September 25, 2007
Two Ex-City Councilmen and DART Board's
First Asian Member Weigh State House Bids
By
Mike Hailey
Capitol
Inside Editor
The first Asian American to ever serve on the
Dallas Area Rapid Transit board, a former Richardson
city council member who's also been school board
president and an ex-Garland councilman who helped
draft the state GOP platform are being mentioned
as potential contenders for the Texas House seat
that State Rep. Fred Hill has
decided not to seek next year.
Garland residents Angie Chen Button
and Randall Dunning and Jim
Shepherd of Richardson are reportedly
in the mix of possible candidates for the Republican
nomination in House District 112. Former Garland
Mayor Bob Day's name also has
been floated amid the speculation on possible
successors to the Richardson Republican who plans
to give up the seat that he's held since 1989.
HD 112 contains parts of Richardson and Garland
in north central Dallas County - and almost two-thirds
of the voters there have backed Republicans in
recent elections. While the seat is not completely
out of the Democrats' reach, it would be a long
shot at best for a Democratic contender and none
has emerged so far since Hill announced his impending
retirement last week.
All of the potential Republican candidates for
the HD 112 seat would bring impressive resumes
to the open House race. Button, a longtime Texas
Instruments employee who represents the city of
Garland on the DART board of directors, would
presumably be counting on strong support among
the district's large population of Asian voters.
With a significant number of Americans of Asian
and Middle Eastern descent working in the high
tech industry, HD 112 has the third highest percentage
of residents who are listed as "other"
of all 150 House districts in addition to those
who are African-American, Hispanic or white.
Button also appears to be getting some early
help from U.S. Rep. Pete Sessions,
a Dallas Republican who's reportedly made fundraising
calls on her behalf. But in a House district where
voters are fairly evenly divided among Garland
and Richardson, Button could face formidable competition
for support in the city where she lives from Dunning
if the battle for the GOP nomination turns into
a territorial fight.
By the same token, Shepherd would appear to have
an advantage if he's the only candidate from Richardson
in a three-way primary race against Dunning and
Button if the contest became a battle of east
vs. west. Shepherd has discussed a potential HD
112 race with Hill - and he's received encouragement
from others as he weighs a House bid in 2008.
Shepherd served a dozen years on the Richardson
City Council before stepping down in May. Shepherd,
who has his own law firm that represents corporate
clients and local governing entities, is a former
city planning commission member who served four
years as a Richardson school trustee including
one year as school board president in the early
1990s.
Dunning, who's reportedly told supporters that
he's going to run for the HD 112 vacancy, was
one of the Garland City Council's most outspoken
during a five-year stint that began when he beat
former Mayor Jim Spence by about
three dozen votes in 2002. Dunning had actually
trailed Spence in unofficial returns before being
declared the winner.
While serving on the council, Dunning gained
a reputation as an ardent conservative with an
inherent distrust of government in general. Dunning,
who's been a delegate at state Republican conventions
and a member of the Platform Committee as well,
will hope to draw substantial support from the
GOP's grassroots base if he runs for the Texas
House as expected. Dunning is a software developer
who works for Nortel Networks, which specializes
in advance communication networks.
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