Chronic Pain Specialist in Tavener, TX

In a 5-3 decision, the court ruled Texas Central — the Dallas company planning to build the railway — has eminent domain authority.

DALLAS — A divided Texas Supreme Court has given the proposed high-speed bullet train between Dallas and Houston renewed life, at least on paper.

In a 5-3 decision, the court ruled Texas Central — the Dallas company planning to build the railway — has eminent domain authority. The ruling comes a little more than a week after opponents of the controversial project thought it was dead after Texas Central's CEO resigned, leaving the company without any top management.

The $30 billion train has been in the works for years. If built, it would travel at a speed of up to 200 miles per hour and enable passengers to commute between Dallas and Houston in about 90 minutes, according to Texas Central. The company argues the project will benefit Texas by taking cars off roads, creating thousands of jobs and generating billions of dollars in economic impact.

Many Texas land owners whose properties sit in the proposed path of the train oppose the project. James Miles of Leon County sued Texas Central in 2019 challenging whether the company has the authority to use eminent domain to take property for the project.

In siding with Texas Central, the court's majority said their decision focuses narrowly on the issue of eminent domain, not about the merits of the train.

"At the outset, it is important to recognize what this case is about and what it is not about. The case involves the interpretation of statutes relating to eminent domain; it does not ask us to opine about whether high-speed rail between Houston and Dallas is a good idea or whether the benefits of the proposed rail service outweigh its detriments," Justice Debra Lehrmann wrote for the court.

Lehrmann was joined in the majority by Chief Justice Nathan Hecht and Justices Jeff Boyd, Brett Busby and Evan Young. Justices John Devine, Jimmy Blacklock and Rebeca Aizpuru Huddle dissented. Justice Jane Bland, who joined the court in September 2019, did not participate in the decision.

One of the central questions during the case has been whether or not Texas Central actually meets the definition of being a "railroad." The trial court decided the entities comprising Texas Central do not qualify as either railroad companies or interurban electric railway companies and granted summary judgment to the landowner. The appeals court reversed the lower court's decision and ruled the entities qualify as both.

The Supreme Court majority ruled Texas Central has eminent-domain power as interurban electric railway companies and said it did not to address whether they also qualify as railroad companies.

In a dissenting opinion, Justices Huddle, Blacklock and Devine said the ruling "resurrects a 115-year-old statute" governing interurban electric railways", which they described as "sisters to the trolley car" popular in the late 19th century.

"No one questions that the statute ... granted eminent-domain authority to facilitate construction of small electric railways for ferrying Texans short distances between adjacent towns and up and down Main Streets alongside horse-drawn carriages," the dissenting justices wrote. "But it blinks reality to conclude, as the Court does, that the same trolley-car statute confers eminent domain power on private entities aspiring to build — in 2022 — a massive $30 billion infrastructure project capable of supporting an elevated, 672-foot-long high-speed train as it traverses hundreds of miles and thousands of privately owned parcels between Houston and Dallas."

They also wrote that the majority opinion abandons longstanding principles to provide protection to property owners.

Texas Central celebrated the decision in a statement to the Dallas Business Journal while offering little detail about what the company plans to do next. "We are appreciative to the Texas Supreme Court for their time and consideration of this important issue as we continue work on this innovative high-speed passenger train rail," the company said.

An attorney representing Miles, the landowner who sued Texas Central, was not immediately available for comment.

Jennifer Stevens, a spokeswoman for the group ReRoute the Route, expressed disappointment in the court's ruling. ReRoute the Route is comprised of Texas businesses and civic organizations opposed to the train.

"While we are deeply disappointed with the ruling, Re-Route the Route will continue to educate federal, state, and local officials on this project’s many failings, including private property violations, severe public hazards, adverse minority community impact, weakened flood control, significant environmental damage, financial mismanagement and more, all of which render it utterly ineligible for any taxpayer support,” Stevens said.

Waller County Judge Trey Duhon, who is also president of Texans Against High-Speed Rail, said in statement said the group will continue to oppose the project. Despite the ruling, Duhon said he does not believe Texas Central has the ability to make the project happen.

"We cannot understand how the Supreme Court of Texas can designate a company in full meltdown and another company that was created and exists entirely on paper as railroads with eminent domain authority," Duhon said. "No matter the ruling, we were and remain prepared to continue the fight. We will continue to protect private property rights, tax dollars, and our natural resources. We strongly believe even with this ruling that Texas Central will not be able to progress, as it has no money, no permits, and no leadership, which has been the case for years."

An executive director at a Planned Parenthood’s sex education arm claimed that children are born “sexual” while simultaneously advocating for comprehensive sex education from kindergarten through 12th grade and porn literacy for certain ages, Fox News Digital found.

Bill Taverner, who has advocated for sexuality education at U.S. congressional briefings, is the executive director of Planned Parenthood’s Center for Sex Education located in New Jersey. The Center provides training materials nationally and hosts the largest conference for sex educators in the U.S.

In 2015, he said, “[We have] in our society, an assumption of asexuality of people with intellectual disabilities. It’s a myth that’s perpetuated, and really we are all sexual beings from birth until death.”

Taverner did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Planned Parenthood also did not immediately provide a response to a request for comment on whether Taverner’s statement on “sexual beings” was consistent with the organization’s viewpoint. However, Fox News Digital found a similar statement on a Planned Parenthood sex education document.

Planned Parenthood said in a guide entitled the “Fundamentals of Teaching Sexuality” that “sexuality is a part of life through all the ages and stages. Babies, elders, and everyone in between can experience sexuality.”

Around the year 2012, Taverner said children of a certain age should be taught about pornography in sex education, a position he has maintained up until at least February 2021.

Taverner appeared to say during the 2012 interview that some of “erotica” was “useful.”

He said, “I think that there’s this yearning for information that young people have that… hasn’t changed. [The] delivery of how we get information is quite different. I think that the internet is a major influence on how people learn about sexuality. There’s access to erotica, pornography. That was very different for young people 30 years ago. It’s certainly not as accessible, certainly not as instantaneous. So there’s a lot of information that is useful.”

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The interviewer interrupted Taverner and said, “some of it is wrong.”

“Some of it is wrong, a lot of it is wrong,” Taverner said. “But there’s good stuff out there as well.”

Taverner did not clarify what he meant when Fox News Digital inquired, however, he said in the 2021 interview that sex educators never wanted pornography to be the primary source of sex education, and that instruction needs to adapt to modern times.

He further argues that teaching about pornography in classrooms is similar to instructing children on how to use a condom.

“There’s a resistance to… if we talk about porn, [some think] is it going to make people want to watch it? Which is the same faulty kind of premise as if we teach about condoms, it’s going to make people want to have sex with condoms or maybe that’s not a bad thing,” the sex educator continued.

He added that porn literacy would help students clarify their values on the topic and will meet “people where they are.”

“Getting back to meeting people where they are, if this is what they’re doing with their cell phones and tablets and their laptops, then we need to shift our education and stop doing the banana on a condom and think that, you know, we’ve done our thing. So we need to present opportunities for young people to think about…, for example, their values. You know, let’s do an opinion activity. Let’s do the ethics of porn. And that’s not to say that there’s a right answer .”

Taverner has said in the past that some parts of comprehensive sexuality education should begin in kindergarten.

What do you think? Post a comment.

“Sexuality education is not isolated to a particular point in a person’s life, it’s a continuous process. Young children are learning about sexuality from the attitudes their parents display… When we think of K-12 education… we may be talking about what makes a family, we may be talking about disease prevention… All of that sets the foundation for a basic understanding that is useful for further conversations when we’re talking about condoms… [and] pregnancy conversations,” he said.

“Age-appropriate sex education is so important,” he said. “And we have to let our experts guide us.”

COMMERCE — The eclectic background of this East Texas football team might have made it an unlikely pick to bring home a national football championship.

The quarterback never played football in high school. He was a bowler. The team's standout kicker was a Dreamer student who moved around a lot after coming to Texas from Mexico. And other players included walk-ons or transfers who just showed up at Texas A&M-Commerce University wanting to play ball.

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"Some are second-chance guys, some are no-chance guys but together we really built something," said head coach Colby Carthel. "That's what's great about football. You take people from all backgrounds with different stories, put that together in a locker room and build one team and one goal."

And on Friday morning, the school came together to celebrate the team reaching the highest goal: winning the NCAA Division II national championship for the first time. The whirlwind journey included a five-game playoff bracket the Lions had to sweep to clinch the title.

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Students, faculty and alumni gathered for a pep rally and tailgating party to celebrate the December win. While the celebration was low-key amid ongoing classes for the start of the semester, students say the victory has boosted school spirit like never before.

"I was never into football, but they made me this way," said freshman Davida Kessebeh, who was among hundreds who joined the caravan to Kansas City, Kan., for the game. "This whole experience — seeing that stadium flooded with blue and gold, getting that win, today — this is just amazing for my first year in college."

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The tranquil campus — tucked quietly between Dallas and Oklahoma — hadn't had much hope for any football glory since it last won a national title in 1972 when it was East Texas State University. It's long been in the shadow of other schools like its A&M flagship campus or Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, which recently won its bowl game.

It was only in the last few years that momentum started building with three consecutive conference titles.

Still, Donna Tavener has been a faithful supporter since the late 1970s, when she was a coach for women's sports on campus. Even after leaving the college to work at nearby public schools, she and her husband — an alum — would go to games.

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"You have no idea what this championship means to me," Tavener said. "For years, we'd look at all the empty seats all around us. And then to have 10,000-plus people turn out for our playoff games here? And then the win? I've been waiting 40 years for this."

Players and staff credited their head coach for being the force that found the right mix of players, staff and strategy for the championship. Carthel, in return, credited everyone from the band members to the field house janitor for being the spirit driving the team.

Senior Chris Smith, a defensive back from Mansfield, said he's still in disbelief about the record year. But for him and many others, one of the highlights of the season was off the field.

After a September game against Texas A&M-Kingsville, the team spent a day helping with Hurricane Harvey recovery efforts in Corpus Christi, where they cleared a cemetery of debris washed in by the storm.

"There were snakes everywhere and coach had a tarantula or something on his head, but it was the best time," Smith said. "This — well — it's all bigger than just football. It's life. When we all come together, we can have a real impact and change the world in some way."

A subsidiary of Australia-based property and infrastructure company Lendlease will build a 200-megawatt solar farm west of Houston.

The $170 million project will receive tax abatements, according to a press release from Fort Bend County.

The subsidiary, Fort Bend Solar LLC, is leasing about 1,800 acres near Orchard, northwest of Rosenberg. A presentation posted by the county shows the property is along U.S. Highway 90 Alternate and near Tavener Road. Most of the land is leased from family partnerships owned by descendants of John and Lottie Dyer Moore, and some land is leased from Old South Plantation Inc., a spokesperson said. Construction is expected to start early next year, and the facility should be operational in 2020, per the release and the presentation.

The facility will contain about 700,000 solar panels measuring roughly 3 feet by 6 feet and mounted on a single-axis tracker system, which will allow them to slowly move from east to west throughout the day for maximum sunlight absorption, per the release. An on-site substation will convert energy absorbed by the panels from low-voltage to high-voltage and then deliver it to Houston-based CenterPoint Energy Inc. (NYSE: CPN), which will build a switchyard to allow the power to flow into its system. The 200-megawatt facility is expected to power the equivalent of about 40,000 homes on average, per the release.

Using the 1,800-acre site for the solar farm will take the property off of agricultural exemption and add $170 million to the county tax rolls, Jack Belt, executive vice president of the Fort Bend Economic Development Council, said in the release. That will create a significant tax benefit for both Fort Bend County and Brazos Independent School District, even though the project will receive tax abatements for a decade, he noted.

Brazos ISD’s board approved a Chapter 313 appraised value limitation abatement for Fort Bend Solar at a special meeting Aug. 15. Chapter 313 agreements allow companies building certain kinds of projects to make deals with school districts that limit how much of the project's value the district can tax for a 10-year period. School districts must get approval from the Texas comptroller for the deals. Fort Bend County and the Fort Bend County Drainage District also are offering 10-year abatements on the 30-year lease, according to the press release.

“While economic development has always relied on good roads and good bridges, it also relies significantly on power — which is largely invisible to the masses,” Precinct 1 County Commissioner Vincent Morales Jr. said in the release. “We need power now more than ever, especially when considering population projections for the county, and the state of Texas. I am so pleased and delighted that Fort Bend Solar will be here, contributing to the economy and also putting more power into the grid.”

Separately, Cypress Creek Renewables also is building a solar farm in Fort Bend County, one of three that the Santa Monica, California-based company is developing under a supply contract with Houston- and New Jersey-based NRG Energy Inc. (NYSE: NRG). Including two in the Dallas area, the farms will produce 25 megawatts for Houston-based Sysco Corp. (NYSE: SYY).

A KSST Morning Show visit with Northeast Texas Children’s Museum Sharline Freeman and Museum Board of Directors President Donna Tavener shed some light on an important upcoming event for the educational needs of children in the ever-expanding area of outreach by the Museum. Plan to attend the Silent Auction and bid on fossil-hunting trips, horseback riding lessons, a flyover, a Taste of Sulphur Springs Restaurants package and more exciting items!

The 2018 Silent Auction for the Northeast Texas Children’s Museum will be a pivotal event for the Museum. The event is set for Monday, April 23 in the Sam Rayburn Student Center on the Texas A&M University-Commerce campus. The bidding begins at 6:00 PM and closes at 8:00 PM.

The Museum continues its challenges as it deals with issues involving the current building site. In June 2017, Texas A&M University-Commerce announced that the Museum could look forward to a new site at the location of the previous University president’s home. The Museum would join a proposed agricultural complex at the site.

Finalization of this exciting proposal includes a new building for the Museum’s future. The 2018 Silent Auction will initiate an active step toward raising the $3 to $5 million needed for the new building.

“We will need support from throughout northeast Texas to make the proposed building a reality”, said Sharline Freeman, Director of the Northeast Texas Children’s Museum. “I envision our visitors – parents, grandparents, students and children – engaging to help us achieve what appears be a Herculean task. I do think it can be done. This year’s Silent Auction is a new beginning.”

Guests at the auction will find a variety of items for bidding as they enjoy a fun and festive evening out with friends and neighbors. Items include floral arrangements, furniture, home accents, original paintings and artwork, collector’s items, holiday décor and jewelry, as well as unique experience packages, and much more.

An exciting part of this year’s Silent Auction will be the raffle. A number of ways exist to purchase raffle tickets include purchasing them from Museum board members, at State Farm Insurance in Commerce, in person or by calling the Children’s Museum – or even by purchasing them at the door on the night of the event. With the support of the community this year’s raffle will include three items. These will be cards totaling $1,000 sponsored by Alliance Bank, Cypress Bank, Guaranty Bank and Trust, and Inwood Bank; a 60” TV donated by 10-2-4 Ranch; and a Yeti package donated by Commerce Veterinary Clinic. Raffle tickets are $5 or 5 tickets for $20.

The Market provides another venue for shopping. With family recipes of hot sauces and barbecue sauce, the Market will also have an assortment of baked goods and other culinary delights. Popular items from the Children’s Museum Gift Store will also be available. The Museum accepts checks, cash and credit cards.

“There are so many ways to support this event. Donate an item for the auction, purchase a raffle ticket, or visit the Museum Market. We request community support by attending and participating in the bidding of more than 300 items,” said Donna Tavener, Museum board president. “We hope that this year’s Silent Auction will be a great event as the Children’s Museum moves toward a new building.”