Lots of people I know wish they could do a celebratory victory dance in front of City Hall today over the outcomes in Saturday’s local runoff elections, especially the surprising defenestration of three City Council incumbents favored by the mayor and The Dallas Morning News. It’s amazing. I not only…
Hundreds of demonstrators gathered on Saturday for a “March Against Sharia” in Richardson, rallying outside the Islamic Association of North Texas building at the intersection of Abrams Road and Centennial Blvd. which Counter-protestors gathered along the opposite side of Abrams, outside the Islamic center, to protest the protest. Protestors voiced their…
It’s hard to describe Saturday night’s Dallas City Council runoff elections as anything but a repudiation of Dallas’ political establishment. Three incumbents, all backed by For Our Community, the Super PAC run by Mike Rawlings’ consultant Mari Woodlief, appear to have lost their seats on the council. Rawlings endorsed two…
Police in Arlington have closed Interstate-30 at Cooper Street after a pursuit of an 18-wheel truck ended in flames. Police tweeted they are “working a standoff” and media in the area reports “SWAT teams” are moving toward the site of the crash. We will update this story. …
In less than two weeks — June 19 — Dallas will inaugurate its new City Council. Eleven members of that council are set. Ten incumbents are coming back. Dwaine Caraway, who knocked off freshman Carolyn Arnold in District 4, might as well be an incumbent; he served four two-year terms…
Tenants, the landlord and the judge in the HMK mass-evictions case in West Dallas cobbled together an 11th-hour deal Thursday afternoon, hours after a protective court order expired, with some help from Catholic Charities of Dallas. It should mean that even some tenants eight months in arrears on rent will…
Vanessa Swarovski, heiress to the Austrian crystal empire, is ditching her house in Westlake. The six-bedroom, nine-bathroom mansion in the tony North Texas exurb is estimated to be worth about $4 million, but Swarovski and her ex-husband, former MLB scrub Jorge Piedra, are selling it in an absolute auction June…
Since his retirement last October, former Dallas Police Chief David Brown has kept a relatively low profile. With the exception of a couple of commencement speeches, the ex-chief hasn’t talked much about himself and his six years as chief of one of the largest police departments in the country. This…
Dallas is changing because the ground is shifting. The arrival of new, young players and their gradual ascent into elective office is altering the city’s dreams of itself. The new city has visions that the old city fears. Handing big assets such as Fair Park and the Trinity River off…
Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings announced late Wednesday afternoon that the city of Dallas will join several of its fellow Texas in cities a legal challenge to Texas Senate Bill 4. The decision came after a parade of open-mic speakers encouraged the City Council to do so and followed a lengthy executive…
Dallas police arrested state Representative Victoria Neave early Wednesday morning for driving while intoxicated. Neave, who the Texas House Democratic Caucus’ recently named “freshman of the year,” remains in Dallas County Jail, waiting to see a judge so she can be released on bail, according to county records. Neave represents House District…
On Tuesday afternoon, an unsatisfied Texas Gov. Greg Abbott elected to call Texas’ House and Senate back for a special legislative session. In doing so, Abbott exercised one of his greatest gubernatorial powers for the first time, illustrating the priorities he has for the remainder of his first term as…
Denton’s suspected serial rapist has a history of peeping in windows and masturbating in public. Police reported that he’s been attempting to break into apartments where his female victims lived since at least October 2016.
On Tuesday, the 2017 National Homeland Security Conference kicked off in Buffalo, New York. Typically, a conference for law enforcement and emergency personnel in Buffalo wouldn’t make much noise in Dallas, but this year is a little different. During the conference’s opening general session, interim Dallas Police Chief David Pughes…
It has taken a while — half a year — but it looks like we are finally about to get our first good rubber-meets-the-road test of Dallas’ new city manager and new city attorney. Until now, they’ve been all about pretty talk and deck chairs. Both the new manager, T.C…
Denton resident Earl Leroy Thompson Jr. has been arrested in connection with a string of attempted and actual sexual assaults near the University of North Texas campus and Denton’s downtown square. Scott Fletcher, deputy chief of the Denton Police Department, told the Observer on Tuesday that Thompson confessed and gave significant details to…
After a grand jury indicted him in May, John Tufts make his first court appearance to face felony child abuse charges.
Irving state Rep. Matt Rinaldi picked either the worst time or the best time to put himself in the center of the Texas political universe. On Memorial Day, the last day of the 2017 Texas Legislature’s regular session, Rinaldi, a Republican, picked a fight with some of his Democratic colleagues,…
I can tell you exactly what the vote fraud is in West Dallas, where a Dallas City Council runoff election will be decided Saturday. It’s terrible. The fraud is the turnout. And to the extent that any other narrative serves to keep people away from the polls, that narrative is…
The Dallas City Council’s Housing Committee made it clear Monday that it doesn’t want the city to face a crisis like the one in West Dallas over the fates of occupants of rental homes owned by the Khraish family. Rather than hoping that another landlord will offer to finance and…
Dallas Police Department command partially evacuated Jack Evans Police Headquarters, 1400 South Lamar St., on Monday morning after someone left a bottle containing a clear liquid with a note attached at the building’s north entrance. The discovery prompted deployment of the DPD bomb squad and a Dallas Fire-Rescue hazardous materials team. …
It’s not fun, but it is interesting at times to watch the Washington press corps struggle with public education issues. I have empathy. If anything bollixes up our bookkeeping in the news business about who’s a black hat and who’s a white hat, it’s that damned education issue. Last week,…
