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SEALING A NEIGHBORHOOD CAVE—IN

Op-Ed by Commissioner cook

  • 26 septiembre 2018
  • Author: Doris Sanchez
  • Number of views: 4737
  • 0 Comments

An aerial view taken from a drone of the homes and the sectioned-off area around the Cambria Cave excavation.

The Texas Historical Association claims that Texas has at least 3,000 caves. Make that at least 3,001.

A cave—first incorrectly called a sinkhole—was discovered underneath Cambria Drive in the Woods of Brushy Creek neighborhood on Feb. 8, 2018.

While it was reported initially that a broken water pipe contributed to the collapse of the cave roof, there is no evidence of that. There was, however, a relatively thin cave roof under Cambria Drive where the water line trench had been dug.

Caves can be fun and mysterious, but they can be a bit disturbing when they’re right smack in the middle of a subdivision and reach underneath the yards of three homes.

Chief Appraiser of the Williamson Central Appraisal District (not part of county government) Alvin Lankford said the homes’ values will be impacted, but we may not know how much until and if the homes are sold. 

Mr. Lankford worked mightily helping these homeowners by discussing their valuations over the past several months. His decisions on values are restricted by the property tax code.

Cambria Cave was thought to consist of four chambers, but in early August, when the cave floor was cleared of debris, a fifth chamber extending into Ephraim Drive was discovered.

Cambrian Environmental (company name coincidental) geoscientists mapped the cave in February and measured it as approximately 230 feet long by 40 feet wide, with a maximum floor-to-ceiling height of about 23 feet in the largest chamber.

Only about 10 percent of the cave was affected by the collapse that occurred in the early morning hours. Neighbors said it sounded like a bomb blast.

Cave experts said that the closed cave is prehistoric, close to 40 million years old. When authorized personnel entered the cave, they found no evidence of previous human entry. They were the first!

The Texas State Historical Association reports that caves and sinkholes are distributed in karst areas covering about 20 percent of the state. Karst is terrain formed by the dissolution of bedrock.

After county and outside experts started entering the cave, sections of asphalt roadway and concrete curb on Cambria Drive began moving downward, and the sides to the entrance of the cave began crumbling. The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality approved a request from the county to allow our contractors to open the cave entrance 20 feet longer, making the entrance more stable for workers going inside.

The neighborhood where the cave is located was developed between 1986 and 1990, and there are other caves in this area. In 1986, during development of Ephraim Drive, which runs perpendicular to Cambria Drive, a cave was discovered but at the time, TCEQ didn’t exist and the developer just dynamited and filled the void, and then completed the road.

However, no previous knowledge of a cave at the Cambria location was known until now.

It required five months to conduct evaluations and pass TCEQ approvals to fill the cave per the designed plan. We now know about preservation of cave critters and water flow to the Edwards Aquifer – gone are the days of bomb-fill-go.<

Balancing Williamson County Needs with Mandates

Oped by Commissioner Cook

  • 15 agosto 2018
  • Author: Doris Sanchez
  • Number of views: 4910
  • 0 Comments

Commissioner Cook Cook sits at her office desk in front of her laptop with magnifying glass in one hand and pen in the other as she reviews and analyzes budget requests from county departments

August brings on the hard work of refining a county’s budget as the beginning of the fiscal year begins on Oct. 1. So, what does a county government need to spend taxpayers’ hard-earned cash on?

Your taxes pay for infrastructure, such as buildings to house county offices, county equipment, maybe utilities, airports, parks and museums; elections support so each of us can exercise our right to vote; and a court system with county attorneys, prosecutors, courtrooms, court administrative support, judges and juvenile justice services.

Other services you pay for include public safety, requiring fire stations, emergency medical services, law enforcement, jails, probation services and justices of the peace. A sizable portion of funds for transportation support — building and maintaining roads and bridges, drainage, on-site septic system planning and approvals and long-range highway planning — are also on the taxpayer.

Emergency management with hazardous materials mitigation, swift-water rescue, emergency conditions planning and response teams — including our 911 emergency network — is funded by taxpayers.

Your tax dollars also pay for public health, especially provisions for indigent and emergency conditions, solid waste management and social services.

And finally, you help fund community oversight with tax assessing and collecting, vehicle registrations, and recording and records retention of births, deaths, marriages, divorces, real estate property, contracts and real estate platting.

But beneath all this are support functions to keep a county running, such as facilities and fleet management and technical services for computers, radios, cameras and other electronic equipment and data.

Then there’s the landshark at the door — unfunded legislative mandates — requiring more people, more equipment, more work and more room but no funding to help counties do what the law requires.

The Texas Association of Counties conducts a biannual survey of county spending specific to those functions dictated by statutes but not funded by the state Legislature. They show that the costs to cover these between fiscal years 2011 and 2016 rose 20.9 percent.

One classic example of an unfunded mandate is the Michael Morton Act. Morton, who was found guilty of killing his wife in 1987, spent 25 years in prison until it was revealed that evidence corroborating his innocence had been suppressed.

The Michael Morton Act requires all evidence — including police reports and witness statements, regardless of whether the evidence is material to guilt or punishment — to be available at any time to the accused and all defense teams.

Two Precinct 1 Constituents Appointed to Williamson County Historical Commission

The Williamson County Commissioners Court voted July 10,2018, to approve the nominees

  • 24 julio 2018
  • Author: Doris Sanchez
  • Number of views: 4804
  • 0 Comments

Photo shows Jane DiGesualdo seated.Longtime community volunteer Jane DiGuesaldo has served on numerous organizations from PTA when her children were in school to the Chamber of Commerce. Her interest in history has led to the establishment of an Oral History and Archives collection at the Round Rock Public LIbrary. She has been a member of the Williamson County Historical Commission and the Williamson County Sesquicentennial Commission.

She's a member of the Daniel Coleman Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution.

Described as a wealth of information, Jane has participated in historical groups and organizes excellent field trips to various historical sites. The Tonkawa Springs HOA Board member can be seen around town almost daily visiting multiple nursing homes and assisting seniors with transportation and other needs. The wife, grandmother, gardener and caregiver once owned and operated an automatic repair and body shop. As an Indiana transplant, Jane has been in the Round Rock area since 1974

Some of her biggest contributions to the area's history are a book she authored on Round Rock and numerous history columns she has written through the year for various publications, along with recording interviews of historically interesting people.

Jane looks forward to serving on the Williamson County Historical Commission once again and will be a tremendous asset to preserving and restoring the area's history. 

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Photo of Tina Steiner-Johnson with a nature backdrop.

Tina Steiner-Johnson has an impressive genealogical background as a descendant of Wade Sauls, Sr., an African American landowner at the turn of the century renowned locally for his successful farming techniques. Tina is an active member of the Round Rock Black History Organization and the Round Rock Preservation Committee.

Her interests and community support are varied. She is also a volunteer with the Ambassador and Operations Committee of Rodeo Austin.

The middle and high school teacher holds a Master's degree. Her combined interests, activities and talents will serve Wilco highly as a new member of the Williamson County Historical Commission. 

NOTE: The Williamson County Historical Commission is dedicated to the preservation of the history of the county. For more information, please visit http://www.williamson-county-historical-commission.org/default.htm

The Long Road to T. Don Hutto

Oped by Commissioner Cook

  • 25 junio 2018
  • Author: Doris Sanchez
  • Number of views: 6019
  • 0 Comments

A long line of protestors--some carrying signs--march around the Historic Courthouse on Tuesday, June 26, petitioning the Court to end the contract with T. Don Hutto Residential Center in Taylor. Long before Tuesday’s vote of 4-1 in Commissioners Court to end the Taylor-based T. Don Hutto Residential Center contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement and CoreCivic, Inc. (formerly Corrections Corporation of America), much has been written in newspapers and more disseminated through social media concerning this facility.

Why do we have it in Williamson County? Well its history is a circuitous, disjointed story.

Jose Orta, past president of the League of United Latin American Citizens Council in Taylor and an advocate for immigrants, said, “This facility sits on land (Welch St.) originally owned cooperatively by Mexican workers before the 1950s. Denied a place in town to park their trucks during cotton season, the workers pooled their wages to purchase the land, which also became a place to congregate and hold fiestas. Part of this land became Hidalgo Park.”

Between the 1980s and 1990s, Orta said the workers were unable to pay the property taxes and donated the land to the local Catholic Church, St John Vianney, with the understanding that the land would be parish property. Orta explained that the Archdiocese actually owned the land, and in 1995, sold part of it for revenue to CoreCivic, a private prison company.

County records show that in 1995, CoreCivic sold the land to a new subsidiary, Taylor Detention Center Corporation, to build a private minimum-security prison. CoreCivic bought back the prison the following year at the end of July. 

In July 1997, the prison became the T. Don Hutto Correctional Facility, named after one of the company’s founders. According to Orta, in March 2004, CoreCivic announced it was closing TDH, citing low inmate demand in the region. This was one of several times TDH would be “mothballed” as CoreCivic sought prisoners to house.

Protect Property Taxpayers

Billions in higher property taxes are hurting Texans. You DESERVE to know why.

  • 15 junio 2018
  • Author: Doris Sanchez
  • Number of views: 6015
  • 0 Comments

It's no secret that Texas relies on property taxpayers as their source of funding for more and more each year...

Texas Association of Counties

When the state does not fund its mandates, property taxpayers are stuck with the bill.

Did you know?

Property taxpayer protections can be put in the Texas Constitution.

A proposed amendment, HJR 73 by Rep. DeWayne Burns, passed the House on a vote of 127-18. Despite overwhelming bipartisan support, it stalled in the state Senate, never getting a hearing.

Similar measures already protect taxpayers in many other states.

If the Legislature acts, voters will get the chance to stop the Legislature's practice of passing costs on to homeowners.

If the Legislature believes something is important, shouldn't they pay for it? Homeowners shouldn't be treated like the state's no-limit credit card.

We can have a responsible, pay-as-you-go state government. Ask the Texas Legislature to give voters a voice in ending unfunded mandates!

Unfunded Mandates:

  • Drive up your property tax bill.
  • Drive up the size and cost of county government.
  • Remove accountability from government spending.
  • Cost Texans billions of dollars.
  • Force property tax increases that strain YOUR budget.

Take action below to protect property taxpayers:

http://protectpropertytaxpayers.org/

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