Opinion

LEGISLATORS DON’T PLAY FAIR when they’re drawing political maps. Republican Texas and Democratic Illinois are recent examples, according to the Redistricting Report Card, a collaboration between the Princeton Electoral Innovation Lab and RepresentUS. Both states got failing grades on their latest redistricting efforts.

A FRIEND AND FREQUENT visitor to The Record office, Harry King, was admiring the result of a recent office reorganization project that we had done with the help of Kim McKinney. Harry had stopped by to drop off his weekly Wildcat Pick ‘Em prediction, and we chatted, as we always do. As he turned to leave, he wondered whether we had misplaced—or worse, disposed of—the rare collector’s item which has been on my desk for as long as I can remember: a bottle from the J.C. Born Bottling Company in Canadian, Texas.

Another look at impact of Winter Storm Uri More than eight months after an unprecedented snow and ice storm led to widespread power blackouts in Texas, the Texas Comptroller’s office took an in-depth look at the state’s response and the legislative actions that followed. Texas is the only state in the continental United States with its own electric power grid, which serves 90 percent of its population.

Superintendent Lynn Pulliam responded this week to Klein’s accusations of corruption at Canadian ISD: “At the press conference last Wednesday (10/20) conducted by Klein Investigations, Mr. Klein played a recording of a prison phone interview with a person who reported to be player on the 2016 Canadian High School football team.

THE FIRST PAPER I picked up after moving here made me an instant fan and keenly aware of what a treasure we have in you. Since then, I’ve only become more impressed to witness your dedication to not only your craft, but your profession.

I AM PROUDLY VOTING for Allen Hadaway in the Nov. 2 Canadian School Board election. As a fellow business partner, and father of three boys, I know the passion and dedication that has been a hallmark of his professional life. Allen’s credentials as a dedicated public servant and involved parent have been well-documented over the past 30 years, and his dedication to professionalism and being a positive voice for CISD won my support.

MY NAME IS DR. KRISTIN CAMPOS, and for those who don’t know me personally, I am a licensed specialist in school psychology (LSSP) and provide mental health services for six rural school districts in the Texas Panhandle. I am also a member of the Canadian graduating class of 2005. My wish to highlight the importance of mental health comes during the worst week of my professional career, spent helping junior high and high school students process the emotions of burying three boys within the communities of Gray County. With the help of my good friend and classmate Megan Schafer, who is a licensed clinical social worker, we composed this letter.

I have seen life return when all believed life was lost. I have seen broken relationships healed when no one thought it was possible. I have seen the room go electric when the faith of a community was galvanized by the presence of the Spirit. How about you? A great deal of our confidence in the future is not seen by looking ahead, but by looking behind. We have seen the possibilities before. We are witnesses. Like so many of you, I have seen the amazing and transformative power of the Spirit in action. What happened then can happen now at any moment. We have a sense of hope because things can change even when we have given up on change.

ON OCTOBER 8, the executive director of curriculum and instruction for the Carroll Independent School District in Southlake, Texas, told a teacher to make sure to follow Texas’s new law requiring teachers to present opposing views on controversial subjects. The Carroll school board had recently reprimanded a fourth-grade teacher who had kept an anti-racism book in her classroom, and teachers wanted to know what books they could keep in their own classrooms.

THE FEDERAL JUDGE WHO temporarily blocked enforcement of the new abortion restrictions in Texas said state lawmakers knew the law was unconstitutional and wrote it to try to prevent the federal courts from saying so.