Looking forward to the future of journalism

Is your apartment building safe? How to check Code Enforcement Records

A fire that engulfed the San Pedro Apartments on Tuesday was probably caused by an overloaded electrical outlet. But tenants complained the old building wasn’t well maintained, which raised questions about any past Code Compliance violations issued by city inspectors. San Antonio’s Code Compliance Department has a Web site where you can plug in the … Read more

Follow the money: Searchable payroll database of city employees posted online

Reporter Greg Jefferson wrote a story in today’s paper that examined how taxpayer money is being spent on salaries and overtime for San Antonio’s 10,000 city employees. The story looks at the city’s highest-paid employees, and explains why $13 million in overtime went to the Fire Department and many of its dispatchers. This information was … Read more

Satellite photos show impressive crowds on Inauguration Day

Photo courtesy of GeoEye The company GeoEye released a cool gallery of satellite images showing the crowds in Washington on Inauguration Day. The company’s press release says of one of the featured pictures: The image was taken by GeoEye’s newest satellite, GeoEye-1, as it moved from north to south along the eastern seaboard of the … Read more

How to look up incident reports about plane crashes

Photo courtesy of eyewitness Janis Krums from TwitPic If you want to find official reports about plane crashes and other accidents, the National Transportation Safety Board has a searchable database of incident reports on its Web site. Related: Adrift: Hot-air balloon pilots face little scrutiny from FAA despite higher crash rates The nice thing about … Read more

How to track a bill in the Texas Legislature

The Legislative session in Texas officially starts today, which means lawmakers will be filing thousands of bills dealing with topics ranging from the trivial to the profound. This year, bills have been filed that prohibit human cloning; expand the definition of college hazing; and encourage more “green” jobs in Texas, just to name a few … Read more

Open records: Financials of Texas charities

Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott is unveiling a new Web site where you can soon look up the “990” tax forms of nonprofit organizations in Texas. The 990 is a good starting point when you want to know more about a tax-exempt charity and what it does with its money. You can find out how … Read more

Why couldn’t watchdog journalism save Seattle newspaper?

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, the sister-paper of the Hearst-owned San Antonio Express-News, where I work, is going up for sale after hemorrhaging money for years: The Seattle P-I is being put up for sale, and if after 60 days it has not sold, it will either be turned into a Web-only publication or discontinued entirely. “One … Read more

Mapping fire response times in San Antonio’s outer neighborhoods

fire response times in san antonio

View Larger Map I made a quick Google map of the data we analyzed for this story about fire response times in San Antonio. Many residents of the exclusive Dominion, home of the San Antonio Spurs’ David Robinson and other celebrities, aren’t happy about a slow response to a recent fire that destroyed a $1 … Read more