Richardson's First Directly Elected Mayor

Who will it be? Read on.

Yesterday, I analyzed the upcoming referendum to amend Richardson's City Charter to have a directly-elected mayor. I confidently predicted that the proposed amendment would pass. I less confidently predicted that there would be no serious organized opposition because the amendment would be likely to pass in any case. Everyone would save their time, effort and money for the upcoming mayoral election in May, 2013.

After the jump, how that will go down.

Mayoral Referendum: Now What?

Revolution is not coming to Richardson, it is finally here.

Source: Anonymous online commenter.

According to a press release by the political action committee that bankrolled it, the effort to secure enough petition signatures to force a referendum on the direct election of Richardson's mayor has met its goal. Assuming the signatures hold up, the big question now is, what's next?

After the jump, the road ahead.

Higgs Boson or Fireworks?

Today's diversion is a simple quiz. Which is it: Higgs boson tracks or Richardson "Family 4th Celebration" fireworks? You decide.

From 2012 07 04 Breckinridge

This July 4th, a team of nuclear physicists announced experimental evidence for the Higgs boson, the particle that gives everything its mass (the so-called "God particle," a term physicists hate). It was predicted to exist in 1964 and ever since physicists have been working towards having a powerful enough particle accelerator to produce experimental results to test the theory. Now they have one, the Large Hadron Collider, a $10 billion instrument buried in a 17 mile circular tunnel, the collaboration of dozens of countries, hundreds of universities, and thousands of scientists, the largest and most complex device ever built. With the July 4th announcement, scientists worldwide celebrated a major advancement in human understanding of the building blocks of our universe.

Coincidentally, the City of Richardson was holding its "Family 4th Celebration" on July 4th, too. Despite the smaller cost and more local audience, the tracks of fireworks across the sky at Breckinridge Park delighted young and old just as much as the Higgs boson tracks delighted scientists. This year, there were two reasons to celebrate. Congratulations, scientists. And Happy Birthday, America.

More photos after the jump.

OTBR: Desolate Flats of Bessemer Bend

Latitude: N 42° 50.058
Longitude: W 106° 38.922

A child on a road trip with his family asks, "Where are we?" and the father answers, "Let's check the map. We're off the blue roads [the Interstate Highways marked in blue on the road atlas]. We're off the red roads [the US and state highways]. We're off the black roads [the county highways]. I think we're off the map altogether." It was always my dream to be off the map altogether.

After the jump, a few of the random places (and I mean random literally) that I visited vicariously last month that are "off the blue roads".

Repeat Tweets: Obamacare For the Win

Repeat tweets from June, 2012:

• 2012 06 02 - Headline: "Detroit turns a freeway into a river." Imagine the Trinity Tollway after a spring flood. http://t.co/x94JjsL9
  
• 2012 06 04 - Listen in on Bill McCalpin's phone call to Chris Cutrone: http://t.co/fh46NmpC
  
• 2012 06 05 - 1Q84, by Haruki Murakami: Action, mystery, fantasy. Murders, cults, love and two moons. Indelible characters. Best novel in years. A+
  
• 2012 06 07 - The Book of Nothing, by John Barrow: Zero, vacuums, quantum theory. Science and history of science. Last half might lose non-physicists. B-
  
• 2012 06 07 - Wonder how world leaders could have been so stupid as to blunder into WWI or the Great Depression? Wonder no more. http://t.co/fcUdp052
  
• 2012 06 07 - "Rethinking a Lot: The Design and Culture of Parking." Every city council member should read this book. http://t.co/fw4vJ7Yk
  

After the jump, more repeat tweets.

A "Tammy" for Richardson

The City of Richardson proudly announced that "Richardson’s newly re-designed website has earned the top award from the Texas Association of Municipal Information Officers (TAMIO) for website design in a community with a population less than 100,000."

Kudos to the City of Richardson. After the jump, a few minor caveats.

School Funding: A Race to the Bottom

Kris Oliver, member of the Richardson school board, attended the Summer Leadership Institute, a training conference for the Texas Association of School Boards (TASB). He kept his Twitter followers informed with bits of trivia.

Facts from my @tasbnews finance training. Texas rank in education spending per pupil? 42

Source: Kris Oliver.

If you knew that, then you probably won't be surprised by this next bit of trivia, either.

Texas rank in percent of adult residents with a high school diploma? Dead last.

Source: Kris Oliver.

Surely, you think, the Texas legislature realizes that the correlation between school funding and academic results just might be a bit of a cause-and-effect relationship, too.

After the jump, will it be this year?

One Of These Is Not Like The Others

Today's diversion involves a simple quiz on your knowledge of grade school civics. Well, actually, it's a quiz on your critical thinking skills^* disguised as a civics quiz. There are no right and wrong answers, only good and bad reasoning.

After the jump, a few simple questions.

The Little Engine That Could

Slowly but surely, planning for the Cotton Belt rail line from Wylie to D/FW Airport to Ft Worth continues to move forward. There's still no funding for the $2 billion project but that hasn't stopped the planning process. ("A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you're talking real money." -- attributed to Everett Dirksen)

After the jump, a tale of two cities' attitudes to the Cotton Belt line.

A Museum, A Cottage, and A Wedding

From 2012 06 Wisconsin

Our summer vacation in Wisconsin included a day at Milwaukee's Museum of Art, several days at the family cottage on Big Lake in Shawano County, and attendance at Lisa and Dan's wedding in Appleton.

More photos after the jump.