One evening during the summer of 1994, Karl Pratt was wrapping up a day at Lake Lewisville. It had been a satisfying outing but, as he backed his truck to the water’s edge to pick up his boat, he realized his trailer had been stolen. Someone had cut the lock…
Zebra mussels, the innocuously named but virulent mollusk, were first discovered domestically in the Great Lakes back in the late 1980’s, having spread westward from their native Eastern Europe and hitched a ride in the ballast of U.S.-bound ships. Since then, they have spread through the nation’s waterways. They were…
Boy Scouts of America has made it abundantly clear: While they have no problem with gay people per se, they do have a problem with gays being associated with the organization. That’s why Irving-based BSA ousted Ohio mom Jennifer Tyrrell as leader of her son’s Cub Scout Pack. A couple…
For months now, Domingo Garcia and Marc Veasey have been groveling before increasingly less significant public figures for endorsements in the race for the U.S. House seat stretching from Oak Cliff west to Ft. Worth. I thought that, with the July 31 runoff fast approaching, they had exhausted all endorsement…
You might remember FreedomWorks. In 2010, the nonprofit, established and funded by billionaire David Koch, helped shape a sprawling Tea Party movement into the force that swept a large number of very conservative Republicans into Congress. Call it grassroots, call it AstroTurf. For a hint, if one is needed, of…
Texas has executed five people so far this year, all using the same procedure. First, a barbiturate, pentobarbital, is administered to induce unconsciousness. Then a dose of pancuronium bromide paralyzes every muscle in the body. Finally, a dose of potassium chloride stops the heart. That will change when Yokamon Hearn…
Temple Smith was a farsighted man. In 1913, the president of Fredericksburg’s first bank had sense enough to help finance the construction of a rail line between Fredericksburg and Comfort. A small town, Bankersmith, was settled there, but Smith saw beyond the relative boom that brought a post office, lumberyard,…
The world of early childhood education is cutthroat. There are only so many hyper-concerned parents willing to shell out public college tuition for their 3-year-olds to get the type of preschool education that will propel them into the Ivy League. Used to be, you could slap the name “Montessori” on…
When the Cowboys drafted Dez Bryant a couple of years back, I ignored all the hand-wringing over supposed character issues. He’s young, I thought. Everybody does stupid stuff when they’re young. Give him a massive spotlight and several million dollars a year and he’ll grow out of it. But last…
Yesterday evening, the Dallas Morning News reported on its business blog that it had purchased “hyperlocal online news provider Pegasus News.” The news was surprising because Pegasus has been at the periphery of the local media scene for nearly a decade, never standing out as much of a competitor or…
Daniel Hall’s dog, Boyd, was 10 years, two months, and 24 days old on July 9 but still spry. They’d played fetch together the day before. But that day, according to Hall, the golden retriever/rottweiler mix was lounging on the floor while Hall, his girlfriend and a friend sat on…
You might know Jennifer Tyrell as the mother from Ohio ousted as den leader of her 7-year-old’s Cub Scout pack not because all the other kids were jealous that her son is named Cruz Burns, which is undoubtedly the awesomest name a second grader could have, but because she is…
You don’t have to look terribly hard to find garbage at White Rock Lake: Plastic grocery bags, water bottles, plastic foam cups, lots and lots of beer cans, other stuff. It’s so common it fades from consciousness, becomes part of the landscape, except of course when it becomes the entire…
A few years back, the North Texas Tollway Authority took out those pesky toll booths and replaced them with cameras that, if you happen not to have a toll tag, snap a picture of your license plate and helpfully send you a bill — or send a bill to the…
Five years ago, the Trinity Railway Express signed a deal with 4G Metro “to provide the nation’s first comprehensive wireless broadband solution spanning the entire length of a major public railway.” Impressive, right? But by last year, it had become not so impressive. “The contractor wasn’t able to generate enough…
Update at 1:29 p.m.:Dr. Shannon’s email announcing his resignation, as well as board chair Donna Branson’s responses to my questions, are below. Original post: Skip over to Parkland’s website and scroll through the roster of senior executives and you’ll notice it hasn’t been updated in a while. But they still…
For the past year, WFAA has been digging into Richard Malouf and All Smiles Dental and Orthodontics, the chain of pediatric clinics he owns (used to own, actually) with his wife. What the station found was what appeared to be a massive case of Medicaid fraud in which he bilked…
It’s like clockwork. Every year as summer rolls around, media outlets begin to hyperventilate about the approaching West Nile epidemic, then proceed to breathlessly report on every single human case that shows up. Public health experts dutifully slip on their white coats and talk about what a grave danger West…
We love Josh Hamilton. For one, he’s a damn good baseball player who’s helped propel the Texas Rangers to its first two World Series. Plus, his backstory’s the stuff of Hollywood films. But we don’t love Hamilton as much as Hamilton loves Jesus and, to underscore that point, he’s releasing…
Last December, with Texas in the midst of one of the worst droughts on record and with lake levels dropping to worrying lows, the city of Dallas implemented Stage 1 water restrictions, meaning residents and businesses could only drench their grass twice per week. Even as North Texas was emerging…
Splashed across the front page of the Morning News today, large and above the fold, is an article detailing a new Brookings Institution study that measures how well public transit connects people and jobs in the nation’s 100 most populous metropolitan areas: “D-FW among worst for getting to work on…
As promised, the North Texas Tollway Authority published a list of all drivers with 100 or more unpaid tolls, and it’s a long one. Some 25,000-plus people owe the agency a total of $12.5 million. NTTA is billing the posting as a convenient resource for drivers to check and see…
