Lee Leffingwell writes in regarding funding for the Austin City Store, which we discussed in our live-blog of the budget adoption Monday. (We said, "Leffingwell's iterating that no tax dollars were used to subsidize snowglobes, just mainly hotel taxes. Wait, that's a tax …") The council member says:

One thing: On the City store deal - what I said was '...there was never any Austin taxpayer money involved..." (very careful in that choice of words.) Of course it was "taxpayer money", but no Austin taxpayers paid it - unless they were in the "doghouse" and had to go spend the night in a hotel and therefore paid the hotel tax for a room there.

The point was that there would be no benefit to Austin taxpayers by closing the store -- the money saved could not be used (by state law) for any other purpose.

Remember kids, the company store closes Sept. 29. Don't let the door hit ya where the good lord split ya …

Passed along without comment from Chronic's inbox:

A news story featured on Nightline and World News Tonight has made its way to your local area. A Walmart store in your area is currently selling an entire line of Christian Toys called Tales of Glory. This is the first time that a national retailer like Walmart is carrying Christian toys. You have a rare opportunity to cover the story from a local level and get video or pictures of the toys on the shelves at Walmart, something that has not been done.

This toy line includes a Talking Jesus Doll that speaks Bible verses such as John 3:16. The Jesus Doll in particular is selling incredibly well and based on current sales will be sold out before Christmas. Is the Tales of Glory Jesus Doll this years "Tickle Me Elmo"?

To find out which store in your area has Tales of Glory visit our Wamart Store Locator at www.one2believe.com.

And their coda: The Battle For The Toy Box Is On!

Here’s a tip: If you want to haul a large stash of pot from the border up to Austin, it would probably be a good idea to have a driver’s license, to have a front license plate on your car, and to obey the posted speed limit. And, hell, it’d probably be smart to have a good cover story in place too. (Just a thought.)

Case in point: On Sept. 5, Travis Co. Sheriff’s Office Deputy Brett Hellerud spied a black Chevy Camaro (sans front plate) speeding northbound on IH-35. He pulled the car over only to find that 20-year-old driver Frank Gabriel Martinez didn’t have a driver’s license – but he did have a female passenger, and a lame story to tell. In an affidavit for Martinez’s arrest, Hellerud wrote that Martinez told him that he was driving to Austin from Brownsville to see his girlfriend’s suicidal brother. But when Hellerud asked Martinez’s female passenger (traveling with her two-year-old child) where the two were headed she said they were on the way to Houston to “just hang out.” (Apparently she lacks a keen sense of direction and, quite possibly, any sense of fun – hanging out in Houston? Yikes.)

It used to be that the future of transport was going to be atomic-powered jet packs strapped to our foreheads. Now it's corridors.

The U.S. Department of Transportation has decided that as part of its Corridors of the Future project, to solve what it calls "national congestion relief," it's going to spend $17 billion in federal funds on six major highways. Big chunks of two of these roads run through Texas: I-69 (aka the infamous Trans-Texas corridor) and I-10 from California to Florida, running parallel to the Mexican border from El Paso to Orange. Texas is on-line to get $6 billion of the I-69 cash, plus potentially part of another $8.6 billion for easing up congestion on I-10.

According to the Texas Department of Transportation, they're expecting total travel on the whole length of I-69 to be 23 million vehicle miles per day by 2015. Just a thought, but any possibility of some of that de-congestion cash going on, say, investing in long-distance rail freight?

Well, of all the complaints you can make about the city, message discipline ain't one. Minutes after a motion from Brewster McCracken shitcanned the Austin City Store – the gift shop in City Hall requiring subsidies to stay afloat (this after it was revealed the city's since-departed Chief Financial Officer's wife landed a consulting gig opening the place – how hard was it to line up some plush armadillos and Leslie magnets?) – the city sent out a press release announcing the store will close its doors forever Sept. 29. Can this be the beginning of the end of Enron on the Colorado?

The presser:

The Austin City Store will formally close its doors following normal business hours on Saturday, Sept.29. The store’s closure follows a unanimous vote today by the City Council to eliminate funding for the store in the Fiscal Year 2008 Budget.

Through the end of this month, the City Store will work to sell its existing inventory of Austin-focused items. When the store closes its doors, the remaining inventory will be sent to the Austin Convention Center where items will be sold at kiosks during major events.

The Austin City Store, located at the northwest corner of Austin City Hall (301 W. Second Street), has operated in the thriving Second Street Retail District since December of last year. Featuring more than 1,400 square feet of shopping space, it was designed to spotlight products that promote City services and Austin’s history, cultures and environment.

The Austin City Store is open Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Customer parking is available in the Austin City Hall parking garage.

In the interminable crawl to next year's presidential elections, the tiniest of events can become fascinating, (even if it's just to break the tedium.) There's few events tinier than non-binding straw polls, and both Texas Dems and Republicans have had theirs now.

First off, the Republicans had their "pay to vote" straw poll in Houston on Sept. 1, which handed Californian US congressman Duncan Hunter what may be his only victory of the campaign. Meanwhile, on Monday morning, the Democrats announced the results of their wholly unbinding, unscientific and fairly worthless ePrimary, an online exercise in wild surveys. The winner was not as wildly unexpected as in the Republicans: John Edwards, often regarded as the Dem dark horse, won with 37%.

However, the Dems – and especially the Edwards camp – played it smart. The winner's wife, Elizabeth Edwards, turned up for the photo-op. So instead of it being a "remember, folks, this is just for fun" event, it became a stump speech that all the Austin-based print and broadcast media turned up for (and then scratched their heads over how they would turn this into a news item.) By turning this into a bragging rights affair, Edwards may have made the Texas straw poll more useful in their race for the White House than the actual primary may be.

It was Gov. Rick Perry vs Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger this past weekend, and the prize seems to be the future of the Republican party.

Perry had been invited to attend the California Republican Party Convention in Indian Springs, CA last Friday. The major thrust was supposed to be Arnie warning the party faithful that yelling for God, Guns and Small Government strips votes away and alienate independents.

So what does Perry do? Play to the base. In a rip-roaring, moderate-bashing speech, he said that the only true Republicans were conservative Republicans, and evoked the spirit of Ronald Reagan. He went after all the traditional targets – global warming, a nuclear middle east, and the specter of a second Clinton administration. He even went after his host, muttering darkly about Republicans that vote and act like Democrats, saying "It’s a sad, sad state of affairs when liberals campaign like Republicans to get elected, and Republicans govern like liberals to be loved. We need to hold the line on what it means to be a Republican which is, of course: being conservative."

So here we are – about to start adoption of the final Fiscal Year 2007-08 Budget for the City of Austin. But, despite there being three days scheduled to do so, odds are your boy won't be typing that long. (I hope not!) The previous couple years were short, sweet and literally scripted; each council member taking turns to announce funds for their pet project, it was like some awesome Christmas morning the kept going.

However, that was then. This budget's been far more politically charged, with council members bucking against the City Manager's preparation. Plus, as she budgeted most of the discretionary spending already under the auspice of "council priorities," there's far fewer scraps to fight over – a move more Machiavellian readers might ascribe to a divide-and-conquer ideology on Futrell's part.

More in a moment.

Sitting behind the AV control-table, I see iTunes running, raising the frightening prospect of a theme song. Last year, when the budget was adopted, the PA started blaring – no shit – "My Future's So Bright (I Gotta Wear Shades)." Guess "My Future's So Bright (I Got no Choice but to go with the Highest Property Tax to Close a $27 Million Gap") was unavailiable.

Kate Alexander suggests the Star Trek theme, bringing this whole endeavor full circle.

Whole gang is finally on the dais. Should start any moment now …

Wynn has called the meeting to order, describing the process. "Lots of input, lots of analysis … Big and complicated."

Items 1 and 2 pertain to the search for a new City Manger - authorizing up to $40,000 for a search to find Futrell's replacement. And it passes …

Read the continuing coverage inside …

Medical insurers can no longer say that some sorts of unpaid insurance claims are the Federal government’s responsibility. On August 31, the Texas Supreme Court ruled that five Texas hospitals can sue health care benefits provider Aetna Inc. directly without having to go through a complicated appeals process.

The hospitals - Christus Health Gulf Coast, Christus Health Southeast Texas, Gulf Coast Division Inc., Memorial Hermann Hospital System, and Baptist Hospitals of Southeast Texas – claimed Aetna had attempted to avoid being sued under state law by using the Federal Medicare Act as a shield. The hospitals did not have a contract with Aetna, but with North American Medical Management of Texas. However, Aetna’s wholly-owned subsidiary NYLCare paid NAMM to provide healthcare under the Medicare+Choice program.

When NAMM was placed into supervision conservatorship by the Texas Department of Insurance in August 2000, they were alleged to have underpaid on 6,000 individual claims for a total of $14 million. The five hospitals sued Aetna in Harris County, arguing that, under the Texas Insurance Code, Aetna was liable for NAMM’s underpayment. Aetna argued that the hospitals would have to appeal each claim fully through the federal administrative system. Initially, the Harris trial court and the Court of Appeals both dismissed the lawsuit, finding they had no jurisdiction. Describing those judgments as turning the Medicare administrative system into a “de facto claims administrator”, the Supreme Court overturned them and returned the case to the trial court.