East Texas representative ready to tackle dead birds, illegal Mexican babies, students who plan to fail TAKS for spite

NACOGDOCHES — On his way to be sworn in as the newly elected veteran representative for East Texas, Wayne Christian was ready to take on governmental red tape, head on.

He said he was ready to fight to get some recreational and economic development options for Toledo Bend, put a stop to unfunded mandates and try to make a bold statement to the federal government that Texas should not be made to recognize Mexican babies as U.S. citizens, just because the child's parents came over illegally to give birth.

What he found, when he got to Austin on Tuesday were dead birds.

On Monday, the day before the 80th Legislative Session was to start, police shut down about 10 blocks of downtown Austin for several hours after 63 birds were found dead in the street. Preliminary tests found no threat to people.

Christian was no more surprised about the fact that there was no threat than he was about an apparent overreaction to the dead birds.

"It was only a few dead birds," he said. "It was probably just some boy with a BB gun who hated those things."

A similar bird kill that occurred in the "real world" outside of Austin not too long ago was treated much differently, according to Christian.

"They just sacked 'em up, sent one of them to Texas A&M and then burned 'em," he said. "That's how you do things in the real world — not in Austin, Texas. Only in Austin, Texas, do they shut the whole thing down and stop the economy."

And it's that same bureaucracy that leads to shutting down 10 blocks when there is no apparent threat that is at the heart of a lot of Christian's frustration with Texas government.

In this year's session, Christian said he hopes to fix at least part of those problems with bills he intends to introduce. One deals with considering legislative intent, and another addresses "unfunded mandates," which are new laws that cities and counties are forced to implement without any additional state monies.

According to Christian, there is a massive amount of time wasted in Austin every year by "un-elected and unaccountable" commissions and committees deciding what the complex wording in new bills actually say. But the intent of the legislator is never even considered, unless there is a lawsuit, he said.

It's a problem Christian said he hopes he can help remedy with a law that brings the "intent" into the implementation of the law.

As for unfunded mandates, Christian said he intends to file legislation that states if a lawmaker wants to file a bill, he or she must also include some sort of fiscal budget that would put a price tag on the new law, and then address where the money would come from.

Christian said cities and counties should not be the ones that always have to foot the bill for new laws made by the state.

"Those bills would change the way the government operates in Texas," he said, adding that it was time to take power away from gubernatorial appointees and bureaucrats and put the general public back in control of their state.

Christian also has plans to support, if not author, a few "legislative nuggets" that may prove to be fairly controversial — fighting the federal definition of a citizen as one who is born in the U.S. — taxing wages made in Texas and sent back to Mexico — and adding a "no pass/no play" criteria to Texas standardized testing that Christian said would hold more students accountable for their actions and their performances.

On the subject of immigration, Christian said Texas should impose an 8-cent sales tax on every dollar that leaves the state to be sent to family in Mexico and Central America.

And supporting what may prove to be one of the most controversial bills that Texas does not have the authority pass, Christian said he plans to joint author a bill that says Texas would not recognize the child of an illegal alien as a naturalized U.S. citizen.

Christian admits that the bill can't pass, but the intent is really just to bring attention to a growing problem that the entire state is facing.

In one Dallas hospital last year, Christian said, there were nearly 20,000 births to parents who were in the U.S. illegally. Current federal laws make all of those children U.S. citizens, but Christian said it is the taxpayers of Texas who are having to shoulder that burden of the flood of Mexican babies born on this side of the Rio Grande.

As for the "no pass/no play" rule, Christian said he understands the problems with "teaching to the tes" as much as anyone, but he said there has got to be some sort of standardization that allows the state to compare student performance.

The problem with the current rules, he said, is that students know they don't have to pass the test until their junior year — so it is possible for groups of students to get together either their freshman or sophomore year and agree to all fail the test simply to make their school or teachers look bad. But if they know they will not be allowed to participate in extracurricular activities, unless they pass the test, Christian said, it makes students more accountable.

Also during this legislative session, Christian said he hopes to work to open Toledo Bend Reservoir for skiing and other recreational uses, as well as opening avenues for residential and retail development on property surrounding the lake.

He also said he hopes to help draft a state version of a proposed federal "Jessica's Law" designed to punish convicted child sex predators and allow for measures that would reduce their ability to re-offend.

And, being an investment representative himself, Christian said he wants to allow special preferences for Texas-based investment options, when all other factors are equal.

"There's a lot I want to get done," Christian said Wednesday afternoon. "But, right now, it's only the second day."