Cowtown One of Top Places for Biz Launch

Fort Worth ranked No. 9 on CNNMoney.com's list of the best places to live and launch a new business. Among the reasons cited were the city's "laid-back tax structure" as well as the various incentives the city offers for companies that locate in one of the its enterprise zones.

According to CNNMoney the hottest industry in Fort Worth (as well as dallas) is the life sciences - the region boasts nearly 500 biomedical technology businesses, and tourism.

Cowtown was one of the biggest cities to make the list.

Startlegram Exports Jobs to India

The Star-Telegram is outsourcing part of its ad production department to Express KCS, Editor & Publisher reported today. The move will cost 26 Fort Worthians their jobs at the local paper.

The move had be widely expected since the paper was purchased by the McClatchy newspaper chain. Several other McClatchy-owned newspapers have announced similar moves.

Based in San Jose, Express KCS has operations in Gurgaon, India.

Thoughts From The Polls

Just got back from voting. Some random thoughts:

It's the little things that really win elections.Little things like making sure your supporters know where to vote, not just who to vote for. At my polling place there were a whole bunch of people that showed up at the last minute to vote only to find out that they were in the wrong place. Many of them didn't make it to the correct polling place in time.

There is absolutely no rhyme or reason to how polling places are picked. In my case, to get from my home to the correct voting site I actually had to drive right past another polling place.

The large number of African-Americans standing in line to attend the caucus would seem to bode well for Senator Obama.

PUC Investigating Failure to Report Wind Shortage

The Texas Public Utility Commission (PUC) has started an investigation into last week's sudden drop in wind power the Startlegram reported over the weekend. Specifically, the PUC is asking why the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) failed to follow its own rules and make appeals through the news media for conservation during the emergency.

Last Tuesday (02/26) a sudden drop in West Texas wind power combined with an increase in electric use led to a sudden loss of stability on the electric grid. This caused ERCOT Engineers to implement the second step of an emergency blackout prevention plan and cut power to some large industrial customers.

So far, so good, but after a more serious situation in 2006 ERCOT established rules that require it to make appeals through the news media for conservation during such emergencies. No appeals were made. ERCOT officials say that by the time they could have contacted the media, the crisis was over. I suppose ERCOT doesn't have internet access?

Call me cynical but I can't help but wonder if the reason no conservation appeal was issued is that ERCOT doesn't want the public to know how unreliable wind power is. Texas leads the nation in production of wind power and plans are to greatly increase production. However, such increased production will entail massive new wind farms and hundreds of miles of ugly transmission lines. Perhaps some are worried that the public will balk at such a high environmental cost if they realize how unreliable so-called renewable energy is?

Local Dance Group Invited to China

Texas Ballet Theater announced today that it has accepted an invitation to attend the prestigious China Shanghai International Arts Festival. The dance company is the the first North Texas arts group ever invited to perform at the event. The company's first Chinese performance, Cleopatra, will be televised to an audience projected to be more than 500 million people.

Performances of Western Ballet and Chinese dance, classical and pop music, opera and theatrical productions are scheduled for the festival. Arts groups participating include American Ballet Theater, New York City Ballet, the Paris Opera Ballet, the Berlin Philharmonic, the Kirov Ballet, James Galway, Andrea Bocelli, Yo-Yo Ma, and others.

The company was originally founded in 1961 as the Fort Worth Ballet. Upon the demise of the Dallas Ballet, the group changed its name to Texas Ballet Theater and began to focus on performing for the entire North Central Texas region. The ballet performs at Fort Worth's Bass Performance Hall, Dallas' Music Hall at Fair Park and the historic Majestic Theatre in downtown Dallas.