Something we should have posted hours ago, but better late than never: Infamous radio curmudgeon Sammy Allred has been canned from his position at KVET, which he has held for 35 years. The Sammy & Bob Show is no more. I guess for now it's just the "Bob Cole Show." We'll bring you details as we learn them.

This image from the John Edwards campaign is a sure to give you a sleepless Halloween night.

After last year's bitter campaign and divisive election, the SOS Alliance and ACLU-backed "open government online" city charter amendment was defeated at the polls, having been decried as too expensive and restrictive. City leaders promised to revisit the issue and provide greater transparency – and that was all we heard. Until now.

Tomorrow, City Council adopts a city website redesign with "the goal of significantly increasing the number of online services available to the public." It remains to be seen what those "online services" constitute. Updated access to lobbyist information, more meeting transcripts, and expedited development info, for instance, would be good; rinky-dink shit like paying parking tickets online, however, doesn't fit the bill for accountability and transparency. This press release makes clear the city's looking for your input:

Mayor Pro Tem Betty Dunkerley, along with Council Members Lee Leffingwell and Mike Martinez, will announce a major overhaul of the City of Austin’s Web site at a news conference 9:30am, Thursday, Nov. 1, 2007, at Austin City Hall.

As part of the redesign effort, council members will detail plans for public involvement throughout the process and unveil a Web usage survey designed to gather ideas and suggestions. Council members will utilize computers at the event to be among the first to take the survey.

So there you have it. Continue the push for accountability, folks.

On another note, the presser notes Austin City Connection "was launched in early 1995 as one of the few municipal government sites in the nation." Courtesy of the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine, here's the city website from 1997, 1999, 2001 and 2003. Whoa …

Today could see the last occurrence of an Austin tradition: Escuelita del Alma's annual Downtown Trick-or-Treat. The staff and students of the Congress Avenue child care center will be putting on their scary faces and visiting local businesses, as well as City Hall, from 3.30-5pm. However, since Escuelita is one of the businesses that will have to move out of their current home to make way for White Lodging Services planned Marriott hotel, the future of the walk may be in peril.

The center does have a new home picked out on E. Second, but still has to secure the funds. So it seems the Save Escuelita campaign may be hoping for something more than some gummy worms and a lollipop in their Halloween sack.

Lee Leffingwell's aide Andy Mormon, on an extended leave of absence in Ghana, checks in with this bloodcurling picture from the dark continent. As Andy writes, it "brings a whole new meaning to international development!"

Like our president says, we once thought our oceans could protect us, but sadly, no more. Suttle is everywhere.

Texas teens aren't necessarily bad drivers - if they can take the cell phone out of their hands.

The Texas Transportation Institute, as part of their Teens in the Driver Seat campaign, surveyed 4,400 teens at 18 Texas high schools to find out if they were aware of dangerous driving habits, and how often they were likely to indulge in them. 80% had either a driver's permit or license, and, in good news, most students knew about the big traditional risks and avoided them. Only 2% of students surveyed didn't know that any of the top bad habits – drinking/drugs, cell phone/texting, speeding, too many teen passengers, using a seatbelt and driving at night – might get them killed or increase the risk of a serious accident.

However, 67% have talked on the phone while driving, while 51% have either read or written a text while driving. However, there's a weird twist there: it seems that urban kids are a little bit smarter about the risks, because students polled from rural areas were twice as likely to be on the phone while barreling along the road.

But a bigger issue may be a lack of understanding of the law. Only 42% had taken a formal driving education class, and only 50% knew about the graduated licensing law, which sets different standards the longer a driver has held their license. This could explain why only one polled teen in five knew they had to have an accompanying adult if they had other teenagers in their car.

Visit the TTI website for the full results.

Agenda highlights for the Thursday, Nov. 1, council meeting.

Item 7: Setting the 2008 meeting calendar. Bet there's a lot of Thursdays.

Item 8: Accepting a $990,000 Dept. of Justice grant to fund SWAT, the "Automated Fingerprint Identification System" and "operations in crime hotspot areas." Where's Alex Jones when you need him?

Items 13-25: Dropping the speed limit on dozens of streets to 25 MPH. Where's Sammy Hagar, for that matter?

Items 26-33: This week's Purchasing Office bonanza includes cash for water meters, one-inch river rock, liquid phosphate, and backfill polyurethane foam kits for stabilizing utility poles. Fun!

Item 37: Directing Toby Futrell to implement "Open Government Online, a citywide redesign project to the city’s Website with a goal of significantly increasing the number of online services available to the public." Let's hope this transparency doesn't stop at online bill pay …

Item 38: Making four-person staffing the minimum for Austin Fire Department engines. Does wonders for Chinese fire drills.

Item 45: Setting public hearing to consider Lee Leffingwell's SOS Ordinance revisions next meeting, Nov. 8, 2007, 6pm. Planning Commission chair Dave Sullivan reminds us not to lose our "civility of tone!"

Items 53-59: A smattering of zoning cases, including tweaks to the Domain, and making the Antique Marketplace (5350 Burnet) vertical mixed-use.

Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, made an impromptu appearance at city hall yesterday - complete with stoic Secret Service agents who mumbled into their jacket sleeves - declaring an otherwise mundane Monday "Energy Independence Day!"

She stood alongside local U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett, to talk up energy independence and global warming mitigation, what she called the "flagship issues" of the the Democratic leadership's New Direction Forward initiative. "It's been a long time since we've had a House Speaker at city hall and it's been a long time since we've had a Speaker committed to energy independence," Doggett said. Calling Austin the nation's leader in clean energy, Pelosi lauded the work of city council, Austin Energy, and the Clean Energy Incubator in advancing use of technologies like solar photovoltics and biodiesel, also giving props to Austin's Climate Protection Plan and Mayor's Will Wynn's role as Energy Committee Chair of the U.S. Conference of Mayors for its focus on climate change - an issue "as local as a neighborhood and as global as the planet," she said. "So too must be our proposals in our leadership for change to make the difference, said Pelosi, "and I see that here."

It seems for swinging Austin, attractiveness is the coin of the realm. At his State of Downtown address last week, "Hunkiest Mayor" Will Wynn described how "attractive cites" like ours attract talent "frankly, at the expense of less attractive cites." Now Mayor Eligible's found more grist for the attractiveness mill: an "America's Favorite Cities" poll conducted by www.travelandleisure.com and CNN Headline News lists Austin as one of the top 25 vacation destinations in the country. Moreover, the ATX also places high in several categories, including live music, nightlife, clubbing, happy hours, vintage shopping, athleticism, "wild weekends" and – you guessed it – attractive people. While receiving a "singles scene" first place, Austin's "ease of getting around/public transportation" score strikes out in 18th place. The write-up is available in the November issue of Travel + Leisure, and on the magazine's website.