A budget shortfall, COVID-19 issues, and the powers of the governor will all be topics for next year’s Legislative session, according to State Sen. Kel Seliger (R-Amarillo).
Seliger held a virtual town hall meeting for Donley County residents via Zoom on Monday, November 2.
“I miss our face to face town halls, and will still do them if people ask me to,” Seliger said.
The senator began his remarks with an overview of the COVID-19 pandemic’s effect on Texas and the number of cases in the Amarillo area, where the hospitalization rate topped 28 percent this week and the state has sent additional resources.
“This thing is bad and is going to get worse,” Seliger said.
He said he was not optimistic that a vaccine would be ready soon and suggested that people need to follow the published guidelines for masks and other health precautions.
“I had the virus, and it was no fun,” Seliger said, noting that he still has not regained his stamina.
COVID-19 precautions will be seen at the Legislature, Seliger said, in the form of Plexiglass dividers in meeting rooms and a limited number of staff being allowed on the senate floor. Officials are also considering ways to allow people to testify virtually or in limited timeframes on important legislation.
The senate will work hard not to spread the disease, but Seliger was confident that his office will “make it happen” if constituents want to come see their senator in person, even if that means meeting under a tree on the Capitol grounds.
Seliger said the state is forecasting a $4 billion budget shortfall. He is open to using a portion of the state’s Rainy Day Fund, which currently has between $8 and $9 billion, he said. But he also said the fund shouldn’t be used for ongoing expenses and needs to keep a healthy reserve for the future.
The senator said Texans should expect to see cuts across the board in most areas, but he said he doesn’t want to see any cuts to higher education and particularly area community colleges.
Seliger said he expects to see bills designed to limit the power of the governor during emergencies after actions that Gov. Abbott took during COVID-19, although he points out that most people don’t have any problem with the governor having those powers during hurricanes.
“I don’t think he was right all the time,” Seliger said.
Local control will also be a topic that comes up again in the next session. He pointed to efforts in the City of Austin to cut police funding and said he was opposed to the state stepping into that situation.
“I think it would be wrong for the state to try to take control of the Austin police,” the senator said. “The citizens there will only take so much of that [cutting the police].”
Seliger ran afoul of Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick in the last legislative session by standing with local governments on a variety of issues, particularly the ability for local boards to set taxes. He told the Enterprise his relationship with Patrick today is “very business-like and that’s all,” but he took pride in the fact that Patrick has told people “Seliger is the only vote I don’t control.”
“I don’t work for him,” Seliger said. “I work for the people of this district.”
The senator said local officials need to band together to tell politicians that if they follow the “Empower Texans model” – the far right lobbying group – then they are going to have a tough time getting elected.
“Teachers helped get me elected in the last primary, and that was noticed in Austin,” he said.
Seliger also is in favor of setting aside accountability ratings again this year, saying that teachers and administrators have enough to deal with right now.
He noted that many schools still want to give the STAAR test for the information they can receive from it but said schools should not be graded on the test this year.
Following the 2020 US Census, redistricting will also be a top priority for Seliger and the senate in the next session. District 31 will have to be enlarged by about 130,000 people, and that will see it expand down through Childress and further south most likely, he said. It currently starts in the Permian Basin and runs north to take in the Panhandle.
Seliger said the Legislature must set new boundaries by June of next year or a five-person committee will take over the job and that committee will have no representation from West Texas.
Going forward, Seliger said he wants to encourage residents to contact him at any time if they have issues that need his attention.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.