Rural highways to get boost to 80 mph

AUSTIN (AP) — Texans who brag they do things bigger and better are about to go faster too.

State transportation officials are expected Thursday to boost speed limits on two stretches of rural highway from 75 mph to 80, leaving wandering armadillos and feral hogs a split-second less time to avoid becoming roadkill.

It would be the highest posted speed limit in the country.

And while state officials say the roads can accommodate it, safety and energy conservation advocates warn it will cost lives and hit drivers in the wallet at a time of spiking fuel prices.

“We studied it,” said Transportation Commission Chairman Ric Williamson. “These are parts of the state where higher speeds is a safe decision.”

DeLay’s final House bill approved

WASHINGTON (AP) — Former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, who is resigning from Congress June 9 amid legal problems, won House approval Wednesday of the final bill he introduced — a measure aimed at getting foster children into permanent homes faster.

The bill passed unanimously on a voice vote.

According to DeLay, children wait longer to be placed with a family outside of the state where they are in government foster care than they do if placed with a family within that state.

“Thousands of children, shuttled in and out of our broken, debasing foster care system, have foster or adoptive families out of state more than willing to provide them a permanent, safe, loving home,” DeLay, R-Sugar Land, said in a news release.

Lay-Skilling jury deliberations to continue a 6th day

HOUSTON (AP) — Jurors in the fraud and conspiracy trial of Enron Corp. founder Kenneth Lay and former CEO Jeffrey Skilling have deliberated for about 31 hours over five days without reaching a verdict in the premier criminal case to emerge from the company’s collapse.

The panel was slated to resume talks for a sixth day on Thursday.

On Wednesday, the jury sent a note to U.S. District Judge Sim Lake asking whether it was possible to see transcripts of testimony. The judge asked the panel to be more specific about what it wanted, and the issue didn’t come up again.