April 24, 2007 09:05 - Kyle's coming retail boom
By Bill Peterson
KYLE – The state of retail in Kyle will take on dramatic increases, both in terms of volume and visibility, when the new shopping center anchored by H-E-B Plus! opens at the intersection of IH-35 and Kyle Parkway on June 6.
The town known best as 10,000 rooftops without a grocery store will change forever within two months. The center is going up so quickly that it will open nine days before the original target date of June 15.
And, when the center opens, it will include more than a grocery store.
Barshop & Oles, the developer putting together the H-E-B project, has announced an additional 13 chain locations for the shopping center, including two banks, two restaurants, a video rental store, a liquor store and a dry cleaner.
"This project represents not only Kyle's first large grocery store, but also over 500 new jobs to our local economy," Kyle Mayor Miguel Gonzalez said.
The list of retailers includes Movie Gallery, Twin Liquors, Jack Brown Cleaners, Great Clips, T-Nails, Sprint, Goodwill, PostNet, Subway, Papa Murphy's, Whataburger, Chase Bank and Wells Fargo Bank.
Barshop & Oles said additional retailers will be announced soon.
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April 25, 2007 23:20 - The wieners are coming
By Bill Peterson
BUDA – The world of wiener dog racing comes back to town this weekend for the event that has put Buda on the map.
The Buda Lions Club Country Fair and Wiener Dog Races, as the event is officially titled, begins Saturday at 9 a.m. with a parade down Main Street, featuring the race contestants in all their finery. Two days of wiener dog races will be joined with live music, cook-off contests and craft booths.
The race theme and poster is one of the best yet: Teen-Aged Mutant Ninja Wieners.
Lions Club officials say the number of dogs entering will at least approach last year's total, which exceeded 500. As of Tuesday, the number of entrants approached 400, with at least 100 more entries expected at race time. To race more than 500 dogs last year, officials put on 81 preliminary heats.
In the end, Copper won for the fifth time in his seven-year life. Owned by Brian Shocklee of Austin, Copper is once again entered. The burning competitive question this year is whether age catches up with the Copper dynasty.
Officials expect crowds totaling 15,000 to 20,000 along Buda's main street and city park. Last year, Lions Club officials estimated the Saturday crowds at around 12,000. Generally, the crowd thins as dogs are eliminated through the heat process.
The races will begin Saturday at 10 a.m., with the quarterfinals, semifinals and finals scheduled for Sunday at 3:30 p.m.
The fair's annual fireworks show is scheduled for Saturday at 9:30 p.m.
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April 26, 2007 22:32 - Same job, different time
The Hays Highway
KYLE – Replacing the legendary Minerva Falcon in Kyle is a work of many people, since the city has grown to 50 times its size when she first became city secretary in 1975.
But Amelia Sanchez will do her best. The city named Sanchez as its new secretary this week. Falcon retired at the January and, bless her, she's staying out of the city fray.
Sanchez has lived in Kyle since 1995 and served the city in many positions for the last 13 years, most recently as the city's permit coordinator.
The city says it took 22 applications from as far away as Lubbock for the position, but decided to stay in house.
Befitting the facts that the city administration has grown and Falcon no longer is around to wear all her old hats, even if one person still could in a city approaching 30,000 residents, City Manager Tom Mattis said Sanchez will perform a considerably different job.
In days not so long ago, when Kyle could get by with part-time city administrators and very little support staff, Minerva was, in many respects, the seat of Kyle government, holding the operation together.
"The city secretary position will be somewhat reorganized from what some people may be accustomed to as we are continuing to develop our senior management team and address the demands of our growing city," said Mattis. "Now that we have been able to add key staff to critical positions, this position will now perform tasks more traditional to the City Secretary."
With Sanchez' move to city secretary, Administrative Assistant Grace Nino is being moved up to executive assistant, a position from which she will assist Mattis and the rest of the city's executive team. Nino has been a consistent presence at the city council meetings since Falcon's retirement, taking on the mind-numbing task of recording the meeting minutes. Now, that work will go to Sanchez.
The city is already looking for a new permit coordinator to replace Sanchez.
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April 27, 2007 23:02 - San Marcos re-organizes
The Hays Highway
The city offices in San Marcos have taken on a slight re-organization so City Manager Dan O'Leary can make his load a little more sensible. It's called delegating.
O'Leary has promoted Director of Administrative Services Collette Jamison and Director of Environment and Engineering Laurie Anderson each to assistant city manager.
Instead of 15 departments reporting directly to O'Leary, now only the Department of Public Safety will report to him, as will the assistant city managers.
Jamison will administrate over community service departments, including Finance/ Information Technology, Human Resources, Women, Infants & Children, Environmental Health, Library and Parks and Recreation.
Anderson will administrate over development departments, including the Electric Utility, Environment and Engineering, Planning and Development, Public Works/ Airport, and the Water/ Wastewater Utility.
"As San Marcos develops, our City organization needs to be prepared for community growth," O’Leary said. "Having two outstanding individuals in these management positions will help coordinate our development process as well as community programs that are so important to the people of San Marcos."
O'Leary said a desire to simplify and unify the permitting process in San Marcos is, in part, responsible for the changes. Anderson, who has guided the city's engineering department for 19 years, would be responsible for the departments relevant to the permitting process.
"We are striving to unify our review processes and centralize them at one location," O'Leary said. "Placing the departments who are involved in the development of San Marcos under an assistant city manager will be very beneficial."
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