Students across Texas returned to campuses last week as schools and universities scrambled to put into place new lesson plans that best accommodate a pandemic. For many school districts, this meant greatly expanding the technological resources of their students to support a mix of in-person and online education.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Congressman Roger Williams (R-Austin) sent a letter last week to U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Acting Secretary Chad Wolf, requesting an update on the implementation of Non-Intrusive Inspection (NII) technology at the southern border.

I was disappointed to read the (Tuesday, Aug. 4, The Highlander) guest column by Denise Rives, which covered a broad array of topics but eventually settled on attacking mask-wearing during the COVID-19 pandemic as being un-American, unhelpful, and even downright harmful.

A Texan’s speeding ticket put her in the legal history books last week. To combat the backlog in criminal cases created by the pandemic, a Travis County justice of the peace conducted the nation’s first virtual criminal trial.

Our city health reports continue to show some CoVid increases with 130 in Llano County; 19 active cases in HSBay - with four from the Burnet County side of HSBay now included in our total to date count of 51.

Agriculture, oil, education and health care top the list so far, but please keep the conversation going about what’s happening in your corner of our big state and what is of highest interest to you.

Recently you published an article where the author talked about the Democratic Party believing in equal opportunity, freedom, fairness, family, community, and responsibility to each other and ourselves. Yet, the author failed to define these values.

Texas Comptroller Glenn Hegar revised the Certification Revenue Estimate (CRE) and now projects a fiscal 2021 ending shortfall of $4.58 billion. The shortfall, which Hegar attributed to the COVID-19 pandemic and recent volatility in oil prices, is a decrease from the $2.89 billion positive yearend balance originally projected in the October 2019 CRE.

By Julie Oliver

U.S. Congressional candidate
 

Spider webs vs. Cobwebs We learned something cool from Jessamyn Putnam of Marble Falls.