TRANSCRIPT
You’re listening to Red River Radio News.
Good morning, I’m Jeff Ferrell.
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INTRO:
Hundreds of thousands of Texans are losing access to federal food assistance as tougher eligibility rules and application delays shrink the SNAP program.
Texas enrollment fell to 2.8 million in September, down 21 percent from a year earlier — its lowest level in 17 years.
Speaking on Texas Public Radio’s “The Source” Eric Cooper, president and CEO of the San Antonio Food Bank, said families are losing access to food as inflation drives up the cost of basic necessities:
SOT:
“Many children, many seniors that were eligible for the program in the past are now being removed from being able to participate, and they are coming to food banks across the United States to find the food that they need to nourish their families.”
TAG:
The statewide network of food banks, known as “Feeding Texas” says the state has the highest food insecurity population in the nation, with more than six million Texans facing food insecurity.
The rate of food insecurity in Texas has risen from 17.6% to 19.4% since last year’s report.
Currently, 1 in 5 households in Texas are food insecure.
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INTRO:
Louisiana truckers rank lawsuit abuse and insurance costs over the high price of fuel as their top concerns for 2026.
Renee Amar, the Louisiana Motor Transport Association executive director, says state lawmakers have passed reforms to help improve property and private auto insurance reform.
But she says commercial auto insurance rates have not been addressed:
SOT:
“There’s not been any really big, bold reform taken to help the commercial industry. And just so people understand, this is not just 18-wheelers, this is anybody who has to buy a commercial policy.”
TAG:
While truckers across the country are most concerned about fuel prices, Amar says Louisiana trucking companies are still fighting a litigious environment that puts the state’s trucking companies at a disadvantage.
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INTRO:
In Arkansas, a state lawmaker is proposing legislation to create more bed space within the state’s prison system.
The proposals, by Democratic State Senator Clark Tucker, would provide alternatives to traditional incarceration for certain state prison inmates.
As Little Rock Public Radio reports, at a joint judiciary committee meeting, Tucker said the goal is to reduce the backlog of convicted and sentenced inmates, waiting in county jails for a state prison bed to open up:
SOT:
“We have a limited resource. We have, right now, we have 17,000 prison beds, to use a round number. And I think it’s incumbent upon us as a legislature to make sure that we’re using that resource in a most effective and efficient way possible. And is incarcerating someone who’s 72 and medically frail the best use of that resource, while a convicted murderer is waiting for a prison bed in a county jail?"
TAG:
One of Tucker’s proposals would transfer some inmates over 60 years of age to home confinement – if they no longer pose a threat to public safety.
Gary Moore, the former director of Ohio’s prison system, said this effort worked in his state:
SOT:
“You have the safeguards of identifying who can go. You have the safeguards of saying that they can’t be a threat to the public, and you have home detention with electronic monitoring.”
TAG:
Arkansas’ legislative session begins in January.
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The National Weather Service in Shreveport is calling for:
* Sunny condition w/ a high of 83 today.
* Tomorrow: Mostly cloudy through mid-morning, then becoming sunny, with a high near 84.
* By Friday, Mostly cloudy, with a high near 78. That’s the same high for Saturday, with showers likely and possibly a thunderstorm.
* Mostly sunny to partly cloudy skies will prevail across the Four State Region Today through Tonight. Highs will range through the 80s with lows ranging from near 50 to the lower 60s. The wildfire threat continues Today as well.
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