A major story developing out of Washington today will impact millions of people right here in Texas. President Obama is heralding an unprecedented $25 billion mortgage settlement for the help it will bring the nation's struggling homeowners. Texas is set to receive a $430 million chunk of that change. A crunch of the numbers, according to POLITICO, shows those facing foreclosure could get a couple thousand dollars back.

About $290 million will go directly to Texas homeowners who lost their homes to foreclosure. It will be rolled out over the next three years. A settlement administrator designated by the attorneys general will send claim forms to those eligible for compensation.

Now even if you are not contacted, and your loan is serviced by one of the five settling banks -- Ally, Bank of America, Citi, JP Morgan Chase and Wells Fargo -- you're encouraged to contact your provider directly to double-check. Reform is a huge part of this agreement; for instance, 'robo-signing' is ending.

Home buyers will also receive proper/qualified counseling as a result. David Long helped found the Foreclosure Prevention Task Force in Texas, which offers free counseling services to at-risk home buyers, and he says the latter move is a great idea.

"We do know that borrowers who go through and do have the counseling sessions are 70 percent less likely to be foreclosed on and that's a pretty significant statistic that if you can receive counseling that your chances of being able to stay in your home are significantly greater than if you don't," Long said.

The other $140 million Texas is getting in the settlement will go into the state treasury. The legislature will decide how that portion of the money is spent.

State Comptroller Susan Combs unveiled a state water management report which shows a growing concern over how much the ongoing drought is costing the state. John Salazar has that story here.

You can see both stories in the video below.

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Capital Tonight's Harvey Kronberg joined us to fill us in on another headline out of the Comptroller's office this week: sales tax revenue. You can hear Harvey's take in the clip below.

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Our regular contributors, Democratic Strategist Harold Cook and Republican Strategist Ted Delisi sat down with Paul to talk about Rick Santorum's Tuesday night sweep and Gov. Perry's big week back in the TV spotlight. You can hear from them about all of that in the clip below.

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And It's been almost 19 years since a Democrat from Texas served in the U.S. Senate, when Bob Krueger was appointed to fill Lloyd Bentsen's seat, after Bentsen resigned to become President Clinton's secretary of the treasury. Less than five months later, Kay Bailey Hutchison easily beat Krueger in a special election, and Republicans haven't looked back since. Now, several Republicans want to take Hutchison's place since she's not running again. And for the Democrats, there is Paul Sadler.

The former state representative from East Texas served in the House for more than a decade. Sadler stopped by last week to talk about his chances. You can hear from him in the clip below.

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