Archive for the 'News' Category

Westlake Academy students win indie book award

By Christina Rowland/ Star Community Newspaper
June 4, 2009

Westlake Academy students recently learned they have won a 2009 Next Generation Indie Book award in the category of “education/academic”. The award is an equivalent to winning an award at the Sundance film festival.

The 29 student-authors beat out adult authors competing in the same category. Their book, The Best of the Black Cow: Great Writing by Great Kids, is a compilation of stories that have been published in their student newspaper over the past three years.

Their student newspaper is printed monthly and is open to all students at the school. The newspaper is not a school class, as it is in most schools, but rather a volunteer opportunity that the students have a choice to make. Westlake Academy parent and published writer David Lieber is the club sponsor for the event.

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April existing home sales rise by 2.9 percent

By ALAN ZIBEL AP Real Estate WriterWASHINGTON — Sales of previously occupied homes rose modestly from March to April as buyers who were brave enough to dive into the market took advantage of prices that were 15.4 percent below year-ago levels.

The National Association of Realtors said Wednesday that home sales rose 2.9 percent to an annual rate of 4.68 million last month, from a downwardly revised pace of 4.55 million in March.

The results slightly beat economists’ forecasts. Sales had been expected to rise to an annual pace of 4.66 million units, according to Thomson Reuters.

The median sales price plunged to $170,200, down from $201,300 in the same month last year. That was the second-largest price drop on record after January, when prices fell 17.5 percent.

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Real estate: Sinclair Building won’t lose parking

By Sandra Baker

May. 24, 2009

The owners of the Sinclair Building in downtown Fort Worth were not left without parking for their tenants when they recently sold the building’s parking lot at Third and Commerce streets to billionaire Ed Bass’ Fine Line Diversified Realty.

As part of the deal, Fine Line conveyed to Sinclair Building Partners the 20,000-square-foot surface parking lot it owned on Jones Street, between Fifth and Sixth streets, two blocks east of the Bass Performance Hall, according to deed records. The Sinclair Building is at Fifth and Main streets.

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Cowtown City Hall Considers Going Postal

The Fort Worth City Council has approved money for a study on moving City Hall into the city’s historic downtown Post Office building.

The city is considering renovating the state landmark into a new City Hall.

“And we should do that, because its a centrally located facility, it’s at the heart of the Lancaster corridor development (and) it has great access to current and future mass transit,” said Randall Harwood, director of the city programs office.

The City Council approved $200,000 for a study to determine if the project would be economically feasible.

The question is: Do the numbers work?

The city would be on a 20 to 30-year lease purchase agreement at up to $6.4 million a year.

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Rise in Tarrant County property values puzzles some homeowners

By ANTHONY SPANGLER May. 16, 2009FORT WORTH — A reeling economy plus rising foreclosures plus a faltering housing market equals higher home values.

Sound like fuzzy math?

Thousands of property owners in Tarrant County may be asking that question. Roughly the same number of homeowners’ values increased as fell, but overall property values rose 4.6 percent in Tarrant County in the past year, according to preliminary data.

Values would have dropped if not for an additional $1.2 billion in taxable mineral rights and $4.4 billion in residential and commercial construction, data released Friday show.

So why did some properties rise in value against the downward current?

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Texas highway officials support plans to divide stimulus money among Fort Worth-area projects

By MICHAEL A. LINDENBERGER / The Dallas Morning News
AUSTIN – Texas highway officials, carving up federal stimulus money, are endorsing projects that range from a big toll road in Fort Worth to road improvements across North Texas.

Among the ideas:

•$250 million for the DFW Connector toll road project, which would expand State Highways 121 and 114 near Grapevine in Tarrant County.

•$60 million to repair dozens of existing highways in Dallas, Collin, Tarrant and nine other nearby counties.

•$144 million for a new interchange at Interstate 20 and State Highway 121 in Tarrant County.

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Dallas-Fort Worth home prices slide, but not as bad as nationally

By Andrea Jares

North Texas home values dropped 4.3 percent between December and a year ago, according to figures released Tuesday morning from the S&P Case-Shiller Price Indices.

The price drop is the second-least severe of all 20 metro areas surveyed. Denver had a 4 percent drop.

Dallas-Fort Worth is also faring better than the national average, which saw an 18.2 percent drop between December 2007 and December 2008.

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Dallas-Fort Worth area to have new warning guidelines for storm emergencies

By BLANCA CANTÚ / The Dallas Morning NewsNorth Texas emergency officials announced new guidelines on Monday for outdoor warning systems to establish a standard for notifying residents of severe weather and other potentially catastrophic events across the region.

The North Central Texas Council of Governments formally unveiled the recommendations to kick off severe weather awareness week. Outdoor warning systems are typically referred to as tornado sirens but can be activated for other reasons.

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