Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert was supposed to give the keynote address at today’s annual meeting of the Dallas Citizens Council. An appearance in Washington, D.C. put the kabosh on that. So, in his stead was the Lone Ranger (played by Dallas economic development czar Karl Zavitkovsky). How did Zavitkovsky do? Aside from referring to his broomstick horse as Trigger, not bad, I say. (He seemed to enjoy the role almost a little too much.) The obvious question then is: If Karl Zavikovsky is the Lone Ranger, who (or what) is his Tonto? Jump for shameless name dropping and a rehash.
State Sen. Royce West and state reps Allen Vaught and Dan Branch were among the politicos who attended. Near the podium were Dallas City Manager Mary Suhm and DISD Super Michael Hinojosa. Citizens Council chair John Field Scovell presided over the event. Scovell and the other citizens council members kept it upbeat, vowing to avoid words like “downturn,” “recession” and the other “D” word (which, in this case, doesn’t stand for “Dallas”). The main feature of the event, other than perfunctory elections and Der Ranger Loco, was a video that showed leaders of Fluor, AT&T, Tenet, Turner Corp. and Comerica extolling the greatness of Dallas, and why their companies moved here. Oddly enough, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson didn’t mention in the video why he won’t call me back for a profile. Maybe I’ll have to call him again…
For the link to see the same video we saw, click here.