Gov. Rick Perry expects scaled back services after the state’s comptroller certified $9 billion less for lawmakers to spend in the new two years, the Austin American-Statesman reports. Still, the governor says the cuts won’t be as deep as those in 2002 when the last recession bedeviled budgetmakers. . . . While many residents were still nursing New Year’s hangovers, the Statesman reported Jan. 3 on ongoing plans for an extension of Texas 130 south from its current terminus at U.S. 183 all the way to Interstate 10. The roadway is the first — and possibly last — segment of the celebrated and vilified Trans-Texas Corridor, now being scaled down in favor of a more modest tollway system plan.
TODAY’S PAPERS reads the region’s newspapers and watches the news so you don’t have to.