Texas
As John Blake steps back, spotlight shines on Texas Rangers PR man’s one-of-a-kind efforts
ARLINGTON – Here’s the thing about PR guys: They create and curate team Halls of Fame, they don’t populate them.
Then again, John Blake has always been one of a kind.
For nearly 40 years in Arlington – usually a bit disheveled, occasionally gruff, always prepared and exceptionally loyal to the franchise – it would be hard to argue that anybody has had a bigger hand in how the Rangers’ brand has matured. As the public relations man, then executive vice president for communications and lately public affairs, he has overseen the casting of virtually every story involving the team. He didn’t make the stories, but he spun them into myths when possible and managed them with honesty when crises arose (which was often).
He helped create a sense of history for a franchise that had none, establishing the club’s Hall of Fame in 2003 and entering it as an inductee 21 years later.
“I don’t know that there has been anyone in our organization who has worked harder, invested more time and put more heart and soul into the team than John Blake,” said no one less than Mr. Ranger himself, Tom Grieve. “And that includes players, coaches and executives.”
Which is why it’s hard to imagine that on Sunday the Rangers will honor Blake as he prepares to “retire from full-time employment,” on Nov. 1 after 46 years in baseball, 36 of which have been with the Rangers. Blake is expected to step back into a part-time and consulting role, though nobody around the club can quite find a way to put Blake, 69, and “part-time” into the same sentence.
As the club’s unofficial historian, he will continue to help build the team’s legacy initiatives, conduct a series of popular ballpark tours, oversee team publications and consult, particularly in crisis management (of which there has never been a shortage).
Blake did not comment for this story, because to do so, would have forced himself to become part of the story. And his working credo has always been to put the club first. That even applied to the kids. His kids. He was in Toronto in 1989, when his first son, Chris, was born six weeks early and in days before cell phones, he couldn’t get back. He was, however, at the appropriate movie, “Parenthood,” at the moment. When doctors were getting ready to let Chris go home, Blake first consulted how it would conflict with Nolan Ryan approaching his 5,000th strikeout.
When his daughter, Becky, was born three years later, he was sure to be there. It’s just that the C-Section was scheduled around the Rangers’ precursor to FanFest.
(Full disclosure: We’ve worked alongside Blake for most of the last 28 years, consider him a friend, his wife of 46 years, Harriet, an unofficial saint of the Greek Orthodox Church, and the kids family).
It’s hard to put into words the sense of duty he feels to the Rangers, but allow us to try. After 20 years with the Rangers, he was exiled by a GM and manager when he lobbied for more transparency and accountability and fell into the dream job for a New England-born, prep-school reared baseball fan as a vice president with the Red Sox. Won a World Series there, too. Then, a year later, when Ryan became the Rangers president, his first call was to Blake, asking him to return. And he did.
“Working at Fenway was always a dream for him,” Harriet said this week. “But it wasn’t meant to be. The Rangers have had their ups and downs, but he loved working for the Rangers. He adores them.”
We should stop here to mention that Harriet, a former editor at The Dallas Morning News, met Blake when they were both students working at campus newspapers at Georgetown in the 1970s. At the time, Blake had also been a manager for the Georgetown football team, covered high schools for The Washington Post, worked in the press box for the Baltimore Orioles and was studying to be an international diplomat (his degree is International Politics).
Perhaps the only thing that stopped him from a career of mediating international disputes was mediating the equivalent of one on the Georgetown campus. After a banner with a vile racial epithet was hung in the Georgetown gym directed at new basketball coach John Thompson, Blake wrote a column defending the new coach.
Not soon after, Thompson was recruiting Blake to run the school’s sports information department and help on the radio broadcasts. Worked out OK. The Hoyas won a national championship while he was there. Though Blake may be one of the only color analysts in NCAA history to pick up a technical for shouting at the referee. His trademark call: “Break out the raincoats! Here comes the hose job!”
The Georgetown gig became part-time when he landed with the Orioles. He’d go from basketball season, into spring training where he occasionally had to round up wayward Hall of Fame manager Earl Weaver, who could drink into the night and argue into the morning. He spent six years with the Orioles. Won his first World Series ring, too. He was well-entrenched in the “Oriole Way,” when the Rangers called the then 29-year-old about becoming the second PR director in the club’s history.
He got a quick course in what to expect. On the day he arrived for his interview, he picked up a paper to read a report that the Rangers were about to fire GM Joe Klein, one of the people with whom he was supposed to work. Went through the interview anyway. He was offered the job the same morning the Rangers announced Klein’s firing. And he still accepted the offer. Came back three weeks later to look for housing and get a feel for the environment. Still not yet on the payroll, with Blake in attendance, California’s Mike Witt finished off the season by throwing a perfect game at the Rangers.
Blake leaned over to then-Dallas Morning News beat man Tim Kurkjian and asked: “Are all the games here like this?”
And he still took the job. The Rangers became a better organization for it.
“We were a major league team,” said fellow executive vice president Chuck Morgan, one of a handful of employees who have been with the club as long as Blake. “But we became a little more major when he got here. He’s got an unmatched work ethic and a passion for the game that is even better than mine. He reveres the game.”
“There was an emphasis on doing things right,” said radio broadcaster Eric Nadel, who preceded Blake by five years and became a Hall of Fame broadcaster thanks in part to Blake’s belief in him and loyalty to him. “You know that when he is in charge, everything was going to be done with the utmost efficiency. When he came here, he saw it as a challenge to bring things up to big league caliber. It became a labor of love to build that and then maintain it.”
He oversaw the arrival and ascent of Nolan Ryan from mere mortal to pitching god (helped, of course, by two no-hitters after the age of 40 and the all-time strikeout record). He helped create excitement about not one, but two, new stadiums and hyped, not one, but two All-Star Games, as well.
On the crisis front, there was always something to manage. Just consider this run from 2009-14: An All-Star recovering alcoholic who showed up in photos at a local bar, licking whipped cream off a woman; a manager acknowledging drug use to his team; a pair of internal power struggles; and the sudden resignation of the same manager for infidelity. And all of the principles involved end up still beloved by Rangers fans. Pretty impressive crisis management.
“There is nobody better in a time of crisis,” said former Rangers GM Jon Daniels, who didn’t work with Blake until three seasons into his own tenure and still spent more time with him in a GM-PR relationship than anybody else. “He was such a stable resource of good judgment and understanding and how things would play.
“He loves the game, loves the community and what is in the best interests of the team. The first day of spring training, he’d introduce his staff to the team and say: ‘We are here for you.’ And it was true and authentic. He earned the trust of everybody around. He truly has the organization and your best interests at heart.”
At times, that meant getting combative with media.
“My second favorite John Blake story is after every postseason win we had, just seeing the pride he had in the job and the organization; it made us know how invested he was in us,” said Michael Young. “My favorite was anytime he’d blow somebody up. We’d all laugh hysterically. We knew it was out of loyalty.”
About the Blake dustups, there were many. And they could be directed at the performance on the field, too. Nobody took losses harder. Grieve remembers an occasion in his first year as GM when he was sitting next to Blake in the press box, where emotions of any kind are generally frowned upon, and the Rangers blew a late lead. Grieve sat in silence as the game ended. Until Blake slammed his fists on the counter.
“It was hard enough that my arms flew up off the table,” Grieve said. “It told me how much he was invested.”
His loud voice became a drop on The Ticket, when he’d finish off interviews with Yu Darvish, shouting “questions in Japanese?” His “cut” motion became a meme after TV cameras caught him delivering one to play-by-play man Dave Raymond when an in-booth interview with just-retired Adrián Beltré went too long.
Drops and memes. The modern way to immortalize funny, awkward moments.
“Beyond a distinctive exterior, John has used his extreme intelligence, savvy and PR acumen to elevate the Rangers for decades,” said Rich Rice, his patient, long-time assistant who has succeeded him atop the Rangers communications department. “He has made this his life’s work, and his contributions to the club are immeasurable. There will never be another John Blake.”
Well-said. Or, as Blake himself, would put it: “ANY MORE QUESTIONS!”
Find more Rangers coverage from The Dallas Morning News here.
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Texas
Most applicants for Texas school choice vouchers already attend private schools, state data shows
The deadline for Texas families to apply for Texas Education Freedom Accounts (TEFA), also known as school vouchers, is on March 17.
TEFA is the $1 billion program that provides families with taxpayer money to help pay for private school. A longtime priority of Gov. Greg Abbott, Texas Republicans were able to pass it through the Legislature in a special session in 2025 after years of opposition from a coalition of Democrats and some Republicans worried about it negatively impacting public schools.
In the period from when applications opened on Feb. 4 through March 8, more than 160,000 Texas families have applied for the vouchers. Acting Texas Comptroller Kelly Hancock expects the program to reach capacity in its first year.
Texas school voucher application data by income
According to data from the Comptroller’s Office, 79% of the applicants for TEFA are already in private school. Lawmakers who advocated for the program said it was designed to give public school and homeschooled students an opportunity to switch to a private education.
After applications close, the Comptroller’s Office will allocate funding to eligible families through a lottery that prioritizes students with disabilities first. Eleven percent of all applicants, about 18,000, are students with disabilities from families at or below 500% of the Federal Poverty Level.
Next on the priority list is students from low- and middle-income families. Just 35% of applicants are from households that earn 200% or less of the Federal Poverty Level:
- 200% or less of the Federal Poverty Level ($66,000 or less for a family of 4): 35%
- Between 200% and 500% of the Federal Poverty Level ($66,001-$164,999 for a family of 4): 36%
- 500% or more of the Federal Poverty Level: ($165,000 or more for a family of 4): 29%
The Comptroller’s Office will report the waitlist to the Texas Legislature to determine funding for future years.
Texas school voucher application data by grade
The highest share of applications are for students who will be entering pre-K in the fall. Nearly 21,000 applications, about 12.8%, are in that cohort. The number of applicants per grade level declines as the students get older:
- Pre-K: 20,975
- Kindergarten: 15,777
- First grade: 13,654
- Second grade: 13,035
- Third grade: 12,922
- Fourth grade: 12,449
- Fifth grade: 12,273
- Sixth grade: 12,262
- Seventh grade: 10,953
- Eighth grade: 9,600
- Ninth grade: 9,464
- Tenth grade: 7.921
- Eleventh grade: 6,731
- Twelfth grade: 5,347
Texas school voucher applications by school district
The Comptroller’s Office also released a list that broke down the number of applications submitted in each school district across the state.
How much money public school districts will miss out on will depend on how many enrolled or prospective students they lose to private school because of TEFA, since state funds follow the student. But since 79% of applicants are already in private school, the extent of the impact on public school funding may be limited.
Here are the North Texas school districts with the most TEFA applications from within their boundaries:
- Dallas ISD: 5,267
- Fort Worth ISD: 3,151
- Plano ISD: 2,875
- Richardson ISD: 1,803
- Frisco ISD: 1,793
- Arlington ISD: 1,746
- Northwest ISD: 1,661
- Garland ISD: 1,622
- Lewisville ISD: 1,614
- Keller ISD: 1,541
ARLINGTON, Texas – Arlington police are continuing to investigate a fatal crash that killed a 43-year-old woman on Friday afternoon, saying speed was a factor and that investigators are working to determine whether street racing was involved.
Surveillance video shows speeding before crash
What we know:
Tanya Cypert was less than a mile from her Arlington home when the collision occurred at the intersection of Cooper Street and Eden Road, authorities said. Cypert had been on her way to get something to eat before her shift at Great Wolf Lodge in Grapevine.
Police said surveillance video from a nearby business shows two vehicles speeding northbound on Cooper Street moments before the crash.
The footage shows a black sedan moving in and out of frame, followed by a second black sedan, identified by police as a 2025 Mercedes, weaving between other vehicles.
Another camera angle shows Cypert’s white Hyundai Tucson slowing to make a left turn onto Eden Road as the first black sedan passes through the intersection. Seconds later, the Mercedes enters the intersection and collides with Cypert’s vehicle.
The impact produced a cloud of smoke and caused an engine to detach and land on the road.
Arlington police investigate potential street racing
Dig deeper:
The 18-year-old driver of the Mercedes was injured and remains hospitalized with broken bones, police said. Investigators have not yet interviewed him.
Cypert was transported to a hospital, where she later died. Her French bulldog, which was in the vehicle with her, was also killed.
Victim’s family on the tragedy
What they’re saying:
Cypert’s sons, Chancellor and Ethan, said they returned to the crash site Monday to honor their mother’s memory.
“It was a regular day for her, and now it’s going to be memorialized as the worst day of our lives,” said Chancellor Cypert.
Chancellor said the family is seeking justice but not revenge.
“As much as we want justice and stuff, it’s not about seeking revenge. It’s about trying to honor her memory and how many people she loved,” he said. “She loved everybody.”
Ethan said the damage to the front of the vehicle was “crazy and mind-blowing,” adding, “There is no need for that amount of speed at all.”
A family friend, Karen Arce, described Cypert as selfless and supportive.
“The sun just shines a little less bright every day,” Arce said.
The family also said an off-duty Midlothian police officer witnessed the crash and was the first to exit his vehicle to try to help. They expressed gratitude for his efforts.
Charges pending in fatal Arlington collision
What’s next:
No arrests have been made, and no charges have been filed. Police said they are continuing to interview multiple witnesses and review surveillance video as the investigation remains active.
The Source: Information in this article was provided by FOX 4’s Peyton Yager.
Texas
Texas Officials Unveil Amended Hemp Rules With Strict ‘Total THC’ Limits But Lower Licensing Fee Than Previously Floated – Marijuana Moment
Texas officials have adopted a series of new rules for the state’s hemp market—with certain revisions that advocates and stakeholders call a “direct victory,” including changes to make participation in the industry more affordable, and other regulations that threaten to severely restrict product availability.
The Department of State Health Services (DSHS) unveiled the amended hemp rules on Friday, about two months after publishing proposed regulations with licensing fees and other changes that led organizations such as the Texas Cannabis Policy Center (TCPC) to sound the alarm.
In response, the department received more than 1,400 comments urging revisions.
“Revised rules have slashed manufacturer fees from $25,000 to $10,000 and retailer fees from $20,000 to $5,000. This is a direct victory for advocacy,” Heather Fazio, director of TCPC, said in an email to supporters on Monday. “However, significant challenges remain.”
Specifically, the agency decided to maintain language requiring hemp products to be tested for “total THC” content, including THCA, which means most cannabis flower would be considered non-compliant with limitations imposed under state law.
“We estimate this will hand 50 percent of the legal market to illicit operators, making our state less safe,” Fazio said.
TCPC and other groups such as the Texas Hemp Business Council (THBC) have also pointed out that there would be additional requirements imposed on hemp businesses with respect to product testing, labeling and record-keeping.
Separately, under a proposed rule from the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission (TABC) there would also be a “less consequential, but important” update to the hemp program, Fazio said, with the agency seeking to prohibit the on-site consumption of hemp at businesses where alcohol isn’t allowed. There would be no “sampling” exceptions in place, either.
(Disclosure: Fazio supports Marijuana Moment’s work with a monthly Patreon pledge.)
TCPC did share a piece of positive news for advocates, noting “steady progress” in expanding the state’s medical cannabis program under a law enacted last year. While adult-use legalization has continued to stall in the conservative legislature, the medical marijuana program is significantly expanding, with nine new licenses already approved and three more expected before April 1.
Meanwhile, last week, Texas voters approved a marijuana legalization question that appeared on the state’s Democratic primary ballot.
As part of the primary election on Tuesday, each major party was able to place several non-binding propositions on the ballot that allow voters show how they feel on key issues. The Texas Democratic Party used one of its propositions to find out where the electorate stands on legalizing cannabis and whether past convictions should be expunged.
For what it’s worth, a statewide poll released last month found that Texas voters don’t like how state leaders and lawmakers have handled marijuana and THC policy issues. In the survey, a plurality of voters (40 percent) said they disapprove of how their elected officials have approached the issue, according to the survey. Just 29 percent said they approve of how cannabis issues have been handled, while 31 percent said they didn’t have an opinion one way or another.
A separate poll released last year found that a plurality of Texas voters want the state’s marijuana laws to be made “less strict.” And among the legislative items lawmakers considered during recent special sessions, voters say a proposal to address hemp regulations was among the least important.
—
Marijuana Moment is tracking hundreds of cannabis, psychedelics and drug policy bills in state legislatures and Congress this year. Patreon supporters pledging at least $25/month get access to our interactive maps, charts and hearing calendar so they don’t miss any developments.
Learn more about our marijuana bill tracker and become a supporter on Patreon to get access.
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For its part, the state Department of Public Safety in October adopted additional rules to increase the number of licensed dispensaries, establishing security requirements for “satellite” locations and authorizing the revocation of licenses for certain violations.
DSHS also recently finalized rules allowing doctors to recommend new qualifying conditions for cannabis patients and creating standards for allowable low-THC inhalation devices.
Meanwhile, bipartisan Texas lawmakers say the stage is set to advance legislation next session establishing regulations for hemp THC products, with growing understanding among their colleagues that prohibition fails to effectively address concerns about the cannabis market.
Marijuana Moment is made possible with support from readers. If you rely on our cannabis advocacy journalism to stay informed, please consider a monthly Patreon pledge.
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