This is a weekly feature produced by my friend Ginger. Let us know what you think.
This week, in news from Dallas-Fort Worth: an attack on an ICE facility near Fort Worth; what’s being done about flooding and emergencies in the Metroplex; the DMN gets bought by Hearst and editorializes against our absent mayor; the latest in Tarrant County news, including the election of a new Democratic chair; the big mad locals are having about DART system cuts; the sanctions against a Dallas judge; museum updates; and at last, a zoo born.
This week’s post was brought to you by the music of Wet Leg, who have a new album out and will be touring this fall. Sadly we’re going to miss their show because it’s the night between MARINA and Garbage and grown-ups can’t do three shows on school nights in a week.
Jumping straight into the news:
- You’ve heard about this story even if you don’t know you’ve heard about this story: over July 4, there was a “planned attack” on an ICE facility outside of Fort Worth that resulted in an injury to a single officer. If you got a “blue alert” about a police shooting in Alvarado this week, this is the incident. KERA has a good explainer with the most detail I’ve read so far. The Star-Telegram has a backgrounder on this facility that you’ve probably never heard of. It was opened in 2017 to house 707 detainees; it had a dedicated space for trans detainees that no longer seems to exist; it’s closer to the Metroplex than other ICE facilities holding folks; it’s now overcrowded and unsanitary but still better than other facilities.
- Following the Kerr County floods, the Dallas Observer tells us about Dallas flooding in 1908 and 1995 and the history of flood control in Dallas. And from the Fort Worth Report, a similar story about Fort Worth, featuring an Arlington flood in 2018 and previous floods in Tarrant County in 1922 and 1949.
- Not specifically related to the Kerr County flooding but good to know: Texas A&M is opening a $24.5 million emergency management hub in east Fort Worth.
- In big news in news, the Dallas Morning News has sold itself to Hearst. Pick your poison: the DMN itself, which calls it a merger, KERA, which notes that this sale ends 140 years of local ownership, D Magazine, which talks about how Hearst has changed things at other Texas papers (they already own the Statesman, the Chronicle, and the News-Express), or the Dallas Observer, which focuses on the staff reaction.
- Speaking of the DMN, they’re not hiding how they feel about Eric Johnson in this editorial: Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson seems like the mayor of Somewhere Else. Subhead: “His July 4 post shows he’s auditioning, not governing.” He shows up on Xitter more often than he does here in Dallas. Some background for this editorial is at D Magazine.
- Tarrant County is adopting new software to keep its voter rolls clean and get ahead of the True the Vote registration challengers. They’re paying $46K for a year’s access to skip-tracing software to find out about folks who have moved within or out of Tarrant County.
- To the surprise of exactly nobody, Tarrant County GOP Chair Bo French is hanging in there after Dan Patrick and other officials called for him to quit or be replaced. Between the upcoming special session and the floods, worrying about his bigotry is so last week.
- Tarrant County Democrats, on the other hand, have a new chair, or rather an old one: Allison Campolo, the former chair, won an election to take the job after her successor retired. The Star-Telegram also has more about Campolo’s goals. I wish her and the Tarrant County Dems all the luck in the world, and much success.
- After the recent brouhaha about the historical marker for the Rainbow Lounge, Tarrant County has added five new members to the board of the Tarrant County Historical Commission to fill vacancies. The new members include four Republicans and one Democrat, and when they say that they mean precinct chairs and former paid party staff. Future historical commission meetings ought to be interesting.
- We have our first West Nile cases of the year: one in Brazos County and the other in Tarrant County. Officials urge folks to take mosquito precautions.
- Dallas Area Rapid Transit had their final public meeting about their proposed service changes (cuts) earlier this week, and despite terrible weather conditions, they had enough speakers to keep the meeting going until midnight even though they skipped all the wheelchair-using speakers on grounds of space and accessibility. Over the course of the public meetings on this issue, DART collected more than 700 comment cards. The only people who like these changes are Plano city council.
- We now have a trial date for Karmelo Anthony, accused of stabbing another teen to death at a UIL track meet in Frisco earlier this year: June 1, 2026. More details at KERA and the the DMN.
- State Sen. Phil King (R-Weatherford), the mind behind the Ten Commandments bill this session, is predicting victory in the separation of church and state lawsuits filed against the bill. I hope he’s wrong but we’ve seen the courts rule unconstitutionally all too often in the past.
- We have another update about the EPIC City controversy: the East Plano Islamic Center is suing the Texas Funeral Service Commission over their cease-and-desist letter requiring the mosque to stop performing funerals. If you’re not familiar with Islamic funeral rites, they require quick burial of the deceased, preferably within 24 hours. Working with other funeral homes obviously slows that process down. One measure of religious freedom in Texas is comparing the expected outcomes of the lawsuits against the Ten Commandments law and this case. The Dallas Observer has also updated their timeline of the EPIC City controversy, by which they mean the state’s attacks on the plan.
- You may already be familiar with Dallas County Judge Amber Givens’ name. She’s in the news this week with sanctions from the State Commission on Judicial Conduct. She received a reprimand, the most serious sanction, for letting a court coordinator impersonate her four years ago, and an admonishment for putting a man in jail and revoking another offender’s bond after she had recused herself from those cases, per KERA. I’m going to be surprised if someone doesn’t primary Givens.
- Texas Monthly has an explainer on the feud between Fairview residents and the Latter-Day Saints who want to put up a temple in their town.
- A few items of museum news: Mark Lamster in the DMN with an update on the Dallas Museum of Art’s renovation plans (they’re adding the firm that designed the High Line in New York to the team); the African American Museum of Dallas is teaching freedom school classes in Black history, also discussed at KERA; and the Perot Museum of Nature and Science has a new exhibit about bugs. Spouse and I have already seen the Perot exhibit during early member hours, and give it a strong recommendation.
- D Magazine reports that not only was the Miss Texas winner a North Texas contestant (Miss Richardson), but all of the top five contestants were from North Texas.
- And last, but not least, we have zoo-borns at the Fort Worth Zoo: critically endangered gharial crocodiles, for the third year in a row. They have photos on Instagram.