AUSTIN, Texas - State Sen. Juan Hinojosa has given a shoutout to retiring Texas A&M System Chancellor John Sharp for his critically-acclaimed Bordering the Future report.

Sharp published “Bordering the Future: Challenge and Opportunity in the Texas Border Region” in 1998 whilst he was Texas State Comptroller. The report gave an in-depth assessment of the economic, political, and social condition of the Texas border counties. The report showed that if the 43-county region stretching from El Paso to Brownsville were a state unto itself, it would rank first in the nation in poverty, first in unemployment, and first in the percentage of residents without a high school diploma.

“One of the biggest impacts you had, besides statewide and all the different programs pushing A&M to a much higher level, was in the Rio Grande Valley,” Hinojosa told Sharp.

“You will recall, in 1999 you released a report about the challenges and opportunities that the border area offered to the state. And from that report you suggested and recommended certain initiatives. And we implemented those initiatives. They have made such a difference in taking the Valley out of poverty, making it into an economic success.”

Hinojosa made his comments during a Senate Committee on Finance hearing at the state Capitol. Sharp was there to testify on Texas A&M’s funding requests for the next biennium.

“People don't realize the impact that Chancellor Sharp has had throughout our state and the nation, and for that, we are very grateful and thankful for what he did,” Hinojosa said.

Sharp penned a guest column about Bordering the Future for Texas Monthly in September 1999, after he had left the Comptroller’s Office. He said:

“As a son of South Texas—I was born and raised in Victoria—I confess to a certain bias. I think the challenges of the border region demand our attention now, not later. I think the future of our state, even those areas that are far removed from the international boundary itself, will increasingly be subject to the ups and downs of the border.

“The Texas workforce of the future will be drawn largely from this region, where a huge and growing population of young people gives us a comparative advantage envied by other states. If we continue to shirk our responsibility to provide them with the best possible education, those young people will be a liability large enough to drag down the rest of us. But if we offer them the educational and training opportunities they deserve, they will drive a future prosperity so strong that it will make the books of the past look like a barn dance.”

Editor's Note: Go to the Rio Grande Guardian International News Service website to read the full story.

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