Austin Business Journal articles from July 1992

Austin Business Journal archives from July 1992

Reform Act may level health insurance costs. (Health Care Cost Containment and Reform Act of 1992) (Focus: Employee Benefits & Insurance)
July 6, 1992... Price standards for health insurance would be established for all physicians and hospitals under one of several proposed national health-care reforms. "I think this is a pretty good step toward national health care," said Alfred Gilchrist,...

Scam targets credit unions. (check forgery in Austin, Texas)
July 6, 1992... A check-cashing scam that preys on credit unions is operating in Texas, and Austin institutions have been alerted but, so far, unapproached. One woman has been arrested in Farmers Branch, near Dallas, and several other suspects are being...

SOS taps emotions. (Save Our Springs Initiative, Austin, Texas)(includes related article)
July 6, 1992... When it comes to environmental issues in Austin, controversy nearly always is the rule and the Save Our Springs (SOS) initiative facing voters Aug. 8 clearly is no exception. With one month remaining before the election, both sides are...

American cars make passing grades.
July 6, 1992... There is a perception that domestic carmakers have only recently begun to care about quality. There also is a belief, particularly evident in the mass media, that U.S. carmakers didn't use the "breather" given them, through restrictions on the...

Take care when buying insurance. (life insurance) (Focus: Employee Benefits & Insurance)
July 6, 1992... You better shop around Caution should be used when buying one of the many types of individual life insurance available on the market, according to the state licensing agency. Records of licensing, financial strength and complaints are...

HMOs, PPOs can cut health-care costs. (health maintenance organizations, preffered provider organizations) (Focus: Employee Benefits & Insurance) (Industry Overview)
July 6, 1992... Beating high premiums A 30-percent increase in insurance premiums was more than Select Marketing of Austin wanted to absorb. An option: Changing to a modified preferred provider plan with a 20 percent cost increase. A preferred provider...

SOS controversy continues: dueling ordinances. (Save Our Springs; environmental ordinances in Austin, Texas)
July 13, 1992... The controversy surrounding the Save Our Springs (SOS) initiative has all but overshadowed an alternative ordinance that will appear on the Aug. 8 ballot. That silence is expected to end in coming weeks as some anti-SOS forces begin focusing...

Executive job hunting. (Focus: Recruitment and Employment)
July 13, 1992... Many companies are downsizing and cutting out management positions as global competition increases, pushing executives into the job market. Nationwide, executives are forced to seek work as companies become less militaristic and paternalistic,...

Candidates' commercials not welcome. (campaign spending of presidential candidates may not be beneficial to Austin, Texas due to restrictive federal regulations)
July 13, 1992... Three men are predicted to toss tens of thousands of dollars into the Austin economy in the next few months. But the main beneficiaries of that money wish the trio would keep it. Local sales managers and political analysts predict millions of...

Women business owners chapter folds. (Austin chapter of the National Association of Women Business Owners)
July 13, 1992... Calling it quits After six years of struggling, the Austin chapter of the National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO) called it quits June 30. One of the founders and immediate past president of the local group, Susan Pauley, said...

The TEC can fill some positions fast. (Texas Employment Commission) (Focus: Recruitment and Employment)
July 13, 1992... While private employment agencies can fill job openings almost immediately, the Texas Employment Commission (TEC) offers a larger field of job applicants. "The biggest thing we offer is jobs right away," said Bill Hudson, north branch manager...

Computer skills key to temp jobs. (temporary jobs) (Focus: Recruitment and Employment)
July 13, 1992... Computer literacy is a ticket to a job with a temporary agency, according to a handful of managers. Also in high demand in the growing temporary industry are people with skills in technology, medical and service-related fields. To meet...

The lines are drawn. (update on the Balcones Canyonlands Conservaton Plan)
July 20, 1992... If nothing else, the Aug. 8 bond proposal for the Balcones Canyonlands Conservation Plan (BCCP) has made for some interesting bedfellows: Environmentalists and developers both are supporting Proposition 10, which would authorize $22 million in...

Big problems for small loans. (bank services offered in Austin, Texas)
July 20, 1992... The biggest Austin banks are being accused of having words that speak louder than actions when it comes to making loans to small businesses. But the bankers say their words are just being misunderstood. Some of the largest banks have made major...

Computer schools hot over TEA rules. (Texas Education Agency)
July 20, 1992... Computer training schools are reeling as a state regulatory agency brings down the hammer for a law that has been on the books for years and in recent months has started being enforced. A representative of the Texas Education Agency (TEA) said...

Chenault sentenced. (John Bert Chenault, loan packager and business broker)
July 20, 1992... An Austin loan packager and business broker was sentenced in a Travis County state district court last week after pleading guilty to two charges of misapplication of fiduciary property of more than $10,000, both first-degree felonies. John...

Records sealed in Schlotzsky's case. (Schlotzsky's Restaurants Inc.)
July 20, 1992... Alleged leaks to the press have led a state district court to seal financial records being examined in lawsuits against the managing partners of Austin-based Schlotzsky's Restaurants Inc. In another unrelated case, one of the Schlotzsky...

Dell: computer wars are brewing. (Dell Computer Corp.) (Industry Overview)
July 20, 1992... The head of a major power is predicting a "brutal" war in the next three or four years that will have a casualty rate of 50 percent or more. But the power isn't based in Washington, D.C. -- it calls Austin home. Michael Dell, head of Dell...

Bank tellers standing up to robbers.
July 20, 1992... Your bank tellers may be giving you the eye a little more in the future. But they are not trying to stare you down. They just want to prevent getting a gun in their face. Although bank robberies are down in Austin, there have been a spate of...

Phones roam all over the roads. (cellular telephones)
July 20, 1992... Little antennas are popping up on cars and trucks at an almost rabbit-like rate of proliferation as wireless telephone technology gains popularity. Some 50,000 Austinites and 7.6 million people nationwide are linked up to wireless telephones,...

Phone companies make connections. (telecommunications companies merge)
July 20, 1992... Some telecommunications companies are gaining a louder voice in the market through buyouts and mergers. Two mergers have been announced this summer, one between U.S. Sprint Corp. and Centel Corp. and another between smaller players in the long...

Austin tops in campaign cash. (Austin Medical Association political action committee ranks first in budget)
July 27, 1992... There's big money flowing through Austin. Only problem is, it's flowing into Washington, D.C. A recent review of Federal Election Commission records by State Federal Reporter, a Washington, D.C.-based research publication, showed that Texas'...

Westward ho, Cattlemen's. (Cattlemen's State Bank to open second branch)
July 27, 1992... A renowned East Austin bank is attempting to spread west. Cattlemen's State Bank, until recently the only bank in East Austin, has applied to the Texas Department of Banking for a branch at 1601 W. 35th St., the former site of a Windsor Savings...

The money matters. (Save Our Springs Coalition questions funding and reporting methods of Citizens for Responsible Planning)
July 27, 1992... Leaders of the Save Our Springs Coalition (SOS) are questioning the funding and reporting methods of a group working to defeat the SOS initiative voters will decide Aug. 8. SOS Director Brigid Shea and campaign manager Mark Yznaga contend the...

Judge denies request to raise Heep's allowance. (Harriet Heep)
July 27, 1992... A judge refused to order the Austin Trust Co. to distribute additional funds from a multi-million dollar trust it administers, despite claims one of its beneficiaries can't pay her utility bills. It's the latest chapter of a saga that has been...

Logue holds the ticket to success. (Courtland Logue Jr., president of EZCORP Inc.)
July 27, 1992... Not many people think of a guy called "Corky" as their banker. But Courtland "Corky" Logue Jr., EZCorp. president and chief executive officer, believes he fills a banking niche. And for his success in filling that niche, Logue has been named...

Working toward a better relationship. (government-funded research; evaluation of research and development partnerships)
July 27, 1992... Government-funded research D. Allan Bromley, one of the nation's leading nuclear physicists, came to Austin July 17 on a mission -- not from God, but close. He was here on a White House directive, overseeing a meeting between University of...

Sam Walton: two sides of the coin.
July 27, 1992... Unauthorized biography Even becoming the richest man in the country doesn't guarantee complete admiration. At least that is the reflection of an Austin resident's book on Sam Walton, who earned billions of dollars as the founder and majority...

Gonzalez maps out Austin's ADA plan. (Dolores Gonzalez, Americans with Disabilities Act coordinator for Austin, Texas)
July 27, 1992... July 26 was significant in two ways: It marked the day employers could no longer discriminate against persons with mental or physical disabilities, and it was the deadline for Dolores Gonzalez to have completed a weighty report prioritizing...

Attorneys enjoy law after 'divorce.' (Bankston, Wright and Greenhill) (Focus: Law)
July 27, 1992... Austin's legal house is quieter now, patched and repaired after a shake up six months ago that occurred when two of its pillars suddenly shifted. Those pillars, nameplate partners in two of the city's largest law firms, last February walked away...

Austin law firms buck the trend. (rise in law firm partnerships in Austin, Texas) (Focus: Law)
July 27, 1992... Some of the biggest legal outfits in Austin signed on more partners this year, bucking the trend in other Texas cities and across the country. A weekly trade paper, Texas Lawyer, reported a rise in the number of partners for seven of the eight...