Why Cant West Texas Grow? (El Paso, Lubbock: calculated, statistics, moving)

[WillysB]

I suspect one reason people don't move to west Texas is related to growth and jobs. Your elected city council members can influence a companies decision to open a business in that locale. Attitude may have as much to do with it as tax breaks. And who'd want to pay 200 bucks to fly from Abilene to DFW when you can fly from ABIA to Love for less?

And then there's jobs, at least where that company may have opened shop in some west Texas city. Many of those jobs are filled with locals right away and those locals aren't likely to pick up and move to a competitor... as though one would even exist... leaving few to no jobs for someone looking to relocate. And even if that job did exist, it's going to someone with a local reference before it goes to some over qualified stranger from Timbuktu.

And yes, I know some don't regard Abilene as west Texas, but I suspect the same conditions exists for any west Texas city with one or more 5A schools. You can water your yards and make the grass grow but who is watering the cities growth?

[Former Odessan in Austin]

Originally Posted by Westerner92

Still trolling I see.

Instead of stalking me Westerner92, why don’t you add a constructive post with reasons why someone should move to West Texas? I gave the forum two big reasons why people don’t want to move there. Having lived in Odessa for eighteen years I have a real perspective of what West Texas is like, besides all you have to do is look at the posts about West Texas towns in this forum to get that answer or look at the local newspaper articles about their perspective cities. Articles in the Midland Reporter News have reported numerous reasons you would not want to move to Midland. For Instance:

There is only one movie theater and they had to close at one point because of safety issues due to pest infestation according to Midland Reporter News. See link below for a link to that article.

http://mywesttexas.com/articles/2009/01/19/news/top_stories/doc4970f8d4a5b05363349042.txt

The Midland Independent School District, the whole district not just one school, was ranked as Unacceptable by the Texas Education Agency on July 31, 2009. See the link below from the Midland Reporter News for that article.

http://www.mywesttexas.com/articles/2009/08/01/news/top_stories/doc4a7381b2906d9855940719.txt

Midland Deputies acting childish during a training visit to Williamson County are under investigation for alleged disorderly conduct during training visit to Williamson County.

http://www.mywesttexas.com/articles/2009/08/13/news/top_stories/doc4a838ee135351849637342.txt

See the thread in this forum from people commenting about Big Spring. The link is posted below.

http://www.city-data.com/forum/texas/731603-any-opinions-big-spring-tx.html

I have to go to West Texas towns on a quarterly basis. If anything they have gotten worse not better since I left Odessa in 1976.
And this will be my only direct post to you. Stalkers only deserve one response from anyone and you probably did not even deserve this response.

[Former Odessan in Austin]

[SIZE=3]Or let’s talk about another West Texas town that actively recruited a nuclear waste dump to their county, Andrews, Texas and was successful because it would supply a few jobs for the barrio. A few jobs just to ruin the water table for a sizable part of West Texas and poison the land. Does this give you another clue why people won’t move to West Texas?
[/SIZE][SIZE=3]See link below for that article.[/SIZE]
The Texas Observer > Good to Glow by Forrest Wilder -

[Former Odessan in Austin]

Or will allow a religious cult compound in their community that practices polygamy in El Dorado, Texas. See link below for that. Another fine example why people don’t want to move to West Texas.

Marci Hamilton: Prosecuting Polygamy in El Dorado

[Westerner92]

^^^ Don't flatter yourself. I'm not stalking you; I just happen to read the same threads as you. I'm just calling them like I see them, and I'm not the only one who thinks that you're a troll. The fact that the majority of your 56 posts are dedicated to bashing a place you left 33 years ago says a lot. It takes a special kind of closed-mindedness to blindly generalize an entire region like you do.

[pammybear]

And we CHOSE West Texas. We are educated (dh and I both have advance degrees) we have young children and we are happy here. We are not the only ones. If you don't think West Texas is growing then you haven't been here in awhile. No, it is not Dallas of course but the people in my circle like living in a smaller city and when we want something different we travel to Dallas/San Antonio, Houston etc then we come HOME to where we CHOSE to live. Last time I checked the borders around Midland are open so people can come and go as they CHOOSE. Former Odessan, you obviously made your choice and Bravo for you so leave the rest of us alone. You will never understand why we like to live here so just give it up. And by the way, I did not grow up here, I am not a right wing conservative by far so don't try to pigeon hole me into a stereotype that you think lives here. I have been talking to numerous people in private because they don't like your negativity and obvious hatred for the area. There are 200,000 people in the Odessa/Midland area and some of us LIKE living here. No, it is not for everyone but even AUSTIN has problems it's just I don't want to waste my time digging them up and posting them here because anyone who wants to go to Austin, Midland or anywhere will research the area and learn the good, the bad and the ugly that EXISTS everywhere. You just personally hate West Texas which is your perogative but ENOUGH already. We are tired of hearing it. Move on already................

[mmjw]

Pam I AGREE!!!!!
We CHOSE to live here almost 3 years ago and have watched the city grow in just this amount of time. So many new business are opening up (friends of ours opened Dickey's), and so MANY more are coming! This city has continued on a great growth spurt for just over 5 years now! The economy may be down but honestly West Texas has continued to GROW while the rest of the nation is falling to pieces!!

[Former Odessan in Austin]

Originally Posted by pammybear

And we CHOSE West Texas. We are educated (dh and I both have advance degrees) we have young children and we are happy here. We are not the only ones. If you don't think West Texas is growing then you haven't been here in awhile. No, it is not Dallas of course but the people in my circle like living in a smaller city and when we want something different we travel to Dallas/San Antonio, Houston etc then we come HOME to where we CHOSE to live. Last time I checked the borders around Midland are open so people can come and go as they CHOOSE. Former Odessan, you obviously made your choice and Bravo for you so leave the rest of us alone. You will never understand why we like to live here so just give it up. And by the way, I did not grow up here, I am not a right wing conservative by far so don't try to pigeon hole me into a stereotype that you think lives here. I have been talking to numerous people in private because they don't like your negativity and obvious hatred for the area. There are 200,000 people in the Odessa/Midland area and some of us LIKE living here. No, it is not for everyone but even AUSTIN has problems it's just I don't want to waste my time digging them up and posting them here because anyone who wants to go to Austin, Midland or anywhere will research the area and learn the good, the bad and the ugly that EXISTS everywhere. You just personally hate West Texas which is your perogative but ENOUGH already. We are tired of hearing it. Move on already................

Maybe instead of addressing me and stalking me around the forum, you should also address the original poster’s question on this thread, “Why can’t West Texas grow” and stop addressing and stalking me. I assure you I have no interest in discussing anything with you. My previous posts in this thread were reasons why I think people do not want to move to West Texas supported those reasons with links. Having lived out there for eighteen years I know what West Texas is like and I know people only move out there as a last resort. They usually leave as soon as possible. Another reason West Texas can’t grow much is people always leave the first chance they get to leave West Texas and smart people always get that shot first. Maybe someday you will also get your shot, and until then I wish you all the best in your future endeavors.

[pammybear]

to answer you the way I want........how full of yourself can you possibly be. I believe you are the stalker or the troll or whatever.....We are all having a good laugh at your expense! Like I said, we can live wherever we want and we CHOOSE to live here and that is true for so many people. Stay in Austin where I am sure it is perfect...................

[catman]

What's with all the talk of 'stalking' and trolls? Some people like West Texas and others don't, it's as simple as that. I personally like West Texas, but I can see why some people don't. It's all a matter of what one's priorities are. DFW has gotten way too populous for my liking (6.3 million!).