March Scene and Heard

Sandwiched between February's Stock Show and Rodeo and Fiesta, March used to be a relatively calm month in the Alamo City. No more. First, former Mayor Phil Hardberger and his wife, Linda, helped S.A.'s vibrant arts community get the annual Luminaria celebration off to a brilliant start. This month, the 3rd annual Luminaria―fast becoming a major national arts event and tourist attraction―is set for March 13. Most remarkable of all, perhaps, is the fact that it's free to everyone, so families and folks from all walks of life can revel in our city's rich creative culture together.

Folks who worried Mayor Julian Castro might not support the creative community as passionately as his predecessor should feel relieved―while the young mayor is all over the map with initiatives from high-tech to pre-school preparation for our youngsters, he's also voiced strong support for the arts. As he noted in his State of the City address to a Greater SA Chamber of Commerce crowd last month, S.A.'s "destiny is tied to how vibrant and culturally rich we make our city." Castro also had high praise for one talented young arts group at the luncheon―the Youth Orchestra of San Antonio played the Star-Spangled Banner for the guests, and Castro noted that the accomplished young ensemble will help represent S.A.'s arts community at China's huge Shanghai World Expo in May. S.A. attorney and longtime Democrat fundraiser Jose Villarreal is the U.S. commissioner general to the Expo. (Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, a longtime friend of Villarreal's, appointed him to the post.) Pretty high-profile job, since according to Villarreal, the month long Expo is expected to draw between 70 and 100 million attendees, making it the largest such event in recorded history.  San Antonio is one of only a few U.S. cities with its own designated "days" at the festival, which business leaders say means many more opportunities to "sell" the city to global investors.

The Expo is big news now, but it's certainly not the only thing Castro's talking about these days. There's his pledge to work to bring 20,000 jobs to town.  Also, his crusade to keep more kids in school, and to cut S.A.'s high number of teen pregnancies.  There are also the issues of the environment and natural resources, ensuring enough power and enough water to keep S.A. going and growing.  Those issues can't be far from Castro's mind all the time. In fact, he started his remarks to the crowd with a joke about recent headlines:  "When I heard there were 900 people here I thought my speech must have been billed as ‘CPS Energy―Behind the Scenes.’”  In fact, NRG lobbyist/lawyer Frank Burney, a Greater Chamber stalwart who’s also an insider in the ongoing CPS nuclear brouhaha, was also a luncheon speaker, introducing Greater Chamber board prez Carrie Baker Wells, who introduced Castro's speech. Most folks gave Castro high marks for his State of the City address. There’s no way yet to tell how successful his initiatives will be, but he sure gets an "A” for energy and ambitious planning.  Stay tuned.

Speaking of education, a recent e-mail press release from the city's Department of Communications and Public Affairs invited media coverage of the opening of a new dam and spillway at Southside Lions Park. The subject line of the e-mail was definitely an attention-getter: "Request for Coverage: District 3 Southside Lions Damn Ribbon Cutting." Note to the mayor: education begins at home.

Ed Whitacre is a big tall Texan. And he has a tall order in his big new job.  In January Whitacre, already an American business legend for his leadership in rebuilding AT&T,  moved up to the top job at General Motors with the goal of rebuilding one of America's biggest automakers. Just days after Whitacre was announced as GM's new CEO, he was back in S.A as a co-chair of the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce's big annual gala. Whitacre didn't actually speak at the black-tie event―he didn't need to, since he was liberally mentioned in everybody else's comments. New chamber chairwoman Norma Martinez-Lozano, senior vice president–Merger Transition at AT&T, was one of Whitacre's protégés, and the very first Hispanic officer in the SBC days. She spoke with real affection and respect for her former boss. And she noted his influence as she and chamber CEO Ramiro Cavazos announced a $250,000 gift from AT&T to support the group's main educational initiatives. Whitacre's strong influence was tangible throughout the evening.  One of his two gala co-chairs, Berto Guerra (a former Hispanic Chamber prez) was also a former SBC/AT&T exec. Guerra now runs Avanzar Technologies, one of Toyota's S.A.-based suppliers, which made for pretty interesting background in a week when Whitacre was openly wooing Toyota customers to come over to General Motors cars. S.A. businessman Max Navarro, whose Op-Tech Corp. is also a big local Toyota supplier, also made a splash at the gala, donating $50,000 to help the chamber develop small businesses here. Even the third gala co-chair, H-E-B's brand-new president and CEO Craig Boyan, couldn't help using his brief remarks to deliver a message to the Whitacres: "We have a brand new H-E-B in Pearsall, so Ed and Linda, you can now have prime steak and fine wines for the three weekends a year you are hunting on your ranch there."

S.A. movers and shakers Jane Macon and Pat Smothers were honored guests in London last month, as the UK's chapter of the International Women's Forum celebrated 20 years.  Macon, a former president of the forum, an international association of high-powered female leaders, and Smothers, also a longtime leader in the group, helped found the British chapter two decades back, along with New York investment guru Muriel Siebert and some of Britain's top women. As the UK forum turned 20, our S.A. friends were honored for many decades of the work they continue to do quietly to help women around the world, with breakfast at the Ritz, a reception at St. Martin's Hall and a lively luncheon at the House of Lords. Like many high-achieving women who give their all for others, Macon and Smothers often downplay their extraordinary achievements worldwide. Kudos to their soaring spirits, and the many lives they've changed!

The life of a volunteer can be rough. Ask former KMOL-TV honcho Bob Donohue. The longtime S.A. Stock Show & Rodeo volunteer was just delivering a press packet for the January Go Western Gala to the offices of Scene in SA one evening when disaster struck. Dropping by the magazine's office after hours, Donahue used a building men's room. Things went bad when the lock stuck, trapping him inside. Fortunately, he had his cell phone, and was able to call Raffles lounge, which is just next door, and a friend walked over to the building and located a guard with the master key. Bob was pretty red-faced about the whole thing, but his wife Margo thought it was funny enough to tell her friends. There's a moral to the story, after all: always take your cell phone to the rest room.

SA’s weather is predictably unpredictable. But some KENS-TV viewers got a real shock back in January, a week after the coldest snap in years. A few days after the weather warmed up, folks watching KENS’ morning show, Great Day S.A., saw a parka-clad weatherman predicting lows in the low 20s in the coming couple of days. Apparently a mix-up of tapes led to broadcast of the previous week's highly unusual cold forecast, rather than the balmy prediction that matched the weather outside. Gives us chills just thinking about it...

Seems like every school district is feeling the pinch of the economy these days, and many parents and school supporters are stepping in to help. In some cases, they've been doing it for years. The streets of Alamo Heights will be alive with the sound of music this month, at the Alamo Heights Band Association's 21st annual “Run/Walk to the Beat" 5 and 10K event on March 6. Talented students from the junior and senior high school band programs play along a route that runs right through the upscale heart of ’09. Nothing like a little Sousa to get your blood going.  “Our band is successful because of the people who help support us,” Band Association prez David Miracle, says. “We have an incredible network of volunteers who donate their time, money and muscle power to a school music program our district can be very proud of.”  In fact, the group has added another big fundraiser this year―the first annual "Swing to the Beat" Golf Scramble, coming up April 10. This kind of fundraising can make all the difference for creative arts programs in our public schools. Expect some great fundraisers for the brilliant-but-endangered North East School of the Arts (NESA) soon.

An evening of dinner theater reaped great rewards for supporters of the Bexar County Family Justice Center last month. This was the fourth year for the annual event, an evening at the Empire Theater featuring dinner and a play. The audience was packed with civic stars. Tracy and Nelson Wolff, Phil and Linda Hardberger, Rosemary Kowalski and many more city VIPs were among the sell-out crowd. The cast was stellar, too, including some of S.A.'s most talented attorney/actors. Catherine Babbitt, the chief of the District Attorney's Family Justice Victim Protection Division and a fine actress in her own right, helped create the event and has been in the cast each year, along with Catherine Hayes, an assistant DA on Babbitt's team. (Judge Phil Kazen, another stage-seasoned actor and attorney, has been in the cast the past three years, but had to bow out this time to focus on his campaign.) This year's rollicking farce, Dearly Departed, featured the largest cast ever, including award-winning performers Greg Hinojosa, Kevin Murray, Amy LaPresto and Gypsy Pantoja. Vivian Elborne, one of S.A.'s best-loved theater pros, directed the show. Tanji Patton emceed the evening with D.A. Susan Reed, who came up with the idea for the Family Justice Center in the first place, helped create it, and has been a tireless supporter ever since. With dinner by the RK Group and a tempting silent auction (including a 'donation tree" to support the center's 40 partner programs), the evening  raised more than $100,000 towards the center's work of helping families in crisis. If you missed the show, you're in luck; Dearly Departed, with the same stellar cast, will be staged all through March at the Cameo Theater. (Check our entertainment calendar for details.)

D.A. Reed is just about everywhere these days, working on all kinds of programs throughout the city as she gets her re-election campaign in gear.  Busy as all that keeps her, Reed is also a devoted mom.  So when son Travis recently moved into his own place, she made time to help him pick out the decor. After accompanying her to the Dearly Departed benefit, Travis gave us a virtual mini-tour of his new digs on his IPhone screen. He also showed us the coolest app yet―a Benjamin Moore paint-matching program that analyzes all the colors in your stored photos. Now that's truly useful high tech.

A fundraiser is a fundraiser, but some are definitely richer than others. In February, the S.A. Museum of Art's big Blue and White Ball had the distinction of one of the highest ticket prices we've seen in this town―$625 per person. ("Either you hyperventilate and turn blue when you see the price, or you just go white as a sheet," one waggish reader e-mailed.)  Hey, in this kind of uncertain economy it's nice to know there are still enough art fans with the dough to pay that kind of tab. And to put it in perspective, you might pay even more to see a Dallas Cowboys football game in their spiffy new, incredibly expensive stadium.

It has taken years of work just to get the project going, but the dedicated folks behind a San Antonio Fire Museum have persevered. In February, Fire Chief Charles Hood presided at the launch of a $5 million capital campaign to make the dream a reality. The museum has a fabulous new home, too―historic Fire Station No. 1 at 801 E. Houston, just a block from the Alamo.  The old station, built in the 1930s, is no longer suited to the high-tech equipment of a modern fire house, but it's an ideal place to display the rich history of the city and its firefighting teams. It's definitely an idea whose time has come―Fort Worth's old Fire Station No.1, featuring displays that illustrate that city's history, is a top tourist attraction. It's great to see S.A. finally getting on the fire wagon. One major key to moving forward with the plan has been forming a non-profit "friends" group to support the museum―the S.A. fire Museum Society. And society prez Carlos Resendez has a great new board of directors, including Ret. U.S. Army Maj. General Alfred Valenzuela, Charles Barrett, Gilbert Barrera, Tino Duran, State Rep. Ruth Jones McClendon, City Councilwoman Mary Alice Cisneros, Patsy SasekYolanda Arrellano.   Check out www.sanantoniofiremuseum.org.  It's hot! and

For years we've heard folks from various parts of town complain of mysterious interference with their computers or home phones or garage door openers. Usually it's sporadic, and they just learn to live with it. Now a widespread spate of problems on the West Side has led to a revelation of sorts. Last month, District 6 City Councilman Ray Lopez was getting so many calls about crazy garage door glitches around Potranco and Military Highway West that he looked into the problem, and came up with an answer, if not a permanent solution. In recent years, it seems, lots of federal agencies, particularly the military, have increasingly used Land Mobile Radio (LMR) systems for emergency communications. While the feds actually own the particular radio frequencies the LMRs use, lots of consumer products, from remote controls to headsets to toys, computers, baby monitors and yes―garage door openers―also use the same frequencies. Sure enough, it turned out that a new federal LMR station on Potranco was causing much of the electronic angst. The good news―the feds agreed to shut down their system briefly (until the first of this month) so folks could retrofit any affected openers, etc.  The bad news―since the government owns most frequencies their LMRs use, consumers who have problems just have to get used to it. Want to know more? The FCC call center is at 1-888-225-5322. GIve 'em a call―if your phone works.

King Antonio, Rey Feo, the Mud King and Queen, Charro Queen, Cornyation royals...as Fiesta rolls around, the royals start popping up like wildflowers all over town. There's even a royal couple representing S.A.'s classic appetizer―chips and salsa. This year a pair of marketing pros, Marco Guerrero and Mae Escobar, are the King and Queen of Chips 'N Salsa. Together they'll reign over their own official Fiesta event, a casino night and dance (poker chips and salsa music―get it?) on April 17 at the Alameda Lofts. The party is an annual benefit for San Antonio Youth Centers, a 26-year-old non-profit aimed at keeping kids in school and helping those who drop out resume their education or train for jobs. Want to know more about the party, or the cause? Check out www.chipsnsalsafiesta.com. One protocol note about this royal couple: do NOT call them 'dips.'