As Texas Goes... (22 page)

Appendix

Texas on the Brink
A Report from the Texas Legislative Study on the State of Our State

“Texas on the Brink”
is a measure of how the state stands up to the rest of the country, published at the beginning of every two-year session by the Legislative Study Group in the Texas House of Representatives.

When this 2011 version was produced, Representative Garnet Coleman was chair of the group. Its other officers were Representative Lon Burnam, vice chair, Representative Elliott Naishtat, treasurer, and Representative Rafael Anchia, secretary. The staff included Joe Madden, executive director, Phillip Martin, policy director, and policy analysts Jasie Boyd, Cappreese Crawley, David Kanewske, Lisa Mathews, Ashley Reeder, Kira Ruben, Mimi Tran, Rachel Watson, and Kimberly Willis.

Just spending money isn’t a sign of progress. If your state came in at the bottom on student achievement, you probably wouldn’t be comforted by the news that it had paid the most per capita on its students. And Texas does have a low cost of living. So the fact that it ranks forty-fourth in per pupil expenditures might not mean anything at all—if the high school graduate rate didn’t clock in at forty-third.

If you check out only one thing, look at the numbers on the environment—and then contemplate the fact that Texas members of Congress and Texas governors have spent the last couple of decades bitterly denouncing the Environmental Protection Administration for meddling in things that Texas can take care of for itself.

—Gail Collins

Texas on the Brink

Since 1836, Texas has stood as an icon of the American dream.

Blessed with land, rivers, oil, and other abundant natural resources, early Texas welcomed everyone from cattle ranchers to
braceros
, from cotton farmers to Chinese railroad workers. These pioneers built a great state, and together we fulfilled a destiny.

From humble beginnings, we built a state with the firm belief that
every
Texan might rise as high and as far as their spirit, hard work, and talent might carry them. With education and determination every Texan might achieve great success—home ownership, reliable healthcare, safe neighborhoods, and financial prosperity.

In Texas today, the American dream is distant. Texas has the highest percentage of uninsured children in the nation. Texas is dead last in the percentage of residents with their high school diploma and near last in SAT scores. Texas has America’s dirtiest air. If we do not change course, for the first time in our history, the Texas generation of tomorrow will be less prosperous than the generation of today.

Without the courage to invest in the minds of our children and steadfast support for great schools, we face a daunting prospect. Those who value tax cuts over children and budget cuts over college have put Texas at risk in her ability to compete and succeed.

Let us not forget that the business of Texas is Texans. To ‘Close the Gap’ in Texas, we must graduate more of our best and brightest with the skills to succeed in a world based on knowledge. If we invest in our greatest resource—our children—Texas will be the state of the future. If we do not, Texas will only fall further behind.

Texas is on the brink, but Texas can do better. The choice is ours.

State Rankings

State Taxes

(50th=Lowest, 1st=Highest)

Education

(50th=Lowest, 1st=Highest)

State of the Child

(50th=Lowest, 1st=Highest)

Health Care

(50th=Lowest, 1st=Highest)

Health and Well-Being

(50th=Lowest, 1st=Highest)

Women’s Issues

(50th=Lowest, 1st=Highest)

Access to Capital

(50th=Lowest, 1st=Highest)

Environment

(50th=Lowest, 1st=Highest)