Has the expressway billboard for the RGV Spy Store caught your eye?  Ric Tamez hopes so. “It lets people know we’re here,” said the owner of RGV SpyTek, which carries security cameras, GPS trackers, recording devices, data recovery tools for hard drives and much, much more. “We’re the only spy shop in the Valley, but it’s a competitive world,” he said. “I’ve got to stay ahead of anyone thinking about getting into the business.” Tamez, a former McAllen Police Department burglary investigator, opened…

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As employers, we often define good hiring as being able to hire the person who can prove she has already successfully done the job somewhere else.  Even if we find this person, it turns out, “nobody’s perfect.” She’s late; she doesn’t know everything she thought she did; she surfs the Internet when there are deadlines to be met.  There might be someone in the office that “rubs her wrong” or a lack of progress in learning the new job.  If you are lucky, a little adjustment period, a…

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Tom Mason II and his father staked out different areas of real estate expertise. The elder Mason ran Mason & Company, a Valley brokerage and property mangement firm, for almost 50 years. His son, also a broker, focused on commercial property valuations, asset management and property tax appeals in Dallas, handling a $3 billion portfolio which included North Park Mall and Dallas Market Center. Mason returned full time to the Valley 18 months ago and took over as owner/broker of…

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Large, colorful math posters of decimals, multiplication tables, fractions, algebraic symbols  and calculus functions cover the walls of Shine Learning Center’s restroom. Admittedly, that is an unusual  learning environment, but the private tutoring center takes its mission seriously. When Joseph Khamo was an elementary and middle school teacher, he knew some students did not grasp some fundamentals and needed supplemental education. As a principal for grades 6-12, he arranged tutors for those students, expecting them to rise to their grade level. To his surprise, the students made little to no progress. “We needed a results-based tutoring center…

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The Rio Grande Valley is not perceived as a film industry mecca, yet it is the home of a top-of-the-line, nationally accredited production company. “Nobody in South Texas has our record of delivery. We are the number one production company in the Valley,” said Harlingen native Roberto Rodriguez, owner of Rio Bravo Pictures. After earning a degree in film with a minor in international marketing from the University of Texas in Austin, Rodriguez spent three years traveling the world, filming documentaries…

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A spring rain drenched Wally Winters and his son as they loaded 22 large palms — Chinese fan, washingtonia and sago — onto the San Antonio contractor’s trailer.  Winters, who with his wife Lillian owns Adams Gardens Wholesale Nursery, admitted he didn’t usually run the forklift, but he had sent his crew home early because of the heavy rain. Yet 35 years earlier, when he first purchased an abandoned nursery on 10 acres off Bass Boulevard west of Harlingen, Winters had been the crew. His initial goal had been to restore the…

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The cough and cold syrup sold under the Dr. Manzanilla label is designed to appeal to the Hispanic customer.  The female, cartoon doctor is named for the popular herb manzanilla or chamomile, and the over-the counter medicine is physician-developed and -recommended. Telenovela star Laura Flores is pictured on the bi-lingual label of the brand headquartered in Raymondville. While Dr. Roberto Rey was completing his pediatric residency and pediatric oncology fellowship at Beth Israel Medical Center in…

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Without a properly-drafted Texas will, the cost of administering your estate will be expensive and time consuming. Texas has a unique system of independent administration that makes the cost of probating an estate relatively inexpensive.  But this independent administration process is available only if you have a properly-drafted will that contains the necessary language.  With a properly-drafted will, a single court filing and appearance can lead to issuance of documents that authorize your administrator to pay your debts and dispose of…

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