Harris County: Winning in Insuring Election Integrity

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1 Harris County: Winning in 2018 JANUARY 2017 Next Meeting Wednesday, January 25, 2017 Lakeside Country Club, 100 Wilcrest Drive :00A.M. Registration 11:30 A.M. Program and Lunch RSVP on the website or Or Optional Lunch $25.00 (cash only) RSVP for lunch no later than Friday, January 20 th at 12:00 NOON Please notify us of dietary restrictions when RSVP *No-Shows will be billed* Complimentary Valet Parking Paul Simpson is serving his second term as Harris County Republican Party Chair. His activities in the Harris County Republican Politics for over thirty years have included campaigning, recruiting, mobilizing, organizing, poll watching, election judging, conventioneering and fundraising. Paul also served for twenty years as a Republican precinct chair, during which he was also district chair, legal counsel, and treasure. Paul is a lifelong Republican. He was State Chairman of the Louisiana Teenage Republicans and mobilized young people for Conservative Republican campaigns in college. He is a partner with the law firm of McGinnis Lochridge, a practice centered on oil and gas matters DATES TO REMEMBER JANUARY 10 JANUARY 17 JANUARY 20 JANUARY 25 First day of 85th Texas Legislative Session Greater Houston Council Nuts and Bolts Workshop INAUGURATION DAY!!! VRW General Meeting JANUARY TFRW Board Meeting FEBRUARY 22 VRW General Meeting MARCH 22 APRIL 5 APRIL 6 VRW General Meeting Belles and Boots, Austin Legislative Day, Austin Insuring Election Integrity Alan Vera has been elected Chairman of the Ballot Security Committee at Harris County Republican Party since He is one of the original founders of True the Vote, a grassroots effort to restore integrity to U.S. elections. He has written many state specific election observer curriculum, trained many thousands of observers and supervised in over twenty states. He wrote the election observer curriculum for Wisconsin in 2012 and trained over 1,000 observers for the recall election of Governor Scott Walker - in person, online, and via video conference. Alan is President of Quest Business Agency with responsibility for all marketing strategies and clients. 1

2 YAHOO!!! 2017 IS FINALLY HERE AND NOT A DAY TOO SOON! Forget making resolutions and instead give thanks and count your blessings! Health and freedom are at the top of my list. You know life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Obama and the Liberals are out of our way Nationally, onward and upward! My family is healthy and I live in the greatest country in the World with a new Republican President being sworn in this month. And to top it off, Republicans will control the Senate and the House! I have never felt so positive about the future of this country. I don t think I am alone, just look at the stock market and everyone you talk too. Even those that didn t vote for Trump are saying so far they are pleasantly surprised. But, we have a huge challenge ahead of us here locally. We lost all the qualified, experienced local judges and so many local officials. I hope you will all join me at the January 25th meeting to hear the details of the November elections and the challenges we have going forward. Alan Vera will give us the inside story of the voter fraud that is taking place in Harris County and across the states. Chairman Paul Simpson will fill us in on the details of his game plan going forward. Women, Hispanics and the younger generation are the key to whether Harris County and the Republican Party will thrive or decline. Bring your friends, 2017 will be an exciting, fun and fruitful new year for VRW and the USA! Another year has flown and I am preparing to publish our new annual directory. We invite Business Owners and Elected Officials to place ad in our directory. Full page (4.5" X 7.0") $ Half page (4.5" X 3.5") $ Mail your check payable to VRW for the amount of your ad size to P.O. Box Houston TX Put "Directory Ad" in the memo line Please your ad in JPEG format to bjuhlmer47@gmail.com Ad must be ed before January 31, 2017 Thanks for your support of VRW! Beverly Uhlmer Roberts 2

3 Looking at the 2017 Crystal Ball Question: The national stage is set; Austin is gearing up, but what s going on in our own backyard? Hint: $2 billion is at stake. Now that Election 2016 is in the rear-view mirror, we re moving forward. It s a New Year a year with the 85th Texas legislative session and important local elections. Local elections and local governance matter. The 2016 Presidential Election garnered a lot of the attention, but many of us were disappointed in our local election results. We must get our neighbors, friends, and family members to the polls. In local elections, turn-out tends to be small, which makes every single vote all that more important. Mark your calendars now. We have two scheduled election days in 2017: May 6 and November 7. Education may prove once again that all politics is local in While we hope and expect the Texas Legislature to focus its attention on our state-wide school finance system, there s also a lot going on right now in our own backyard. For example, our elected Houston ISD Trustees oversee a $2 billion budget, set a portion of our property tax rate, and manage bond issuances. The most recent HISD Trustee election could have turned on only 37 votes out of about 6,600 total votes casted. Five of nine HISD Trustees are up for election in In addition to the various elected offices on the November ballot, Houstonians also had a difficult decision to make concerning Houston ISD and voted not to authorize HISD to make recapture commonly referred to as Robin Hood payments to the state. HISD s first big recapture payment to the state would have been $162 million, and the payments would have come to approximately $1 billion over the next four years. As a result of this vote, the TEA Commissioner is required to detach and reassign for taxing purposes some of our wealthy property $18 billion worth to lessproperty wealthy ISDs. We need to pay attention to our HISD board in this critical year because they could vote to raise our property taxes in order to cover bond dollars that will be lost to detachment. Adding to the complexity of this issue is the fact that currently there is no legal avenue for Houston to reclaim its detached property even if HISD is no longer designated as a Chapter 41 district (AKA property rich and a donor ISD). Thankfully, State Rep. Jim Murphy will be introducing legislation to provide a mechanism to return a detached property to its geographical ISD if the geographical ISD comes out of recapture. Between the State legislature and our local landscape, there will be plenty of opportunities in 2017 to weigh in on critical issues that directly affect all of us. Republican women get it done, which is why our elected officials listen when we speak up. April 6, 2017 Texas Federation of Republican Women s (TFRW) Legislative Day in Austin Theresa Chang Kathleen Evans Sharon Hemphill Mark Herzog John F. Luman III 3

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7 The meeting was called to order by President Ingersoll at 11:35 A.M. Ms. Cheryl Dalton (Chaplain) read the invocation and Ms. Mary Grace Landrum led the members in the Pledges. President Ingersoll introduced guests and visitors who were present. Minutes of the October General Meeting were approved as recorded with no corrections and the Treasurer s Report will be filed for audit as stated. President Ingersoll reminded everyone that the VRW Christmas Party is December 4 th. There is no cost for a member and guest if that member has a paid the 2017 membership fee. If not, the cost to attend the Christmas Party is $25.00 per person. Ms. Kathaleen Wall (Programs) reported that the speaker for the January Meeting will be Mr. Paul Simpson, Harris County Republican Party Chairman. President Ingersoll thanked the membership for all of their help working as election judges, alternate judges, poll watchers, block walkers and giving out brochures. She also thanked members for working at the Westside Campaign Headquarters. She thanked Ms. Nancy Scott, Ms. Rajada Fleming and Ms. Beverly Roberts for their work at the Westside Campaign Headquarters. Ms. Nancy Scott (Campaign HQ) further thanked Mr. Holly Frost for donating the seed money to start the center. The space was donated by Metro National with the help of Commissioner Steve Radack. The Westside Campaign HQ sponsored Marri Velasquez so she could go to Florida to work with the Latino community on behalf of the Republican Party. Ms. Scott thanked many VRW members for their hard work during the campaign and also thanked Mr. Bob Hall. Mr. Bob Hall was involved in the Westside Campaign Headquarters. Mr. Hall spoke about the Veterans for Trump signs and thanked all volunteers. Mr. Hall recognized Ms. Jodie Dornak as the outstanding phone bank volunteer. Candidates S.J. Swanson and Fred Shuchart thanked the membership for their financial support during their recent unsuccessful judicial campaigns. Mr. John Luman, candidate for HISD Trustee in District 7, urged the members to vote Appeals Place 2, thanked VRW members for their support during his successful election. Mr. Paul Simpson, Harris County Republican Party Chairman, spoke about the voting trends in Harris County, straight ticket voting, financial support for each party and future plans to reach out to Republican voters. He also thanked all of the volunteers. The meeting adjourned at 12:15 P.M. The speaker was Colonel Jerry Smith who is the Director of the Texas A&M Veterans Resource and Support Center. Colonel Smith spoke about how this program gives all-inclusive support to Aggie Veterans and their families. Following the speaker, Ms. Landrum conducted a short ceremony to honor the veterans who attended the luncheon. Village Republican Women provided each veteran with lunch, an American Flag badge and a centerpiece donated by Ms. Landrum and Ms. Emely McHattie. 7

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