Backing Up Ron Kirk’s Point

We have evidence that Victory is, indeed, a success, as Kirk says. As it happens, the draft annual report for fiscal year 2007 (ending September 30) for the Sports Arena TIF came out on Monday. It won’t go online until the City Council formally accepts it next month. But here are the relevant numbers from page eight:

The district’s assessed 1998 [Ed note: the year of the arena election] tax value was $16,423,773. The total appraised value of all taxable property for 2007 was approximately $386,526,044 … which represents an increase in taxable value of $206,251,094 (114%) from 2006.

So is Victory a success? As an investment by the City of Dallas, it is a huge success.

Wall Street Snubs Belo (And That’s A Good Thing)

The stock hit a high of $20.64 on October 1 when it announced the split. Since then, it has drifted down to today’s price of $16.51. Of course, there’s been plenty of bad news about newspapers in the intervening four months, and broadcasting isn’t setting anyone’s pants on fire either. We’ll know more when the stocks officially split (in about 30 days), but if newspaper company’s stock sinks like a stone, which I bet it does, it’s a perfect buy-back opportunity for Robert Decherd. The newspaper group won’t have any debt and will have free cash flow, so he should be able to get the financing at good terms. That would free him of the Wall Street yoke, and enable the News to right itself in a turbulent sea. Which I hope, hope, hope it does.

Snow Leads to Impulse Buy

Was just out shopping for something to wear to a b-day party tonight when I was hit with both buyers remorse and snowflakes. Side note: Ahab Bowen is having a good sale.

My Goldfinches Are Fine

A FrontBurnervian Birder asks if I have American goldfinches this year. Yes, I have about eight. I shot this picture of one, Atticus, resting on a tree yesterday. Isn’t he yar?

Holy Nuthatch

Just came home for lunch and found a pair of red-breasted nuthatches on my tree and a flock of about 16 white-throated sparrows on the ground. They must have all come into town ahead of the cold front. Dark-eyed juncos in mass quantities. Tra la.

Bark Preps Hot Seat For Rowlett

TV critic Ed Bark, who grilled Gordon Keith on the debut of his Uncle Barky Show at Stratos Greek Taverna, has a new victim lined up for this Saturday’s second episode. He is … drumroll here, please … Emmy-winning CBS 11 newsman Tracy Rowlett. Details about the free live event are on any page of Bark’s Web site.

News’ Site Up 22%

Scary headlines must work. Personally, I find the News’ site almost impossible to navigate, but that’s just me.  A new report on web traffic at metro newspapers from Editor & Publisher says it is doing quite well, thank you. The stats after the jump:

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Foreclosures Up! World Ends! (Or Maybe Not)

“Dallas-Fort Worth home foreclosure filings jump 31%” screams the scare headline on the DMN site. Indeed, more than 5,300 homes are up for auction on February 1. But there’s a little something wrong with the story. The something wrong starts with this:

One reason for the substantial increase in February postings may be that the January auction fell on New Year’s Day, Foreclosure Listing Service analysts said. By law, lenders in Texas are only allowed to take properties through foreclosure on the first Tuesday of each month.

As reporter Steve Brown notes, there were 43,000 foreclosures in 2007 — averaging 3,583 a month. If, as he suggests, the 5,300 figure represents two months’ worth, that’s 2,650 a month. Which means foreclosures are down 26% for the first two months of 2008. Isn’t that worth its own headline?

Cuban Still Covets Cubbies

The rumors swirled before that Mark Cuban was interested in buying the Chicago Cubs. According to this soon-to-be-published interview Cuban did with GQ’s (and Deadspin’s) Will Leitch, he’s still interested. Very interested. Nice pic, btw.

Is Victory Park a Success or Not?

Several commenters to my earlier post about Ron Kirk getting all high-fivey over the success of Victory have said quite the contrary: Victory ain’t a success. They cite two bits of proof: 1) declining liquor sales and 2) rent subsidies. Let’s take a close look at the former. The following numbers are for sales in August, September, and October.

Ghostbar — $444,561 — $553,876 — $591,954
Kenichi — $127,378 — $97,413 — $104,457
N9NE — $189,768 — $157,009 — $209,762
Nove — $128,978 — $86,589 — $98,243
Victory Tavern — $39,602 — $51,036 — $81,692

I don’t see a downward trend here, at least not over that three-month period. Now, Ghostbar is down year-to-yea, about 25 percent (the other places are too young to have year-to-year data). But Ghostbar is a weird animal. Their October 2007 liquor sales could have been inflated by one huge convention. It’s also possible that half a mil in sales is their sweet spot, and the higher numbers from a year ago were the result of curiosity. All the people who were only ever going to visit once have gotten that visit behind them. Maybe these numbers are all below projections. That would be cause for concern. But I don’t see declines.

As for rent subsidies (a year free, or charging a percentage of sales), that’s only a problem if it wasn’t in the business plan to begin with. And I suspect it was. That’s how you build a critical mass of retailers. Tenants attract other tenants. You have to sweeten the deal to get those first storefronts filled.

Hicks: “I Am Not Selling Any of My Shares [Of Liverpool] To Anybody.”

Tom Hicks says it’s “rubbish” to think that he is. Yep. Move along. Nothing to see here. Apparently it doesn’t worry him that his partner doesn’t entirely agree with the refinancing plan, that all of Anfield doesn’t like him, and Dubai International Capital wants the club and has money to spend.

Odds that Tom Hicks will continue to co-own Liverpool in two months: 4-1.

Burger Talk

Over here.

AIG Heading Downtown

In the latest coup for revitalizing downtown Dallas, insurance giant AIG says it’s moving to Plaza of the Americas.

Bloomberg Testing Texas Waters

The presidential race could get even more interesting. Here’s the scoop from the venerable and insidery Quorum Report:

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Re: Why Young Black Women

You don’t think there aren’t young black women in Dallas? Or young white women? Who want to marry? IJS.

Ashleigh Banfield Is Not Sick Of O.J. Simpson

Seriously. She isn’t. Just ask her. You don’t even have to ask her. She’ll tell you.

Re: Why Young Black Women Are Unlikely to Marry

Um, Wick? Do I need to forward to you a copy of the mission statement? Remember the “conversation about Dallas” part?

Why Young Black Women Are Unlikely To Marry

And why young white women have a hard time finding the right partner. Interesting.

Ron Kirk, I Need Your Help

Just finished reading Ron Kirk’s op-ed letter to Laura Miller in today’s paper about what a great success the Victory development — spurred by the AAC — has been. But one sentence toward the end made me stumble:

I sincerely hope that you are as proud of what we accomplished working together in building a new and vibrant urban center for our great city.

As proud as what? The previous sentence didn’t mention any pride that we could compare ours to. So what’s missing? Ron Kirk, did the DM editors mess this one up? “I sincerely hope that you are as proud as I am of what we accomplished …” ? “I sincerely hope that you are as proud of what we accomplished working together in building a new and vibrant urban center for our great city as you are proud of your mustache” ?

Help?

Dallas-Fort Worth Is Bigger Than You Think

The most recent estimate of our population, in January of last year, is 6,406,500. According to these 2005 statistics, that would make us more populous than Libya, Paraguay, Papua New Guinea, Jordan, Sierre Leone, Laos, and Nicaragua. Not impressed? We’re also bigger than Denmark, Finland, Norway, Ireland, and New Zealand, to name only a few. It gets more interesting when one does a little amateur economic analysis. Denmark is the largest of the industrialized countries on the list. Denmark’s GNP, according to the CIA, is $202.1 billion or $37,032 per person. According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, our GDP in 2005 was $315.5 billion or $49,247 per person. (The U.S. per capita GNP in 2006 was $43,800.)

That’s all for now. Class dismissed.

Possible Headlines For the Kuehne-Williams Nuptials

“Fore Your Love.”  “COURT-ship Complete.” “Second Serve for Kuehne.”

Hank Kuehne and Venus Williams Make for a Swinging Couple

News comes that the club-swinger from Highland Park has apparently popped the question to his racket-swinging sweetheart. Adam, I need a pun-tastic headline for this story, something involving “par” and “love.” Go!

Incoming Feathered Missiles And A Big Word

I was just walking my dog and encountered a huge flock of cedar waxwings in a tree. A marvelous site, these dapper frugivores. But if you see them in your yard, close your blinds and curtains–once full of fruit, they become intoxicated and will slam into your windows. It’s a funny, yet horrifying site. Like watching a drunken co-worker leave a party. Right, Timmy?

Leading Off

1. Dallas is considering strengthening its pet laws to address the problem of dangerous strays that Rod Davis wrote about last year. Now if they would only make not picking up after your pet a felony, I’d be happy.

2. Not surprisingly, the head of a Collin County rape crisis center is none too pleased that a jury gave a probated sentence to a teen rapist.

3. Tech coach Bobby Knight earned his 900th coaching victory, this one over highly ranked Texas A&M, proving that even the dangerously megalomaniacal can achieve their dreams if they just try hard enough.