Our dog Sonora, who is about 17 months old, is one of the sweetest and most tender dogs I’ve ever been around. We named her after the heroine in the film Wild Hearts Can’t Be Broken. Like that character, Sonora can be shy and tentative, but her hesitation belies a kindness and a depth to her personality that defies description. We’re lucky to have her and her sister as part of our pack, even if she acts a little strange (above) whenever I give her a dog biscuit. She usually hides while she eats it so her sister, Layla, a rambunctious sweetheart named after Muhammad Ali’s prize-fighting daughter, doesn’t come after it. Good call, Sonora.

It may be a technicality, and it may be short-lived, but anything that makes English Only less likely to become law is a good thing, in my opinion:

[Metro legal director Sue] Cain’s Monday ruling said petition-driven charter amendments can only be submitted every two years. Cain’s ruling interprets the word “submitted” to mean when the voters weigh in on the proposed charter amendment. Davidson County voters approved the charter amendment requiring voter approval for property tax increases on Nov. 7, 2006. The English Only amendment proposal would be on the Nov. 4 ballot, which according to Cain means it falls short of the two-year waiting period by three days.

Maybe this will buy time for a stronger opposition to what I think is shortsighted and intolerant legislation that will do little else beyond serving as a lightning rod, and maybe it will energize an apathetic electorate. I’m not really sure, but I’m glad that, at least for now, this wrongheaded amendment will not be on the ballot this November.

There’s an upside to not having a booming tech industry: not having a busting one, either. Nashville Business Journal editor Lance Williams said that the thing he notices most is that the city has a very broad-based economy.

Like anywhere else, Williams noted, Nashville isn’t recession proof. Nashville’s broad base means Nashville may be in a better position to avoid especially painful bust periods, though. Of course, conversely, it may miss out on the highest of the highs during boom times, too. He said that he thinks Nashville is “poised for nice, steady, strong growth” over the long term and credited the city’s health care and higher education communities as evidence of its well-rounded economy.

Compared to Nashville, Williams said that Austin, where he worked for the Austin Business Journal until a few months ago, is “very up and down” because of its robust technology industry. It operates very cyclically. He arrived in 2003 as the “ashes” of the dot-com bust had mostly disappeared and covered the city during four boom years before taking his new job here in Nashville. He mentioned that layoffs at major players such as Dell and AMD were taking place as he was getting ready to relocate. The Austin economy endures more periods of boom and bust, he said, because of the depth and breadth of its technology industry.

Williams noted that Austin was a “sleepy” town in the 60s and 70s and only began to emerge as a tech leader in the 80s, when some fellow (Michael Dell) started selling computers built in his dorm room and another guy (Whole Foods Market founder John Mackey) got into health food. That worked out pretty well.

Nashville Business Journal editor Lance Williams, who relocated here three months ago following stints in Austin and Cincinnati, was in the office today to talk to our staff.

Williams was honest that a big downside for Nashville, one I’ve heard mentioned elsewhere, is that access to capital for new business ideas is “horrible outside of health care.” I’m aware that the Nashville Technology Council and other organizations in town are working to change that, but in the meantime Williams said that the city isn’t a great place to be a tech company that’s looking for investment dollars.

What advice did Williams offer for changing things? “Continue to be welcoming, because the money is here. It just needs to be better connected.” It sure does.