Are these former board of regents members pulling a pension from UH that will be reduced if the student enrollment oh the UH system drops when Cinco, Sugar Land, and Victoria fall under TAMU? Why else would former members, who are no longer on the board, be so concerned? What do they have to lose?

Walker, who served on the UH System board from 1993 to 1999, also took a strong stance against the change.

"In my opinion, a change of system could interrupt and risk the destination university we so desperately need for our population and the Victoria community," she said. "I have not read the bill, but....."

I quit reading at that point. DID NOT READ the bill LMAO

But strongly against this....

BRING ON TAMU

I have a degree from UHV.

According to this article Dunn-O'Connor states
" Many degree programs that are popular here are offered only by the UH System and not by UHV".

I, like others, think this statement needs clarification.

Perhaps O'Connor should read Section IV of the legal brief in my blog. If the somewhat substantiated rumor is true that the unmarked $100k might be intended to lobby the Texas Legislature to gain support for this move, civil action by "any interested party" could freeze that money for those purposes for the remainder of this Legislative session and would force this to happen on its merits versus being submitted to the usual political favors swap-meet.
www.victoriaadvocate.com/weblogs/para...
-

Section IV. - What remedies are available under TOMA?

The Texas Open Meetings Act offers both civil and criminal remedies to violations of the Act. The civil remedies authorize actions of injunction and mandamus, and all agreements made in violation of the Act are deemed voidable. The Act also creates criminal offenses for conspiring to circumvent the Act, unlawfully closing a meeting, participating in a closed meeting without a certified agenda or recording, and disclosure of a certified agenda or recording from a closed meeting. All of these criminal offenses are misdemeanors.

In this case, an action of mandamus or injunction could be brought in a Victoria County district court by any interested party to stop, prevent, or reverse actions made in violation of TOMA by either the Victoria City Council or VSTDC. Actions found in violation of TOMA would be voidable by the court. The court is also authorized to assess costs of litigation and reasonable attorney’s fees to a substantially prevailing party for any actions of mandamus or injunction. Because of its speed and effectiveness at stopping or reversing pending unlawful acts, and the ability for any interested party to bring an action in district court, the civil remedies of injunction and mandamus offered under TOMA are the most appropriate remedies to prevent any further unlawful acts in this case.

Toolchest: Perhaps Ms. O'Connor was oposed for the same reason I am. It is redundant and a waste of tax payer funds to have two programs running concurrent to each other on the essentially the same campus. Downward expansion should have only taken place if it included Victoria College donated to UH-V to eliminate duplication of administration, at the very least.

A proposed land development scheme now expanded to include the State Legislature. I hope a concerned citizen's group comes together to fight this "fleecing" of the taxpayer. I'll write the first check....

many may not be aware but Morgan O'Conner was against turning UHV into a 4 year University. She wanted it to stay a Jr Sr Level campus for some odd reason
She has her own agenda

"Many degree programs that are popular here are offered only by the UH System and not by UHV," she said.

Think about this statement as you read it.

Many programs that are popular here (Victoria, Texas) are offered only by the UH System (Houston, Texas) and not by UHV (Victoria, Texas). How do these programs benefit the UHV student if they are only offered in Houston?

How is this an argument to keep it UHV instead of switching to TAMU? Is this a statement that was misspoken or did VA report it wrong? The way it has been written states that the reason to fight to keep it UHV is because the programs offered in Houston will not be the same programs that TAMU will offer. Regardless of what is offered, the way it is written implies a change in Houston programs are the cause for concern.

It's nice to know that no matter how this goes, we can count on O'Conner and Walker to continue their commitment to the development of a "destination university" in Victoria.

Let me stand with the "some" in opposing this bill that transfers UofH-V to TA&M. This has been in the works since last year. A threat that Mayor Armstrong made to the UH system because he and the Crossroads Commission on Education, created by State Rep. Geanie Morrison, plans to expand to Mr. Buhler's land, next to the airport, was rejected by UH.

When no one else but UofH was willing to bring a upper division campus to this town, and after almost 40 years, we now have a 4 year undergraduate and graduate schools, sports, a top ten ranked business school, etc.

For some to suggest UofH should be taken over by another system because some local folks who are mad that UofH will not relocate their campus to a piece of dirt located in the middle of nowhere, then spend $10 million for a road, by city taxpayers, to access it, and yet another $70 million in tuition revenue bonds (increase tuition to pay this debt) to build a new campus is preposterous.

Now it's time for political pay back against UH for not supporting this ill conceived plan by Armstrong and Morrison's commission.

Folks it's time to play hardball, if you want UH to stay.

I am no fan of UHV but they are slowly expanding. Seems like the only reason for the change is because they did not jump on the offer of land by the Mayor's buddy. Wonder how long A&M will last if they don't take the land offer. Maybe the city will pay for a parking lot out there--surely they need extra parking for the hiking trail and the old high school.

FREE LAND!

Yeah 100 acres all out by its lonesome.

Of course the FREE LAND comes with a local, hoped for by Mayor Will, $10 Million commitment to build a road out to the FREE LAND at taxpayer expense.

Then there is always the cost of the buildings themselves, at who knows how much, wholly or partially funded by all the taxpayers of Texas, and the local taxpayers get to pay for part of the buildings to.

And of course, since two overpasses are going to be built, one for high school students, at $12 Million to local taxpayers, how long do you think it will be before Airline Rd. will need a overpass too?

FREE LAND!

Yeah Right.

You are right Booger. I am pretty sure all the UHV degree programs are offered by TAMU. Probably much higher ranked...LOL

"Many degree programs that are popular here are offered only by the UH System and not by UHV," she said.

Name one.

http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/poli...

How can any rational person be for this change when this State has far more important issues to dela with????

Of course JackDeuce, most of the people upset out of the A&I to A&M change were loyalist that would not be happy at all. If you look at the A&M system history, you will notice a lot of success in expansion and building of campuses and programs (Texarkana and Corpus come quickly to mind). I would imagine downward expansion would stay status quo. Sugar Land and Cinco are good questions, though I imagine Sugar Land will spin off on its own soon anyway (its getting very large). UHS has no plans to let UHV expand to its own campus which it desperatly needs (look how it rejected FREE land). I would imagine that TAMU agreed before Morrison filed this bill. Personally O'Connor and Walker are just old loyalist with no vision. They received a lot of smoke up the rears when they were regents, so of course they would speak out against this. In reality, this could be the best thing. We just need TAMU to cast it's vision.