Headlines

A statewide rally to Save Texas Schools drew an estimated crowd of 11,000 teachers, students, and parents to the Capitol on March 12, 2011. (Photo by Jana Birchum)

• City Council doesn't meet today (Thursday) but resumes work sessions Tuesday and has posted a draft agenda for Jan. 12, when the most high-profile matter will likely be the public hearing on Austin Energy's proposed new rates (scheduled for 4pm, but good luck with that). The morning briefing is a demo of the city's new website, currently in beta testing.

• In an abrupt turnaround, council is also expected to consider accepting $900,000 in weatherization grant funds from the Texas Department of Housing & Community Affairs – including $400,000 that the city had apparently lost last month because of a missed deadline. See "Weather-Beaten but Still Ticking."

• Perry whipped Michele Bachmann – and nobody else. Gov. Rick Perry, coming in fifth in the Iowa caucuses with a blistering 10%, announced he was returning to Texas to "reassess" his candidacy – mostly by calling deep-pocketed GOP funders to see if they still care to bankroll this folly. Later, the Guv tweeted that he would return to the trail in South Carolina.

• Perry was not the only Texas Republican to have a disappointing trip to Iowa. Sometime-Libertarian U.S. Rep. Ron Paul was shoved into third place by a surprise last-minute rally by former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, who only lost to former Massachu­setts Gov. Mitt Romney by eight votes.

• Austin is reeling from its first two murders of the year: Esme Barrera, a 29-year-old assistant to students with special needs at Casis Elementary and volunteer at Girls Rock Camp Austin, was killed in her North Campus home Jan. 1 by an unknown intruder. On Jan. 2, the body of Stephanie Renee Har­vey, a 34-year-old homeless woman, was found in a Dumpster off North Lamar. Police are treating both deaths as homicides. For more on the victim of the year's first homicide, see "Barrera Death a Great Loss."

• Williamson County District Attorney John Brad­ley – whose new campaign slogan should be "I'm Not Responsible" – escaped sanctions for misconduct from the Texas State Bar for his actions in the Michael Morton murder case, particularly that Bradley fought attempts by defense attorneys to have evidence tested for DNA that later exonerated Morton.

• Colony Park is to become home to a grand new green experiment. Using a $3 million HUD Community Challenge planning grant, the city of Austin plans to convert 208 acres of vacant land into a mixed-use, mixed-income community of 500 single-family and 250 multifamily units, using sustainable, energy-efficient, and zero-waste technology.

• After splitting over the plan to let IDEA Public Schools take over Eastside Memorial and Allan Elementary, the Austin ISD board of trustees will try to patch itself back together for its first meeting of 2012: a Jan. 9 work session on the new North Central elementary school.

• There's a new person to resent as you write that property tax check. Travis County has appointed an interim tax assessor-collector, Tina Morton, who will serve for this calendar year; Morton previously served as the office's director of public information and training. Nelda Wells Spears stepped down from the post after almost two decades of duty, retiring Dec. 31. Checks in either name will be processed as the office transitions, but remember: The deadline for payment is Jan. 31.

• Governor Who? With both Rick Perry and Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst out of state over the holidays, Senate President Pro Tempore Mike "Inaction" Jackson, R-La Porte, filled in as acting governor from Dec. 27 to Jan. 4. No one seemed to notice.