Talmadge L. Heflin

Talmadge Loraine Heflin (born 1940) is a Republican Party former member of the Texas House of Representatives from District 149 in Harris County, who served from 1983-2005. From August 2007 through March 2008, he served as Executive Director of the Republican Party of Texas. He is now the Director of the Center for Fiscal Policy at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a think tank based in Austin.

Heflin was narrowly defeated for reelection in 2004 by the Democrat Hubert Vo, who is the first person of Vietnamese extraction to serve in the Texas legislature. Vo polled 20,695 votes (50.03 percent) to Heflin's 20,662 (49.96 percent). There was a recount but Vo prevailed. Heflin then failed to unseat Vo in 2006, a strongly Democratic year nationally but not particularly so in Texas. Heflin polled 10,632 votes (45.72 percent), or roughly half his raw vote from 2004, to Vo's 12,621 (54.27 percent) in a lower-turnout election. Vo was reelected in 2006 and 2008.

Between January 1993 and January 2003, when Democrats had majority control of the Texas House, Heflin was the only Republican member to have served on both the Ways and Means and the Appropriations committees. Heflin took over Appropriations in January 2003 and helped to close a $10 billion budget shortfall without raising taxes but included hundreds of millions of dollars in new and increased state fees.

Heflin was born in tiny Shongaloo north of Minden, the seat of Webster Parish in north Louisiana. In 1959, just out of high school, he wed the former Janice Johnson (born ca. 1941). The couple has a son, Gordon, and two granddaughters, Shawna and Kristy. The Heflins have lived in Alief, a Houston suburb since 1969.

Heflin was employed in petrochemical construction and engineering for twenty-four years, having been a design engineer and a consultant. He is active in community and public service, as a deacon at the Alief First Baptist Church and on the board of trustees of Alief's Independent School District, where he served for seven years. There is an elementary school named for him in Alief.

In 2002, Heflin won his last term in the House. He polled 13,144 votes (55.5 percent) to Democrat Andrew Tran, who received 10,530 (44.5 percent). Tran declined to run again in 2004. Hubert Vo then won the Democratic nomination and defeated Heflin. The district has a significant number of voters of Vietnamese extraction.

References

http://elections.sos.state.tx.us/elchist.exe

• Official site of Talmadge L. Heflin