This Texas Gas Station Turned Camels and Karaoke Into a $30 Million Business | Inc.com

June 1, 2015 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Editor’s note: This tour of small businesses across the country highlights the imagination, diversity, and resilience of American enterprise.

Come for the cheap gas and tacos. Stay for the livestock and karaoke.

This is a typical Saturday night at Fuel City in Dallas. Two police officers direct traffic as cars line up for unleaded gas at $2.39 a gallon. All three taco windows are mobbed, as are the carts peddling elote en vaso (corn in a cup). Customers wander into the karaoke trailer (complete with disco ball) to belt out Tejana favorites, country classics, and oldies. Out back, longhorn cattle snooze on the ground. The zebra remains standing.

“Our slogan is ‘Where dreams come true,'” says Fuel City founder John Benda. “Maybe that’s a little corny. But that’s what I want this place to be.”

11 dead, 12 missing after record floods swamp Texas and Oklahoma | Mashable

May 26, 2015June 4, 2015 ~ knjohn ~ 1 Comment

UPDATED 1:15 p.m. ET: With the addition of three fatalities in the Houston area, the death toll from the Memorial Day weekend storms in Texas and Oklahoma has now risen to 11. This figure is expected to rise based on the number of people still missing from the flash flood in Wimberley, Texas.

Authorities are still searching for 12 members of two families who went missing over the weekend when sudden, raging floodwaters swept a vacation home away in Wimberley, Texas. Those family members are now presumed to have perished in the flood, according to the emergency operations center in Hays County, Texas.

The floods have been a remarkable turn of events for a region that was still mired in drought as of three weeks ago. That drought, which had affected Texas since 2010, is now effectively over in most areas, as is a long-running drought in Oklahoma.

Stop Punishing Students Who Stand Against Invasive Microchip School IDs | ForceChange.com

October 21, 2012January 22, 2015 ~ lmehit ~ Leave a comment

Target: Northside Independent School District

Goal: Prohibit the punishment of students who decline new microchip photo IDs.

In San Antonio, Texas, schools have employed new tactics to fight the state’s abysmal truancy levels. Both John Jay High School and Anson Jones Middle School have instated the use of radio-frequency identification (RFID) chips by imbedding the small devices in student ID cards, enabling officials to track every pupil’s location. Although educators insist the new technology is necessary to stem widespread truancy, many students and parents believe the new requirement invades personal freedoms. Many have chosen to opt-out of the new IDs. According to the new guidelines, students are allowed to continue using their old photo IDs, but recently teachers and officials have begun to target those students who decline the new protocol, finding ways to punish them for their refusal. Students have the right to protect their personal liberties, and should not be subjugated to recriminations and reprisals due to their beliefs.