Good morning, 

Here is today's Texas Minute.

– Michael Quinn Sullivan 

Tuesday, January 21, 2020
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• Tarrant County commissioners voted unanimously to accept refugees after Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has tried to pull the state out of the federal resettlement program. Robert Montoya reports one of the commissioners seemed most concerned about “losing” the federal dollars that accompany the refugees.
          
• Texas’ teachers are up in arms over news that the state’s Teacher Retirement System will be spending $326,000 per month in rent for office space on Austin’s Sixth Street, while continuing to raise costs on current and retired teachers. Cary Cheshire has the details about an agency that manages a $150 billion trust fund established to finance teacher retirements. TRS is the largest public retirement system in Texas, and the sixth largest public pension fund in the U.S.
      
• Beginning in 2021, TRS will be charged just over $326,000 per month for space in the luxurious Indeed Tower. The bill will increase to over $383,000 towards the end of the multi-year contract.
        
• A source told me yesterday that TRS is an investor in the building, which they allegedly cannot disclose for various legal reasons. While the building is probably a good real estate investment, officing there seems a bit tone deaf. An agency allegedly devoted to protecting the retirement interests of Texas’ public school teachers shouldn’t be operating out of swanky downtown Austin offices.
     
• (FWIW... we’re submitting requests to TRS for records to see if we can confirm they are investors in the building. Whether or not they respond to us, TRS should be able to respond to retired teachers, whose assets they are managing about specific investments.)
       
• Candidates vying for an open congressional seat in a heavily Republican central Texas district are divided on the question of whether or not they would join the Freedom Caucus should they be sent to Washington D.C. Brandon Waltens reports nine of the race’s 12 candidates showed up to a forum in College Station to answer a series of questions ranging from fiscal policy to healthcare to immigration. The event was co-hosted by Grassroots Victory 2020, Empower Texans, and the Texas A&M chapter of the Young Conservatives of Texas.
      
• Four of the nine said they would not: Trent Sutton, Todd Kent, Scott Bland, and Renee Swann. Four others said they would, including Elianor Vessali, David Saucedo, Kristen Alamo Rowin, and George Hindman. One candidate, Laurie McReynolds, said she didn’t know if she would join. (Three candidates – Ahmad Adnan, Pete Sessions, and Jeffrey Oppenheim – skipped the forum altogether.)
     
• Dallas County taxpayers are shelling out another $6 million for new voting equipment, after the county discovered components bought just last year can’t be used securely—a costly mistake one local official blames on the head of the county’s elections department. Erin Anderson has the story.

• “As part of a plan to win in 2020, Democrats are suing the state of Texas to subvert election integrity safeguards. National Democrats have sued Texas to implement online voter registration.” – Direct Action Texas
          
• In a recent report, Transparency Texas looks at the “luxury lifestyle” many Texas lawmakers are enjoying at the expense of their political donors. Among other finds, State Sen. John Whitmire (D-Houston) “spent $15,445 on tickets to see the Houston Texans, $12,272 on tickets to the Rockets, and $10,303 to see the Astros.” Meanwhile, State Rep. Jeff Leach (R-Plano) seems to “really like the Fairmont Hotel in Austin. Even though he already recorded a $6,000 expense covering his ‘room and board’ while in Austin, Leach also racked up 20 separate stays at the Fairmont Austin for $11,265, each tagged as ‘candidate lodging’ charges.”
       
• Their report also found State Sen. Kel Seliger (R-Amarillo) enjoys his spa days. His campaign reported spending “$1,000 at Viva Day Spa, $100 at Bella Salon Austin, and $90 on Mantis Massage.”