| Fort Bend County fell in line with the rest of Texas in its strong approval of a ban on same-sex marriages.
Proposition 2, which calls for a constitutional ban on same-sex marriages and other arrangements "similar" to marriage, won by 82 percent of the vote.
Some 43,521 Fort Bend County residents voted this election cycle, or 17.9 percent of the county's registered voters. Voters approved all but two of nine proposed Texas Consitutional amendments, falling in line with the rest of Texas.
Proposition 5, which calls for allowing for high-interest commercial loans, and Proposition 9, which sets six-year terms for board members of regional mobility authorities, each were rejected in Fort Bend County. Those two were also rejected in the state.
Texans approved Proposition 2, which gathered the most attention this election cycle, by 76 percent (35,695 to 7,542).
‘‘I think it's a really loud message that people in Texas and nationwide really strongly believe that marriage is a man and a woman, and children deserve both a mom and a dad and we shouldn't be tinkering with that,'' said Kelly Shackelford, a leader of Texans For Marriage, which favored the Texas ban.
While Texas law already prohibited same-sex marriages, the constitutional amendment, dubbed Proposition 2, was touted as an extra safeguard against future court rulings that might allow it.
The ban's opponents, however, argued that a constitutional ban is merely a statement of discrimination against homosexuals. They also suggested that the amendment's wording could endanger common-law or even traditional marriages, depending on how a judge interprets it.
On other proposed amendments, Texas voters approved a change to deny bail for criminal defendants who violate release conditions pending trial, and to create a relocation and improvement fund for Texas railroads. Voters approved a change to allow cities to issue long-term grants and loans for economic development.
Texans also passed a measure to allow people age 62 or older the option of borrowing against the equity in their homes by setting up a line of credit rather than taking a lump-sum loan or fixed monthly advance.
Voters rejected proposals giving the Legislature the authority to define maximum interest rates for commercial loans, and the authority to expand members' terms on regional mobility authority boards, or toll-road agencies, from two years to six years.
In Houston, voters re-elected Mayor Bill White to a second two-year term and sent Democrats Ana Hernandez and Laura Salinas to a runoff election to replace state Rep. Joe Moreno, who was killed in a traffic accident in May.
In White Settlement, a suburb of Fort Worth, voters rejected a proposal to change the town's name to West Settlement. Some citizens said the name taken in the 1800s for the city's white pioneers was politically incorrect and hindered economic development, but others believed the city should hang on to its heritage.
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