Trust: Mayor's Race Inspires Charter Change

I published my Voters Guide yesterday covering the City Council election. I've also been publishing accounts of the ongoing work of the Charter Review Commission. The two topics have kept themselves separate. Today, they collide.

The Wheel's Voter's Guide (May, 2025)

Source: ImgFlip.

Early voting for the 2025 local elections in Texas starts Tuesday, April 22, 2025. Election Day is Saturday, May 3, 2025. On the ballot will be two contested places on the City of Richardson City Council and two contested districts of the Richardson ISD Board of Trustees. Find more election information at the League of Women Voters of Richardson. Find your personalized ballot and the candidates' answers to the LWV-Richardson questionnaire at Vote411.org.

Here's the executive summary of The Wheel's recommendations:

For City of Richardson Mayor, I recommend Amir Omar.
For City of Richardson Place 6, I recommend Lisa Marie Kupfer.
City of Richardson Places 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 are uncontested.

For RISD District 2, I recommend Vanessa Pacheco.
For RISD District 5, I recommend Rachel McGowan.
RISD District 4 is uncontested.
The other RISD Districts and Places are not up for election this year. To vote in either of these districts that are on the ballot, you must live within the district.

Read on for the reasons I make these recommendations.

LWV Forum for Richardson City Council

On April 16, 2025, the League of Women Voters of Richardson hosted a forum of Richardson mayoral candidates at the Eisemann Center, moderated by Lanet Greenhaw. Mayoral candidates Mayor Bob Dubey and former Councilmember Amir Omar participated. Alan C. North was unable to participate because of a scheduling conflict. Mayor Pro-tem Arefin Shamsul and Lisa Marie Kupfer, candidates for Place 6, also participated. About 150 persons were in the audience. The forum was live-streamed by the City and video on demand is available on the LWV website.

I was pleased with the forum, with the questions asked by the LWV and members of the public, by the earnestness shown by the candidates, by the decorum on stage and in the audience. I recap the highlights here, excerpts that I feel best show the distinctions between the candidates. I will be stripping out a lot of words, maybe at the risk of losing important context, but that's what the video is for. If a snippet of an answer here makes you want to hear more, then watch the video on the LWV website.

Einen Veritablen Shitstorm, Exhumed

Today I exhume a post buried deep in the archives. Why? Because someone is trying to rewrite this disgraceful history from Scott Dunn's time on the Richardson City Council. Why? To invent a false narrative that paints Amir Omar as the bad guy in this episode. Who is doing that? I won't name them here. I will say it's not Scott Dunn. I hope I won't have to name names. I hope that they will see that bringing this back up hurts their own candidate, Bob Dubey. The truth actually helps Amir Omar. What's the disgraceful episode this person wants to relitigate?

The Dubey Way: Breaking the Street Grid

Head shot from City of Richardson. CGI by Adobe Firefly.

February 10, 2025: Despite a City plan to redevelop downtown Richardson in a way that not only preserves the compact street grid, but extends it, Mayor Bob Dubey voted to approve a 580-foot-long apartment building in the heart of downtown that will create a superblock that cuts the downtown street grid, disconnecting business development on Polk Street from that on Kaufman Street.

The Richardson Way: Plan the Work, Work the Plan.

The Dubey Way: Plan the Work, Wreck the Plan.

The Dubey Way: More Drive-Thrus

Head shot from City of Richardson. CGI by Adobe Firefly.

December 9, 2024: Despite a new City plan to do a reinvestment study for the area around Plano Rd and Belt Line Rd, Mayor Bob Dubey voted to approve a drive-thru only coffee shop there. Luckily for the Richardson residents who have repeatedly said that area has more drive-thru restaurants than they need, especially chicken restaurants, the rest of the Council said no. They denied the request 5-2, with only one other Councilmember joining Mayor Dubey in thinking another drive-thru is a good idea there.

The Richardson Way: Plan the Work, Work the Plan.

The Dubey Way: Plan the Work, Wreck the Plan.

The Dubey Way: Salvage Car Lot

Head shot from City of Richardson. CGI by Adobe Firefly.

October 14, 2024: Despite a City plan to redevelop the area it has rebranded as Richardson IQ and claims is "Texas' premier tech hub" (not just North Texas, mind you, but Texas as a whole) and "our living laboratory for big ideas and groundbreaking technology," Mayor Bob Dubey's own big idea is to put a salvage car dealership there. Salvage cars are cars that have been totalled and repaired. With Dubey's approval, that's what will be the first thing companies see when they come to Richardson to explore whether the IQ is a good place to relocate their business.

The Richardson Way: Plan the Work, Work the Plan.

The Dubey Way: Plan the Work, Wreck the Plan.

The Dubey Way: More Car Repair Shops

Head shot from City of Richardson. CGI by Adobe Firefly.

September 23, 2024: Despite a City plan to redevelop the Interurban District as an "edgy, mixed-use district", Mayor Bob Dubey voted to give a special permit to a car repair shop, a body shop, and a vehicle storage lot in the heart of the district. The Council vote was split 4-3. The Mayor's vote was decisive.

The Richardson Way: Plan the Work, Work the Plan.

The Dubey Way: Plan the Work, Wreck the Plan.

The Dubey Way: More Signs. Taller Signs

Head shot from City of Richardson. CGI by Adobe Firefly.

August 8, 2024: Despite a City sign control ordinance limiting pole signs to a height of 20 feet, which is the most common limit in neighboring cities as well, Mayor Bob Dubey voted to grant a variance to a car dealer to erect his own 40 foot sign. Of course, other businesses soon followed.

The Richardson Way: Plan the Work, Work the Plan.

The Dubey Way: Plan the Work, Wreck the Plan.

POTD: World's Tallest Wooden Buildings

"Steel still rules the sky,
But the smell of pine reaches
Up where clouds drift by."
— h/t ChatGPT

From 2024 07 07 Lillehammer

Who says wooden buildings can't be more than four or five stories tall? Today's photo-of-the-day was taken in Brumunddal, Norway. It shows Mjøstårnet, "an 18-storey mixed-use building completed in March 2019. At the time of completion, it was officially the world's tallest wooden building, at 85.4 m (280 ft) tall, before being surpassed by Ascent MKE in August 2022." Who knew there was even a competition?