Are our State Legislators of Texas Becoming Wiser and More Insightful?

Texans seeking to determine whether the current 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature has been marked by wisdom and incisiveness and foresight on the part of those lawmakers, should ask themselves the following questions:

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve funding for and establish an official consolidated toll-free State of Texas information and referral phone service----a toll-free hotline providing quick referrals to Texans unsure about which State of Texas-affiliated institution or agency or office to contact, with the proposed consolidated State of Texas toll-free hotline service citing the name and phone number and street address or mailing address or E-mail address of the applicable office or division or bureau or agency or institution or department owned by or affiliated with the State Government of Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law authorizing a salary increase to a total figure of $100,000 per each year, in addition to generous fringe benefits, for each and every year of each state representative's tenure, and a salary increase to a total of $150,000 per year, in addition to generous fringe benefits, for each and every year of each state senator's tenure in the State of Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new law in 2011 that's designed to reduce air pollution levels in several cities and towns and metro areas in our state.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature provide funding for State of Texas-ordered clean-up of any lake or river in Texas that is currently unsuitable for swimming or as a primary source of municipal drinking water for a nearby municipality.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new law in 2011 that's aimed at deterring energy-wasteful and environmentally-destructive and unsightly urban sprawl in our state?

----Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law providing financial incentives to business owners and property owners to locate their business or residence or real-estate within a one-mile radius of the center of the downtown section of a city or town or village in this state.

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature in 2011 approve any new law that provides financial incentives for land-conserving and energy-conserving multi-story (multi-level) construction of new real-estate properties and multi-story (multi-level) expansion of existing real-estate properties situated anywhere in Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new law in 2011 that's aimed at protecting the total existing quantity and quality of agricultural and ranching acreage throughout our state?


---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new legislation in 2011 that's aimed at promoting organic farming throughout our state?

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new resolution or law publicly praising each of the seven avocado-farming counties of our state (those 7 counties being Hidalgo County, Cameron County, Dimmit County, Kaufman County, Liberty County, Washington County, and Willacy County, according to Jessica Glover of the Texas Department of Agriculture) and officially designating the very healthful Texan salad of Guacamole as the Official State Salad of Texas?

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve funding for and authorize establishment of an official Texas Avocado Council designed to promote the production, sale, and consumption of healthful avocados that were raised on agricultural land in Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new law in 2011 that provides financial incentives to private-sector employers throughout our state to themselves participate comprehensively in recycling of plastic products, glass products, aluminum products, paper products, and other recyclable items.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new law in 2011 that provides significant financial incentive to new and current for-profit or non-profit businesses operating in Texas that exclusively or primarily provide recycling services or environmental-protection services or renewable-energy-related services anywhere in Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature follow the longstanding lead of the U.S. state of Maine in that way by approving a new law that requires all grocery store and supermarket owners in Texas to pay 5 cents to customers returning recyclable bottles or recyclable plastic jugs to that grocery store or supermarket.

---Did the 82nd Ssssion of the Texas Legislature in 2011 approve state funding for the purchase of numerous additional environment-friendly "trash cans" on State of Texas-owned properties--- including at each of the state parks of Texas----that are each exclusively reserved for the deposit and pick-up of recyclable items (aluminum cans, for instance) only.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature provide funding for the acquisition by the State Government of Texas of parkland for 10 additional state parks, with nearly all of those proposed stae park sites being situated within 100 miles of metro areas or cities where the population of our state is increasing the most rapidly.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature that concludes in late May 2011 approve any new law or legislative resolution citing the official statewide goal of Texas becoming the leading state in the entire nation for research and development of solar power and wind power technologies.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature feature approval of a new law in 2011 that provides for a significant increase in State of Texas funding for conversion of as many government buildings as possible to reliance on wind power or solar power for their electricity.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law, and provide funding for, a mandatory energy audit of each and every State of Texas-owned building or institution or agency, with the 82nd Session of the State Legislature also providing funding for implementation of resulting recommendations for renovations or modifications to those buildings that will reduce energy bills incurred by the State Government of Texas or any institution affiliated with the State of Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve funding for high-speed rail passenger-train services throughout our state, making it very easy and safe and comfortable for a resident of Austin, for instance, to travel to El Paso or Dallas or Houston or Fort Worth or Houston or Tyler or Lubbock or Midland for the weekend by high-speed passenger train.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new law in 2011 that provides funding for and mandates the construction of dozens of railway overpasses for trains that significantly reduce the risk of collisions occurring between trains and motor vehicles in our state at current ground-level points of intersection between railway routes and roadways in Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law requiring any city in Texas with at least 50,000 residents to develop a light-rail transit system or subterranean subway system providing energy-efficient and comfortable and safe public-transportation services throughout that city.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature provide funding for numerous additional public-sidewalk construction or public-sidewalk renovation projects in cities and towns throughout Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature provide funding for the design and construction of numerous pathways and hiking paths in cities and towns and rural areas throughout Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law and providing funding for the biannual awarding by the Texas Legislature every two years of 10 generous financial stipends of $10,000 each to the private citizens not employed by a State of Texas institution or agency who in the most recent 10-year period provided an idea or recommendation to the State Government of Texas that generated significant financial savings for the State Government of Texas or, alternatively, significantly improved the quality or efficiency of the services provided by a state agency or State of Texas-owned institution in our state.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new law that requires the conferment of generous financial awards upon 10 respective employees of State of Texas-owned institutions or agencies who in the most recent applicable two-year period distinguished themselves through courageous vigilance and admirable support for law-abiding as well as honorable and honest conduct by employees and officials of State of Texas-owned institutions and agencies.

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a change in state law that prohibits an employer from punishing or retaliating against an individual working for that employer who has filed a workers' compensation claim with that employer.

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law that provides financial incentives to employers based in Texas to offer their employees the additional option of those employees selecting a 401K retirement plan for themselves in which at least one or several or the majority or all of the corporations featured in the investment portfolio of that 401K plan are themselves headquartered in Texas or in a southwestern state (Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Southern California apparently comprising all the geographical areas included in that description, though possibly Colorado and Utah might also be included in that cited geographical area).

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve the conferment of a "Texas's Friendliest" award and accompanying financial prize on one adult man, one adult woman, one male youth, and one female youth who are each permanent residents of Texas.


--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law in 2011 that authorizes any city or town of Texas to establish a legal "Alcohol-Free" zone within that city, a protected zone and fully-enforced section of that city where no sale or possession or consumption of drinking alcohol is permitted anywhere within that zone.

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new law that significantly increases State of Texas funding for affordable treatment programs serving Texans who voluntarily seek treatment for addiction to marijuana or any other illicit drug, tobacco, or alcohol.

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve and provide funding for establishment or expansion of a Wellness Program for employees of any and all State of Texas-affiliated institutions or agencies, with treatment programs for addiction to illicit-drug addiction, alcohol-addiction, or tobacco addiction being among the services provided to individuals employed to the State of Texas who agree to or choose to seek treatment for that addiction.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new requirement that any and all hourly employees of any State of Texas agency who wish to take a "smoke break" in the middle of that employee's workshift must first obtain prior permission from a supervisor, must clock out for that time period in order to go on a "smoke break," must clock back in after they have completed their smoke break, and must later make up for that lost time by working additional minutes or hours later that day or some other day during that same workweek.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law authorizing disciplinary actions against, and possible termination of, any hourly employee of any State of Texas-owned institution or agency who takes any "smoke break" without obtaining prior permission from a work supervisor and without clocking out for the entirety of that smoke break.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law providing financial incentives for insurance companies in Texas to offer financial discounts on auto insurance premiums and health insurance premiums to Texan nonsmokers and to Texans who completely and permanently abstain from consumption of any drinking alcohol, respectively.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law providing financial incentives for insurance companies in Texas to offer financial discounts on health insurance and auto insurance premiums to Texan residents who do not have any felony-conviction criminal record.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law that strictly prohibits the sale by any business operating in Texas of any marijuana paraphernalia or any other illicit-drug paraphernalia?

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law significantly increasing the sales tax on any and all tobacco pipes being sold in Texas for use in pipe-tobacco smoking.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law requiring and providing funding for random-drug testing twice per year of each and every part-time or full-time staff member, faculty member, and administrator at each and every State of Texas-owned educational institution or State of Texas-owned research institution (with those State institutions being subjected to that type of legislative requirement including, among other institutions, the University of Texas at Austin, Texas A&M University at College Station, and Texas Tech University in Lubbock), accompanied by an automatic dismissal from that educational institution of any and all individuals testing positive on any such random drug test (for marijuana or any other illicit drug) that is administered to them without any prior warning and at randomly-selected varying times of the year.

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature promulgate to our entire state a healthy Zero-Tolerance Policy toward marijuana consumption and any other illicit-drug consumption, by the Legislature approving a new law in 2011 that imposes unannounced random-drug testing at least twice per year (with dates and times for those drug tests being randomly selected each time), on each and every state legislator and each and every member of that lawmaker's legislative staff, with any state legislator or member of his staff who tests positive on any such illicit-drug test being automatically dismissed from that individual's elective position or appointive position of employment.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature in 2011 approve a new law requiring and providing funding for the Texas Department of Public Safety to establish an official website that cites by name and provides the cited mailing address for each and every person who was convicted in a court of law in Texas of having been guilty of illicit-drug trafficking anywhere in Texas at any cited date in the most recent 50-year period.

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature impose a statewide ban on any and all consumption of tobacco by anyone inside any restaurant and inside any other public place, anywhere in Texas?

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature impose a permanent ban on the establishment of ANY additional tattooing parlors or any additional businesses providing tattoos emblazoned on human bodies anywhere in this state.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature impose a five-year ban on any additional sex-change operations occurring anywhere in Texas, and a new law fully protecting and upholding the legal right of any male adult Texan resident to refuse to himself undergo a sex-change operation at any time.

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas legislature approve a new law in 2011 that is expected to help significantly reduce the criminal-recidivism rate throughout our state?

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law requiring each and every county and municipality in Texas to post fully up-to-date factual information on the Internet that cites the neighborhoods or districts or sections of that county and city or town where the crime rate, by cited category of crime, is the highest for that entire county and that entire city.

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature provide funding and authorization to the Texas Department of Public Safety to invite complaints about and investigate alleged cases of "snuff movies" or intended "snuff movies" in which a cited victim against his wishes is subjected to illegal violations of his privacy rights involving media technology in a context in which one or more of the participants in or actors in or financiers of or sponsors of or producers or directors of that media project allegedly sought to harm the medical health or injure or attempt to kill that cited victim.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature authorize the Attorney General of Texas to file a lawsuit in a court of law against the Federal Communications Commission of the U.S. Government relating to any current "interactive-media" productions involving a current resident of Texas and any form of electronic media, whether that be television, radio, or film, and that, in each such case, allegedly violated the privacy rights of a law-abiding Texan resident, or otherwise significantly wronged an individual subjected to any such "interactive-media" production without his own directly-stated consent.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature provide funding for and approve a new law in 2011 which requires that the salary levels paid to Texas Department of Public Safety troopers must equal or exceed the average of the salary levels that are paid to municipal police officers in the three respective cities of Texas with more than 100,000 residents that each pay the highest salaries to their police officers.

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new law in 2011 that is designed to help reduce the student dropout rate at high schools throughout our state.

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law in 2011 that is designed to help significantly reduce the teenage female unwanted pregnancy rate and the female adult unwanted-pregnancy rate throughout our entire state?

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law in 2011 that prohibits any and all thought-control projects involving human subjects anywhere in this state, and that delineates a criminal-law penalty through the state penal code for the deliberate infliction of a thought-control project at any time on any resident of Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law in 2011 that imposes a criminal-law penalty on any individual or group of individuals or business entity or non-profit group or religious group that is ever found in a court of law in Texas to have illegally attempted to brainwash a Texan resident over a multi-hour period or multi-month period or multi-year period or multi-decade period.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new law or legislative resolution that protected the legal right and human right of any law-abiding adult Texan resident to set his own priorities in his own life, and to enjoy full privacy rights in that cited context.

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any resolution or new law emphatically stating that the Texas Legislature and the State Government of Texas and the people of Texas will NOT tolerate any form of censorship of honest and law-abiding and privacy-respectful adult residents of Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve generous financial compensation to a current adult resident of Texas who had been subjected against his wishes and in a manner violating his legal and human rights to incessant and unwanted communications and verbal abuse from a vigilante-style group of individuals harassing that Texan resident in a context in which that group committing a defacto form of illegal vigilanteism allegedly sought to compel and hound that Texan resident into moving to or traveling to another U.S. state or to a foreign country.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new law strictly forbidding the use of continuous multi-hour, multi-week, multi-month, multi-year, or multi-decade noise pollution and accompanying non-stop verbal harassment and slander and character assassination as a weapon or cited "tool" aimed at punishing or harming or restricting or persecuting a law-abiding adult Texan resident whose own political and religion-related beliefs and personal beliefs and philosophical beliefs and priorities differ significantly from, and are significantly incompatible with, the individuals and entities and groups inflicting incessant noise pollution on that Texan resident in an unconscionable and very cruel and unjustifiable manner on their part.

--Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any resolution deploring any other U.S. state or commonwealth or any foreign nation for that state's or commonwealth's or foreign nation's alleged sponsorship of or complicity in alleged violations of the privacy rights of any current specifically cited resident of Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new resolution upholding the legal and human right of any current resident of Texas to himself enjoy full and immediate year-round access to reliable and honest news and information services, including reliable and honest medical-information services, at all times.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law making the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality or the Texas Department of Public Safety legally responsible for investigating and pressing criminal-law charges relating to legal complaints from Texas residents that they were themselves significantly medically harmed by unwanted noise pollution inflicted on them in Texas that they did not want and did not themselves authorize and did not themselves generate.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature in 2011 approve a new law and provide funding for official State of Texas establishment of a "State Ombudsman" office in Austin, Texas, that invites and investigates specific complaints about state and local government agencies in Texas that are filed with that State Ombudsman by any and all current residents of Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new law that prohibits anonymous communications occurring in Texas in any cited context?

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new legislation requiring a formal report to the Legislature that formally evaluates whether the statewide anti-stalking law in Texas (a law approved by the Legislature in a recent prior decade) has, in fact, been successful at adequately protecting any and all Texans from the risk of their being stalked by someone whom those Texans have already rejected from their own life.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new legislation that increases the criminal-law penalty against any individual or group of individuals or business entity or civic group or religious group or political group or labor union that is found in a court of law in Texas to have inflicted illegal electronic surveillance or illegal televising or illegal videotaping on any current resident of Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new legislation prohibiting and outlawing fraudulent or deliberately-dishonest or fictitious communications in any cited context, with that new law providing funding for investigation and prosecution of individuals and businesses and non-profit groups held blameworthy for fraudulent communications occurring in Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve any new law that strengthens the legal authority of the State Comptroller of Texas, the Attorney General of Texas, and the Texas Department of Public Safety state agencies, respectively, to investigate allegedly unethical conduct apparently or possibly violating the law that allegedly originates from a citedly unethical media company or citedly unethical media entity or "entertainment-industry" corporation operating in or evidenced in Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law that assures a single adult Texan resident who is himself not under a current mental health commitment in Texas, not currently incarcerated or institutionalized in Texas, and not currently officially classified as "disabled" in Texas, of his legal right to himself have and enjoy full and immediate access at present to ALL of his own cumulative financial wealth and property wealth, including all of his own intellectual property rights, that he has accumulated or accrued or earned or obtained over the course of his life, including during the most recent multi-month period of his life.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law that imposes strict criminal-law or civil-law punishment on any individual or any group of individuals that were or was determined in a court of law in Texas to have been guilty of abuse of power of attorney in any context victimizing a current resident of Texas.


---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a revision to our state penal code that imposes more stringent punishment than at present, such as through an mandatory and automatic life sentence punishment, upon any person found guilty in a court of law in Texas of having himself or herself committed the unconscionable and outrageously violent crime of attempted homicide anywhere in Texas.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature in 2011 approve a new law that after each applicable 12-month period automatically cancels and nullifies any cited "power of attorney" authority that any individual or group of individuals may claim to have hold for 12 consecutive months in regard to a cited resident of Texas, with any renewal of that power of attorney authority after each such 12 month period requiring a formal court proceeding in Texas at which the individual cited as having "given" or "assigned" power of attorney authority to another individual or group of individuals, must himself testify in person in that judicial proceeding that he is willing to authorize a possible continuation of that power of attorney authority for that additional one-year period of his own life, or, to the contrary, that he now opposes the holding of any such legal authority toward himself by the cited individual or cited group of individuals.

---Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law prohibiting employment discrimination by any employer in Texas against a job applicant or current employee at a workplace that allegedly occurs after that individual volunteers on his own initiative to a prospective employer or current employer, or after that individual provides a very recent medical report on his behalf indicating, that he himself is HIV-negative and that he himself does NOT have AIDS.

----Did the 82nd Session of the Texas Legislature approve a new law in 2011 that orders the State of Texas-mandated permanent closing of any and all of the commercial sex parlors throughout Texas, including any of the so-called "gay bathhouses" in Texas, where sex between human beings occurs in a public place, it being a violation of the state penal code of Texas whenever sex between human beings occurs in a public place.

A Great Guacamole Cause: Urgent Plea to Residents of Hidalgo County, Texas

This is a special plea addressed to all current residents of Hidalgo County, Texas, who are also constituents of State Rep. Veronica Gonzales.

If you reside in the great avocado-producing county of Hidalgo that's situated along the Rio Grande River, you can help make Guacamole Salad the "Official State Salad of Texas" this month.

Texas currently does not have any Official State Salad.

The proposed Texas Legislature designation of Guacamole as the "Official State Salad of Texas" will help promote heart-healthy avocados. Avocados are considered to be a "miracle food" because they are very beneficial to Texans' cardiovascular health.

The proposed Guacamole resolution or bill this session of the Legislature will also help promote avocado farming in Texas as well as the purchase and consumption of Texas avocados by Texan consumers.

At present, many Texans are unaware that we have any avocado-producing counties, much less that we have any avocado farms, anywhere in our state.

According to an E-mail letter that Jessica Glover of the Texas Department of Agriculture sent me in February of this year, there are, in fact, seven avocado-farming counties in our state. They are: Hidalgo County, Cameron County, Dimmit County, Kaufman County, Liberty County, Washington County, and Willacy County.

You can help promote this Great Guacamole Cause by contacting the Austin legislative office of your duly elected state lawmaker, State Rep. Veronica Gonzales. That legislator's office phone number in Austin is (512) 463-0578.

The legislative aide of State Rep. Gonzales who has been serving as the primary contact person on this public-policy issue is Katherine Mendiola. Katherine Mendiola, a very nice lady, frequently answers the phone at the above-cited phone number on behalf of Rep. Gonzales's legislative staff in Austin.

Katherine Mendiola told me several days ago on the telephone that if Rep. Veronica Gonzales receives enough phone calls of support from Hidalgo County residents, Rep. Gonzales is likely to author legislation this session that designates Guacamole as the "Official State Salad of Texas."

E-mail letters of support for this Great Guacamole Cause can also help persuade Rep. Gonzales to author this important legislative resolution or bill for our entire state. The official E-mail address for Katherine Mendiola in Rep. Gonzales's office is: katherine.mendiola@house.state.tx.us.

The official E-mail address for State Rep. Veronica Gonzales is: veronica.gonzales@house.state.tx.us.

In your phone calls and E-mail communications to Rep. Gonzales's legislative office in Austin, please remember to state your own full legal name, your own mailing address and phone number, and whether you yourself reside in Rep. Gonzales's legislative district.

Also, please state clearly whether you would like to see the Texas Legislature this month designate Guacamole as the Official State Salad of Texas.