The basic outlines of the argument could have been surmised from any number of Dallas City Hall disputes that have gone down the last couple of decades. One faction on the City Council wants to do something that they believe could — maybe, they aren’t really sure — do something…
Two years after pushing one of its weekly meetings to the afternoon to better accommodate residents who can’t easily get off work on Wednesday mornings, the Dallas City Council is one step away from moving all of its City Council meetings back to their traditional 9 a.m. start times. Monday,…
Jason Witten isn’t ready to retire again. The legendary tight end, a year removed from his return from the Monday Night Football broadcast booth, said last week that he intends to play in 2020, regardless of whether the Cowboys want him back. Which leads us to this list. No matter…
Many adults in the United States wrongly believe this year’s census will be about citizenship status, and some worry about participating because of it, according to two recent studies. Dallas-area immigrant and refugee organizations say that concern and confusion are symptomatic of the Trump administration’s efforts to reduce immigration to…
We here in Dallas must reserve some place in our hearts for the old-school white-shoe Republicans, because, after all, their leader and standard-bearer, Bush XLIII, lives quietly here among us. Perhaps it is appropriate that our city’s only daily newspaper is the one that has devised the template for white…
Days after the Irving-based Boy Scouts of America announced its Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing, children with the organization set up their tents at Camp Wisdom, one of Texas’ oldest campsites, for a weekend-long camporee. On the second day of the camporee at Camp Wisdom, scouts yelled as they yanked and…
For more than a year, Dallas has been sitting on a report addressing the city’s trash problem. It lays out recommendations for reducing litter and illegal dumping — problems concentrated in historically underserved communities in southern Dallas. Now, according to a top official, the city will be implementing them. The…
It may be a small step, but Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is putting a little of his money where his mouth is on criminal justice reform. Thursday afternoon, the governor announced a specialized clemency application process for Texas Department of Corrections inmates who were victims of sex trafficking or domestic…
One should be cautious, very cautious, when embarking on the journey upon which we are about to embark. There are few conclusions, legitimate or otherwise, worth drawing from early voting, much less two days’ worth of it. But the data is there, providing as close a facsimile as exists for…
Nearly half of America’s college students don’t have a safe, affordable and consistent place to live, and nearly 4 in 10 don’t have reliable access to food. Perhaps most troubling, 17% of the nation’s college students were homeless at some point in the past year. Those are the conclusions of…
Late last year, Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, never one to be mistaken for a moderate, struck perhaps the most conciliatory note of his political career when he said he supported closing the so-called “gun show loophole” and mandating background checks for all gun sales between strangers. Wednesday, a coalition…
“Reform Dallas,” a Facebook group I’m still trying to figure out, lit up for a while this week with a provocative post that started out, “I see a lot of people who despise and rally against gentrification.” The post went on: “My question is how do we organize and improve…
In the next three months plus, Dallas and the Metro Dallas Homeless Alliance plan to reduce the city’s count of homeless veterans by 25%. They plan to take the most direct route possible to achieving that goal — getting housing for at least 100 of the city’s estimated 400 former…
A little before noon Wednesday, a Twitter account with fewer than 50 followers caught a viral wave and sent Cowboys fans into a panic. Amari Cooper, the team’s star free-agent wide receiver had been, according to @TOffseason, shot “in a parking garage in the Dallas area.” The tweet was bullshit…
Dallas and Fort Worth students’ performance on national standardized tests looks much better when you take demographics into account, according to a new report released by the Urban Institute. Dallas jumped to No. 5 in the ranking of 27 large school districts across the country. The analysis was based on…
A half-decade ago, Dallas County came this close to signing off on a contract that could’ve banned in-person visits at its county jail. Tuesday, by a unanimous vote, the Dallas County Commissioners Court approved a plan that will see county jail inmates charged just $.01 per minute for phone calls…
Show me a silver lining, I will find you a cloud. From 2014 to last year, the Dallas public school system became a state leader and role model for its ability to turn around failing schools. That’s the silver lining. The cloud is what happened next. As soon as the…
Airbnb, Vrbo and the rest of their short-term rental brethren appear set to head down the same road traveled by Uber and Lyft five years ago. The Dallas City Council wants a task force, one that will make sure the city gets its cut and will respond to concerned neighbors…
Dallas is nowhere close to fulfilling an ambitious plan to create a citywide network of bicycle lanes. In 2011, the City Council adopted a plan to create 1,300 miles of bike routes, including bikes lanes, street markings and multipurpose trails, that would promote “wide-spread use of bicycles” in the car-centric…
The city is proposing implementing new restrictions and raising fees to address safety concerns about its “Dockless Mobility Program.” The program allows five companies — Bird, Jump, Lime, Ojo and Wheels — to blanket the city in scooters that can be picked up, rented by the minute and then dropped…
If it seems like just yesterday that the Iowa Democratic Party was making a mockery of their caucus’ treasured first-in-the-nation status thanks to their inability to count votes or name a winner — it isn’t. But it’s close. Things are just getting started and, already, Texans are about to get…
A little over a year ago, The Dallas Morning News hired a new editorial page editor, Brendan Miniter, from the (George W.) Bush Presidential Center (Library) in Dallas. Ever since, the page has been embarrassing. And I guess it would be fair to wonder who is embarrassed. Clearly not the…
