Mayor chooses Atlantan to lead airport system

By BRADLEY OLSON
Copyright 2010 Houston Chronicle

April 14, 2010, 8:02PM

Mayor Annise Parker Wednesday named her pick for a new city aviation director, presenting a top official of Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport — the busiest in the United States — for City Council approval.

A native of Barranquitas, Puerto Rico, Mario C. Diaz had been deputy general manager of the Atlanta airport since 1999 and previously worked in New Jersey's airport system, John F. Kennedy Airport and for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

Parker said she has asked Diaz to build up international business in the city's airport system, the fourth-largest in the United States, particularly in Latin America. She also said Diaz will play a major role in the city's economic development efforts.

"I believe that we can be more entreprenurial and more innovative in moving into the future, and I think I have the right person at the right time to help us do that," Parker said.

Abrupt resignation

Diaz will inherit an airport system that drew unwanted attention last year when its leader, Richard Vacar, was abruptly forced out by Mayor Bill White. Public scrutiny at the time focused on the Houston Airport System Development Corporation, a complex nonprofit formed under Vacar that reimbursed the city for consulting work performed by aviation department employees on foreign airport development.

A subsequent probe by a law firm hired by the city, as well as an audit released Tuesday by City Controller Ronald Green, found minor irregularities in HASDC's billing activities, but largely certified the entity's ability to make money and benefit airport operations in Houston.

"The potential net operating revenues and future liquidated equity appears to have long term benefit to HAS, if the activities outlined in the agreement are allowed to continue," Green said.

Parker indicated a willingness to continue at least some aspects of the city's relationship with HASDC, which pays 1.8 times the cost of aviation employee time, plus any expenses, spent on airport development work abroad.

"There are some elements of that relationship that I think are very beneficial to the airport, others that are less so," Parker said. "I'm not interested in killing it off, but we want to make sure that it moves forward to the best benefit of the Houston Airport System."

'Glad it's over'

Vacar, who ardently defended HASDC after leaving his post, said the reason he initially set it up was to provide the airport system with another revenue stream to complement the fees paid by airlines, given the volatility in that business in recent years. The result of the city's scrutiny is a vindication, he said.

"I'm glad it's over," said Vacar, now a senior vice president for project development for HAS & ADC, a for-profit partnership with which HASDC partnered to become involved in airport development in Ecuador and Costa Rica. "They've run all the traps and had all the legal reviews, and this thing passed the smell test."

Vacar also praised Parker's selection of Diaz, saying it was clear she chose a "competent professional" from a major worldwide airport.

Parker said Diaz, who will become one of the city's highest paid employees with a $200,000 annual salary if he is approved in the coming weeks by City Council, was selected using data gathered by a previous search committee, input from Southwest and Continental Airlines and advice from Andy Icken, the city's chief development officer.

Diaz, a licensed pilot with an MBA from Rutgers University, said he was drawn to Houston because of the opportunity to manage an airport system, including George Bush Intercontinental Airport, Hobby Airport and Ellington Field.

"In Atlanta, I've been there, done that. It's interesting, a wonderful city and wonderful airport, but it's not an airport system," he said. "There is a complexity, there is a challenge, there is a strategy that you have to employ in an airport system that you simply don't get an opportunity to do in a single airport system."

bradley.olson@chron.com

 

Click to View Original Article http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/6959291.html

A Great Day for America!

  

WASHINGTON -- A long-overlooked group of women who flew aircraft during World War II were awarded the Congressional Gold Medal on Wednesday.

Known as Women Airforce Service Pilots, or WASPs, they were the first women to fly U.S. military planes.

About 200 of these women aviators, mostly in their late 80s and early 90s and some in wheelchairs, came to the Capitol to accept the medal, the highest civilian honor bestowed by Congress.

In thanking them for their service, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said these women pilots went unrecognized for too long.

"Women Air Force Service Pilots, we are all your daughters, you taught us how to fly," Pelosi said.

In accepting the award, WASP pilot Deanie Parrish said the women had volunteered to fly the planes without expectation that they would ever be thanked. Their mission was to fly noncombat missions to free up male pilots to fly overseas.

"Over 65 years ago we each served our country without any expectation of recognition or glory and we did it without compromising the values that we were taught growing up ... We did it because our country needed us," Parrish said.

Thirty-eight WASPS were killed in service. But they were long considered civilians, not members of the military, and thus were not entitled to the pay and benefits given to the men. When their unit was disbanded in 1944, many even had to pay their own bus fare home from their Avenger Field base in Sweetwater, Texas.

They were afforded veteran status in 1977 after a long fight.

It's estimated that about 300 WASP aviators are still alive.

Sens. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, and Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., along with Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., and Susan Davis, D-Calif., led the push in Congress to get the women recognized.

The Congressional Gold Medal was awarded in 2000 to the Navajo Code Talkers and in 2006 to the Tuskegee Airmen.

(Copyright ©2010 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

Finally

Haitian Court Frees U.S. Missionary as Group's Leader Remains in Jail

Monday, March 08, 2010

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti —  One of two Baptist missionaries still held on kidnapping charges in Haiti was released and flew to Miami on Monday, but the U.S. group's leader remained in custody.

Charisa Coulter, 24, was taken from her jail cell to the airport by U.S. Embassy staff more than a month after she and nine other Americans were arrested for trying to take 33 children out of Haiti after the earthquake.

Coulter, wearing a red tank top and sunglasses, declined comment as she quickly got into an SUV that took her to the Haitian airport, where she caught a flight back to the United States.

Coulter's father said his daughter arrived in Miami late Monday and went straight to a hotel.

Mel Coulter said her release brings a mix of joy and sorrow knowing that the leader of the Idaho-based missionary group, Laura Silsby, will be spending the night all alone in a Haitian jail.

"It is good news, but it's tempered," Coulter said. "We're really happy to have our daughter back on American soil. But Laura is still there. So this is really only completing part of the journey for the two of them. My daughter has left her best friend behind."

Silsby, 40, said she was glad about Coulter's release.

"I'm very happy that she left today, and for her freedom, and expect mine to come soon," Silsby told The Associated Press as she left the courthouse where a judge held a closed hearing Monday. She was returned to her cell in a police station near Port-au-Prince airport.

Defense lawyer Louis Ricardo Chachoute said Coulter was released because there was no evidence to support the charges of kidnapping and criminal association. He predicted Silsby would be released soon as well.

"There are no prosecution witnesses to substantiate anything," Chachoute said.

Coulter, of Boise, is a diabetic and had medical difficulties during her confinement. She was treated at least once, on Feb. 1, by American doctors after collapsing with what she said was either severe dehydration or the flu.

fter a court hearing Monday for Silsby, Judge Bernard Saint-Vil said he heard evidence from a police officer who said he stopped Silsby from loading a bus with children near the Dominican Republic consulate in Port-au-Prince on Jan. 26. That was three days before her group was arrested while trying to cross into the Dominican Republic with 33 children.

"I found inconsistencies in some of Laura's statements," Saint-Vil told reporters, saying he planned to visit the Dominican consulate to resolve them.

The Dominican consul in Haiti, Carlos Castillo, has said previously that he warned Silsby she lacked the required papers to leave the country with the children and risked being arrested at the border for child trafficking.

The Americans' arrest came as Haitian authorities were trying to crack down on unauthorized adoptions to prevent child trafficking in the chaos following the catastrophic Jan. 12 earthquake.

Silsby initially said the children were orphaned in the quake that the government said has killed more than 230,000 people. But the AP found the children had been given away by still-living parents.

Chachoute said the Americans only came to Haiti to help the country. "Firstly, there was no criminal conspiracy; secondly, there was no child snatching," he said.

The Baptist group planned to take the children to the neighboring Dominican Republic to an orphanage that Silsby was creating in a former hotel.

The judge released eight of the Americans on Feb. 17 after concluding parents voluntarily gave up their children in the belief that the Baptist group would give them a better life. But he decided he still had additional questions for Silsby and Coulter.

What Do You Think??

Obama lays out 'roadmap' to restore Gulf Coast

By CAIN BURDEAU
ASSOCIATED PRESS

March 4, 2010, 7:09PM

NEW ORLEANS — The Obama administration on Thursday laid out a plan to deal with the catastrophic dangers of rising sea levels, hurricanes and erosion on the Gulf Coast, and backed efforts to invest in restoring barriers islands and wetlands in Mississippi and Louisiana.

Experts hailed the policy document as the strongest sign of support for coastal restoration on the Gulf Coast ever endorsed by a White House.

"It's a terrifically important document if it's followed through on," said Mark Davis, director of the Institute on Water Resources Law and Policy at Tulane University in New Orleans.

The document, called a "roadmap" for the coast, said the nation's energy supply, crucial ports and waterways, vital habitat for fish and wildlife and the Gulf Coast's "rich cultural legacy" were at stake.

"Unless we stem the rapid rate of ecosystem loss in the region, the ecosystems and the services they provide will collapse," the document said.

At risk, the paper said, was "not only the economies of Louisiana and Mississippi, but also the economy of the nation as a whole."

Tom Strickland, assistant secretary for fish and wildlife at the Department of the Interior, said the White House understands the problems on the Gulf Coast.

"Finally, this issue has received the highest priority with a White House and a president that has said we are going to take charge of this," Strickland said. He is one of several high-level Obama officials who crafted the document as part of a working group looking at the Gulf Coast's unique problems.

Already, there are several multimillion-dollar programs to stem land loss in Louisiana, but they have been unable to keep up with erosion.

Since the 1930s, the Mississippi River delta has been slowly falling apart and eroding due to levee construction, oil drilling hurricane damage and other factors. Louisiana has lost about 2,100 square miles of coast and loses about 25 square miles a year, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

With sea levels on the rise due to global warming, experts warn that much of south Louisiana and Mississippi are at risk of being lost for good.

The administration said it would work with state officials to develop long-term solutions to pay for the massive multibillion-dollar ecosystem restoration project, which would be one of the largest ever undertaken.

Cutting the red tape

Over the next 18 months, the administration said, it would cut through red tape, finish critical reports looking at what can and cannot be saved, fill in data gaps to gain a complete scientific understanding of the problem and do a better job of using Mississippi River sediment, most of which washes out to the Gulf of Mexico.

The sediment in the river is important because scientists say it can be diverted into sections of the coast that have been cut off from the Mississippi. The Mississippi's mud built the Louisiana delta over the past 7,000 years but the delta began falling apart after levees were erected.

The report also said it was vital to protect Mississippi's barrier islands and coastal wetlands because they "served to absorb or reduce some of the impacts from coastal storms." Last year, Congress appropriated $439 million for barrier island restoration and other ecosystem repair work on the Mississippi coast.

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said the report "clearly demonstrates a positive shift in direction, but must be coupled with aggressive action on the ground — turning dirt. There is no time for delay."

U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., praised the Obama plan as carrying out an "integrated, comprehensive approach that accelerates our work in coastal Louisiana and builds a true partnership with the state."

Still, there were questions about the administration's approach, which advocated that restoration of the delta was possible. There are scientists who believe policymakers need to emphasize relocating towns and communities and stop beachfront development because of sea level rise.

"The science is clear that ecosystem restoration — at the level that will be possible — will provide limited storm protection to infrastructure and communities," said Rob S. Young, a coastal geologist and director of the Program for the Study of Developed Shorelines at Western Carolina University.

Davis, the Tulane professor, said the White House's document left many questions unanswered about how the restoration work would get done and with what money.

Mayor's Youth Council Town Hall 2/25/2010

Tonight's Mayor's Youth Council Town Hall focused on "Ecology and Environmental Issues", for information about the topics discussed visit: Green Team America, an organization that works to promote climate change and awareness with Houston's youth, and Alliance for Climate Change (ACE), a non-profit organization that is dedicated to education high school students about the science behind climate change. As usual if you have any questions or comments feel free to send a message.

Sincerely,
Andrew Romo
City of Houston Mayor's Youth Council, District F

Guess Who's Back

Friends,

A new article has finally been posted, I have been very busy the last two weeks. It is my sincere hope that all of you will continue reading my blog. If you have any questions or concerns please feel free to leave a comment.

Sincerely,
Andrew Romo
City of Houston Mayor's Youth Council, District F

East End Residents Want Dynamo Stadium

HOUSTON (KTRK) -- The fight over the location of the proposed Houston Dynamo soccer stadium is heating up. On Tuesday, some east Houston residents put pressure on county commissioners to bring the stadium to their neighborhood, mainly because they don't like the possible alternative. With property values hanging on the line and a vacant lot still undeveloped, residents from the East End once again took their concerns to elected leaders.

"I expected this to have been voted on a long time ago," said East End resident Rachel DeCordova. "This deal is really a no brainer."

This time, they're asking county commissioners to take action on a plan that would put the new Dynamo stadium in their part of town.

"Make it happen, make it happen for the East End and downtown area, especially for our minority community, the children, the youth," argued resident Marilu de la Fuente to Harris County commissioners Tuesday.

The plan, which was conceived during former Mayor Bill White's term, was designed like this. The city would buy the land for $15 million, and pay $10 million for infrastructure. The county, in turn, would contribute $10 million of its own money, with the Dynamo paying for the construction of the stadium.

The problem, however, is that the county and city have yet to work out the finer details, like ultimate ownership and upkeep. County commissioner Jerry Eversole questioned why residents came to commissioners court when the issue hasn't even made the agenda.

"This is at least the third time we've discussed Dynamo Stadium and it's no further today than it was three months ago or four months ago," he said.

But Judge Ed Emmett reminded the commissioner that's why residents were there, because a decision had not been made, understanding concerns that if the deal falls through, something less attractive could end up on the site. He points out that's it's not every day a team is willing to build its own stadium.

"So let's find out what the hang-ups are, what the sticking points are," said Judge Emmett. "Let's move forward. Let's make something happen."

For this issue to be put on the agenda, it'd have to be put there by Commissioner El Franco Lee. We tried to contact his office, but he refused comment. We know city and county leaders plan to meet on Wednesday about the stadium.

(Copyright ©2010 KTRK-TV/DT. All Rights Reserved.)