THE LONG HOLIDAY WEEKEND combined with a minor storm event (rain! quick, deploy all reporters to stand out in the water!) means there’s not much hard news to start the work week, but here’s a little lunchtime reading:
- When can you get into the Houston Zoo for free? (KTRK-13 News)
The zoo is changing its designated free-days policy, to help with parking (as they put it; and if it generates a little revenue, well….) - TSU paints over murals created by retired prof (Sarah Raslan, Houston Chronicle)
It would be easier to figure out if something truly valuable was needlessly lost if Chron.com had posted images larger than thumbnails. - Continental to recall pilots, union says (Houston Business Journal)
- The Chronicle, which always and ostentatiously ignores . . . (Unca Darrell)
. . . our most profound national civic holiday, July 4, found time today to celebrate — in a manner of speaking — Labor Day. The first sentence signals that this will be another . . . anti-editorial — pointless (August was really, really hot, but now it’s not August anymore), snarky (we aren’t declaring mission accomplished), elitist (white shoes?) — an editorial with nothing to say, saying it.
- No media in Houston (Case # 1743928) (Harris County Almanac)
- Selling the public on light rail (Live Oaks)
The Chronicle tells us that new Metro chairman George Greanias faces the challenge of selling a “sometimes skeptical public” on the alleged merits of light rail. The article makes it appear that Greanias is more concerned with the troubled agency’s public image than correcting its financial problems. And that isn’t surprising.
Unlike a private business, Metro has an endless source of funds–taxpayers–which it can tap into.
Here’s one of our problems with the Chron’s tireless cheerleading for METRO (with Mike Snyder taking the cheerleading to new levels): METRO has a bloated PR department to spin a positive message for the public. Citizens and taxpayers have a handful of local journalists supplemented by a few citizen-activists and bloggers to look out for their interests. When the beat reporter at the area’s newspaper of record seems to head the 801 Texas Avenue METRO PR desk, that’s not particularly helpful to citizens and taxpayers.
