Wow! Angela Hunt and a coalition of citizens groups are calling for an election to get the planned Trinity River toll road out of the Trinity River park!
That's huge. I mean, huh-you-gggggggguh!
Just the idea alone is going to turn around this wacko mayoral election we've been having, to say nothing of giving people a chance to tell City Hall what they really think.
Unfair Park broke the news yesterday that Hunt was going to hold some kind of press conference down in the Trinity River Bottoms to talk about our benighted decade-old messed-up public works project to rebuild the river where it ruins through downtown.
I went down to the press conference at noon today filled with dread. I was saying to myself, "I know I'm going to get down there and it's going to be a bunch of people with 'Save our toads' signs. Just my luck, my wife will be one of them." I'll be walking around the house for a week saying, "Why do you think I don't care about the toads? I think the toads are extremely important."
But no!
Speaking to a full complement of electronic and paper media, Hunt ran right out into the ring throwin' lightnin'.
She said the toll road is slowing down the Trinity River project.
She said the story that the road pays for the park is a lie.
She said if we put the road outside the park, we can build the park faster.
They want a referendum next November. Something like, "Do the road, just not in the park." They have to get 50,000 signatures to get it on the ballot. Ouch! That's half the registered voters in the city. That's a tough hill to climb.
All the serious road supporters came to hear what she would say -- Craig Holcomb of Trinity UnCommons, whatever it's called; Bill Ceverha, a principal bag-man for the project; Marcus Woods, who lobbies for the property owners along Industrial Boulevard.
They obviously were taking this seriously. And they were very upset.
This thing was not spur-of-the-moment. I have been hearing rumblings for months. The main group behind it, TrinityVote, has hired political consultant Brooks Love to flak for them. Love was handing out a pretty slick press packet today at the deal. I think it's great mainly because it means some of the truth about this project will get on the front page of The Dallas Morning News and on TV. For a change. --Jim Schutze
