Tag Archives: AGN Media

How would this guy do in the Internet Age?

Internet

My mind wanders occasionally into strange places.

I think of people I used to know and wonder things like, oh, how would they fare in today’s world?

The name of a one-time Amarillo gadfly came to mind today. His name was Michael Wyatt. He’s deceased now; he died in an automobile accident in the late 1990s at a fairly young age.

I came to Amarillo in early 1995 to become editorial page editor of the two papers published by the same owner: the Amarillo Daily News and the Amarillo Globe-Times.

One of the things I learned upon arrival was that the opinion section operated under a policy that I felt compelled to change immediately. It did not place any time restriction on the frequency of people submitting letters to the editor. Put another way: One could get letters published every day of the week if he or she were so inclined.

Michael Wyatt was a prolific letter writer. He had opinions on just about anything — and anyone — in public life. He was unafraid. He took on City Hall, the school districts, county governments, the chamber of commerce. You name it, he had something to say about it.

The frequency of Wyatt’s submissions, I would learn, had a chilling effect on others who had something to say about a public issue. Wyatt scared people off, kept them from expressing their views. “Why get into a public p*****g match with this loony bird?” they would ask themselves.

Well, we changed the policy right away, settling finally on a once-per-calendar-month rule.

He also would come engage us face to face, talk our ears off about this and/or that. He wanted to know what we thought about something and, of course, he would share his own view.

I’m wondering now how Wyatt would fare in this Internet Age.

I have to believe he’d be in hog heaven with the availability of venues, forums, platforms, websites — whatever — to express himself.

I wrote a column for the newspaper upon hearing of Wyatt’s death. I saluted him as someone who felt the calling to contribute to the public dialogue. He did so with gusto and demonstrated great courage in speaking his mind. A member of the Amarillo City Commission at the time called me to complain about the column paying tribute to Wyatt; he told me he “couldn’t stand him.” Why? “Well he was just so damn critical all the time.”

My reaction at the time, as best as I can remember, was “umm, too bad.” He sought to keep our elected officials on their toes.

To be blunt, Wyatt likely would put many of the individuals who respond to this blog to shame. I’ve got my share of “regulars” who like to comment on this or that; many of them get into arguments with each other on the social media outlets through which I channel these blog posts (and which will receive this one once I’m finished with it).

I find myself chuckling at the notion of Michael engaging in these seemingly endless exchanges. He was quite capable of devouring anyone rhetorically.

It’s too bad he didn’t live long enough to witness the dawn of this new “information/disinformation age.”

Michael Wyatt — wherever he is now — no doubt is wishing he could come back to take part. He would be right at home.

 

Thank you, readers, for joining this adventure

Blog concept in word tag cloud

I entered the blogosphere on Feb. 13, 2009, with this post:

“My name is John Kanelis and I am joining the world of bloggers.

 “What will this blog feature? That will depend on my mood and what I see as I go through my day, and travel through Amarillo and the Panhandle.
 
“My discussion topics will be mostly local, I predict, but not exclusively so. They’ll focus mostly on politics and policy. They’ll have an edge. They will invite comment and community discussion.
 
“I’ve been in daily journalism for 32 years. I’ve watched the media change during that entire time, but never at the pace it is changing now. Thus, this entry into the Age of Blogging is an exciting venture for me.
 
“With that, well, let’s talk.”
I was working full time as a print journalist for the Amarillo Globe-News, and the blog was written exclusively for that publication. My association with the newspaper ended abruptly in August 2012, but the blog has continued.
I want to thank those of you who’ve stuck with me over the years and hope you’ll stick around for as long as I continue to vent, rant, cajole, coax, praise, pound and offer a word or two of my brand of wisdom on this and/or that subject.
We’re heading toward the end of an eventual year and the next one is shaping up to make this one look like a walk in the park.
I intend to be there to watch it unfold.
As always, I hope you’ll feel free to share these musings with your own social media friends, acquaintances and assorted contacts as you see fit.
Thanks so much.
Stay tuned. There’s much more to come.

 

Who’s on first in the Texas League?

baseball-pic

Left hand, meet the right hand. Right, say “hey” to left.

Someone — and it’s difficult to discern who — isn’t talking entirely straight regarding a possible baseball franchise move from one city to another in Texas.

A consultant who works with the San Antonio Missions of the Texas League apparently has told downtown Amarillo officials that the Missions might like to consider moving to Amarillo once the city build its downtown ball park.

Oh, but wait! Tom Kayser, president of the Texas League, said the Missions aren’t moving anywhere. Kayser said Rich Neumann, the consultant working with Brailsford & Dunlavey, isn’t speaking for the team or the league or anyone else he can think of.

The third principal here is Melissa Dailey, head of Downtown Amarillo Inc., who told the Amarillo Local Government Corporation of the Missions’ possible move. I don’t recall her saying anything was set in stone, or that any other pledges had been made.

Yes, it’s a bit confusing.

Something is amiss. Someone might have spoken out of turn down yonder in San Antonio without telling the league president of the intention.

It’s been reported that San Antonio wants to upgrade to a AAA farm club; the Missions are a AA team affiliated with the San Diego Padres of the National League. Amarillo’s baseball fortunes currently are tied to an independent organization that in the next season will play half of its own homes in Grand Prairie. So, with that, Amarillo is looking to upgrade as well, to a AA team with a Major League Baseball affiliation.

So, let’s get all this straight. OK?

Many of us in Amarillo want to see some movement in the right direction as it involves the city’s baseball future.

First things first. How about we determine with absolute certainty whether the discussions we’ve been told have occurred with the San Antonio Missions are the real thing — or are they just a diversion?

 

 

May the right university system win

reg_vet-img

My pal Jon Mark Beilue — a columnist for the Amarillo Globe-News — as usual, has laid out a fascinating critique of a growing dispute between two highly regarded Texas university systems.

One of them, Texas Tech, just announced plans to build and develop a college of veterinary medicine in Amarillo.

The other one, Texas A&M, has fired a shot across Tech’s bow, implying it will resist the effort to build an animal doctor school in the Texas Panhandle.

Beilue, himself a Tech alumnus, has taken up for his alma mater. But he’s right on the merits of his argument to argue that A&M is better than to exhibit a petulant streak in seeking to block Tech’s entry into the world of veterinary medicine academia. A&M’s credentials as a premier veterinary medicine institution are impeccable.

But let’s boil this possible tempest down to a more personal level.

Two men are leading their schools’ efforts. They both have at least one political thing in common: They both served in the Texas Senate.

Bob Duncan is chancellor of the Tech System. He’s a Republican who left the Senate this past year to take over the Tech job after Kent Hance retired to become something called “chancellor emeritus.”

Duncan’s Senate reputation is sparkling. He was named routinely by Texas Monthly magazine every two years as one of the top legislators in the state. His job now as chancellor is to raise money for the Tech System and he gets to lobby his friends in the Senate for help in that regard.

John Sharp served in the Senate quite a while ago, from 1982 to 1987; prior to that he served in the Texas House of Representatives. He’s a Democrat, who left the Senate to serve on the Texas Railroad Commission and then as Comptroller of Public Accounts. He, too, developed a reputation as a solid legislator, although he has fewer individuals with whom he served in the Legislature than his rival chancellor, Duncan.

This face-off will be fun to watch, particularly if it develops into something more than it appears at the moment.

I hope it doesn’t grow into anything more serious. Texas Tech is entitled to develop school of veterinary medicine anywhere it so chooses. That the system brass decided to bring it to Amarillo is a huge plus for the Texas Panhandle.

My hope would be that if Sharp stiffens his resistance that Duncan could call on his fellow Republican buddies in the Panhandle legislative delegation to use their own considerable muscle to make the veterinary school a reality.

As Beilue pointed out in his essay, the value of a veterinary school to any region of this state should rise far above petty politics.

 

 

 

Let’s not pussyfoot around: Atkinson was forced out

atkinson

Every single time I add 2 + 2, I get the same answer.

Thus, every time I try to figure out what’s been happening at Amarillo City Hall — and the destructive relationship between the city manager and most of the members of the City Council — I keep drawing the same conclusion.

City Manager Jarrett Atkinson could no longer work with the controlling bloc of council members. So, he has tendered his resignation.

Atkinson’s upcoming departure doesn’t bode well for what has been happening in Amarillo over the past, oh, half-dozen years or so.

The city has marched forward on some ambitious plans to remake its downtown district. Atkinson has been a key player in that effort.

But then along came the three new council members, two of whom ousted incumbents, and the dynamic has changed.

They called for the manager’s resignation right out of the chute. He didn’t quit. He stayed on — for as long as he could.

And yet we hear from one of the new council members, Elisha Demerson, seeking to put a positive spin on Atkinson’s departure. Demerson told the Amarillo Globe-News: “I disagree with the naysayers who would like to turn this into a political decision. This was a decision by Mr. Atkinson for the betterment of himself and his family and I respect that.”

Please excuse my candor, Councilman Demerson: That is pure crap!

Sure, he sought to better “himself and his family.” Why? Because he likely was sick and tired of being hassled at every turn.

I’m not privy to what went into Atkinson’s decision to quit at this time. But none of it adds up to anything other than maddening frustration and an inability to work constructively with most of those who comprise the City Council. How else does one explain why a city manager would throw in the towel in the midst of all the hard work that still needs doing to improve the city’s future?

The council faces the most important task it ever will undertake. It must hire a new city manager. My hunch is that the council will not find a successor within the ranks of current administrative staff. They’ve been party to what has transpired since the May election and the takeover of the council by its new majority.

The alternative? Conduct a nationwide search. Oh, and be sure you tell every candidate who applies precisely — and in detail — what he or she will face if the council selects them.

That would be a ringside seat from which the new manager will get to witness more turmoil and bickering.

Case builds for approval of MPEV

amarillo MPEV

Roger Cox is a man of strong feelings … and he possesses the ability to express them with great effectiveness.

The Amarillo lawyer has done so with an essay published in the Amarillo Globe-News. His topic: the multipurpose event venue and the ballot measure set for voters’ decision on Nov. 3.

Making the case for MPEV

Cox’s essay is on point at many levels, but the one point that resonates most clearly with me is the funding mechanism that will operate the MPEV once it’s built.

The structure would cost $32 million to build. It’s intended to include a ballpark and would be used for a variety of activities designed to attract people to the downtown district.

Cox writes: “As a landlocked city, we are what we build. People come to Amarillo not for the mountains, lakes or coastline but because of the public facilities, entertainment and other features that we and our predecessors have built.”

He notes as well that city government relies heavily on sales tax revenue to fund the services it provides residents — and visitors. The MPEV, he reckons, will generate more sales tax revenue through the goods and services purchased by visitors who come to Amarillo.

He writes: “So anything that generates sales tax, especially paid by visitors from other communities, is OK by me. Most local retailers will tell you that anywhere from 30 percent to 50 percent of their business comes from out of town — ditto for sales tax. It doesn’t matter whether that money comes from Dallas or Dumas, it spends the same.”

Allow me, then, to add that those who come here from distances too far to travel in just a single day would generate additional revenue from the hotel occupancy tax that would then would be used to maintain the MPEV.

Planners have pledged until they’ve run out of breath that the MPEV, the downtown convention hotel (where officials are about to break ground) and the proposed parking garage will not result in an increase in property taxes.

There’s been a bit of trickery involved with the ballot language. The vote will decide whether to build an MPEV that includes a ballpark. If voters say “yes,” then the city moves forward; if they say “no,” then the project stops.

As Cox notes: “There is no Plan B. A negative vote sends our city back to the drawing board.”

More from Cox: “Will a baseball stadium in downtown Amarillo be a panacea? Of course not. But it is a major piece of a larger puzzle.”

I join my friend Roger Cox in endorsing this proposal.

 

Matney sets a principled example

downtown Ama Inc

Paul Matney’s resignation the other day from the Downtown Amarillo Inc. board demonstrated a high ethical standard that the former Amarillo College president has set for himself throughout his lengthy public life.

He joined a group formed to fight for approval of a Nov. 3 ballot measure that will decide the fate of a multipurpose event center being planned for downtown Amarillo. Then he quit the DAI board because, in his mind, the two roles presented a potential conflict of interest.

His keen attention to ethical detail should not be lost on others who find themselves facing a similar potential for conflict.

There appears to be another DAI board member who ought to look inward. He is Lester Simpson, who wears another important hat: publisher of the Amarillo Globe-News.

First, I must disclose that I left the Globe-News in August 2012 under unhappy circumstances created by an organizational restructuring that resulted in my resignation from a post I’d held at the newspaper for more than 17 years.

Where is the conflict?

Simpson gets paid to run a newspaper whose franchise is to report — and comment on — community affairs. The reporting must include a thorough examination of all the issues relating to those affairs — warts and all. The commentary ought to be critical when the need arises.

Simpson’s role on the DAI board gives him access to proprietary information that may be relevant to the public’s interest. Is he going to withhold that information from the newspaper he has run since 2002? Or is he going to be loyal first and foremost to the organization that pays his salary?

And what about the commentary, the newspaper’s other obligation? How does the newspaper look critically at decisions delivered by DAI if its chief executive officer — the publisher — is part of the process that produces a decision that the newspaper otherwise might feel compelled to criticize?

DAI’s mission statement says this: “Downtown Amarillo, Inc. is committed to making Downtown Amarillo a vibrant and attractive place for people to live, work, play and worship, while preserving Amarillo’s rich history and culture.”

That is a noble and worthy goal.

But the process that drives DAI to achieve that goal can produce criticism. Does DAI do everything perfectly? No. But the newspaper has had its hands tied because its publisher wears two hats.

With all the changes occurring in journalism these days — with the Internet robbing newspapers of paid subscribers and changing the very way that papers deliver the news — it is my fervent hope that the noble craft isn’t forsaking its time-honored principle of protecting the public interest.

An important line of demarcation between media watchdog and newsmaker is being blurred in Amarillo.

Paul Matney recognizes the potential for conflict when he sees it — and he reacted appropriately when he faced that potential head-on. Is the message being lost on one of his former DAI colleagues?

 

Why not play ball at MPEV?

Amarillo MPEV

Jon Mark Beilue might have laid out what could be a pivotal argument for approving construction of a multipurpose event venue — as it’s currently configured — in downtown Amarillo.

The stellar Amarillo Globe-News columnist — and a friend of yours truly — noted in an essay: “I would bet all the change in my pocket that no less than two years after construction, independent baseball would be replaced with AA Texas League affiliated baseball. From there, the MPEV could be designed in such a way as to draw other events that are the other half in making the venue succeed and attracting downtown crowds to added retail.”

The MPEV is coming up for a vote on Nov. 3. It headed to the ballot on a narrow 3-2 Amarillo City Council vote, with the three newest council members voting to place the issue on the ballot.

The crux of Beilue’s column was that the new guys “whiffed” on common sense, and that they had their mind made up long before taking the vote.

But I’m intrigued by the notion of what might happen if the MPEV design gets voter approval this fall.

As has been noted before — in this blog and in many other forum — Potter County Memorial Stadium, aka the Dilla Villa and now the Thunderhead Park, is a dump. It’s hardly more than a piece of fecal matter as far as athletic complexes go.

Is it unreasonable to believe that a brand new, shiny, state-of-the-art venue could become a magnet for the kind of minor-league baseball organization that Beilue and others visualize for the city?

My answer is “no,” not in the least.

Beilue writes: “Neither I nor most others are married to a baseball stadium as the signature piece of an MPEV, but it’s the most logical. The MPEV needs an anchor tenant, and baseball fits that.

“A Hollywood Bowl design has appeal, but its events would be in direct competition with the Globe-News Center for Performing Arts and Amarillo Civic Center Complex. Baseball is a unique alternative that would draw thousands.”

I refuse to heed the naysayers who insist that Amarillo “isn’t a baseball town.” It hasn’t been a baseball town for years largely, in my view, because that rat hole at the Tri-State Fairgrounds is a lousy place to play — or watch — a baseball game.

The ballot measure states: “Should the Multi-Purpose Event Venue (MPEV) to be constructed in downtown Amarillo include a Baseball Stadium at the approximate cost of $32 million?”

It works for me.

Thanks, Internet, for changing travel habits

SANTA ROSA, N.M. — We ventured west along Interstate 40 to this community.

Our intention was to relax in our fifth wheel, do a little swimming at the Blue Hole and just get away from the hustle/bustle of our regular lives — although it’s a lot less hustle-and-bustly than it used to be.

However, one of my travel indulgences includes purchasing a newspaper.

So, we awoke and, given that this was a Sunday morning, I only assumed I’d be able to drive to the nearest convenience store, truck stop, grocery market and purchase a paper from a large metropolitan area that’s not too far away from here.

Silly me.

I went to three retail outlets. At the last one, I asked the clerk: “We’re from out of town. Is there anywhere here where we can purchase a Sunday newspaper?” The lady said, “Oh no. They stopped delivering the Albuquerque Journal some time ago.”

That did it!

Then it occurred to me. I can blame the Internet for this catastrophe. Newspapers everywhere are cutting back — or eliminating — regional distribution of their editions (I refuse to refer to newspapers as “products,” which is what my former employers in Amarillo have taken to calling the newspaper that’s being published there in diminishing numbers).

Thus, one of the staples of my traveling habits has been eliminated whenever my wife and I travel to markets that don’t have a daily paper of their own.

Thanks for nothing — whoever it was who invented the Internet.

 

Should online comments meet same standards as printed comments?

online papers

Word has been bouncing around Amarillo about the suspension of online comments to news and opinion articles in the Amarillo Globe-News.

I don’t know the particulars, as I don’t talk to the higher-ups at the paper these days. Nor do I subscribe to the print edition, which means I get very limited access to the online version of the publication. I get a few “free clicks” each month, then I have to pay to read it online — which I do not do.

OK, but what about the suspension of the comments?

It brings to mind an on-going debate I believe is still occurring in editors’ and publishers’ offices around the country. It centers on whether online comments should meet the same standard as those required for publication in print editions.

I’ve long believed they should.

I guess the AGN suspended the comments because many of them were getting a bit too harsh, intensely personal and were impugning people’s integrity. So, I reckon publisher Lester Simpson suspended the comments until he figures out what to do about their tone.

This is the monster the Internet has created. Too many of these online commenters — and they’re not limited, of course, to just this market — are allowed to get away with too much. They can submit their opinions using bogus handles, not their real names. They use that shroud of anonymity to attack individuals and to sling accusations like so much feed lot manure.

Back in the old days, when the printed paper was the sole source of information for a community, there was a standard that contributors were asked to follow.

Give your name, address and a daytime phone number where the editor of the editorial page or his/her representative can contact you. The paper would then publish the writer’s name and his or her city of residence. The paper would insist that the writer stick to the issue and refrain from personal attacks. Editors then would remind readers that there are laws against libeling someone in print and that the paper wouldn’t tolerate anything that even hinted at potentially libelous material.

The presence of the writer’s name had at least one positive benefit: It tended to elevate the tone and tenor of whatever discussion was occurring.

These days, with anonymous snipers lurking in cyberspace, that civility occasionally disappears.

Oh sure, some readers like reading this stuff. They find it entertaining. An individual, someone I know personally, complained this week that the online edition of the paper has gotten “boring” without the comments, and that he liked following the give-and-take among readers.

Well, OK. Sometimes, though, the give-and-take starts to draw blood unnecessarily.

This is the new age of journalism. It has brought an entirely different set of questions, issues and problems to handle.

My suggestion? Set the same rules for online comments that you do for print.

Intelligent commentary plays just as well on a computer screen as it does on the printed page.