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Soldiers Charged With Violent Crimes Will Now Face More Scrutiny Before They Can Simply Leave the Army - by Vianna Davila and Lexi Churchill, ProPublica and The Texas Tribune, and Davis Winkie, Military Times ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investig...7 hours ago
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Richardson Mayor Lobbys for Higher Taxes - [image: shakedownsm] Promising retribution against elected officials in higher offices, City of Richardson Mayor, Paul Voelker and other local special int...6 years ago
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$437M bond package headed to Richardson ISD voters in May - Richardson ISD voters will decide on a single $437 million bond proposal in May. The bond package includes $215.7 million in maintenance funds for items in...8 years ago
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Richardson Rental Inspections - What's new on the Richardson Rental Registration/Inspection Program?Landlords Fight Back! - Last month, an association of landlords sued the city of Omaha along with a couple of city code inspectors in federal court.Landlords file federal complain...10 years ago
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Residential Rental Registration Revisions - Residential Rental Registration and Inspection Revisions were passed in a consent agenda vote, no discussion or comments. I don’t know if the new ordinan...10 years ago
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Dallas high crime areas that feed RISD - We have our own problems, but we import a significant amount from Dallas. Car thefts that are nav-tracked south down US75, robbery and burglary suspects w...12 years ago
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What was the point? - Why did we waste our time going to all those forums? Why did the candidate's waste their time walking all of those neighborhoods? Why did anyone waste any...14 years ago
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Popular Posts
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This year’s council elections may be something to yawn at. Only 2 contested races. But it seems the real events will begin after the offi... -
Time for a break from vacation….. Sometimes it is hard to stay on vacation especially when a conspiracy theorist is so ripe for the picki... -
From Mayor Laura Maczka to Mark Jordan, November 21, 2013: “FYI … And FTR, good thing I had such a fun afternoon yesterday. Because la... -
Last night, at the city council work session, reporter Brett Shipp confronted Laura Maczka with emails between her and Mark Jordan that da... -
Today I was emailed a billing record produced by the City of Richardson in response to a request for public information. The... -
Brinks Document Destruction Team at City Hall During the past month, people have been upset about the mayor and what she... -
Third time’s a charm (talking about rumors there). So far, three people, who would be in the know, have told me there are some w... -
Wendy Hundley has written several good article lately, and put up another one last night. Here is it http://www.dallasnews.com/news/commu...
The department of redundancy department. The diverse inclusion of reach out initiative.
ReplyDeleteIt's one thing to talk about attempting to connect or superfluous gestures providing the illusion of desire to understand cultural nuances that resonate with other ethnicities. To live it is another matter.
It is much more genuine when one speaks from a lifetime of experience, and less so when as an item on the political campaign bucket list.
It's easy to see who has what it takes in this department. And, it ain't the cheerleader in red.
Amir did better on this topic at the JJPearce forum. He gave a specific example of increasing diversity on one of the city's commissions.
ReplyDeleteI can't wait for DC to post the tea party forum video. That's a lot more amusing! ;)
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0XmuhMkXTCo
I find that the people who talk about diversity as some kind of noble goal or idyllic thing are people who don't live around or know the first thing about actual diversity. See what happens when you ask most white people to put their children in school with "diversity". All of a sudden diversity isn't quite the same noble goal.
ReplyDeleteagreed, 11:06. Before the law suit that prohibited "adult only" apartments, the West Spring Valley area was vibrant. But, ever since those apartments started loading up with school kids from extended families, the city has allowed it to decay. Now it's ironic to hear those who shoulder the responsibility for that urban blight to be talking about embracing ethnic diversity. The racial mix of families in Canyon/Prairie Creek vs. the East side is a tale of two cities. Funny, how the "not in my back yard" attitude glares you in the face when you dig a little deeper.
ReplyDelete"have got to..." and "going to have to..." are phrases constantly repeated by Laura. Granted, Amir has only been on the Council one term longer, but he sure spearheaded several key initiatives those first two years. It seems, after her first two years, Laura is still in the campaign mode feeling out the polling data and regurgitating the issues back with no actual plan of action. That could be a good thing. Maybe there's not enough time to actually accomplish any of them.
ReplyDeleteYea, and if the work session vote on the issue of direct election of Mayor is any indication, there may never be enough time to do the things we "have got to" do.
ReplyDeleteWhat should be evident is in January of 2012 when the work session was held, Laura had already been promised she would be anointed as Richardson's next mayor in the 2013 election.
ReplyDeleteSo the only reason for her to be concerned at that work session was the action item to decide if a mayoral election in May 2013 should be held. She handled that personal challenge quite effectively with her motion to kill discussion about a mayoral election in May 2013. Her argument was "there was not enough time to "do it properly" in time for the May election date. As most know now, her motion was endorsed by the five of her colleagues that also didn't think citizens had enough intelligence to decide who should be mayor.
Then came the mayoral petition and the 3 to 1 vote that effectively took away her mayoral coronaton behind closed doors. (have to mention it's humerous to hear Mr. McCalpin's verbal contortions claiming that isn't what has been happening since Richardson first had a charter to go by)
So she had to run. And get citizen's votes.
All of a sudden, her lip service about initiating change, and what needed to be done about improvements and problems over the last two years became apparent. Can anyone identify one single issue of those things Ms. Maczka initiateded during her two year term?
And that folks, is the problem. A Maczka win will perpetuate the closed door, secretive attitude of management, the good ole boy (and girl) go along with what ever is proposed, because management is right every time because they are "Professionals, they know what they are doing." as Mr. Dunn often says. (They do a good job for the city, as they are hired to do. However, they also do a great job for themselves) What Mr. Dunn and his less than illuminating colleagues like Mr. Solomon, Mr. (hard to think of his name when he never says anything - now I've got it), Mr. Hartley, and "360" degree Mitchell evidently forget, is their group isn't a committee, isn't a board - it is a COUNCIL whose sole purpose is to make policy for the city that benefits the citizens and the City, and make sure what staff proposes (like their raises and benefits) isn't just automatically approved.
If Ms. Maczka is elected, get out the smokeless tobacco and the dip cup, 'cause we're in for some more "good old boy (and girl)" governance.
Those who moved to Richardson in the late 60's and early 70's recalled how wonderfully the apartments on Spring Valley touted by the City because it offered "a first step before home ownership for young couples".
ReplyDeleteNow, the City says those same apartments are a blight. They and City management maintain that what we need now - (and as Laura says, with "lower income" people moving in) is even more apartments - 20 story apartments - to make Richardson a "great place to work and play".
Have these people never seen the results of the huge multistory multifamily developments built for "lower income" people thirty or forty years ago in Detroit and Chicago?
Richardson's success and growth were forged by it's early technical corporations - Collins and TI to name two - and the need to provide housing for employees of those corporations, and a great school system for their children.
They wanted to live in houses. So now our housing stock is aging. What is the gang of 6 propose to solve that? Build even denser apartment complexes with lots of on premises retail. Fine. Look at the East Side and the debacle at east Spring Valley. The expensive consultant contract to decide how Richardson's "downtown" can be best handled. Plano and McKinney had downtown structures to renovate. Richardson has no "historic" downtown. You can't renovate what isn't there.
We need to be thankful for those companies who have decided to locat here, even though bribed mightily to do so. We need to figure a way for the City toparticipate in renovating our aging housing to encourage those employees who work for these new companies move here. The idea that all new employees want to live in twenty story apartments and own no car because everything they need is a horrible sham, period.
Richardson's appeal has always been special - close to every where, great schools, and limited by its land locked position. What Richardson needs is renaissance of forty years ago, not a misguided effort to strain the already burdened and strained school system to become this densly populated, walkable ommunity that is not only a fiction perpetuated by profit motivated developers, but which will in the long run make Richardson a small version of those crime ridden densly populated high rises in Detroit and Chicago.
I agree. The City should spend the money given to developers through tax abatements and incentives for these consultant recommended "High Ddensity" apartment/retail projects differently. The Council should provide the same incentives and tax abatemets for homeowners in Richardson and those home investors in Richardson housing so that Richardson can once again become the headquarters city and bedroom it was before and should and can be again. Management will squeal and squirm, but they need to learn that a bond issue every two years is no longer sustainable, nor is it desirable. We ned to learn to live on our income. The City and our deluded elected "leaders" need to draw in the grandiose infinitively expensive high density developer proposed ideas and return to what made us what we are, and what we can be again.
ReplyDelete