Quality density is answer
Re: “North Dallas high-rise good for everyone — New state law ensures NIMBYs can’t stop development, and it will benefit them, too,” by Dallas Cothrum, Sunday Opinion.
I rarely side with developers, but Cothrum’s column on Preston Royal and the subsequent editorial on the city’s looming funding shortfall hit the mark. The bevy of letters lamenting our imperiled Dallas City Hall highlights the need to preserve our city’s unique assets while adapting to change.
Like many U.S. cities, Texas’ historic urban centers face a difficult road ahead. Decades of investments in sprawl have strained municipal tax bases, coinciding with an aging urban population.
Consider that Dallas, once the state’s second-largest city, has been overtaken by San Antonio and could soon be passed by Austin and Fort Worth. By including Lake Ray Hubbard, Dallas claims more total square miles than Fort Worth, but fewer square miles of dry land. Senate Bill 840 offers a glimmer of hope by enabling the denser development we need.
Opinion
For three-quarters of a century, we’ve tried to reduce traffic by reducing density, a strategy that fails because it forces everyone to drive. The answer isn’t no density, but quality density. By building walkable, mixed-use communities welcoming residents of all ages and incomes, we can avoid Detroit’s fate and create a sustainable future for Dallas.
Ken Duble, Dallas/The Cedars
North Dallas neighbors dismissed
No, a North Dallas high-rise is not good for everyone just because he says so. Cothrum referred to North Dallas homeowners multiple times as NIMBYs, a slang term for people who object to something unpleasant in the area where they live.
Why couldn’t he just refer to them as homeowners? He actually tried to make them the bad guys for wanting to curb increasing traffic and to want some peace in their neighborhoods.
Homeowners all over the metroplex are sick of overly excited developers who come in and build mixed-use properties that create traffic havoc in already traffic-saturated areas.
We happened to be in the Preston Royal area Sunday, and traffic was atrocious. These people endured a tornado and now they have to deal with developers who want to insert hundreds of apartments and additional retail businesses. And they are being called names when they complain about it at a community meeting.
A direct quote from his opinion is “I’ve stopped listening to people when they cry about traffic.” Are developers going to be driving in the traffic woes they create? Doubtful!
Robert and Tina James, Melissa
Keep calling out bigotry
Re: “GOP Must Reject Bigotry, Antisemitism — Cruz has stepped up to lead and should insist conservatives purge poison from ranks,” Saturday editorial.
It is with pre-Thanksgiving gratitude that I applaud The Dallas Morning News editorial staff for calling out the bigotry and antisemitism exhibited by a high-profile wing of the party, and for calling upon others in the party to also call out this display of hate.
I even have to give credit to Sen. Ted Cruz for doing the same, even if he did so in front of a receptive audience (the Republican Jewish Committee).
Generally speaking, I oppose the Republican Party’s platform and its policies, but I long for the day when I can simply disagree with the GOP instead of despising what many GOP members stand for, and what far too many others within the party tolerate.
Lori Block, Argyle
You mean both parties
Since the vast majority of antisemitism on college campuses in recent years has come from the left (Democrats), shouldn’t your headline be, “GOP and Democrats Must Reject Bigotry, Antisemitism”?
Les Gregory, Frisco
It’s costly to stifle learning
Re: “Don’t Austin my College Station — GOP megadonors use politicians in battle for control of Texas A&M,” by Glenn Rogers, Sunday Opinion.
The Texas A&M Board of Regents will meet on Thursday to add to bureaucratic bloat and to raise the costs of higher education in Texas. Why? Halloween is over, but apparently the university remains haunted by the ghosts of DEI.
The regents propose to require that any course touching on issues of race and gender face administrative pre-clearance. This is micromanagement at its worst. It will only add costly bureaucratic burdens. Entirely non-controversial subjects — such as the mere existence of racial slavery before the Civil War or of the women’s suffrage movement that led to the 19th amendment — will suddenly require approval by administrators.
University tuition is already highly inflated, in part because of the enormous growth in administrative personnel over recent decades. Why would the regents want to increase inefficiency? The costs to the budget and to faculty productivity will easily dwarf any benefits, negligible at best.
If that weren’t enough, it is also a violation of the principle of academic freedom— the idea that university faculty engaged in the production of knowledge should not be overseen by Soviet-style political commissars.
Ariel Ron, East Dallas
Rejecting 287(g) is admirable
I have to come out to praise our leaders and community on the 287(g) ICE issue recently. This was one of the biggest attempts so far from our higher government to try to impose a measure meant to fracture the resolve of this community.
My City Council member Chad West, along with Jaime Resendez, Adam Bazaldua and Paula Blackmon, were first to come out swiftly and together to support Police Chief Daniel Comeaux in rejecting this program. The reasonable and clear comments from the community overwhelmed the opposition.
Fascist politics is meant to target individuals based on fear and greed and confusion, so I applaud anyone who can stand resolute, because it is not easy to do so.
Programs like these stem from demonizing minority groups with fewer rights and resources. To empower these groups, we must help them fight politically and economically through labor unions and groups like Workers Defense Project and Young Active Labor Leaders.
Again the courage of our City Council members and community to protect the least of us will help us through the toughest times.
David Lowery, Dallas/Oak Cliff