The Daily Drive

Commentary
By Bill Peterson
One wonders if the Republican Party in Hays County is on more pins and needles than the environmentalists who worry that Gov. Rick Perry really will appoint Jim Powers to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ).

Powers, the two-term Hays County Judge, applied for a position on the state commission in March, reportedly saying someone in the governor's office asked him to throw his hat in the ring. The governor's office has said no time table is set for the appointment, which could make the fall election season a little hairy.

Powers is running for a third term against Dripping Springs Democrat Liz Sumter after defeating former Hays County Republican Party Chairman Ernest Murry in the March primary. Powers is notorious for raising lots of money from developers outside Hays County while not being enough of a Republican to suit the party's far right wing. For that reason, some local Republicans would be happy for the governor to appoint Powers so they can run a more conservative candidate. But Powers also isn't enough of a Republican to deeply offend Democrats.

In 2004, Powers beat Democratic challenger Bill Liddle by only 55-45 percent, despite a $100,000 campaign endowment that trumped Liddle's funds by 10-1. During the March primary, Murry complained that Powers just doesn't light up the county Republicans, so they don't turn out for him. But Powers beat Murry in the primary with 57.22 percent of a light vote.

Chances are, Perry will keep party interests in mind and refrain from appointing a TCEQ commissioner from among 10 candidates until after the November election. But just the idea that Powers is up for the commission places his re-election and the county Republicans in a tough spot.

If the governor makes an appointment before the election, the county Republicans will have to pick a candidate who won't run with the advantage of incumbency. In this case, the party insiders would have to decide between a candidate who fits their vision of the party or someone with broad appeal. If the insiders decide their vision has broad appeal, they could go to Murry, but the record already shows that Murry isn't as strong of a candidate as Powers. If the governor lets the election pass without an appointment, Sumter will argue that Powers really doesn't want to be county judge.

Environmentalists might worry about Powers going in the TCEQ because he is developer friendly, but Hays County isn't what one would call a world leader in industrialization despite 40 percent growth in the last 15 years. That said, he's not going to save the blind salamander, either.

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June 27, 2006 18:38 - The San Marcos metro area?

Commentary
By Bill Peterson
Just finished reading the city of San Marcos' annual report for 2006. It's a nifty little publication that lays out many of the city's accomplishments, including economic development, street construction, parkland acquisitions and plans for the future. The publication is designed to tell readers that the city is on the move.

But the best part comes on the inside back cover, where the "San Marcos Metro" population is listed at 3,133,237. Not at all by coincidence, the Austin Metro and San Antonio Metro populations listed right underneath add up to 3,133,237. But one loves the spirit behind claiming all that as the San Marcos Metropolitan Area. San Marcos Mayor Susan Narvaiz loves pointing out that her town is the best spot on the Austin-San Marcos corridor. Why not lay claim as the principal city and take all of it?

Our little stretch of highway is bound to someday cause headaches for the White House's Office of Management and Budget (OMB), which delineates the Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs). As it happens, all of Hays County is counted as part of the Austin-Round Rock MSA, as are all of Travis, Williamson, Bastrop and Caldwell Counties. Round Rock has its name in there because it exceeded 50,000 residents on the 2000 Census.

OMB defines an MSA thusly: "Metropolitan Statistical Areas have at least one urbanized area of 50,000 or more population, plus adjacent territory that has a high degree of social and economic integration with the core as measured by commuting ties." Sounds like Hays County belongs in the Austin-Round Rock MSA. But growth along IH-35 is closing the distance between Austin and San Antonio. It's not uncommon to find people who live in Austin and work in San Antonio, nor is it so unusual for a couple to live in Kyle, with the wife working in Austin and the husband working in San Antonio. Some people working inside the San Marcos daily believe the city's newspaper readers are split, 50-50, between the Austin American-Statesman and the San Antonio Express-News.

It probably won't be too long, maybe following the 2020 Census, when OMB winds up defining an Austin-San Antonio-Round Rock-San Marcos-New Braunfels MSA, with San Marcos designated as a "Metropolitan Division." Rather than launch any more dorky Census talk about what constitutes a metropolitan division, we should just have a laugh and refer to the whole thing as the San Marcos Metropolitan Area, complete with giant exurbs in Austin and San Antonio.

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June 28, 2006 22:55 - Ted Lehman

Commentary
By Bill Peterson
The Hays CISD community lost a great one when Ted Lehman passed away on June 14. As a member of the Buda, Kyle and Hays school boards at different times, Lehman cast crucial votes for inclusion and consolidation. A high school in Kyle bears his family name because of him.

Ted Lehman died at age 83, less than three months before the school named for him was to play its first varsity football game. Arguably, Lehman first made his name in the area as a football star at Buda High School, where he graduated as valedictorian in 1940. In 1948, he married Hazel Lippe of Kyle, to whom he remained wedded for the last 58 years of his life.

Lehman made his living as an independent farmer, one of the last in the area. But he made his impact by making the right calls for education during his days on the various local school boards. In the late 1950s, Lehman voted for integration of the Buda public schools. An enormously controversial measure at the time, it passed by a single vote, 4-3. In 1960s, as a member of the Kyle school board, Lehman fought for the consolidation of schools in Buda, Kyle and Wimberley, where three small, independent districts found they couldn't provide educational value separately.

Lehman was 81 years old when Lehman High School opened, partially on land donated by his family, in 2004. Sadly, he'll miss the school's first full flowering when it graduates its first senior class next spring.

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June 29, 2006 23:06 - The sad state of boys, girls and cars

Commentary
By Bill Peterson
One of the unique pleasures of living and working in Buda is that hour or so spent 10 or 12 times per year on the sideline with the kids who play football at Hays High School. In Texas, oddly, it's not considered routine for reporters to work high school football games from the sidelines because Texas, almost alone among the United States, builds high school football stadiums with press boxes that are functional, if not almost luxurious. In most states, the high school "press box" is a glorified tree house with barely enough room for scouts.

So, as a bow to old habits learned by covering high school football in other parts of America, it's always fun to spend half of a game on the sidelines, which isn't possible when covering football at the higher levels. The Hays kids, especially in the last three years or so, don't seem to mind being joined by some old goofball with a notebook. The kids feel invincible, especially when they're already ahead, 52-10. They're fun. They like to laugh and play. They're pups.

But one worries about what might happen to some of these guys, because it's always anyone's guess if kids will make it to 22 without being pregnant or dead. And one especially worries after recent news developments in which two 19-year-old Buda boys have found deep trouble for themselves. In each of these terrible matters, the kids are accused of serious crimes, cases in which momentary lapses of judgement could ruin their lives if they are, in fact, guilty.

In one case, 19-year-old Pete Solis of Buda is in the news nationwide for having sex with a 14-year-old Austin girl who he met through the social networking website MySpace. Along with statutory rape charges against Solis, the girl's family is suing News Corporation, which owns MySpace, for $30 million on grounds that the site doesn't sufficiently protect teens from sexual predation. By one local report, Solis had no idea he broke the law by so involving himself with a such a young girl. Now, he faces the prospect of 20 years in prison, along with lifetime registration as a sex offender.

In the other case, 19-year-old Jeremy Cisneros of Buda is charged with failure to render aid after his pickup truck allegedly struck and killed a homeless man bicycling on the FM 2001 exit off IH-35. Cisneros is charged with a third degree felony, which, according to the Texas Penal Code, could land him in jail for up to 10 years.

Girls and cars are the two great passions of teenaged boys with little idea how to handle either. The guys too seldom understand that even if they're absolutely terrific human beings, they can be ruined by one mistake either way. One. And it's way too easy to make mistakes.

Sadly, the drives connecting boys with cars and girls are so strong as to be impenetrable by constant exhortations to safety. Driving fast seduces kids without direction or prospects, giving them the metaphorical illusion that they're going somewhere. The illusion is shattered when "somewhere" ends up being a jail cell, a hospital bed or a grave.

The sex impulse is hard enough to tame and sublimate for kids who would know how to do it. Unfortunately, most young guys can't begin to understand what that would mean. The energy is stronger than their mental powers to harness it. How else would a 19-year-old boy ignore the prohibition against pubescent girls?

One hates to repeat lectures bound to fall on deaf ears, but it's important for fellows to understand this: there is no such thing as consensual sex with a 14-year-old girl. Texas sets the age of consent at 17. This means that until someone is 17, he or she is legally considered to lack sufficient understanding of the consequences to be capable of consenting to sex. The people of Texas and their legislature have spoken on this. And it's irrelevant if you or the girl disagree, because the law will win. Condoms will protect you from pregnancy and disease, but they will not protect you from the law.

Legal implications aside, try to at least refine your drive through standards. Only a gluttonous scavenger picks the low-hanging fruit. As the orchards will tell you, the low-hanging fruit isn't ripe. It's better to go a little hungry than to sicken yourself with unripened fruit. Pick out girls who are legally aged. They'll play the same game and it will save you a lot of screwing around in court.

We can't stop mid-teens from having sex, but nor do we wish to promote it, because the consequences often wreck young lives and exact avoidable social costs, to say nothing of creating younger lives brought to the world under destitute circumstances without their consultation. Keep adult relations among adults, or something like adults.

So, 19-year-old guys, watch it with cars and girls. You don't have to be a eunuch, but don't be a knucklehead, either. Drive carefully. Don't ruin your lives before they've begun. It's too nasty for you, and too heartbreaking for the rest of us.

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June 30, 2006 23:25 - Building big

Commentary
By Bill Peterson
The development of every town is a race between commercial development and residential development, with planners and long-time residential property tax payers hoping the commercial side stays ahead. San Marcos lived on the right side of that line in 2005, issuing only 118 single-family home building permits and permits for 634 dwelling units (apartments) out of $130 million in total building permits.

But the houses are starting to catch up. Carma Developers, a Canadian firm, is planning the 2,000-home Blanco Vista subdivision in the northern part of town. The largest subdivision in San Marcos history, it stands to add more than 5,000 to the city's population on 575 acres along Old Stagecoach Road and Five-Mile Dam. Though the development is in the San Marcos jurisdiction, it also lies in the Hays CISD, which should hope a nearby $450 million Blanco Riverwalk project near Yarrington Road at IH-35 will somehow generate commercial tax revenue to offset the drain on schools.

The Blanco Riverwalk, approved recently by the San Marcos City Council, will include 765 condos, more than 800,000 square feet of entertainment and retail space and 400,000 square feet of medical office, hospital and extended care facilities. The development also will include three hotels and a 5,000-square-foot amphitheater.

New San Marcos residential subdivisions either finished or under construction by the end of 2005 included Bishop's Crossing (Phase II), Blanco River Village, Majestic Estates and Camino Real.

But commercial development in San Marcos continues unabated. On the industrial side, aircraft engine parts maker CFAN is expanding its plant by 100,000 square feet with plans to add 200 jobs in the next three years. Industrial lighting firm Wide-Lite last year increased its space to 210,000 square feet and better than doubled its employees to 410.

Retail is booming in San Marcos. On the south end, Prime Outlets completed a $26 million expansion last year. Southeast of Wonder World Drive and IH-35, construction has begun on the 311,000-square-foot Red Oak Village, a $20 million project that will include a Petsmart, Sam's Club, Marshall's and Bed, Bath & Beyond. A 280-room Embassy Suites hotel nearby is scheduled for 2008.

And that’s to say nothing of a controversial project from the state’s General Land Office concerning 113 acres it owns west of IH-35 between Wonder World Drive and Centerpoint Road. The land office is trying to finish a $50-million deal with a Dallas developer for a master-planned retail center, using the state’s tax exempt status to sweeten the pot. San Marcos officials are furious at the potential loss of property tax revenue. Project advocates say the retail center will raise money for Texas school children.

Downtown retail projects include the Sanctuary Lofts and the Too Bitter Club.

Building permits in San Marcos this year are running around $90 million, with $55 million of it to go towards a new San Marcos High School.

San Marcos, with its 118 single-family home building permits issued last year, came in last among the Hays County cities along IH-35. Kyle issued 1,209 such permits in 2005, and Buda issued 199.

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