Bay Area Houston

Bear with me a bit…..

Yesterday the extreme right wing lead of the Harris County Republican Party, Steven Hotze, was indicted by a grand jury. According to ABC13:

Hotze’s attorney, Jared Woodfill, confirmed with ABC13 on Wednesday that his client is charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and unlawful restraint.

According to ABC13 Hotze’s organization paid an investigator who was indicted last year for allegedly holding an air conditioning repairman at gunpoint while in search of phony ballots. This is what Hotze is now charged with. 

This is odd.

Jeff Larson is a CCISD Trustee and was talking with a Facebook group called The Trailer Park Show. He was describing the election of 2019 with a coalition of “conservatives” running together. He starts at 31:45 describing the election. It runs for a couple of minutes until he freezes out and picks up again at 38:46. Larson barely won while Parizo lost by 25 percentage points at 38:46 he begins to discuss the night Parizo was escorted out of the meeting. It is entertaining. It ends at 46:25. 

He wasn’t very nice. True, but not very nice. 

NOTE: IT SHOULD BE OBVIOUS BY NOW. I DO NOT LIKE SCOTT BOWEN. He is at it again. This is who he is.

Remember when CCISD Trustee thought it was funny to play cough on a woman who was wearing a mask during a board meeting? He was swiftly called out for it and sort of apologized at the next board meeting with the typical “If I offended anyone….” crap. Here is a recap:

Bowen showed his dickness when a parent was distributing a document to each of the Trustees. She wore a mask because I believe she was being careful about COVID. As she passed by Bowen he played coughed on her then turned to Trustee Cottrell who joined him for a good laugh. It was all quite funny poking fun at a parent concerned about bringing a deadly virus back to her kids at home. Bowen just couldn’t pass up the opportunity to be a dick about everything. He did a great job.

In a recent forum Bowen had to be a dick again by referencing a former board member claiming (incorrectly) that the board member neglected the community. The previous board member, who was not part of the forum, had served 4 terms. She was re-elected to an at large position 4 times and served honorably. She had no opportunity to defend her record. It was a nothing but a cheap shot.

Bowen barely won that district after spending a record amount of money backed by the Republican Party. Bowen brought his politics into the board meetings. He has encouraged the extreme far right to attend meeting and make outrageous claims including the racist dog whistle, CRT. He has caused considerable disruption to the the board and to our education system in CCISD. He hasn’t neglected the community.

He has abused the community.

Here is a comparison of the two candidates, Jessica Cejka (on the left) and Misty Dawson (on the right), running for CCISD School District 1. This information is from the CCISD website.

Education

• Jessica Cejka. Bachelors degree in mathematics from Texas A&M. Masters in education (Instructional Technology) from UHCL. Masters in education (Educational Administration) from UHCL. 
• Misty Dawson. Graduated from CCISD High School.

Applicable Experience

• Jessica Cejka. Secondary math teacher grades 7-12. Community college adjunct professor. Education Manager at NASA. Managed student and teacher STEM programs. Real estate agent.
• Misty Dawson. Former Controller of a company. Pool company business owner.

School Activities

• Jessica Cejka. VP of Fundraising on PTA board. Girl Scout leader, Cookie mom. Volunteer on the Speakers Committee of the Houston Livestock and Rodeo. Volunteer on high school rocketry program. Supporter of the Birthday Joy Program and Clear Creek Education Foundation.
• Misty Dawson.  Carnival Fundraiser Co-Chair, Sandra Mossman Elementary PTA 

Contact information

Jessica Cejka. 

www.jessica4ccisd.net

Info@jessica4ccisd.net

832-541-6616

Misty Dawson.

https://www.facebook.com/electMistyDawsonCCISD/

http://mistydawson.com

832-517-0451

Misty.deen@aeonbluepool.net

Just saw a pic on Facebook from Misty Dawson who is running for the CCISD school board. She is working hard to follow the Republican Party playbook of misleading and scare tactics.

A couple of things:

• The Appraisal District [the Appraisal District is a separate office than the Tax Assessor] accesses taxes based upon home values. It’s not like they willy nilly raise the assessment. Home sales are through the roof for reasons unknown. Tax rates have not changed. She might want to contact the Galveston County Tax Assessor for accurate information. (The Assessor is a republican)
• CCISD has NOT considered eliminating the homestead exemption. As part of their budget process this is always on the table, as it should be, but has never been considered especially in the most recent years. When the State has cash strapped the school districts sometimes drastic cuts or considerations must be take but not this time. So this is nothing more than a scare tactic addressed towards the ill informed.
• She claims she will fight for keeping the homestead exemption, something that isn’t being considered, again catering to the ill informed. 
• And BTW….CCISD’s M&O is at the lowest rate allowed by law and the State actually penalizes school districts for not taxing enough. Go figure.

There is something seriously wrong with this.

In a race that requires a couple of thousand dollars, a handful of signs, and attending meet and greets with education professionals and the community, Scott Bowen has broken the bank. His own bank.

According to his 30 day campaign finance report Bowen raised over $25,000……sort of. Bowen loaned his campaign a staggering amount of $20,000. Many candidates for CCISD in the past have loaned their campaigns money but $20,000 is outrageous much like State Representative Money Mayes Middleton who self financed his campaign with over $2.5 Million for a race that should have cost $500,000 if it was competitive. (it wasn’t) 

This self financing is the latest tactic being used by wealthy republican candidates. Eric Dick a republican for County Treasurer self financed his campaign for over $250,000. (he lost) As I have reported before:

Much like Kathaleen Wall who invested $6 Million for a Congressional primary (and lost), and David Mayes Middleton who invested $1.5 Million [$2.5M total]  for his State House primary win, Huffines invested $6 Million for his primary win for a State Senate seat. Out of his $7.4 fundraising haul 81% came from his own pocket!

$20,000 for a school board race is obscene. There is more to this. Bowen’s Treasurer left right after the 2019 election. Currently he does not have a Treasurer on file and will have to explain that to the Texas Ethics Commission. There is more concerning the mailer he sent with pictures of kids which he did not have permission to do but that is for later.

His remaining donations of about $5000 includes $1300 from Kevin Odit who ran for CCISD back in 2021 and a $2000 donation from Thomas McNutt from Corsicana Texas. McNutt is another extreme far right candidate who the party rejected in the 2022 primary for State Representative.

The Clear Lake Chamber of Commerce held a forum for the CCISD candidates. The entire forum can be viewed at the I45Now channel here. 

The Good. Jessica Cejka and Krysten Garcia. Out of the five these are two very outstanding candidates. Clearly both are very knowledgeable in education matters. Both showed confidence, poise, and were very comfortable answering questions. Watching them answer the questions you could tell they could easily talk in detail about any subject. Both were very impressive. As former educators they would bring a wealth of knowledge and applicable experience to the board.

The Bad. Carl Nunn. Chief Nunn has spent his career in law enforcement but he has had trouble transitioning to being a candidate for a school board. He was clearly having trouble answering some questions. As an example at about 52:45 he took a considerable amount of time to think about the question then simply punted and could not answer. Would he be better than the current board member? Absolutely. 

The Ugly. Misty Dawson. Ms. Dawson is clearly out of her element. At about 31:15 on the question of property taxes her opponent took the entire minute to answer the question while Ms. Dawson took a whole 5 seconds to simply agree. She is self financing but stated candidates should take money from partisan organizations. She had trouble answering questions. At about 58:15 she had to pass on answering since she did not know what “at risk student” meant. According to the moderator “at risk student” is actually defined by the Texas Education Agency. 

Scott Bowen. He is great at pandering to the audience and cloaking his extreme, right wing, partisan, views when necessary. Bowen is one of the reasons we have parents coming to the School Board meetings causing unnecessary trouble on non-existent issues. He seems to enjoy being the instigator of chaos. He should take these skills and run for a partisan office where they will be appreciated.