Giddings ISD Delays Start of School Year
Giddings Times & News
• A late release of information by the Texas Education Agency (TEA) is a major factor in the decision to delay the first day of school for Giddings ISD students. The TEA has committed to providing a learning management system for districts to track student progress and attendance but has yet to announce which system will be used. Due to this delay by TEA, Giddings ISD administration and the District Improvement Committee will be recommending to the Giddings ISD Board of Trustees that the 2020-21 school year begin on August 31, with both face-to-face and remote instruction. This delay will provide additional time for faculty and staff to be properly trained on the new learning management system, as well as provide time for teachers to get lessons ready for remote learning. In order to avoid extending when the last day of school will occur, a recommendation will also be made to extend the school day by 15 minutes. By doing this, the district will add five more days to the calendar in addition to the three emergency closure days that are already built-in. With the exception of any bad weather days or any other reasons for the district to close, the district would end the year as originally planned.
The Bellville Times
• The Bellville community is mourning the death of a high school senior. Zach Hood, who was entering his senior year of Bellville High School, died in a single-vehicle wreck on FM 1456 just around midnight on July 20. The investigation into the cause of the accident is continuing. No other details involving the accident were made available by the Austin County Sheriff’s Office or DPS at this time. Hood was a starting member of both the Bellville Brahma football and soccer teams.
The Brenham Banner-Press
• The Office of Emergency Management (OEM) and the Joint Information Center (JIC) said the coronavirus’ case count, active case count, hospitalizations and recoveries will no longer be shared on the Joint Information Center dashboard. Anyone interested in following current numbers will be directed to the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) COVID reporting site. This change primarily comes from the Public Health Region 7 offices’ inability to timely report all the numbers to the JIC and OEM. “Each phase of the pandemic will require us to make changes that can better report the most accurate data to you,” the two offices said in a statement. The JIC and OEM believe that at this stage the focus needs to be on recoveries. Though the dashboard will no longer be active, they will continue to track all local data, rates of hospitalization, the population affected and burn rate of personal protective equipment.
• The Brenham ISD Board of Trustees voted unanimously to select Dr. Tylor Chaplin as the lone finalist for the district’s open superintendent position on July 21. The seven-person board must now wait 21 days before officially voting to hire Chaplin. Chaplin will fill the vacancy left by former superintendent Walter Jackson, who left the district for the La Porte ISD superintendent position following the expiration of his contract in June.
Burleson County Tribune
• On July 19 Paul Dunham Mosley, 31 of Caldwell, was pronounced dead when he lost control of his truck in a curve on FM 2000 and crashed into a tree. The accident occurred at 12:55 a.m. when Mosley, southbound in a 2011 Dodge 3500 Dually pickup about 7.5 miles northeast of State Highway 21, approached a left curve at an unsafe speed, drove to the right side of the road, overcorrected across the centerline, went into the opposite bar ditch and collided with a tree. The truck caught fire and Mosley died inside the wreckage. The fire spread to the tree and to some nearby grass. Firefighters were able to extinguish it. Mosley was traveling alone and it is unknown if he was wearing a seat belt.
• Somerville Police Chief Craig Wise has announced his retirement. On July 17, Wise gave a letter to City Administrator Danny Segundo announcing his retirement effective Friday, July 31. Wise’s retirement comes after several weeks of controversy which included calls for his resignation by Mayor Michael Bradford and members of the public. According to Segundo, three police officers have also resigned. One reserve officer resigned earlier this month, effective July 18. This leaves the city with two police officers. Calls for Wise’s resignation began in early June after the city rejected the rehiring of former Harris County Sheriff’s Deputy Chauna Sheffield. Calls for action intensified after members of the public condemned the police department’s handling of a police brutality protest on June 13, in which several armed men arrived. The city has already begun its search for a new police chief, with Segundo saying the Burleson County Sheriff’s Office will be asked to help with law enforcement until the police department hires more officers.
The Bastrop Advertiser
• After 110 years on the Bastrop County Courthouse lawn, the tall, stone monument set up by the United Daughters of the Confederacy will be removed because of a nearly unanimous vote by the Bastrop County Commissioners Court on Monday morning. The monument, along with a second memorial honoring Joseph D. Sayers, a major in the Confederate army and Texas’ 22nd governor, will be moved to a new home, which will be determined by a relocation committee expected to be impaneled by the court next month. Monday’s vote is a victory for a campaign that, since 2015, has pushed to move the monuments in the face of firm opposition from county leadership. The effort regained steam June 7 when a 26-yearold man tagged the statues with “BLM,” referring to the Black Lives Matter movement, and “Free Rodney Reed” — a reference to the controversial 1998 conviction of death row inmate Rodney Reed in the killing of Stacey Stites in Bastrop. The renewed efforts last month were initially met with opposition from Bastrop County Judge Paul Pape, who attempted to block formal discussions, but in a surprise reversal two weeks ago, during a special meeting to discuss the monuments, Pape announced his intention to “correct as best we can the misgivings of the past to remove this public representation of prejudice, segregation and enslavement.”