Tag Archives: Houston

The Texas Tribune reports: A Houston judge has thrown out the six-year-old lawsuit a pair of Houston taxpayers filed to keep the city from paying spousal benefits to the same-sex spouses of municipal employees. But the long-running legal saga is long from over, according to the side that was handed a loss this week. The lawsuit dates back to 2013, …

Houston’s OutSmart Magazine reports: A Drag Queen Storytime protester allegedly trespassed in the Freed-Montrose Library this weekend after previously being banned from the premises. James “Doc” Greene Sr., who was issued a trespassing warning last month by the Houston Public Library (HPL) stating he could no longer visit its Montrose location, was detained, disarmed, and escorted out by police on …

Click 2 Houston reports: The ticketing and security checkpoint at George Bush Intercontinental Airport’s Terminal B remained closed Monday because of a shortage of TSA workers, who are not being paid during the government shutdown. A Houston police officer could be seen blocking the ramp to the passenger drop-off area of Terminal B early Monday morning. There have been reports …

Courthouse News reports: Christian activists who tried to stop Houston libraries from hosting “Drag Queen Storytime” because it allegedly promotes the LGBT community’s “secular humanist” religion lack standing, a federal judge ruled Thursday, dismissing the lawsuit. Lead plaintiff Tex Christopher [photo above] said in the lawsuit that “‘gay marriage’ is ‘fake marriage’” and that, as a Houston taxpayer and library …

CNN reports: The late former president George H.W. Bush’s final flights on Air Force One will be called “Special Mission 41,” Bush’s spokesman said Sunday. By tradition, the plane is only called Air Force One when the president is on board. President Donald Trump will not be traveling on the aircraft, so the plane has been redesignated and renamed to …

The Houston Chronicle reports: Rolanda Anthony went to vote at her polling location before 8 a.m. at Iglesia Bautista Libre in north Houston where a poll worker, Evelyn Tillman, told her there was an issue with her address in the system and she needed to fill out a residency verification form. Anthony told her, “Ma’am, I’ve been living here for …

The Houston Chronicle reports: A federal judge in Houston swiftly ended a chapter Wednesday for a group of conservative Christian activists seeking to stop the Drag Queen Story Hour at a local public library. Chief U.S. District Judge Lee H. Rosenthal put it simply in her four sentence order, issued just days after the lawsuit — blasting gay marriage and …

The Houston Chronicle reports: A crew of anti-gay protesters rallied outside the federal courthouse Friday afternoon, announcing they have sued the Houston Public Library over a city-sponsored Drag Queen Story Hour which they say violates their freedom of religion. The group behind the lawsuit identify themselves as “Christ followers,” taxpayers and card-carrying library patrons. One of those bringing the lawsuit …

From the editorial board of the Houston Chronicle: With eyes clear but certainly not starry, we enthusiastically endorse Beto O’Rourke for U.S. Senate. The West Texas congressman’s command of issues that matter to this state, his unaffected eloquence and his eagerness to reach out to all Texans make him one of the most impressive candidates this editorial board has encountered …

The Houston Chronicle reports: Houston City Council on Wednesday updated its rules on sexually oriented businesses, instituting changes that could bar plans for a store that allows customers to try out sex dolls on the premises from opening near the Galleria. Toronto-based KinkySdollS had planned to open a Houston branch where it would sell “adult love dolls” constructed of synthetic …

The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reports: A Democratic Party site selection committee will visit Milwaukee next month as the city tries to become the host of the 2020 Democratic National Convention. Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett said Tuesday he received a call from Democratic National Committee chairman Tom Perez to notify the city of the visit. The date of the visit has not …

Politico reports: Former President George H.W. Bush has left the intensive care unit at a Houston hospital, where he was admitted over the weekend to treat an infection, and is expected to continue his recovery the next several days from “a regular patient room,” his spokesman said Wednesday. Delivering an update on the 41st president’s health status in a statement, …

The Houston Chronicle reports: The City of Houston and Mayor Sylvester Turner filed a petition Friday asking the U.S. Supreme Court to review a decision that came down earlier this summer, concluding that states did not have to provide publicly funded benefits to same-sex couples, according to a news release from the city. The decision in Pidgeon v. Parker from …

The Huffington Post reports: Pastor Joel Osteen, who has been under fire for his Houston megachurch’s slow response to helping survivors of Hurricane Harvey, vowed on Sunday that God would “pay back” victims for what they lost. “We’re not going to understand everything that happens, but having a ‘poor old me’ mentality or ‘look what I lost’ or ‘why did …

NBC News reports: A flooded chemical plant near Houston exploded twice early Thursday, sending a plume of smoke into the air and triggering a fire that the firm plans to let “burn itself out.” Arkema Group, one of the world’s largest chemical companies, had warned Wednesday that the plant would catch fire and explode at some point — adding that …

ABC News reports: Pastor Joel Osteen said today that his Lakewood Church has been taking people in “from the very beginning” of Harvey as he pushed back against criticism that the church did not initially welcome evacuees. “We were here for people. We were a shelter,” Osteen said today on “Good Morning America.” “We were taking people as soon as …

Ann Coulter is very upset about this Politico article: Climate change is making rainstorms everywhere worse, but particularly on the Gulf Coast. Since the 1950s, Houston has seen a 167 percent increase in the frequency of the most intense downpours. Climate scientist Kevin Trenberth thinks that as much as 30 percent of the rainfall from Harvey is attributable to human-caused …

The Weather Channel reports: Harvey’s circulation center will crawl northward just offshore from the upper Texas coast before making a final landfall on either side of the Texas and Louisiana border on Wednesday. Later this week, Harvey’s center will then track through central Louisiana as it turns northeast. That places Louisiana, including Baton Rouge, Lake Charles and New Orleans, in …

“It’s like Sharknado!” The Hill reports: Fox News host Jesse Watters fell for a fake photo of a shark swimming down a highway that circulated through social media Monday alongside legitimate images of flooding from Tropical Storm Harvey. Watters was discussing the extent of the “biblical things” that he saw on social media about the storm on “The Five” Monday …

The Weather Channel reports: Tropical Storm Harvey is drifting back into the Gulf of Mexico and will meander near the upper Texas coast the next few days, bringing more torrential rainfall to the flooded Houston metro area, piling onto record-breaking, catastrophic flooding. Localized storm total rain amounts of up to 50 inches are not out of the question once Harvey’s …