You heard it from Commentary first. Yesterday, the Keep Houston Safe folks sent up all star hot shot GOP lawyer Andy Taylor to advise the H-Town City Council that putting the anti red light camera item on the ballot would not stand up in court. He got my attention when he said the action would probably violate the Voting Rights Act because holding an election to amend the city charter to ban red light cameras would “dilute the minority vote”. I’m trying to figure this one out.
(First of all, I wonder where Andy Taylor is on the Voter I.D. issue.)
I wish he would have explained the diluting the minority vote aspect of his argument. I know it was kind of a feeble attempt to appeal to the minority members of the H-Town City Council, but it would have been interesting to hear his reasoning.
First of all, the anti red light camera ballot item doesn’t automatically add a bunch of non minority voters to the rolls. You don’t automatically get registered to vote if you happen to be nonregistered voter and got a ticket generated by a camera.
I think the only community that would really get all worked up and made sure they turned out to vote against the cameras are the folks that got the camera generated tickets and I think they are folks of different colors.
That Kubosh fella that helped organized the petition drive threw a zinger at Andy Taylor when he wondered out loud about “Republicans worried about the minority vote being diluted.” Ouch!
Commentary spent yesterday afternoon watching the H-Town City Council debate whether or not to put the anti red light camera proposed ordinance before the voters, despite the fact that over 25,000 signatures were verified. CM Clutterbuck did her best to circumvent the signature process on technicalities. In the end the vote was 11 to 1 to put it on the ballot.
Regardless of where you are on the issue (Commentary thinks the cameras are A-Okay and make sense), it is hard to tell 20,000 plus folks that signed the petitions that you can’t have an election.
Of course, I was told that it didn’t help that only GOP consultants were at the City Council meeting advising the Keep Houston Safe folks and sending up a hot shot GOP lawyer to speak to a body with nine Dems and six GOPers. GOPer Clutterbuck ended up being their only vote.
Check out the Chron story on yesterday’s action.
What do I know about baseball anyway? A couple of days ago I said the ‘Stros wouldn’t have to face Roy O. this week. In last night’s extra inning game, Ryan Howard of the Phillies got the old heave ho in the 15th inning and the Phillies found themselves without position players to replace Howard so they stuck Roy O. in left field.
How many World Seriouses have the Phillies won?
Add Juliet Stipeche and Judith Cruz to the list of those that have filed to run for HISD Trustee Position, District VIII. Now there are three candidates.
The Phillies won the 1980 World Serious and the 2008 World Serious of course for a total of two.
Last night’s game lasted five hours and twenty minutes as Roy O. got up to bat once and grounded out to end the game as the ‘Stros won 4-2 in 16. Not bad at all as we go up against Roy Halladay tonight and J.A. Happ goes for us!
Camposcommunications' Blog 
We’re about to see exactly how smart Gov. Dude’s consultants really are. This anti-red light vote puts lots of naturally anti-Bill White votes at the ballot box in the state’s biggest county … and since to those folks, Bill White is Mayor Spy Cam, they are naturals to vote for White’s opponent. It will be interesting to see how that plays out in November.