The city Planning Commission saw the departure of member Chris Riley this week. Riley, an attorney, has served three two-year terms since August 2001, when City Council redefined the Planning Commission and split off some of its duties (in areas without adopted Neighborhood Plans) to the Zoning and Platting Commission. The Planning Commission votes on proposed zoning changes before they go to council– making it one the few commissions with real power. Commissioners also recommend changes to the city's master plan, vote on land use changes within neighborhood planning areas, and annually recommend capital improvements.

After failing to find a buyer for its beleaguered electronic voting division, ATM manufacturer Diebold Inc. has done the next best thing and given it a new name. The firm announced that, as of today, its Allen, TX, based electronic voting division, Diebold Election Systems, will be known as Premier Election Solutions.

This change will, the press release notes, "create a more independent structure for its elections systems subsidiary." Of course, the firm's independence has been in question ever since its then-CEO (and Bush booster) Walden O'Dell said he was "committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president next year." In reality, the division has been a pr millstone ever since the firm took over Global Election Systems in 2002 to create their voting division.

Shares in Diebold dropped 3.34% on the New York Stock Exchange today. They'd been buoyant for much of the year, but sluggish sales and resistance to e-voting in many states had made market analysts downgrade it from a "buy" to a "hold" recommendation. There's no word on how this will affect the other Texas-based electronic voting machine vendor, Austin's privately-owned Hart Intercivic. However, if investors are getting cagey about investing in an election machine firm the year before a presidential election, that's a bad sign for proponents of dropping votes into the digital abyss.

The changes to the Children's Health Insurance Program that passed in the last legislative session go into effect Sept. 1. Texas families who are enrolled in CHIP will no longer have to reapply for the program every six months; they will stay in the program a full year before having to enroll again. Another change is that most families will be able to enroll in the program immediately instead of waiting 90 days for coverage. The changes are part of an effort by the Texas Legislature to expand CHIP, which covers children from families with incomes too high to qualify for Medicare, but too low to afford private insurance. During a budget crunch in 2003, the Legislature passed rules that cut the half-million or so children covered by the program by almost half; however, when news reports surfaced of sick children denied coverage by CHIP, the Legislature moved last session to reverse some of those restrictions.

Texas continues to lag behind the national average on ACT scores, although students have made recent, significant gains – from 20.3 last year up to 20.5 this year. The national composite average on the ACT this year was 21.1. In Texas, the SAT dominates over the ACT when it comes to college entrance exams. While the number of students in Texas taking the ACT is high, it's still only 30% of all students. ACT statistics ranking Texas students on college readiness are grim. According to scores, only 19% of the students who take the test would be considered college ready in English, math, science, and social studies. When it comes to African-American students, that number drops to 4%; for Latinos, it's only 7%.

Elvis has left the building – along with whatever's left of the mayor's dignity. Fresh off Will Wynn's Esquire write-up, the people at Forklift Danceworks inform us the mayor done channeled E for an Elvis-impersonation performance. And they've got the photo to prove it.

Setlist: a hip-twisting rendition of "Viva Las Manitas," b/w "Whole Lotta Shakin' Going On (at 301 W. 2nd Street)."

On Tuesday, Gov. Rick Perry got his ceremonial pen out to sign into law House Bill 3678 a.k.a the Schoolchildren's Religious Liberties Act a.k.a. the Religious Viewpoint Anti-Discrimination Act. This law, emitted from the pen of Rep. Charlie Howard, R-Sugar Land, and endorsed by the Liberty Legal Institute (sort of a Bible-wielding version of the ACLU), is supposed to protect students in school who have been oppressed because of their religious views. Perry claims that, in search of an intellectual level playing field, schools are "unintentionally suppressing religious expression."

It's supposed to give religious groups the same kind of on-campus free expression as, say, the Chess Club. Except it does a little more than that. According to the bill analysis, it "prohibits students from being penalized or rewarded on account of the religious content of their work." So, theoretically, this means that a child who hands in an essay for a science class denying evolution could drag the school and the school district through the courts.

With all the hullabaloo about Mitt Romney's Mormonism (could we see the first ever magic underwear drawer in the White House?), it's easy too forget there's an oppressed religious minority in America. Catholics.

In a mail out from the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, the claim is made that "it's open season on Catholicism." How bad is it? Well, apparently, Barbara Walters let Rosie O'Donnell and Joy Behar "bash Catholicism 15 times in one session." There's Madonna, of course. And then there's the James Cameron "tomb of Christ" documentary. They really didn't like that at all. Apparently, this is "the most violent attack on the Catholic Church in the media and public life since the days of the Ku Klux Klan."

They then go head-on into O'Reilly/Colbert country by noting that "we'll be fighting the Christmas wars before too long."

Here's something for all you "why-don't-you-ever-cover-good-news?" people out there. Travis County Auditor Susan Spataro was honored Wednesday with a prestigious award – the 2007 Sam Seale Trailblazer – by the Texas Assn. of Counties Leadership Foundation. From an inside baseball perspective, the award is a big deal for a number of policy and political reasons. (And this is where the "good news" falls by the wayside.) As a couple of examples, the statewide recognition validates Spataro's spot-on attention to detail, thus creating the perception that the county is head and shoulders above the city on matters of "internal controls." Additionally, when former county attorney Ken Oden makes his annual pitch to privatize the county's delinquent tax-collection business, Spataro the trailblazer will be at the ready with Exhibit A – a veritable chapter detailing all the reasons why the county shouldn't turn over its cash cow to a private for-profit shop like Oden's law firm.

Speaking of Oden, one of his strongest anti-privatization adversaries is back at the county! That would be former Commissioner Karen Sonleitner, who owes her crushing defeat at the polls in part to Oden's bankrolling hand in the campaign of her opponent, victor Sarah Eckhardt. Anyway, Sonleitner is now working as a planner in the auditor's office, so there you have it.

It's aways nice when the Lege gives the press pack a heads-up on what the next big scandal will be. Most people were caught off-guard (but not surprised) when the Texas Youth Commission turned out to be the debacle it did last session. But now the first order of business for '09 seems to have arrived: the systematic abuse of some residents in the state school system of homes for people with profound mental and educational disorders, run by the Department of Disability Services.

Last Thursday, with little fanfare, Speaker Tom Craddick put out a press release stating that he would "continue to monitor the Texas State School system." The system, he said, had become an "interim priority" – Lege shorthand for "well, we know what we're going to have to fix next session."

The House Committee on General Investigating and Ethics Committee is already working with DADS and Family and Protective Services, and there's an interim improvement plan in place. But they'll need it. After a truly horrifying US Department of Justice report on the Lubbock State School and some damning reporting by the Dallas Morning News, the magnitude of the scandal is becoming clear.

But here's the kicker: Craddick say that "it is my intent to make the issues of State Schools a priority for consideration as an interim charge so that any new policy recommendations might be made available for the 81st Legislature." Which is odd, because the DoJ report was lodged with Rick Perry on Dec. 11, 2006 – before the 80th session.