Frank Librio, the city's director of public information, tells Unfair Park this morning that at last count there were 903 Hurricane Ike evacuees still living at the Dallas Convention Center, though an updated number is due within the hour. (Update: Says the city at 10 a.m., "The current registered head count at the Dallas Convention Center Shelter is 731.") And while the Federal Emergency Management Agency yesterday announced its "transitional sheltering initiative" that will get folks into temporary housing till they're allowed to return to the Gulf Coast, Librio says the city's not yet sure when the federal government will start moving people to their new digs. And a return home isn't in the foreseeable future, as yesterday Galveston County Judge Jim Yarbrough threatened to declare martial law if folks don't leave a decimated Galveston .
But for an afternoon, at least, kids living at the convention center will have something resembling fun as a handful of Texas Rangers are expected to show and serve up "a ballpark-style lunch." Among those expected to attend: Travis Metcalf, Bill White, Brandon Boggs, Nelson Cruz, Brian Gordan, German Duran and, tentatively, Jarrod Saltalamacchia and local boy Taylor Teagarden. The Salvation Army will bat clean-up. Also today, children displaced by Ike will have the opportunity to enroll in Dallas and Fort Worth schools. --Robert Wilonsky
