30 April 2006

Casey and Hines draw salaries for this?

Chronicle readers who don't read the New York Times might have found Rick Casey's column on James Baker from earlier this week interesting.

The New York Times article was better, though, not to mention more timely.

It's not really clear why the Chronicle pays its metro/state columnist to rewrite stories he reads in the national press.

Then again, it's also not really clear why the Chronicle pays its D.C. columnist to write about things he sees on C-SPAN.

The reinvention of the Chronicle still has a ways to go, it would seem, little slaps at the New York Times notwithstanding.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/30/06 10:41 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)

The ideal state isn't a very timely state

A week ago, Chronicle reporters Matt Stiles and Steve McVicker broke a story on one cop whose income has recently topped Mayor White's, thanks to overtime pay.

The Chronicle editorial board, having dispensed with that pressing matter of a Jamaican food recipe yesterday, finally weighed in on the matter of the HPD overtime pay today:

Arresting drunken drivers and securing their conviction is a laudable police goal, but it appears some Houston police officers have received extraordinarily large overtime payments for off-duty court appearances. The practice raises questions about HPD's management of scarce law enforcement resources and department policies that may have encouraged wasteful expenditures.

Wow, it took a week to come up with that?

The ideal state certainly seems a little... slow.

And the ideal state seems a little insensitive, if the conclusion is any indication:

Chief Hurtt says the high overtime totals are unavoidable because of understaffing in the police department. Perhaps that's so, but when the HPD indians are making almost as much as the chief for sitting in court, a financial sobriety test of DWI task force policies and procedures is in order.

Indians?!

Don't they know that's Native Americans? The horror!

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/30/06 10:07 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)

KTRK: City hopes to build a windmill farm

KTRK-13's Ted Oberg reports that Mayor White has plans for the City of Houston to become a producer of electricity:

Electricity will cost the city of Houston $130 million this year. That's $30 million more than last year because of rising natural gas costs. But now, the city tells us it has a plan to spend its way to a lower power bill.

[snip]

So then why is the city asking for a $50 million loan to build windmills? They could be 17 huge windmills, each of them almost 400 feet tall to generate power the city would use for itself.

[snip]

The proposed city of Houston wind farm on top of downtown Houston would take three square miles. Don't worry. It won't be built in downtown, but 250 miles away in Kennedy County. The windmills would connect to the Texas power grid, which runs all over the state, so Houston could grab the wind electricity here.

[snip]

[I]n the last 12 months, Houston's natural gas electricity ranged in price from 14 cents per kilowatt hour right after Katrina to six cents today. Wind energy is a steady six cents - today, tomorrow, and for years in the future.

"Break even or save the city money on what it would pay on its energy bills," said Mayor White.

The city's application is still with the IRS, which needs to approve it. Then city council votes on the plan. If that goes well, the windmills could turn in 2008.

We sympathize with the Mayor's desire to lower the city's cost for electricity, although it's not clear that the city needs to be in the electrical-generation business. Before branching out to that field, it would be nice if the city could simply get better at the murder-prevention business, and the graffiti-eradication business, and the crime-response-time business, and the emergency-call-answering business, and the pothole-repair business, and... well, you get the idea.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/30/06 11:30 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (12)

Lifestyles of the rich and academic (cont'd)

In a post on some recent reporting by Matthew Tresaugue on Priscilla Slade's expenses at Texas Southern University, we wrote:

It would be most informative for readers if the Chronicle would request similar expense information for Slade's equivalents at other state universities.

Today, Tresaugue delivers on that request. Here's an excerpt:

Documents show that Slade traveled the world, furnished her million-dollar home, employed a full-time maid, bought rounds of drinks and learned to play golf at the school's expense.

She defends much of the spending as legitimate and necessary as chief advocate and fundraiser for the 11,600-student university.

But a Houston Chronicle analysis of 2005 financial records from 26 public university presidents shows that Slade's spending generally exceeded that of her peers. Her expenditures at TSU, a historically black university, revealed few, if any, examples of the penny-pinching displayed by many of her colleagues.

Out of all the presidents in Austin on the eve of the appropriations hearing in February 2005, only Slade spent more than $200 on her room. Her room service and bar tabs added $76.80 to the Four Seasons bill.

Meanwhile, the University of Texas-Pan American's president, Blandina Cardenas, stayed at the Red Lion in an $80-a-night room.

"What we have is a sense of entitlement with some presidents and chancellors," said Patrick Callan, president of the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education in San Jose, Calif. "There is a belief that they ought to live like the people in the highest income brackets. Part of this is because we expect them to raise money. But we're forgetting this is a public service."

The story is worth reading in its entirety.

(hat tip to Laurence Simon for the heads up on the reporting)

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/30/06 11:16 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)

29 April 2006

Houston Community Newspapers acquires Examiner weeklies

The Houston Business Journal reports that the Houston Community Newspapers group has purchased the Examiner Newspaper Group, which puts out free Examiner weeklies in select Houston neighborhoods:

Houston Community Newspapers has purchased the Examiner Newspaper Group.

The Examiner newspapers, which are printed for West University, River Oaks, Bellaire and Memorial, will join the HCN network of 31 newspapers reaching more than 635,000 households.

George Boehme, publisher of the Examiner Group, will remain with the newspapers and continue to operate out of the offices in Rice Village.

Starting in the May 10 issue, the Examiner newspapers will convert to a traditional broadsheet format, and will include Greater Houston Weekly, a lifestyle insert published by HCN.

In addition, the papers will join HCN's news-sharing partnership with KTRK-TV Channel 13.

The only overlapping newspaper is in the Memorial area. HCN's Memorial Sun will merge into the Memorial Examiner, also starting May 10.

The Examiner newspapers do some nice work. Here's hoping the partnership with Houston Community Newspapers benefits both.

BLOGVERSATION: Brazosport News.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/29/06 09:25 PM | Houston Media | Technorati | Comments (1)

Chief Hurtt's chief of staff agrees to demotion, pay cut

The Chronicle's Rosanna Ruiz reports that Chief Harold Hurtt's chief of staff has agreed to a demotion, in relation to a sexual harassment claim that was filed in February:

Houston Police Chief Harold Hurtt's chief of staff agreed to a demotion, salary reduction and reassignment as a result of a sexual harassment claim filed against him.

Lt. Joe Buttitta will be demoted to the rank of senior officer with a maximum salary of about $53,000. The demotion will be effective by May 6, said HPD spokesman John Cannon.

[snip]

Buttitta will no longer work from HPD's downtown headquarters at 1200 Travis, but his new assignment has yet to be determined, Cannon said.

Buttitta was suspended Feb. 28 after the allegation was made and an internal HPD investigation launched. Cannon would not reveal the findings of the department's investigation, referring all such inquiries to Buttitta's attorney.

It seems unlikely that an innocent person would agree to a significant demotion and cut in pay.

Last year, HPD lost a $600,000 sexual harassment lawsuit.

ADDITIONAL COVERAGE: KHOU News Blog.

PREVIOUSLY: Mayor White can't be happy about this (Isolated Desolation).

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/29/06 08:20 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (3)

Better wait a few days before trying the recipe

To celebrate the Jamaica-themed International Festival that opened last weekend and closes this weekend, the Chronicle editorial board has posted a recipe for Jamaican rice and peas as one of its two daily chances to opine on matters of importance to Houstonians.

Given the newspaper's recent difficulties with recipes, not to mention the editorial board's occasional difficulties with facts, the blogHOUSTON crew recommends holding off on trying the recipe right away. Watch the corrections for a few days, THEN give it a try if you're so inclined.

Consider this post a public service announcement from your friends here.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/29/06 07:58 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (2)

Editorial LiveJournal: Mr. Gibbons goes to the theater!

It's been quite a while since a member of the Chronicle editorial board treated us to a diary of one of his/her grand adventures in the city of Houston in the form of an Editorial LiveJournal.

Bad things come to those who wait, however, as James Howard Gibbons has an account of his trip to the theater in today's Chronicle:

In this overstimulating age, I'm frequently tempted to say, "Oh, let someone else go out and get himself royally entertained." Fortunately, I resisted the temptation and went to see a production of Molière's The Miser, which runs through Sunday at the Alley Theatre.

This production of the 17th century French play, by Theatre de la Jeune Lune, adapts the script for today's audiences. But while the play now refers to Enron, the themes are dissimilar.

It seems kind of fitting that that Mr. Gibbons chose to write about an interpretive bastardization of Molière on a bastardization of a major newspaper editorial page.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/29/06 07:46 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (2)

Priscilla Slade goes to the victim card

Priscilla Slade, effectively fired from Texas Southern University for inappropriate use of university funds, is suing the university in an effort to squeeze even more money from the institution.

The Chronicle's Matthew Tresaugue has the details:

Priscilla Slade sued Texas Southern University's governing board Friday, claiming the regents failed to provide a mandatory hearing before effectively firing her as president.

The lawsuit, filed in state district court, accuses the regents of making plans to hire a new president while Slade still holds the job. Attorney Ron Franklin, who represents Slade, said he hopes to win unspecified monetary damages.

[snip]

"Her contract requires them to give due process and a hearing, and they have ignored it," Franklin said.

The board [of regents] inquiry, conducted by the law firm Bracewell & Giuliani, found that Slade and former Chief Financial Officer Quintin Wiggins failed to follow university policies and state laws, including "long-accepted principles prohibiting the use of public money for private gain," to buy more than $260,000 in furniture, landscaping and security equipment for her house.

A recent university audit also found that Slade spent nearly $650,000 over the past seven years on personal purchases not allowed under her contract.

In the lawsuit, Franklin claimed the audit "was selective, incomplete, misleading and clearly calculated to create an impression of wrongdoing on Dr. Slade's part."

Dr. Slade seems to have done a fine job creating that "impression" all on her own.

Slade's attorney gave KTRK-13 a nice quote, in reference to the hearing that TSU must give Slade before her firing is official:

"If I know before a trial begins that the jurors have already decided everything and are trying to decide whether or not to cut off her head or hang her, why would I go through that scam," said Franklin.

It's quite an upside-down world in which a university official can put someone convicted of bouncing checks in charge of finances, (allegedly) misuse nearly $1 million, AND claim to be a victim of the equivalent of a hanging when terminated for cause!

FROM THE ARCHIVES: Priscilla Slade.

BLOGVERSATION: TBIFOC.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/29/06 07:14 PM | Houston People | Technorati | Comments (3)

28 April 2006

Chron: Clark to transfer to Illinois facility (Updated: Perhaps not)

On Monday, Anne Linehan posted about Andrea Clark, the most recent Houston hospital patient to run up against the state's futile-care law. Right Wing News had previously posted on the topic (and continues to follow the story). Local bloggers followed suit, and KHOU-11 ran early local coverage of the matter.

Today, the local Hearst daily decided to cover the matter, with reporter Todd Ackerman explaining the following:

Hoping to defuse the latest local controversy involving Texas' futile-care law, St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital agreed Thursday to transfer a severely ill heart patient to a facility in suburban Chicago.

The agreement, announced three days before the hospital planned to take Andrea Clark off life support, comes amid a growing movement to reform the Texas law, which allows hospitals to discontinue terminal patients' life-sustaining care as long as their ethics committee determines the case is futile and gives the patient's family 10 days notice to find another facility.

[snip]

The agreement to transfer Clark today to Glenshire Nursing & Rehab Centre, a long-term acute-care facility in Richton Park, Ill., came Thursday evening, at the conclusion of lengthy negotiations between St. Luke's and Clark's family. The family had preferred she stay in Texas and wanted St. Luke's to extend the 10-day deadline so they could continue searching for another in-state facility. In the end, her sister, Lanore Dixon, said the family felt it had no other options.

St. Luke's will pay the transfer costs, even though the law says the patient's family is responsible for such payment. Ward says she was told they will amount to nearly $15,000.

"We are delighted that this issue has been resolved to the satisfaction of all parties," said Rosemary Luquire, senior vice president and chief quality officer for the St. Luke's Episcopal Health Care System. Another senior official said the hospital's position had been about "compassion and the best interests of the patient."

Clark, 54, a "blue baby" upon whom Drs. Michael E. DeBakey and Denton Cooley performed pioneering open-heart surgery on the then new heart-lung machine in the late 1950s, has been at St. Luke's since November.

Her condition deteriorated after open-heart surgery in January and bleeding in the brain this month, Dixon said.

The conflict erupted April 19, when Dr. Robert Carpenter Jr., chairman of St. Luke's ethics committee, wrote Ward and Dixon to say that the committee had unanimously agreed with Clark's attending physician that "the life-sustaining treatment currently being provided to your sister is inappropriate and should be discontinued."

This is great news for Andrea Clark and her family, although it is unfortunate that Clark must leave the state to continue to receive life-sustaining medical treatment.

The Chronicle article notes the role that the internet played in drawing attention to the St. Luke's decision as well as the state law behind it:

"There may be an agreement, but the real story is a law that allows physicians and ethics committees to make life-and-death decisions based on what they perceive a patient's quality of life to be," said Jerri Ward, the lawyer representing Clark. "It's unfortunate Texas has become ground-zero for this futile-care movement."

Even without Ward taking the matter to court, Clark's case galvanized hundreds of supporters around the country. Online forums and blogs aired details of her sister's campaign to stop St. Luke's from pulling the plug and opponents of the plan flooded the hospital with outraged phone calls. A small protest was held outside St. Luke's last weekend.

Blogs are never going to displace mainstream media and basic journalism, but one function that blogs (posts and the ensuing conversation) do perform is to act as shadow editors -- to push stories that aren't getting attention, to push angles that aren't getting attention, to illustrate biases and other mistakes in reporting, and the like. In this instance, there's not much doubt that blogs helped this story to bubble up and get the attention of mainstream press.

As for the issue itself, we've been discussing it for a while in our forum (see the RELATED links at the end), with a healthy back-and-forth on both the pros and cons of the Texas law. Some of us find the following news heartening:

The case comes a year after three high-profile cases in Houston. In one, Texas Children's Hospital removed from life support a 6-month-old boy with a fatal form of dwarfism. In another, courtroom-wrangling by the lawyer of a 68-year-old man in a persistent vegetative state extended the 10-day deadline and gave the family time to find another facility, where he died four months later. And in the last, a 6-month-old girl with leukemia died five days before Memorial Hermann Children's Hospital planned to unplug her respirator.

Those cases and others — Ward filed a petition Thursday in Austin in another such case — prompted the reassessment going on in the capital, said Greg Hooser, an attorney and consultant leading the meetings. He said the reforms likely will include an extension of the 10-day notification period.

Dr. William Winslade, a prominent bioethicist at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, said the reforms should include a more impartial process.

"One problem with the law is that it gives all the bargaining power to the hospital and doctors," Winslade said. "I think it would be better if an external mediator looked at cases. I'm sympathetic to hospitals on these issues, but I've talked to too many families who feel browbeaten and without recourse."

Given how this law has played out in a number of instances and the controversy it has generated, surely nobody can object to a reassessment.

UPDATE: Right Wing News is now reporting that St. Luke's has nixed the deal to transfer Clark.

UPDATE 2 (04-29-2006): The Chronicle reports that the Illinois facility nixed the deal.

UPDATE 3 (04-29-2006): Wesley Smith offers some thoughts on the futile-care law at play here.

BLOGVERSATION: Cvstos Fidei, TBIFOC.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/28/06 09:19 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (7)

Sheila Jackson Lee arrested outside Sudanese embassy

Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee was arrested today with four other members of Congress, for protesting outside the Sudanese embassy:

Five Congress members were willingly arrested and led away from the Sudanese Embassy in plastic handcuffs Friday in protest of the Sudanese government’s role in atrocities in the Darfur region.

“The slaughter of the people of Darfur must end,” Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif., a Holocaust survivor who founded the Congressional Human Rights Caucus, said from the embassy steps before his arrest.

Four other Democratic Congress members — James McGovern and John Olver of Massachusetts, Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas and Jim Moran of Virginia — were among 11 protesters arrested on charges of disorderly conduct and unlawful assembly, a misdemeanor subject to a fine.

“We must hold the Sudanese government accountable for the attacks they have supported on their own citizens in Darfur,” Olver said.

Dozens of demonstrators carried signs, some reading “Stop the slaughter” and “Women of Darfur suffer multiple gang rapes,” in front of the embassy Friday morning.

The protesters cheered as the Congress members and others were cuffed, hands behind their backs, with plastic ties and quietly led to a white police van by U.S. Secret Service uniformed officers.

The arrests were expected. Lantos’ office issued a news release about them in advance.

Ordinarily, we'd make light of the Congresswoman's penchant for latching on to publicity and cameras, but at least this time she brought the media spotlight to an issue that certainly deserves it.

BLOGVERSATION: Houston Democrats.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/28/06 01:15 PM | Houston People | Technorati | Comments (16)

Sorry about the disruption

Our web host experienced a massive denial of service attack earlier today, and it rendered quite a few familiar sites unavailable in addition to ours.

As Matt Bramanti notes, the problem has been isolated, and things seem to be getting back to normal.

We join him and others in flipping the bird to the enemies of civilization who were responsible for the crude attempt to squelch speech.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/28/06 12:09 PM | Announcements | Technorati | Comments (1)

27 April 2006

KTRH: METRO, Siemens disagree on stray-current problem

KTRH-740 reports on the ongoing concerns over stray current along the METRO rail line:

At a cost of hundreds of thousands of dollars, Metro has already fixed damage along the line thought to have been caused by electrical current eating away at metal bridge anchors around the tracks.

Engineers are still performing assessments, but a February report from Siemens Transportation Systems, the company that built the line, says no damage has been caused to "either utility lines or Metro facilities due to stray current."

Metro disagrees. The transportation authority says other experts have found evidence of electrical leakage at spots along the line and have suggested more tests be done.

Local METRO watchdog Tom Bazan has experienced great difficulty getting METRO to comply with his numerous public information requests on the stray-current issue, but it doesn't seem to be a problem that's going away anytime soon, especially if METRO and the contractor are now squabbling over the extent of the problem.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/27/06 07:57 PM | Houston Transit | Technorati | Comments (8)

Gibbs & Bruns back out of travel firm lawsuit revenue stream

The Houston Business Journal's Jenna Colley reports that Mayor White has suffered a setback in his bid to sue internet travel firms:

Prominent Houston law firm Gibbs & Bruns LLP has bowed out of plans to represent the City of Houston in its fight to recapture Hotel Occupancy Taxes from online travel companies, forcing the city to choose another firm from scratch.

According to Houston City Attorney Arturo Michel, Gibbs & Bruns' decision centered around information contained in a memo issued by Houston City Controller Annise Parker to Houston City Councilmembers on April 11 that questioned the city's ability to recapture back HOT taxes from online travel companies such as Expedia and Travelocity.

So far, no formal legal action has been filed by the city.

According to Michel, Gibbs & Bruns attorneys expressed concern over the effects that such a memo from a high-ranking city official like Parker could have on any potential litigation.

Officials with Gibbs & Bruns could not immediately be reached for comment.

Michel called the firm's decision an overreaction and pledged to work toward hiring another firm to take the case.

For weeks, the contract with Gibbs & Bruns has faced delays as some city councilmembers wrangled over the possibility of securing a legal victory against the online travel companies.

It's doubtful that Mayor White will be deterred in his pursuit of this new revenue stream.

PREVIOUSLY: Mayor White concocts creative new revenue stream, White plan to sue internet travel companies delayed by council.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/27/06 07:47 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (1)

Fighting crime: A van AND an acronym!

Yesterday, we learned that HPD would be breaking out a new crimefighting van to take on the rising murder rate.

Today's reporting suggests that HPD is breaking out all the stops. Not only will there be a new van to fight crime, but Chief Hurtt has unveiled a new acronym:

Houston police hope a new mobile command center will help fight crime in the city's most dangerous neighborhoods, KPRC Local 2 reported Thursday.

U-net, which stands for Unified Neighborhood Enhancement Team, is a police station on wheels where officers can access information and process criminals.

[snip]

U-net was unveiled Wednesday at a substation on Fondren and West Bellfort in southwest Houston.

In a Lone Star Times exclusive, Matt Bramanti managed to get a photo of the U-Net van in action.

MayorWhiteChiefHurtt clearly have the bad guys on the run now!

BLOGVERSATION: Cigars, Donuts, and Coffee.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/27/06 07:29 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (1)

Life calls...

...and I must answer.

Things will be hectic for me for the next few days, so I am going to take a break from blogging until next week.

Have a wonderful weekend everyone!

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/27/06 06:06 AM | Announcements | Technorati | Comments (3)

The sex tape that wasn't

Remember KHOU-11's breathless reporting of a SEX TAPE at a local high school?

11 News has learned about a tape that shows two students having sex on the dance floor at a school-sponsored event.

We've learned someone is selling the tape at Madison High School.

[snip]

Sources told 11 News that during the function, inappropriate sexual behavior took place, behavior that was videotaped by a student and then burned to dozens of discs.

Well, never mind:

Vice investigators could not find obvious signs of sexual contact depicted in a video of a Valentine's dance sponsored by Madison High School, police said on Wednesday.

"By looking at the tape, you can't make any conclusions that there was obvious lewdness, but you might have parents and others say that some actions might have been inappropriate," said John Cannon, a Houston Police Department spokesman.

[snip]

The tape itself does not constitute enough evidence to charge anyone at the dance with public lewdness, Cannon said.

Both HPD and HISD are continuing to investigate. It would seem that some type of "dirty dancing" took place, but is that really so shocking these days? Look what Hollywood routinely offers up.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/27/06 05:58 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (4)

26 April 2006

Murder rate up; City to deploy crime van

The Houston Police Department has released crime statistics for the first quarter of 2006, and the numbers aren't good.

Since most media outlets in town are likely to be reporting the White Administration's spin on the numbers, it's helpful that KHOU-11 has posted the actual stats to its website in the form of a PDF file.

The raw number of murders in the first quarter of 2006 is up 18.4% from the same period in 2005, according to the report, and overall incidents of violent crime are up 6.1%. The number of homicides per 100,000 residents is up 10.8% from 2005, and overall violent crime (per 100,000 residents) is down by 0.6%.

Both sets of numbers are helpful (raw numbers are useful, and so are numbers that take into account population), but it will be interesting to see which ones are reported by various media outlets and how they work the White press shop's spin into their reporting.

KHOU's Amy Tortolani reports that Mayor White is promising action:

"The murder rate is just unacceptable." said Mayor White. The situation is so alarming that Wednesday, Mayor White asked city leaders to take steps to attack the problem.

Houston Police Captain Dwayne Ready said his department is up to the challenge and will be moving into high crime neighborhoods. "This will be different bringing command van right out there in the field whereever officers are deployed," he said.

A van?

Man, Mayor White sure knows how to put the bad guys on the run!

Wouldn't it be cool if they painted it to look like the Mystery Machine from the Scooby Doo cartoons, only with a big "FEAR REDUCTION INITIATIVE" slapped on the side?

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/26/06 06:24 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (14)

KPRC: City continues to pursue loan for controversial developer

In November of last year, Richard Connelly shined some light on a seemingly arcane bit of business on Mayor White's agenda:

It's probably not a great idea for a city government to do business with a developer of low-income housing if that developer is the subject of an FBI probe that may bring down Dallas's mayor pro tem.

So it's likely a good thing that Houston didn't lend developer Brian Potashnik $2.3 million, as it planned to do at one time.

But how it reached that decision shows the city bureaucracy is still a wondrous thing to behold.

Approval of the two loans to Potashnik was on the agenda of City Council's Housing Committee November 15; the meeting ended before they reached the item, so discussion was rescheduled for November 21. Between those dates, committee chair Shelley Sekula-Gibbs was asked (by a Houston Press reporter) whether she knew about the FBI investigation.

It turns out she did, and had asked the city's director of housing, Milton Wilson -- all the way back in June, when a deal with Potashnik was first proposed -- to respond to her concerns about the Dallas matter. She never heard back from him.

"We have had some very ill-conceived, ill-advised relationships with…affordable-housing developers in the past, and we should be scrutinizing these things very carefully," Sekula-Gibbs says. "It really bothers me that we were not given more detail on this project."

Wilson says he didn't get back to the councilwoman because the proposed deal was dead, and had been dead since shortly after it first came up. (This all concerns the arcane and Byzantine world of HUD, so just accept the fact that both the housing projects in question have already been finished.)

Just to make things more confusing, the mayor's office tried to resuscitate the deal after its demise. Aides there wanted to redirect money to the project partly because the city had placed some Katrina evacuees in the apartment complexes.

So, as far as the council's Housing Committee was concerned, they were still being asked to get in bed with Potashnik and weren't getting any response to their concerns about that potential hookup. Wilson, however, says he would have told the committee to ignore the item if they had reached it at the November 21 meeting.

Right.

Here's a report on KPRC-2's website today:

A Dallas developer wants a $2.3 million loan from Houston, but some city council members say it's risky business as a bailout that could cost taxpayers, the KPRC Local 2 Troubleshooters reported Tuesday.

Brian Potashnik is developing apartment complexes in Houston and asking Houston City Council for a $2.3 million loan with your tax dollars. He's also at the center of an FBI investigation in north Texas.

The cash is needed because his company, Southwest Properties, missed out on federal funds that were linked to a development contract that he signed with the city. He lost the federal money because some city leaders said his company violated the contract.

"I don't want anyone to think they can not live up to their contract obligations and just come to city council and change the contract," Houston City Councilman M. J. Khan said.

The contract required Southwest Properties to secure certain bonds before building two senior citizen apartment complexes. But that did not happen and they were built anyway, the Troubleshooters reported. One of them is on Airline and the other is located on Aldine Bender near Interstate 45.

[snip]

White's staff has been pushing for the loan despite the broken contract.

"We entered into negotiations with the owner to try to find a way that we could mitigate the fact that they had not complied with the requirements of the contract," said John Walsh, the mayor's housing aide.

[snip]

Council members grilled him about the FBI investigation in Dallas, where city leaders are accused of taking free rent in exchange for approving his projects.

Potashnik told Houston City Council that he did nothing improper, but he would not talk to the Troubleshooters about any of it.

[snip]

Council members are getting the full court press for the loan, even from Mayor White, the station reported.

In a memo, White called both of the projects "high quality" and he alluded to the FBI probe in Dallas, saying it shouldn't be a problem in Houston, even if wrongdoing is found.

But enough council members are bothered about all of the questions surrounding the loan of tax money that the vote could be delayed Wednesday or council could vote it down.

It sounds like business as usual at City Hall. Maybe that is what Mayor White means when he talks about running the city like a business.

RELATED: Nonprofit's 'loan' helped builder profit (Dallas Morning News), Investors sue developer entangled in City Hall investigation (Dallas Morning News), Stacked deck (Dallas Observer), Firm in Dallas probe has housing projects pending in Houston (Houston Chronicle, 06/23/2005).

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/26/06 10:52 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (1)

25 April 2006

Controller Parker shuts down special Council bank accounts

KHOU-11's News Blog reports an interesting little thing that was discovered during the Bonusgate investigation and how it's now been shut down:

Houston City Controller shuts down 11 special bank accounts set up by councilmembers and routed through the city's books.

Houston City Controller Annise Parker has shut down 11 special bank accounts set up by several councilmembers.

Parker says she closed the accounts in order to prevent any inadvertent violations of campaign finance laws or city laws.

The accounts, which were discovered during the mayor pro tem bonus scandal investigation, were set up to raise donations for community events.

They were operated as non-profits under the control of individual council members.

KEVIN WHITED ADDS: Let's see, today is April 25.

Here is what the Chronicle editorial board wrote about the matter on March 8:

The district attorney is deciding whether to charge the four city employees. With both Mayor White and Councilwoman Alvarado providing full cooperation, the investigation of City Hall's bonusgate should be quickly put behind us.

It's a good thing nobody in town pays much attention to the Chronicle editorial board and the investigation continues. Otherwise, who knows how many "inadvertent" abuses might have occurred?

UPDATE (04-26-2006): KHOU posts a news report, as does the Chronicle.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/25/06 04:21 PM | Houston Politics | Technorati | Comments (0)

Speaking of thieves...

The Chronicle's blogging features editor is all riled up today on the subject of intellectual thieves (and for the record, this sort of thing riles us up too):

But see, when I steal, I footnote. Kids today! They think the whole world is out there for them to sample. Intellectual property is soooo over.

Just ask the smart-aleck kid from Harvard (eccchhh!) who got the big book contract. Well, duh, I could have gotten a book contract at 19, too, if I'd decided to steal somebody else's entire oeuvre.

19?

Some newspapers don't really mind if featured veteran columnists borrow the work of others without proper attribution (and then offer a lame non-apology after getting caught).

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/25/06 04:21 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (1)

Chron politics section overloads on New Orleans

Chris Elam notes that the Chronicle politics section has a disproportionate number of stories about New Orleans today.

Perhaps Chron.com could just retitle "Politics" as "Times-Picayune" and be done with it?

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/25/06 03:42 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)

Press-release reporting, Austin-bureau style

A security breach has compromised the personal information of students of the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas, according to a press release from the school.

The press release recounts a previous security breach:

A similar security breach took place in 2003. Former student Christopher Phillips was found guilty of accessing protected computers without authorization and possession of stolen Social Security numbers.

Interestingly, Janet Elliott's reporting for the Chronicle's Austin bureau also recounts the previous incident:

A similar security breach took place in 2003. Former student Christopher Phillips was found guilty of accessing protected computers without authorization and possession of stolen Social Security numbers.

That looks strikingly similar. Maybe the newspaper should have just posted the press release?

BLOGVERSATION: Lone Star Times, Mattsapundit.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/25/06 12:02 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (1)

Will Enron PR lessons help Carol Alvarado?

(Temporarily only a) Councilwoman Carol Alvarado has an Enron tie? Kinda, sorta, according to Isiah Carey:

Mark Palmer was one of the few high profile executives at Enron not indicted in the ongoing probe. He now runs a public relations firm, Public Strategies. The agency is in charge of salvaging former Houston Mayor Pro-Tem Carol Alvarado's image after bonus-gate. So far Palmer's partner, Joe Householder, has always advised Alvarado to address her city scandal issues. I'm sure he knows bonus-gate is not gonna go away...

And playing the victim is not a winning strategy either.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/25/06 11:53 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)

24 April 2006

Help Andrea Clarke

John Hawkins at Right Wing News blog came across a disturbing story playing out right here in Houston. It involves a woman who is on a respirator and receiving dialysis, and hospital officials have decided to end those treatments:

My sister, Andrea Clarke, is at St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital in Houston, TX.

The hospital ethics committee met the day before yesterday and concluded that Andrea's treatment (respirator and dialysis) should be discontinued. We have ten days to move her from that hospital or they will "pull the plug" and let Andrea die. Andrea, until a few days ago, when the physicians decided to increase her pain medication and anesthetize her into unconsciousness, was fully able to make her own medical decisions and had decided that she wanted life saving treatment until she dies naturally. We have learned that this is part of the process, when hospitals decided to declare the "medical futility" of continueing treatment for a patient. But, this is not a Terry Schiavo case; not anything like it. Andrea, when she is not medicated into unconsciousness (and even when she is, and the medication has worn off to some degree) is aware and cognizant. She has suffered no brain damage to the parts of her brain responsible for thought and reason, or speech. She has only suffered loss of some motor control.

[snip]

Houston hospitals have a policy in that once the medical treatment of a patient has been deemed "medically futile" no other hospital in the area will accept transfer of that patient to their facility. This means that the patient, who is usually in a very delicate condition anyway, has to be transported over a long distance, in order to receive care.

That is from the original story that Hawkins saw. Subsequently, Hawkins spoke to Andrea Clarke's sister and here's what he learned:

She told me that her sister recently had surgery for a heart condition. After surgery, she developed an infection and that's why she's so weak and needs a respirator to breathe. Again, her sister is not brain dead, she can speak, and she does not want the hospital to let her die.

Moreover, disturbingly, according to Ms. Childers there is a doctor at St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital who has examined her sister and said that he thinks she has a chance to recover. Imagine that, folks -- being sick, having the odds against you, but wanting to fight for your life -- and having the hospital that's treating you cut you off at the knees when you're at your most vulnerable.

Melanie has told me that she has been trying to find another hospital that will take her sister before the deadline, but she's had no success so far (even though her sister has insurance) and St. Luke's and a social worker assigned to the case have been of little or no help.

[snip]

Update #2 ***: I've just gotten off of a phone conversation with Andrea Clarke's lawyer, Jerri Ward of Garlo Ward.

I had her look over this post and she did confirm all the details and added a few more. She said that Andrew Clarke is widower, with a 23 year old son, and she does not want to die.

She also added that the hospital's ethics committee held the meeting where they decided to terminate Andrea at 7 AM and refused to reschedule it, which led to Andrea Clarke's family sleeping in the parking garage in order to make it on time and Jerri not being able to make it.

The deadline for Andrea Clarke is Sunday and Jerri said she'll be exploring "all legal avenues" in an effort to stop it, but because of the way the law is written in Texas, she's not confident she can get Andrea Clarke into a new facility or keep St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital from terminating Andrea Clarke's medical care.

I can't recall seeing anything about this in our local media, but if you have, please forward the link so I can include it.

I hope this story will receive some attention so Ms. Clarke's family will have the time they need in order to move her to another hospital. I'm no expert, but it sounds as though Andrea Clarke wants to live, her family wants her to live, and even a doctor has said she can recover. It is unconscionable that she would not be given that chance.

UPDATE: KHOU-11 is now reporting the story.

BLOGVERSATION: Cvstos Fidei, Lone Star Times, Texas Rainmaker.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/24/06 08:51 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (34)

Outstanding property tax radio

Dan Patrick (KSEV-700) has just finished debating someone, whose name I couldn't quite catch, on the Sharp Tax Plan.

Dan's position was that this really is a tax increase, albeit on some businesses; that without an appraisal cap, any property tax cut is meaningless and temporary due to property tax creep; that the state never discusses cutting spending; and that with a healthy surplus, the state of Texas should be returning the overpaid revenue to the taxpayers.

Amen!

The gentleman he was debating (Tom something) argued that this is a shift in taxation to some businesses, and is not really raising taxes.

Dan said that the state will be raising the amount of taxes it collects by $4 billion per year through this new business tax, and through property tax creep, any reduction in property taxes will take two years to be wiped out. Ugh.

This is by far THE issue that will see Dan elected to the state Senate, and if he can stay focused and not get swallowed up by all the schmoozing and comity crap that seems to plague legislative bodies, he could shake things up in Austin.

BLOGVERSATION: Lone Star Times

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/24/06 05:08 PM | Houston Media | Technorati | Comments (6)

Food and drink roundup (04-24-2006 edition)

Time for a quick and easy food and drink roundup.

Alison Cook does her turn reviewing Dolce Vita Pizzeria Enoteca and rates it quite highly.

Robb Walsh finds the normal hour-and-a-half wait at Ra Sushi gets shorter if the hostess is slipped some cash. Maybe there's a real dearth of trendy restaurants on my fave list, but do people really slip twenties (or more) to cut in line at these restaurants? He also stops by the new Floyd's Cajun Seafood House.

Dai Huynh goes crazy for peppercorns. This isn't your mom's salt and pepper.

Ken Hoffman checks out Papa John's new Kong's King-Size Pizza. Twenty four grams of fat per serving not enough for ya (yes, one slice is one serving)? He then tries the new French Toast Sandwich from Burger King, which rings in at 32 grams of fat. Do we really need fast food sandwiches made with fried bread?

And Lance Scott Walker makes Mocha Life sound comfy.

World Class, all of it. Enjoy!!

Posted by Callie Markantonis @ 04/24/06 01:05 PM | Houston Life | Technorati | Comments (3)

Is Houston world-class enough for the Olympics?

George DeMontrond hopes so:

Monday morning, the Houston 2012 Foundation Chairman George DeMontrond will present a report to City Council members on the latest push to eventually get the games.

He said they will make recommendations for future bids.

God help Houston.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/24/06 09:28 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (7)

Richmond rail line voted down before

Rad Sallee's Move It! column today says that Richmond Avenue rail is not a new idea. It was first proposed back in the early 1980s, but ran into problems:

Retired architect Edward "Ted" Richardson dropped by last week with some interesting reading: two environmental impact statements that the Metropolitan Transit Authority produced in the early 1980s for what it then called the "Southwest/Westpark corridor."

[snip]

An interesting sidelight to today's debate: Both street-level light rail as a transit mode, and Richmond as a route, were ruled out. The 1980 draft environmental statement says light rail would cause "severe traffic disruption on major cross streets and operate at relatively low speed."

And guess what? A vote was held:

Voters turned down that plan by a scorching 62 percent to 38 percent. Two decades later, by contrast, they approved — narrowly — the plan that's binding now.

Ahhh, but voters did not approve a Richmond rail line in 2003. They (barely) approved (they thought) a Westpark rail line. Perhaps we now see why Metro didn't put Richmond language on the 2003 ballot.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/24/06 09:25 AM | Houston Transit | Technorati | Comments (6)

Metro's new smart card system appears to be working

Now that Metro has a new company working on its smart card system, things appear to be moving along at a much faster clip:

Some bus riders may already have noticed a small box mounted beside the bulky unit. The new readers are not only sleeker than the ones they replace, they are smarter and a lot more durable — with no moving parts.

Like the existing cards, the "smart cards" that work with the new readers will be sold at Metro Ride Stores and at retail outlets. But in place of a magnetic strip that can be programmed with digital code, they have an embedded computer chip.

Both types of card can keep track of fare charges, but the old cards had to be inserted into the reader, and riders needed a separate card for each type of fare purchased: day passes good for 24 hours from time of purchase; time passes good for seven, 30 or 365 days after first use; and stored-value cards that offered discount fares for paying in advance.

A single smart card can be programmed any of these ways, and will work on buses or MetroRail trains.

Now, if we could just get Metro to practice fare enforcement (turnstiles, perhaps?) on MetroRail.

Rad Sallee's story includes the big dollar contract details:

Metro terminated Cubic's $8.5 million contract in March 2005 and hired Ascom (later bought by ACS) in August. Lobron said the ACS contract, for up to $20 million, covers much more than Metro had asked from Cubic, including marketing assistance, a public education campaign, a help desk and other services. To date, $14 million has been spent, he said.

Meanwhile, Cubic has sued to collect the $4 million unpaid balance on its contract. The case is pending in state district court.

Cubic is suing to get the balance of a contract when it never delivered a working product? Unbelievable. For some reason I had thought Metro was suing to get back all the money it had paid to Cubic, but apparently not, so that's four million taxpayer dollars down the drain.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/24/06 08:37 AM | Houston Transit | Technorati | Comments (3)

Black voter turnout in New Orleans was big...or maybe not

What to make of New Orleans' mayoral election? According to the Chronicle, black voters made the difference for Mayor Ray Nagin:

The most intriguing news out of this city's mayoral primary election is the story of what didn't happen: White voters failed to dominate at the polls Saturday as thousands of black voters returned home.

Nearly eight months after Hurricane Katrina decimated the majority of New Orleans' black neighborhoods, black voters kept incumbent Mayor C. Ray Nagin's candidacy alive, casting an estimated 90 percent of votes in his favor.

But according to the New York Times, black voter turnout was disappointing:

Black residents, whose neighborhoods were the most devastated by the storm, voted in much smaller numbers than whites did on Saturday, even more so than usual. White turnout is usually higher than black turnout, but the gap was about double what it is normally, analysts said Sunday.

As a result, most of the votes here were cast against Mr. Nagin, who is black, even though he came out on top in a crowded field, with 38 percent of the vote. If that trend holds, New Orleans will elect its first white mayor in nearly 30 years on May 20, when Mr. Nagin will face Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu, who got 29 percent, in a runoff.

Wouldn't it be interesting to take race completely out of this story and see how the media reports the election returns?

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/24/06 08:16 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (9)

23 April 2006

HPD officer earns more than mayor; Chief Hurtt unconcerned

Chronicle reporters Matt Stiles and Steve McVicker report today on an HPD officer whose salary topped that of Mayor White last year:

As a senior officer in the Houston Police Department, William Lindsey Jr. received a salary of about $72,000 last year.

Because he is on the department's DWI Task Force, however, Lindsey's overtime pay put him at an income level rivaling Mayor Bill White and Police Chief Harold Hurtt.

The 27-year HPD veteran grossed more than $100,000 in overtime pay in 2005, and he wasn't the only task force member pulling in a six-figure income.

Two others in the unit, including Lindsey's supervisor, were boosted above the $100,000 income level last year with significant help from overtime pay.

Though police and prosecutors defend the hefty overtime as an effective means of getting drunken drivers off Houston's streets, critics of the practice say many of those hours are an unnecessary expense that increases the risk of putting physically and mentally fatigued officers on duty.

Lindsey's total income of more than $172,576 from HPD last year put his pay above White's $165,000 but below Hurtt's $184,000. The mayor and police chief are not eligible for overtime pay.

Among the other task force members with six-figure incomes in 2005 was Lindsey's supervisor, Sgt. Edward Robinson, whose $76,055 in overtime pay boosted his overall compensation to $161,722.

Given the previous reporting by Stiles on the HPD bonus program for mechanics, this is not terribly surprising. However, one does wonder about the financial management and accountability at HPD.

Or I should say, this one wonders. The guy in charge of the department seems wholly unconcerned:

Hurtt, who learned about the high overtime pay after Chronicle inquiries, said he doesn't worry about the public's perception of the spending.

Apparently, he's more worried about truly important matters for HPD -- new badges, cameras for Tasers, red-light cameras, renegade downtown pedestrians, crimefighting by acronym, and our very favorite, the Fear Reduction Initiative.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/23/06 10:47 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (12)

The B-Team reports/emotes on Slade

The Chronicle's Matthew Tresaugue has done some excellent work covering Priscilla Slade and her spending scandal at Texas Southern University.

Unfortunately, Tresaugue's name is nowhere to be found on the weekend reporting on the Slade affair, but we have one story that's pretty much a recap of his reporting and two stories heavy on emoting and enabling.

To start off the B-Team reporting, KHOU-11 runs Pam Easton's Associated Press account of the Slade scandal. Here's an excerpt:

Priscilla Slade was one of Texas Southern University’s biggest cheerleaders as its president, nearly doubling enrollment, constructing new academic buildings and overhauling the financial aid system.

Slade became a popular and high-profile president during more than six years leading the historically black university — the alma mater of the late U.S. Rep. Barbara Jordan and other notables.

But her accomplishments have taken a back seat to scandal.

Slade was fired last week and faces a criminal investigation into her use of state money. She’s accused of improperly spending $87,000 to furnish her home, $138,000 on landscaping and exterior improvements, and $56,000 on security related equipment and labor.

That all seems accurate and familiar. Who knows, maybe Easton even read Tresaugue's reporting, even though it's nowhere acknowledged in the AP story.

The Chronicle posted a story today by David Ellison about "revived anxiety" at TSU:

Texas Southern University regents last week conjured up ghosts of the past.

In voting 8-1 to fire President Priscilla Slade, the board revived bitter memories among alumni and supporters in Houston's black community of the revolving door in the president's office before Slade took over in 1999. The action also invoked a lurking dread: that lawmakers in Austin might try to merge the historically black school with another university system or — worse — shut it down.

"I think the merger issue is coming up, absolutely," warned Minister Robert Muhammad, of the Nation of Islam's southwest region. "It's difficult when you lose your independence. That's about to happen here."

While other officials were quick to dispute that, the reaction shows that anxiety over Slade's departure is clearly about more than money. Even those who support her dismissal — amid allegations of nearly $650,000 in questionable spending — credit Slade with saving the university from financial ruin. Alumni and other supporters fear the loss of momentum for future leadership.

"Without her leadership, I'm not really sure what the future holds for Texas Southern," said Keith Scott, a member of the TSU Alumni Austin Chapter. "Her leadership was very important and very crucial."

Here's a novel thought for Mr. Ellison (who actually complains in the story that "[a]ttempts to contact alumni who supported the firing ... were unsuccessful"): Instead of interviewing a handful of "important" loudmouths, why not go to the campus and ask as many students as possible what they think of a university president who improperly uses university funds to support a lavish personal lifestyle, rather than making sure those funds support student aid or academics?

The Chronicle's insipid "Sunday Conversation" also makes a return (unfortunately), and it's a conversation between a TSU alum and... David Ellison (busy guy). Here's the introduction:

When Katrina LeVert learned of the firing of Texas Southern University President Priscilla Slade last week, the TSU graduate sent an e-mail to the school's alumni affairs office opposing the governing board's decision. LeVert, a legislative and regulatory specialist for a Houston company with a degree from Thomas M. Cooley Law School in Lansing, Mich., attended TSU from 1989-1993, before Slade was named president in 1999. A native of Biloxi, Miss., LeVert said she was so impressed with Slade's performance that she became active in the university's alumni association. Chronicle reporter David Ellison spoke with her last week.

The next time you don't like something that happens in the city of Houston -- like a white-collar thief being terminated for cause -- perhaps you should email Mr. Ellison (david.ellison@chron.com) and let him know about it. Maybe you too can take part in a Sunday Conversation with the local Hearst daily! I'd suggest keeping it pithy, as Bill O'Reilly says.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/23/06 10:09 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (2)

22 April 2006

Who is Boone Clayton?

It's nice that the Houston Hearst daily decided to send one of its Big 12 reporters out to cover the University of Houston baseball game last night.

It would be even nicer if the Big 12 reporter would check the Cougar roster or official box score before filing his report:

Memphis scored two early runs off Lincoln, jumping on his mid-90s fastball early in the count. Lincoln started throwing his curveball and changeup to set up his fastball, and the results were dominating.

The Cougars righthander retired the final 13 batters he faced and allowed only two base runners after falling behind 2-0 in the third inning. He struck out five of his final six batters before exiting after eight innings. Boone Clayton pitched the ninth and got the win.

His name is Clayton Boone.

Maybe the Big 12 reporter ought to spend a little more time reading Chron.com's excellent UH Sports blog. UH journalism student Ronnie Turner really does a nice job with it. Turner's post on last night's Cougar victory was filed at 9:30 pm, incidentally.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/22/06 08:33 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (7)

21 April 2006

Forbes: Astros 10th most valuable MLB franchise

The Houston Business Journal reports that Forbes has released its latest valuation of Major League Baseball franchises, and that the Astros rank tenth:

The Houston Astros are worth an estimated $416 million, the 10th most valuable franchise in Major League Baseball, according to Forbes.com.

In the special report, The Business of Baseball, Forbes ranks the New York Yankees as MLB's most valuable franchise, worth $1.03 billion. The biggest winner was the Washington Nationals, whose value rose 42 percent to $440 million to rank sixth out 30 MLB franchises.

[snip]

Forbes calculates revenue, operating incomes, stadium deals and a variety of other metrics in compiling team valuations.

Forbes estimates the Astros took in $173 million in revenue last season and earned $30.2 million before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization.

Instead of ringing up a friendly Chronicle reporter to argue that the team actually lost money, a team official deferred all questions to the league office, according to Brian McTaggart's reporting for the Chronicle.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/21/06 05:52 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (5)

City extends contract of waste disposal company that ripped it off

KTRK-13 reported on Wednesday that City Council granted a one-year contract extension to a waste-disposal company that overbilled the city:

A garbage collection company that overbilled Houston taxpayers will continue picking up your trash.

On Wednesday, the Houston city council granted Republic Waste a one year contract extension. Our 13 Undercover team found that Republic charged the $2 million for hauling trash that didn't belong to Houston residents. Mayor White pointed out that Republic paid back the money and fired employees.

White says it's cheaper to renew the contract instead of taking bids for a new garbage contract.

Today's Chronicle coverage, which surprisingly credits KTRK for breaking the original story, goes into further detail:

Republic agreed in February to a $2 million settlement with the city, as well as a $140,000 reimbursement for the audit, which was completed last week.

A second phase of the audit by Controller Annise Parker will examine other aspects of city trash collection.

The first phase confirmed that Republic, which picks up trash for 86,000 households in Houston, charged the city for collecting and disposing of tons of garbage from other cities. The company has more than $50 million in city contracts.

A separate investigation linked the wrongdoing to several company employees and showed that top officials played no part in the scheme.

Will Flower, a spokesman for Republic, said Wednesday's council vote shows the city has confidence in his company.

Councilwomen Addie Wiseman and Shelley Sekula-Gibbs voted against the contract. Wiseman said the company misused taxpayer dollars and violated the public's trust.

The vote was 12-2. Councilman Ronald Green was absent.

Is this an example of "running the city like a business," as Mayor White likes to put it?

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/21/06 05:31 PM | Houston Politics | Technorati | Comments (3)

Taqueria Arandas to close May 1 in support of illegal aliens

KHOU-11's Karla Barguiarena reports on a local restaurant chain's show of support for illegal aliens, replete with the debasement of the English language that has become the norm in these sorts of stories:

Supporters of immigration reform want to keep the heat on lawmakers to give undocumented workers a chance at U.S. citizenship.

One popular Houston restaurant chain is planning a boycott to show solidarity with the immigrants but some people worry it may backfire.

Since it opened its doors more than 20 years ago, Taqueria Arandas has never closed -- until now.

"Majority vote -- everyone wanted to close," said franchise president Judy Camarena.

On May 1, the Mexican Labor Day, all 41 restaurants and bakeries in the Arandas chain will close.

Owners say it's in support of their 2,500 employees who want to be part of the next big Hispanic protest which is a call to skip work and not spend a cent on May 1.

It's certainly the prerogative of the owners of Taqueria Arandas to close for any reason they want.

But, they shouldn't be surprised if some people don't appreciate their display of support for illegal immigration, or if immigration officials scrutinize the documentation of any inadequately documented workers that might be on the Arandas payroll.

BLOGVERSATION: Houblog.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/21/06 04:37 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (2)

Chief Hurtt's Thursday press conference

It appears Chief Hurtt held a press conference Thursday touching on a range of issues:

At a Thursday press conference, Chief Harold Hurtt said the force was doing extensive recruiting all over the country to beef up the staff.

The N.E.T.T. program used about 84,000 man hours, using $3 million.
About 2,800 people have been arrested as a result of the program, which targets areas that are hot spots for crime.

Chief Hurtt said the red light camera contract was still taking place, and they are currently testing tasers with audio-video cameras. They cost $400 more.

He also spoke on the shooting at an HISD school bus. He said he met with HISD on Thursday, but that the TAKS testing is slowing down the investigation.

Chief Hurtt said HPD was not involved in Wednesday's immigration sting.

I had hoped that there would be some stories posted today expounding on all those tidbits KHOU-11's News Blog reported, but all I can find so far is this from KUHF-88.7 on the Taser cameras:

In 2004, the department bought almost 4000 Tasers that don't have the audio and visual capabilities. Since then, they've been used hundreds of times to subdue suspects without using lethal force. Hurtt says it's important to have a visual record of Taser incidents to make sure officers are adhering to department policy when they use them.

"We see that as very valuable in being able to record the voice exchange between the suspect and the officer as well as observing the suspect's behavior prior to the deployment of the Taser."

Hurtt says it would cost about $1.5 million dollars to add Tasers with cameras to the force, something he says the department can't afford right now.

According to KPRC-2's story from earlier this week, the camera wouldn't start recording until the Taser was turned on, which would seem to leave very little prior behavior to be recorded.

And everyone who's surprised that HPD didn't participate in Wednesday's roundup of illegal immigrants, raise your hand.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/21/06 07:37 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (5)

20 April 2006

HPD releases sketch of suspected bus shooter (updated)

HPD has released a composite sketch in the HISD bus shooting incident:

A composite sketch was released Thursday of a man suspected of shooting at a bus filled with Houston Independent School District students, shattering a window, KPRC Local 2 reported.

[snip]

Police released the following description of the shooter -- an African-American man with a very dark complexion, average build, 6 foot 3 inches or taller, in his late teens or early 20s.

I guess since the sketch clearly shows a black man, local media can now include the full description.

So far this has only shown up on KPRC-2's website. We'll see if other local news sites follow suit.

UPDATE: The Chron has a new story posted with the headline, "Teens offer description of man who shot at HISD bus":

Police are crediting a sharp-eyed teenager with giving them a solid description of a man who fired a gun at a moving HISD bus.

The girl, 13, was among about 30 students riding the bus in the 9900 block of Ashville about 5 p.m. Tuesday when a bullet pierced a window two seats behind the driver.

She spotted a man standing near a church just before the single shot rang out.

What? You wanted more of a description than that? Too bad -- that's all the Chron's giving us.

KTRK-13's story includes the sketch and the description.

UPDATE (4-21-2006): KHOU-11 and KTRH-740 post the sketch. KTRH includes the description; KHOU does not.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/20/06 06:02 PM | Houston Media | Technorati | Comments (0)

19 April 2006

Casey dissects US News ranking of UH Law Center

The Chronicle's Rick Casey (yes, Rick Casey) dissects the recent US News law school rankings that may have played a part in Houston Law Center Dean Nancy Rapoport's recent decision to step down.

Here's an excerpt:

The magazine polls the dean and three faculty members at every law school. In that poll, Houston ranks slightly above SMU and well above Baylor. This counts for 25 percent of the U.S. News rankings.

But the magazine also polls more than 1,000 lawyers and judges for 15 percent of its rankings. In that poll, Houston scores miserably, well behind SMU and Baylor.

The school, with a relatively small endowment and state budget cuts, also is dragged down by resource issues such as student/faculty ratio.

But the single biggest negative factor is the low scores nationally among lawyers and judges.

Leiter suspects that the sample is skewed to the coasts, something a former U.S. News editor I spoke with denied. I think many lawyers may simply not know the school, but have an image of Houston that does not project an excellent law school.

There is a box for "don't know," but few lawyers I know would be comfortable checking that box.

The former U.S. News editor, who defended the rankings as helpful to students, himself expressed surprise.

"I would never think of Houston as being No. 2 in Texas by peer rankings," he said.

Clearly, the belief among those "in the know" is that the University of Houston Law Center is the second-best law school in Texas.

However, the low rankings nationally among lawyers and judges probably are a result of misperception, including a negative perception of Houston in general, but also a less-than-stellar perception of the University of Houston in general nationally. That's unfortunate.

PREVIOUSLY: UH Law Center dean resigns.

BLOGVERSATION: Houston's Clear Thinkers.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/19/06 10:32 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)

Selby profiles soon-to-be State Senator Patrick

Since we've recently linked articles that suggest local talker Dan Patrick is behaving more and more like a politician, it's only fair (and balanced) to link to Gardner Selby's recent story about Patrick in the Austin American Statesman:

He said he sought to succeed retiring Sen. Jon Lindsay in frustration over the GOP-majority Legislature falling short of cutting school property taxes, retooling how schools are funded and addressing illegal immigration.

Patrick touts a mix of goals not always associated with Republicans: higher teacher pay. Removing school administrators. Enhancing access to health insurance for children of the working poor. Spending surplus revenue on lowering property taxes, and paying for the cuts in future years by whacking away at the state budget.

He says that lowering the state cap on annual property appraisal increases from 10 percent to 5 percent should be on the Legislature's agenda (it's not yet), adding: "A tax cut without a cap is basically meaningless, because it will all disappear in two years. And we'll be sitting here in 2008 and be back to where we were today in terms of property taxes, and we'll have all these new business taxes. And business taxes affect everybody."

Of the two-thirds consensus requirement before measures win debate, Patrick said: "I want to see every major issue have good, old-fashioned honest debate."

The appraisal cap is Patrick's biggest issue, and his most likely winner.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/19/06 10:13 PM | Houston People | Technorati | Comments (0)

Bridging the digital divide - the series

Earlier this week, the Chronicle's Alexis Grant provided the latest installment of the newspaper's series, Bridging The Digital Divide, Downtown WiFi Bubble Style:

Cyberspace may be a freewheeling world, but most users still have to pay to surf it

That will likely be the case in Houston, even if access gets cheaper and more convenient once the city installs its proposed wireless network.

"I'm not sure we'd get a lot of interest from a multimillion-dollar investor that couldn't get a return on their investment," said Richard Lewis, the city's director of information technology. "Water is not free. Why should communications be free?"

The city is gearing up to choose a vendor that would finance and build a city WiFi (Wireless Fidelity) network. As envisioned now, it would be free for city government and in several public places around the city, including parks and libraries. But most residents and businesses would pay, albeit less than they do now, to access the high-speed network.

The city is requesting proposals for a network solely in downtown, estimated to cost about $300,000, Lewis said. The provider would then have the option of extending the network to other areas of the city.

Although a single contractor would provide the network, it would connect to various Internet service providers. The city would regulate the wholesale rate ISPs paid to the network, so the providers could charge consumers about $15 per month compared with the $30 to $50 now.

Grant continues to refer to what people pay "now." That is nonsensical, since right now there is no wifi bubble available to access across the whole of downtown, at any price. Perhaps she is referring to the cost of various wifi hotspots (although T-Mobile customers can use T-Mobile hotspots for as little at $19.99 per month, less than the $30-50 she continues to cite). Perhaps she is referring to the cost of residential broadband, in which case she is in error, since SBC Yahoo DSL is available for around $13 per month. In the next installment of Bridging The Digital Divide, Grant should really clarify those price figures she's been throwing about in the last two installments.

Substantively, Larry Hendrick has discussed the costs of "bridging the digital divide" as Mayor White proposes in some detail, concluding:

In the referenced article, the city has stated that they intend to cap the price at the $15-20/month range and I am here to tell you that the true cost will be much higher. There is no way around it if you look at the true cost to provide this service, and not the fairy tale the city is proposing.

Hendrick's post should be read in its entirety.

For the sake of balance, maybe Hendrick could even make an appearance in the Chron's next installment of Bridging the Digital Divide!

PREVIOUSLY: Bridging the digital divide, Grant/White style!.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/19/06 09:32 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (8)

The Houston Bowl is circling the drain

Last week, USA Today reported some troubling news about the Houston Bowl:

The payouts from last season's Houston Bowl have not yet been made in full, marking an unusually long wait for the conferences involved.

"It's the first time that has happened to the Big 12 in its 10-year history," said Bob Burda, assistant commissioner of communications for the league, which sent Iowa State to the bowl.

Including the 2005 season, Big 12 teams have 68 bowl appearances.

Houston Bowl executive director Shawn Bouley said Wednesday that he could not comment on the status of payouts, citing reasons of confidentiality.

Nearly a week later, the local Hearst daily decided the matter might be of interest to its readers:

Strapped by financial problems and waning attendance, the Houston Bowl could cease operations as early as next week, a college football official said Tuesday.

The 6-year-old bowl is currently without a sponsor, and the Big 12 and Mountain West conferences have yet to receive the full payout of $1.2 million each for participating in last year's game.

It looks as if Houston's lower-tier bowl is about to go the way of the Bluebonnet Bowl. Given recent attendance figures, it doesn't appear that very many people are going to miss it.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/19/06 03:00 PM | Houston Life | Technorati | Comments (5)

City budget will require borrowing, using cash reserves

KTRH-740 says the city of Houston will need to borrow and dip into its cash reserves, according to a new budget plan:

The City of Houston will borrow about $100 million against taxpayer money and spend cash reserves to make budget, according to planning documents delivered recently to City Council.

Mayor Bill White says there will be some borrowing for pension obligations, and it will use some cash surpluses that have been deliberately built up over the past two years.

White says City Council won't finalize the plans until it votes on a budget in June.

Look for Mayor White to use this as ammunition in his campaign to derail implementing Prop. 2.

PREVIOUSLY: City, METRO are enjoying sales tax windfall (April 15, 2006), City's credit rating outlook downgraded (March 12, 2006)

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/19/06 12:36 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (4)

Local media won't provide complete description of bus shooter

If you've been watching the news, you know that someone shot at an HISD school bus yesterday, injuring two students. Here's the suspect's description in the Chronicle's story:

A man wearing a red shirt and black pants fired at least two shots, striking the bus as it traveled on Ashville in south Houston about 5 p.m. Tuesday.

[snip]

Many students on the bus, however, gave police a description of the shooter, Abbott said.

Here's the description in KTRK-13's story:

Fortunately, no students suffered any serious injuries. They did tell police they saw a man running after the bus was hit, but it was only a vague description.

KHOU-11:

Some of the students onboard did see the alleged shooter running away from the scene, and they have provided police with a description.

KPRC-2 and KTRH-740 do not mention any sort of suspect description in their stories.

Now, here's the suspect's description that was provided to local media:

The students on the bus described the suspect as a black male, in his late teens or early 20s, with a "thick" build, wearing a red shirt with black pants.

Those were the details provided to police by the children on the bus.

So, there is someone on the loose who shot at a school bus filled with children, yet local media won't give the public the information provided by eyewitnesses that could help apprehend him.

We've been down this road before with the Chronicle, when Reader Rep. James Campbell explained why the paper often decides to leave race out of descriptions:

[Read More]

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/19/06 10:19 AM | Houston Media | Technorati | Comments (2)

HPD considers buying cameras for Tasers

KPRC-2 reports that HPD has found yet another new money-spending opportunity:

The use of tasers by police officers has been at the center of controversy in Houston and across the country. To hopefully quiet critics, the Houston Police Department is considering putting cameras on all tasers. While the department hopes the cameras will help justify the use of the weapons, some officers question whether the results will justify the expense

[snip]

"Anytime we use them, we are confronting individuals who are so out of control and displaying such violent behavior that the officers don't have any other option," said Lt. Robert Manzo with the Houston Police Department.

To hopefully settle the debate, the Houston Police Department is strongly considering purchasing tiny cameras for every taser in the department.

The new cameras are actually part of a modified battery pack, which can record up to 90 minutes of both audio and video.

[snip]

Each camera costs $400. If the department decides to put cameras on all 3,700 tasers, that's nearly $1.5 million.

Isiah Carey got a heads up on this taser camera program a few days ago from an HPD officer who worries that the expenditure will cut into funds for basic policing needs.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/19/06 07:16 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (5)

18 April 2006

METRO gives drivers the green light to hit the Danger Train

Laurence Simon posts about his experience at a METRO light rail crossing today -- he literally watched the traffic lights go green while the train was in the intersection.

I saw the same thing happen earlier this week at Main and Elgin (noted as an update to this post).

It is true, as Laurence points out, that only a complete moron would hit the gas on green (without looking) at any intersection in Houston, let alone a Danger Train intersection. Still, as METRO seriously contemplates the insanity of laying a rail line down the middle of yet another heavily-trafficked street (Richmond), it might be nice if they could actually get the traffic lights working properly on their current experiment in dangerous transit.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/18/06 10:21 AM | Houston Transit | Technorati | Comments (10)

Mayor White is anxious for red light camera revenue to begin flowing

KTRH-740 is reporting that Mayor White is agitating for Council to approve the city's red light camera contract with American Traffic Solutions:

It appears a contract for red-light cameras will be pushed through Houston's City Council, although Mayor Bill White says he's still trying to convince council members to go with the American Traffic Solutions Co.

White says no elected officials have interfered with the selection process, and he doesn't believe politics will play a part in making a decision.

As a reminder, Kristen Mack recently discovered the connection between Mayor White and ATS:

HPD maintains that ATS won because it had the best overall package.

As is typical in efforts to land profitable city contracts, someone on every side has some City Hall connection.

ATS' ties are through former Texas Land Commissioner Gary Mauro, a good friend of White.

[snip]

Both worked in 1975 for then-U.S. Rep. Bob Krueger, D-New Braunfels. City Hall chatter to the contrary, Krueger says he has no ties to ATS.

But Mauro and White have other political connections. Mauro headed Bill Clinton's presidential campaigns in Texas. White worked in Clinton's administration as a deputy energy secretary.

And the reason for the contract challenge was because a requirement was changed as the red light camera test run got underway.

But the whole process has been shenanigan-free, Mayor White assures us.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/18/06 10:12 AM | Houston Transit | Technorati | Comments (11)

UH Law Center Dean resigns

UH Law Center Dean Nancy Rapoport has resigned, apparently rather unexpectedly. The Chronicle and Texas Lawyer have the story. Tom Kirkendall wonders if the latest U.S. News and World Report law school rankings are the reason, but TP suggests, in the comments to Tom's post, that the real reason might have more to do with relations between Dean Rapoport and faculty members.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/18/06 09:27 AM | Houston People | Technorati | Comments (4)

17 April 2006

City Hall performance-pay investigation continues (updated)

Remember back in early March, when the Chronicle Editorial LiveJournalists argued that there was nothing to see, and that it was time to move on from the City Hall bonus scandal?

Here's an excerpt from their editorial:

The district attorney is deciding whether to charge the four city employees. With both Mayor White and Councilwoman Alvarado providing full cooperation, the investigation of City Hall's bonusgate should be quickly put behind us.

Thankfully, nobody pays much attention to the Editorial LiveJournalists, certainly not the Chronicle's City Hall reporters, other local journalists, or local law enforcement. And so, following a March 24 story by Chronicle reporters Matt Stiles and Alexis Grant that analyzed HPD's odd bonus program for its mechanics, it appears that city officials AND the Harris County District Attorney's office are looking into the HPD bonus program.

KPRC-2 posts the following AP dispatch:

City Controller Annise Parker believes the department needs to review the plan.

"It shouldn't be a supervisor getting a bonus because his subordinate hits a target. It should be a supervisor getting a bonus because he exceeds his job," she said.

[snip]

Parker said the payments create the appearance that bosses give subordinates extra pay in an effort to increase their own.

With almost all mechanics earning incentive pay, Parker said the bar is set too low and the program's performance standards need to be completely re-evaluated.

Police commanders are also reviewing the program.

Executive Assistant Chief Martha Montalvo said police managers are sometimes eligible for incentives, but she isn't sure whether that should be the case for those in the fleet program.

"I don't think there was anything illegal about it. Would I like to make changes to it? Of course," she said.

But Montalvo said the program is worth the money because the average number of marked police vehicles available has increased about 5 percent since 2002. The productivity also has allowed the mechanics to work on other departments' vehicles.

Support staffers, such as inventory clerks, car attendants and administrative assistants, also get commissions if the mechanics beat expectations.

[snip]

Mayor Bill White has ordered a review of all the city's incentive pay plans but has defended them in general, saying, "Modern, successful organizations pay for performance."

Matt Stiles and Alexis Grant followed up on their original story:

Payroll records show that at least 12 fleet supervisors received extra pay under the police program. The bonuses were similar to those of the mechanics, who got more than $1 million since 2004 for speedy repair jobs. One of those mechanics earned more than $95,000 in extra pay, the Chronicle reported last month.

The fleet supervisor who received the most incentive pay was a shop manager. He got $47,000 extra during the period examined by the Chronicle. The division's second-highest ranking supervisor, who is responsible for administering the overall fleet-incentives program, got $32,000. Four other supervisors received more than $30,000 each, records show.

[snip]

Support staffers, such as inventory clerks, car attendants and administrative assistants, receive commissions if the mechanics beat expectations. Supervisors also get bonuses, depending on how well their mechanics perform, said Lt. Robert Manzo, a department spokesman.

Almost all the mechanics earned incentive pay. At least 34 of them were paid more than $10,000 since 2004, records show.

The number of mechanics receiving bonuses, Parker said, suggests that the bar is set too low.

"They need to completely re-evaluate what the performance standard is and base it not on some national average for people across the industry, but for mechanics in their shop who are doing jobs on the same cars over and over again," Parker said.

[snip]

Police officials declined requests for interviews with the incentive-pay recipients. They have not provided documentation showing that former Chief C.O. Bradford, who ran the force when the bonuses began as a pilot program in late 2002, signed off on the idea. Bradford could not be reached for comment.

"What I've been told is that the program was approved. I have not been able to find documents with signatures," Montalvo said, adding that officials in the city's Human Resources and Finance and Administration departments also searched without success.

It wasn't hard to guess that the Lee Brown/Clarence Bradford Reign of Error would come into play at some point.

It will be interesting to see what other matters come to light, as journalists and law-enforcement officials continue to investigate the matter (and to ignore the hapless Chronicle Editorial LiveJournalists, who really ought to take their own bizarre Easter advice and go on a pilgrimage -- preferably a LONG one).

UPDATE (04-18-2006): I've made a few minor edits above for clarity, in response to points raised by Matt Stiles in the comments.

UPDATE 2 (04-18-2006): Harris County District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal informs us that his office is not looking into the HPD mechanics' performance pay, and that reports to the contrary are erroneous.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/17/06 10:35 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (7)

TSU calls special meeting to discuss Slade

KPRC-2 reported on Friday that Texas Southern University has set a special meeting for this afternoon to discuss the future of President Priscilla Slade, who compounded her spending scandal by disregarding a request from regents not to talk about the matter:

The board was scheduled to meet May 5. But members may believe that it is time for the university to move forward and make a decision about Slade's future on Monday, the station reported.

Before a decision is made, the regents will review an audit conducted by the Bracewell & Giuliani law firm. It is investigating whether Slade used public money to lavishly landscape and furnish her Memorial-area home, as well as make other purchases not allowed on her contract.

Earlier this week, Slade began waging a public campaign to clear her name and reputation. She conducted radio and television interviews.

But it may have backfired because the regents had ordered her to remain silent during the investigation.

Matthew Tresaugue's reporting for the Chronicle over the weekend makes it sound as if the board is ready to make a decision:

"I'm still evaluating the situation, but I want to bring closure to it Monday," Diaz said. "The sooner we make a decision, the better off the university will be."

It's difficult to believe that Slade will retain her post much longer.

UPDATE: KHOU-11 just sent out an email blast that Slade has been terminated. The Chronicle, whose Matthew Tresaugue has owned this story, reports the following:

Priscilla Slade's seven-year run as president of the state's largest historically black university headed to an end tonight when Texas Southern University regents voted to fire her on the grounds that she misspent school money.

Slade's contract guarantees her the right to a public hearing before the firing becomes official and her attorney said she plans to request one. The hearing must be scheduled within a month.

If a PR firm advised Slade to go public, she should ask for a refund. Her termination became entirely predictable at that point.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/17/06 07:56 AM | Houston People | Technorati | Comments (15)

New sports podcast posted

There's a new blogHOUSTON sports podcast posted.

We talk a bit about Texans GM Charley Casserly's impending departure, as well as the usual local sports topics.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/17/06 07:36 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (2)

16 April 2006

Parking Commission chair already longing for more power, less accountability

KUHF's Jim Bell checks in on Houston's Public Parking Commission, which held its first meeting on Thursday. Already, the new entity seems to be focusing on ways to enhance its powers and decrease its accountability:

As constituted now, the Parking Commission has no authority to adopt rules or ordinances. It's just an advisory board, but [Commission Chairman Marvin] Katz says City Council is taking steps to change that.
"They are now working on certain drafts of modifications to the ordinances, that would perhaps give this commission certain authority, in the same manner that the planning commission has the authority to approve or disapprove plattes, City Council cannot second guess what the Planning Commission does. And I think the idea is to make certain things fall within the purview of this committee. (Q: But as things are now you're just an advisory group?) That is absolutely correct."
The 15 member Parking Commission is made up of people from the general public, city departments, and other agencies with some degree of control over public parking -- Planning and Development, Public Works and Engineering, Conventions and Entertainment, Metro and Harris County Commissioners Court.

Isn't it nice when chairmen of quasi-governmental bodies decide that it's second-guessing for the elected officials of the city to exercise their powers instead of delegating them to entities that are not directly accountable to voters?

It's only a matter of time before this body acquires greater powers -- perhaps eminent domain powers -- and finds a way to insulate its decisions from Council.

PREVIOUSLY: Parking Commission archives.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/16/06 11:21 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (3)

Editorial cartoon déjà vu (updated!)

Here's Nick Anderson's editorial cartoon dated April 14.

If it seems familiar to you, that's because it's oddly reminiscent of a Tom Toles' editorial cartoon that appeared in the Washington Post back in January.

More on the Toles' cartoon controversy here and here.

If Anderson's cartoon is meant to pay homage to Toles' cartoon, that really ought to be made much clearer.

UPDATE: In response to a couple of comments (from Laurence Simon and Rorschach) on his blog, Nick Anderson explains:

The cartoon is an obvious REFERENCE to the famous Toles cartoon. That's why it says "after Toles" under my signature. I emailed him a sketch and final copy of the cartoon. Needless to say, he got a kick out of it.

-Nick Anderson

With my (obviously) failing eyesight, I can barely see that tiny little "after Toles" thing Anderson's talking about.

You know, the reference is kinda in the spirit of Chron corrections -- teensy weensy.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/16/06 08:48 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (5)

Another close call with the Danger Train

It happened again: a local media person, who couldn't figure out why so many dumb Houston drivers were crashing into the Danger Train, experienced the problem first hand:

I was driving in downtown Houston near main when I came to the light rail. So when the light turned green I proceeded across the rails but in less than 1 second, and I do mean 1 second the light was yellow again and then red. And there was the light rail car right on me. I'm caught on the rail just as the light is turning red in less than a second or more...and I do mean no more. From this experience I assume in the engineering system the light rail car has the right of way. Meaning even if you have the green light and the rail is approaching the light will automatically change to accommodate the rail car. I see this as a very dangerous situation for drivers and pedestrians out there. Metro really needs to look at this issue because if it happened to me it's happened to others.

Let's build more!

KEVIN WHITED ADDS (04-17-2006): I was waiting at a red at Main and Elgin this morning at about 7 o'clock headed west, watching the train approach from the north (headed south). Before the train had cleared the intersection, the Elgin light turned green. If a car on the other side had hit the gas to head east across the intersection, it would have struck the train and would have had a green light to do so! This isn't the first time I've seen this happen at that intersection.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/16/06 07:51 AM | Houston Transit | Technorati | Comments (8)

15 April 2006

Chron editorial board neglects notable local example of collegiality

The Chronicle's Editorial LiveJournalists went on (and on and on and on) today about women and politics, with all the expected clichés about the more collegial environment that allegedly results from greater representation by women.

Here's an excerpt:

As it turns out, women do bring a distinct character to Congress — but it's not their politics. It's their greater focus on party-neutral legislation that aids mothers and children — and a more collegial way of doing business.

Locally, as Callie reminded me earlier, we've seen that more collegial approach manifest itself in the (temporarily!) former Mayor Pro Tem Carol Alvarado (allegedly) calling fellow female councilmember Shelley Sekula-Gibbs a "bitch" during public proceedings.

Maybe the clichés of the Editorial LiveJournalists only apply to Congress.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/15/06 09:55 PM | Houston Politics | Technorati | Comments (1)

City, METRO are enjoying sales tax windfall

State Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn released the latest sales tax revenue figures last Friday, and Houston and METRO are enjoying a windfall:

Year-to-date, sales tax allocations to local governments are up 17 percent, compared to this time last year.

Houston received a sales tax disbursement from the state of $31.5 million for April, up from $26.1 million in April 2005.

Harris County does not collect a sales tax, but the Metropolitan Transit Authority of Harris County assesses a 1-cent sales tax and received $32.6 million for the month.

With all that cash rolling in, one would think METRO could actually afford to add bus service (as promised in the METRO Solutions plan) instead of continuing to cut it, and one would think Mayor White could focus on priorities like crime, instead of new revenue streams.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/15/06 04:53 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (3)

Chron's Pulitzer cartoonist ignores reader rep dictate on "illegals"

Roughly two weeks ago, the Chronicle ran an editorial by reader rep James Campbell describing the paper's policy on the language of immigration:

The Chronicle's stylebook takes its instruction from minority journalist groups. We never use the term "alien" except in quoted matter, and we don't use "illegals" as a noun, even in headlines.

One major problem that results from professional writers trying to make their styleguide conform with the whims of professional sensitives instead of with the dictates of reality is that the language becomes debased. A related problem is that it becomes very difficult at a practical level to keep track of those whims, which undoubtedly explains Nick Anderson's use of the label "illegals" in one of his recent cartoons that focused on the immigration debate.

The Pulitzer-winning cartoonist did not respond to Matt Bramanti's comment on the blog about the apparent disregard of the Chron styleguide.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/15/06 03:50 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (3)

Maybe this is why we need $10,000 parking meters

An old story is new again: downtown parking meters are being vandalized:

Under the Pierce Elevated, parking is cheap.

“Yeah, it is!” driver Steve Willis said. “Cheaper than parking in the parking lots.”

But even at 25 cents an hour, it adds up -- so much that thieves have been swiping parking meters.

And drivers seek out the meter-less spaces.

“There’s quite a few of them that’s been taken,” Sheila Robbins said. “And usually, a lot of people go through and we look for an empty one that’s, you know, been taken.”

They’ve been taken not only under the Pierce Elevated, but also a block from Minute Maid Park, next to a lot full of police cars.

Ouch! Kevin Whited noted KHOU-11's reporting on this topic back in December of 2004 and wondered then if it wasn't a manifestation of HPD's manpower shortage.

Maybe the new $10,000 meters will be vandal-proof?

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/15/06 04:56 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (3)

13 April 2006

KHOU: Alvarado received warnings from F&A on spending

As Anne Linehan noted in an update to this post, KHOU-11 obtained a copy of the documents compiled by the Houston Office of Inspector General on the City Hall payroll scandal. Here's an excerpt of Doug Miller's reporting from earlier:

For the first time, it was revealed that a warning from the Finance and Administration Department had been sent to the mayor pro tem's office, with a copy sent directly to Councilmember Carol Alvarado via e-mail.

It said the office was going over budget and specifically mentioned the bonuses Alvarado said she knew nothing about

There was also a handwritten note from a finance and administration official saying that one of the employees who was getting big bonuses was warned the office was going way over budget.

KHOU has helpfully posted the OIG documents to its website (warning: the pdf appears to be large). I haven't had a chance to download and read it yet, but readers are more than welcome to leave comments about it.

It will be interesting to see how Councilmember Alvarado's PR team spins this latest information.

RELATED: Houblog.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/13/06 10:28 PM | Houston Politics | Technorati | Comments (10)

Mack profiles Borris Miles

The Chronicle's Kristen Mack taps out an excellent profile of Borris Miles, the Democratic newcomer who unseated incumbent Al Edwards in the Tuesday primary runoff for the House District 146 seat.

Although Mack identifies Miles as part of a new generation of black leaders, his victory is also interesting in that it represents a rejection of a veteran party pols thought to have lost touch with the local grassroots. In a sense, political newcomer Dan Patrick's primary victory over three more established candidates in the Senate District 7 primary reflects a similar dissatisfaction among the Republican grassroots with some of its veterans.

Wouldn't it be interesting if the Chronicle had an area politics blog by Mack, Matt Stiles, and other reporters, where such matters could be covered with greater frequency, and more of a conversation about area politics could take place?

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/13/06 10:03 PM | Houston People | Technorati | Comments (1)

Slade ignores TSU governing board, takes case public

The Chronicle's Matthew Tresaugue, who has done a good job covering Priscilla Slade's spending scandal at TSU, reports that the embattled university president is taking her case to the public:

Priscilla Slade, Texas Southern University's president, is waging a public campaign to defend her integrity, breaking a two-month silence with a series of interviews and an open letter this week before the school's investigation into her spending concludes.

But the strategy puts Slade at odds with TSU's governing board, which ordered her in February to remain mum during the inquiry.

"I almost don't know how to comment," J. Paul Johnson, the board's chairman, said Wednesday. "It was my opinion that we would not try to air this thing in the media."

The nine-member board is scheduled to meet May 5, but Johnson said the regents are considering the possibility of meeting before then to decide Slade's future at the historically black institution.

The lack of institutional control of spending during Slade's tenure -- including her choice of someone once convicted of passing hot checks as her chief financial officer -- should be reason enough to send her packing, but the latest acts of insubordination really leave the board little choice.

BLOGVERSATION: Houston's Clear Thinkers, On Message, Slampo's Place.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/13/06 09:52 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (3)

Editorial LiveJournalists + religion = train wreck

The Chronicle editorial board opined yesterday on yet another subject for which it seems intellectually ill-equipped: religion.

David Benzion at the Lone Star Times posted a lengthy response, which was followed by some interesting discussion.

Sedosi Alhambra also posted on the general topic, asserting:

Let me just say that when Mrs. White and Christianity get together, the results aren't pretty.

Amen.

Please go read their provocative posts and add to their discussion.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/13/06 09:15 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati |

Alt-weekly reports non-story, blog mischaracterizes, Chron links

Metroblogging Houston links to a story in the Houston Press, and claims a family in Houston was "forced from home by eminent domain."

A more careful reading of the original Houston Press article doesn't really justify the way the blog characterized the story. Here's a relevant excerpt:

The Trevinos were first approached about selling their property some two years ago.

Property Commerce, a Houston-based retail developer, gobbled up 30 acres of mostly industrial land occupied by large abandoned warehouses. Also included in the purchase were several small businesses and single-family homes.

Many homeowners took the money and ran. There were no protests, no petition drives. No one cried foul.

But the Trevinos quietly resisted. Oscar Trevino was particularly adamant about holding on to the property. He never married, and had lived there with his parents for most of his life. He had a close relationship with his father, who died in 2001.

His eight siblings, who all live nearby and return to the house several times a week for dinner, are also sentimental about it.

"Our memories mean more than money," insists 42-year-old younger brother Manuel.

Oscar says a broker representing Property Commerce shadowed him for months.

Every afternoon Oscar visits his father's grave site at Hollywood Cemetery. The broker would follow him there, Oscar says, and to the nearby storefront church where his father served as pastor for two decades.

"I want to talk to you about your property," the broker would say, according to Oscar. "You don't know what you're passing up. You're being selfish. Your sister needs a new Suburban."

Chad Moss, a broker for Property Commerce and a point person on the development project, says that broker is no longer retained by the company.

"We never endorsed that; we never supported that," Moss says. "You just don't do that."

Eventually the Trevinos had to face facts. If they didn't leave voluntarily, they would be forced out. They say that the broker had threatened them with an eminent domain lawsuit.

Plus, the ordeal was a strain on their diabetic mother. Jackhammers and bulldozers kept her awake all day. The electricity and phone frequently went out.

If they had to go, they might as well cash in.

So, the Houston Press journalist reported that the seller thought he was under some threat of eminent domain, and that's that -- no need to verify with the real-estate company if that was under consideration by them or with legal experts as to whether it was even possible. A blogger picks up that bit of sloppy journalism and compounds the problem with an erroneous characterization of the matter. And Dwight Silverman gives the erroneous characterization credence by linking it from the Houston Chronicle editorial page, which is honestly about par for the course as that joke of an editorial page goes.

Anne Linehan and I puzzled earlier over the Press story, and whether this was even a story that should have been published. The basic story is, a neighborhood is undergoing redevelopment, a guy took the cash after resisting initially, and then found a journalist who gave him an outlet to whine about eminent domain. The problem here is, he didn't lose his property to eminent domain. He sold it voluntarily. It's unfortunate he felt he had to move, but unfortunate things happen every day; that in itself isn't an especially compelling story.

Maybe readers see something more to this story than we do. Feel free to leave a comment.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/13/06 08:45 PM | Houston Media | Technorati | Comments (5)

Metro should be wary of going back on its word

The Greater Houston Partnership may have thrown its weight behind Metro's desire to consider a Richmond rail route (such a stretch since three of its board members are also Metro board members), but the funding Metro needs has to go through Rep. John Culberson's Congressional committee:

Culberson said his impression is that opposition from homeowners and businesses becomes strong west of Mandell Street in the Museum District.

When a resident who lives near Weslayan and Richmond objected to the line, Culberson replied, "I think you folks west of Shepherd ought to rest easy."

"If a majority is opposed, I'm going to be there for them," he told the crowd of about 900 at Rice University.

"Metro has to come through my committee," said Culberson, the only Texan on the House Appropriation Committee's transportation subcommittee.

That's sure to give Richmond Avenue proponents fits.

One thing that keeps coming back to bite Metro is the language Metro put in the 2003 referendum -- Westpark. If Metro tries to wriggle out of honoring the Westpark commitment that it (barely) sold voters, Metro will be sending a bad message on any future votes...for anything:

While past ballot language concerning light-rail plans did not guarantee a Westside line would run down Westpark, many at the meeting who live and work in the Richmond Avenue area claim that's what they thought they were voting for.

That's the key. Voters who DID vote yes thought they were approving a Westpark line. If Metro wants to hang its hat on a little disclaimer, it should be prepared for tremendous skepticism in the future whenever it needs public approval, since it will appear that Metro could go back on its word at any time.

Along the same line, Metro sold poor, minority and elderly communities on increased bus service. We have seen how that has worked out and that could also come back to haunt Metro.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/13/06 11:49 AM | Houston Transit | Technorati | Comments (6)

Who read the F&A email warning of bonuses? (updated)

In today's Chronicle, Alexis Grant and Matt Stiles expound on Tuesday's Civil Service Commission hearing for the four fired Bonusgate employees:

Alvarado, who has stepped down temporarily as mayor pro tem while Harris County prosecutors investigate the payments, said she did not approve extra pay. But Hernandez said she and the other employees earned the bonuses for doing extra tasks, including projects for Alvarado's re-election campaign.

Alvarado denied requiring them work on her campaign, or that they did so on city time.

Hernandez's attorney, Walter A. Boyd III, said Alvarado's latest comments were just shifting the blame away from her own lax oversight of the pro tem office.

He noted that city finance officials had copied the councilwoman an April 2005 e-mail, revealed at Tuesday's hearing, that mentioned $18,000 in bonuses for pro tem employees.

"This is inconsistent with her continued and repeated denials of her knowledge and involvement," Boyd said.

Alvarado said she didn't remember reading the e-mail.

What's interesting about the city finance department email is this from Controller Annise Parker:

When consecutive bonus requests were received, Controllers Office staff requested confirmation from F&A that the bonuses were authorized. When the bonuses continued, they contacted the Mayor Pro Tem office and were informed that the authorizing staffers had full signature authority, which was confirmed.

Who gave confirmation is not stated. If confirmation was given by Rosie Hernandez, then that's more proof that Councilwoman Alvarado took a remarkably hands-off approach to managing her staff and day-to-day office happenings.

Also included in today's Chron story is the news of a new legal defense fund for Alvarado set up by former state representative Al Luna. Attorney Rusty Hardin doesn't come cheap, you know.

UPDATE: Whoa! KHOU-11 got a look at a 264 page OIG compilation report:

For the first time, it was revealed that a warning from the Finance and Administration Department had been sent to the mayor pro tem's office, with a copy sent directly to Councilmember Carol Alvarado via e-mail.

It said the office was going over budget and specifically mentioned the bonuses Alvarado said she knew nothing about

There was also a handwritten note from a finance and administration official saying that one of the employees who was getting big bonuses was warned the office was going way over budget.

Alvarado still maintained in Tuesday's Civil Service hearing that she knew nothing about the bonuses and it was all the fault of renegade employees. Hmmmm.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/13/06 09:35 AM | Houston Politics | Technorati | Comments (0)

12 April 2006

White plan to sue internet travel companies delayed by council

The Houston Business Journal notes that Mayor White's plan to hire outside legal counsel to sue internet travel companies has been held up by City Council:

The city delayed a vote on Wednesday on a measure that calls for hiring Houston-based commercial litigation firm Gibbs & Bruns LLP to investigate whether city has any legitimate legal claims to taxes online travel companies don't pay on rooms they buy in bulk and then resell to online consumers.

Typically, online companies pay taxes on the price they pay, but not on the mark-up paid by customers. If taxed on that difference, the companies would be obligated pay to millions of dollars in back taxes to the city.

[snip]

As a whole, the state's tax code does not directly address the issue -- a modern dilemma spawned by the nebulous nature of online retail activity.

"This is a very gray area," said Councilmember Carol Alvarado. "Even the state comptroller doesn't know what should be taxed."

[snip]

If hired, Gibbs & Bruns would represent the City of Houston on a contingency fee basis, with the city paying the firm a percentage of the money it might win from the online companies on a sliding scale.

According to its proposed contract with Gibbs & Bruns, the city would pay the firm 30 percent of the first $15 million it recovers, plus 25 percent of any award over $15 million up to $25 million. If the city is awarded a higher claim, then the firm would earn more. Gibbs & Bruns would also be reimbursed for any expenses incurred as part of the effort.

But the nature of the uncharted legal territory has some city officials cautious of pursuing the legal action.

Jenna Colley does not report which members of council tagged the item. Anne Linehan, however, helpfully pointed out to me earlier that the item was tagged by Councilmembers Wiseman, Holm, and Sekula-Gibbs.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/12/06 11:39 PM | Houston Politics | Technorati | Comments (9)

Wolff Cos. frets over government agency's venture into real estate

Now this is amusing: the Houston Business Journal has a story about the Texas Land Office venturing into the commercial real estate business, in an effort to diversify. The problem? Not all private real estate companies are happy about it:

"I don't have a problem with another competitor in the market," says developer David Hightower of Houston-based Wolff Cos. "But I do have a problem with a competitor that has an advantage over free-market individuals such as ourselves ..."

Wolff Companies? Would that be the same Wolff Companies run by David Wolff, Metro board chairman? The same Metro that has eminent domain powers AND recently opened its own real estate services department? A real estate department that was the brainchild of...David Wolff?

That's just too funny.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/12/06 09:59 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)

New Bonusgate revelations emerge from Civil Service hearing

The Mayor Pro Tem employees who were fired by the city have had their firings upheld by the Civil Service Commission, but they didn't go down without a fight, and there are some new revelations about Bonusgate:

The Civil Service Commission for Municipal Employees rejected their appeals early this morning after a marathon hearing in which Councilwoman Carol Alvarado and a former employee gave conflicting, sworn testimony about whether she gave permission for four employees to get large bonuses.

[snip]

But attorneys for the employees elicited revelations that Alvarado had been notified that pro tem employees were getting large bonuses, and that her council office employees received significant pay increases.

Alvarado denied ever reading the notification, saying she was copied an e-mail that she apparently never read. In it, finance officials said the pro tem employees received $18,000 in bonuses in fiscal 2005.

She also said the fact that her employees received higher salaries for a few months in early 2005 was a mistake by Hernandez. She said the extra money was a misunderstanding that was corrected after a few months, and that she stayed within her annual budget by reducing the same employees' pay.

KHOU-11 has more on the pay raises at Alvarado's district office:

During the meeting on the bonuses Tuesday night, Alvarado said that Rosie Hernandez was ordered to give yearly pay raises to the staff in her District I office.

Instead, Hernandez reportedly gave the total yearly raises on every bi-weekly pay check.

That was discovered in the spring of 2005.

We asked Alvarado the obvious question, why didn't she fire Hernandez back then?

"Now that I look back upon it, I'm not sure if that was an honest mistake. She may have been doing it intentionally to make it look like this was happening in both offices. But immediately, when we discovered what was happening, it was corrected, and my district staff took a cut in pay," Alvarado said.

Well, well. Alvarado admits Hernandez was authorized to give pay raises to her district office staff. Allegedly Hernandez didn't handle the raise the way Alvarado intended, but still. Up until now I believe (glancing through bH's archives) Alvarado has claimed ignorance about any sort of pay raise. Now she admits she did tell Hernandez to take care of the paperwork for bonuses for her district office. And let's not forget that "Alvarado tried to change the system in order to give one of the accused employees, Rosie Hernandez, more power over payroll." Other council members put the brakes on that plan.

This is not to say that Councilwoman Alvarado has done anything wrong, but it would seem that some of her actions (and a tremendous lack of oversight) allowed the improper bonus problem to snowball out of control.

KEVIN WHITED ADDS: Does this mean that there IS a fireable offense at the City of Houston?

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/12/06 06:32 AM | Houston Politics | Technorati | Comments (12)

11 April 2006

Republic Waste pays big fine for overcharging city

Republic Waste Services, which provides Houston with trash collection services, agreed to pay $2 million after Controller Annise Parker's audit showed Republic had overcharged the city.

via KHOU-11's News Blog

UPDATE: Let me amend that. Controller Parker's audit was prompted by a Wayne Dolcefino (KTRK-13) investigation. Details are here.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/11/06 02:42 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (3)

Was she marching on her lunch break?

From Chron.com's NewsWatch: Immigration blog in a post on yesterday's downtown march:

While most protesters opted for cushy sandals or sneakers, Emily Patterson marched on in two inch black heels - and a gray business suit.

Over the deafening sound of cheers echoing under an overpass, Patterson said she didn't feel out of place. Patterson is a criminal defense attorney with the Mayor's Advisory Committee on Immigrants and Refugee affairs.

"Everyone's effected [sic] by immigration,'' she said.

Wow. (You can visit MACIRA's page on the city's website here.)

Which gets me wondering if any other city employees were out marching yesterday.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/11/06 10:55 AM | Houston Politics | Technorati | Comments (8)

How professional La-Z-Boy pundits see the world

As David Benzion points out, the Chronicle editorial board gets two shots per day to offer its opinion about any topic in the world. Today, Benzion notes, one of those slots is devoted to slapping down a junior prosecutor in "bad guy" Chuck Rosenthal's office.

The other slot is devoted to advising Americans how to respond to Venezuela strongman Hugo Chavez's latest antics:

The United States must respond to Chavez's provocations, particularly when they involve violating diplomatic immunity, but a restrained response would be best. Now that elections in Brazil, Bolivia and Peru have drawn Latin America leftward, the United States needs to redouble its engagement there, rising above insults and showing consistent concern for our neighbors and their democracies. U.S. businesses operating in Latin America also have a vital role to play by being good, civic-minded employers and environmental stewards.

Hugo Chavez has already seized assets of foreign companies, Bolivia's Evo Morales has announced plans to nationalize the hydrocarbon industry, and the Chronicle editorial board's advice is to be a good employer and a good steward of the environment?

To quote Benzion responding to today's other editorial, oookay.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/11/06 07:49 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)

Little guy Rudy Rios vs. big, bad HISD

Former Chavez High School JV baseball coach Rudy Rios is working to get his coaching gig back:

Rios, who retained his position as an English as a Second Language teacher, said he made about 30 copies on his own paper to show support for his students. He said he didn't write the message, pass out the fliers or otherwise weigh in on the controversial debate.

"I'm not for it; I'm not against it," said Rios, whose Mexican-born mother became a U.S. citizen last year. "But I tell the kids, 'You need to stand up for what you believe in.' "

Rios said he plans to take his own advice by fighting HISD to get his coaching position back. In addition to his $42,000 annual salary, he receives a small stipend for coaching. "It's against all odds. It's a big school district for a little guy," he said. "You make a choice. You have to live with the consequences. But it doesn't mean I have to live with them lying down."

Against all odds? Rios should contact Chris Tritico.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/11/06 06:55 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (4)

10 April 2006

Mayor White concocts creative new revenue stream

Even as the city is enjoying record revenues, Mayor White continues to concoct new revenue streams for the city. His latest scheme involves suing online travel websites:

Houston's mayor plans to file lawsuits against some of the nation's biggest travel Web sites including Travelocity and Expedia.

Mayor Bill White wants to collect millions of dollars in unpaid travel taxes.

Here's why: When you check into a hotel, you pay hotel occupancy taxes. And Houston banks on its hotel taxes to pay for amenities like Minute Maid Park

But travel Web sites basically rent big blocks of hotel rooms at what city officials call a bulk rate, then sell them to the public for a higher price.

Most of the Web sites pay hotel occupancy taxes only on the so-called bulk rate they pay for the rooms -- not the end price actually paid by the customer. So Houston's city government is hiring a law firm to take some of the big travel Web sites to court.

So, the mayor hopes to squeeze online travel sites that actually book rooms in Houston (not exactly a travel destination!) in bulk, and he proposes paying outside legal counsel instead of the city's own legal staff to do so?

Give Mayor White credit for creativity on this potential new revenue stream. It's good that he has solved all of the problems in the city, and has time to come up with these schemes.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/10/06 08:37 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (26)

Greater Houston Partnership enters University line fray

Rad Sallee brings us the news that the Greater Houston Partnership is backing Metro's efforts to consider a Richmond light rail line, without the need for a new referendum:

The Greater Houston Partnership, whose clout helped get the Metropolitan Transit Authority's first light rail line built, upped the ante with a resolution saying Metro should be allowed to explore alternative routes without having to fight another referendum campaign.

Metro's $2 billion long-term transit plan would be "severely impacted and delayed" by another referendum, the resolution says.

With the route studies in progress, it says, "it is premature and ill-advised to eliminate alternative alignments."

The GHP's press release is here (pdf) and includes this:

We should evaluate before we decide, instead of deciding before we evaluate.

Ummm, didn't Metro evaluate and decide when IT wrote up the 2003 referendum?

I do wish Sallee had pointed out that three of Metro's board members are also on the board of the Greater Houston Partnership: David Wolff, Gerald B. Smith, and George DeMontrond. It does seem worth mentioning.

And as an aside, at this week's city council meeting Mayor White will be offering up some renominations for Metro's board:

2. REQUEST from Mayor for confirmation of the reappointment of the following to the Board of the METROPOLITAN TRANSIT AUTHORITY, for two year terms:

·Position 1 - MR. DAVID WOLFF

·Position 2 - MR. GEORGE A. DEMONTROND, III

·Position 3 - MR. JAMES W. E. DIXON, II

·Position 4 - MS. CARMEN ORTA

·Position 5 - MR. GERALD B. SMITH

(Thanks to Tom Bazan for the heads up on that last bit.)

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/10/06 06:56 PM | Houston Politics | Technorati | Comments (4)

A case for the Fear Reduction Initiative taskforce

KTRH-740 reports that some northeast Houston apartment dwellers are turning to the Almighty for help with crime:

A handful of residents of a Northeast Houston apartment complex came together over the weekend to pray, following recent drive-by shootings that claimed two lives.

One woman who has lived at Crofton Place Apartments for 22 years says she's moving out, claiming the complex has become too dangerous. As a group of youngsters played near a sign saying "Drive slow. We love our children," residents offered up prayers for the two shooting victims.

Deric Muhammad with the Millions More movement says some residents feel the shootings were the result of gang warfare, while others think the deaths stem from a drug deal gone wrong. Still others blame random violence.

Surely upon hearing this news, MayorWhiteChiefHurtt dispatched members of the Fear Reduction Initiative taskforce to calm these Houstonians.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/10/06 02:40 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (3)

09 April 2006

Can anybody explain the running "Cowboy Lamza" joke?

David Barron's most recent Sports TV-Radio column for the Chronicle contains the following unusual aside (in bold):

NBC's Sunday night games for the final eight weeks (with the exception of Monday, Dec. 25, when Terrell Owens will try to bring Christmas cheer to his former Eagles teammates at Texas Stadium) will be determined 12 days in advance. CBS and Fox each can protect five games, but neither can protect more than one each week.

Also, you may notice that start times for all games in the Eastern and Central time zones for the final seven weeks are listed at noon CST. If you're a Cowboys fan in Houston, that could be cause for concern, since there are three potential occasions when Cowboys games could be blacked out here because they conflict with noon Texans starts at home. However, any or all could be moved to 3:15 p.m. or to NBC.

(By the way, when I told Bill "Cowboy" Lamza that three to four Cowboys games could be blacked out here, he blurted, "I may have to move." Alas, cruel fate could rob us of this golden opportunity when the networks start shuffling games.)

What is the bizarre fascination with Bill "Cowboy" Lamza?

It's one thing for the Chronicle's most popular columnist to work Lamza into his columns regularly. That's one perk of being a popular columnist, one supposes. But why in the world would readers of the sports section care about a guy that hardly anybody knows? And why would such a parenthetical even make it into print in a quality newspaper (or the Chronicle, for that matter)?

What am I missing here? Feel free to explain in the comments.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/09/06 01:53 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (23)

City launches electricity provider website

A few days ago, the Chronicle's Matt Stiles reported the launch of Mayor White's new website aimed at helping Houstonians to choose a provider of residential electricity.

Earlier reporting on the topic suggested that the costs of the program would be borne by private industry, although Mayor White (as usual) left himself a bit of wriggle room:

White said he envisions a full-scale blitz of television, radio and mailings. The $1 million for the advertising would come from donated services and perhaps from nontaxpayer city revenue, such as the franchise fees the city gets from utility companies, he said.

According to the latest reporting, the city will bear a non-trivial portion of the costs of the program:

The $800,000 program featuring a planned advertising blitz is funded mostly by the electricity companies and other donors, White said. Less than $100,000 will come from city funds to pay for city staffers and an outside consultant who designed the program.

Less than $100,000? That isn't very informative. Why not report the exact amount? We'll just assume the amount is "close to" $100,000, since it seems unlikely the Mayor's press people would give the $100k number to reporters to repeat uncritically unless the total was close to that amount and not some lesser amount (like, say, $20,000).

So, the city's $100k has bought it some staffing and the advice of an outside consultant (boy, we'd sure like to find a sugar daddy with $100k to throw at the blogHOUSTON.net website!) and a nifty website (replete with a nice photo of Mayor White). It's always nice when governmental entities can enrich outside consultants.

Of course, Mayor White's consumer education website isn't entirely about educating consumers. As the Chronicle's Matt Stiles notes, some companies are not listed on the city's website:

In addition to listing the various companies and their plans, the site features a glossary explaining common electricity terms. Similar information also is at www.powertochoose.org, a site administered by the Public Utility Commission of Texas. Several companies listing offers on that site either were excluded or didn't participate in the city's plan, but Houston customers still can get their power from those companies.

That the city is designating certain companies on its Web site contradicts deregulation, said Carlos Santos, a spokesman for TXU Energy, which didn't participate.

"Government intervention that limits the choices that people have is not good. It's not good for consumers. It's not good for deregulation," he said.

But the mayor argues that selecting companies based on their financial viability — or the number of complaints they've received — is an important consumer-protection tool.

So, the city's $100k only buys consumers information that meets criteria established by Mayor-Nanny White, which doesn't seem as informative as it might be. What a deal!

It's not surprising that the Chronicle editorial board (or Mrs. White, as Sedosi refers to them) loves Mayor White's initiative. However, it's still not clear that this program was necessary. While $100,000 may not seem like much money to those who think of government as a perpetual money catapult, it's still $100,000 that might have been directed towards other priorities (public safety, graffiti eradication, etc).

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/09/06 01:38 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (5)

A letter to Houstonians from Chief Hurtt

via the Chronicle:

The city of Houston remains a safe place to live, despite reduced [police] staffing and an increasing population. While any increase in crime, especially violent crime, is unacceptable, I believe Houstonians should know that this city remains a safe city, that the Houston Police Department is committed to reduce crime in the city and that the initiatives under way within the department will yield results over time.

Recent reports have depicted Houston in a crisis, and that simply is not the case. Houston overall is a safe city.

Official department crime statistics reflect that rates of increase in violent crimes are in the single digits or slightly down from the previous year. During the first two months of 2006, for example, violent crime, a category consisting of homicides, rapes, robberies, and aggravated assaults is up 7.1 percent compared to the same time period in 2005, while total crime is up only 1.8 percent.

In addition, despite much publicity regarding crime increases throughout 2005, especially in the last few months of that year, the city's violent crimes rose only 2.4 percent compared with 2004, and the total crime rate actually decreased 1.8 percent during the same time period. Holding crime to this level despite an increase in the population of as many as 150,000 persons, and at a time when the department continued to experience reductions in its staffing is a testament to the dedication and hard work of every member of the police department.

I believe that focusing resources in areas where we see increases in violent crime will yield results. In fact, our Neighborhood Enforcement Task Force Team (NETT) initiative, through which we placed the equivalent of 150 additional full-time officers in patrol, already resulted in 2,444 arrests, 1,851 criminal charges filed, 934 criminal investigations cleared, and hundreds of thousands of dollars in property recovered since the beginning of the year. The arrests alone represent an increase in felony appre-hension by 10.5 percent and an increase in misdemeanor apprehension by 11.6 percent over what is considered normal arrests activity for the month of January. In an effort to further bolster the number of officers in patrol, we recently completed the transfer of 100 police officers from jail assignments to patrol assignments.

As I have stated before, initiatives such as NETT are short-term solutions. Therefore, with the support of our mayor and council, I have proposed an aggressive recruitment campaign to bring the Houston Police Department staffing up to nationally accepted staffing levels from our current 2.2 officers per 1,000 to 2.8 per 1,000.

Lastly, I want to emphasize that we need the cooperation of every resident of Houston to achieve our goal in making Houston a better place to live. I encourage all residents to take an interest in activities occurring in their neighborhoods and to participate in department initiatives such as the Blue Star program or the Positive Interaction Program. After all, reductions in crime benefit all of us who live and work here.

HAROLD HURTT chief of police, Houston

He forgot to mention his Fear Reduction Initiative.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/09/06 07:13 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (9)

08 April 2006

Councilmember Alvarado to propose new grease-trap revenue stream?

Councilmember Carol Alvarado, whose lack of oversight of the Mayor Pro Tem's office dominated the news for weeks, is back in the news with a proposal that will surely cause Mayor White to frown less than he did over the Pro Tem fiasco: a new revenue stream!

KHOU-11's Doug Miller reports:

With Houston's thousands and thousands of restaurants, there's a whole lot of grease going down the drain

Sometimes, it stinks.

It's a smelly situation that's now the center of a fight at Houston City Hall.

If you run a restaurant, you cook a lot of meals, clean a lot dishes and produce a lot of grease.

So Houston restaurants must install grease traps to keep the stuff from clogging sewers.

"My grease trap, personally, here, is a 1,000-gallon grease trap," said Michael Massa, owner, Massa's restaurant.

Houston spends an estimated $800,000 a year cleaning fats, oils and grease out of sewers.

And city officials say state regulators fined Houston another $1 million because of sewer overflows.

"We're proposing $50," said Carol Alvarado, Houston city councilmember.

Now city councilmembers are considering imposing some new rules.

"So we're asking the grease trap owners to pay a $50 fee. And then they'd also have to clean out their grease traps four times a year," said Alvarado.

But most of the grease flushing down Houston's sewer system comes not from restaurants but from the kitchen sinks in houses and apartment complexes.

"Actually, only 20 percent of the problem comes from the restaurants. 80 percent is due to other entities," said Sue Lovell, Houston City Councilmember.

So restaurant owners think the proposed new rules would basically pick on the wrong people.

"It's all really a money grab. This is targeting a business that is not the root of all the problems that are happening with the grease problems." Massa said.

Of course it's a money grab. If it were merely about keeping the grease traps clean, the city could simply require that restaurants clean out grease traps four times a year, take a year to assess the problem, and then consider if further action is necessary. But why stop there, when there's money to be made for the city?

As for the bolded part of Doug Miller's story -- Anne Linehan astutely pointed out to me an earlier blogHOUSTON post that cited the Brazosport News on that very topic:

State enviro regulators have ordered H-Town to pay nearly $1 million in penalties for unauthorized discharges from 11 of its wastewater treatment plants. One fine is for $969,195. Then another fine of $17,500 was added for additional infractions that occurred at a later date.

So, is this the fine to which Miller is referring cryptically? Is the city trying to suggest that the wastewater treatment facility discharge penalties were directly related to the alleged grease problem? If so, is Alvarado trying effectively to get restaurants to pay the penalties? If not, then are restaurants being asked unfairly to help pay the penalty (and has the real problem been addressed by city officials)?

Those are the sorts of questions we'd like to see local journalists answer in their reporting, instead of so frequently repeating talking points.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/08/06 03:11 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (10)

Rumbo scales back operations

Rumbo, the Spanish-language newspaper that entered four Texas metropolitan markets (including Houston) over a year ago, announced some changes earlier this week:

The Spanish-language Rumbo newspapers in San Antonio, Houston and the Rio Grande Valley have announced new personnel and distribution changes.

The newspapers are available free to readers in all three markets effective today. Previously, the newspapers cost a quarter.

Rumbo also is doubling its number of distribution points and providing free home delivery. The company is increasing its Houston distribution to 230,000 copies weekly and its San Antonio distribution to 120,000 weekly. The Valley edition will have a distribution of 60,000.

Two new publishing industry executives have been hired, Rumbo chief executive Edward Schumacher Matos announced.

Lynne Cook, former vice president of sales at the Houston Chronicle, has been named vice president of sales for Rumbo. Jose Rego, former chief financial officer of Metro newspapers, the world's largest chain of free dailies, has been named Rumbo's chief financial officer.

[snip]

Meximerica Media, the publisher of Rumbo, announced last month that it had stopped publishing its Spanish-language Rumbo newspaper in Austin and that it was making changes to its three other newspapers. All had been dailies.

The Rumbo newspapers in Houston and San Antonio are now being published on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, with each day's paper having a specific focus. The Rio Grande Valley edition will be published on Friday.

In January of 2005, we posted on a New York Times story that highlighted the local-news focus or Rumbo, and its well-educated staff. This latest development can only be interpreted as a retrenchment for Rumbo, which is unfortunate. We're all hoping for the emergence of a smart, locally focused news daily in this town, even if it's not written in English.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/08/06 02:50 PM | Houston Media | Technorati | Comments (3)

Self-righteous armchair warrior punditry...from a comfy office

Yesterday the editorial LiveJournalists told us that it's not okay for some to practice free speech, especially when what they are saying is wrong or offensive. The editorialists take three people -- a missing soldier in Iraq, a Vietnam war commander, and Christian Science Monitor journalist Jill Carroll -- and blast those who have said harsh things about them:

THIS Sunday marks the second year since the capture of Army Reserve Sgt. Keith "Matt" Maupin, the single soldier listed by the Army as an Iraqi hostage. Insurgents seized Maupin after attacking his convoy outside Baghdad. A week later, Al Jazeera showed him on a video, flanked by armed, masked men.

If he miraculously survives, he'll be entitled to support from his employers, thanks from those he served and a stretch of silence from self-righteous armchair soldiers who would question Maupin's patriotism and courage.

Such self-righteous pundits have logged countless hours on the Internet recently, but their kind has been around for decades. They were particularly venomous in 1968, when Navy Commander Lloyd Bucher and his crew returned from almost a year as North Korean captives.

[snip]

Though his men revered Bucher for saving them, Cold War ideologues in the United States reviled him — from the comfort of their offices, of course.

[snip]

The La-Z-Boy warriors were in peak form again this month. This time they trained their judgment on a young reporter kidnapped while working for a newspaper noted for rejecting sensationalism.

[snip]

One needn't be an excitable broadcast executive or cable pundit to make stupid remarks. But these commentators' judgments about Carroll expose a frightening mindset. They don't seem to know or care what war really entails.

Jill Carroll valued accuracy enough to learn Arabic before moving to Iraq. She was pilloried while still in captivity.

Sgt. Matt Maupin, whereabouts unknown, surely learned about the harsh exigencies of war. If he comes back alive, would armchair warriors listen when he talked?

Self-righteous armchair soldiers and pundits, armchair and La-Z-Boy warriors, and ideologues who express stupid opinions from the comfort of their offices...why, the editorial LiveJournalists are describing themselves!

It's okay for them to express their opinions (from the comfort of their chairs and offices) even if those opinions are offensive and/or wrong, yet it's not okay for others to do the same?

Let's take one of the LiveJournalists' more recent offensive editorials, where they criticized Harris County black voters for supporting traditional marriage:

Inner city black voters in Harris County, many of whom have long experience with the denial of civil rights, favored the marriage amendment by an even higher majority than the general Harris County voting population. Black discomfort with homosexual marriage is rooted less in conscious discrimination than in religious belief, but support for the amendment brought blacks into incongruous accord with members of the Ku Klux Klan, whose members rallied in Austin in support of Proposition 2.

Phew! Talk about your self-righteous armchair punditry from the comfort of an office!

It's offensive, it's wrong, and it's allowed under the First Amendment.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/08/06 06:28 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (6)

07 April 2006

Food and drink roundup (04-07-2006 edition)

It's Friday and time for a pre-weekend food and drink review.

Last week Alison Cook went Creole and did the Sunday buffet and more at Lagniappe Grill. She also traveled to Manville for barbecue and fixins' at the Naked Rib Smokehouse. Speaking of Alison, if you're not making her blog a daily stop on your Houston meanderings, you're missing much.

There isn't a seafood gumbo in town that can come close to being as good as Denis' seafood gumbo, in my humble opinion, but Robb Walsh convinces me in his review this week that I should give Joyce's Ocean Grill a try.

Last week Dai Huynh checked out the opening week for Tart Cafe in Montrose. This week she makes me all squeamish with her Texas blue crab review.

Peggy Grodinsky gets fruity on us with stories on local strawberry farms and loquats. Of course loquats are edible. They're yummy. She also announces Zagat's most popular Houston restaurant. Did Armadillo Palace really get customer accolades for being one of the best newcomers in town?

Ken Hoffman does not get fruity on us with his review of Burger King's new Tendercrisp Cheesy Bacon Chicken Sandwich.

And finally, Lance Scott Walker checks out Home Plate Bar & Grill near Minute Maid Park.

World class, all of it. Enjoy!!

Posted by Callie Markantonis @ 04/07/06 09:00 AM | Houston Life | Technorati | Comments (3)

Blunder: DeLay "campaign" organizes anti-Lampson swarm

Yesterday, what probably seemed like a great idea to a frustrated campaign staff that suddenly has nothing to do backfired in a big way.

As KHOU-11 reports, supporters of retiring Rep. Tom DeLay crashed a Nick Lampson campaign rally in Sugar Land, at the urgings of DeLay campaign staff. According to KHOU, the DeLay supporters effectively shut down the Lampson event. KHOU reports that assorted physical thuggery (shoving, even an assault) took place, although KTRK-13 reports that "despite a lot of yelling and verbal sparring, there was no physical violence of any kind." Police were not called.

Here are relevant excerpts from the KHOU report:

Nick Lampson, Democratic nominee for Tom DeLay's soon-to-be-vacated seat in the U.S. House tried to hold a news conference Thursday at 10 a.m. on the steps of Sugar Land's City Hall. But as soon as he stepped to the microphone, he was swarmed by approximately 30 DeLay supporters who all but prevented him from speaking.

"Even in his resignation there is corruption," Lampson said of DeLay.

Suddenly, the Lampson camp found itself swarming with DeLay supporters.

"We do not want a Democrat in this area," said DeLay supporter Vera Kuhn.

All the while the Democrat struggled to talk above the roar.

[snip]

Turns out, DeLay's campaign manager is largely responsible. He admits sending an e-mail urging DeLay supporters to give Lampson a parting shot that wrecks his press conference.

When asked if he had written an e-mail that read 'Let's give Lampson a parting shot that wrecks his press conference', "We absolutely were interested in bringing out Republican activists to that press conference and letting Mr. Lampson know they don't appreciate him being a liberal from Beaumont. That is my e-mail where I was contacting Republican activists," said Chris Homa [sic], DeLay Campaign Mgr.

While it was mostly a war of words, several women at the event in support of Lampson said that they were pushed and shoved by male DeLay supporters.

One woman says she was assaulted by two different men, and that she's considering filing charges.

The KTRK report indicates that the Lampson campaign had a permit for its rally, and that the DeLay supporters did not.

Chris Homan and the rest of the DeLay campaign staff should be very thankful that this event didn't turn more violent, and result in arrests. The potential was certainly there, and that would have been an even bigger black eye than the successful effort to shut down political speech (enough of a black eye itself).

That said, there is no excuse for what should be a defunct DeLay campaign to have organized (and I use that term loosely) this chaos in the first place. Undoubtedly, an element of frustration had set in among campaign staff who joined up to help the House Majority Leader increase the Republican majority and move Republican legislation, saw him fall back to a mere member of the House, and then saw him announce plans to step away from the House altogether, all in a short span of time. Nonetheless, in this instance, some grownup should have shot down the idea of a counterprotest as follows: No good can come of this, and it's not befitting the governing party of the United States or the fine people of the district. Period.

ADDITIONAL COVERAGE: KPRC-2, KHOU-11 (Homan email to DeLay supporters).

BLOGVERSATION: Texas Safety Forum, Slampo's Place.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/07/06 08:29 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (1)

06 April 2006

Chron business section owns the (prepared statement) franchise

The Chronicle recently announced the selection of an editor for the business section:

Laura Goldberg has been named business editor of the Houston Chronicle, editor Jeff Cohen has announced.

She has been interim business editor since last summer.

"Laura already is a forceful advocate for expanding and improving the section's reach and for owning the franchise on important local beats from energy to health care to Latin America," Cohen said in making the announcement.

In eight years at the Chronicle, Goldberg covered airlines and energy as a reporter.

As if on cue, the business section ran a story by the D.C. bureau's Dirk Vanderhart a few days later on a newly released report on airline service. The story contained useful information such as:

While customer satisfaction declined a bit last year at Continental Airlines, the Houston carrier improved its rank among the nation's top airlines, according to a report on airline service released Monday.

[snip]

"Measured against our network airline peers, 2005 was an outstanding year for Continental, where we ranked first or second in all of the key U.S. Department of Transportation performance categories," the company said in a prepared statement.

[snip]

In its statement, Continental acknowledged that flying so many planes with so few empty seats is a challenge.

"We're flying with record load factors," the company said."While that poses significant operational challenges, we feel we are doing an excellent job in meeting the expectations of our more than 60 million annual customers."

So if the Chronicle is really serious about "owning the franchise on important local beats," wouldn't it have been a good idea to interview an actual living, breathing person at Continental, the Houston-based carrier, instead of quoting from a prepared statement -- and perhaps to follow up with someone in the Houston Airport System? Wouldn't one even expect it, given the new section editor's experience in covering airlines?

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/06/06 10:51 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (2)

New parking meters: world class, cutting edge AND trailblazing!

From KHOU-11's story:

This project represents the nation’s first parking meter system that does not rely on a cellular network but will communicate using a dedicated 802.11g WiFi network.

Uh oh. Why does that sound familiar?

In 1999, former Houston Mayor Lee Brown trumpeted Houston as the first city to have a completely automated water meter reading system.

[snip]

Johnson said part of the problem is the new meters did not stand up that well to Houston's climate.

"This is cutting edge technology. Nobody has ever done this before in a city this size," he said.

Oh dear.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/06/06 06:44 AM | Houston Politics | Technorati | Comments (5)

05 April 2006

Lifestyles of the rich and academic

The Chronicle's Matt Tresaugue, who has done an excellent job covering the spending scandal involving TSU president Priscilla Slade, checks in today with some additional details on Slade's spending obtained via public information requests:

Slade's supporters have said many of her expenses are justified because of her responsibilities as TSU's chief ambassador. They also point out that she has helped the university raise $37 million from donors over the past five years and boosted the school's profile.

Her expenses in 2005 include new furniture for her home and office, season tickets for the Houston Rockets and Houston Texans and at least seven trips to the Houstonian Club's spa.

TSU also spent more than $20,000 for Slade's airfare to destinations as far away as Beijing and as near as College Station and renewed her membership in Continental Airlines' Presidents Club, which costs $250 a year.

The perks were in addition to her cash compensation, including housing and car allowances, of roughly $310,000 last year.

[snip]

Slade's spending came under scrutiny in January after regents learned she charged TSU $86,467 to furnish a spacious, Spanish-style house on the corner of Memorial and Terrace drives. She reimbursed the university $138,159 for the cost of landscaping her private home after regents questioned the expense. Slade has said she never expected TSU to pay that bill.

Slade purchased a $9,169 sleigh bed for the master bedroom, a $2,891 bed for a guest room, $9,118 worth of artwork for the living room and a $17,807 four-piece sofa for the family room, records show.

She did not seek approval for the furniture from the board, which is generally asked to approve contracts of more than $100,000. TSU purchased furniture for her two immediate predecessors after selling the university-owned president's house in the mid-1990s because the job requires entertaining donors at home.

The university also paid her moving costs from an apartment to another in November and then to the newly constructed house in December. The two bills totaled $9,483.

Slade's contract allows up to $50,000 annually for travel, entertainment and other expenses related to university business. The expenses "shall be reasonable" and are subject to the approval of the university's board chairman, according to the terms of the contract.

Slade spent more than twice the limit in 2005, according to records.

Her contract allows Slade to join "a health and/or dining club" of her choice, and TSU spent more than $20,000 on her membership dues and incidentals at the Houstonian Club and Spa and the Houston Club, a private dining club downtown.

In addition to the Houstonian's annual dues of $5,738, Slade charged $1,280 for golf lessons and 47 Pilates exercise sessions at a cost between $55 and $65 each to the university. She also spent $2,316 at the club's Trellis Spa.

On purchase orders, university officials justified the expenses as necessary "for building university relationships" and "for stress release/relaxation" related to Slade's role as president.

Slade also used her expense account to buy nearly $800 worth of gift baskets for regents, in most cases as birthday presents. And she spent $4,884 at Neiman Marcus on candles, perfume and neckties as Christmas gifts for employees.

Unfortunately, these expenses don't seem that extravagant for a president of a major university. It would be most informative for readers if the Chronicle would request similar expense information for Slade's equivalents at other state universities. The public would undoubtedly be shocked at the posh lifestyle that they provide for university officials.

That's not to excuse President Slade's (alleged) thievery, though. Academic administrators lead such posh, pampered lives that (alleged) thievery just seems wholly impolite.

RELATED COVERAGE: KPRC-2, KHOU-11,

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/05/06 11:12 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (5)

Trite headline of the day

KTRK-13 ran the following headline today:

City of Houston steps in to help hurricane victims

It's hard to believe, I know.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/05/06 10:57 PM | Houston Media | Technorati | Comments (0)

Higher ed and flying (inferior airlines) get more expensive in Houston

The cost of flying from Hobby Airport will soon be more expensive thanks to your elected officials on Houston City Council:

Travelers flying in and out of Houston's Hobby Airport will likely face a $3 fee on each ticket by year's end after City Council approved the surcharge Wednesday.

The fee, which would help pay for capital improvements, would apply only at Hobby, not at George Bush Intercontinental Airport. It now awaits the approval of the Federal Aviation Administration, which is expected in about eight months.

"I think it makes sense to have users of the airport, airline companies and the passengers pay for airport improvements rather than shifting it onto the general public," Mayor Bill White said.

[snip]

Three council members — Addie Wiseman, Anne Clutterbuck and Ada Edwards — voted against the measure, saying passengers should not have to pay for the budgeting mistakes of airport officials.

"The fact that there is an inability to control spending or manage spending within the Houston Airport System gives me great concern," Wiseman said.

Councilwoman Pam Holm requested an audit of how the projects are managed.

While Southwest Airlines, which carries more than 80 percent of the passengers at Hobby, requested the fee, it would apply to passengers on all airlines that operate there. These carriers are AirTran Airways, American Eagle, Atlantic Southeast Airlines and Delta Air Lines.

Dallas-based Southwest said Wednesday it was pleased with the council's action.

"We support the implementation of the PFC, and we are pleased that it was approved," Southwest spokeswoman Paula Berg said. "This common funding mechanism will help the airport finance the current expansion project and protect Hobby's identity as a low-cost transportation alternative for the citizens of Houston."

No such charge is in place at Intercontinental because Houston-based Continental Airlines is against it. The company says it would make it less competitive with other airlines.

White said the city will have the option to suspend the fee if it drives customers away from Hobby.

Yeah, right. The next time that Mayor White suspends a fee -- any fee -- we'll post about it in bold, all caps. I'm never going to have to do that. But please, good readers, do remind me if it comes to pass.

That's yet another reason to fly Continental, the hometown airline, out of Bush Intercontinental, and avoid the inferior airlines that operate out of that other, inferior airport in town.

Speaking of the southeast side of town, the University of Houston has just passed on a big tuition increase to students:

University of Houston students will pay nearly 10 percent more in tuition and fees for the coming school year, the university system's regents decided Monday.

The tuition increase will bring the cost of attending UH-Main to $2,926 a semester for Texas residents taking a full-time load of 12 units, up from $2,663 this semester.

By agreeing to the plan, the regents followed the governing boards of the Texas A&M University and University of Texas systems, which recently approved their own similar increases. Campus leaders have defended higher rates as necessary to ensure quality in the face of shrinking state subsidies.

UH's tuition increase will generate about $27 million, with $6.4 million set aside for rising energy costs, Provost Donald Foss said. The new money also will allow the aspiring research institution to add 30 faculty members and provide 2 percent salary increases.

Foss said the additional faculty positions are needed to keep pace with hiring campaigns at Texas A&M and UT-Austin.

"To keep our place in the hierarchy," he said, "we have to improve."

Trying to keep your place -- let alone go Tier One -- can get expensive.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/05/06 10:47 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (0)

Chris Baker on the Chavez baseball coach story

Chris Baker went off on quite a rant against HISD in the Chavez baseball coach incident. Chris berated HISD spokesman Terry Abbott because the district hasn't fired Rudy Rios.

I agree Rudy Rios shouldn't be teaching, but the person Chris should be yelling at is Gayle Fallon, the big boss at Houston Federation of Teachers. The teachers unions have made it extremely difficult for a school district to fire a teacher. It has to be a really egregious offense to merit firing and even then there are appeals processes that give the teacher multiple opportunities to get back on the taxpayer-funded payroll.

And who does Gayle Fallon run to when one of her teachers needs an attorney? KTRH sub host Chris Tritico.

Gayle Fallon must be laughing herself silly.

Chris Baker says shame on HISD. Really? Who set up the system we have, how long has it been in place and how can it be changed? If the public gets angry enough about a system that makes it almost impossible to fire bad teachers, then maybe something will change.

Shame on the taxpaying citizens who have allowed this to continue for all these years. And shame on Gayle Fallon and HFT for claiming to be interested in the education of children, but really only caring about preserving the status quo and teachers union power.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/05/06 04:51 PM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (7)

Council approves "cutting edge" parking meters (updated)

City Council has approved a $15 million contract for 1,500 world-class parking meters. The company awarded the contract? ACS. We last heard of ACS as a red light camera contender, and in January, Metro chose ACS to come up with a new "smart card" fare system.

The Chronicle's Alexis Grant has today's parking meter story:

The Houston City Council today approved a $15 million contract for 1,500 tech-savy parking meters that will allow motorists to pay using cell phones, credit cards and dollar bills, in addition to the traditional coins.

[snip]

The first 750 meters are expected to be working within a year, said Liliana Rambo, assistant director of parking management, who is managing the project.

ACS State & Local Solutions Inc. of New Jersey was chosen as the vendor.

[snip]

Council members voted unanimously to approve the contract, praising Rambo for using a transparent process and creating a project that will pay for itself through parking revenues.

"This is what taxpayers want... a project like this that is fiscally sound," said Council member Adrian Garcia.

Does that mean the city's $15 million investment will be reimbursed with parking meter profits? Houstonians can only hope it really will be a system that pays for itself.

And what does (temporarily only a) Councilwoman Carol Alvarado think?

"We can say that Houston now is on the cutting edge when it comes to parking," said Council member Carol Alvarado.

It's too bad she wasn't interested in being on the cutting edge of management oversight in the Mayor Pro Tem's office.

ANNE ADDS MORE: I've been thinking about Council's praise for Liliana Rambo's transparency. Were there city-issued press releases about this parking meter contract? Were there public meetings, besides today's City Council meeting? Is our local media so inept that there really was all this transparency and we just missed it somehow? All I see is this press release issued today.

Maybe city officials have a different definition of transparency than I do.

UPDATE: This Houston Business Journal story says ACS will also install the wireless network the new world-class/cutting edge parking meters will require, and also includes information on progress in the mayor's proposed city-wide wi-fi network:

City officials are currently being courted by several companies interested in providing a wireless overlay for Houston.

So far, 65 companies have expressed interest in taking part in the implementation of the network, says Richard Lewis, the City of Houston's chief information officer.

"We were overjoyed to see the number of companies," Lewis says of the initial pre-selection proceedings being conducted by the city.

That larger wireless network contract is expected to appear before Houston City Council for approval by year end.

BLOGVERSATION: If it ain’t broke, spend $10K for a new one (Matt Bramanti)

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/05/06 01:34 PM | Houston Transit | Technorati | Comments (8)

Mayor White: fighting crime takes time

Yesterday Sedosi highlighted Mayor White's plea for Houstonians to hang in there while the city fights crime:

Basically the theme of his message is: "just wait, and try not to get shot or killed while you are waiting".

Not exactly confidence building at its finest.

No, it's not.

And then this happens overnight.

Mayor White needs to find a better message than, "Don't worry, be patient."

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/05/06 10:36 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (8)

Trainloads of Metro meetings

The Metro meetings page is filled with opportunities to discuss the new University line.

Also, Rep. John Culberson will be holding a town hall-type meeting on April 12:

The April 12 town hall meeting will be held at Rice University's Shell Auditorium, and will focus primarily on local transportation issues, such as METRO's proposal to build a light rail line down Richmond Avenue. State Representative Martha Wong and City Council Member Anne Clutterbuck have also been invited as special guests. The Congressman is very interested in hearing the opinions of local residents and business owners, and would greatly appreciate your attendance at this meeting.

BLOGVERSATION: Deskmerc.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/05/06 10:12 AM | Houston Transit | Technorati | Comments (6)

Where are the editors? (con't)

Check out the Chron oops Tom Kirkendall found in a story about witness preparation that referenced Martha Stewart's trial:

Sounds reasonable, doesn't it? Except when you realize that Stewart elected not to testify during her criminal trial (see here and here).

Ah well. Maybe all the Chron editors are busy with Tom DeLay stories.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/05/06 09:56 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)

04 April 2006

New municipal court computer system plods along

Over the weekend, KTRK-13 excitedly reported on a new computer system for the municipal courts:

Saturday morning, a new, state-of-the-art computer system went online at the municipal courthouse downtown.

The goal is to, one day, put all of the paper records on computers and make them easier to transmit digitally. The new computer system will manage 1.2 million records every year. The one it's replacing is 18 years old.

Eventually, the court's goal is to reduce staff and improve customer service as a result of this system.

"State-of-the-art" must not be quite as good as "world-class," because there have been some problems. Here's a more recent KTRK report:

Officials with the Houston municipal courthouse say it will take a little time to iron out the kinks in their new computer system and that means delays.

Frustrated residents were forced to wait in very long lines for hours on Monday. The new computer system replaces one that's 18 years old. Court officials say it will eventually make it easier to transmit records online.

"Until you actually get in there and work with it, you can't get real proficient," said acting cirector and chief clerk Richard Lewis. "So every day our goal is to improve the speeds in which the user performs their transactions."

The lines got so long that administrators were forced to offer free parking for those who waited.

Other media outlets were less upbeat about the problems. Here's KPRC-2's reporting:

KHOU swings and misses on Chavez baseball coach story

Last night KHOU-11 ran a story about a Chavez High School JV baseball coach who was fired for making copies of a student flier and passing them out to students. Except that the coach wasn't actually fired. He was removed as a coach, but he's still an ESL teacher at Chavez. The principal made the decision to relieve Coach Rudy Rios of his duties based on the fact that Rios used taxpayer-funded equipment to copy a flier, then pass it out to students.

KHOU's story didn't include what the flier said, but we'll reproduce it in the "Read More" section, since it contains a bit of foul language. It also contains enough grammatical errors to give bH's copy editor a case of the vapors.

When you read what the fliers actually said, you can decide for yourself if the Chavez principal was justified in removing Rios from his coaching position. And shame on KHOU for getting the story so wrong.

UPDATE (04-05-2006): Here's Jennifer Radcliffe's story in the Chronicle.

[Read More]

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/04/06 08:59 PM | Houston Media | Technorati | Comments (3)

Houston's soccer may be world-class; Chron editorial page is not

The Chronicle editorial page is giddy about Sunday's debut of the Houston professional soccer franchise:

It may have taken them a while to get their name straight, but Houston's newest professional sports franchise, the Major Soccer League Houston Dynamo, staged a successful liftoff at Robertson Stadium Sunday.

[snip]

In their previous incarnation the Dynamo won two MSL Cups, a good omen for its success here.

[snip]

World class soccer will add another sports dimension to a city that continues to capitalize on the diversity of its citizens.

The Dynamo are part of Major League Soccer, or MLS. Not Major Soccer League, or MSL (as the editorialists put it).

It's a shame that Philip Anschutz's world-class contribution to Houston is a soccer team. We'd much prefer a world-class contribution of a different sort, given the sorry state of print journalism in this town.

(Hat tip to John Wagner for catching the latest editorial-page gaffe)

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/04/06 06:02 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (2)

Chron: Enforcing immigration law is "harsh"

I imagine everyone had their fill of the immigration issue last week, but in catching up on my reading I noticed this Chronicle headline:

Documented problem: Many businesses, fearing loss of workers and higher costs, oppose harsh reforms

Here is the story's description of those "harsh" reforms:

The provision that's drawing the greatest opposition from employers, workers and business organizations is one in the House bill that would increase the criminal penalties on employers who hire undocumented workers. Under current law, employers are subject to criminal prosecution if they knowingly hire 10 undocumented workers in a year's time, according to Jacob Monty, an immigration lawyer in Houston who represents employers.

So, a mechanism designed to enforce existing immigration law is "harsh."

It's good to see professional journalists striving for balance and objectivity, rather than shading the coverage with adjectives that lead readers to conclusions.

Sarcasm aside, that choice of headline was poor, as Chronicle headline writing tends to be.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/04/06 05:30 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (1)

03 April 2006

Time: DeLay to abandon reelection bid

The Galveston Daily News just sent out an email blast, and now Drudge has posted a link to a Time article with news about Rep. Tom DeLay:

Rep. Tom DeLay, whose iron hold on the House Republicans melted as a lobbying corruption scandal engulfed the Capitol, told TIME that he will not seek reelection and will leave Congress within months. Taking defiant swipes at "the left" and the press, he said he feels "liberated" and vowed to pursue an aggressive speaking and organizing campaign aimed at promoting foster care, Republican candidates and a closer connection between religion and government.

"I'm going to announce tomorrow that I'm not running for reelection and that I'm going to leave Congress," DeLay, who turns 59 on Saturday, said during a 90-minute interview on Monday. "I'm very much at peace with it." He notified President Bush in the afternoon. DeLay and his wife, Christine, said they had been prepared to fight, but that he decided last Wednesday, after months of prayer and contemplation, to spare his suburban Houston district the mudfest to come. "This had become a referendum on me," he said. "So it's better for me to step aside and let it be a referendum on ideas, Republican values and what's important for this district."

I can't say I saw that one coming, but then again, I've been in London for a week and haven't been following local affairs as closely as usual. This news certainly jolted me out of the jet lag.

UPDATE: The Chronicle is on top of things as usual:

DeLay reportedly won't seek re-election

Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, a Texan touched by a lobbying scandal that ensnared some of his former top aides and cost the congressman his leadership post, won't seek re-election to Congress, a Republican official said today.

DeLay was expected to disclose the plans Tuesday, said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because DeLay had not publicly disclosed his plans.

More details to come on this breaking story.

And so the Chron is scooped by Time and the Galveston Daily News in its own back yard. Impressive!

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/03/06 09:59 PM | Houston People | Technorati | Comments (16)

02 April 2006

Patrick continues political evolution (the series)

The Chronicle's Kristen Mack has documented another instance in which local talker Dan Patrick continues his transition from "insurgent" to typical politician:

Early in the campaign, Patrick called for a $1,000 limit on campaign donations. Now he says a $5,000 limit would be more reasonable.

People who are carefully watching to see if Patrick the candidate is different from Patrick the politician — the Houston Chronicle included — are only trying to play a game of gotcha, Patrick said.

"People in the party are waiting for me to make a mistake because they are angry," he said.

It probably only feeds the radio talker's ego to continue to point out instances of his changing his mind on issues. But the entertainment value of his playing the "I'm a victim of angry Republicans!" card almost certainly makes it worth it.

PREVIOUSLY: Patrick continues political evolution, Patrick makes quick transition from insurgent to pol, Patrick continues transition from insurgent to pol.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 04/02/06 12:32 PM | Houston People | Technorati | Comments (3)

Chronicle reports on Houston's world-class murder rate

From the Chronicle:

The number of homicides in Houston rose nearly 25 percent during the first three months of 2006, compared with the same period last year, despite a multimillion-dollar police effort in the city's most crime-ridden areas.

The Houston Police Department investigated 90 homicides through Friday, compared with 73 in the first quarter of 2005, police say. That puts the city on track for the deadliest year in more than a decade and would erase the last of the gains made in the 1990s, when the city's homicide tally was cut in half.

[snip]

But a Houston Chronicle analysis of 326 homicides that occurred in the city last year shows that those trends were obvious long before the first evacuee-related slaying and the year-end spike that prompted Police Chief Harold Hurtt to direct resources and public attention to these problem areas.

Hurtt last week admitted that HPD was slow to identify the patterns. But he blamed a staffing shortage that grew worse over the last year and outmoded tools for crime analysis.

"We were behind the curve as far as resources," he said. "We need to do a better job of continuously identifying and even forecasting trends. But you need (technology) and you need personnel to be able to respond."

And Mayor White said Harold Hurtt was "the most successful major-city chief in the country"??? If Chief Hurtt was THE most successful major-city chief Houston could choose, then Houston has some big problems.

Chris Baker and blogHOUSTON have been calling this quite awhile now. Local media have been reporting sporadically on the police manpower shortage, but there have been enough stories that if MayorWhiteChiefHurtt were paying attention, Chief Hurtt wouldn't be blaming outdated forecasting tools for his inaction (wink, wink).

City officials' constant focus on world-class this and world-class that hasn't helped. And red-light and surveillance cameras aren't the answer either, unless the city wants to play defense. Actual police officers ARE a deterrent, and when the city gets serious about a world-class safety strategy, then all the pretty, fluffy stuff (downtown park, for example) might be worth discussing.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/02/06 09:44 AM | Houston Miscellany | Technorati | Comments (13)

Metro's security track record does not inspire confidence

Last week KHOU-11 discovered that not all residents around Metro's proposed Grand Central Station think a bus station in their neighborhood is a good idea. In fact, they are worried about an undesirable element moving in:

It's not far from Maria Nieto's new restaurant. She'd love to cook up new business but said she questions the kinds of customers a bus station might bring.

In Spanish, she said she doesn't like the idea, and she's not alone. 11 News received many calls from residents in this northside area, suspicious of a new bus station near their homes.

"There's a few bad people running already as it is," Nieto said.

Respondeth Metro:

"I think this will be a tremendous amenity for that part of the city which needs a little bit of revitalization and more job formation," said David Wulfe with Metro.

(I think KHOU meant David Wolff)

Is Mr. Wolff/Wulfe going to live in that area to walk his talk? Yeah, right.

Now, why in the world would anyone be fearful of the element that hangs around bus stations? Oh, I don't know. Maybe it's because of Metro's track record. Metro got rid of security officers at Park and Rides, otherwise known as Park and Pillages, then promised security cameras would be installed, then admitted the few security cameras it had weren't working. Oh, but Metro Police Chief Tom Lambert did form a task force and asked CrimeStoppers to put up some signs.

Then there was the woman who was raped at a Metro bus stop. Metro's response? Riders with a concealed carry permit can start packin' heat!

And then last Friday, there was another Park and Pillage spree. KTRK-13 has the details:

METRO police are looking for the thieves who broke into nearly two dozen cars. It happened Friday afternoon at the park and ride in Spring off FM 1960 and Carlsway Road.

Thieves stole radios, broke windows and slashed tires. In all they hit 22 cars. Along with causing a lot of damage, they've left many METRO riders questioning park and ride security.

They can ask all they want. Metro's answer will be the same: Metro's not responsible for the cars parked in Park and Ride lots, and if anyone sees anything suspicious, they should call CrimeStoppers.

It's a call to action for METRO from a customer. Concerns may force him to trade in his bus pass and get back behind the wheel.

METRO did have personnel in the Spring parking lot much of the day on Friday. But they think thieves hit the lot after the METRO employees left in the early afternoon.

Well, sure. If a thief knows that Metro employees won't be staying at a Park and Ride lot all day, the thief will be patient. What else does he have to do?

Until Metro gets serious about security at ALL of its transit offerings (and not just an elite counterterror unit consisting of 20 officers), then residents have good reason to fear the bad people who will be drawn to a bus station. Metro's security track record is woefully lacking.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 04/02/06 07:43 AM | Houston Transit | Technorati | Comments (3)

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