Christopher Connelly

Denton County voters may find themselves voting in new districts for members of the county commissioners court next year. The Denton County Commissioners Court is planning to redraw their districts this summer. Commissioners say it’s an effort to make sure their precincts are equal in this fast-growing county, but critics of the plan says it’s being rushed unnecessarily and will have a discriminatory effect.

The emergency room at Tarrant County’s public hospital faced its own emergency last week. Patients swamped John Peter Smith hospital’s emergency department in Fort Worth following the Memorial Day holiday.

With the ouster of Fort Worth Police Chief Joel Fitzgerald last week, attention is turning to what the city should look for in its next police chief.

Deputy Chief Ed Kraus was sworn in as Fort Worth's new interim police chief Tuesday. He’ll lead the department until a replacement can be found for outgoing Chief Joel Fitzgerald, who was fired by city hall last week.

Texas incarcerates more women than any other state. The number of women in Texas prisons has ballooned since 1980, growing by nearly 1,000% – twice the rate of men. 

TEXRail got off to a bit of a rocky start, delayed by the federal government shutdown. But four months after the train began running between central Fort Worth and Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, riders say they’re happy with the service.

Four years after Sandra Bland died in a Waller County jail, her name is still reverberating in the Texas legislature.

Fort Worth Mayor Betsy Price has won a fifth term in office and is on her way to becoming the longest-serving mayor in city history. 

The Dallas mayor’s race is heading to a runoff after no one was able to get a majority of the votes, while the Fort Worth mayor won re-election.

Nearly two weeks after publishing a letter to the residents of Dallas County outlining a broad reform agenda, newly minted District Attorney John Creuzot is still dealing with criticism over a petty theft policy. Despite the attention, though, Creuzot's approach to theft is unlikely to be his most impactful reform. 

If a poor person steals food or diapers or other essential items that they need but can’t afford to pay for, should they be prosecuted? Dallas County District Attorney John Creuzot says no.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Wednesday arrested 284 employees at a technology repair company in a Dallas suburb on charges of working in the United States illegally. Officials say it's the largest worksite raid in the country in 10 years.

When Ashley Franks got pregnant with her son, her grandfather kicked her out of the house. She didn’t know where to go. So she lived out of her car throughout the pregnancy.

“Daily life [when living in the car] is trying to find a place to take a shower, make sure that your hygiene is kept up, make sure that your vehicle is running properly, because that’s all you have,” Franks says.

Sherizon Scott says her life is on the right track, but it’s been a struggle to get there. 

For years, Scott and her husband teetered on the edge of financial instability. They could take care of their growing family’s needs on their own, but only so long as everything went right, she says.

Lawmakers in Austin who oversee the state’s sprawling prison system are concerned about state jails. These middle-tier facilities, which are for low-level felons with crimes related to underlying issues, were set up with the idea that they’d provide an array of rehabilitative services that would prevent future crime.

When Mia Greer went to prison, she says she wasn’t the only one who was punished. Her kids suffered too.

“They started failing in school, my son started lashing out,” Greer, a registered nurse from Austin, told lawmakers on the House Corrections committee on Thursday.

After years of work to solve its pension problems, Fort Worth will make changes to shore up the Fort Worth Employees Retirement Fund. City workers, voting over the past few weeks, gave their approval to a series of changes aimed at keeping the fund solvent.

With the legislature at work in Austin, constituencies of all kinds are working to make their wants and needs clear. The Texas Municipal Police Association’s executive editor, Kevin Lawrence, says his wish list focused less on what he wants from lawmakers, but what he hopes they won’t do.

An urban farm is growing on the banks of the Trinity River in Fort Worth. Opal’s Farm is named for 92-year-old Opal Lee, a retired educator and longtime community advocate who has for years nurtured the vision of a farm to feed Fort Worth’s food deserts.

Members of the Dallas City Council’s public safety committee on Wednesday heard a proposal from the police department to strengthen a board charged with reviewing the way the department handles allegations of officer misconduct and misbehavior. For more than a year, community activist groups have been working with the Dallas police chief and board members give the Dallas Citizens Police Review Board more teeth to fulfill its oversight role.

Across Texas, Catholic dioceses are releasing lists of priests and laity suspected of sexual abuse since 1950. It's being done with the goal of restoring trust to a Catholic Church that has been rocked for years, in Texas and around the world, by allegations of sexual misconduct and cover-ups.

Texas ranks second in the nation for human trafficking cases, and Texas Sen. John Cornyn was in Dallas Tuesday to highlight a new federal law he co-wrote to provide resources and funding to fight traffickers and support victims. It’s called the Abolish Human Trafficking Act, though Cornyn acknowledges there’s still a lot of work to be done to end what he calls “modern-day slavery.”

Texas lawmakers are expected to look at a range of criminal justice issues during the 2019 legislative session. Criminal justice reforms have been a bipartisan bright spot for a decade in Austin, as conservative and liberal lawmakers have sought to reduce the number of people behind bars, increase public safety and cut costs.