When this is over, it will just be beginning. The global pandemic already is shaking the foundations of class, capitalism and nationhood all over the world. Some people see it. Some don’t. Here in Dallas, our mayor is an unfortunate example of don’t. According to the most recent population estimates…
The long haul is getting longer. Friday morning, Dallas County Commissioners voted to extend the county’s Public Health Emergency until May 20. That means all residents of the county will continue to shelter in place for at least the next six weeks, barring intervention from Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins…
Like the rest of the country, Texas, the second-largest state both in population and land area, is in the midst of a public health crisis. In the state’s largest counties, the number of confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus is rising drastically each day. Gov. Greg Abbott has shut down…
Three and a half years after stepping down as chief of the Dallas Police Department, David Brown has been named to lead Chicago’s police force. Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced Brown’s selection Thursday afternoon. “We are Chicago and we deserve the best,” Lightfoot said. “In this time, in this moment,…
There’s one really attractive exception to Dallas’ stay-at-home order. Sure, it lets you get out and shop for essentials and go get takeout, but that stuff’s banal. The big thing, the “Get Out of Jail Free” card, is the county and city orders’ exception for those seeking outdoor exercise, either…
As thousands and thousands of Texans continue to lose their jobs as the state and the rest of the world suffer through the COVID-19 pandemic, the Texas Workforce Commission has been overwhelmed. The commission’s phone lines have been overwhelmed, and its website huffs, puffs and stalls during high-traffic hours. The…
A bit of happy news amid the coronavirus darkness: Texas Rangers outfielder Shin-Soo Choo is extending a big helping hand to every player in the Rangers’ minor league system. According to multiple reports, Choo is giving all 190 Rangers minor leaguers $1,000 to help them navigate the coming weeks and…
Dallas ISD students who don’t have internet access at home may have to wait a few weeks to receive mobile Wi-Fi hot spots. At a meeting last week, the district’s board of trustees voted unanimously to spend up to $2.5 million to buy 12,000 mobile hot spots to send home…
As a former conservative talk radio host and current elected official, Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick surely must know the prime directive for American politicians: Do NOT screw with the olds. They vote. Maybe he forgot. He is, after all, getting on in years. He turns 70 on Saturday. In…
By now we are all sort of aware of the story of President Donald Trump and General Motors and the ventilator shortage. I haven’t quite kept up with the inner detail. There was a request for GM to manufacture ventilators and then a voluntary consent and then some kind of…
As layoffs and cut hours because of the coronavirus hit Texas, food banks are scrambling to meet the needs of people who can no longer afford food.
These are such strange times. They should be awful, and they are. We know it hasn’t hit yet, not the way it will. I don’t know about you, but I feel fear. But then I also feel something else — an inkling, but I’m not at all sure inkling of…
Barring something truly unforeseen, you, dear renter and reader, are still obligated to fatten your landlord’s pocket sometime in the next couple of days. For all the stimuli that have been pushed out and all the hollering from the left about your plight, there’s little relief on offer for those…
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s coronavirus abortion ban is back in place thanks to an emergency stay from the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The stay, according to the court, was issued so that it can give full consideration to an emergency appeal from the Texas attorney general. The ban…
Until Monday night, Wednesday was going to mark a sea change in Dallas civic life. For the first time, Dallas workers were going to be guaranteed paid sick time — one hour for every 30 hours they worked. It’s couldn’t have come at a better time, either. Then the courts…
Advice from DFW plumbers during the COVID-19 crisis: stop flushing weird stuff down the toilet. Because of our bizarre, virus-fueled run on toilet paper, many area residents are being forced to resort to alternative options. Kleenex. Wet wipes. Paper towels. Napkins. No reports yet of leaves or corn cobs, but…
Despite Gov. Greg Abbott and Attorney General Ken Paxton’s best efforts to make hay while the coronavirus spreads, abortion remains as legal in Texas as it was before the virus hit, following a temporary restraining order issued by U.S. District Judge Lee Yeakel. A little more than a week ago,…
Dallas Area Rapid Transit is going to keep going amid the novel coronavirus pandemic, the agency announced Monday, but it plans to cut back service. Beginning Monday, April 6, each of the agency’s light-rail lines will run every 20 minutes on weekdays, a cut from typical service, and many buses…
State and federal officials are setting up a pop-up hospital at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center in downtown Dallas to help expand the number of hospital beds available as the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 continues to grow. During a news conference Sunday, Gov. Greg Abbott said the…
There’s a crisis within the coronavirus crisis hitting hospitals and medical facilities around the country. Personal protective equipment — the gloves, masks and gowns needed to protect front-line healthcare workers — is in short supply in many U.S. hospitals. Private companies and nonprofits are pitching in, trying to get the…
Nothing about this is new. Almost to the letter, the coronavirus crisis today repeats the entire history of pandemics, some aspects of which, like deciding who gets expelled and banished, never get easy. In the spring of 1348, when the rodent-borne Black Plague was decimating a third to half the…
Like many people, Rachael Wilkins has spent a lot of time lately reading the news and feeling like things are spinning out of control. The number of reported cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, ticks up each day, both nationwide and in North Texas. Schools are…
