You can't Hunt in here, this is Natinsky land

A big fuss was raised a couple of weeks ago when Dallas City Council member Ron Natinsky challenged colleague Angela Hunt over a zoning issue in her district. Ms. Hunt informed Mr. Natinsky that interference in someone else's territory was just not how it's done in these parts. And, it seemed to the consternation of many third party observers, she was right. Regardless of how council members may feel personally about a particular zoning issue, they will vote according to the wishes of the council member who represents the involved district. In fact, as I recall, the Dallas Morning News raised somewhat of an editorial stink about this practice.

That practice, if it every really existed, was not followed today at City Hall during a public hearing and subsequent vote on whether a new hospital should be located across Greenville Avenue from Presbyterian Hospital. Councilman Mitchell Rasansky, who represents the district in question, opposed the new facility because, as I understood his often convoluted arguments, it would create a mass traffic jam that might cause the death of someone with a heart attack trying to get to the emergency room. (This is the same councilman who opposed the city's current blue recycling carts because he just knew some little old lady would fall into one and never be heard from again until she was recycled, which may have just been her intention all along.) However, the majority of the council went against his wishes and approved the new hospital saying that the issue could not be decided on traffic but on land-use issues and on those, the hospital passed muster.

I'm thinking Presbyterian simply didn't want a competing, for-profit hospital, right across the street, but I could be mistaken.

I'm wondering if this is going to set a new precedent.