Yesterday, during my occasional and futile shift on the Rick Perry firing squad, I unloaded most of my ammunition on Perry’s impossibly ignorant rant about Obama’s plan to protect gay people overseas — an act Perry deemed as an attack on “traditional American values.” By the time I finished firing,…
Rudy got to this before I could, but no matter: What you see above was made for the Dallas Citizens Council, which had a dinner this week to which I am sure Schutze’s invite was lost in the mail. Long story short: Dallas is kickin’ ass. We have “attitude.” We’re…
On Monday a few Friends of Unfair Park seemed a little humbugged to hear that the Dallas Police Department, along with the mayor and the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office, would prefer you buy non-black-market items for your Christmas list this year. Nonetheless, DPD Chief David Brown, undeterred, stopped by…
At yesterday’s meeting, the council-appointed drilling task force grappled with some of the more divisive issues in front of them — and actually nailed down what they’ll recommend the council do about set-back distances and allowing disposal wells for produced frack water. As they deliberated, anti-drilling activists in the audience…
Here’s the president yesterday, decrying not-minor human-rights violations against gays overseas (from the Washington Times):”I am deeply concerned by the violence and discrimination targeting [lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered] persons around the world — whether it is passing laws that criminalize LGBT status, beating citizens simply for joining peaceful LGBT…
Yesterday afternoon the Arts Culture and Libraries Committee took its quick tour of the construction site that will soon be the City Performance Hall, which they hope somebody might want to rent out at some point. City council members Ann Margolin, Jerry Allen and Delia Jasso called their committee meeting…
At present, the Hall of State in Fair Park is closed to the public whilst it breaks down the “Texas!” exhibit that went up in time for, and lingered well after, the State Fair of Texas and attracted some 120,000 visitors during its run. But when it reopens at the…
It’s been nearly six months since U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director John Morton issued a memo to his subordinates, which we’ll translate from bureaucrat-speak for you: Look, we got scarce resources, so don’t head out into the field looking to pop every Tomas, Diego and Enrique you find without…
Yesterday the Woodall Rodgers Park Foundation sent word: The deck park would be receiving its first trees this morning, at ’round 10:30. I was told that despite the cold temperatures, the timing was good: “This season is the preferred time to plant because leaves are gone so the trees will…
The answer is no, the question being: Will we ever stop writing about the city redistricting process? But it’s been a little while, so let’s review. Then we can discuss the dueling delegations who apparently met with the Department of Justice last week to discuss the (barely) council-approved map forwarded…
Tomorrow, the Dallas City Council will go behind closed doors to meet with city attorneys about a host of legal issues staring down City Hall, among them: a long-going federal wrongful arrest suit about to get even more expensive (council will vote next week to pay Brown & Hofmeister an…
One month ago, Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport board member, former Dallas Housing Authority chair, ’07 Dallas City Council candidate, one-time chair of the City Plan Commission and longtime Friend of Unfair Park Betty Culbreath wrote on her blog that it’s time for Dallas County Commissioner John Wiley Price to go…
Back in June, Schutze laid out his case against the under-construction City Performance Hall in the Arts District, which is set to open in September 2012 and serve as a home for six tiers’ worth of small- to mid-sized arts orgs in need of fancier digs. Today the council’s newly…
This holiday season, City Hall, the Dallas Police Department and the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office would like to remind you not to buy your gifts out of the trunks of cars or through sketchy-seeming eBay sellers. At a packed press conference at City Hall this morning, Mayor Mike Rawlings,…
A couple of months back the council’s Economic Development Committee got a look at Dallas’s workforce and jobs courtesy the Office of Economic Development, which asked: Does the city have the “wrong workforce or the wrong jobs?” Said the briefing, reiterating a familiar catchphrase uttered in recent years, the city’s…
Schutze’s must-read of the winter has finally arrived: the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Dallas Floodway Environmental Assessment, in which we finally get a good look at the city and HNTB’s $30 million in proposed fixes for the Trinity River’s levees. Not sure when Jim will turn in his report;…
Far as lower-tier bowl games go, the second-ever TicketCity Bowl — to be played January 2 at 11 a.m. at the Cotton Bowl — is about as intriguing as it gets: The University of Houston (so, so, so close — a one-loss team, thanks to Southern Miss over the weekend)…
As it turns out, the United States Postal Service is looking at shuttering several post offices in the city — not just the main processing facility on IH-30, but also its locations in the Earle Cabell Federal Building (known as “Station C”), the Belmont Finance Station on Greenville Avenue and…
For those wondering whatever become of the stagnating Lake Highlands Town Center, a ray of hope appears on the council’s Economic Development Committee’s agenda for Monday: “Community Development Block Grant Section 108 Guaranteed Loan Application for the Lake Highlands Town Center.” I’ll post the actual briefing docs when they’re posted…
There’s a piece in this morning’s Wall Street Journal in which Unfair Park’s cross-the-street neighbor Harlan Crow and Fort Worth oil man Charles Moncrief explain why they’re throwing their money at Mitt Romney after years spent filling Rick Perry’s coffers. Long story short: It’s that openin’-his-mouth thing he does. It’s…
In mid-October we predicted that the hearing before the Permit and License Appeal Board over whether the club Afterlife should have its dancehall license revoked would probably be the most exciting thing that’s come before the board in a very long time. In hindsight, that was probably an understatement. At…
Pike Park, on Harry Hines as you’re heading into downtown, sits more or less in the shadow of the American Airlines Center; you’ve probably driven by it hundreds of times, even if you’ve never stopped once. Built in 1914 at the cost of a little more than $18,000 in what…
