Lotto Sales
The pandemic may have soured the economy of the state and nation, but that didn’t stop Texans from playing the lottery in record numbers.
The Texas Lottery Commission reported (Sept. 24), that for the fiscal year ending Aug. 31, lottery sales, for the 10th consecutive year, set a record.
The $6.7 billion in lottery sales for the fiscal year for 2020 resulted in a record $1.661 billion transferred to the Foundation School Program, and has contributed more than $25.7 billion to Texas public education to date.
Higher-ed Almanac
The data reflects that in the 10 years since the almanac was first published, Texas public higher-ed graduation rates have increased from 59.9 percent to 63.6 percent. (See also this press release.)
ITT Settlement
State Attorney General Ken Paxton announced (Sept. 17) a settlement agreement with PEAKS Trust, a private student loan program run by ITT Tech and affiliated with Deutsche Bank entities, granting over $27 million in debt relief to former ITT students in Texas. The settlement announcement gives avenues for affected former ITT students to find out more about the settlement.
The bankrupt, for-profit ITT career school network abruptly shut down in September 2016.
Guilty Plea
Former Houston ISD college entrance test administrator Niki D. Williams, 46, on Sept. 25 (press release) became the 41st person to have entered a guilty plea in the well-publicized national college admission scheme involving the use of bribery, manipulated test scores and falsified student athletic backgrounds to get the children of wealthy parents into colleges to which they might not otherwise have been admitted.
Williams admitted being bribed to allow a co-conspirator to either secretly take a ACT or SAT test she was administering, or to manipulate the test to reflect correct answers before they were sent off to be scored. She pleaded guilty to a charge of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and mail fraud and honest services wire fraud and mail fraud.
Prosecutors have recommended that due to her guilty plea and cooperation with investigators, when she is sentenced by a Boston judge on Dec. 21, she receive a sentence of: 1) a year of supervised release, 2) a fine, 3) forfeiture in the amount of $20,000 and 4) restitution. Prosecutors said this represented the “low end” of the federal sentencing guidelines for the charge to which she pleaded guilty.
Last February, a former UT Austin tennis coach Michael Center was sentenced to six months in federal prison due to his guilty plea in which he admitted accepting a bribe for helping to get a student admitted to the university as a tennis recruit, even though the student didn’t play the sport competitively.
Forfeiture Sought
Houston media reported that a civil forfeiture complaint filed recently by an assistant U.S. attorney alleged that former Houston ISD chief operating officer Brian Busby conspired to pay a landscaping contractor for work performed by district employees in exchange for kickbacks.
The filing states that a raid on Busby’s home in February resulted in the seizure of $90,150 in cash, and that $95,878 in cash was seized from the home and vehicle of the contractor.
Busby has not been criminally charged, reports reflect.
HISD placed Busby, whose wife reportedly continues to work for the district as an administrator, on paid leave after the February raid on his home, and did not offer him a contract renewal after his last day of work on Aug. 31.