Latinos For Texas Blog

Coming up: a Mexican American cultural center

Construction of the city-owned center began in January 2006.

The project, which was approved in 1998, will be done by June, but the project manager said officials are aiming for an informal opening on Cinco de Mayo.

The $16 million center is taking shape on a 6 1/2-acre site at the end of River Street.

Designed by well-known Mexican architect Teodoro Gonzáles de León, CasaBella Architects of Austin and Del Campo & Maru of San Francisco, it features simple yet striking structural forms, such as a pyramid, and is made in part with white concrete panels that were hand-chiseled in Mexico City.

A tower with a narrow, vertical window will be able to be seen from Interstate 35.

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Mexic-Arte Museum will also be looking to selling their current location on Congress and building a new site for their museum near the MACC. This is exciting news indeed. Let’s plan to go to the informal opening on Cinco de Mayo.

AAS profile on Representative Eddie Rodriguez 1/12/07

Law student back to refine legislation for East Austin district

Monday, February 12, 2007

Rep. Eddie Rodriguez, D-Austin, is working on several fronts to keep a roof over people’s heads.

“Texas right now has the highest rate where people are losing their homes because they can’t make their mortgage payments,” Rodriguez said.

Rodriguez, a first-year student at the University of Texas School of Law, is starting his third term as a lawmaker.

He wants to require home buyers to get financial counseling before signing up for “exotic” mortgages that require balloon payments or escalating interest rates. He also wants to make it easier for people to apply for homestead exemptions by requiring the applications to be mailed along with the owner’s property appraisal. The exemptions result in lower property taxes.

Rodriguez, who has seen escalating land prices force some Austinites out of their neighborhoods, is back with legislation on homestead preservation districts.

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Kudos to Representative Rodriguez for this legislation making housing a priority for him this session. Everyone needs a roof over their head. The American dream is based on owning your own home too, so every avenue we have to move more people into ownership is a worthwhile effort.

Richard Raymond’s 2007 Capitol Report VLOG (video blog)

Today I cosponsored a bill to move the 2008 Texas Primaries to February.

Today I cosponsored a bill, House Bill 993, by Rep. Alonzo of Dallas. This bill would move the Democratic and Republican primaries in 2008 to the first Tuesday in February.

We’re going to have a new President elected next year. And the Texas primary right now is too late in the process for Texas to have any meaningful impact on who the nominees are — both Democrat and Republican. I’ve talked with a lot of Democrats and Republicans and we’re all in agreement that it would be a good idea to move the primary to the first Tuesday in February. It’s after New Hampshire but it’s still early enough in the process that we’ll actually have a real impact.

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I am so impressed with our Representatives using multi-media tools and the Internet to get their message out. Congratulations to Representative Raymond on his video blog! And he’s got the post and video in both English and Spanish too.

Oh and kudos on the bill too which I support whole heartedly. HB 993 We need to make sure Texas counts.