we were driving here, where the first one showed up because we're early birds. Super early, which I don't appreciate that much. And we were talking about the Senate in the past, you know. I do understand the Senate's position. But then when Governor, he was getting a small group of the representative together. You remember the meeting we had? No lunch, just a meeting. No, he did point out, but my district is in the suburb of Dallas. But we did know a lot of things going on in the DISD. DISD used to have such a bad reputation. In case, you know, people don't want to send their kids. But now it's changing with this new approach about how to incentive. And the one thing I find extremely important, when we talk about incentivize the good teachers, not just the pay, pay is great, but also the respect. And from my charming English, you all can tell that I wasn't that lucky to be born in this country. I was born in Taiwan. In the Chinese Taiwanese culture, teacher profession is the best. And the most important character in the 5,000 years Chinese history is Confucius. And guess what? He was a teacher. So you got to have this respect in addition to the monetary pay. Although the financial side is equally important. So I do understand that. But I also agree with the result. It's the true result from Dallas, DISD. So we got to be open minded. And this is still the beginning of the session relatively. So I think a lot of things that can work out. What do you think? I'll let her do that. Unless you're ready for me. I usually do what she says. I'm just going to actually ask to represent Cole and then come to represent Sirier. But you have a lot of disadvantage schools within your district. What are your concerns about this omnibus legislation that's supposed to cover it all? Well, I have, or I'm about to file a bill that says we've got to stop looking at these districts just as a whole district. Because I have schools in my district that are just as bad and worse than all the money that we send out to others disadvantaged schools. So what my legislation would propose is that we look at those and a certain percentage of those we would get credit off of our recapture amount. Because it does not make sense for Austin to have a $600 million check that it writes to the rest of the state. And it still has a $200 million problem. Well, and they said, I mean, you know, recapture getting rid of that Robin Hood this session is not going to happen. I mean, it would be nice, but even the leadership has said that's not going to happen. Is that correct? Well, you know, the issue I think for all of us and what I'm hearing from many people is the pressure on the local taxpayer has gotten almost just unbearable. Okay. And that's that's regardless of neighborhood. It used to be at one point you'd hear a lot of complaining from large landowners, business big businesses, refineries. We're hearing it all the way down to families that have held their homes for 50, 60 years and done nothing to them. They're fearful of not being able to stay in their home. But by the same token, Texans also know that the schools that are having challenges, whether it's yours or DISD or SISD or Edgewood, or the schools and Chairman Sirius district, they need to be those kids need to have an equal opportunity to to as bright a future as their potential will allow them to have. In order to do that, though, we have to focus on the school. So with a big issue recapture, as we all know, came about because the system was inequitable. Schools, it was a lottery on whether where your parents live, whether you got a good education or not. As a state of Texas, that is bad public policy and it's bad for our future. I think if we say because we don't know no neighborhood has a monopoly on smart kids and every kid should have an opportunity to fulfill his or her potential. So I think we can as long as we can ensure equity statewide. So whether you want to call it recapture or Robin Hood, whatever it is, I understand your frustration. But we have to make sure that all our kids are treated the same and given that same opportunity to succeed. I think it's part of reason why the public school systems come under attack because people feel sometimes trapped in underperforming schools. So the mistake we've made rather than improving the schools, we created a separate system. And we're divvying up the same amount of dollars. And so we have got to be smarter about this. We can all, we have the brain power to do it. We just need the political will. Well, speaking of that, I mean the political will, all the big three representative or House Speaker Dennis Bonham, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, Governor Abbott are all on the same page. How I guess represent Syria talk about the dynamics this session between the two chambers between the big three and how much that counts for getting these big orders done. Yeah, it's, I don't know how to describe it other than it's really a breath of fresh air. I mean, especially for us members that have been here. One of the things that I always talk to our new members is saying, hey, this is different. And I saw Jason earlier and I told him that I was going to be talking about this because I do speak about this quite a bit about the decorum and the culture right now in the House. I was telling Jason because he used to work with Speaker Strauss and nothing against speakers. You know, this isn't going against Speaker Strauss at all, but it's just different. You know, it's a change. It's a big change with with Speaker Bonham. And part of it has to do with just kind of going back to, you know, the speakers been in the House for 20 some years, 23 years, you know, as a as a Sergeant working when he was at St. Edward's University and then now working, you know, as a state representative. And so he's seen three different speakers during his tenure in the House. So he's seen a lot of changes. He's seen a lot of things that worked and he's seen a lot of things that probably didn't work. And I'll have to tell you, as a member that's been in for just a couple of sessions, last session didn't work. Last special session, I call it the special special session, didn't work. And it's it for a lot of us, we were especially, you know, we all make extreme sacrifices to be able to do this, to do this and be here. And I know for for many of us, if not all of us, you know, if you're going to do the sacrifice, you better get, you know, you better see results. And that's one of the things we're seeing now. We're able to see that we're working together. Like we spoke about earlier, is that now that you have two big topics that need to be worked on, we've got those in front of us. But just the decorum, and I call it the culture of the House, it's just really good. And of course, it's going over into the Senate. We're all feeling it too, you know, from all three, from all the way around. How much of it though is where we're at in session right now? Okay, so yeah, people go, oh, it's the honeymoon period, right? You know, oh, it's just the honeymoon period. No, it's really different. And maybe I'm just the optimist or or whatever. And you could help on this, but it is it is just yesterday, for instance. So I'm a new chairman and we have we have monthly or excuse me, weekly chair meetings or whatever with the speaker has these weekly meetings just kind of talk about what's coming up with the leadership and things like that. Well, yesterday, Speaker Bonin really it's only our third meeting had all members meet. And so we met, we met with the speaker and kind of speaker Bonin rolled out, you know, what he sees coming up. And also to had our parliamentarian speak about decorum and what things that we should be doing. And I literally had some, I had a freshman and I had also a senior member go, I never knew that. And I go, I didn't either because we were never told, you know, so one of the things that the speaker has done extremely well is obviously, you know, Speaker Bonin's got the experience. He's got the leadership skills. But one of the leadership skills that that's being amplified right now is he can communicate. He does such a great job of communicating the vision and where we're going. And I just I'm so excited about what we're getting done and just how we're working together and how the leadership is able to bring everybody together right now. So I don't I don't think it's a honeymoon period or I don't think it's just because this part don't get me wrong. And this is one of the things that the speaker brought up just yesterday and keeps the thing going, which is we will have some very tough discussions. We will have some things that we will have to debate. But now's the time to build those personal relationships to understand each other and get to know each other better. So when we do get into those tough discussions, we can realize that, hey, we're still friends and we still can work together and and to get the common goal completed. Representative Cole, you were going to add something. I agree with everything Representative Sirier just said. I just want to emphasize that the change in the leadership, especially being led by Speaker Bonin in unity and getting something done in our relationships is really not just a reflection of him. It's a reflection of y'all and the election and the memo that the voters sent, which I say starts with this is not Washington. And that went to both parties. And what you see most on the Republican side, I believe is they got the harshest memo. But even on the Democratic side, and I've kind of been a part of that thing too, you know, the worst thing we can do, the worst strategic mistake we can make is let them be nicer than us. There are a few, if any, polarizing issues on the agenda of this session. Representative Button, is there a risk of overcorrecting and potentially alienating a huge part of your voting block on the right? This is really a tough question, you know, but I believe if you serve with all your passion and all your heart and get close to your voters, you will come out of the solution. Now you can please everybody. For example, the Democrat, not speaking on anybody, the Democrat caucus review the Dale plan for the finance, school finance reform. And you look at the list, there are several items, very, very good items. And, you know, especially the food day, the pre-k, that kind of, because I was one of the first Republicans not only raised my hand, but also got up, says, hey, the half-day, the pre-k, which the governor proposed was an excellent idea. But you look at the individual items, many of them are really, really good. But then you only have a limited budget. And all constitutions say we have to have a balanced budget, which I'm very, very proud, goes back to that Washington, D.C., is not a good model for us to follow. Okay, so you got to make a decision which way you're going to pick. And everybody has different arguments and different points of views. And we can all work together. So I really, really, we're trying to butter up our speaker, prepare for the next time, the committee assignments. No, you're just kidding. Because we're truly, truly marking. He made it very, very clear when the press conference come out. And he said, we are not talking about a Democrat finance reform plan, or Republican finance reform plan. Okay, we are talking about the Texas finance reform plan. And I thought that is exactly the message he made. And we got to work together. Not everybody will be happy, okay? But then with limited resources, you got to pick the right way to allocate. And we start to talk. And I know that somebody was joking about once Chairman Huberty starts to do his hearing. It's probably assumed that the members in the committee, they're not going to sleep. It will be 24 hours. Who knows? And then another topic is tomorrow. Ways to mean good luck tomorrow. It's going to be a late one. It's going to start with Dale at the property reform. So it's going to be long hours. But then I think even the long hours, exhausting hours, we need to appreciate that everybody come to the committees, present their ideas. Because that's how, you know, coming from once again, now that I like to bring out my background, because I do think I have a different perspective. You look at the way I grow up, you know, Taiwan is a democratic society, you know. But now to this degree. So when you see people are so much into the political process, try to make sure that you have a voice into the system. And then the country, the state, the community get the benefit. I tell you what, you know, democratic system might not be a perfect system, but it is still the best system because everybody gets to talk. That's right. Yeah, so I just love it so much. Well, and we're talking, like I said, about a bill potentially hundreds of pages long. The Bill Filing Deadline, of course, is next Friday, March 8th. Senator Menendez, you've talked about pre-care. Are you going to see that as a separate measure that hopefully maybe passes, you know, separate from this big omnibus bill? There have been many leaders on the issue of pre-care. You know, Senator Zaferini has a modification. She's been working on it for a long time. I know you've been a leader on the issue. We've been espousing the benefits. I see full-day universal pre-care, in my opinion, it brings so many benefits. I think of it as an economic development tool. I think if you think of the fact that I also think of it as strengthening our community. So people buy homes and neighborhoods with good schools. And so if you get universal pre-care, in my opinion, once these three and four-year-olds get into the system and they get into first grade, their scores are going to be better. They're going to be better students. They'll be better used to it. They'll be getting acclimated and having those friendships and having those life skills to get along. And so I don't think it's right that we've limited pre-care only to a certain groups of taxons. I think all Texans pay their taxes. They've paid for those school buildings. We should have pre-cays in neighborhoods where you can walk your kid to school. And that would then, in full-day, allow someone actually to maybe take on a second job or get a little more income that maybe they couldn't. And with unemployment as low as it is, I think it's an opportunity to help people, to do things, maybe to start up a second business or do something from home. I think it's just the right thing to do. And now Chairman Siri and I were talking about this is the session to fix a lot of financial issues. This is the session to invest. And one of the things I love hearing the representatives and that I love the working together sort of reminds me of 2001, my first session in the House. Speaker Laney was there. There were 78 Democrats, 72 Republicans. The balance was so close that you had to work together. And things worked so well, issues got vetted. And I think the only partisan thing we had on that year was the redistricting bill. And other than that, things worked smoothly. Which is, unfortunately, in my opinion, we should take out of our hands there's a better way to do redistricting that really is more respectful of the communities and lets voters pick their electeds and not electeds pick their voters. If you look at all the gerrymandered districts that we have, I think it's very disrespectful to see how we sometimes draw those lines. Is there the political will, the session I checked last night, and there's so far been 31 bills filed related to marijuana. Whether it's legalizing medical marijuana, expanding the Compassionate Use Act, the Senator Menendez has filed. Representative Cole, you filed a few that you said surprised you and got so much attention, but everything from decriminalization to legalizing it for medical use. But the one that you co-authored, HJR21, has gotten a lot of attention sending the issue of medical marijuana legalization to voters. Talk about that. I'm very excited about that bill. The part that I'm shocked about is I have spent 92% of my time with my legal background and CPA background thinking about these formulas. And I filed a marijuana bill, and then all of a sudden, everybody wants to see me. So I'm done with that stuff. We'll let the brains. Seriously, I mean, my sons called me one in New York and one was in LA, and they were like, you're on Facebook, you know what I'm saying? It was very exciting. I just think the tide has changed in terms of the way the country, and we're debating that at the state level about how we feel about marijuana, and definitely the decriminalizing part of it I think will pass. And I'm really optimistic given the results, and they sent me polling about the legalized part. And so I came this close yesterday at the big PTA rally, and Chairman Huberty had spoke, and then I spoke next of like, ask him if we can just pass that bill. But I didn't do it. Not the great place to do it. Yeah, that would be a great place. Well, there were little kids there. But I sure thought about it. Representative Sirier, do you think there's the political will on the right to get some of these measures passed? Yeah, you know, on the medical marijuana side of it, yes. We saw some of that with the release of the oils and things like that. I still feel like there is a lot to look at and where the constituents get tied up into it as they, when you start talking about medical marijuana, obviously they start getting nervous about just recreational. But no, I've seen it just in the short time I've been in the house, I've seen it loosen up a little bit. It's really just an education, right? It's more of an education process and it takes time. And you're watching some of the, I would say, some of the do's and don'ts of what the other states have done. And so we're learning from that as well. So, yeah, I do. I see that we're going to each session, it's going to, on the medical marijuana side of it. Not the decriminalization? On some of it, like the amounts and things like that, yes. I see that happening too as well. But have you heard from your constituents on this issue? Well, it's pretty much similar to the chairman just mentioned. So I don't have additional to add on. But I do have to compliment on chairman Stephanie Clark, when she was working on the early stage, how to make sure that people understand the medical marijuana impact and needs in our community, especially when you see some people just absolutely suffer and kids as well. And she put in a lot of effort. And, you know, so I totally understand. But as to what's going on in the future, that I think chairman made a real good statement that there's a lot of things that need to be watched. But also on the other hand, you also want to be careful like everything I do, I just always want to make sure we have a right balance. But then the definition of a right balance can have a different interpretation. And so that's why it's very important to have your ears open and listen to the constituents and listen to people who have the first contact about the issues. Senator Menendez, I spoke with you even before session started. You filed a bill to expand upon the Compassionate Use Act, which is for a very narrow part of the population, those with intractable epilepsy. Why start there and just kind of expand upon that to get this done? So this, let me see, we're in 2019. It's the 18th year. And I've noticed that the best ways to get things done in certain legislative sessions depends on a step that says you said yes to this. How can I get you to understand? So what I see is exactly what you said about what Stephanie Click did with the people who are suffering, people with epilepsy. The question that I have is if you have cancer, disease worth any less than people with epilepsy, I say no. If you have MS, does your disease mean any less than that? If you have Parkinson's, do you have it? So there's so many people. And my question is why are we, as legislators, telling doctors how they can practice medicine? And so my thought is we've already said, we've already said as a legislature, and the governor signed the bill, signed a medical compassionate use act for children or people with intractable epilepsy. So why do we get to pick winners and losers of diseases? Who is most worthy? And so I think that we, and I've heard people say, the science, I'm in agreement. I'm all about medical, I'm all about the science, but I know for a fact there are many people who would do so much better with using this natural product rather than being on opioid narcotics. We have an opioid epidemic. I've had many pain specialists tell me to help them get people off the opioids. And if we want to, that's killing people. And no one has died from an overdose of marijuana. So there's just, I love the word balance. I think there's a lot of balance. And you said common sense earlier. I love using common sense. And I bet you I could get you all polling data that would show in every one of our districts the people would support medical use of marijuana probably with 70%. In those liberal states of Oklahoma and Arkansas, we pass with 60. Montana has done this. We would be the 34th state in the nation to approve a use of medical marijuana. So we're not blazing new trails here. And I think it's time for us to just take a deep breath and know our constituents will trust, they trust doctors and they would trust us. Now, no one's talking about recreational, but I will tell you this, you can go to any high school kid in your districts and ask them, do you know who sells pot in your school? Every one of them knows. So the people who are trying to get stoned are getting stoned. This is not about that. You know who's not using marijuana? Law-abiding citizens. Law-abiding citizens are the ones that say, no, it's illegal, I won't do that. My father-in-law had cancer, he was dying and the narcotics were horrible and he'd either be in pain or asleep because of the narcotics. You know, the question, the conversation came up. Do you want to go to a different state, do you want to do something? He said, no, it's illegal and I'm in too much pain and other people are leaving Texas for their family members. We can do better. We are smarter. We can do better. And I agree that this is not about recreational, this is about a doctor, this is about adults making decisions about what's best for their health. We'll pause there real quickly. We have about 10 minutes left. We are sending a mic around. If you have questions, there's a couple there in the back. Let's start with the gentleman in the far back. Thank you for being here today. I got a question back on school finance and taxes and property taxes. I guess there's a general consensus that the driver for taxes are coming from the school districts and the state has not put its share in. And I read an article the other day though that said that we have a internet sales tax now in the state, but the comptroller, while he's collecting it, is not being as aggressive as other states are. And there's a whole pot of money that hasn't been collected and redistributed to local governments. So my question is how do you justify raising or allowing the rollback election when they're not getting the proper resources right now that should be collected by the state? Who'd like to? Yeah, Representative Button. Actually, were you there last night? Depends. Okay, which one? Somewhere last night. Depends where there is. Actually, there are some talks and I didn't get permission to announce some of our members are working diligently in this field. Their approach is, yes, we try to get more money, okay, but if we have to, not enough money, then we have to go to the tax swap. So what will be the potential area? And in this case, it will be a brand new resource. So, you know, this wonderful colleague of mine, he has been working diligently. They got a lot of good data information by working closely with the comptroller's office to think about. So, yes, we are working on the issue, but is that maturing enough and it's the right time to announce that, you know, he hasn't, you know, officially filed a, you know, so I think I need to respect the privacy he has at this time. Thank you for your question. Yes, right here. Yes, Texas is a doctor. They go up 60% of all census 25 to 34 would have a post-secondary degree of some sort by the year 2030. Yet Hispanics and African-Americans are only achieving a post-secondary degree of about 13% five years after high school. So in 30 seconds or less, we would be trying to address two things that you would do to address this problem. I've got three. So 30 seconds or less. Three very quickly. Number one, I have a bill. One of the things that frustrates me is why aren't we telling all high school students that if you don't take Algebra II, you're not going to be eligible for top 10 or some other scholarships. Why don't they find out about it till it's too late? That's, it's unconscionable. It's wrong. We need to tell these kids because they have the capacity to do it. They're just not being told and they're kids. They're 14. They're choosing not to. Number two, why don't we institute, like the state of Florida did, a first generation scholarship? So in Florida it started a dollar for dollar where the state would put up a dollar for every dollar that a state, community college, or university would raise from the philanthropy or private sector. That would be scholarship money to a first generation student regardless of where they came from in the state. If we do, now it's so successful, the state's putting up $2 for every dollar the school's raised. Currently there's a philanthropist who's set aside here in Texas, $15 million for first gen scholarships, for first gen students. If we at the state can pass this bill and create this, we'd have $30 million overnight for scholarships for first generation. Regardless of what district they come from, regardless of what they look like, what their last name is, whatever. The other last thing, many students of color or other disadvantaged backgrounds, a flat tire could be, they're not going to school, a broken transmission, an emergency. Higher Education Coordinating Board has realized that sometimes we need small grants to help kids get to school, finish their classes, not drop out. We're working on a bill with Higher Education Coordinating Committee right now to get some small grants for students for emergency situations. We don't want hardworking kids who maybe are putting themselves through college or working hard to get there, and they're in their senior year, they're in their junior year, some life unexpected emergency happens, and they drop out and never come back to finish. And I'll just finish with this, Ivy League schools, you get into an Ivy League school, that school wraps around you, your graduating becomes a source of pride or they get looked down if they don't graduate you. We should be doing the same thing in Texas. If we let a child into UT or A&M and we say to them, you're good enough to be here, we should wrap services around them, we should do intrusive advising, we should make sure that we've done everything we can so they graduate. Getting them enrolled is not, we shouldn't beat our chest of enrollment, it should be graduation rates. Representative Button, did you want to add? Yes, very much, because I serve on the Higher Education Committee for two sessions, and I'm very passionate about that. Two points. First, Algebra II. I was one of the few people, you remember several sessions ago when we strength the five testings, 15 into five, okay? I was one of the people actually walking on the floor, trying to say, please keep the Algebra II, please keep the Algebra II. But then a couple of reps reminded me, Angie Chen Button, you are a nerd, you love Algebra II, but not everybody does, okay? So I finally have to give up. But go back to, I think there's another issue I'd like to point out is that, especially the underpreveraged students, they're not like us, okay? Well, I might be kind of like underpreveraged students to a certain degree, but then the students, they don't always have parents, friends, relatives telling them, hey, you're about to graduate, this is the field you need to pick up because it's going to utilize your talent. And when you graduate, you're going to have a very marketable, valuable job waiting for you. And Dr. Oliverson, the representative from Houston area, has been working diligently. Actually, tomorrow in the high-end committee, his bill will be the first bill to be heard, is to come out an automatic way to help the students, because you see students, they go into the college, they drop out, they come back, whatever, finally they graduate after six or seven years, and then they get a degree that's absolutely non-marketable, okay? So, meanwhile, they incurred significant student loan, and with that kind of salary, if they get, well, right now, an environment is good. If you don't major in good field, you can still get a job. But to pay off that student loan is going to take forever. So, Dr. Representative Oliverson are working on this automatically. The students, when they apply for the college admission, it will lead them to, just a couple of tabs, lead them to a website, give analysis about, hey, this is the field you want to move in. First, are you qualified? What's the future? What can you do about that? The reality of the financial situation. That's right, that's right. Of course, it will be great if you can find an uncle or aunt to sit down with you. In your case, anybody wants to be a lawyer or CPA, just go to you. You can tell them everything. But not every kid is so lucky, especially the ones who need the most advice. They are now getting that. Thank you. Anybody else? Right here? The furthest away. Hi. Arming more school teachers has been proposed as a solution to deal with active shooters in schools. And there's no research to show that's effective. And in reality, I think an armed teacher is more likely to shoot an innocent student bystander or be shot by police who don't understand what's happening. And to be an effective solution to an active shooter. So my question is, would you support measures that would keep guns out of dangerous hands in the first place so we don't have to respond in the schools, such as red flag laws or laws that prevent child access to firearms? Yes. Yes. Representative Cole? Yes, I would. But that's not the focus this session. The focus is on mental health. I mean, we need all of it. I mean, I didn't get to the other question before, but we know certain things. We know that there are different demographics, different racial groups, make-ups, that impact your ability to be educated. So on that front, there are certain small things that we've learned about African-American children, males, hardest to educate. They respond to technology so that if you gave them a smart phone as opposed to asking them to sit still for three hours, they'd just exhale. And so there's little solutions like that that I think we need to spend more time putting into place. I couldn't agree more with the sort of value question about parents and all that, but my answer to that is this. No one has a child. We all have children. They are a gift and they belong to all of us. So it makes... I mean, I had never heard that we're not evaluating the formula again and maybe my bill is the formula. I don't know if it's a freshman to say that, but we have to care rather than that person that kid lives in inner-city Houston and they're facing recapture and so many dollars are going out or if they live in the valley. It's got to be the same analysis or we're suspect in whether or not we're just being political. And we can be political about a whole lot of things, but our kids just don't want them. Representative Siri, I've had some of your colleagues who also represent rural areas tell me that they rely. A lot of their school districts rely on the school martial program past a few sessions ago that allows some people on campus to be armed. Do you see that a lot in your district? I don't see it a lot. I do think that in a rural district it's definitely different. I live out on acreage and things like that and proud to say my wife knows how to use the shotgun and it's different than being inside the city versus... One of our school superintendents said a few years back or whatever, which is kind of what I just said. We're used to having firearms. That's kind of our culture and growing up, especially being in a rural community. So it is different where you're at I've got 23 school districts. That just tells you right there. With five counties I have diverse school districts and diverse needs. Senator Menendez, how does the legislature respond in the wake of the Santa Fe shooting, for instance? Here's my thought. You've heard the representatives say Texas is so large and diverse. Rural, urban, suburban. It's very difficult to come up with a one size fits all solution. Let's try to take this down to the granular cause of this thing. My thought is, as I heard the lady ask the question, as we've talked about right after Santa Fe, there were lots of meetings. We held a school safety meeting. What I believe would be the best thing. We've already had a lot of schools do their hardening in terms of their magnetic doors, their two stage, the cameras, all that stuff. Really what I think would be best is can't we help put more counselors into the schools so that we can address the issue before any one of the student body becomes a shooter. The issue in my opinion is, I think when you're dealing with, say, we're going to put guns in the schools to protect, you're expecting the shooter. So that's after the fact. I agree there has to be some hardening, there has to be some security to keep the kids secure. But a lot of these kids, they know those schools better than any of us, right? That's where they go every day. They know where the soft spots are. They know how to get something in if they want to. They can get around it. The thought is, how do we address these kids? If you look at Santa Fe, if you look at Parkland, you look at all these, every one of these shooters, there were signs. There were signs. And people didn't see the signs. And so I do think that we should use a little common sense when I think we can address gun legislation with like everything else with common sense. And in some cases, if someone is a danger to themselves or other, and it's been determined, we should look at, you know, talking to them about would you, for some period of time, let us hold your gun and you'll get it back. But right now, you and your spouse are in a heated battle here, you and your kids. This shouldn't be there right now. The other thing, should kids not have access to unlocked guns? I don't think they should. If a kid comes to any one of our houses, if we're gone and I have teenagers, if they were to host a party and someone leaves the party and gets in an accident, I'm responsible. Why is it any different for if a kid comes and finds a gun and shoots somebody? Why didn't I keep it locked? Why didn't I keep it safe? I think we have double standards that we can approach. But the common denominator, we need to have more licensed health professionals in the schools. The kids are dealing with more anxiety, more pressure, more depression, more stress than they've ever dealt before. And we're not addressing that issue. I don't think well enough. Representative Button, you're working on a mental health approach to the issue this session. I hosted a thing on mental health a few years ago and I had school counselors come up to me and said, you never mentioned school counselors. I think it's because they're seeing now as proctoring tests or advising you on where to go to college. Is there a focus there to reinvest in school counselors? Yes, definitely. You know that Senator Nelson, she has the SB-10 and to make a consortium of 26 different mental health agencies including the Children's Mental Health Institution. Actually I like to refer them as behavior institutions. And so they can consolidate the resources and make something happen. I do want to add a little bit. Dr. Bohnen, he Representative Bohnen, he is working on a school safety program, which is a basic structure and also kind of like an audit and a checklist because of each school you write. The rural schools and urban school there requirements are different but there are some basic plans that we can have audited and also when he mentioned that to me and I say please do not give our school another I'm funded the main day. If you want to do this you got to have a funding for them to make great things happen. So he promised that they are working on that. We just haven't seen the detail yet but I think that he's working diligently. Would you ask him to keep flexibility than that? Because some schools have already done these basic checklists. They should be able to use the money to go hire a counselor if that's what they want to do. He will make it very very flexible. He also said that he's not going to publicize what would be the standard requirements because once you publicize hey somebody can get it and know where are the weak spots that you can get in and that would be bad. He's working on that diligently. Well with that I think we'll have to leave it there for time. Let's have a round of applause for our panelists. Great discussion.