Pro-Business Republicans' budget would cost Texas thousands of private sector jobs

Not Surprisingly, The Texas GOP has become the butt of many jokes.

The GOP has always sold itself as being pro-business and pro-jobs. Well, their currently proposed budget will have exactly the opposite effect on some of the state's private industries. The Dallas Mornings has the following eye-opening report of how GOP cuts would negatively impact private sector jobs that deal in providing services to the poor and the elderly.

The Dallas Morning News reports:

AUSTIN — Business owner after business owner warned Wednesday that proposed cuts would shutter their operations serving Texas’ disabled children and frail adults. The spending blueprint would reduce payments to some social service providers by more than 30 percent.

“I don’t know that I’ll be able to stay in business,” said Jerre van den Bent, owner of Dallas-based Therapy 2000, a 3,000-employee agency helping children with developmental disabilities.

Mickey Atkins, president of Austin-based D&S Residential Services, which has 13 group homes for the mentally disabled in Collin and Denton counties, said it couldn’t survive proposed cuts to “Medicaid waiver programs” that keep clients out of institutions.“We’d be out of business by Sept. 1,” said Atkins, who has 1,500 employees.

George Linial, who represents Texas’ nonprofit nursing homes, with 35,000 residents, said cuts of 34 percent to Medicaid’s spending on skilled nursing facilities would be a death blow to what is a major employer in many rural areas. “The cuts are basically going to close a lot of nursing homes,” said Linial, president of the Texas Association of Homes and Services for the Aging.

After listening to scores of witnesses, some Democrats seethed with frustration, calling for care providers to rally support for lawmakers to find ways to raise new revenue. Senator  John Whitmire, D-Houston, told care providers: “Build an army. … Talk to your neighbors, your employees and your families.” Senators of both parties heard more than 80 witnesses, and 10 of the panel’s 15 members were still in their seats in late afternoon. “They have never been that engaged,” said 24-year Sen. Judith Zaffirini, D-Laredo, saying she’d “never seen a quorum of this committee for public testimony” last so long.

Mexico to supply Texas with much-needed electricity

Outages? We don't need no stinking outages!

I don't know if Arizona would be likely to get any help from Mexico if it were in a bind but it sure looks like Texas will. Amid state-wide power outages and rolling blackouts, Mexico will be supplying Texas with much needed electrical support. I know relations between the two countries are often strained but it's refereshing to see (or should I say warming to see) that Ol' Mexico is willing to give it's neighbor to the North a hand.

From Canadian Business Online
MEXICO CITY (AP) - Mexico will provide electricity to Texas to help the U.S. state weather an ice storm that has forced rolling blackouts.

Mexico's Federal Electricity Commission says it has agreed to transmit 280 megawatts of electricity to Texas between Wednesday and Thursday night.

A commission statement says the electricity will be transmitted at interconnection points in Nuevo Laredo — across the border from Laredo, Texas — and Piedras Negras, which sits opposite of Eagle Pass, Texas.
Rolling blackouts have been implemented across Texas, including in Super Bowl host city Dallas, due to high demand during the rare ice storm.

Laredo Sun is reporting word of "brownouts" throughout Gateway City

Ready Kilowatt says: Prepare for power outages. Also, I miss being atop the CPL plant in Laredo, Texas!

Laredo Sun is reportedly shortly after 12noon that Laredo can expect to experience some "brownouts" throughout the local area. The power companies have resorted to using the term brownouts to refer to power outages that are usually planned and shorter in duration than the unplanned blackouts. It sort of doesn't make sense to me. When the power is off, it's off and you don't see brown when it's dark, you still see black until you find a candle or something. I think a more appropriate term would be black offs. Oh well. Keep those flashlights and candles handy.  Here's what the Laredo Sun has on the outages.

From The Laredo Sun 

City of Laredo officials have been notified by American Electric Power (AEP) that our community, as well as others in the State of Texas, will experience temporary power outages throughout the day as the demand of electricity has increased due to the cold weather.
The temporary outages, also known as “Brownouts”, will occur at different times and in different sections of the city.

The public is asked to take the necessary precautions such as treating traffic lights as all-way stops, ensure that critical and essential electrical equipment has operational power back-up, and to monitor local media outlets for updates.

P.S.  photo caption refers to a time when Ready Kilowatt glowed in the night at Laredo's power plant.

Laredo Taco Company employing cutting edge technology in advertising

  
From CSP Daily News:  Taco Tweets, Texas Style

CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas -- Susser Holding Corp.'s Stripes convenience store chain has come up with a high-tech and high-profile way to promote its Laredo Taco Co. tacos, the company said recently on its Facebook and Twitter pages.

The company's Firehouse Agency thought a good way to do it would be to publicize the positive feedback Stripes had gotten for its tacos on Twitter, letting its customers essentially become its copywriters by putting those tweets up on digital billboards.

Working with Lamar Advertising, Firehouse combined two of the hottest areas of media right now, said the report, social media and digital outdoor.  "The agency monitors any conversation happening on Twitter about @stripesstores and their tacos," Lamar digital strategist Ian Dallimore told the publication. "The tweets are then sent to Lamar's data feed manager, where the tweets are filtered and stream live to the digital billboard."

Eight billboards across Texas are running the campaign, the report said. The campaign, which will run through March 3, uses Lamar's iSpot technology, which allows billboards to include live data feeds.The billboards are in six markets: Corpus Christi, Brownsville/Rio Grande Valley, Laredo, Lubbock, Midland/Odessa and San Angelo, Texas.

An extension of the Don't Mess With Texas reputation? Texas has it's own Power grid



I Reckon We best have our own Power Grid Y'all.



By Slate.com's Brendan I. Koehner

Blackout  postmortems have noted that in the continental United States, the electricity system consists of just three regions, the Eastern Interconnection, the Western Interconnection, and the Texas Interconnection. Why does the Lone Star State have its own power grid?

Partly because of a historical desire for self-sufficiency and partly because of that famous "Don't Mess With Texas!" attitude. The majority of the state's residents live within the region regulated by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, an "island" that generates and supplies all its own electricity—unlike, say, New York City or Detroit, whose residents found out the hard way that lots of their power comes from Canada. (A small sliver of Western Texas gets its juice from the Western Interconnection, while a few customers in the north and the east are hooked into the Eastern Interconnection. Still, ERCOT handles 85 percent of the state's electricity needs.)

The local utilities that comprise ERCOT have pledged not to sell their power to interstate customers. As a result, the interconnection is exempt from most regulation by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, the Beltway agency that governs the transmission of electricity from state to state—say, by mandating transmission standards, or requiring that prices be listed in public forums. ERCOT's resistance to federal regulation plays well in President Bush's native land, where meddling from Washington, D.C., is generally abhorred.

School's out at LCC and TAMIU

It's freezing:  Hey Palomino, Is LCC still open?   Naaaaaayyyyyyy!

The freezing weather is forcing both Laredo Community College and TAMIU to close down.  Employees and students at LCC were notified that the "power was being shut off" and everyone was sent home at about 11am today. Apparently, TAMIU has also close shop for the day. The state's power grid has decided to implement some rolling blackouts throughout the state. It is not clear if the closing of LCC and TAMIU was a decision resulting directly from that decision. I, personally, haven't heard of any K-12 schools being closed due to the weather. The decision to hold classes at Laredo's public schools came late Tuesday from both LISD and UISD.

San Antonio has been having it's share of problems due to power outages/blackouts. Some people calling in to KTSA 550 AM were reporting that they had been without power for up to 6 hours. Many people reported being stuck in elevators. One caller who spoke to the "elevator people' was told that it would be a while because there a bunch of people stuck. Those few Laredoans who have to deal with elevators might think twice when deciding how to get to that 2nd floor.

Mayor says "we're expecting snow"??

"Don't be fooled by that Green tree behind me, we're expecting snow!"

Ol' Mayor Salinas was on Pro8news at noon to let us all know that the city is ready for the apparent blizzard coming in. "We're expecting snow" the Mayor told Mindy Casso and Victoria Marshall. That came as news to me. I know we're supposed to get a hard freeze with temperatures expected to drop well into the 20s. Also, I understand that there is a very slight chance for some  precipitation on Thursday. However, I was somewhat puzzled when the Mayor said that the city had two truckloads of sand ready. Since sand is usually used to deal with icy roads, I guess we just might get some ice on Thursday after all.

On a positive note, Mayor Salinas said that the city has all departments on high alert and arrangements have been made to house those who need shelter from the cold. He mentioned the Laredo Civic Center as a place people can go to in order to stay warm. Any overflow from the Bethany House would also be directed to the Civic Center according to what the Mayor said. Hopefully, Nuevo Laredoans will also take the necessary precautions to guard against the frigid temperatures.