| Texas attorney has money to wage a U.S. Senate bid
Attorney Mikal Watts has the wealth to wage a Senate race in Texas, reporting in financial disclosure forms that he earned $40 million during the 18 months that ended in June. Watts, who hopes to challenge Texas' junior Sen. John Cornyn in 2008, also has several properties, two airplanes and earned more than $5 million from the sale of his cattle ranch. Watts filed the 22-page financial disclosure forms with the Senate last week. By contrast, Cornyn has spent the past 23 years in government jobs after seven years as an attorney defending medical malpractice cases. His wife, Sandy, works as a consultant, and Cornyn has a current Senate salary of $165,200. Head startWealth is never a guarantee of victory, but by contributing millions of his own money, Watts was able to show potential contributors his seriousness in running and give himself a head start against candidates less well-funded.
News in brief: Federal Office building gets facelift
HUNTINGTON -- The Federal Office Building at 502 8th Street has undergone a facelift. The nearly 50-year old building has been remodeled and its entrance moved to a new location. Visitors and employees to the Federal Office Building now will enter the building from 5th Avenue. The old 8th Street entrance has been permanently closed. The new entry is more centrally located and coordinates with the openings to the Sydney L. Christie Federal Building and Huntington City Hall. .
City Hospitals Chief Describes 'Activist Agenda'
As a lawyer for the state of New York and the city's housing authority in the 1980s and 1990s, Alan Aviles championed civil rights and affirmative action. Now the head of the city's public hospital system, Mr. Aviles directs a health care network that serves 1.3 million New Yorkers, including 400,000 uninsured patients, guided by the same activist principles. "I really think the issues of health care access are issues at the forefront of this generation's civil rights concerns," the president of the New York City Health and Hospitals Corp. said recently. "Some of my friends who have known me a long time, when I went over to health care, were sort of surprised by that" move, Mr. Aviles said. "From my perspective, it's not really that strange or long a trip." Created in 1970 as a public benefit corporation, HHC is the country's largest public hospital system, with 7,407 operating beds throughout the five boroughs.
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