by BRAD ROLLINS
Voters in this neck of the woods have several options come election day on Nov. 8.
They will decide between former Mayor Bobby Lane and retired Air Force Master Sgt. Jose Montoya for the Buda City Council seat being vacated by Councilman Scott Dodd. Voters who live within Hays County Emergency Service District No. 8 will decide whether to authorize the district to increase its sales tax to 1.5 cents for every $1 spent.
Yet turnout so far has been abysmal. As of midday Tuesday, 1,568 of 95,000 or so registered voters had cast ballots in the whole county. These include 67 who voted at Buda City Hall through Friday last week and 69 who had voted at Kyle City Hall.
During early voting, any registered Hays County voter may cast a ballot at any early voting location, so polling location traffic is not necessarily a perfect indicator of how much interest is being drummed up at the ballot box in different parts of the county. Voters across Hays County, however, are barely registering a pulse with less than week to go before Election Day.
Even in San Marcos, where six candidates are vying for two City Council seats, 648 people cast ballots last week either at the Hays County Elections Office, the San Marcos Public Library or the LBJ Student Center on the Texas State University campus.
In Dripping Springs, where voters are deciding whether to let the school district raise its property taxes by 13 cents per $100 in value, 531 voted through Friday at the DSISD administration building.
Ten amendments are on the ballot for the Nov. 8 election. The measures would extend homestead exemptions to the spouses of disabled veterans; authorize the Texas Water Development Board to issue $6 billion for water infrastructure; allow the Land Commissioner to transfer up to $300 million a year generated by oil and gas leases on publicly owned lands for public education.
In the past decade, 626 graduating high school seniors in Hays County have paid for college or trade school through a low-interest student loan program run through the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board.
Since 2000, the Hinson-Hazlewood College Student Loan Program has benefited local students to the tune of $6.5 million, according to coordinating board records. Now the program is out of money and state voters in the Nov. 8 election are being asked to approve a constitutional amendment that would authorize another $1.86 billion in bonds to pay for College Access Loans.
Texas voters have approved issuing bonds for the loan program seven times since 1965. But this time around they are being asked to give the coordinating board “evergreen” authority to keep the program replenished forever as long as the total amount of outstanding bonds does not exceed the ceiling set by voters (in this case, $1.86 billion).
