Plastic Bag Ban? What Plastic Bag Ban?

Born-again environmentalist D-Wayne Carriedaway, that District 4 Dallas city councilman who desperately wants to become mayor and hopes to achieve his goal through sheer bombast, came up with this idea that has become very popular among green cities: banning the use of plastic shopping bags.

Dallas wants you to believe it’s a "green city" and, in a moment of kindness, I’m willing to admit the city is lima bean green, at best. I also firmly believe a majority of Dallas citizens, when it is made clear to them all the harmful environmental effects as well as the detrimental financial effects resulting from the use of plastic bags, would support an all-out ban of plastic bags by a significant majority. Bans like those in already in effect in Austin; Los Angeles; San Francisco; Wasington, D.C.; Portland, Ore., and others. However, those who donate big bucks to the election coffers of those running for the Dallas City Council oppose an all-out ban by an even more significant majority. So, of course, Carriedaway’s Crusade had as much a chance of success as his hopes for higher office.

What he wound up settling for was an ordinance that allows store customers to continue to take their goods home in plastic bags, but they must pay 25 cents for each bag they use. (I still haven’t heard how this is going to be enforced at the self-checkout lanes, but that’s another story.) I guess Carriedaway figured (1) merchants would get weary of maintaining a separate product category for plastic bags, complete with their own scannable bar codes and/or (2) customers would quickly tire of shelling out 25 cents for a plastic bag and start using reusable shopping bags. Either one of those options would mean the end of plastic bags as we know them in Dallas. I don’t think either of those possible outcomes is realistic. Why?

Last night, in CFO Jeanne Chipperfield’s slide presentation during council member Adam Medrano’s budget town hall meeting, Ms. Chipperfield displayed a slide titled "Clean, Healthy Environment." The second bullet on that slide was: "Initiate enforcement of City’s new single-use bag ordinance." During the Q&A session following her presentation, one audience member asked Ms. Chipperfield what that bullet meant. Ms. Chipperfield replied "So (that’s the word she uses to begin the answer to every question directed her way) then went on to explain, from the city’s point of view, the purpose of the audience without ever once saying the "b" word, which led me to believe that word has been (pardon me for this) banned for use by city officials. She told the audience that the city nets 5 cents for every bag sold, money she suggested, would be used to pay for enforcing the ordinance. So, great news, folks, this ordinance pays for itself.

But the fact that the ordinance pays for itself was not what I was thinking when Ms. Chipperfield forecast the city would collect some $2 million in the 10 months of the fiscal year during which the ordinance will be law. What I was thinking was that amounts to 40 million new plastic bags introduced to the Dallas environment, 40 million additional plastic bags that will clog our water systems, strangle endangered wildlife and bringing a quicker demise to our landfill.

And Dallas has the gall to want to call itself a "green city."

The Charter Barter

As I watched select members of the Charter Review Commission brief the Dallas City Council today, I gave silent thanks that no members of this council were around back when the U.S. Constitution was drafted. If they were, we’d be living in the States of America, because there would be nothing United in their efforts.

These small minds have no right determining what should be changed in the Dallas City Charter. The CRC’s recommendations should go right to the voters, bypassing the idiots on the council completely.

Here, in summation, was the basic argument each of the council members had to each of the commission’s recommendations: "That’s not in my best interest." The discussion was all about the wants of these self-centered egotists and had nothing to do with the best interests of the city at large. To his credit, Mayor Mike Rawlings recognized this and tried in vain a couple of times to change the subject from "me, me, me," but, ultimately, he realized his efforts were fruitless.

This was especially true when it came to the subject of redistricting — a process that is shameful because it is so politicized. But instead of considering changes that would de-politicize it ever so slightly, all the council members were interested in was protecting their turf, as if they were still going be representing that turf 30, 20, even 10 years from now. The pinnacle of this ridiculousness came when District 5 council member Rick Callahan, an anglo who represents a district that was created to elect an Hispanic, attempted to display how fair everything would be under the current system by announcing "I would appoint a Hispanic to represent District 5 on the redistricting committee." As if he’s even going to be around when the next redistricting committee is named. "You are term-limited, you jerk,"

Then there was District 3 representative Vonciel Jones Hill who argued against higher council pay because she was an attorney and no one was going to force her to give up her law practice just because she was on the City Council. That means, she argued, being on the City Council is not a full-time job. Again, all about "me."

I attended and even spoke to one meeting of the Charter Review Commission and watched most of the other sessions on television. I guess you could say I’m a city government wonk. From that vantage point, I can testify that the recommendations of the CRC mirrored the will of those Dallas residents who spoke to the commission. It’s therefore amazing to me that the appointed CRC is far more attuned to the will of the people than is the elected Dallas City Council.

I have lived in Dallas for 46 years now, all of them as a voting-age adult. I was a major supporter of the 14-1 City Council system because I saw the injustices that resulted when the city was ruled exclusively by white males who lived in North Dallas. The argument against 14-1 was that the result would be 14 individual mini-mayors who would only protect their own self-interests and would not be cognizant of the needs of the city as a whole. I thought those fears were exaggerated, but, sadly, they have come the reality. I will still argue, however, that it is not the system that’s to blame; it’s the small, closed minds we elect to the council in the name of that system.

The Hispanic Situation

 

I find myself agreeing with Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings more often than not, but he is totally clueless about what happened in the most recent Dallas City Council elections. Before the election, three Hispanics served on the council. Then that august body got together, like it’s required to do every 10 years, and redrew its district boundary lines with the aim of electing four Hispanics to the council. When the dust cleared and the new council was inaugurated Monday, it contained two Hispanic members.

Rawlings said in his speech at the ceremony (it was technically not an "inaugural address" because he was not up for re-election) that the problem is that the city charter needs to be "tweaked" to improve the way the council redraws the district boundaries. He said the current method is too messy and too "political."

"We must minimize politics and maximize effectiveness to achieve racial representation with geographical tightness to keep our neighborhoods’ integrity high," he said.

Hate to tell you this, Mayor Mike, but eggs will be taken out of omelettes before politics is taken out of redistricting. It is, by definition, a political process.

Look, Mayor Mike, why do you think Republicans in the House of Representatives aren’t afraid to oppose immigration reform? Why, when all the pundits say Republicans will never get the Hispanic vote unless they change their ways, do despots like Republican Ted Cruz, the shameful representative of our own border state, continue to fight immigration reform every chance he gets?

Because Cruz and the other ideologues like him have realized something Mayor Mike still hasn’t come to grips with: Hispanics don’t vote.

Now I’ve heard all kinds of reasons for this, some which even have a shred of legitimacy, but the fact remains that, by and large, the Hispanic population doesn’t go to the polls on election day as other groups do.

So instead of wasting time trying to find ways to "tweak" the city council, the mayor should put together a task force, headed by state Rep. Rafael Anchia, to discover and then implement ways to get the Hispanic population to the polls. And because this should be expanded to a statewide effort, I would nominate San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro to join Anchia at the head of this task force.

And this effort should begin immediately.

Want more representation on the council? Then vote!

I’m sorry, but I have absolutely no sympathy with Hispanic activists demanding another seat on the Dallas City Council when the Hispanic community doesn’t participate in the electoral process. For whatever reason, Hispanics don’t vote proportionately to their population. Some say much of the Hispanic population in the city is too young, below the voting age. That could be true. Others say much of the population is illegal and can’t vote. That could be true also. I would also argue that recent Republican efforts to depress voting by minorities — namely the requirement to show photo identification — will accomplish exactly what these racists want.

But representation should be based on voting strength. In its latest redistricting effort, the City Council created one district with a 75 percent Hispanic population. The activists claim a Hispanic can’t win in this district and they are probably right. But that’s not the fault of those drawing the map. I can’t see the Justice Department agreeing with the argument that a district that is 75 percent Hispanic is a non-Hispanic district.

Instead of wearing ridiculous T-shirts and protesting at City Hall, former city councilman and head activist Domingo Garcia should be initiating voter education programs and registration drives among his constituency. Initiate grassroots get-out-the-vote campaigns. Recruit talented Hispanic leaders such as Domingo’s wife and Delia Jasso, place them before this now-educated and voter-savvy constituency and keep getting them elected.

The recently redistricted city council map contains four districts with a majority Hispanic population: District 1 with 74.19%; District 2 with 56.1%; District 5 with 65.57%; and District 6 with 64.55%. African-Americans have only three districts in which they are a population majority and one of them is by the slimmest of margins: District 4 with 59.36%; District 7 with 50.76%; and District 8 with 60.57%. Yet, according to all the "experts," African-Americans are guaranteed four seats on the City Council. Why? Because African-Americans know they will send enough voters to the polls to win a seat (District 3) in which they comprise 45.19% of the population. Yet Hispanics claim they can’t win District 1. That’s their fault, not the demographers’.

But now the Hispanic activists are yelling for five council seats, something even Garcia, who was on the redistricting committee, couldn’t figure out how to accomplish and remain with the voting population guidelines for each district. The Hispanic population is too geographically dispersed to create a fifth district and have that district pass Justice Department muster. In four other districts in which they are not a majority — districts 3, 4, 7, and 9 — Hispanics comprise at least a third of the population and I’m betting those numbers will increase.

The seats are out there for the taking. But the way democracy works is quite simple: the one with the most votes wins.

And the redistricting winner is … Donna Halstead

Donna Halstead

You can now visit the City of Dallas’s Web site and take a gander at the various ideas for redistricting the city’s 14 council districts, including one from former Dallas Observer writer Sam Merten. Of all of them, I like commissioner member and former council member Donna Halstead’s the best. She has solved one of the worst representation problems in the city, of which I am familiar because it’s the area where I live — what I call the “Forgotten Triangle,” that area of Dallas north of LBJ Freeway and east of North Central Expressway. Right now it is situated in District 11, but it has far more in common with Lake Highlands (District 10) than it does with North Dallas. And Halstead, being a Lake Highlands resident, obviously knows this.

My son auditioned for and was accepted in the Arts Magnet High School, but if he had gone to the high school whose district covered where we lived it would have been Lake Highlands High School. He did attend Forest Meadow Junior High, located in District 10.

A couple of years ago, a Walt-Mart opened between Forest Lane and LBJ Freeway, just west of Abrams, less than a mile from my town home, but not in the same council district as I. Former District 10 council member Bill Blaydes did a superb job of notifying all his constituents about the progress on that site (it included closing and demolishing a couple of whore/crack houses). But even though it impacted my area far more than the overwhelming majority of the residents in District 10, we never received any notice of what was going on. We were offered no chance to give input into the project. Not that I was opposed to the construction of the Wal-Mart, far from it, but its location in the northern most reaches of District 10 had a direct affect on us.

Donna Halstead’s redistricting map is the only one I saw that corrects this glaring mistake of keeping us in District 11. As Bob Dylan so eloquently put it, “One should never be where one does not belong” and those of us north of LBJ and East of North Central are currently where we don’t belong.

Incidentally, this area of Dallas does not have anything located within its boundaries, featuring the seal of the City of Dallas — not a rec center, not even a park, not a library — nada. As I said earlier, we’re pretty much forgotten, at least when we’re in District 11.

The future’s so dark I gotta wear headlights

Politics around here gets more depressing by the day. On the national level, Barach Obama has been an abysmal failure as President. I actually had hopes for him when he got elected, but the man just didn’t get it. His predecessor single-handedly ruined our economy and I had all the hope in the world he would turn it around. He hasn’t. And his failure to turn it around is the single reason all those idiot Tea Party right wingnuts got elected all around the country. Health care reform is a requirement in a civilized society but on the priority scale it falls below jobs. Here’s an idea: Why not send a bunch of folks who are spending their days trying to figure out that to do at the Commerce Department over to the U.S. Patent Office. Go over all the recent patent filings that have been approved for those that might turn into a startup businesses. Then shop matching grant proposals to cities for the rights to locate these companies in their burgs. And what have you got? New jobs. Which translates into new dollars spurring the economy.

Of course, no city in Texas would be eligible for these matching grants. That’s because under the iron fist of Gov. Hair, Texas is systematically dismantling and ultimately destroying the state’s public school system so that there will never be enough people in the state with enough education to compete for the types of jobs these grants will create. Hair’s on his way to doing to the state’s economy what his predecessor did to the country’s. When they are not doing that, the state’s lawmakers are calculatingly disenfranchising the elderly and minorities and anyone else who tend to vote for real leaders instead of partisan political hacks. And these dirty old men spend an inordinate amount of time intefering in the privacy of pregnant women and make it impossible for injured consumers to ever seek justice from the businesses that victimize them.

On the local level, we have two completely out-of-touch candidates running for mayor, one who won’t give a straight answer on building a toll road out where it floods and another who doesn’t understand flow control or how to grow a local economy. And one of these clowns is going to be sitting at the head of the Dallas City Council for the next four years. Thank heavens for the council-manager form of government.

It all reminds me of an Animals song and, no, I’m not referring to The House of the Rising Sun.

The issues in the mayoral runoff

Jeff Siegel at the Advocate is wondering whether “ethics reform,” something mayoral candidate David Kunkle has decided to make a big deal in his runoff with Mike Rawlins, really resonates with voters. The answer is “of course not.”

It’s really quite simple. The only issues voters care about are those that directly affect their everyday lives. On the national level, it’s the economy, which translated means “Why is it I can’t get a job or at least one that pays me what I’m worth?”

On the local level there are a number of issues:

• “Why can’t the city keep the streets I drive on everyday in decent shape?”
• “Am I going to need to put steel bars on the windows of my home so I can feel safe when I go to sleep at night?”
• “What? They’re going to put low-cost housing only a block away from where I live? Next thing you’ll be telling me is that they plan to build a Wall-Mart a block in the other direction. Whaaaat???”
• “Are my kids going to have a safe place to play between the time school lets out and I get home from work?”
• “When is that ugly pile of debris on the corner going to be finally hauled away? It’s been the neighborhood eyesore for months now.”
• “Look, I don’t give a crap about tollroads, wave pools and convention center hotels. All I want is a halfway decent supermarket in my neighborhood. Perhaps a Starbucks even. And, while you’re at it, a movie theater would be nice.”
• “Is anybody ever going to do anything about that abandoned boarded up house with all the junk cars in the front yard and weeds growing all over the place where all the gang members loudly gather late at night to smoke crack?”
• “Highrise? Highrise? They’re going to build a highrise? What do they think Dallas is? A city?”
• “I don’t care if another Borders does close. At least we still have our public libraries. What’s that you say?”

No, ethics reform and the budget deficit gap are not big issues with municipal voters. And the reason we have such a poor turnout for our municipal elections is because we don’t have candidates with the guts to address those issues that are important.