Tag Archives: Amarillo TX

local news

Mayor does the impossible

Brianna Chacon has done the seemingly impossible by replicating what I used to witness in another mayor serving another Texas city.

She has defied the laws of physics by seeming to be everywhere at once. I don’t know how the Princeton (Texas) mayor does it.

I used to joke with a former mayor of Amarillo, a considerably larger city up yonder from Princeton, about her ability to be everywhere all at one time. Debra McCartt is her name. She’s now a private citizen, but so help me as surely as I am writing these words, she was able to show up at various public functions anywhere within shouting distance of Amarillo.

So it seems with Brianna Chacon. She’s been on the job for a couple of years and has made amazing use of social media to appear to be able to clone herself on demand.

Totally amazing!

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news, media news

Curiosity leads to some answers

My curiosity over the possible future of a building where I once worked is beginning to produce some potential answers. I am getting a nice buzz about what I am hearing.

The Amarillo Globe-News building on the corner of Ninth Avenue and Harrison Street now belongs to a new owner. It is a company that makes petroleum-based lubricants.

I am curious about the fate of an inscription on the Harrison Street side of the building. It reads: “A newspaper can be forgiven for lack of wisdom but never for lack of courage.” The iconic message is attributed to the late Gene Howe, publisher of the Globe-News.

I want the inscription preserved forever. I learned today from a longtime friend and a former colleague at the newspaper that the owner of the building is interested in keeping it, too.

My friend believes the engraved wisdom will remain on the side of the building and that the new owner of the building will seek some sort of historical grant to preserve the exterior appearance of the building.

That means Mr. Howe’s wisdom will remain where it has been for decades.

The owners have uncovered a lot of material left behind when the Globe-News staff vacated the building a few years ago. He told me of the discovery of the Pulitzer Prize medal the paper won in 1961 for its uncovering of corruption in county government. He mentioned old newspaper articles and handwritten notes on them from the late T. Boone Pickens, who criticized the publisher of the paper, Garet von Netzer, over the tone of the articles the paper printed … presumably about Pickens!

This is all valuable stuff, man!

My hope now is that the building will be refitted to accommodate the offices of the new lubricant-maker but will retain the personality that made it such an iconic structure in Amarillo.

To my way of thinking, it starts with Gene Howe’s wise words.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

‘Amarillo Matters’ … to whom and for what purpose?

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A new political action committee has popped up on Amarillo’s landscape.

It’s called Amarillo Matters.

I took a quick look at its website. I found a tab at the top labeled “About Us.” You see these things on websites all the time. The tab implies some information about the PAC, its sponsors, its intent, perhaps a statement or two about how it hopes to achieve whatever noble end it seeks.

Here is what I found:

http://www.amarillomatters.com/about_us/

OK, I’ve read the mission statement a couple of times. It’s noble, high-minded and — I’ll presume for a moment — well-intended.

What I cannot gather, though, is its source. Who are the folks backing it, supporting it presumably with money or who this group intends to benefit?

It says it intends to elect leaders with “impeccable character” and who are “focused on the needs and well-being of the citizens of Amarillo.” Well, duh? Who isn’t — in their own heart and mind — focused on those things?

I, too, want the best for our city. My wife and I pay our taxes, we enjoy the perks the city has to offer, we enjoy some of the quality of life accoutrements available to us? We want more of it.

Amarillo Matters? Who are you?