Tales from the West Texas Dust

[Plainview Daily Herald:] A dispute over current operations and expenditures prompted a call by Plainview Humane Society Board President (and current Plainview mayor) Lloyd Woods for an emergency board meeting Wednesday. The board meeting was so contentious that Woods and half of the board eventually resigned in protest. The leadership dispute overshadowed the more overlooming issues the board faces: continuation of its contract with the city of Plainview to handle pet adoptions, care for stray animals, and maintainence of the city shelter. Also facing the shelter are overwhelming financial problems that have resulted in the temporary layoff of office manager Malinda Floyd and two part-time employees until the Society's problems could be resolved...

[Lubbock Avalanche-Journal:] (1.) In the midst of a Lubbock City Council meeting that detailed the presentation of the effectiveness of city services in Lubbock, a faulty cable connector turned out the lights for a small portion of the Lubbock downtown about 9:50 AM (CST) for about an hour. Lubbock Power and Light director Paul Thompson was the first to rush out of the room to determine the problem and said that work crews were making repairs within five minutes. "This was a routine failure that happens to all utilities," Thompson said. "Over time these connections will fail. We probably have one go down about once a month somewhere in the city." This prompted a couple of jokes by City Council members - one when Mayor Windy Sitton (as city staffers fumbled for flashlights) said that council members are "always left in the dark" and another by Councilmen T.J. Patterson and Victor Hernandez when they kidded City Manager Bob Cass about how he was fortunate to have had his annual evaluation taken care of last month...

(2.) Gubernatorial candidates Gov. George W. Bush (Republican) and Garry Mauro (Democrat) swung by the Hub City Thursday in the midst of their respective election campaigns. Bush spoke about the rumors surrounding him in his decision whether or not to seek the Republican presidential nomination in 2000 and his opinion on the current scandal surrounding President Clinton while Mauro used his time in Lubbock to go door-to-door in the South Overton nieghborhood to let them know how he would spend an estimated $6 billion budget surplus on his education proposals. Mauro expressed confidence in the movement of his campaign despite the lackluster showing he has had in the polls lately and complained of Bush following him on the campaign trail and his unwillingness to publish his campaign schedule...

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