On a ridge overlooking the scrub and pinon country of northern New Mexico, Clifford Sinclair crafted a monument to his own felonious ingenuity. From a federal prison cell, the confessed swindler directed construction of a house in an exclusive subdivision outside Santa Fe. It would be the home Sinclair retired…
Louise Elam sat on the floor next to a copy machine last Thursday morning, trying her best to fish a jammed piece of paper out of a document feeder with a pair of scissors. Elam, her terra cotta-colored pantsuit rumpled after only two hours at work, jabbed at the copier…
Tuned out The abrupt announcement that veteran evening talk-show voice Karen Denard will depart in January has left KERA-90.1 FM mulling over a replacement. Some at KERA view Denard’s departure as a splendid opportunity to try to lure Bob Ray Sanders back to public broadcasting. Sanders, KERA’s brightest local light…
Federal auditors are urging the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to terminate longstanding contracts with a Dallas company that operates some of the area’s worst apartment complexes. The company, Pioneer Management, Inc., based in Oak Cliff, ran the Prince Hall Chambre Apartments in South Dallas until November 1…
With the program over, the image of a couple enjoying their pots and pans flashes on the TV screen. This is All-Clad cookware, the voice-over informs us, “the great conductor, available at Dillard’s.” Welcome to public television–Dallas style. For decades, public television has billed itself as “listener-supported” and “commercial-free.” But…
Death to Dallas Life The Dallas Morning News has put a long-suffering stepchild out of its misery. On Monday, November 14, a one-page memo was posted in the paper’s newsroom, announcing the demise of Dallas Life Magazine. The Christmas Day issue will be its last. In the memo, News executive…
Adventures in waste I read with interest your article “The Trashing of Ferris, Texas” [November 10] and noted several similarities between Ferris’ experiences with Waste Management and that of the City of Garland. During 1993, while I was a member of the city council, Waste Management attempted to reopen negotiations…
Huntville, Texas Well, big-city politics has once again reared its ugly head, and I note it is once again at our expense. I refer, of course, to the new sports arena. The articles written by Laura Miller [“Arena Wars,” October 13 and October 20] have been both informative and infuriating…
Sheesh. Sest lah vye, Mabel. I’ll say one thing for the results of Tuesday’s plebiscite: it is sure as hell going to be interesting for the next couple of years. What an utterly fabulous cast of characters. Strom Thurmond, 92, chairman of Armed Services. Jesse Helms, chair of Foreign Relations…
Throughout the fall, the Krasniqis diligently abided by the court order. Krasniqi rented an apartment and attended a sexual offender’s group treatment program run by Chester Grounds, a staff psychologist with DHS. Grounds said in court that Krasniqi originally admitted in group that he had sexually abused his children, including…
Most of the houses in this quiet, middle-class Richardson neighborhood look alike –wide, one-story, brick homes with small, manicured front lawns. The home of Sam and Kathy Krasniqi has one distinguishing feature: rain or shine, several pairs of men’s and women’s shoes can be found lined up on the porch…
Stephan the Red In the last few months, Dallas-bred fantasy novelist Stephan Grundy has been the subject of plenty of ink, from a cover story in Dallas Observer (July 21) to reviews in Publisher’s Weekly and the fantasy magazine Locus of his first novel, the Norse epic Rhinegold–a number-one bestseller…
Bad memory chip? The East Dallas reader of The Dallas Morning News thought what she was reading seemed familiar–suspiciously familiar. Veteran News editorial-page columnist Ann Melvin was weighing in on the debate over whether books on computer will someday make the paper-and-ink version obsolete. Absolutely not, Melvin opined, in a…
Rabbi David Shawel is not an imposing figure. Standing only five feet and four inches, he talks fast and rarely stands or sits in one place for long. But lately it is Shawel who has had powerful grocery chains hopping. Shawel is The Man–that’s The Macher in Yiddish–in Dallas when…
The FBI is investigating allegations of public corruption in Ferris involving Waste Management and its consultant, former Ferris mayor Billy Don Dunn. In a nine-page affidavit filed in federal court to establish probable cause to obtain a search warrant for Dunn’s home, Dallas FBI agent James Kendall states that he’s…
By 1989, Earline Jackson recalls, the convoys were rumbling down old highway 75, trailing behind them that awful smell. They’d line up at the gate to Skyline Landfill–dozens of trucks from God knows where–dumping ton after ton of trash in the tiny burg of Ferris. Residents of the little town…
The San Francisco publishers of STEAM magazine are in an uproar over a waggish letter from Fort Worth police Chief Thomas Windham. The national gay and bisexual-oriented publication, which reaches about 45,000 readers each month, prints a directory of the best places around the country for public sex. A copy…
Clueless Your recent two-part series on the construction of Reunion Arena [“Arena wars,” October 13 and October 20] confirms my worst fears about the city of Dallas. Our city managers who presided over this fiasco were either too behind to see the obvious or crooked. They should be sued for…
Delvin Gray watches as two stray mutts–one black, one gray–circle a trash can in a small South Dallas park beside a pond. Gray’s six-month-old son, Julius, sleeps soundly in his lap. It is dusk now, and so quiet in the park, so peaceful, you can almost hear the baby’s breath…
Knowing when to fold ’em Texas first husband Ray Hutchison, spouse of U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, must be counting his blessings these days. Last year, the former legislator and hotshot bond attorney uncharacteristically rolled over when a group of bondholders sued him and his Dallas firm, along with former…
The last time Richard Sledge Harvey ran for office, his defeat was sealed when opponent Ted Lyon pointed out Harvey’s unfortunate tendency to land his private airplane with the landing gear up. After licking his wounds for six years, Harvey is back, making another pass at the District 2 seat…
BOSTON–Oh boy, now this is starting to be fun. Senator Ted Kennedy and his opponent, Mitt Romney, duked it out here Tuesday night while the Senate candidates in New Jersey were getting blood all over the floor down there. In New York, they’re still reeling from Republican Mayor Rudolph Giuliani’s…
