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Tim Rogers, Editor, D Magazine

Ah, yes. The ol’ year-end sampler platter of favorite stories, a clever way to offer content on the blog during the holiday downtime. Sounds easy, right? Wrong! This is a highly politicized operation. One must select one’s favorite stories with the primary consideration being an equal distribution of favoritism across coworkers’ work and that of favored freelancers. So fraught! But what if one thumbed one’s nose at courtesy and rather than give shine to Richard Patterson’s deeply personal story about Dallas’ finest furniture store; or Zac Crain’s epic historical investigation into the racism that displaced 300 Fair Park families; or James Dolan’s melancholic tale of growing up with a father who was a hitman; or Eve Hill-Agnus’ review of Meridian, which she’d later name the restaurant of the year; or Peter Simek’s profile of Mayor Eric Johnson, which, several months later, seems to have led the mayor toward a self-reflection that has made him a better leader; or Mary Glenn’s bizarre, almost unbelievable account of how a squatter took over her house for nearly a year — what if one ignored all that and one instead selected only one’s own stories? Radical!

Did you know Dallas is now home to the country’s fourth-largest working bell? It’s true. I was the only journalist to cover its arrival. Similarly, I was the only person brave enough to write about the weekend on which I was loaned a $250,000 McLaren. In another example of my eagerness to write about myself, I profiled 97.1 The Eagle’s Ben Rogers and Skin Wade and inserted myself into the story as an untrustworthy omniscient narrator. I exposed Mavrello Ballovic and adopted the voice of lesbian chickens living in Plano before focusing my reportorial skills on a Highland Park woman who refused to obey the town’s new topiary ordinance. Then I wrote the most touching lost-dog story this city has seen in a generation.

See you in 2022. If you dare. (For FrontBurner readers, there is more after the jump.)

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays. This right here will be the very last Leading Off of 2021. D Magazine is logging off for the holiday and will be back on January 3. Until then, look for a semi-steady stream of look-ahead journalism like this, stories looking back on 2021, editor’s picks, and plenty more. Mask up, get boosted, stay safe, and enjoy the time with family. We thank you for coming with us in 2021—it was another record-setting year for D Magazine Dot Com. And when you come back for the new year, hopefully all of our new website kinks will be fixed. Christmas miracles happen.

Last night, I watched The Matrix Resurrections in the comfort of my living room. My 16-year-old daughter joined me for the screening. About 10 minutes into the movie, she said something to the effect of “What is happening?” She hadn’t seen the first three movies, which I suppose is an indictment of me as a father. But let’s save that topic for another time. The point is: my girl was confused. So I paused the movie and tried to explain the backstory to her, which I quickly realized was going to be a fruitless exercise. She abandoned the flick at some point during the first gun battle.

If you haven’t been following the Jovan Philyaw saga, for the purposes of this post you are basically my 16-year-old daughter. If I tell you that he invented the CueCat and helped launch Susan Powter’s career and changed his name to J. Hutton Pulitzer and got involved with the Cacheology Society of America and the National Treasure Society and a Roman sword found in Canada and then did something with the Cyber Ninjas in the kooky Arizona vote audit and got mocked by Rachel Maddow, you are just going to get confused and walk away. Which is actually fine. Because this post probably doesn’t deserve any more of your attention than does The Matrix Resurrections. They are both space fillers. Quality space fillers. But space fillers nonetheless.

That said, earlier this month something called the “ReAwaken America” tour came through Dallas (er, Frisco). The three-day event was held at Elevate Life Church. The DMN wrote that the gig “mixes conservative politics, controversial anti-vaccine discussions and conspiracy theories with Christian worship, hymnals and fellowship with like-minded Republican supporters … .” Michael Flynn and Roger Stone and Eric Trump were all there. And so was Philyaw-cum-Pulitzer.

Which brings us to the unsurprising news, via Vice, that a bunch of the attendees have fallen ill, which they believe is the result of having been poisoned with anthrax. The Vice story cites a podcaster who was in attendance and reports that “Pulitzer has not been heard from in several days and he reported more severe complications including ‘body lesions and weeping skin,’” which sounds gross.

To Pulitzer, I offer my thoughts and prayers. To the rest of you: The Matrix Resurrections gets a C+. It’s worth watching. But, like, to make a comparison that is an inside joke for seven people on this Christmas Adam (because it comes before Eve), Lady in the Water is a better film.

Building on last year’s Executive Holiday series, we continue in 2021 wish more memories, wish lists, and New Year’s resolutions from North Texas C-Suiters. Be sure to check out yesterday’s post featuring Brad Alberts, Ossa Fisher, Erin Nealy Cox, and more—and be watching tomorrow for our final post in this year’s edition.

Giraffes Died of Unrelated Causes. The Dallas Zoo says the deaths of 19-year-old Auggie and Jesse, 14, who died within a week of each other in October and both showed signs of liver damage, were not connected. After conducting lab tests and consulting with outside experts, the zoo says Auggie died of liver failure, and Jesse had colitis.

Luka Doncic Added to Mavericks’ COVID-19 Protocol List. He’s the sixth Mavs player who will be held out as part of the NBA’s health and safety protocols. Many NBA teams are in similar situations and signing replacement players. Doncic can’t return for 10 days or until he twice tests negative for COVID-19.

Two Guys Impersonating Officers in Farmers Branch, Police Say. The men pulled somebody over, identified themselves as police officers, asked for ID and insurance, and then let the driver go, according to police in Farmers Branch. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

Record High Temperatures Expected for Christmas Weekend. Douse the open fire, toss the chestnuts, and pack away the ugly sweater.

After the success of last year’s Executive Holiday series, D CEO editors decided to check in with more DFW leaders for what is becoming one of our team’s favorite holiday traditions—a look into how our business community celebrates the holidays. C-Suiters share their most memorable moments from 2021, what holiday traditions they’re carrying on, and what resolutions they’re setting for 2022.

Editor’s Note: Over the next few weeks, D will publish a series of stories looking forward to policy, programs, and projects we’ll be watching in 2022. First up is parking reform. Find the other stories here over the holiday.

For two years, the city of Dallas has been researching what would happen if it stopped requiring businesses to provide so much parking — a seemingly radical idea in this car-centric town.

Before we examine how this move might change Dallas, here’s what it won’t do: it won’t make parking disappear. It won’t flood single-family neighborhoods with empty cars overnight. It also won’t immediately solve the problem of garages sitting empty. And where buildings have been torn down already and replaced with parking lots, the concrete and asphalt will remain.

The city calls those buildings “disappeared,” by the way. Back in May, the Zoning Ordinance Advisory Committee—known as ZOAC, an important volunteer body that researches the impact of changing the city’s development code—received a routine briefing from city staff that featured a satellite image of Lower Greenville. About a dozen plots were highlighted in yellow. The image included the caption “disappeared buildings that are currently parking lots.”

It is a tangible example of what parking minimums do to a city. When a city’s development code requires every project—big or small, office or residential, retail or church or bar or bowling alley—to provide a certain amount of space for a certain amount of cars, it changes the landscape. In a denser neighborhood like Lower Greenville, a developer working on one building has had to acquire its neighbor to tear it down in order to fulfill the city’s parking requirements. (And various building uses require various amounts of parking, so the the parking can wind up limiting the pool of tenants. One developer I spoke to for this story said he had to tell a to-go food operation that it could not place two tables with chairs inside because it would require more parking.)

“What is now surface parking lots used to have old structures on them,” says Jon Hetzel, the president of the Deep Ellum Foundation and a partner with Madison Partners, which owns and leases buildings in popular neighborhoods like Deep Ellum, Lower Greenville, and Oak Lawn. “Those are old structures that our company and others bought and tore down because of code parking requirements. Because we had to.”

The current deep dive into the city’s parking code began in 2019, when a husband and wife couple found a dream building they wanted to redevelop, only to have their dreams crushed by parking requirements. The building, which was a little over 5,000 square feet, was on Beckley Avenue in North Oak Cliff, not far from Bishop Arts.

As detailed by the Dallas Morning News, Timm Matthews and his wife wanted to turn the building into a boutique hotel and a restaurant. To get the city’s OK, the couple was asked to produce more than 8,000 square feet of parking—which, if a single parking space is about 350 square feet, meant 24 spots. The city requires a parking space for every hotel room and for ever 100 square feet of a restaurant. According to the News report, the project fell about 16 spaces short. Matthews told the plan commission that it would cost between $2 million and $3 million to meet the city’s standard.

Mayor Pro Tem Chad West, the councilman who represents the district, and his then plan commissioner, Enrique MacGregor, soon triggered a review of the city’s parking minimums. One major problem stuck out: the city still relied upon a parking formula that was introduced in 1965, codified into a development code known as 51A.

On a recent Zoom chat, some local architects talked about how silly this is. They had a guest online, Dr. Donald Shoup, the urban planning professor at UCLA widely thought to be the first to study and quantify the effect of parking requirements in cities. He started his chat with the Dallas branch of the American Institute of Architects by pillorying the city’s more ridiculous parking requirements.

Clubs are required to provide one parking space for every 25 square feet of dance floor. A bingo parlor must have a parking space for every 50 square feet. A sewage pumping station requires a parking space for every million gallons of sewage the station can pump; it does not clarify whose job it is to track such a thing.

“Of parking codes, I have to say the ones in Dallas are the most bizarre I have ever seen,” Shoup said. “Most of them date from 1967, and it seems as though no one has ever looked at them since.”

COVID Surge Is ‘Inevitable’. Parkland’s chief medical officer believes a North Texas surge in omicron cases and hospitalizations “is inevitable” and expects cases to begin to ramp up in a week or so. That will likely lead to a delay of care to non-COVID patients. Dallas County reported 63 COVID-19 deaths and 3,784 new cases. The two week average case load is up, and Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins urged residents to get the booster if they can.

Carroll ISD Torpedoes Diversity Plan. The school board voted to settle a lawsuit that alleged that the school district violated the open meetings act as it created its Cultural Competence Action Plan. The plan was drafted over three years after viral videos surfaced showing students shouting racial slurs.

Two Challengers File to Unseat Embattled District Judge. Earlier this year, District Judge Amber Givens was accused of having two members of her staff pretend to be her during online court proceedings. Now the judge will face two challengers in the Democratic primary.

Thousands Flock to South Oak Cliff Celebration. The champions paraded down Marsalis Avenue after winning their first state title in school history and the first DISD state football championship in 63 years. “This is a workday,” State Senator Royce West told the DMN. “And yet, thousands of people have come out to offer their support. That speaks to the level of support, both in athletics and academics, this community has for its schools.”

It didn’t take long for the omicron variant to become the dominant version of the disease in the United States. Just weeks after arriving, 73 percent of all new cases sequenced are now omicron. It will soon be the dominant strand in North Texas. But as hospitals prepare for yet another wave of COVID patients, there may be a silver lining to the highly contagious variant.

According to the World Health Organization, cases are doubling every 1.5 to 3 days. The delta variant doubled cases every seven days. But it isn’t all bad news when it comes to omicron. Bloomberg News reported that only 1.7 percent of identified Covid-19 cases resulted in hospitalization during this fourth wave, compared to 19 percent of cases during the delta wave. This week, Harris County reported the first death related to the omicron variant in a man who had been previously infected. According to a statement from the Harris County Health Department, he was unvaccinated and had underlying health conditions.

In North Texas, hospitalizations are staying steady, with about 800 patients across all of Trauma Service Area E, which includes 19 counties in the region. Dallas County has chosen to keep its advisory level at “orange,” which recommends residents use “extreme caution” when venturing out of their homes. Dr. Philip Huang, Dallas County’s health director, told county commissioners on Tuesday that omicron’s rapid spread is “very scary.” About 56 percent of residents in Dallas County have received both shots of the vaccine.

But DFW Hospital Council President and CEO Steve Love says hospitals are preparing for another surge, especially if the region follows the patterns set in the U.K. and South Africa. However, we can do things to help alleviate the pressure on providers.

“We anticipate that a lot more people are going to want testing,” Love says. “Many may come to emergency rooms, but if they’re only coming in just to be tested, it’s probably better to go to a community testing site.” Emergency rooms are trying to treat people to keep them out of the hospital, and testing will delay that treatment, which could keep the hospitals from being inundated.

Until Saturday morning, I hadn’t watched a second of South Oak Cliff football. I can identify only a handful of their players—mostly Corinthian Coleman, who has an A+ name—and I couldn’t tell you what their uniforms look like on days when they aren’t dressed in the “icy white” they wore Saturday. Head coach? Newly acquainted. Big-time recruits? BRB, checking 247Sports.

I am mostly a blank slate when it comes to the Golden Bears—learned the mascot over the weekend, too—which owes itself to nothing whatsoever other than we live in a city blessed with far too much sports for one person to consume, even for me, whom this magazine pays to be a sports degenerate.

Here’s what I do know: South Oak Cliff is the sports story of the year in Dallas, and they would have claim to that distinction even had they not won DISD’s first recognized state championship since 1958 and first UIL state championship since 1950.

I latched onto SOC’s story for the same reason tens of thousands filled the Death Star Saturday and thousands more watched at home on television. SOC is the archetypal underdog story turned up to 11, a team that withstood and transcended conditions they never should have had to endure. It is a safe bet that the majority of teams that won state championships this year have their own practice field. At the very least, their students attend classes in buildings that don’t perpetually spring leaks. SOC spent two years without a practice field, forced to bus students to other fields around town to squeeze sessions in, and they still don’t have a watertight building six years after the student body staged a walkout following too many days of classes with buckets and trash cans set up to catch dripping water.

D Magazine Redesigns Website. You might notice some changes around here. The rollout has not been without a few hiccups. Bear with us.

Omicron Is Here. North Texas hospitals are gearing up to do battle with the wily variant, and the Dallas Theater Center has canceled performances of A Christmas Carol at the Wyly Theatre. Get vaxxed and boosted, people!

Wayne Slater, R.I.P. The retired longtime Dallas Morning News bureau chief and political writer died in a car crash in Williamson County. He was 74.

Carpetbaggers Moving to North Texas. Dallas-Fort Worth was the top destination in 2021 for people relocating from other parts of the country, according to Allied Van Lines and Zillow. Most of the folks moving here come from Chicago, Los Angeles, and Phoenix.

QAnon Cult Generates National Headlines. You know those folks who came to town for JFK Jr.’s resurrection? They are still here, and now they are drinking chemicals you shouldn’t drink. The Daily Beast has picked up the story.