Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Texas Windstorm Insurance Association's authority to assess insurance carriers and to use future premiums to pay prior obligations (RQ-1134-GA).

News release about DART's adjusted services schedule in observance of the New Year's holiday.

News release about DART's end of the year charity drives.

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Special needs plans (SNP) reported having higher profit margins and spending a lower percentage of total revenues on medical expenses, on average, than Medicare Advantage (MA) plans available to all beneficiaries in 2011. For instance, SNPs' average profit margin was 4.0 percentage points higher than plans available to all beneficiaries--8.6 percent vs. 4.6 percent. SNPs also had a higher plan-level median profit margin compared to MA plans available to all beneficiaries--7.1 percent vs. 3.2 percent. All three types of SNPs--dual-eligible SNPs, chronic condition SNPs, and institutional SNPs--spent, on average, a lower percentage of total revenue on medical expenses and had higher profit margins relative to MA plans available to all beneficiaries. SNPs also spent a lower percentage of total revenue on medical expenses and had higher profit margins relative to MA plans available to all beneficiaries after accounting for whether a plan had a high or low enrollment-weighted average benchmark--the maximum amount Medicare will pay plans to serve an average beneficiary in a given area. Similarly, SNPs spent a lower percentage of total revenue on medical expenses and had higher profit margins relative to MA plans available to …

Minutes for the December 19, 2103 TXSSAR meeting, held by the McKinney chapter.

A statement of record issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "No overarching federal privacy law governs the collection and sale of personal information among private-sector companies, including information resellers. Instead, laws tailored to specific purposes, situations, or entities govern the use, sharing, and protection of personal information. For example, the Fair Credit Reporting Act limits the use and distribution of personal information collected or used to help determine eligibility for such things as credit or employment, but does not apply to information used for marketing. Other laws apply specifically to health care providers, financial institutions, or to the online collection of information about children."

News release about DART's adjusted service schedule in observance of the Christmas holiday.

News release about DART transportation options to the "Heart of Dallas Bowl" football game between the University of Nevada Las Vegas and the University of North Texas.

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "FPS faces challenges ensuring that contract guards have been properly trained and certified before being deployed to federal facilities around the country. In its September 2013 report, GAO found that providing active shooter response and screener training is a challenge for FPS. For example, according to officials at five guard companies, their contract guards have not received training on how to respond during incidents involving an active shooter. Without ensuring that all guards receive training on how to respond to incidents at federal facilities involving an active-shooter, FPS has limited assurance that its guards are prepared for this threat. Similarly, an official from one of FPS's contract guard companies stated that 133 (about 38 percent) of its approximately 350 guards have never received screener training. As a result, guards deployed to federal facilities may be using x-ray and magnetometer equipment that they are not qualified to use which raises questions about their ability to screen access control points at federal facilities--one of their primary responsibilities. GAO was unable to determine the extent to which FPS's guards have received active-shooter response and screener training, in part, because FPS lacks …

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether the Austin City Council may transfer governance of Austin Energy to a board of directors (RQ-1132-GA).

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether the Kleberg County commissioners court may create and fund an additional bailiff position for the 105th District Court (RQ-1133-GA).

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins ""

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "GAO found (1) the Federal Housing Finance Agency's (FHFA) financial statements as of and for the fiscal years ended September 30, 2013, and 2012, are presented fairly, in all material respects, in accordance with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles; (2) FHFA maintained, in all material respects, effective internal control over financial reporting as of September 30, 2013; and (3) no reportable noncompliance for fiscal year 2013 with provisions of applicable laws, regulations, contracts, and grant agreements GAO tested. In commenting on a draft of this report, the acting Director of FHFA stated that he accepted the audit conclusions and commented that the agency would continue to work to enhance its internal control and ensure the reliability of its financial reporting, its soundness of operations, and public confidence in its mission."

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "GAO found (1) the United States Securities and Exchange Commission's (SEC) and its Investor Protection Fund's (IPF) financial statements are presented fairly, in all material respects, in accordance with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles; (2) SEC maintained, in all material respects, effective internal control over financial reporting as of September 30, 2013, although internal control deficiencies exist that merit attention by those charged with governance; and (3) no reportable noncompliance in fiscal year 2013 with provisions of applicable laws, regulations, contracts, and grant agreements GAO tested. In commenting on a draft of this report, SEC's Chair expressed her pleasure that GAO found that SEC had successfully remediated the two significant deficiencies identified in 2012. The Chair added that SEC will focus on the significant deficiency GAO reported in 2013 in the area of information security."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "In September 2012, GAO reported that Department of Homeland Security (DHS) employees identified having lower average morale than the average for the rest of the federal government, but morale varied across components. Specifically, GAO found that, according to the Office of Personnel Management's 2011 Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey (FEVS), DHS employees had 4.5 percentage points lower job satisfaction and 7.0 percentage point lower engagement--the extent to which employees are immersed in their work and spending extra effort on job performance. Several components with lower morale, such as the Transportation Security Administration, made up a substantial share of FEVS respondents at DHS and accounted for a significant portion of the overall difference between the department and other agencies. In September 2012, GAO recommended that DHS take action to better determine the root cause of low employee morale, and where absent, add benchmarking against similar organizations, among other things. Since September 2012, DHS has taken a number of actions intended to improve employee morale, such as directing component human capital officials to reevaluate their action plans to ensure that metrics of success are clear and measurable. In December 2013, GAO …

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "GAO found (1) the Office of Financial Stability (OFS) financial statements for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) as of and for the fiscal years ended September 30, 2013, and 2012, are presented fairly, in all material respects, in accordance with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles; (2) OFS maintained, in all material respects, effective internal control over financial reporting for TARP as of September 30, 2013; and (3) no reportable noncompliance for fiscal year 2013 with provisions of applicable laws, regulations, contracts, and grant agreements GAO tested. In commenting on a draft of this report, the Assistant Secretary for Financial Stability stated that OFS is proud to receive unmodified opinions on its financial statements and its internal control over financial reporting. He also stated that OFS is committed to maintaining the high standards and transparency reflected in these audit results."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "GAO found that government agencies were increasingly using reverse auctions as a means to drive down prices but without adequate guidance to ensure that the potential benefits were maximized. GAO's analysis of the data also identified some common characteristics among contract awards resulting from reverse auctions."

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "GAO performed the procedures contained in the enclosures to this report, which it agreed to perform solely to assist the Department of Transportation's Inspector General in ascertaining whether the net excise tax revenue distributed to the Airport and Airway Trust Fund (AATF) and the Highway Trust Fund (HTF) for the fiscal year ended September 30, 2013, is supported by the underlying records. GAO was not engaged to perform, and did not perform, an examination, the objective of which would have been to express an opinion on the amount of net excise taxes distributed to the AATF and the HTF during fiscal year 2013. Accordingly, GAO does not express such an opinion. This report is solely for the use of the Office of Inspector General of the U.S. Department of Transportation and should not be used by those who have not agreed to the procedures or have not taken responsibility for the sufficiency of the procedures for their purposes."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The President and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) have established policies and procedures for coordinating investments in geospatial data, however, in November 2012, GAO reported that governmentwide committees and federal departments and agencies had not effectively implemented them. The committee that was established to promote the coordination of geospatial data nationwide--the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC)--had developed and endorsed key standards and had established a clearinghouse of metadata. GAO found that the clearinghouse was not being used by agencies to identify planned geospatial investments to promote coordination and reduce duplication. In addition, the committee had not yet fully planned for or implemented an approach to manage geospatial data as related groups of investments to allow agencies to more effectively plan geospatial data collection efforts and minimize duplicative investments, and its strategic plan was missing key elements."

News release about DART's annual "Stuff a Bus" charity drives.

News release about the appointment of Rick stopfer to the DART board of directors, representing the city of Irving.

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether a justice of the peace may serve as a court-appointed investigator for an indigent defendant in a felony case (RQ-1131-GA).

Meeting minutes for the December 2nd meeting of the Dallas Way including fundraising information and other reports.

Final report regarding engineering evaluation for expanding city of San Marcos's reclaimed water system to also serve Texas State University.