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Mayor John Whitmire proposing a 5% cut across the board, except for fire and police departments.. Tax hikes and increased fees for parking and city services are likely .. The Mayor of Houston says the city is 'broke' after overspending for decades. Experts say the problem has existed for years, but COVID handouts from the federal government helped mask them. ... A tax hike through a bond is expected in November. ... The city has been struggling to make firefighters whole, from meeting its contractual obligation to their pension, to paying backpay and wage hikes that have been promised years...

Pete Buttigieg has tapped into the New York fundraising scene better than any other 2020 Democratic candidate — and he’ll be back this Labor Day weekend to rake in more big bucks. The South Bend, Indiana, mayor already brought in $3.7 million from New York state — including $2.9 million just from New York City, according to donor data provided by the Center for Public Integrity and analyzed by The Post. He bests all other Democratic White House hopefuls in the Big Apple — by a landslide — including New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, who raised $885,000 in...

Video at link. Houston Mayor Annise Parker wasn’t exactly gracious in defeat, accusing those who opposed the city’s transgender-rights ordinance of “deliberate lies” and predicting the city’s economy would suffer as a result of the measure’s repeal. In remarks shortly after Tuesday’s balloting, Ms. Parker blamed the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance’s lopsided loss on “a very small but determined group of right-wing ideologues and the religionist right” for waging “a campaign of fear-mongering and deliberate lies.” The ordinance, named Proposition 1 on the city ballot, lost by 62 to 38 percent despite the strong support of national gay-rights organizations, who...

...Prop 1, nicknamed HERO, is failing by a margin of 61-percent to 39-percent... ...Supporters of the ordinance included President Obama, Hillary Clinton and several entertainers... ...Early voting numbers doubled compared to the last local election and analysts say Prop 1 was the main catalyst driving voters to the polls.

Mayor Annise Parker took a moment on Twitter to bash former Houston Astros star Lance Berkman after he voiced opposition toward the city's equal rights ordinance known as HERO. In late September, Berkman recorded an advertisement for the Campaign for Houston PAC, a group that is opposed to HERO. "My wife and I have four daughters," Berkman says in the ad. "Proposition One, the 'bathroom ordinance,' would allow troubled men to enter women's public bathrooms, showers and locker rooms. This would violate their privacy and put them in harm's way. That's just wrong." The mayor called Berkman a hypocrite for...

A Texas judge has rejected the city of Houston’s demand to deny a jury trial to pastors fighting a controversial transgender ordinance. The ruling, released late Tuesday by Judge Robert Schaffer in the Harris County District Court in Houston, came in a case in which the city created a firestorm of controversy by issuing subpoenas for copies of pastors’ sermons. In its latest motion, the city claimed the pastors have no right to a jury trial, contending the decision should be made by a hand-picked “special master.” The pastors are opposing an ordinance adopted by lesbian Mayor Annise Parker and...

Houston's Lesbian Mayor Annise Parker is at it again after standing down on subpoenaing pastor's sermons. We had not heard from her for a few months after she got blasted by pastors and the public following the City Council's attempts to push through an unlawful "bathroom bill" and the city attorney's attempts to manipulate signatures in a petition against their illegal actions. However, that has changed. Now she is claiming that the pastors have no right to a jury trial and is calling for a "special master" to investigate. Though the city withdrew its subpoenas of the pastor's sermons,...

It largely escaped the notice of the national media, but there has been a pretty big political story playing out in Houston the last few weeks. Well, it has been a big story, at least, for one very key GOP constituency. Here's the recap: The city of Houston a few weeks back subpoenaed the sermons of five pastors who opposed an ordinance that was aimed at increasing the rights and protections of LGBT residents of the city, which is home to the first openly lesbian mayor of a major American city, Annise Parker (D). The subpoenas were issued in response...

The mayor's office of the city of Houston in Texas confirmed Thursday that conservatives sent in more than 1,000 Bibles to the city's first openly gay mayor, Annise Parker, in protest after the sermons of five local pastors were subpoenaed in a legal dispute over a controversial ordinance some say will allow men to use women's restrooms in the city. Earlier reports noted that city officials in Houston were upset over a voter lawsuit filed after the Houston City Council rejected valid petitions to repeal the city's controversial Equal Rights Ordinance, which allows men who identify as female to use...

Houston announced Wednesday that it will withdraw the subpoenas of sermons from five pastors who publicly opposed an ordinance banning discrimination against gay and transgender residents, The Houston Chronicle reported. "I didn't do this to satisfy them," Mayor Annise Parker said, referring to critics of the subpoenas. "I did it because it was not serving Houston."

Take a look at P.J. Gladnick’s post over at Newsbusters . The gist: Houston Mayor Annise Parker’s daughter had trouble getting her driving test done to get her driver’s license. Parker, a lesbian who married her partner out of state after being elected mayor of Texas’ largest city, blamed the problem on the Texas Department of Public Safety and, specifically, on Texas law which does not recognize same-sex marriage. Their daughters are adopted and they also have a foster son. Parker launched her blame game in this tweet. Daughter needs drivers test. Has all docs, some in MomA name, some...

The Huffington Post published a story by Amanda Terkel which purportedly showed that the daughter  of the lesbian mayor of Houston, Annise Parker, was denied a driver's license because she has two moms. The story included a tweet from the mayor claiming this as the cause for denial. Unfortunately for the mayor, an update to the story proved her to have been lying about this incident. First let us look at the initial Huffington Post article in which the daughter of the mayor was supposedly subjected to discrimination due to having two moms:

The daughter of Houston Mayor Annise Parker was briefly denied the chance to take a driving test this week because her birth certificate and other documentation indicated she has two mothers, the mayor said.. Parker, who married her longtime partner, Kathy Hubbard, in California this year and remains a rarity as an openly gay mayor of a major U.S. city, complained on her Twitter account on Friday.

The city of Houston, Texas (Mayor Annise Parker), has issued subpoenas for pastors' sermons... Not surprised at all. To get right to the point without taking up any unnecessary space, who do statists want Separation of A.) Church and B.) State, but not Separation of B.) State and A.) Church? They apparently want the forward of this, but not the reverse. And they want religious folk to butt out of politics, but they seize every opportunity to stick their noses into the affairs of religious folk. In your opinion, why do you think this is; what do the statists want?

Houston recently passed an ordinance through its city council that has sparked quite a bit of controversy amongst conservative evangelicals. The Houston Equal Rights Ordinance (HERO), a broad-sweeping, left-leaning law trumpeted by the City of Houston and its openly gay mayor, Annise Parker, is supposed to protect gay, lesbian and transgender people from discrimination. All well and good, but according to the Independent Journal Review, the ordinance to ensure nondiscrimination, discriminates against those of faith who oppose it. Five pastors, members of Houston's conservative, evangelical base, oppose HERO, as does the liberal Americans United for the Separation of Church and...

President Barack Obama says the Supreme Court’s recent gay marriage orders may have the biggest impact of any ruling of his presidency. Obama told The New Yorker that the court’s Oct. 6 rejection of appeals from states seeking to preserve gay marriage bans is the best of his tenure. …

AUSTIN, Texas -- The battle over Houston's non-discrimination ordinance has moved from the ballot box to the church pulpit, as a group of pastors fights efforts by the city to subpoena their sermons and private communications with church members. The law, passed last June, was criticized because it could be used to allow men to use women's bathrooms, among other objections. Opponents to the law had collected more than 50,000 signatures to place a repeal measure on the ballot this November, far more than the 17,269 required. However, the City of Houston moved to invalidate the majority of the signatures,...

. 2014-10-15 Houston LGBT Mayor has EVERY LEGAL RIGHT to Prosecute Christian Churches for Political Activity First, I (Patton@Bastogne) am a pro-life anti-gay-marriage evangelical Christian. Second, (in today's news story reported by The Houston Chronicle, below) ... I am calling out the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) and their attorney Christina Holcomb ... as "Despicable Liars". ADF attorneys KNOW FULL WELL that Churches' "voluntary" acceptance of the IRS 501-C3 "federal contract" means that Christian Churches SURRENDER their rights to ... First Admendment "Free Speech" ... when practiced behind a "tax-exempt church pulpit". Period. I openly challenge the deceptive ADF organization (and...

AUSTIN, Texas -- Houston Mayor Annise Parker has backed down from the subpoenas the City of Houston issued to several area pastors, Breitbart Texas has learned. Breitbart Texas reported earlier about the controversy, stemming from litigation challenging the city's anti-discrimination ordinance and subpoenas asking the pastors for the content of their sermons, speeches and communications with church members. Texas Senator Ted Cruz weighed in, firmly supporting the pastors in their efforts to fight the subpoenas, while Mayor Parker initially remained adamant that the city had the right to request those records. Despite posting comments on Twitter just hours before that...

If the 5 pastors used pulpits for politics, their sermons are fair game. Were instructions given on filling out anti-HERO petition?-A— Annise Parker (@AnniseParker) October 15, 2014