Meddlesome Media
CLEARLY, Sainted Editor loves odd fonts. (It stems from his wanting to be a printer when he grows up.) Alphagraphic’s compositor, Justin Seabourn, must think I have it in for him, putting him to so much trouble, and I even know better! No publication should use more the two or three fonts (not counting attributes such as italic or bold), but they’re just fun. Where I really test Justin’s patience, however, is with special characters J. There I’m actually using them as they should be used. Two bulletins ago (Analog Eyes), for example, I referred to HDTV screens as being so detailed as to require a (diagonal) width of at least 1/3 of the viewing distance. But I used the single character “?” instead of the three “1/3,” and that apparently mapped into “J” in Justin’s character set! Sainted Editor will have to be more cautious in future missives.
Guido rang the dinner bell late at 12:18, calling upon Reverend Mueller to Pray and Kyle Walters to Pledge. He thanked Earnest Burke for Greeting. And Sainted Editor thanks Charles Awalt for the last minute save when Barry went AWOL (with notice).
Captain Kirk (once a real fly-boy in the Air Force with that rank, so my promotion was redundant!) fined no one as he led us in the greetings of guests, one of whom, George Lynch, was a retired Methodist Pastor friend of LB the Good. There were, of course, the usual suspects of Visiting Rotarians, none of whom offered either banners or tears.
Our Market Minute was expanded some as Kirk battled to keep us from slitting our financial wrists, given the tanking of investment banks and the proposed pillaging of public coffers to reward those responsible. President Bush had delivered a Fireside Chat to the Nation the prior evening, essentially a notice that he had found Weapons of Mass Depression with no reference at all to the Boy Who Cried Wolf. You could almost hear Dick Cheney slapping his forehead that he hadn’t thought of such a simple, direct theft before; Halliburton could have been rolling in taxpayer clover as opposed to merely wading.
Kirk said that the Frequently Asked Question du Jour was “Is my money safe?” And he promised that no Lehman Bros. client had lost a dime due to its failure. Insurance protects investors from “fraud, malfeasance, and theft,” so their money’s safe. At least until the bailout goes through, that is.
The U.S., he said, can finance the near trillion-dollar bailout by plummeting further into foreign debt (presuming that the rest of the world has gone suddenly soft in the head) and simply printing money, further devaluing the currency. But he has seen clients denied loans or offered only usurious rates to make up for the effects of past “toxic” lending practices. The bailout, he insisted, was not the best solution, but better solutions take more time than the Bear Market will tolerate, so it represents the least painful (if least fair) alternative. He prefaced his remarks with a challenge to the many bankers and investment gurus in the Club to object to anything he said that was amiss, but they were ominously silent.
Ken Roberts wasn’t silent. He offered a sarcastic “clear as a Bell” comment. And into this atmosphere of gloom and doom, Past President Clean glanced at his Blackberry and remarked, “The Dow is up 255.”
Perfect Attendance Pins went to Karen McDonald (4), Jim Anderson (3), Phil Dyer (8), and Bruce Glasscock (18).
Shawn Foster announced that, “I have not suspended my campaign for more insurance.” Then he settled into his duty: introducing the day’s speaker, Sharon Grigsby, Deputy Editorial Page Editor for The Dallas Morning News. Sharon came to Dallas in 1980 from Baylor U. by way of New York and Detroit. Here she married Clay Morton, and they’ve two boys, one in his third year at Austin and the second a freshman at Kansas. She’s staffed almost every post there is at the News, being the editor of Metro, politics, features, religion, and national news. So “she knows just enough about everything to be dangerous.” Her email is
sgrigsby@dallasnews.com
First off, she apologized to a Rotarian visiting from Park Cities; she would give the same talk he’s already heard.
And what he’s heard is that the paper has created The Dallas Project: Bridging the North-South Gap. Sharon thinks it the “most important work I’ve done.” She drew up short and mused that perhaps the most important work she’ll do today is to finish on time. Randy agreed, adding that “we’ll leave whether you’re done or not.”
The Dallas Project is a “multi-dimensional crusade on behalf of southern Dallas,” that is, south of I-30 but within the city limits. It encompasses not only South Dallas and Oak Cliff but also Pleasant Grove and points east. It consists of diverse neighborhoods that share only economic hardship in that they all lag behind their northern neighbors.
Sharon imagines correctly that few of us “have South Dallas as your regular stomping grounds … but advocating for the good of people south of the Trinity will credit all in North Texas.” So the News has dedicated itself to
- Serve as committed advocates, and to
- Educate businessmen, residents, and government officials, here and in Austin, as to why it’s important.
She implied that the problems are so great that we will not see significant changes for decades; she calls it “generational change.” Her assessment is that “there is nothing easy about this;” the News itself has made such noises before, made promises, and then abandoned them. But she believes firmly that such a beautiful, pastoral land and its people can’t be written off.
She looks, for example, to the Mockingbird Station projects and hopes for “transit-oriented development” to begin south of the Trinity. She admires the older homes there that “rival those in the M streets or Preston Hollow.” But it’s an uphill battle against basic city services that don’t exist, and pockets of dire poverty with few retail options. Indeed the poverty cycle is so strong that multidimensional attacks upon it need to be mounted: better schools, better housing, better law enforcement, better parenting.
And she fears that the stereotyping attendant with such problems impedes the solutions. But, she notes, a UTD study shows that the highest crime index isn’t in Dallas south of the Trinity but rather north.
Economics are on her side as well. The south represents 49% of Dallas’ area but only 16% of its property value. While the north in nearing build-out, the south is “ripe for development.” Even now, 38% of southern residents work north of the Trinity, almost half of those in suburbs, including Collin County.
She fears that after build-out, Dallas may become “hollow” as has Detroit. Having once lived there, she would not like to see Dallas living down to that example. So she sees the development of the south as “not charity but an economic necessity.”
Since education is key, she is pleased to see a new community college in Pleasant Grove in the works. She referred us to the project plan in the article “Our City’s Best Hope,” which may be found following the Dallas North-South Project link from the OPINIONS one on
www.dallasnew.com
Lenny voiced a concern about Jerry World, a development such as she envisions, having failed due to county negligence. Sharon finds a CEO attitude in Mayor Leppert betokens recognition of the economic necessity.
A visiting Rotarian asked about declining circulation at the News. Sharon said that it was systemic throughout the industry. People aren’t reading…anything. And newspapers are having a hard time migrating to the Internet where advertisers fear to follow. But the less than bad news is that circulation has stabilized in the last year, and the sales force is emphasizing “readership” over “circulation” as a ploy to squeeze shekels.
Alex wanted to know how the News project relates to the City’s Task Force on the same issue. Sharon’s response was to liken City progress to geologic processes. So the News took the project on because “the time is now right.”
Guido gave her Harry’s House to sign for Plano Children’s Medical Clinic. Jeff Frauenheim announced make-up opportunities at Christie and Sheppard Elementary Schools during our Citizen of the Month award ceremonies. Jessica noted a change of venue for next week: we’ll be meeting in one room but queuing up for lunch in an adjacent one. And our seating will be tight, so shower well and come early! (Too bad you won’t receive this warning until you’re there.)
After leading us in the Four-Way Test, Guido sprung the lot of us at 1:00 pm.
