On any given day, the 10th floor of the Earle Cabell Federal Building in downtown Dallas is filled with men, women and children waiting to appear before an immigration judge. On certain days, like yesterday, many of them are Central American children, having arrived at the United States border, alone,…
Governor Rick Perry’s sending the National Guard to the border may not be the best idea. Sending soldiers to perform law enforcement functions usually doesn’t end well. That being said, at least there’s a certain logic to it. Perry perceives the influx of undocumented kids crossing the border as a…
In Dallas, the political atmosphere for payday lending reform is optimistic. After three years of ordinances limiting lending practices, the local movement has spread to 17 other cities across the state. Today, Dallas City Councilman Jerry Allen went before the Amarillo City Council to try and recruit that city to…
Governor Rick Perry today announced his intention to deploy up to 1,000 Texas National Guard troops to the Texas-Mexico border. While Perry cited criminal and cartel violence as his reason, the move comes following the recent surge of Central American children into Texas. Some 60,000 undocumented and unaccompanied kids are…
It’s been a few weeks since Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins’ startling announcement that Dallas would help shelter the influx of Central American kids. Initial reaction was, in general, positive if riddled with questions. Faith groups across the area have been busy raising funds and holding food and clothing drives…
One year ago yesterday, Governor Rick Perry signed into law one of the country’s most restrictive abortion laws. It’s been a little over a year since Wendy’s Davis’ landmark filibuster, and it would be another few months before the bill withstood legal strutiny in federal courts. But here we are…
Republican Senator John Cornyn and Democratic Congressman Henry Cuellar this week were heralded, by The Dallas Morning News among others, for their proposal to hire scores of new immigration judges to begin ruling on child migrant cases within a week or so of their arrival, as a show of force…
With Central American kids streaming across Texas’ border and nothing but partisan posturing on the horizon, Dallas County, under the leadership of County Judge Clay Jenkins and in partnership with the feds, is preparing to shelter thousands of unaccompanied minors from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, starting as soon as…
Lamar Alternative Education Center used to be Lamar Elementary. It’s part of the Grand Prairie Independent School District, and it officially closed its doors at the end of the 2013 school year because of low attendance. Today, the school sits empty in a working-class neighborhood, and looks the part of…
District Judge Emily Tobolowsky issued an order Friday blocking, at least for now, developer Trammell Crow’s plan to build a 130,000-square-foot Sam’s Club in Cityplace, just north downtown. Residents in the neighborhood near Haskell Avenue and Central Expressway won a temporary restraining order that prevents the city from issuing building…
As expected, the Dallas City Plan Commission voted this afternoon to approve the Trammell Crow backed plan for the area surrounding U.S. 75 and Haskell Avenue. The plan, for a development that’s been labeled the East Village, was presented to neighbors as being for a walkable, diverse multi-use outcropping. To…
President Obama and Governor Perry have been facing weeks of political tension regarding the recent surge in unaccompanied immigrant children fleeing central America and arriving at the Texas border. Although Dallas has made headlines in its promise to shelter many of these kids, it’s an issue that has been attracting…
U.S. Representative Marc Veasey doesn’t have a Republican opponent in Congressional District 33, which is made up of gerrymandered swaths of Oak Cliff, Irving and Tarrant County. That doesn’t mean he’s running unopposed, just that his sole challenger happens to be Jason Reeves, a California-born Libertarian whose most recent political…
East Village Association, a group representing residents who live near the proposed East Village development, has filed a request for a temporary restraining order and a permanent injunction against the city of Dallas and the Plan Commission to block a zoning change that would allow construction of a 130,000-square-foot Sam’s…
It’s not every Tuesday that you see reporters from three Dallas TV stations live tweeting a Dallas County Commissioners’ meeting, but that’s just what happened today. Why the hubbub? This meeting was a de facto public hearing on County Judge Clay Jenkins’ plan to house up to 2,000 undocumented minors…
GOP leadership has officially announced that exotic, exciting Cleveland will be hosting the RNC convention in 2016. The final announcement has come after weeks of teasers. Last month, the RNC selection committee narrowed the convention site shortlist to four cities. Then, last week, they announced that Kansas City and Denver…
If you think Texas’ highways are too beautiful to sully with cheap, unpermitted signs, you’re not alone. Under the Highway Beautification Transportation Code, the Texas Department of Transportation has some very strict, un-Texas-like regulations dictating the types of signs people can display. First, for what is allowed: businesses along highways…
Wendy Davis’ 11th-hour filibuster in June 2013 didn’t ultimately stop the Texas Legislature from passing some of the country’s most sweeping abortion restrictions, nor did it stop abortion clinics across the state from shutting their doors when they couldn’t meet the stringent new standards or obtain the newly required admitting…
Houston-area House member Steve Stockman never fails to make Unfair Park grateful it’s based in DFW rather than anywhere near the congressman’s Bayou City fiefdom. The guy has suggested arming infants, walked out of one State of the Union address and invited Ted Nugent to another. He’s also raised funds…
For a major bureaucratic initiative, County Judge Clay Jenkins’ plan to house around 2,000 unaccompanied immigrant children in Dallas County is falling into place very quickly. Just this past Saturday, Jenkins announced at the Texas Democratic convention his plan to shelter these kids in Dallas by the end of the…
It’s not a new problem, but it does appear to be a growing one, and it’s definitely one politicians are talking more and more about in public settings. The flood of unaccompanied children migrating to the United States from Central America is expected to reach all-time highs this year, with…
Dallas cops act like terrorists in black communities, at least according to the gadfly speaking to City Council on a recent Wednesday. “Realistically, councilmen and councilwomen, this has reached genocidal proportions,” the man added. Councilman Lee Kleinman decided to let that one go. The gadfly pressed on. “For us in…
