Articles for July 20th, 2009
Mark Cuban In Legal Trouble, Ctd.
Good heavens, I love Mark Cuban. He says, eh, it’s not so much that I’m in legal trouble, it’s that Ross Perot Jr. is in financial trouble. Here is his full e-mail response to Channel 11 (please note the awesomeness of the phrase “nickels in the sofa,” the third track to my currently untitled 2010 release):
“I can only offer my opinion, which is that Ross Perot Jr. must be desperate from the losses he has suffered from Victory and his hedge funds. My lawyers have been open with our minority partners, and in Mr. Perot’s case, very minority, about the loans to the Mavericks. The loans have been used to put the best possible Mavericks team on the court, which in turn created the NBA’s longest sellout streak and drove business to the AAC/COC and to Perot’s Victory development. As best I could tell, he was very happy to take advantage of the traffic when he had an economic interest in Victory to do so. Unfortunately for Mr. Perot, he was apparently unable to capitalize on the benefit and is trying to find nickels in the sofa cushion. It is my understanding that Mr. Perot has received legal notice of the loans since they began, right after the Mavs appearance in the Finals as we tried to improve the team further. Only he knows why he has chosen to file a lawsuit and to make it public. The unfortunate reality is that this is the nature of our business relationship with Mr. Perot. From all I can tell, he could care less if the Mavs ever win a game. I have to tell you that the biggest mistake I made in buying the Mavs was in not completely buying out his interest.”
(H/T: Fish)
Jim Schutze on the Don Hill Trial
You need to be following his live blogs from the courtroom (or, really, the overflow room for the courtroom).
http://blogs.dallasobserver.com/unfairpark/2009/07/in_the_don_hill_trial_this_mor.php
Mark Cuban in Legal Trouble Again?
Hillwood Center Partners, the concern headed by Ross Perot Jr., filed suit against Cuban last week, claiming he’s robbing Peter to pay Paul. Or, at least, Dirk and Josh. He’s accused of …
… wrongfully diverting millions of dollars from the NBA franchise’s home arena to make up for shortfalls incurred by the team. … The lawsuit claims Cuban has covered significant cash shortfalls for the Mavericks by obtaining more than $29 million in unauthorized loans through a limited partnership.
We’ll see if he can stiff-arm this one like he did last week with the SEC.
Why Can’t the City of Dallas Use Gmail?
Last month, we got into a discussion here about whether the city of Dallas could essentially use Gmail. The question came up because the city decided it would start deleting e-mails that were older than 90 days, and that raised concerns about maintaining open records. Well, an FBvian who remembers that discussion points us to this LA Times story about the city possibly going with Google. It would be a 5-year deal worth $7.25 million. Google would store all their e-mail. Washington, D.C., already does. So I ask again: is it time for Dallas to get onboard with “cloud computing”?
Emily Ramshaw Decamps DMN for Texas Tribune
I cited an anonymous source on Friday (shame on me!) when I told you that Emily Ramshaw was taking a gig with Evan Smith at the Texas Tribune. Now comes her e-mail to colleagues and friends:
Friends, colleagues, delightful sources:
Just wanted to let you know I’m taking the plunge. I’m leaving The Dallas Morning News, my first job and home for 6 years, to be an investigative reporter for the Austin-based Texas Tribune, a Politico/Pro Publica hybrid for Texas government and politics.
Here’s the NYTimes article on the venture:
http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/17/texas-monthlys-longtime-editor-leaves-the-magazine-for-a-local-web-start-up/My last day at the DMN is Aug. 14. I’ll send out another message when I’ve got my new e-mail address, but you can always reach me at [redacted].
–Emily
John Bloom on George Toomer
Remembrances of George Toomer continue to accumulate in our earlier post about his passing. I asked John Bloom (aka Joe Bob Briggs) to offer a few words. John knew George well and has this to say:
Buffalo George Toomer, the Dallas R. Crumb in both style and talent, designed the official logo of Joe Bob Briggs some 25 years ago and it’s still in use today. It was not hip in 1984 and it’s still not hip, and George would be proud of that. Although he labored for corporate America, he was an early mover in merging the hippie avant-garde with the mainstream. He had a great laugh that came from deep in the diaphragm, the sound of a man who laughs easily and often, and he didn’t like to wear a tie, go to an office, or own things. He was a mess. He was full of love. He would have been an artist if he’d never gotten a dime for anything he ever drew.
A.H. Belo Unloads Rhode Island Monthly
Congratulations to my pal John Palumbo, publisher of the Providence Journal-owned title for the last 12 years and now its proud owner. Is this a one-off deal? Or is Robert Decherd beginning to toss stuff overboard in an effort to keep the ship alfoat?
Dallas’ Most Interesting Sports Figures This Week
Lists, yay, lists! Everybody loves lists.
Here’s one on the most interesting sports figures of the week, just in case you haven’t already visited Inside Corner this morning.
ESPN.com To Launch Local Dallas Site
Los Angeles and New York will follow next year, according to Brooks Barnes in this morning’s New York Times. The expansion is based on the success of its Chicago site, which attracted about 590,000 unique visitors in June. Evan Grant of our own Inside Corner is not amused. Neither is the Morning News, WFAA, NBC5, or CBS11.
Leading Off (07/20/09)
1. Anyone harboring fantasies of becoming a librarian ala Parker Posey in the film Party Girl should officially let them go. Dallas libraries will take a major hit come September thanks to the $190-million cut to the city’s $1.9 billion operating budget. Most library branches are going to slash their operating hours by more than half. But here’s something even more heartbreaking: all branches will “share in about 5,000 new books… a stark drop-off from the 52,000 that the current budget year allowed.”
2. Bad news for anyone thinking about pursuing dreams of becoming a teacher like Olivia Williams’ character in Rushmore. The recession has apparently given North Texas school districts a beating, and they aren’t hiring as many new teachers this summer.
3. But for those looking to become just like Kurt Russell in Backdraft, I say go for it. I have no idea if local fire departments are hiring–unlikely, I suppose–but my goodness, there are a lot of local fires these days. There are house fires and apartment fires, not to mention the blazes in West Texas. Anyway, even if physically fighting fires isn’t your bag, you could just do it Tim’s way: start your own version of Shame, Shame, Shame, and prepare to make lots of new friends.
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