The Baytown Sun (Baytown, Tex.), Vol. 85, No. 204, Ed. 1 Saturday, June 3, 2006 Page: 4 of 16
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1
Sunday, June 3,2006
THE BAYTOWN SUN . !
4A
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
U.S. Views
Enron
grn-o
verdict
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Seniors deprived of tax relief
-Ai»J
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ELLIOT
NAISHTAT
Gina Bibb
Baytown
FRED HARTMAN
Publisher Emeritus
1950-1974
202-224-2934
713-572-3337
Fax: 202-228-2856
. Fax:713-572-3777
cornyn.senate.gov/
contact/index.html
Ted Poe,
Dist. 2 Rep.
866-425-6565
866-447-0242
www.house.gov/
poe
Ron Paul,
Dist. 14 JRep.
202-225-2831
979-230-0000
www.house.gov/
paul
Gene Green,
Dist. 29 Rep.
202-225-1688
713-330-0761
www.house.gov/
green
\ p A
OH '
PEAR...
OPINION
Baytown, 77522; Tax them to (281)
427-1880 or e-mail sunnews@bay-
townsun.com.
Items featured on this page are
the views of the persons identified
with each submission and do not
necessarily reflect the views.of The -
Baytown Sun or its advertisers.
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George W. Bush,
President
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Fax: 202-456-2326
president©
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Vice President
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Kay Bailey
Hutchison,
Senator
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John Cornyn,
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JBaptoiDH &un
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WRITE TO US
The Sun welcomes letters of up
EDITORIAL BOARD
Wanda Gamer Cash David Bloom
Edttor/Pubfeher Managing Editor
Jim Finley f Jane Howard Lee
retired Managing Editor retired Reporter
Doyle Barlow Danielle Lynch
Sports Editor News Editor
to 300 words and guest columns of
up to 500 words. Guest columns
should include a photo of the
writer. We publish only original
material addressed to The Baytown
Sun bearing the writer’s signature.
An address and phone number not
. for publication should be included.
All letters and guest columns are
subject to editing, and the Sun
reserves the right to refuse to pub-
lish any submission.
Send signed letters to: Wanda
Garner Cash or David Bloom, The
All Americans owe a salute to the jury in
Houston that held the chief executives of the
disgraced Enron corporation accountable for
the damage to so many lives caused when that
corrupted company imploded. ' ~
And if their verdict serves as a warning to
other executives and leads to genuine reforms
in corporate behavior and oversight, future
generations of Americans will owe the jury a
debt of gratitude as well.
The eight women and four men deliberated
foitfive days and then pronounced Kenneth L.
Lay guilty on six counts of fraud and conspir-
acy and four counts of bank fraud and Jeffrey
K. Skilling guilty on 18 counts of fraud and
conspiracy and one count of insider trading
(he was acquitted on nine counts of insider
trading). The jury saw through the sham in
which the pair attempted to have it both ways
— extravagantly paid top executives who had
no idea wnat was going on in their company.
The verdicts will be appealed, of course, but
if justice is consistent they will be upheld and
the two men will be off to prison for what
could be the rest of their lives. How much of
their ill-gotten wealth can be recovered from
wherever they’ve hidden it is unknown, but it
would be nice if some of it could be returned
to the thousands of Enron workers whose jobs
and pensions were wiped out.
Enron’s collapse in October 2001 followed
what another former executive, Sherron
Watkins, described as “an elaborate account-
ing hoax.” She alerted Lay to that in an Aug.
15 memo when Skilling resigned as Chief
Executive Officer, but five days later, Lay was
quoted in Business Week as saying, “There
are absolutely no problems that had anything
to do with Jeff’s departure. There are no
accounting issues, no trading issues, no
reserve issues, no previously unknown prob-
lem issues. The company is probably in the
.strongest and best shape that it has ever been
in.”
Live years later, he took the witness stand
and tried to blame the media, staff accountants
and others for the Enron debacle. Everyone
but himself.
The jury knew better. They put the burden
of responsibility right where it belongs.
The U.S. Justice Department prosecutors
also rate a salute for their efforts in this case.
Sean M. Berkowitz, director of the Enron Task
Force, was right on the mark when he said the
jurors “sent an unmistakable message to
boardrooms across the country that you can’t
lie to shareholders, you can’t put yourself in
frbnt of your employees’ interests, and no
matter how rich and powerful you are you
have to play by the rules.”
And we can only hope that the message has
been received in other corporate offices and
boardrooms and business schools — and in
the power corridors of Washington, which for
too long has been far too cozy with Big
Business, primarily because of its campaign
contributions.
Capitalism is a good thing, a mighty engine
of economic prosperity, but unfettered capital-
ism is not —- and America has known that
since the very beginning. It has had to strug-
gle with Robber Barons and rogue industrial-
ists and corruption of politics and policy-mak-
ing. Periodically, the nation needs to restore
the balance between the corporate good and
the common good.
— The Press and Sun-Bulletin,
Binghamton, N. Y.
'■J/*
ADVERTISING
Angie Pagel, Advertising Director
angie.pagel@baytowrtsun.com
HOW TO REACH US
Wanda Garner Cash, Publisher
i wgcash@baytownsun.com
Sandy Denson, Business Mgr.
sandy.denson@baytownsun,com . ”
NEWSROOM
David Bloom, Managing Editor
david.bloom@baytownsun.com
Doyle Barlow, Sports Editor
doyle.barlow@baytownsun.com
Danielle Lynch, News Editor
danielle.lynch@baytownsun.com
Notably absent from the Republican leader-
ship’s self-congratulatory comments regarding
the recently completed special session on
' public school finance were any references to
the fact that, due to leadership’s inaction, over
1.3 million senior citizens and people with
disabilities in Texas will receive little or no
property tax relief. Given that the governor,
lieutenant governor and speaker were all in
positions to intervene on behalf of these vul-
nerable populations, living for the most part
on fixed incomes, I question why the interests
of these particular elderly and disabled Texans
were left so far behind.
House Bill 1, the property tax reduction
bill, as proposed, neglected to provide propor-
tionate tax relief for seniors and people with
disabilities currently recei.L.o _
increases as other homeowners would receive.
Realizing that these seniors and disabled
Texans had been left out of the bill, I offered
an amendment and introduced a constitutional
amendment to ensure that all Texas home-
owners, including those whose taxes are
frozen because they are over 65 or have a dis-
ability, would receive the same level or pro-
portion of tax relief. The amendment was
adopted by the House and retained in the bill
by the Senate. But the constitutional amend-
ment still needed to pass.
The chairman of the House Ways and
Means Committee told me that “a decision
had been made” (by whom, I wondered) to
not let my proposed constitutional amend-
ment get out of committee. Instead, legislation
sponsored by Leo Berman (R-Tyler) that
would provide a temporary reduction in taxes
for seniors and people with disabilities, but ■
would also allow their taxes to float up in the
future, was quickly passed out of the commit-
tee and scheduled for floor debate.
Rep. Berman asked me to sign on to his
bills as a joint author. I told him that as long
as language authorizing property taxes owed
by senior and disabled Texans to float up
remained in his proposals, I would not. Such
language was antithetical to the firmly estab-
lished principle of a tax freeze for these popu-
lations. Berman argued that the additional
amount of taxes owed by seniors and people
with disabilities would not amount to that
much. I asked him why, then, were he and
leadership so insistent upon including the
float-up language? He said something about.
' “fairness.” "
Once again, the full House accepted State Rep. Elliott Naishtat is from Austin
amendments to replace the Berman bills with (Dist. 49), has been a member of the Texas
my original language, providing proportionate House of Representatives since 1991, and
tax relief and a permanent tax freeze for serves on the Human Services Committee.
Expressions of freedom
re: Billy Barnett’s letter on the Dixie
Chicks
In your letter you made the assump-
tion people hated the Dixie Chicks for
exercising their freedoms. I beg to dif-
fer — people do not like the Dixie
Chicks for a variety of reasons, includ-
ing their political views — not because
they exercised their freedoms!
Therefore, you cannot conclude that
many C&W fans are like terrorists. In
fact, many are like the Dixie Chicks,
expressing their freedoms: freedom not
to buy their music, attend their concerts,
or support them in any way. That’s the
beauty of the freedom we treasure" free
to attend the movies, read the books
and listen to the music we enjoy, for
whatever reason; and avoid the ones we
are offended by, for whatever reason.
Many people get that!
Setting record straight
J must, take issue with and refute sev-
eral unfounded accusations alleged in a
“Letter to the Editor” and printed in the
Baytown Sun on May 26. In his letter,
Gerritt von Wenckstem questions with
several assumptions (no facts) the hon-
esty and integrity of myself and mem-
bers of our board.
At our May 22 meeting, Gerritt and
one senior girl spoke very eloquently
and passionately on why we should
change Policy FMH (Local) and allow
six seniors who had not passed all por-
tions of TAKS to take part in gradua- >
tion ceremonies. Last year our Board I
of Trustees had discussed Policy FMH
(Local) at length with the final result of
upholding the policy. The students had
•multiple chances (5) to take and pass
the test and had been pffered remedia-
* tion classes taught by the'high school
■A faculty. Gerrit had presented a similar
presentation during the Open Forum
portion of our previous board meeting.
At that meeting; and according to Open
* Forum rules, board members are not
allowed to comment except to correct
misinformation or to refer to certain
policies.
When the May 22 presentation was
complete, it fell upon me as the newly
elected board president to respond. I
had given the issue much thought when
I saw the presentation was on the agen-
da, as to what I might say should I be
elected board president. I spoke from
my heart as a parent (and grandparent)
who understands the anguish felt by the
six students in question and those who
love them. I wanted them to know that
the entire board is made up of parents
and that we all feel anguish over any
student not being able to graduate with
their class. 1 personally believed it was
not the time to consider a change to the ,
policy, especially with a new superin-
tendent and two new board members,
one of who could not be present to be
sworn in due to work obligations.
Gerritt also stated that our board vio-
lated the law by discussing the issue
prior to the meeting. Nothing could be
further from the truth. When I stated
that “no one on the board has indicated
they want to change the policy,” it was
due to the fact that no board member
had requested the policy be placed in
the agenda as an “Action Item.”
Therefore, by law, no vote could be
Our board is composed of "outstand-
ing members of the community” as
Gerritt stated in his letter, arid I can
assure him and the community we rep-
resent that none of us would “subvert
the Constitution we have sworn to
uphold” as he alleged. To my knowl-
edge, a board of trustees upholding a 4-
year old policy does not subvert the
Constitution of the United States or the
State of Texas.
A public meeting of the School Board ,/ '
is neither a Court of Law with a judge,
jury and lawyers, nor a Town Hall meet-
ing where the audience debates issues
with members of the Board. As school
trustees, we are elected to set legal poli-
cies that benefit the majority of our stu-
dents and reflect community standards.
The majority of the Senior Class of
2006 (217 students) met the require-
ments of Policy FMH (Local) and 3
upheld the high expectations and high
academic standards that Barbers Hill
expects from our graduates. They truly
exemplify our school motto -”We Can,
We Will, We’re Barbers Hill!”
Carmena Gross
Barbers Hill ISO Board
(j
seniors and people with dis-
abilities. But Berman’s pro-
posed constitutional amend-
ment, as amended, still had
to pass in the Senate.
(Berman’s stand-alone bill,
as amended to reflect my
original language, did not
have to pass in the Senate
because both the House and
Senate had retained my lan-
guage in House Bill 1.)
Despite repeated pleas from the Texas
Silver-Haired Legislature, Texas Senior
Advocacy Coalition and AARP, as well as
from a bi-partisan group of legislators, includ-
_______________ ing Rep. Berman and me, the proposed con-
iiving a freeze on tax stitutional amendment was never considered
>wners would receive. f°r a vote ® Senate Finance Committee,
effectively'killing the measures intended to
provide proportionate tax relief and.a perma-
■ nent tax freeze for seniors and people with
disabilities.
At any point during the waning days of the
special session, the governor, lieutenant gov-
ernor and speaker could have impressed upon
the chairman of the Senate Finance ,
Committee the importance of voting out the
requisite constitutional amendment. But they
chose to not do so. The votes were there, the
necessity was apparent. In the end, 1,181,825
elderly and 146,945 disabled Texans were left
out. r .
For those of you interested in understanding
why the Republican leadership.pushed so -
hard for Rep. Berman’s float-up language and,
when my proportionate tax relief and freeze
language was substituted, proceeded to kill
the proposed constitutional amendment, con-
sider the following. Since House Bill 1
requires any increase in school tax rates above
fourtents to go before the voters, the Berman -
float-up language would have ensured that ....
there was a built-in constituency to vote
against school districts raising their rates, and
would have further limited the ability of
school districts to exercise local control and
raise needed revenues. Anti-tax guru Grover
Norquist loved Berman’s float-up language.
So did our Republican leadership. That’s why
the proposed .constitutional amendment was
killed. That’s why over 1.3 million seniors
and people with disabilities in Texas will
receive little or no property tax relief.
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Cash, Wanda Garner. The Baytown Sun (Baytown, Tex.), Vol. 85, No. 204, Ed. 1 Saturday, June 3, 2006, newspaper, June 3, 2006; Baytown, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1191863/m1/4/?q=%22%22~1: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Sterling Municipal Library.