Page 4-A El Campo Leader-News • Wednesday, December 16, 2020

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THE EL CAMPO LEADER-NEWS (USPS 169520) is published semi-weekly on Wednes-day and Saturday for $50 per year in Wharton County; $65 per year out of county; $89 per year out of state; and $50 per year for the online edition by Wharton County Newspapers, Inc., 203 E. Jackson St., El Campo, Texas 77437. Periodical postage paid at El Campo, Texas. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to the EL CAMPO LEADER-NEWS, P.O. Box 1180, El Campo, Texas 77437.

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979-543-3363Website: www.leader-news.com

Email address: lettertoeditor@leader-news.comNews: news@leader-news.com

After continuously hearing the phrase “As we get older ...” for nine-plus years, I rather unhappily an-nounce the transformation officially happened Saturday at 2:33 p.m.

This realization took place in the freezer aisle of an El Campo grocery store somewhere between the frozen hams and fresh beef with no wit-nesses.

Despite this lack of corroboration, I’m rather certain the inability to stand up straight coupled by diffi-culty walking, near exhaustion from grabbing coffee, bread, pasta and a few other items that give health nuts the hives while unable to remember half the “musts” on a forgotten list provide ample evidence.

I hope all you forewarners are happy.

Yes, you told me and, no, I’m not willing to accept this situation and hobble on with the daily obstacles.

I’d yell and scream about it, but I haven’t been able to manage any real volume in years.

Running away from the fact is out too. The general public, however, may be disappointed as the odds of me somehow managing to trip over flat ground and wind up doing an in-advertent cartwheel before sticking

a genuine “spread eagle” landing for a perfect 10.0 score is almost guar-anteed.

Banging our historical newsroom table in frustration is out of the question – there’s just too good of a chance I’d break something.

For full disclosure purposes, the newsroom table is a slab of granite about four inches thick. I intend to use it as my official hurricane shelter should things ever get bad enough in El Campo that bricks start flying through the air.

No doubt, it would not be what broke.

However, I’m beginning to won-der if I must accept this new title begrudgingly seeing how I now refer to my start date at the newspaper as “when Jesus was a small child.”

One reporter here started work at the Leader-News about 10 months

before I did. Another may not have been born when the article “Intro-ducing our new reporter” came out featuring a photo of yours truly city style.

That style vanished somewhere in the years in between, a “Zmena myšlení” or “zatácka” as my Czech buddies would say or “cambio de mentalidad” for those who prefer Spanish.

Somewhere along the line, the as-sorted pieces and parts of Shannon broke down or, some would tell you, they never worked completely right in the first place.

But it just seems wrong to realize “Holy Geritol bottles, Batman. She’s freakin’ old” in a grocery store aisle.

Ought to be something a bit snaz-zier, don’t you think?

Either way, I suppose I should go find a red hat or start lining up the mimosas.

I’ve already got the AARP mem-bership.

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– Shannon Crabtree is editor & publisher of the El Campo Leader-News.

Age sneaks up on publisher

ShannonCrabtree

Louise volunteers help town, residents

Editor, the Leader-News:At last night’s school board

hearing, speakers came to state their feelings regarding a 313 so-lar farm abatement application. Out of this group, everyone was respectful, with the exception of one gentleman. He made his case by degrading Louise, our school board and our Chamber of Com-merce.

I publicly invite him, and any-one else, to join our citizens in try-ing to better our town, instead of bashing it. As a trustee, I have ig-nored personal attacks, but I can’t ignore an attack on my town. His face is not seen in Louise – at our restaurants, stores, fundraisers or community clean up days. He and others have no idea what goes on here.

Louise and LISD are standing tall and proud because of volun-teers who come out in full force. The chamber has taken the dan-gerous abandoned rice mill and turned it into a proud community center in under five years, with the support of our citizens and businesses.

When a community member is sick or going through hard times, we provide meals for the family.

When our kids want to go to Washington, the whole town shows up to make that happen.

When tragedy sets a family back, we have a bake sale to give financial relief.

Biannually, our Beautifica-tion Committee fills dumpsters to clean up the town.

I feel like I can speak for those of us who strive to better Louise when I say: until you have the whole story, please don’t belittle us.

We only have attendance at LISD meetings when there is con-troversy. I wish we had a room packed full when our students or our staff are recognized for their outstanding achievements.

Our school desperately needs upgrades, because of years of ne-glect. (Superintendent Garth) Oli-ver is doing his job to make it bet-ter. Offer your help by joining one of the many LISD committees, instead of threatening to prevent a bond from passing.

I’m a proud Louise resident. Our future depends on our com-munity, and those of us from here aren’t giving up.

We welcome all the help we can get.

Amanda CoxLouise ISD trustee

Louise-Hillje Chamber Second Vice President

Editor’s Note: Louise ISD is in the preliminary stages of review-ing the district’s needs, an effort

which may ultimately be present-ed to voters in a bond election.

Wharton County remains debt-free, granted $3.7 million in aidWith Christmas rapidly ap-

proaching and 2021 looming around the corner, today’s column highlights a number of Wharton County’s re-cent 2020 accomplishments.

Continued Improving Tax-payer Awareness, Involvement: Through biweekly radio interviews, monthly newspaper columns, and various civic and stakeholder gather-ings, elected county officials shared important information and solicited taxpayer input into how and why lo-cal tax dollars get spent.

Adopted 10th Consecutive Deficit-Free Operating Budget: Once again, county commissioners kept operating expenses at or below anticipated revenues.

Regrettably, Austin legislators forced Wharton County taxpayers to assume the $245,000 operational burden of the 23rd District Court which was previously funded by Brazoria County. Those unforeseen costs along with $200,000 in capital murder trial expenses and $100,000 for Indigent Attorney Fees forced Wharton County’s first tax increase in over a decade.

Continued Commitment To Remain 100 Percent Debt Free: Wharton County has remained 100 percent debt free since February 2012. This commitment ensures all county tax dollars are directed to-ward daily operations and nothing is spent on interest rates, bank fees and bond premiums.

Purchased $3.8 Million In

Much-Needed Equipment With-out Raising Taxes Or Borrow-ing Money: Elected representatives agreed to use surplus savings to pur-chase needed precinct and drainage equipment, six sheriff patrol cars, county wide LED lighting upgrades, library flooring, computer software and spyware upgrades, a zero turn mower, and 27 new computers.

Continued Upgrading Coun-ty-wide Drainage Systems: Coun-ty officials expensed more than $2.6 million in 2020 drainage improve-ments. In particular, the drainage department completed its $600,000 in-kind assistance commitment for the Tres Palacios drainage project.

We are finishing work in Pecan Valley ($300,000) with the clearing of trees, widening ditches and in-stallation of three 175 foot by 54 foot drop pipes. We are ready to move dirt in Bear Bottom ($200,000) as engineering schematics are finalized and the needed three large 150 foot by 60 foot drop pipes have arrived.

Continued Seeking, Promot-ing County-wide Cost Sharing Projects: Precinct Commissioners and local municipalities continue collaborating through the sharing of expenses, machinery, and man-power.

Recent collaborations include:• Continued working with cities

to develop a County-wide Transpor-tation Plan that promotes, protects and prepares Wharton County for I-69 expansion projects. In January

2020, TxDOT awarded $208 million in construction contracts for I-69 ex-pansion from Kendleton to Hunger-ford. By September 2023, TxDOT will award another $225 million in bids to extend I-69 beyond Hwy. 60 (Hungerford) to FM 961 (Wharton road to Crescent);

• Completed $600,000 of in-kind drainage support for City of El Cam-po’s Tres Palacios FEMA project;

• Completed $350,000 renovation of the Wharton County Historical Museum;

• Sponsored about $300,000 in Texas Community Development Block Recovery Grants to purchase emergency generators for the Boling and Louise Water Districts;

• Assisted county-wide munici-palities with labor and cost of street repaving projects. The $240,000 Bol-ing Street project broke ground Dec. 1;

• Contributed $98,000 to Whar-ton County Junior College for coun-ty-wide Senior Citizenship Program (Meals On Wheels);

• And purchased a $73,000 Stryk-er Powerload Cot (gurney) and Lift System for the East Bernard Emer-

gency Services District No. 2.Obtained $3.7 million in

State, Federal Grants to En-hance County Revenues: In early November, a large group of Wharton County leaders came together to update the Wharton County Com-munity Plan which provides needed statistical information for grant ap-plications.

Recently awarded county-spon-sored grants include:

• $1,032,000 Coronavirus Re-lief Fund Grant that aids in the battle against COVID-19 by provid-ing reimbursement payments for emergency response salaries and equipment, protective devices and thousands of gallons of hand sani-tizer;

• $788,000 Texas Community De-velopment Block Grant – Disaster Recovery funding will provide Lake Nett with a new diversion channel that drains this region to the north into Baughman Slough;.

-$613,000 CDBG-DR Grant will upgrade the CR 130 Diversion Channel which lies within the Jarvis Creek watershed. Improvements in-clude gathering easements, widen-ing the existing diversion channel, and possibly constructing a berm;

-$285,000 CDBG-DR Grant will provide cross-culvert drainage im-provements on CR 150 and CR 133. Planned worked includes minor channel improvements, berms, and/or regional detention facilities to aid with mitigating flood losses;

• $461,000 TxDOT Transporta-tion Infrastructure Grant to refur-bish 1.2 miles of streets in Boling and several miles of roadway in Pre-cincts 3 and 4;

• $368,000 Texas Juvenile Justice Dept. Financial Grant that funds over 80 percent of Wharton County’s Juvenile Probation services;

• $86,000 Indigent Defense Grant from the State;

• $23,000 FEMA reimburse-ments for Hurricane Harvey flood relief efforts;

• $14,000 in combined library support grants from Dollar General, WalMart and the Gulf Coast Medi-cal Foundation to provide computers and learning resources;

• and precinct commissioners continued their participation in TX-DOT’s Bridge Replacement program and received grant funding for ma-jor bridge construction on County Roads 252 (two), 360, 405, 424, 426, 430, 448 and 467, Pharris Drive and East Street.

My fellow citizens, 2020 was a tremendous year of achievement and opportunity despite the eco-nomic hardships and uncertainties related to COVID-19. Your elected commissioners continue to make sig-nificant improvements to our county wide drainage and roadway systems through the use of federal grant dol-lars ... not from the pocketbooks of local taxpayers.

Have a Blessed Christmas and a Happy New Year.

PhilliPSPenrath

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Representative Phil Stephenson

Texas House of RepresentativesDistrict 85

P.O. Box 2910Austin, TX 78768(512) 463-0604

Senator Lois KolkhorstTexas Senate District 18

P.O. Box 12068 ,Capitol StationAustin, Texas 78711

(512) 463-0118

Congressman Michael Cloud

Congressional District 271314 Longworth HOB

Washington, DC 20515(202) 225-7742

Governor Greg AbbottGovernor of the state of Texas

Office of the GovernorP.O. Box 12428

Austin, TX 78711(512) 463-2000

Contact Your Area Representatives