ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF DAVID JENNINGS’S BIG JOLLY POLITICS BLOG

INTERVIEW OF CHRIS DANIEL.

AUDIO AVAILABLE ONLINE AT

http://www.bigjolly.com/images/stories/audio/chris-daniel-09302010.mp3

David Jennings: My name is David Jennings with Big Jolly Politics. We’re here
today with Chris Daniel, the Republican nominee for Harris
County Clerk, as part of our continuing coverage of the 2010
general election. How are you, Chris?

Chris Daniel: I’m doing fine today.

David Jennings: Doing fine today, huh?

Chris Daniel: Not too bad.

David Jennings: Let me ask you something. Why, why did you decide to run?

Chris Daniel: In investigating the needs and wants of the legal community as I
was going to night school for South Texas College of Law, it
became apparent that the current incumbent was basically making
a mess of the good works and the infrastructure that was in place
for the last 16 years.

David Jennings: Really?

Chris Daniel: And so, it – I found it a duty more than anything else that I need to
get in there and make sure that we put structure back into this
county office.

David Jennings: And this is as you were going to law school?

Chris Daniel: As I was going to night school working full time, work, working
full time as an engineer for what is now National Oilwell Varco.

David Jennings: National Oil Arko?

Chris Daniel: National Oilwell Varco.

David Jennings: Varco – okay. What’d you do there?

Chris Daniel: I designed drill bits, drill pipe, tubing casing, managed research
projects, managed production projects, and managed basically
streamlining production flows. And what I mean by that, to give
you some detail, is if a project would take X number of weeks and
it would require X number of staff, we found ways of cutting costs
and efficiency so that we could make it the, the fastest possible at
the best quality at the lowest cost.

David Jennings: And while you were working full time –

Chris Daniel: Yes.

David Jennings: – did you go to law school? How did all that work?

Chris Daniel: I went to night school about three days a week at South Texas
College of Law for three and a half years and was also elected to
the Board of Trustees in 2006 for Lone Star College System and
would perform my duties for that board as well. And I, I joke that
the only way I got done with all that is that I didn’t have any kids.

David Jennings: Yeah, ****. You were a, a busy guy. I can, I can attest to that.
Well, let me ask you something. What, what were your duties at
Lone Star College because one of the criticisms of, of you is that
you have no experience in government.

Chris Daniel: Sure.

David Jennings: And so, what, what were your, what are your current
experiences, I guess, and, and can, can you kind of relate how that
would, would lead into public service as a district clerk?

Chris Daniel: Sure. The Board of Trustees is basically the – is the equivalent of
a board for a Fortune 500 company. We manage a budget of over
$252 million. We have over 5,000 employees. We have seven
major campuses, eight satellites with more on the way, and two
university centers. And so, while we don’t get paid a dime to be
on the board, the purpose of the board member is to serve in a
 similar function of being behind the scenes of the chancellor who
is the de facto CEO and the presidents which would be the division
heads of the various campuses. And so, we set the policy, we set
the direction, and we set the budget for the entire system.

David Jennings: So, do you have a full vote in that or, or how, how does that
work **** –

Chris Daniel: We are all large and so we have a full vote. So, I don’t just vote
for CyFair. I vote for the entire system.

David Jennings: And how big is that budget?

Chris Daniel: That budget is currently $252 million and growing.

David Jennings: Out of curiosity, how big is the District Clerk budget?

Chris Daniel: The District Clerk’s budget, last time I checked, was about $30
million.

David Jennings: Okay, so you’re going to, to working full time, you’re going to
law school, you’re seeing that there’s some, some, some things that
you’re not liking about the way the, the incumbent that was elected
in 2008 –

Chris Daniel: Sure.

David Jennings: – you’re not liking about the, the way progress is being made.
Can you explain some of that?

Chris Daniel: Let me give you some examples. As online filing has come to
fruition under the current clerk, you have necessary holes in the
system. For example, if you have an expunged record, that record
should be off the books, off the system because it is necessarily
expunged, yet everything in that document is still online, on the
system for the District Clerk’s office. If you are in a family law
case and you have a child who is a minor, their information
necessarily must be protected and yet that information can be
found online at the District Clerk’s office, opening the door to
child predators. If you have an old case at the District Clerk’s
 office where your Social Security number, your banking accounts,
your address, anything a thief might need to steal your identity –
that is available today online at the District Clerk’s office.

David Jennings: Okay, now, we, we met probably what, a year and a half ago
now, something like that?

Chris Daniel: Sure.

David Jennings: It was a, a rough primary. Is this what you talked about during
the primary, this, this sort of online system that, I guess, at, at your
computer terminal certain information is blocked, but if you want
that, you can go downtown, you know – explain that.

Chris Daniel: We have fleshed this idea out since the primary, but this was one
of the primary reasons why I began running, and during the
primary we mostly talked about parking issues. Now, while
Commissioners Court is responsible for infrastructure and so forth,
the District Clerk may raise the issue so that they can address it.
Otherwise, the Commissioners Court led by County Judge Ed
Emmet won’t be aware of a problem unless the other elected
officials that are part of county government raise the problem.
And so, I am aware that there are numerous complaints with
people trying to serve jury duty – that they drive all the way
downtown, they pay an exorbitant fee for parking – once they’ve
found their way, because most people don’t drive downtown – and
once they’ve made their way from Katy, from Spring, from
Kingwood, from CyFair, from Pasadena, from Alief, to downtown,
they’re sitting in a cattle call room called the jury assembly room,
only to be told roughly around noon, hey, guess what? We didn’t
need you. Go home.

David Jennings: Well, isn’t that a traditional thing though? I mean, that’s been
happening – I mean, I’m a little bit older than you, but that –

Chris Daniel: Sure.

David Jennings: – happened even in my time.

David Jennings: But we could use engineering analysis to address that so that we
can streamline how many people we’re calling because right now,
because too few people show up for jury duty, they basically send
out about 10,000 notices and for every 10,000 notices, they get 400
back. And there is necessarily a problem if you have to send out
10,000 notices and 400 show up and you don’t even need the full
400. Not even close.

David Jennings: So, countywide – okay, so, so how could the District Clerk
exactly address that? You’re talking about engineering study.

Chris Daniel: Sure.

David Jennings: How, how would you do that?

Chris Daniel: Well, we could use statistical analysis to see how many people
would typically be needed on any given day for a docket size. And
so, if we know that the docket has X number of cases that we were
statistically going to need X number of people to show up and,
therefore, we only need to send out X number of notices and not
just a standard every day we’re going to send 10,000 notices and
every day we’re going to get 400 people to show up.

David Jennings: Well, when are those dockets set?

Chris Daniel: Those dockets are set by the judge and it varies. It doesn’t –
they’re not all set at the same time, okay, because the judge is
individually in charge of their court.

David Jennings: So, how could you do a flexible system like that?

Chris Daniel: Well, as they set their docket, because that’s now online, we can
immediately measure as the, as that gets input.

David Jennings: And how much time would that take to notify the citizen and –
you see what I’m saying? What’s the timing of all of that?

Chris Daniel: Well, thanks –

David Jennings: Is there going to be enough time to, to actually do that?

Chris Daniel: I think there will and the reason is is that, without going into too
much detail, because remember, I’m not the District Clerk yet. I
think that using technology today, using predictive analysis, using
some of the technology that you – that I studied way back in 2000
at the University of Texas in just a few of the electrical engineering
classes I took, we can easily implement a algorithm that would
allow us to immediately take that data and immediately come up
with a result and then immediately go to an auto dial or an auto
email or an auto text and when it’s available to that citizen, say,
guess what? We don’t need you. We thank you for being a
citizen. We don’t want to waste your time. Don’t come all the
way downtown for nothing.

David Jennings: You see something like that being implemented. What, what is
the term of your office that you’re seeking?

Chris Daniel: Four years.

David Jennings: Four year term. You see in, in four years being able to get
something, something like that done?

Chris Daniel: I would like to. Now, to make that a campaign promise, I would
have to make sure that we would have the budget and that we
would have to – that we had the IT staff available. I’m aware that
we are in a recession right now and I’m aware that county
government is trying to put the squeeze on every office so that they
can survive this recession. Even Jerry Eversole’s talking about a
tax hike, apparently, according to the Chronicle, but if we have the
budget, if we have the staff, I think we can do it in four years or
less.

David Jennings: Let, let’s go back to that online information real quick. I, I
looked back in my notes and in a Northwest Memorial forum, you
did mention an online record system.

Chris Daniel: Yeah.

David Jennings: But you’re saying now that you’ve matured that idea or?
Chris Daniel: We were talking back then that we needed to address combining
online filing systems for the, for streamlining the various ways that
you can file a document, whether it’s federal with PACER,
whether it’s local with ProDoc, or E-Filing, or whether it’s with
the county clerk’s office. And we want to make sure that we can
basically come up with a one-stop shop filing so that it’s not only
easier on the attorneys, easier on the judges, but lowers the cost for
the average citizen that’s using an attorney, because if you have a
case that’s a federal case and you have a portion of it that either
gets removed or dismissed, you want to make sure that you can
send those documents to the right place as quickly as possible
without having to refile and reimage and redo whatever with the
same document in three different places.

David Jennings: Okay, I get it now.

Chris Daniel: So, we expanded that to now include the issue because this
intimately concerns the incumbent of protecting you from identity
theft, protecting children from child predators, and overall just
making sure that we have security in place so that as we move
further and further online, that you, the citizen, are being protected.

David Jennings: Okay, I, I read in a Chronicle article, I think it was last week by
Chris Moran –

Chris Daniel: Sure.

David Jennings: – and it seemed to be mocking that idea saying that he had a
quote from the incumbent, Loren Jackson, saying that it would be
illegal to do that.

Chris Daniel: Now, what Loren was referring to is redacting the physical
documents. And I am a fan of Chris Moran, but at – he
unfortunately misquoted me at – on that and he did submit an extra
clarificational **** district court’s race online, but it was already
printed and what I had said to him repeatedly is that we’re not
redacting the physical documents, which is correct. It is illegal to
redact the physical documents, but that we were going to have an
online redaction system kind of like if you go onto Google onto
certain documents it will automatically put in a black field over
 certain areas, even though if you were to get that physical
document from the Library of Congress or from wherever the
source is, it would be unredacted.

David Jennings: I didn’t even know that technology existed, to be honest with
you. How’d you find out about it?

Chris Daniel: Well, as an engineer, we have gone through numerous websites

and numerous sources of information to find what was available,
what is the state of the art.

David Jennings: The state of the art.

Chris Daniel: Yeah.

David Jennings: Let me ask you something. You, you went through a very, very
tough primary –

Chris Daniel: Sure.

David Jennings: – and now we’re hearing some of the same type of arguments
against you from, from the, the Democrat in this race, through
surrogates, of course.

Chris Daniel: Sure.

David Jennings: Yeah, I just have to ask you, how, how do you, as a candidate
for office, this is a personal thing. How do you put up with all that
on a day-to-day basis?

Chris Daniel: I respond by basically looking at two factors. One, if the

incumbent himself is not personally attacking me, but his
surrogates are, why is the incumbent allowing that to happen?
Why is the incumbent not making a statement that look, hey, they
don’t talk for me. I, I don’t stand for these lies, these slanderous
items, these misinformations. I look at that as a, as a question of
character, but without going on the personal attack, I basically look
at it as look, if they’re going to attack me on these issues, which
are clearly false, or clearly misstated, therefore, they must be
scared. If he’s doing such a good job, if the staff of his are such
 wonderful folks that are doing the attacks for him, why are they
doing these attacks? Why is that necessary? If you are doing such
a good job, why is it necessary to even go down that road? And I,
I remember that and I just keep that to heart because that allows
me to persevere because then I know that I’m winning. Then I
know I’ve got him on the ropes.

David Jennings: So, one of the reasons I ask you that question is that I criticized
you pretty hard –

Chris Daniel: Sure.

David Jennings: – early in the primary because of the way the primary system
worked –

Chris Daniel: Yeah.

David Jennings: And, and actually your answer was, well, that’s the way it
works. I’ll never forget that. So, I actually thought that was pretty
good. I mean, you have to play on the field you’re given.

Chris Daniel: Yup. So, so, but I, I try not to take it personal. I’ll give you an
anecdote. At the moment, my incumbent’s wife is in the hospital
and I try not to, to play anything that would lead to a personal
attack to him because she has to listen to it, too. His daughter may
one day have to, to look back on all this as well and that
personalizes it and then I realize that while we are in a rough and
tumble Texas politics, we can rise above that and make sure that
we’re not getting too personal. And up to maybe two weeks ago,
my opponent and I had been very friendly and had not really gotten
into any fisticuffs politically.

David Jennings: Let me ask you about, about another thing that, that sort of hits
you in the primary and I see that the surrogates are pulling that out
again for the general. The charge that you are a Scientologist.
Now, we talked about this back in I, I think maybe January, end of
January, February.

Chris Daniel: Sure.

David Jennings: And, and you related to me the story of, of the, the entire
background of that and I just thought it was a beautiful story about
how a person comes to know Christ and gets back to their faith.
Would you like to share that with us?

Chris Daniel: Absolutely. Look, when my dad was killed by a drunk driver, my
mother who, who you need to know is – she’s from, from Holland.
She’s actually from the island of Curacao. She’s from Holland and
she’s new to this country. She’s been here for about 28 years and
she had no family. No real connections here in the United States
other than the family friends that she and my dad had made prior to
his passing. And she didn’t really have a way of overcoming grief,
the loss of somebody maliciously killing my dad by taking a legal
left-hand turn while driving drunk. And so, whatever she did to
rise above that, I will never fault her on that because she raised two
beautiful kids and she survived 15 years later making sure that she
held it all together.

And on my own, through the Boy Scouts, and then also through
the, through my local church and through the, the University of
Texas Baptist Student Organization and then later on back here in
just local Bible study classes and Second Baptist Church, I’ve
come to know the Lord. And I think it’s a personal decision that
everybody makes on their own. And that it has to be personal
because you can grow up in anything all you want, but at the end
of the day, your own decision is what makes it real.

David Jennings: Oh, I agree with you. And you know from my writing that, you
know, I just don’t like faith that’s expedient, and, and, and, and,
and coming that way to, to, to know the faith that I have enjoyed. I
fully understand it and it’s just remarkable when I think about it
that, that people are attacking you for a few courses you took and,
and for searching for yourself and, and for looking and finding
that, that light, that, that, that is just – that, that shines through you.
If anybody knows you – I’ve seen you, I’ve been – how many
times have I been around you? A hundred?

Chris Daniel: Or more.

David Jennings: I mean, you’re a busy dude.

Chris Daniel: ****.

David Jennings: You know. Yeah, it’s, it’s just – I was just amazed that they
would attack you for that.

Chris Daniel: It’s even amazing – more amazing that the surrogates of the
incumbent who are Democrats are choosing that path to attack,
because the Democrats are supposed to be the Big Ten. They’re
supposed to include everybody. Now, what are they going to say
to their Jewish friends and their African-American friends when
they’re going to attack somebody on religion in such a manner as
to not only be considered bigotry, but to almost be considered
exclusionary much in the same way that the African-American has
been excluded from many areas of, of life and politics simply
because of the way that they were born.

David Jennings: Yeah, it, it’s just an amazing thing when you think about it. So,
what, what is, what do you do? You’re a young guy. You have
hobbies, anything like that?

Chris Daniel: Sure. I, I –

David Jennings: In other words, who is Chris Daniel and why would I, as a
suburban voter, put you in an elected position?

Chris Daniel: Well, I’m a native Houstonian. I grew up just north of Acre
Homes – Acres Homes off of 249 and Fallbrook and back then
Fallbrook did not go all the way through behind the race track as it
did today. I grew up enjoying Scouts. So, I still like camping. I
still like travelling a lot. And the reason why folks really want to
know me is that I have an engineering viewpoint, a graduate – a
law graduate viewpoint, and an Eagle Scout viewpoint.

See, when my dad was killed, the community stepped up and the
community made sure that my family was taken care of. I give the
example of how Jerry Eversole’s office came unannounced with
his crew to make sure the lawn was mowed and that we had food
for the next three weeks and that anything that needed to be fixed
around the house was fixed. He was probably one of the first
 responder’s on the scene and had seen what had happened and
made sure – we didn’t know who he was – that she was taken care
of, that we were taken care of. And that put into me the idea of
service, the idea that I need to give back to the community.

So, that’s why I run for office and I do thankless jobs on Lone Star
College and other non-profit organizations to make sure that I’m
giving back because it’s not about status or glory or anything else.
I – everybody knows I don’t get paid a dime for Lone Star.

David Jennings: I bet you’re glad you brought that up because that’s another
criticism that oh, man, you’re just using these as stepping stones,
you know. Is it stepping stones or is that, that inner desire that you
have to be a public servant?

Chris Daniel: It’s an inner desire to serve others, to give back and I, I have a debt
to pay to Harris County that I don’t think will be paid for the rest
of this life because of what people have done and what the City of
Jersey Village did for me when my mother’s house was flooded for
the first time and we lost everything we owned without flood
insurance. They made sure that I had the materials and the, the
tools I needed to finish my Eagle Scout project which had been
approved the night our house flooded. They made sure that I was –
had what I needed to succeed. Teachers that went out of their way
knowing that I was waiting until 6:00 at night for various
transportations to make sure that I had that extra tutoring or that
extra tools I needed to make straight A’s to graduate on time, if not
early, from high school, and, and so forth. They – the community
– really made sure that I had to, to give back to them.

David Jennings: Okay. Let’s get back to the actual office of District Clerk.

Chris Daniel: Sure.

David Jennings: Again, one of the criticisms is that you have no experience, but
obviously from what I’m hearing, you really do and that story just
hasn’t gotten out there. Let, let’s think about, about this. Let’s say
you do happen to get elected and, and you look back 10 years from
now at your one or two terms, whatever it is in office. What
 would, what do you want people to remember your administration
by?

Chris Daniel: I want them to remember the administration by not having to focus
on it, believe it or not, because I want to be as behind the scenes as
possible that the service is so smooth, the staff are so cordial, jury
duty is as least painful as possible, that they don’t really think
about it. It’s not to have my name plastered all over the place and
that they remember that my name was plastered all over the place,
but that the service was so good they didn’t think about it.

David Jennings: Let me ask you about that service. Your, your opponent, the
incumbent, has a very good PR machine.

Chris Daniel: Sure.

David Jennings: Roughly about three months after he was in office, in 2008, you
know, he took a, an unexpired term, so he immediately took office.
Roughly three months there was a, a giant puff piece about him
that appeared in the – one of the journals, and, and it talked about a
first day on the job he took a Sharpie and put a sign in the window
that said Lawyers Only. Let me ask you something. Does that
sound like he’s trying to put lawyers above people, voters?

Chris Daniel: What it really sounds like is that he understands one aspect of that
office, but to the detriment of the average citizen who is not an
attorney. And I’ll give you an example. There are certain courts
right now that are online filing only. Now, if you are poor, if you
are an illegal immigrant trying to get legal status, if you are
somebody who has to either rely on pro bono legal service or a
court-ordered attorney, you have almost no access to the courts.
You have been shut off from the courts. And for him to take this
attitude Lawyers Only, really does close the office to the rest of
Harris County.

David Jennings: Well, I’ll tell you what. He – it’s done a good job because the
lawyers love the guy. The, the Democratic lawyers, I guess, and
even some Republican lawyers. Hey, I’ve had a couple
Republican judges actively campaigning for the guy in silent, you
know. So, that, that – the entire thing to me of a government
 official putting one class of people above another, in this case, a
paid class above a, an ordinary citizen, just strikes me as odd.

Chris Daniel: It is odd, but you have to look at also who he’s catering to. He’s
catering mostly to civil judges, civil attorneys. If you talk to a
criminal judge, if you talk to a family law judge, or family law
attorney and so forth, they are furious. There are certain judges
who will remain nameless, who have files in their office solely
because they’re afraid to send them to imaging because they know
that if they send it to imaging, it will be online and it will ruin
whoever’s file that is reputation. And these are folks that have
since had their lives repaired, they’ve moved on, and they’re living
normal lives. And yet if that file gets put online, it ruins their life.

David Jennings: Is this online filing that you’re talking about here, that
specifically the family court documents with, with private
children’s information, is that a project that Charles Bacarisse or
Theresa Chang had in process or is this something that Loren has
done on his own?

Chris Daniel: The entire online filing process, to my knowledge, existed well
before the incumbent filed for office. And to my knowledge, it
could not physically have launched the way that it did within the
first nine months of him taking office without first it being
approved by Commissioners Court, without some plan being in
place well in advance. And I, I am told by several current and
former district clerks that, that they had either submitted the ideas
or requested approval for these ideas as long ago as four years ago.

David Jennings: Could it be that it was rolled out too fast as he came in and
that’s why the – no one bothered to, to think about this confidential
information?

Chris Daniel: It is a symptom of something being released too early and we see
that with Microsoft Windows. We see that with various software
iterations and computer, computerized devices including the
iPhone, which I have right here.
David Jennings: Well, you know, I’ve taken up a lot of your time and, and we’re
sitting in an airport which explains all this. This is my first time to
do it.

Chris Daniel: Sure.

David Jennings: You’re, you’re the guinea pig because I, I like – again, I saw
you were so resilient and, and that you wouldn’t, you wouldn’t
automatically hit me, basically. Let me just ask you –

Chris Daniel: Sure.

David Jennings: What do you want to tell the voters of Harris County to assure
them that, that all of these, these, these, these, these rumors, the
lies, the distortions, and, and to assure them that if you are elected,
the world really will not end and, and, and that some of the things
that you’re talking about will actually improve it and, and that it –
your opponent was elected in a storm of straight Democratic
tickets and that if you are elected in this storm of Republican
straight tickets, that everyone’s going to be okay and the district
court is going to run and, and people are not going to see a
reduction of service.

Chris Daniel: I will tell you a story. When I was first elected to Lone Star
College System, they all thought that Hell was, was breaking loose
on that board and since then, we’ve become the second largest
community college system in Texas, graduating more students than
any other community college in Texas and transferring to more
higher education institutions than any other institution in Texas,
including Hartford, Stanford, Princeton, and Yale, etc. UT and
*** U of H, not to leave out the local schools, and that happened
under my watch. We went from, we went from a middle of the
road community college to being number two in Texas.

Now, as one board member, I don’t influence all decisions, but I

could have screwed it up as well. And so, the point I’m making to
the citizens is I have a proven record of doing the right thing to
make sure that it is what is best for all concerned. Not just
Republicans, not just the poor, not just some isolated group of
interests, but everybody. And so, as the Eagle Scout, as the
 engineer, as the law grad, as the business owner, I am aware of
what’s needed and wanted for both the legal community and the
average citizen. We are not going to cut down services. We’re not
going to drastically change course on what the judges and
attorneys have come to know and expect, but at the same time
we’re going to make sure that we’re not leaving the citizens behind
as well.

David Jennings: One of the things – I thought that was going to be my last
question, but one of the things that your answer reminded me of is
during the primary I’ve talked with – obviously in a primary, you
had the same kind of thing, so I’m going to rely on that a lot. One
of the things that came, came through during the primary was –
and I talked to numerous other officials because I – we all know it
was a pretty dirty, nasty primary.

Chris Daniel: Yeah.

David Jennings: Okay, one of the things that we learned through the primary
process in talking with some of the elected officials that you work
with through the Lone Star expansions actually – people like
Senator Dan Patrick, Representative Debbie Reynolds, those types
– is that they, they – to a person, they said that you worked well
with them. I don’t even know what that means other than they
were very positive about it and they said that you were a guy that
could help them get things done in that particular setting. Tell me
about that.

Chris Daniel: Well, having worked for Gary Elkins in college part-time as a
staffer, I understood the legislative process. I understood what was
needed and wanted by both a state senator and a state
representative, and that’s why even Attorney General Greg Abbott,
I’m proud to announce, has for the first time, has endorsed in my
race for Harris County District Clerk exclusively and not just
supporting all the Republican ticket. And that is because they
understand that I, I know what’s needed and wanted and expected
of a fellow elected official. I’m not out there with an agenda to
throw all caution to the wind or to go to the far right, to the far left.
I’m there to get results done. And that comes through as an
engineer. We try to get results. We’re not trying to, to have a hill
 to die upon, to quote Paul Pressler, on one single issue. We’re
trying to make sure that we get results for everybody.

David Jennings: Excellent. Okay, Chris. One other question I had about the, the
Lone Star College, your position there, there’s been some criticism
of you because I guess you missed a lot of meetings last year as
you were running for the primary or something, but, but I know in
Chris Moran’s article it was there.

Chris Daniel: Let me, let me clarify. What Chris Moran wrote was my
attendance record was worse before the primary started and that
was because I was taking 17 hours in my final semester at law
school trying to wrap it up early so that I could focus 100% on
both Lone Star College and running the primary and perhaps
preparing for the bar exam.

David Jennings: I remember you had to drop out of the bar exam. I remember I
was there that day and you were all sad, but you just, you just
didn’t think you could do both and, and, and –

Chris Daniel: **** I couldn’t be 100% prepared and I didn’t want to give my
opponent any chance to criticize me for failing an exam which I
know I could pass.

David Jennings: I will vouch for you that you were busting your tail during that
period. So, so we can get beyond that, but one of the – on, on the
board meeting things, you know, it wasn’t only that you missed it,
I guess, somewhere along the line there was a comment made that
all the important business was done before the meeting anyway.
Can you clarify?

Chris Daniel: Sure. I said that the meetings were practically ceremonial and
what I meant by that is that you get the board agenda a week in
advance and all the questions and concerns that you have about
each agenda item. You have to address the staff, the chancellor,
the various presidents, whoever it affects beforehand and that is
why I made that comment because I did most of my board work
before the board meeting of finding out well, what is this agenda
item, why do we need to spend X number of dollars on it, and who
does it impact? We didn’t necessarily talk to any other board
 members. No – the majority of the work was done with staff, with
the chancellors, and the presidents and that –

David Jennings: Did you ever miss a vote on raising taxes or a critical
expenditure or what, what, what did you miss?

Chris Daniel: I missed mostly, to my knowledge, meetings that didn’t really

matter to the voter because it wasn’t that we were at the meetings I
missed that we were voting on spending a large amount of money,
that we were voting on tax increases or tax decreases or that we
were voting on budgets. I made the important meetings that
mattered to the voters that elected me to office. And at the
majority of the time that I missed a meeting, I still made the effort
to find out what was needed and wanted on certain agenda items so
that nothing snuck through even if I wasn’t there. And if there was
a concern, we had that removed off the agenda before it would
even get to the board meeting so I wouldn’t have to be there to
vote against it because there is a concern with that item.

David Jennings: So, no open meeting violation –

Chris Daniel: No open meeting violations. We’re not, we’re not taking that act
and turning it into toilet paper. We are making sure that
everything that we need to address is addressed in open meetings
and the legwork is done behind the scenes to make sure that we
have the dollar figures correctly and that the agenda item is
appropriate. Then the concerns and questions that we have about
that once it’s set, we do that in open meetings.

David Jennings: Okay. Anything else you want to tell the voters?

Chris Daniel: I just want to thank them for their vote in the primary if they voted
for me, and I, I truly hope they vote for me in the November
election. And when I win, they can be rest assured that regardless
of what side of the aisle they are on or where they’re from or who
they are, we’re going to make sure that they are properly served by
the Harris County District Clerk’s office.

David Jennings: All right. Thanks, Chris.

Chris Daniel: Thanks, Dave.

Transcription by www.idictate.com