Speaking of Walmart (told you) …In the end, turns out, I didn’t need Mitchell Rasansky to tell me what everyone already knew — or guessed, anyhow. Because, as I discovered this morning, the permits were filed with the city two months ago and approved December 29. So, yes, brace yourself,…
Rasmiya AlGhrawi greets guests with big hugs and a series of kisses from cheek to cheek and back again. She’s a mother and grandmother to both her own family and to anyone who walks through her door and sinks into her comfy couches. She’s also a refugee, having fled from…
We began the new year by rehashing an ancient topic: the proposed Texas Horse Park that’s been around since the mid-1990s and was part of the $246-million capital bond program for the Trinity River Corridor Project approved by voters in 1998. Reason it never happened: The folks charged with partnering…
Word of warning: This won’t be the sole Unfair Park item of the day to feature the word “Walmart.” Patience, patience. But, to begin: Remember that Walmart going in at Ledbetter and R.L. Thornton? Right, that one. Gave us the phrase “Trees do not vote” during the contentious discussion about…
We told you Friday: Very, very, very, very early guesstimates at City Hall have the city short anywhere from $49 million to $87 million when it comes to putting together the FY2012-13 budget. City Manager Mary Suhm repeated that this morning: “We’re very early in the process.” The city’s chief…
It’s been a couple of weeks since lawyers hired by the city and the National Solid Waste Management Association squared off in U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor’s over the flow control ordinance that would have dumped all the city’s solid waste at the McCommas Bluff Landfill. I say “would have”…
A few years back Dallas City Hall made a big push for folks to sign up for its Reverse 911 Emergency Notification System, which called you when danger was near. Or, at least, that was the idea. But this morning the city sent a heads-up: Reverse 911 is dead, long…
When Dallas City Manager Mary Suhm first told the council it was time, at long last, to enact twice-a-week watering restrictions, Dallas’s six water-supply reservoirs were about 25 percent depleted. But last week’s record rainfall, in addition to other recent wet-weather events, have helped fill area lakes as evidenced by…
At this point, Deep Ellum could easily star in its own Rocky-style franchise, given how many times it’s been knocked down and still managed to stagger back to its feet. As we’ve mentioned, the latest worry for business owners in the area comes in the form of some 900 schoolchildren:…
No doubt you’ve heard by now: Rockwall County deputy Keven Rowan had to pull two women from Lake Ray Hubbard early Saturday morning after they took their Honda Civic for a swim. And if you haven’t heard, well, see for yourself; his dash-cam captured his heroics for all to see…
Oh, and there’s one more thing to ask Edwin Flores about tonight: his $10,000 check from the Dallas Regional Chamber-connected EducateDallas political action committee. At least, Carla Ranger, Flores’s fellow Dallas ISD trustee, has some issues with it; she says so this morning on her blog, beneath the headline “Dallas…
Mayor Mike Rawlings has a closed-door, no-press-allowed meeting this morning with 25 LGBT community leaders to discuss something that’s become, say, a small issue for him in the last week: his refusal to sign the “Mayors For Freedom To Marry” Pledge. Earlier this week Rawlings also elected to back out…
For those who forgot the phrase “Meet and Confer,” you may want to reintroduce yourself to the city’s agreement with Dallas Police Department and Dallas Fire-Rescue that saved the city $22 million during the “painful, painful, painful” dog days of 2010, when Mary Suhm had to gut $131 million from…
So, maybe you noticed: On Monday we checked in to see how progress, or whatever, was going with efforts to redo 1401 Elm Street. That’s the George Dahl-designed building Mike Sarimsakci was going to spruce up with $30 million in TIF money from Dallas City Hall. Except, turns out, the…
I warned you: Yesterday’s item about Uplift Education’s intention of opening a charter school in the old Baylor building in Deep Ellum was just the first of many to come. Here’s the second, because yesterday I’d left a message for Deputy Mayor Pro Tem Pauline Medrano, in whose district Deep…
Not two years ago Dallas city officials believed, based upon information provided by HNTB, that to bring the unaccredited Trinity River levees back to that so-called 100-year flood level of protection, it would cost anywhere from $100 million to $150 million. The solution: cut-off walls sunk into the levee, around…
While we await our recap from a raucous Ross Ave. last night, let’s begin with this bit of … well, not sure it’s breaking news, not exactly. Because, after all, we’ve known for months now that Sylvan Thirty — the long-proposed, much-talked-if-not-shouted-about mixed-use development on the site of the former…
Quick test: When you think Craig James, what comes to mind? A. SMU and New England Patriots football player and long-time sports announcer. B. Texan, father, husband. C. Who the hell is Craig James? D. Senate candidate and taxpayer. You’re right! And today, James took his “plethora of experience” to…
On Wednesdays I keep the city council broadcasts dialed up in the office for the high irritainment value. Besides, you never know what’ll happen. Take yesterday, for instance. There were a few things I wanted to keep an eye on, but at the bottom of the bottom of the list…
Someone asked yesterday if and when Omni’s going to move its HQ to the city of Dallas. Well … if you’ll look at the council’s agenda for today, it’s right there: items No. 54 and 55. The first one’s for a mammoth tax abatement agreement for 10 years; the second,…
A few weeks ago, following City Manager Mary Suhm’s sneak peek at the 2012 bond program that will be but a fraction of a fraction of its mammoth $1.35-billion ’06 predecessor, I asked City Hall spokesman Frank Librio if there’s a doc listing all the things that have and haven’t…
Left a message this morning for Paula Blackmon, chief of staff to Mayor Mike Rawlings, to talk about his decision to pull out of a long-scheduled meet-and-greet with the citizens tonight at Kiest Park on Hampton. It’s been on our schedule for a month, and just Monday morning he (or…
