I am cheering loudly for the Dallas Morning News’s selection of its 2025 Texans of the Year.

Notice the plural reference because the DMN went outside its norm in making its latest award. It chose the parents and assorted loved ones of the 100 victims of the Hill Country floods that overwhelmed Central Texas on the Fourth of July.

These men and women didn’t spend a lot of time grieving over the loss of their family members and friends. Instead, they got to work pressuring Texas legislators to write laws that they hope will prevent future cataclysmic tragedies of the type that inundated the region near Kerrville, Comfort and the rest of the Hill Country.

Most of the victims were girls who were staying at a Christian camp — Camp Mystic. They got caught in the torrential current of the Guadalupe River.

As a general rule, I often think of these group awards as something akin to participation prizes. Not this time.

The men and women who lost their precious family members and friends chose to use their grief and their anger for something noble and constructive.

They responded like true-blue Texans.