Chris Polone woke up on Friday to around 100 phone calls. The owner of The Rail Club Live in Fort Worth said they all asked the same thing: Had he heard about Gov. Greg Abbott’s order to shutter the state’s bars? Polone said he was shocked when he learned of…
Dallas County crossed two grim thresholds Tuesday in its ongoing surge of cases of the novel coronavirus. County health officials reported 601 new cases of COVID-19 Tuesday afternoon, marking the first time the county has reported more than 600 cases in a single day. The county also reported 20 coronavirus-related…
Dallas County’s new coronavirus cases continues to rapidly climb. June 1, the county counted 220 new cases. Sunday, the number jumped to 570. The disturbing trend prompted Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins to write a letter to Gov. Greg Abbott on Sunday. In it, he urges Abbott to impose statewide…
Earlier this month, Gov. Greg Abbott announced that students would be returning to public schools this fall. But as COVID-19 cases surge in Texas, Rena Honea, the president of the teachers union Alliance-ATF, said she has concerns about sending kids back to school. Honea and Joanna Cattanach, Democratic candidate for…
Dallas hair salon owner Shelley Luther has cannonballed her way into the national spotlight. Her brash act of political defiance flung heaps more mud into the already murky debate surrounding safety mandates amid the coronavirus pandemic. Last week, the University of Houston released a poll indicating that Luther’s peers disapproved…
Unless you fall into one of a handful of categories that would allow you to cast a ballot by mail, you’ll need to show up in person if you want to vote in next month’s runoff election, coronavirus or not. That’s the takeaway from the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to…
A day after he hit the pause button on the state’s reopening plan, Gov. Greg Abbott is reinstating some restrictions designed to help slow the spread of the novel coronavirus. Friday morning, Abbott issued an executive order closing bars across the state at noon Friday and placing a 50% occupancy…
As Texas’ coronavirus numbers continue their rapid climb, Gov. Greg Abbott put the state’s reopening plan on hold Thursday morning. In a news release, Abbott said the state will pause all scheduled phases of reopening, meaning any businesses that would have been allowed to reopen in the coming weeks will…
We are, as even Gov. Greg Abbott admitted this week, in the middle of pandemic. Across the state, cities, counties and hospitals are reporting record numbers of COVID-19 infections and patients. Municipal budgets and residents’ wallets are under threat, as the Texas summer gets hotter and anti-police violence demonstrators march…
On Monday, Dallas County’s COVID-19 picture got a little darker again. For the first time, the county’s Health and Human Services unit announced more than 450 new infections, a more than 10% increase from Dallas County’s previous record high. On Friday, Dallas County began requiring businesses to demand that their customers…
Almost as soon as Dallas began taking applications for its COVID-19 rental assistance program, the $13.7 million allocated was already spent. About 10,000 residents made it through an initial screening in early May when the program went live, according to the city. About 1,500 received some help, and more than…
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott really wants you to wear a mask. The governor isn’t ordering Texans to do so, he said at a press conference Tuesday, he just thinks that they should. “COVID-19 is now spreading at an unacceptable rate in Texas and it must be corralled,” Abbott said. “We…
Dallas County’s coronavirus numbers continued their upward trend Monday, as county health officials announced 454 new cases of COVID-19. That total represents a 10% increase over the county’s previous single-day record, which the county set Wednesday. The county also announced three more deaths from the novel coronavirus: a Dallas man…
Despite last week’s record number of new COVID cases statewide, many Texans have ditched wearing a mask out in public. It’s no wonder: Recommendations from health officials are being consistently subverted by some government authorities. Friday, Dallas County Commissioners approved an order that requires businesses to enforce mask wearing for…
Wednesday, Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff solved Gov. Greg Abbott’s riddle and lit the path for his fellow municipal leaders. Thursday, counties around the state, cautious over the spread of the novel coronavirus but wary of Abbott and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s wrath, began following Wolff’s lead, crafting orders…
The numbers don’t look good for North Texas’ long-term care facilities, where the coronavirus pandemic has wreaked havoc on elderly residents and staff. Monday, 19 members of a Plano memory care facility were hospitalized after exhibiting symptoms of COVID-19, according to The Dallas Morning News. Since mid-April, Dallas nursing home…
Dallas County reported 416 new cases of COVID-19 Wednesday, far exceeding the county’s previous single-day record. That report marks the first time the county has reported more than 400 new cases of the novel coronavirus infections in a single day. The county’s previous single-day record was 345 new cases, set…
As it turned out, the answer for Texas counties that wanted to require people to wear face masks in public was there all along. All they needed to do was read between the lines and decipher Gov. Greg Abbott’s winks, nods and vague gestures. On Wednesday morning, Bexar County Judge…
Your hopes for voting absentee in July 14’s primary runoffs — assuming you aren’t over the age of 65, physically unable to vote in person or planning to be out of the county in which you’re registered throughout early voting and on Election Day — now rest with the United…
As far as actual news went, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s press conference Tuesday didn’t provide much. There was still, despite record numbers of novel coronavirus infections and hospitalizations across the state, nothing to see here. Doesn’t mean it was an afternoon without fireworks. The governor was abundantly clear about what…
Any student athlete hoping hoping to return to athletic activities on Southern Methodist University’s campus this summer will be required to sign a waiver absolving the school of potential liability should the student contract the novel coronavirus, according to documents first obtained by The Dallas Morning News. The waiver, anonymously…
Thursday, Dallas County set another record for daily reported COVID-19 infections. For almost two weeks now, the records have become routine, climbing from 253, the high during the county’s previous pandemic peak in mid-May to Thursday’s total, 312. As the county reported many of those records, Dallas County Judge Clay…
