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6 days ago | 
houstonlanding.org | José Luis Martínez |Jose Martinez |José Martinez |Jose Martínez
Receipts is a weekly spotlight on how the city of Houston and Harris County spend your tax money, with a focus on the everyday things most residents may take for granted. Got something you want us to look at? Email José at [email protected]. “It takes money to make money,” the saying goes. And when it comes to local government, it takes money to spend money.
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1 week ago | 
houstonlanding.org | José Luis Martínez |Jose Martinez |José Martinez |Jose Martínez |Hanna Holthaus
Houston employees used city-issued credit cards to buy more than $41 million worth of goods in the past two years, but failed to document what was purchased in more than half of those transactions. In tens of thousands of cases, employees failed to include any description of what they purchased. In others, employees simply used “product” or even “generic product” to describe what they bought.
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1 week ago | 
houstonlanding.org | José Luis Martínez |Jose Martinez |José Martinez |Jose Martínez
Receipts is a weekly spotlight on how the city of Houston and Harris County spend your tax money, with a focus on the everyday things most residents may take for granted. Got something you want us to look at? Email José at [email protected]. You’re zooming down the Sam Houston Tollway, a camera light flashes overhead as you pass through the toll plaza and you’re charged $1.75. You not only paid to use the road, you just paid to take cars across the Houston Ship Channel on the Lynchburg Ferry.
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2 weeks ago | 
houstonlanding.org | José Luis Martínez |Jose Martinez |José Martinez |Jose Martínez
Taking care of Houston’s parks and trails is nothing even remotely like a weekend in the burbs, where lawn crews and homeowners mow and trim for a few hours and call it a day. Upkeep of the city’s 382 parks and more than 190 miles of trails is a seven-day-a-week job performed by roughly 240 workers. The annual cost: $25.5 million.
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3 weeks ago | 
houstonlanding.org | José Luis Martínez |Jose Martinez |José Martinez |Jose Martínez
The Houston Fire Department graduated 31 academy cadets in February, swelling its ranks to more than 4,000 firefighters. Their first task? Picking up more than two dozen pieces of heavy – and costly – protective clothing and gear. How costly? About $21,756. Per firefighter. The clothing and equipment has to be able to withstand the most extreme temperatures while remaining durable for repeated use. That’s why the bunker coat, for example, costs $1,400.
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4 weeks ago | 
route-fifty.com | José Luis Martínez |Jose Martinez |José Martinez |Jose Martínez
This article was originally published by Houston Landing. When Liz Rodwell was tracking down information on the Brazoria County Appraisal District’s website last fall, what was supposed to be a short task turned into a maze. She was trying to find the current property tax rate and gather documentation to contest her home’s valuation, but it ended up taking days and many phone calls.
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4 weeks ago | 
houstonlanding.org | José Luis Martínez |Jose Martinez |José Martinez |Jose Martínez
When Liz Rodwell was tracking down information on the Brazoria County Appraisal District’s website last fall, what was supposed to be a short task turned into a maze. She was trying to find the current property tax rate and gather documentation to contest her home’s valuation, but it ended up taking days and many phone calls.
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1 month ago | 
houstonlanding.org | Clare Amari |José Luis Martínez |Jose Martinez |José Martinez |Jose Martínez
Deputies in Harris County Constable Precinct 4 initiated dozens of high-speed chases every year over nonviolent, low-level offenses, a Houston Landing investigation has found, resulting in at least nine fatalities since 2021 — a death toll far exceeding that of Harris County’s seven other constable precincts.
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Jan 7, 2025 | 
houstonlanding.org | José Luis Martínez |Jose Martinez |José Martinez |Jose Martínez
Drive around Houston enough and you’ll likely see one of two things: A low smooth-riding pick-up truck or a behemoth monster truck. Love ‘em or hate ‘em, these modified trucks have been part of Houston culture for decades. Swapping out suspensions or painting a truck’s body is not just a hobby, but a way of life. “They’re not friends. They’re like brothers and sisters to me,” Daniel Perez said of members of his car club.
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Dec 6, 2024 | 
houstonlanding.org | José Luis Martínez |Jose Martinez |José Martinez |Jose Martínez |Adriana Rezal
On election day last month, 29-year-old Shannah Becker from Pasadena showed up at a polling location to cast her ballot, but was turned away. Although she had submitted her voter registration application in early October, she mailed it in late, one day past the Oct. 7 deadline. “I definitely felt very disappointed,” Becker said.
