31 December 2004
Quite possibly the worst editorial page of 2004
We've taken to referring to the Chronicle editorial page as a wasteland, for reasons described in this post (among others).
Later, we'll be offering up our 2005 suggestions for improving the city's only newspaper (we're sure the readers at 801 Texas Avenue eagerly await).
First, though, we thought we'd call attention to the editorial page that ran about a week ago as a perfect "wasteland" example.
The page leads with an editorial arguing that Houston must take steps to improve the Houston Emergency Center. We agree, and we've been posting on the topic for a while now. It's good of the Chronicle finally to weigh in. It's also good of the Chronicle to criticize the Brown Administration for its handling of the HEC. The main problem is that the newspaper was missing in action during the Brown Administration, when it was more of a booster than public watchdog. And it's been entirely too slow to weigh in on this important local issue.
The second house editorial criticizes Halliburton, oversimplifying (a regular Chron editorial board practice) the company's legal wrangling over certain benefits in dispute with employees of subsidiary Dresser. The Chron basically argues that a deal is a deal, and Halliburton shouldn't try to back out of the deal. The same editorial board rejected that reasoning, however, when it endorsed Mayor White's referendum to give the city power to renege on the city's pension deal with municipal employees. Whether that deal was ill advised or not, it was a deal. The only difference in the two that I can come up with is that Vice President Cheney was once affiliated with Halliburton (and therefore both are "bad guys"), whereas Mayor White is a "good guy." This sort of good guy/bad guy oversimplification of issues does not serve the newspaper or the city well.
The Outlook section features an op-ed from former Marine Andrew M. Borene, who criticizes civilian leadership on the matters of body and vehicle armor (despite any number of blog posts and print articles that bring some needed context to the issue), not to mention "tax cuts for the wealthy." It's an op-ed surely designed to appeal to Move On types and Deaniacs, but it's not a particularly compelling op ed to a broader audience because it relies so heavily on emotion and canards, rather than facts. One supposes it resonated with the Chron editorial board -- that they "felt" it to be true -- and that's why it ran. If the Chron editorial page is to improve, the editors and the board are going to have to expand their intellectual horizons. We'll be offering some suggestions later in that regard.
A second Outlook feature is a typical op-ed from Cragg Hines. Hines brings a reliably leftist view to all issues, and tends to write meanly and vindictively -- the style that frequently characterizes the Chron editorial pages. But why waste valuable resources on this, and at D.C. bureau salaries? As one blogger points out, there are plenty of voices like this all over the web, and they come a lot cheaper -- if that's really what you want on the editorial pages.
And the last outlook column comes from Washington Post syndicated columnist David Broder, who is all upset about the D.C. baseball deal. Broder is the so-called "dean" of beltway windbags, but even his lame attempts at explaining why this is of more than parochial interest comes up way short -- except to the Chron editors, who thought for some reason this was an op-ed that Houstonians should read. If ever one needed evidence that the editorial page editors were out of touch with the interests of normal Houstonians, this would be it.
This editorial page may well be the worst example of the year for the Chronicle. We'll be offering some advice later as to how the newspaper might avoid repeats of this mediocrity in 2005.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/31/04 10:38 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)
Thinking about Houston neighborhoods
The Houston Architecture.Info Forum has an interesting discussion going about neighborhoods in the near southwest of Houston (and of other development more broadly).
I added the website to the blogroll on the sidebar a while back after discovering that the name is a bit misleading. While architecture is an interest, the forum is a much broader discussion board about Houston and the goings on here. The board has a large, active membership, and much of the commentary is well written and insightful.
As the local print media continues to neglect coverage of local matters, I would guess that we're going to see sites like the Houston Architecture Info Forum and blogs like this one continue to gain readership. A smart media source would try to use cheap blog/forum technology to leverage the interest of people in their communities, and involve them in the journalistic process. Houston's leading information source, on the other hand, seems to think layout changes and insipid non-blogs will do the trick.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/31/04 10:15 AM | Houston Life | Technorati | Comments (1)
The Prop. 2 tall tale that won't go away
In a Chronicle story by Ron Nissimov on the expansion progress at Bush Intercontinental and Hobby airports, there's a bit of misinformation toward the end. Here's the relevant part:
Airport expansion became a talking point for Mayor Bill White during the recent referendum on competing city revenue-cap proposals.
White said airport expansion, which typically occurs in spurts, would be difficult to achieve under the revenue-limitation proposal called Proposition 2, which he opposed.
White proposed an alternative revenue cap, Proposition 1, that would cap tax revenue but not limit annual growth in so-called "enterprise funds," including airport funds, that generate their income from user fees rather than general taxes.
What Nissimov is trying to write about, in a poorly worded way, is the little untruth the mayor told about Proposition 2 in October. The FAA sent the mayor a letter saying that airport revenue could not be used for property tax refunds. Mayor White took this letter and used it as an opportunity to do some Proposition 2-bashing.
The problem is that Proposition 2 would not have used airport revenue for property tax refunds, according to Paul Bettencourt, Harris County Tax Assessor. And this was discussed by Bettencourt and Frank Michel, Mayor White's communications person, back in October. (The link includes scans of the letters in question.) Michel agreed with Bettencourt that the FAA's letter was not based on the facts, but that didn't stop the mayor from repeating the false assertion and it hasn't stopped the media from spreading the misinformation, either.
But, then again, the Chronicle opposed Proposition 2.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/31/04 10:13 AM | Houston Politics | Technorati | Comments (11)
DMN uncovers more bad news for HISD
The Dallas Morning News has another exclusive on the TAKS cheating scandal story:
Houston's Wesley Elementary may be the most celebrated school in Texas.
When George W. Bush, running for governor in 1994, wanted to declare education his No. 1 priority, he went to Wesley, where desperately poor students outscored children in the wealthiest suburbs.
When Oprah Winfrey wanted to promote a school that "defied the odds," she took her cameras to Wesley, which has been the subject of numerous flattering profiles..
But a Dallas Morning News investigation has found strong evidence that at least some of the success at Wesley and two affiliated schools come from cheating.
"You're expected to cheat there," said Donna Garner, a former teacher at Wesley who said her fellow teachers instructed her on how to give students answers while administering tests. "There's no way those scores are real."
The News ' analysis found troubling gaps in test scores at Wesley, Highland Heights, and Osborne elementaries, which are all in the Acres Homes neighborhood in Houston. Scores swung wildly from year to year. Schools made jarring test-score leaps from mediocre to stellar in a year's time.
After The News shared its findings with Houston officials Thursday, Superintendent Abelardo Saavedra issued a written statement. "We have reviewed the anomalies in the test scores of the Acres Home schools as pointed out by The News, and we agree that these anomalies identify performance that is highly questionable."
If the test scores are to be believed, students at those schools lose much of their academic abilities as soon as they leave elementary school.
An AP story, based on the DMN findings, has been picked up by KTRK-13 and KHOU-11. So far, there's nothing in the Chronicle.
UPDATE 1: KHOU-11 has posted a statement from HISD superintendent Abe Saavedra.
UPDATE 2: KPRC-2 has the AP story posted.
UPDATE 3: The Chronicle finally has an article on this. It's the top story in Saturday's City & State section, the day after the DMN broke the news.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/31/04 09:30 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)
30 December 2004
Food and drink roundup (12-30-2004 edition)
We skipped the food and drink roundup last Thursday, with Christmas approaching.
With a New Year's weekend coming, this seems like the right time for a double dose of food and drink reviews.
Robb Walsh concludes that Sunday night is the best time to visit Annapurna South Indian Cuisine on NASA Road 1. And he finds Grand Lux Cafe in the Galleria area fun, if a bit "hollow."
Alison Cook stays in town, visiting Stamps Superburgers.
Gracie Ochoa checks out The Underground Bar in west Houston.
And finally, Mona Shoup has a couple of weeks' worth of Whine and Dine (here and here).
Here's wishing everyone a Happy New Year full of good food and drink (or, to quote Marvin Zindler, "whatever makes you happy").
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/30/04 11:58 PM | Houston Life | Technorati | Comments (0)
Missing the Chron eye
The state of Texas is scheduled to execute confessed murderer James Scott Porter on January 4, 2005.
There still has been no installment of the Chron Eye For The Death Row Killer Guy devoted to Mr. Porter, so we thought we'd post this little reminder for our friends at 801 Texas Avenue (since it seems like the newspaper is being manned by a skeleton holiday crew at the moment).
We like to do our part to keep the local media lively.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/30/04 10:40 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)
The opposite of hyperlocal journalism
The Chronicle's Austin bureau chief must have skipped town early to celebrate New Year's. Or maybe he's utterly consumed writing his weekend editorial column.
Otherwise, one wonders why the Chronicle had to rely on AP reporting on the fallout over a story broken by the Dallas Morning News yesterday.
One also wonders why there wasn't some adult editorial supervision of this Austin dispatch from R.G. Ratcliffe announcing that House Speaker Tom Craddick (R) has replaced press secretary Bob Richter:
"I want to thank Bob for his continued dedication and hard work," Craddick said in the release. "It has been a pleasure working with him."
Richter described Craddick as a "good guy."
Richter said he is supposed to talk to someone next week about a possible new job.
He's supposed to talk to some guy sometime about some job or something? Nice of the Chron to clear that up!
Then there's this:
As Richter's replacement, Craddick hired Heather Tindall, who has been the spokeswoman for the scandal-plagued Electric Reliability Council of Texas.
Craddick is Richter's replacement?
There's really no excuse for this sort of copy to make its way into the newspaper.
The Chronicle has invested tons of money redesigning its type and layout, and has brought in a new Washington chief who surely didn't come cheaply to a bloated D.C. bureau. Meanwhile, it continues to do a poor job covering local stories (being scooped at least twice by the Dallas newspaper in the last three months on stories it should have owned), and a mediocre job with its Austin coverage.
Surely Jack Sweeney and Jeff Cohen can't believe that anyone would turn to the Chronicle for coverage of Washington politics. And surely nobody but MeMo believes that young readers are going to pick up the rag because the Features section is now identified by a giant * and has lots of skin on its pages. But since there is some evidence the Chronicle brain trust (don't snicker) actually does believe these things, here's a hint for them: Go Local! Cover this city. Cover this state. Bring in some fresh writers who revel in things Texan. Concentrate your resources on doing Houston and Texas better than any other media source in this state.
Or continue to lose readers and relevance.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/30/04 10:17 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)
Why reporters do what they do
If you've ever wondered why reporters do some of the things they do, Banjo Jones has an answer over at the Brazosport News.
Along the way, he recalls his days at the Houston Post and an interview (if one wants to call it that) with former Astro owner John McMullen.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/30/04 09:37 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)
Mysterious movie reviewing criteria
Eric Harrison has the top story in today's "star" section, listing what he considers to be 2004's best movies, and he includes this sentence:
It's as if the furor over The Passion of the Christ, Fahrenheit 9/11 and the presidential election sucked up all the energy.
It caught my eye because Harrison achieved a moment of celebrity in the blogosphere with his reviews of those two movies. The Beautiful Atrocities blog compared what movie reviewers wrote about Fahrenheit 9/11 with what those same reviewers wrote about The Passion of the Christ. Here is Harrison's entry:
Eric Harrison, Houston Chronicle:
F9/11: (Moore) is an indispensable treasure, and his imperfections are part of the reason, because they mark him as real.
Passion: It's awful because everything he knows about storytelling has been swept aside by proselytizing zeal.
Harrison even made James Taranto's Best of the Web. Congratulations!
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/30/04 08:50 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)
29 December 2004
Thinking about the Chron sports pages
We don't normally do many posts on local sports here at blogHOUSTON.
Still, we are interested in how local media covers sports, and the Chronicle frequently comes up short in that area as in others.
For example, a few days ago, the newspaper was running claims that Carlos Beltran had been offered a six year, $96 million deal. Charlie Palillo fairly well demolished that claim, which was based on an anonymous source, on his program on KBME-790; Drayton McLane denied the claim later. Still, the Chronicle continues to refer to an "industry source" who keeps citing large offers. It doesn't get much more anonymous than that, although intelligent readers can guess that Scott Boras and/or his people are quite likely the "industry source" (and they have good reason to spread the notion of a large offer to boost the bidding for their client).
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/29/04 05:13 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (4)
Some kinks in the new towing policy
The Los Angeles Times has a story on Houston's new towing policy, with this toward the end:
Motorists can tell the wrecker driver where to tow the car, within 30 miles. Members of AAA and other auto clubs offering roadside assistance will not be allowed to wait for a private tow truck. That was news to Henry Martinez, 54, who was checking under the hood of his SUV at a gas station on Tuesday.
"My auto club guarantees they'll be there in 15 minutes, and you mean I can't wait for them?" he said. "They can tow the other guy, but don't tow me."
I seem to remember, back when this was being publicly debated prior to the city council vote, Dan Patrick or Edd Hendee of KSEV-700, discussing this issue. One of them was interviewing someone about the downside of this towing proposal (I think it was a city councilperson, maybe Addie Wiseman) and that person pointed out that drivers who are members of a roadside assistance program, such as AAA, would not be allowed to wait for their program to send a tow truck. That struck a cord with KSEV and its listeners and the next day someone on the pro-towing side was forced to called in to either Patrick's or Hendee's show and provide assurances that this was not the case.
My memory is not absolutely clear on the details, but I am fairly certain I remember the basics of those two interviews. If any readers remember that interview and the people who were interviewed, we would appreciate comments or emails helping clarify, or correct, those details.
The idea of rapid towing is great in theory, but the actual policy has some big kinks that need to be worked out:
Advocates for the poor pointed out that under the law, a car could be impounded if the driver could not immediately pay for the tow; to get their vehicle back, drivers would then have to pay not only the tow charge but storage fees for their car.
"The impact it will have on people who can least afford it is certainly an issue," said Houston Councilwoman Addie Wiseman, who voted against the measure. "And senior citizens traveling through Houston in recreational vehicles run the risk of having to pay $1,500 for a heavy tow fee if their mobile vacation homes break down. This ordinance is flawed in every sense of the word."
Two state lawmakers from Houston have talked to her about reviewing the measure after the Legislature convenes on Jan. 11, Wiseman said.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/29/04 12:48 PM | Houston Transit | Technorati | Comments (1)
New Year's Eve babysitting/fundraising
KHOU-11 is running a story about a Friendswood softball team with a unique fundraising idea:
It happens every year. Parents put off confirming a baby-sitter until the night before New Year’s Eve, and end up ringing in the New Year with a bowl of popcorn and hours of Disney films.
This year, however, the Texas Eclipse girls softball team is helping parents welcome the New Year with friends and partygoers by offering baby-sitting from 6 p.m. Dec. 31 to 1 a.m. Jan. 1.
The girls softball team is based in Friendswood, but players come from all over Galveston County. Each year, the team holds a fund-raiser to help pay for travel expenses and registration fees to enter softball tournaments across the United States.
“Sometimes we host tournaments and garage sales,” said Robert Flores, team manager and father of one of the players. “This is our first time baby-sitting.”
Flores said the team is raising money to go to a national softball tournament in Denver, Colo., on July 4.
“At first we thought about baby-sitting for Christmas shoppers, but we couldn’t pull it together quick enough,” he said. “Then we thought maybe New Year’s. I called around and none of your day care-type places are even considering being open on New Year’s Eve, so I thought this might work.”
They'll be inundated. On New Year's Eve, babysitters are at a premium.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/29/04 11:35 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)
Contributions to Sontag obituary
Susan Sontag died yesterday and media outlets everywhere are offering tributes. The Chronicle chimes in with a piece written by Fritz Lanham. Sort of. At the end of Lanham's article is this:
The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
Perhaps the Chronicle should have done what the Washington Times did and just say the story was from "combined dispatches"? With three media sources contributing to the Chronicle's story, the question should be: what exactly did Lanham contribute?
In a post on Sontag's death, Orrin Judd links to a Guardian news story on a plagiarism controversy that erupted over her novel, "In America." The Chronicle story doesn't mention this blemish, although the New York Times story does, toward the very end.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/29/04 11:20 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (3)
28 December 2004
Cirque du Soleil arrives in Houston
KHOU-11 reports that Cirque du Soleil has arrived in Houston.
Shows begin on January 6.
More information about this unusual traveling circus can be found here.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/28/04 10:03 PM | Houston Life | Technorati | Comments (0)
A wasteland of an editorial page
The Chronicle editorial page seems like such a wasteland much of the time.
One would think that the editorial page of the only major daily in the state's largest and the nation's fourth-largest city would be a powerful voice.
Instead, the regular columnists are dinosaur lefties and mediocre writers to boot, the "other" voice snippets are really just repetitive voices (echoes), the selection of syndicated columns is unimaginative, and the house editorials are frequently nonsensical.
And then there are the just-plain-bizarre editorials that appear, such as this one from one of the printing press managers:
Doesn't he realize that Houston's only become world class because of the rail?
Anyway, I guess this was the Chronicle's best effort at duplicating ttweak's approach to marketing Houston. It's not offensive (like some of their efforts). It's just not much of anything. And it shouldn't be what a great (or even good) newspaper does with its editorial page.
But we don't have a great (or even good) newspaper. We have the Chronicle. And we have an editorial page that's just a snooze.
That's where hyperlocal blogs (such as this one) come into play. We're still feeling our way through this little project, but obviously we're going to continue in 2005 with plenty of commentary you won't see on the Chron's editorial page, or in the tired Houston Press. Other local blogs will be providing plenty of commentary as well. And I hope to see more commentary from readers on the message board (such as the recent post from John Coby to a recent post on Tom DeLay). In short, the Houston blog community will be having a conversation about things that matter in our city.
We'll leave editorializing about the heretofore unexplored psychological satisfaction of park-and-ride commuting and offering leftovers to one's neighbors to the city's only newspaper.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/28/04 09:26 PM | Houston Media | Technorati | Comments (1)
Breaking news: Houston isn't like Pittsburgh
What do Pittsburghers (that's what the linked story calls them) think of Houston? Well, let's just say the author of this Pittsburgh Post-Gazette story writes up Houston as a mixed bag:
Many aspects of Houston are as foreign to Pittsburgh as its 90-degree days in October. There are no zoning laws, for one thing. There are no income taxes, for another.
It's truly multicultural, with more than one-third of the population Hispanic, one-fourth of the population black. The city council has representation from those groups, as well as members from Chinese and Pakistani backgrounds. Women make up half the council.
People keep moving out from the city in all directions, commuting on increasingly congested highways to their energy and aerospace and health care jobs.
"Houston to a large extent epitomizes sprawl," said Robert Litke, director of planning and development for the city. "We are overwhelmingly an automobile-dominated society. But growth has enabled an awful lot of people -- minorities -- to get out of the ghetto or barrio and get into decent housing on cheap land in the suburbs, as long as you're willing to spend a little extra time in the car."
Plenty of former Pittsburghers view it as an open society, where enterprising newcomers are treated better than strangers are received in more clannish Western Pennsylvania. A few others, however, said neighbors don't go out of their way to talk to one another. It's one of the things lamented by Iris O'Rourke, 54, who intends to return to small-town life in Lawrence, Washington County, after two decades away.
"When I take food over to a neighbor, they think I'm weird. In Pennsylvania, that's what we do!" said O'Rourke, who left her hometown as a single mother with a few suitcases and $400 to jump-start life for her and her daughter.
All the Pittsburghers here seem to know other Pittsburghers who came and then decided to leave.
Maybe the author should have included a link to this, for skeptical Pittsburghers.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/28/04 01:38 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)
Metro must feed the light rail
There was a Metro-related story hidden away in the West U. regional "This Week" section of the Chronicle. It talks about the need for some kind of shuttle/bus service between the West University Place-Rice Village area and the Texas Medical Center, especially since Metro ended the No. 70 bus, which used to serve that area. The (not quite so) funny thing is that a $50,000 study will be conducted to determine how best to fill the gap left by the cancelled bus route, although local leaders say they already know what kind of transportation is needed, partly thanks to a study that was conducted several years ago. Good grief!
And just to top off the absurdity, there's this quote from Susan Young, president of something called the South Main Center Association:
"Metro is taking a look at all of its services in relation to light rail," Young said. "What are some ways to better feed that service? We think this is a great opportunity to create a circulator route that is a feeder route to the system."
That quote didn't come from a Metro official. Interesting. And now, according to this Susan Young, all of Metro's services will be reexamined to see how they can best "feed" the light rail. That's great. Because nothing says mobility solution like a 7.5 mile, fixed track train system, with a record breaking 71 collisions, and a $93 million budget shortfall.
UPDATE: Tom Kirkendall has, of course, some smart thoughts on the folly of public-financed rail systems:
Thus, as with publicly-financed stadiums, the scam of these publicly-financed rail systems lives on because the benefits of light rail are highly concentrated in a few interest groups such as elected officials, environmental groups, labor organizations, engineering and architectural firms, developers and regional businesses. On the other hand, the costs of such systems are widely dispersed among the general population. Consequently, the many who stand to lose will lose only a little while the few who stand to gain will gain a lot.
This is why a politically savvy minority can con a large group of taxpayers facing relatively small costs into voting for an uneconomic rail system based on perceived benefits such as helping the poor, reducing congestion and pollution, and fostering development. Even though these benefits are exaggerated, it is usually not worth the relatively small cost per taxpayer for most taxpayers to spend any substantial amount of time lobbying against the cost-ineffectiveness of the rail system. With political leadership usually more interested in reading tea leaves than balance sheets and pro forma operating statements, these uneconomic rail systems just continue to perpetuate like a bad virus.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/28/04 10:48 AM | Houston Transit | Technorati | Comments (0)
Chronicle had a heads up on TAKS cheating story
Almost at the end of today's letters to the editor is this one from Terry Abbott, HISD's press secretary, with some surprising information:
THE Houston Independent School District is very serious about maintaining academic integrity throughout the district.
When a Dallas Morning News reporter contacted HISD officials with the results of the newspaper's analysis of test scores of one small group of fifth-graders at one HISD elementary school, the district immediately reported itself to the Texas Education Agency and asked for a full-blown state investigation. HISD also immediately gave a detailed statement to the Houston Chronicle and released details of the findings of its preliminary investigation to the Chronicle within hours of its completion. Even before the Dallas Morning News published its story, HISD had contacted the Chronicle and given details of that internal investigation.
HISD could not possibly have acted any faster or more thoroughly in its response to even a hint of impropriety in its test scores.
The Chronicle's decision to rip HISD in its Dec. 23 editorial was off base. The editorial failed to acknowledge HISD's quick action and commitment to integrity.
TERRY ABBOTT
press secretary,
Houston Independent School District
Wow! The Chronicle had a heads up on the TAKS cheating story unearthed by the Dallas Morning News and still, still that paper had to use an AP story that soon changed into an AP-inspired, Chronicle-authored story? And that AP-inspired story ran for two days, online!
That should be downright embarrassing for Jeff Cohen.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/28/04 07:44 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (2)
27 December 2004
Former Mayor Brown launches think tank, consultancy
Kristen Mack, who has been disappointing as the Chronicle's replacement for former political writer John Williams, nevertheless occasionally provides some humor.
Take last week's column on former mayor Lee P. Brown, who is wrapping up his year as politico in residence at Rice University.
According to Mack, Brown doesn't seem quite ready to abandon campus life:
He hopes to continue his relationship with Rice after next week and has founded the Lee P. Brown Center for Public Service that he hopes will be located on the campus.The nonpartisan, nonprofit think tank will provide "research and solutions" for local governments. He also envisions that it will provide experience for people, especially students, who are interested in local government and public service as a career.
"I couldn't find anything like that in the country," Brown said, citing federal government equivalents such as the Brookings Institution in Washington. "I think it fills a void. As mayor, I found myself dealing with different issues every 15 minutes. It would be nice for government to have somewhere they can call and share an issue and have research done."
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/27/04 10:25 PM | Houston People | Technorati | Comments (5)
Chronicle congratulates itself for decrease in police shootings
On Sunday, the Chronicle ran a story about a decline in police shootings during 2004, in Harris County. The newspaper also took the opportunity to give itself a hearty pat on the back:
Activists and police leaders say the decline is due to policy changes, increased public awareness, the recent acquisition of Taser stun guns by several departments and the Houston Chronicle's midyear investigative reports on the issue.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/27/04 02:09 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)
Local firm developing adult stem cell treatments
The Courier (Montgomery County) has a story about a biopharmaceutical firm in The Woodlands that is developing treatments for heart disease and diabetes from adult stem cells:
PharmaFrontiers has an exclusive contract to develop stem cells that are created from monocyte white blood cells taken from adult blood donations, according to company founder Warren Lau.
[snip]
Stem cell treatment for diabetes and heart failure should be commercially available in five to six years, company CEO Dave McWilliams said.
"The technology actually allows us to change the cells to stem cells and then change them into any type of cell we want," he said. "This type of stem cell research hasn't been widely publicized."
[snip]
PharmaFrontiers chose to develop its license by studying effects on late-stage heart failure and diabetes for several reasons, McWilliams said.
One reason is because of the number of people who have the conditions. The other is because of ongoing studies using stem cells from bone marrow that have shown success in repairing heart tissue and another study in which the cells are used to get the body to begin producing insulin again, he said.
Adult stem cell research is showing tremendous promise in spite of the media's unwillingness to give it the publicity it deserves. The media is invested in embryonic stem cell research, which, aside from very serious ethical concerns, has shown little promise for all the hype it receives.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/27/04 09:05 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)
26 December 2004
Houston newsmakers -- 2004
The Chronicle has a list of local newsmakers that it has decided were the most entertaining of 2004, and while the article carries the byline of Alison Cook, it has a suspiciously MeMo-like feel to it. Hmmmm.
Cook works an occasional dig into the article, even at the expense of some Chronicle sacred cows. Especially noteworthy is the small jab Cook takes at Metro's light rail crash rate -- she says there were a "gazillion" of them -- and the several jabs thrown at Tilman Fertitta. Here's a couple of those:
PARKING HIS EGO WAS HARDER: When Clay Walker played the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion in The Woodlands, Landry's tycoon Tilman Fertitta called ahead to ask where he could park his helicopter.
SOMEBODY'S GOTTA TAKE UP THE SIEGFRIED AND ROY SLACK: Tilman Fertitta moved heaven and city ordinances so he could install four rare white tigers in his downtown Aquarium complex, which he had certified as a zoo.
Some of it's funny, some of it's political, some of it's obscure, but mostly it's too long -- the list seems to go on forever. And that picture of Anna Nicole Smith -- on the front of the "star" section the picture is at least half a page tall. That's much more Anna Nicole Smith than many of us want to see. Why not run a giant picture of a white tiger instead?
UPDATE: Charles Kuffner notes that a correction is in order for one of the entries.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/26/04 06:14 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)
Perfect editorial material
Last week's Chronicle story about a new study showing Texas' parental notification laws could cost $44 million is perfect fodder for a Chronicle editorial today:
In a study designed to measure the impact of two Texas laws limiting the confidentiality of teen access to health care, Luisa Franzini, an assistant professor of management, policy and community health at the University of Texas School of Public Health in Houston, noted that 37 percent of girls who use reproductive health care services will stop doing so out of concern their parents would be informed.
Based on that number, Franzini and her team calculated Texas should expect 8,265 additional teen pregnancies, 5,372 teen births and 1,654 abortions. The economic impact could amount to $43.6 million per year in additional public health care costs. That figure does not take into account thousands of additional cases of sexually transmitted diseases in adolescents.
The whole study is based on hypotheticals, potentials and estimates, words frequently used in the report. The "37 percent" number used by Franzini is an estimate, as noted in the original Chronicle story, and that estimate is loosely based on some numbers taken from a previous Planned Parenthood affiliated study. Since Planned Parenthood has a big financial interest in getting its hands on taxpayer dollars, and that's a big part of what's really at stake here, we need to view the base number, and this entire study, with some skepticism.
The editors also fail to point out that two of the authors are associated with Planned Parenthood of Houston and that one of those Planned Parenthood authors is now Mayor White's health policy advisor.
What is frustrating is the stock the editors place in this hypothetical- and estimate-laced study. What if the Heritage Foundation produced a study showing that teens who made virginity pledges had lower levels of teen sex, which in turn means lower rates of teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. Of course the Chronicle editors would look upon such a study with disdain.
On the Chronicle's website, Cohen provides his own rationale behind the editorial pages:
As the 10th editor of The Houston Chronicle, I have asked our editorial writers to be unsparing critics and to not back down from creating discomfort for even the most powerful elements in this city. We should be skeptical. We should be aggressive. But, at the same time, we should be fair.
Skepticism was running low when this editorial was written.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/26/04 01:08 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)
Howard Hughes' continuing popularity
KTRK-13 is running an AP story on the continued fascination with Howard Hughes and his Houston gravesite:
Nearly three decades after his death April 5, 1976 on a plane from Acapulco, Mexico, to his native Houston, Hughes' grave at the base of a hill at an edge of Houston's 133-year-old Glenwood Cemetery remains a popular tourist site.
"People come in from out of town and come by here," said a cemetery official, who asked that his name not be disclosed. "It's a regular occurrence."
[snip]
Legend has it the granite tombstone, which carries the names and dates of births and deaths of Hughes and his parents, was commissioned by Hughes to be modeled after a key fob his father used to carry. The site, while distinctive, does not prominently display the Hughes name and is dwarfed by significantly more grandiose memorials elsewhere in the sprawling cemetery, where some 22,000 people are buried.
Cemetery officials are polite about directing visitors, acknowledging Hughes' presence but offering little else except to say seasonal flowers are planted regularly at the grave as part of special maintenance agreements provided to that site and others.
Hughes, born Christmas Eve 1905, was 72 when he died. An autopsy determined chronic renal disease as the cause of death. He was buried in what in 1976 was an $8,100 casket and $2,100 vault, according to probate court documents.
I would guess the new movie "The Aviator," will further add to the interest in Hughes.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/26/04 08:29 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (2)
25 December 2004
Maybe White/Hurtt Could Put A Camera On Her house?
KTRK-13's Andy Cerota reports on a homeowner in southwest Houston who thinks the city of Houston is failing in its most basic obligation: public safety.
According to Cerota, Deidre Rasheed's southwest Houston home has been robbed and trashed four times in 45 days.
Now, she's giving in and planning on moving. But not before directing this towards municipal leaders:
Rasheed said, "No TV, cut wires. The police came -- didn't take fingerprints, didn't take any samples to see, to do any follow up investigation. They just left."
Rasheed wants more patrols in her neighborhood but understands that might be difficult since there's a shortage of officers working the streets. She blames city leaders for that -- arguing they've sacrificed citizen safety to balance the budget.
"The officers don't have that manpower," Rasheed admitted. "But at the same time, where does the buck stop? Who takes responsibility for this type of action within our government?"
As we've been pointing out for a while, HPD's ongoing manpower shortages have not been a priority for Mayor White and his Council. They continue to ignore the problem, declining to fund new cadet classes capable of resolving the shortages even as they find time and resources to expend on priorities such as Tasers and a new downtown park.
The city's only newspaper has not been interested in the HPD manpower issues (they have other priorities as well), and other media outlets (notably, KHOU-11, but now KTRK-13) have only nibbled around the edges.
Unfortunately, once Rasheed's misfortune becomes more widespread in the city and the major media discover this "problem," HPD's manpower shortages will be so acute that it will take several years of cadet classes to have an impact. That's why it's well past time for Mayor White and his Council to begin to deal with the problem.
Yes, we've been harping on HPD's manpower issues for a while now, and we'll likely continue. But, we're only a little blog, albeit one that some local media folks and pols read. In case those particular readers are wondering -- public safety is always a good story/issue. We're happy to give it to ya'll without credit, if it means a safer city. By all means, run with it!
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/25/04 09:51 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)
Chronicle: get the Christianity out of Christmas
Even on Christmas, the Chronicle editors can't help themselves:
This holiday season coincides with a renewed flicker of hope for a peace settlement in the Middle East. In the United States, however, contentious assertion of the dominance of Christianity in a pluralistic state runs counter to the Christmas spirit and reduces the store of good will and peace on Earth.
I had to read that several times and I am still befuddled. The dominance of Christianity runs counter to the Christmas spirit?
Here's the definition of Christianity:
The Christian religion, founded on the life and teachings of Jesus.
Here's the definition of Christmas:
A Christian feast commemorating the birth of Jesus.
If Christianity is based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ, how can strongly asserting (or contentiously, as the editors want to put it) one's Christian faith run counter to Christmas, which is the celebration of the birth of Jesus. This makes my head hurt.
All I can come up with is the editors don't like Christians, but that's not really a news flash.
At the end of the editorial, there's more blathering about mean Christians ruining the holiday season for others (how bizarre is that?!), but I am going to ignore the editors' desire further to slam Christians on this most special day.
Merry Christmas!
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/25/04 07:32 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)
24 December 2004
Legislature takes aim at White/Hurtt traffic cameras
The Chronicle's Ron Nissimov reports that the White/Hurtt plan to boost municipal revenues via automated citation-dispensing red light traffic cameras may not outlast this session of the Texas legislature.
Democrats and Republicans alike seem determined to kill the practice:
State Rep. Gary Elkins of Houston, a Republican who led opposition to camera enforcement of red lights in the 2003 Legislature, already has filed a bill to kill the ordinance council passed this week. At least two Democratic lawmakers, Sylvester Turner and Garnet Coleman, also oppose it.
[snip]
Elkins said he is worried that vendors of camera systems, who are frequently paid a portion of ticket revenues, will manipulate the timing of traffic lights to issue more tickets and maximize profits.
Such accusations were leveled against vendors in California lawsuits that led to the dismissal of hundreds of tickets.
[snip]
The Democratic legislators voiced privacy concerns.
"There's been a proliferation of cameras to monitor people, particularly by cameras controlled by the government," Coleman said. "What (state) legislators make decisions on and what the city makes decisions on are totally different. We as state legislators look out for things like privacy rights."
Mayor White responds as follows:
"If the people in Austin don't want us to use technology, then we'd be happy if the state gave us more money to hire more officers," White said.
As we frequently point out here, HPD's manpower problems have been nowhere on Mayor White's list of priorities. It's not a matter of funding from the legislature. The Mayor and his Council have found ways to fund a big Taser purchase, and have found ways to boost municipal revenues by expanding meter coverage and hours downtown (they've also spent time on a new Central Park and an African American Museum). In other words, they've found ways to spend money on questionable priorities, and they've found (questionable) ways to raise new money.
Mayor White would like new revenues from traffic lights, yes. That's the priority here, under the rubric of the "threat" posed by red light runners. One doubts that Mayor White is going to convince the legislature the reason he and his council have thus far neglected to fund new HPD cadet classes has anything to do with red light cameras.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/24/04 09:16 PM | Houston Politics | Technorati | Comments (0)
The demolition of the Dome?
Tom Kirkendall, over at Houston's Clear Thinkers, points out this Richard Connelly article about the Astrodome problem:
Except for the occasional scholastic playoff game, the 39-year-old Eighth Wonder of the World is all but abandoned. Even the religious revivals like the annual Jehovah Witnesses' convention have been seduced by the glamour and luxury of Reliant Stadium, just 30 yards away. The Dome is reduced to hosting dinner parties for nostalgic Houstonians on its floor, even a bar mitzvah or two.
The Oilers' locker room is office space; the Astros' is used for random storage. There is what appears to be an inch-thick coating of dust on the ceiling speakers; cleaning them would require rappelling down from the roof, and no one thinks it's worth it.
A skeleton crew of maintenance workers roams the murky hallways, checking lights and pipes and making sure the Dome is ready for the occasional onetime event like the filming of the movie Friday Night Lights. It doesn't happen too often, but the building has to be maintained just in case.
And doing so costs Harris County taxpayers $1.5 million a year. That may not seem like a big deal for a government entity with a billion-dollar budget, but $1.5 million could buy a lot of library books and after-school programs.
No politician in these parts wants to be the first to call for the demolition of the Dome, at least not until it's proved beyond any doubt -- and any should be underlined and boldfaced -- that the building can't be renovated for other uses.
Kirkendall also offers his opinion about what should be done with the Dome, and it's not this.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/24/04 10:27 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)
Santa's not visiting one Pasadena home this year
I must admit I have threatened my cherubs with the "No Santa Claus for little kids who can't behave" line, but thankfully I've never had to actually follow through on it. The Chronicle has the story of a Pasadena father who is following through:
There's not much laughter today at the home of a Pasadena information technology specialist who has decided to auction off his sons' Christmas presents — and possibly dismantle the family tree — because the youngsters, ages 9, 11 and 15, have been naughty, not nice.
"One thing we teach around this house," said the man, who asked that his name not be revealed, "is that good things happen to good people and bad things happen to bad people."
In a Christmas context, bad people get switches or lumps of coal — or lose the presents they want the most.
"BAD CHILDREN get no Nintendo DS. Santa will skip our house this year," the man announced in his eBay posting to sell three DS systems with PictoChat and Metroid. Also offered were three games for use with the system. "No kidding. Three undeserving boys have crossed the line. Tonight we sat down and showed them what they WILL NOT get for Christmas this year. I'll be taking the tree down tomorrow."
Wow!
Now I am going to wave this story in front of my precious children and I expect an exceptionally well-behaved Christmas Eve.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/24/04 06:20 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (1)
23 December 2004
Conroe artist visits the White House
Here's a nice story about a local artist whose Christmas ornaments were chosen to hang on a tree in the White House:
Out of the 500 ornaments decorated by artists across the nation, 350 were chosen for the tree. Both of Carter's made the cut. She, along with her two daughters, headed to D.C.
The first thing Carter got to do at the White House was chat briefly with Laura Bush.
"She is absolutely beautiful and very, very gracious," Carter said. "I felt sorry for her standing in the receiving line that long, talking to all those people. But when you see her, she concentrates on you and makes you feel very special."
From there, Carter and over 300 fellow artists moved into the Blue Room to see the tree.
"Luckily, there was a book there to help you locate your ornament, because the Blue Room tree is 18 feet tall," Carter said. "But mine were hung low enough that I found them and was able to take pictures of them."
It would have been great to see this story in the "star" section, instead of the regional "This Week" section.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/23/04 11:29 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)
An editorial on TAKS cheating
If you are interested, the Chronicle editors have written an editorial about the TAKS cheating uncovered by the Dallas Morning News. This story broke last Sunday and it took the Chronicle editors four days to comment on it.
Come on, Houston Examiner!
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/23/04 08:52 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)
Not your daddy's town
The Brazosport News points to recent Houston radio ratings, and notes the decline of country music in our fair city. Onetime country powerhouse KILT-100.3 is now just twelfth in the ratings.
In another post, Banjo Jones comments on the Philip Anschutz/Examiner moves in various cities.
So, inquiring minds want to know if Banjo Jones moved back to Texas to head up a new Anschutz newspaper and give Jeff Cohen a good swift kick.
And if so, will he bring on board a few blogHOUSTONites to help him out?
UPDATE: Banjo emails that the highest rated station is actually ninth. Still, that's quite a fall from our Urban Cowboy days.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/23/04 12:19 AM | Houston Media | Technorati | Comments (0)
Future competition for the Chronicle?
Kevin Roderick at LA Observed points to a Denver Post article that reports investor Philip Anschutz has filed to reserve the name "The Examiner" in 69 cities across the country. A spokesman didn't want to share much more:
"It was a prudent business move to protect The Examiner trademark broadly," Monaghan said. "We don't want to talk about our business strategy. But things are going very well in San Francisco, and it seemed prudent to protect the value of the trademark."
Roderick observes,
Anschutz has supported some conservative causes, is quite religious and is trying to single-handedly clean up the culture of Hollywood—this move raises the question of whether he's planning a new chain of right-wing papers.
We can only hope so. Quite a few monopoly dailies could use the competition, including our own Houston Chronicle.
And yes, Anschutz has reserved the name Houston Examiner.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/23/04 12:00 AM | Houston Media | Technorati | Comments (1)
22 December 2004
911 center moves up list of priorities
Anne Linehan has been blogging about the ongoing problems with Houston's Emergency Center (most recently here and here).
Now that priorities like Tasers, ticket dispensing cameras mounted on traffic signals, additional downtown parking meters, and an expensive purchase of land for a downtown park are out of the way, the Mayor's office seems to be turning its attention to the city's not-always-reliable 911 emergency management system.
We hear that a representative from downtown will be chatting about the problem with Chris Baker on KTRH-740 today, around 4pm.
We're glad to hear public safety is moving up the list of priorities downtown. At least we hope to hear that when we tune in later.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/22/04 01:58 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (5)
Houston Food Bank receives big donation
The Houston Food bank has received a big Christmas present -- two years of electricity:
Calpine Corporation (NYSE: CPN - News) is brightening the holidays and New Year for the Houston Food Bank and its member agencies by gifting the nonprofit organization with Calpine's first in-kind donation of electricity in the United States. The independent power producer will provide all of the electricity to the Houston Food Bank's headquarters from its network of 11 Texas power plants beginning December 1, 2004, through December 31, 2006.
Valued at approximately $6,000 per month, the annual donation of close to $72,000 will be the largest single charitable donation Calpine will make in 2005.
"We are in awe of this tremendous gift from Calpine Corporation, and its value goes way beyond its monetary one," says Houston Food Bank President and CEO Brenda Kirk. "This donation will touch the lives of hundreds of thousands of needy residents in the Gulf Coast region with a gift of hope and help in the form of nutritious meals. This donation allows us to take funding earmarked for utilities and redirect it to feeding the hungry in Houston and 17 additional counties across Texas. We estimate that Calpine's donation will allow us to provide more than 2 million additional meals to those in need."
Demand for electricity is around-the-clock at the Houston Food Bank headquarters, a 73,000-square-foot warehouse facility that also houses the organization's businesses offices and features 151,000 cubic feet of refrigeration and freezer space for storage of nonperishable items previous to distribution. The Houston Food Bank's distinction as the national leader among food banks in the distribution of fresh fruits and vegetables also makes this massive refrigeration space a necessity.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/22/04 01:05 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)
Chronicle editors discuss "predictable" HEC problems
Today the Chronicle editors decided to give us their wisdom regarding the Houston Emergency Center mess. I suppose they decided that since they already tackled the pressing issue of Swaziland's King Mswati III, a looming local disaster deserved some attention.
The editorial is basically a rehashing of facts that have been in the local media for several weeks now, but this paragraph is interesting:
The problems with HEC were predictable and predicted. Oversight of the project lacked continuity. Initiated by Mayor Lee Brown's director of public safety, Don Hollingsworth, the project was passed off to Brown's chief of staff, Oliver Spellman, then to Al Haines, chief administrative officer, and finally to John Bales, who succeeded Hollingsworth as director of public safety. The people who negotiated the deal left it to others to make the facility work.
I would love to see the Chronicle post all its editorials, from the time the dispatch center was being proposed and debated, that predicted problems. Maybe the editors did sound the warning bells back then, but I would still like to see those editorials, because the editors have a habit of pontificating in hindsight.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/22/04 11:58 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (2)
Pallilo beats Infinity in court, returns to air today
Sports talker Charlie Pallilo's old employers temporarily took him off the air yesterday, as Pallilo had to respond to their court challenge.
According to David Barron's reporting for the Chronicle, state District Judge Randy Wilson denied a request from Infinity Broadcasting that would have forced Pallilo off his new station. Pallilo will return to the air today.
Pallilo's debut on Monday for the new KBME-790 (Sports Animal) featured a number of interviews with local sports personalities, and the thoughtful commentary for which Pallilo is known.
With the legal challenge settled, perhaps now Infinity can work on improving the talent on its own sports talk station, KILT-610.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/22/04 08:57 AM | Houston Media | Technorati | Comments (2)
21 December 2004
Council approves traffic cameras
Council today approved yet another of Mayor White's priorities, the generation of new revenues for the city via an automated red light/traffic camera system.
Interestingly, the KHOU-11 coverage indicates that road sensors will be deployed, meaning road construction and delays. That's a curious way to "get Houston moving," to borrow from the seemingly forgotten priorities enunciated in the Mayor's last election campaign.
So far, Mayor White has had few problems getting council to sign off on an agenda that has included Tasers, enriching downtown developers to create a new Central Park, enhancing municipal revenues with new downtown parking meters and expanded hours, reconfiguring the city's pension plan with some unusual arrangements regarding the city's convention center hotel, and enhancing municipal revenues via cameras at traffic lights. The only major initiative that Council has forced the Mayor to back down on was his proposed African American museum, which will almost certainly make another appearance down the road. Neither the Mayor nor his Council have, thus far, seemed interested in addressing HPD's ongoing manpower concerns.
COVERAGE: Ron Nissimov/Chronicle, KTRK-13, KHOU-11.
RELATED: Red-light running, from a Houston officer's view (Hans Marticiuc, Chronicle)
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/21/04 10:27 PM | Houston Politics | Technorati | Comments (0)
Space Station will make a Christmas appearance over Houston
The International Space Station will be visible for Houston-area residents early Christmas morning, according to this AP story on KHOU-11:
People who wake up early Christmas morning might get a glimpse of something special in the sky—the International Space Station.
The station will be visible to those living in cities such as San Francisco, New York and Houston during Saturday’s predawn hours. NASA said today that the station will fly by at five miles a second, meaning it may only be visible for a minute or less in some places.
Weather permitting, the space station will also be visible here several days next week.
To see when the station is visible over Houston click here: Space station sightings over Houston.
The Space Station and Santa Claus. Early Saturday morning will be very busy!
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/21/04 07:50 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (2)
Tom DeLay intervenes in rail dispute
Joe Stinebaker reports that a compromise has been reached that will head off proposed plans to build a new rail line on the east end.
The compromise was brokered by local leaders, with every indication that Representative Tom DeLay (R) was instrumental in getting the deal done:
[Houston Mayor Bill] White and others credited DeLay, the House majority leader, with pushing the two railroads to the negotiating table and imposing a deadline to reach agreement.
Julio Del Carpio, an East End businessman and chairman of the Harrisburg Development Corp., said he appreciated efforts by White and other local officials to resolve the issue. But, he said, he doubted local residents could win out over the interests of the railroads until DeLay reversed his earlier position to stay out of the debate."It wasn't until Tom DeLay changed his mind that finally they managed to make some changes," Del Carpio said. "But if Tom DeLay had not done anything, it would have been impossible for the city of Houston to try to make such a drastic change."
Del Carpio, who appeared at Monday's news conference to thank White and DeLay for their efforts, said the issue united all residents of the affected areas.
[snip]
Another Clear Lake opponent, John Cobarruvias, said he is happy with the agreement but that local opponents had proposed the same thing to DeLay three years ago.
"It's great what they did," he said. "They just should have done it three years ago and saved us the money to fight it."
The guess here is that we're going to see Representative DeLay engaged in more such activities in the district. While he was never in any danger of losing his last election (barring an indictment/conviction), his margin of victory ran short of the district's potential. Smart politicians (not to be confused with, say, Talmadge Heflin) understand when it's time to shore up things locally.
Whatever the case, the district benefits from his attention in this matter, and the House Majority Leader benefits from the positive press.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/21/04 06:41 PM | Houston Transit | Technorati | Comments (2)
Mayor White's Planned Parenthood connection
One of today's Chronicle editorials addresses the way to improve health care in Houston and Harris County. Mayor White's health policy advisor is quoted, but we don't think the editors provided readers with the proper context about this particular advisor.
Houston Mayor Bill White's director of health policy, Elena Marks, likes the cautious approach the study group has taken to renovating countywide health care: "I think their idea of letting this council work through it is the right approach. It's not clear that you ought to immediately merge all of the services or never merge any of them."
Marks says she's excited by the thrust of the recommendations "to make some fundamental changes in the way we deliver the full continuum of services from the public health end all the way to the trauma end."
A Chronicle story on Saturday told us that Marks is a volunteer at Planned Parenthood, and it appears she is actually a bit more than just a volunteer -- she is (or was) board chair [sic] of Planned Parenthood of Houston and Southeast Texas, Inc. It is unclear if she is currently board chair (a piece of furniture?) or if that was in the past.
Can you imagine the horror and outrage if someone who was a member of the Texas Right to Life committee was named Mayor White's director of health policy? The Chronicle editors would come unglued! Andrea Georgsson would demand endless editorials screaming about this obvious sign of encroaching theocracy!
Mayor White has apparently known Marks for awhile. This link to a Houston Planned Parenthood newsletter has an article and pictures from a 2001 Planned Parenthood "gala" (does anyone else find that offensive?), and Bill White and his wife were listed as party hosts. If you continue to the second page, you'll see a picture of Elena Marks at the "gala."
And how are things at our local Planned Parenthood these days? Well, the latest newsletter has a "20 Year Reflection" report from its CEO. One of the successes he points to is:
Abortion procedures: 2,882 vs. 6,876. This growth in clients is thanks to our Fannin and Bryan staff, our medical director and other staff physicians.
Thanks, indeed, to the staff: the number of dead babies has increased. Things are looking good at Planned Parenthood of Houston!
Trying to find some biographical information on Marks isn't easy. Her listing on the mayor's website is, uh, short:
Elena MARKS is Director of Health Policy.
Oh, okay. Any medical background? Who knows, but she does have a Juris Doctorate (a very smart person tells me that means she's a law school graduate, which is very important for a health policy advisor.). There is a mention of her in this article that says she is the city’s first health policy director and that it is a ($1 per year) volunteer position, and this 1995 Houston Press column lists her as Planned Parenthood's legal adviser, at that time.
Do you think Marks brings her pro-abortion stance to work with her? Or do you think she tries to be objective, looking at health issues from a pro-life position, also? I think we can guess.
And no wonder the Chronicle editors like Mayor White -- in this case, Planned Parenthood is the tie that binds.
UPDATE 1: A blogHOUSTON reader dug deeper and found the notation "MPH" next to Marks' name on the author information page of the anti-parental notification study. That stands for master of public health. Thank you for the heads up, blogHOUSTON reader. Now we need the mayor's office to note Marks' qualifications on the mayor's website. Houstonians have a right to know who is advising the mayor.
UPDATE 2: David Benzion, an upstanding gentleman doing his best to reign in the motley group over at Lone Star Times, looked at Marks' political donation history, and what he found is not surprising.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/21/04 09:39 AM | Houston Politics | Technorati | Comments (9)
Fixing HEC
KHOU-11 has more details about the consulting firm that will be examining the Houston Emergency Center:
MITRE, an independent not-for-profit agency, is investigating the problems at the HEC.The cost of this six-month assessment is about $180,000. Officials say the money will come from a yearly maintenance fee.
The city hopes that the company will be able to assess the systems, technologies and personnel at the HEC, then come up with a plan to fix the problems.
[snip]
MITRE says it has worked with other 911 systems and should be able to come up with a plan to help get Houston's system in shape.
"I think the bulk of the work we are going to do will be in a three-month time period. We will conduct interviews, look at the system, do our assessment and make the appropriate suggestions and recommendations to try and make improvements as necessary, " says Bobby Blount of MITRE.
City officials say while fixing the HEC is a priority, it's too soon to tell how much money it will take to fix it, or how long the process will take.
Obviously we hope that the people of MITRE can come up with a way to salvage the system. That last paragraph, about how much it will cost, is problematic. The people who sold the city this system need to pay for any fixes, since the fine citizens of Houston have already shelled out $53 million for a system that doesn't work the way it was promised. Last night, KRIV-26 had a report on this where the reporter quoted a city councilman saying the city would have to look into the developer paying to fix whatever is in need of fixing. I should say so!
UPDATE: KTRK-13 also covers this story.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/21/04 06:18 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)
20 December 2004
610 Loop/I-10 ramp to open early
Galleria-area commuters should welcome the following news from TXDOT:
The I-610 southbound to I-10 eastbound direct connector ramp is scheduled to be opened by 5 AM, Tuesday, December 21. The opening of the ramp marks the successful and early completion of the contractor's milestone. The duration of the closure was planned for 24 days with a maximum 10 day incentive bonus for opening early. The early opening date to get the full 10 day incentive was December 23; however Williams Brothers has completed the necessary work in the area to shave off another two days to open the ramp tomorrow morning, December 21. The bonus that will be paid to the contractor is $50,000.00 (equal to $5,000.00 x 10 days).
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/20/04 10:08 PM | Houston Transit | Technorati | Comments (0)
An editorial from left field
The Chronicle editorial page is in rare form today.
After its bit of revisionism concerning the pension plan, it moves on to tackle a topic that has been troubling Houstonians for some time now:
Unlike the newspaper's last big editorial foray into international politics, the editorialist does not refer to any nonexistent treaties this time (a mistake that still has not been corrected).
I can't help but wonder which member of the editorial board fancies himself (or herself) such a scholar of international politics.
If anyone down at 801 Texas Avenue (yeah, we know you read us) knows which member writes these "international" editorials and would like to pass along that info anonymously, we'd be grateful. Just click on my name at the bottom of this post and send away!
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/20/04 09:55 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (1)
Pension plan revisionism at the Chronicle
Today, the Chronicle runs a seemingly sensible editorial that lauds "good guy" Mayor White's plans to abolish the generous "Group C" time accrual provisions in the city's pension plan:
Few City Hall insiders paid attention in 1999 when the head of the municipal employee pension board and former Mayor Lee Brown's chief administrative officer, Al Haines, went to Austin to lobby legislators to change pension rules. The subsequent bill created an exclusive Group C category allowing the pension fund executive director and high-ranking city bureaucrats and department heads to receive double credit for every year served. The credits would be applied toward a maximum pension of 90 percent of their salary after 20 years.
As the Chronicle's Dan Feldstein later reported, that obscure law resulted in a lucrative gain for Haines; his successor, former City Attorney Anthony Hall; and other city administrators. When Haines left the city in the waning months of Brown's tenure in 2003, his pension had jumped from $36,000 a year to $103,000. It's a case of a bureaucrat negotiating a deal that just happened to provide himself some well-funded golden years.
It's a shame the Chronicle has just now decided to cover the shenanigans that took place in the Brown Administration.
It would have been nice if the newspaper had shown such interest five years ago. Contrary to the Chronicle's revisionism, the pension plan revisions were hardly "obscure." What was obscure was the Chronicle's coverage. It was virtually nonexistent.
That's why it's hard to take what follows seriously:
It's unfortunate that council members didn't raise more questions when Haines and others were busy pushing the perk. Mayor White's call for greater transparency in pension fund transactions aims at curing the root cause of this ill-conceived and self-serving boondoggle.
What is most unfortunate is that the city's monopoly newspaper did not raise questions on its editorial pages about Mayor Brown's questionable leadership when he was in office, or provide readers of its news pages enough information to reach informed conclusions about the pension plan (or numerous other issues). Instead, the newspaper was a big booster for Mayor Brown, endorsing him repeatedly and generally giving him a pass on its news pages, which frequently celebrated his "world class" plans for the city.
As I've written elsewhere, the pension plan problems that Mayor White "discovered" earlier this year might not have been a discovery if the city's only newspaper hadn't been busy with other matters (such as rail and Lee Brown boosterism).
Leaving aside the Chron's effort at revisionism, the editorial is spot on in urging the city to end the Group C benefit. The sooner the better.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/20/04 09:32 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)
Will Laurence Simon still talk to us little people?
Time Magazine has a list of ten things its writers have learned about blogs this year. This one is the best, in my opinion:
Pets Have Blogs Too
It started as an in-joke among feline-friendly bloggers: why not post pictures of their cats every Friday afternoon? Friday catblogging became a hit, and soon even NASA was playing along by posting pictures of the Cat's Eye nebula.GO TO: carnivalofthecats.com
That's Laurence Simon's baby and while he doesn't run the Carnival every week, he does manage the feline frenzy. And that's saying something!
It's been a big year for the Carnival of the Cats. First was the New York Times catblogging story, and now Time Magazine puts the Carnival in its big year-end issue. Very exciting! Do you think the Chronicle will ever discover what's in its own backyard?
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/20/04 02:23 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (4)
Mayor focuses on the really important local issues
Mayor White's office issued a press release saying that the land acquisition for Houston's own Central Park is complete:
“This is a significant transaction that will leave a lasting legacy for future generations of Houstonians - a premier urban park,” said Mayor White. “The role of the private-sector funding organizations in helping the city seize this unique opportunity cannot be overstated. I know everyone in Houston shares our gratitude.”
A combination of gifts and pledges totaling $28.5 million are already committed to the project from the Brown Foundation, Houston Endowment Inc., the Kinder Foundation, the Wortham Foundation, the Cullen Foundation and the Fondren Foundation.
“This has been a real Houston can-do project,” said Mayor White, who also thanked Crescent Real Estate Equities Co, which reduced substantially the selling price of the land, and Greg Armstrong, who, as an independent adviser to the mayor, led the efforts to acquire the land. “This would not have happened without the leadership and commitment of Greg Armstrong, as well as the foundations’ generosity.”
I suspect Crescent Real Estate Equities Co. still made out okay, in spite of the mayor's hint that the company had a philanthropic moment.
The end of the press release says this:
Construction of the park is expected to be completed by late 2007. The park is expected to complement other downtown amenities, including the Convention Center, and to spur retail and residential development, strengthening the city's tax base.
In addition, the park should be a nice place for Houston's homeless to hang out.
UPDATE: Here's another press release, with some details of the land acquisition between Crescent Real Estate and the city of Houston:
Dec. 20, 2004--Crescent Real Estate Equities Company (NYSE: CEI) today announced it has finalized the sale of 5.3 acres of non-income producing land to the City of Houston, which was previously disclosed as being under contract on October 19, 2004. The land is adjacent to the 5.5 acres located in front of downtown's George R. Brown Convention Center that Crescent sold to the City at the end of 2002. This transaction allows the City to consolidate its land in order to develop an urban park of more than 13 acres. The sale generated proceeds, net of selling costs, of approximately $23 million, or $100 per square foot, and were used to pay down the Company's revolving credit facility.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/20/04 01:44 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)
DMN continues with TAKS cheating scandal
The Dallas Morning News has another story related to the TAKS cheating scandal, this time going through the ways cheating can occur and the ways officials can detect or prevent cheating, which obviously isn't being done. (The Chronicle is still running its AP-inspired story.)
Here's an example of the official leadership thinking at the Texas Education Agency:
"Typically, school districts police themselves," said Lisa Chandler, the TEA's director of assessment. "We trust educators to educate our kids."
[snip]
Ms. Chandler said she refuses to react cynically when TAKS scores improve by leaps and bounds.
"It may be an optimistic viewpoint, but it's also a necessary viewpoint," she said. "We can't afford to lose five years in a child's educational career. They have to have improvement. Can we expect quick turnarounds? We have to. We can't let those kids not be successful."
The Texas accountability system rewards schools and districts for high test scores. Principals and teachers often see their careers advance if their students score well. That can leave few incentives for educators to be vigorous about pursuing cheaters.
So, for the TEA, even if test scores improve so dramatically as to defy logic, it's okay, because improving test scores is everything. Students actually learning is not.
Boy that makes me mad. I am not against testing at all. I think testing is necessary, but it should be done honestly so we can see if students really are learning. Wildly improving scores should be a huge red flag, and if administrators and officials are unwilling to notice those scores and check them out, then what good are they? They certainly aren't earning their big, fat paychecks.
But Ms. Chandler isn't done with her inspiring words:
Ms. Chandler said the agency is willing to consider toughening its stance. It is considering setting erasure thresholds for schools that, if exceeded, would trigger investigations.
TEA officials also said that the agency is considering adding a check similar to The News' analysis: searching for schools with wide swings in average scale scores.
Considering? Considering? Don't strain yourself with all the considering, Ms. Chandler. After all, it's only about the education of Texas' children. This is why parents are getting fed up with public schools. The people in charge are mainly interested in protecting their own jobs, not in actually educating our children.
And here's a well-earned dig at the TEA and (in my opinion) the Chronicle:
The newspaper's [DMN] analysis was performed entirely with publicly available test scores obtained from the TEA, using basic statistical techniques. The agency could perform a similar analysis on its own, but its leaders choose not to.
If the scores are improving, then the TEA is happy. Why, that must mean Texas public education is in good shape! So, no. The agency would not be interested in investigating red flags.
And shame on the Chronicle for not digging this up. But as we know, the Chronicle does its best reporting when a press release comes out to alert the editors that some news is happening. Since the TEA didn't helpfully send out a press release about the cheating, the Chronicle couldn't write a story on it.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 12/20/04 08:15 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)
19 December 2004
Press discovers "olds"
In the most recent issue of the tired Houston Press, Richard Connelly discovers that Galveston has received acclaim for being so average demographically.
At least one blog pointed out that Galveston news a month and a half ago.
Once upon a time, Connelly used to tweak the Chronicle by suggesting they check with the Press more frequently for their story ideas (frequently rewrites of earlier Press stories). Bloggers could say the same to Press writers these days.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/19/04 02:37 PM | Houston Media | Technorati | Comments (0)
Doesn't Robison have something in Austin to write about?
The Chron's Austin news bureau chief is acting as Mayor White's PR man at the newspaper again this week, rambling once more in favor of cameras at traffic lights.
The "argument" doesn't go much beyond last week's effort, which effectively said "red light runners are bad, and the city should go after them."
But Robison does concede one point to opponents, even as he takes shots at them because they might be conservatives:
What's wrong with the city raising money, to be used for public needs, from people who willingly endanger other people on the road?
Here's what's wrong -- a little thing called accountability. The private contractor has an incentive to raise revenues, and the city wants those revenues -- for what? Nobody has bothered to answer that question, because they all insist this is a safety issue (as I've pointed out before, when politicians say it's not about the money, of course it's about the money). There's all sorts of potential for mischief when our city officials engage in public-private partnerships, as those of us who have lived here for a while understand quite well. Since Mr. Robison spends so much of his time in Austin, he may not realize that. Maybe he should be writing pro-camera editorials for the Austin American Statesman and telling Austinites how to raise more money for their city? Except that newspaper tends to have better taste on its editorial page.
Further, since the paranoid Austin bureau chief imagines a right-wing conspiracy against him, here's an unlikely ally of that conspiracy:
"This is a case of the city looking for money, and they're looking for the money in the wrong way," said ACLU attorney Randall Kallinan. "No study has shown that the safety is increased with red light cameras."
Of course it's about the money.
Robison concludes with another condescending lesson in American constitutionalism:
A popular misconception to the contrary, we don't even have an unrestricted, constitutional right to drive, much less to ignore basic rules of traffic safety.
You mean the Chronicle editors who embrace the constitutional privacy penumbras that protect the "right" to kill fetuses do not embrace the logical extension of said penumbras to traffic cameras? I'm so very disappointed in their selective embrace of constitutional fiat!
All joking aside, here's something for Robison to chew on: citizens do have a right to oppose bad public policy, policy that is designed to further liberal ends of expanding municipal government by raising revenues that are not earmarked for any particular purpose, and is presented under the guise of public safety. And even citizens who might be Republicans (or -- shock -- ACLU members!) enjoy that right, no penumbras necessary.
You would think the Austin news bureau chief might have something in Austin to write about, especially as the upcoming legislative session approaches. Maybe he was busy Kwanzaa shopping, and it was just easier to write a column belittling the people who sent him emails than come up with anything more substantive.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 12/19/04 10:25 AM | Houston Life | Technorati | Comments (1)
DMN beats Chron on important education news
The Dallas Morning News has two stories of interest, relating to public schools. The first questions the dramatic improvements some traditionally low-rated schools have made in TAKS testing:
A Dallas Morning News data analysis has uncovered strong evidence of organized, educator-led cheating on the TAKS test in dozens of Texas schools – and suspicious scores in hundreds more.
[snip]
The News' findings have led to cheating inquiries in three Texas school districts, including the state's two largest, Dallas and Houston. One of the schools under investigation is a National Blue Ribbon School that a year ago was touted by federal officials as an example of top academic achievement.
[snip]
Take Sanderson Elementary, a school in a poor Houston area.
In 2003, after years of mediocre performance, it reached what has traditionally been the pinnacle for American schools: The U.S. Department of Education named Sanderson a Blue Ribbon School because of rapid improvement in its test scores.
But the News' analysis raises questions about the validity of Sanderson's TAKS performance, particularly in fifth-grade math.
Sanderson's fourth-graders scored extremely poorly on the math TAKS test. Their average scale score was so low that it ranked Sanderson in the bottom 2 percent of the state: No. 3,173 out of 3,227 schools.
That's roughly what might be expected from a school where 98 percent of the student body is poor enough to qualify for free or reduced lunches. Hundreds of research studies have found that student poverty is the single most important factor in student academic achievement.
But Sanderson's fifth-graders had astonishing success on the math test. They had the highest scale scores of any school in Texas, beating every magnet school, every wealthy suburban school and every high-performing school in the state.
Sanderson didn't just finish No. 1. No other school in the state was even close. In scale-score points, the distance between Sanderson and the No. 2 school was as large as the gap between No. 2 and No. 116. More than 90 percent of Sanderson's fifth-graders got perfect or near-perfect scores.
Uh oh.
It sure would be nice to see this kind of reporting out of the Chronicle.
UPDATE 1: The Chronicle now has an AP story up, on the probe into TAKS cheating.
UPDATE 2: The Chronicle did that "poof" thing again, where it replaces a wire story with a Chronicle-authored story. The Chronicle doesn't believe both stories can coexist, apparently, so poof! No more AP story. That "poof" thing drives blogHOUSTON crazy. Anyway, the link in UPDATE 1 now goes to the Chronicle-authored story, and we'll use the term "Chronicle-authored" loosely, since much of the information is from the AP story, with a few quotes and a bit of new information thrown in. Here's the AP story the Chronicle used earlier, from USA Today. The Chronicle is truly a piece of work.