The Magnolia Ballroom of Missouri City's Quail Valley City Centre was filled near to capacity early Saturday morning as U.S. Rep. Al Green, D-Houston, held a Town Hall and legislative update geared toward his Fort Bend County constituents.

Green, who has served the 9th Congressional District of Texas since 2005, noted that his Houston-centered district may be the only congressional district in the area that spans three counties - Harris, Fort Bend, and Brazoria. In Fort Bend, the district encompasses most of Missouri City and Stafford.

While Green was running a bit late for the 10 a.m. start time, attendees enjoyed a breakfast provided by Green's office. When he arrived, he began his remarks on a somber note, referring to the Hamas attacks on Israel that had begun only hours earlier. He said he had been corresponding with other governmental officials about the situation since 4 a.m. that morning.

"This is something that I take seriously. I am a person who wants to be part of the 'peace program.' I'm looking for a way to find peace. I hope that we will achieve peace," Green said.

Green next turned to the most recent controversy embroiling the elected body he serves in, the vote last week that ousted Republican Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy of California. Eight far-right Republicans, led by Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida, were joined by a unified Democratic caucus in the motion to vacate, leaving the office of Speaker vacant for the first time in the nation's history.

"We are engaging in a level of fatuous folly, a level of inanity that borders on insanity. We are a ship without a rudder in the midst of a storm. We are trying our very best, at least I am, to right his circumstance," Green told the Missouri City gathering. "But the truth is this - we, the House of Representatives, cannot do anything other than select a speaker at this time. We cannot do anything at this time to fund the government. We cannot take any positions on what's happening in some other place at this time. The only thing we can do is select a person who will act as Speaker."

Green spoke at length on the federal budgeting process now known as "Community Project Funding," but which was formerly called "earmarking" before that term became something of a bad word in political discussion.

Green said that this kind of funding is championed by lawmakers who deem local projects "relevant, material, and necessary" in the communities they serve.

Green said the total national funding for Community Project Funding in the current federal budget is $63 million, which amounts to 0.00094 percent of the federal government's total discretionary budget in fiscal year 2022. But that funding goes toward projects that are invaluable to the citizens in the districts that receive that funding.

Much of the town hall was devoted to giving time to area officials, including Missouri City Mayor Robin  Elackatt, Mayor Pro Tem Floyd Emery, Councilmember At-Large Position 1 Sonya Brown-Marshal, Councilmember At-Large Position 2 Lynn Clousier, and District B Councilmember Jeffrey Boney.

Among the city's accomplishments they called attention to was the planned new Metropolitan Transit Authority Park-and-Ride parking garage that will serve residents commuting to the Texas Medical Center and downtown Houston (paid for in part through federal funding), the expansion of Missouri City's Freedom Tree Park (in which Green paid a part in getting the Phillips 66 company to relinquish an easement on the property) and the recent changing of street names in the Vicksburg subdivision which paid homage to Confederate soldiers (and in one case a former Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan). Green himself paid the fees associated with the name changes, Ecklatt noted.

Several Vicksburg residents who were instrumental in gathering the petition signatures necessary for the street name changes also spoke, including Angie Pearson, who with her husband Rodney led the drive to change the name of the former Bedford Forrest Drive (named after the infamous KKK leader) to Liberty Way Drive in August.

"We want to continue. We want to bring this forward," Pearson said.

Similarly, Rhonda and Beau Gilbro, who led the petition drive to change the former Confederate Drive to Prosperity Drive in 2021.

"I've always been taught that you speak things into existence," Rhonda Gibro said of the effort it took to convince their neighbors to sign the petition.

"if you live on a street that has kind of a negative name to it, it'll kind of make you have a negative attitude sometimes towards certain people, cultures, etc., because you don't really know how that individual feels," said her husband, Beau Gilbro. "So, we can all want success and great things, but we've all got to make sure we're moving in the right history. You can't rewrite history, but we can start a new history for the kids behind us."

In perhaps one of the most emotional moments of the event, Stafford Position 1 Council Member Alice Chen, a Taiwanese immigrant to the U.S. who served for many years in Green's district office, credited that service with inspiring her to pursue public service.

"You changed my life. You changed my life," Chen tearfully told Green.

Chen appeared with the newly installed Stafford Mayor Ken Mathew, an Indian immigrant who is the first minority mayor of the seven-square-mile city. Mathew spoke of how as an immigrant to this country he had been able to achieve his professional goals and ultimately elective office.

Green, a member of the powerful House Financial Services Committee, spoke at length about his career-long efforts to reduce discrimination in lending, as well as his efforts to get Congress to recognize the contributions of enslaved people to the building of the United States.

Corrections: Rep. Green told the audience that the 9th District is the only one in the area that spans three counties. not the only on in the country as originally reported. The story also originally misreported the percentage of Community Project Funding in the federal budget. 

The Fort Bend Star regrets the errors.