Klyde Warren Park news as of late tends to ruffle feathers. At the end of last year, the downtown Dallas park announced a forthcoming multimillion dollar water fountain, drawing mixed reactions and hefty criticism. The latest dispatch from the downtown park: Dallas chain Mi Cocina will serve its Tex-Mex and Mambo Taxis to park goers and nearby urbanites this fall.

Known henceforth as Mi Cocina on the Park, it replaces the glass-walled Savor, which closed in August after seven years at Klyde Warren. Mi Cocina’s newest outpost has a target opening date of September 1.

As with philanthropist Nancy Best’s fountain announcement, Mi Cocina at Klyde Warren has its share of skeptics already. Some folks online have called the team-up disappointing and predicable. Park boosters liken it to an addition to Central Park; others say it’s more like an Olive Garden in New York City’s Times Square. Klyde Warren Park president Kit Sawers isn’t deterred. “One of the things that, frankly, is most exciting to me, especially being from Dallas, is that people care about this place so much. When people care about a place, they’re going to express their opinions,” she told SideDish. 

There were several contenders, including over a dozen local operators, that Klyde Warren’s powers-at-be had considered. Sawers says there were myriad reasons they eventually went with M Crowd restaurant group’s Mi Cocina.

“It’s an iconic Dallas brand and so is Klyde Warren Park. So that was a good fit. We liked the fact that Mi Cocina was so family focused across all generations, and frankly, across all different socio-economic brackets; people go to the Mi Cocina throughout the community. We also liked the fact that it was a bigger company who could expand when we had events in the park and be able to serve cocktails or little snacks in addition to what our food trucks have during our larger events. Also, probably the biggest reason is we did a lot of surveys of parkgoers and via our newsletter and with our friends groups, and Mi Cocina was the one restaurant that was mentioned over and over again by name as being a perfect fit…because of the price point and for all different reasons. So we feel like a lot of ways we’re just providing with the community requested.”

Art and artists have always been part of the Dallas landscape, and the Dallas Public Library photograph collections have examples of how cultural offerings helped shape the city. The following photographs are some of the images of the arts I have encountered in the Dallas Public Library’s Dallas History and Archives Collection and are available through the library’s online catalog.

The late Dmitri Vail shows his paintings and photographs in 1952. Expatriate German artist George Grosz visited Dallas to create a series called “Impressions of Dallas” on behalf of Leon Harris, Jr., vice president of the A. Harris and Company department store. Sculptor Horace Foxall and his works are depicted as part of the Marion Butts collection, as well. The Dallas Public Library’s historic connection to Dallas art is represented by photographs such as the Art Room of the original 1901 Carnegie Library, the contents of which later helped form the Dallas Museum of Art.

Classroom art instruction, art competitions, and influential artists like Everett Spruce and Ruth Uhler are among these historic photographs. Prominent public sculptures occupy other photographs. Take a look in the gallery below.

COVID Update. Because of the MLK Jr. holiday, we don’t have new case numbers for Dallas County. So let’s share some positive news, shall we? According to data from the state, 83,577 people in Dallas County have gotten at least one dose of the vaccine, and 14,789 people are fully immunized. (Though it should be noted that an early look at who is getting the vaccine shows that more folks from North Dallas and University Park are getting the shots, and some folks aren’t happy that the Fair Park vaccine site was closed yesterday.)

David Kunkle Has Neurological Disorder. This story published Sunday, but it deserves your attention if you haven’t yet read it. Robert Wilonsky came out of retirement to write about Kunkle, the former Dallas police chief, and his wife, Sarah Dodd. The couple bravely shared their struggles with Kunkle’s diagnosis of Lewy body dementia.

Mavericks Drop Third Straight. Last season, the Mavs were the only team that didn’t lose three games in a row at some point. Last night, they did it, falling to the Raptors 116-93. Also, Rick Carlisle got ejected, and Tim Hardaway Jr. went 0-12 from the field. Tough one, buddy.

Wylie Man Arrested for Breaking in to Capitol. The FBI has accused Guy Reffitt of obstruction of justice and unlawful entry. When he started to feel the heat, he told his family, “If you turn me in, you’re a traitor and you know what happens to traitors. Traitors get shot.”

Halfway through the vote on President Trump’s second impeachment, 10 months into a pandemic that’s left the lucky among us healthy but locked in our homes, weeks after the loneliest holidays of our lives — something normal happened.

I went to a park and watched grown men play catch and become little boys again.

It all started with a post on Oak Lawn’s Nextdoor site, the digital neighborhood hangout where people relentlessly discuss dog doo, feral cats, loud music, and man’s general inhumanity to man. But over the weekend, I noticed a new post that almost made me gasp. It was so simple and sentimental, but powerful in the way it affected those who read it. It felt like a message from our old lives, a weak radio signal from the way the world used to be.

Alice Miller, of Turtle Creek, had written, “My 74-year-old husband would like to have a partner to throw the ball with. He is a former high school and college pitcher and is looking for someone who knows how to throw a baseball. He is in good shape and loves baseball.”

Within minutes, there were replies:

“Count me in!”

“Played for 12 years as a catcher. Would be happy to throw the ball around again.”

“My husband played ball, too, growing up and would love to join in.”

“Wow! Love to see this come together.”

“I can throw.”

“I’m loving it. I’ll join.”

More School Days Could Be Coming to Dallas ISD. Yesterday, trustees were briefed about a plan for an “intersessional” calendar, which basically means year-round school. I wrote about this idea back in July, which some trustees were floating as an idea to curb learning loss among students. The district is considering starting school a week earlier and ending four weeks later at 11 feeder patterns. One idea is offering the new schedule to about half of the students while the other option is offering another 23 days of school to all of a school’s enrollment. The News’ Corbett Smith says just 10 campuses will be considered. The board can vote on the schedule before they select the schools that participate.

The Vaccine Distribution Looks More and More Like a Free-For-All. In Collin County, 86,000 people are signed up to receive the COVID-19 vaccine. But the county’s health department has only received 2,000 doses. Another 2,000 are coming next week. Meanwhile, 22 mayors of large American cities signed a letter asking President-elect Biden to send vaccine doses directly to big cities. (Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson’s name does appear on that list, alongside the mayors of Houston, San Antonio, and Austin.) It appears that most providers and health departments are following the state’s guidelines until the vaccines are at risk of spoiling, then, as Will Maddox has reported this week, they look for arms to stick. Meanwhile, 39 percent of the doses sent to states have actually been used, per Bloomberg News. Some providers are giving family members of healthcare workers the vaccine regardless of whether they fit the state’s criteria. It’s only fitting that the end of the virus response is as messy and disorganized as every other bit of it.

Local Insurrectionist Goes Free Despite Prosecutors’ Plea. Larry Rendell Brock Jr. is the Grapevine man who was photographed on the Senate floor of the U.S. Capitol wearing a helmet and holding zip tie restraints. He was a former U.S. Air Force combat pilot who, according to an FBI agent who testified in his arraignment, had once been fired from a job for making “racist and threatening comments.” Prosecutors wanted him held in jail, but a federal judge declined, saying that the charges weren’t enough to prove he was a threat to the public. Here is the ridiculous kicker: “It is not yet clear if Brock was required to post bond before being released.”

Sunny, Chilly Long Weekend Ahead. Expect highs in the low 60s, high 50s, and lows in the mid-30s this weekend. There is no rain or snow in the forecast, only the nice sunshine that cuts through the chilly temperatures. Enjoy it.

Mayor Eric Johnson is once again clashing with Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins, this time over the communication surrounding the COVID-19 vaccination distribution at the Fair Park mega center. Johnson made his allegations in a letter he sent Wednesday night to Jenkins, the city manager, and members of the City Council. Media got ahold of it Thursday afternoon. The mayor said that Jenkins was allowing some individuals to get walk-up vaccinations without registering ahead of time, which disenfranchised others in South Dallas, all while not communicating the change to the city.

Johnson’s letter alleged “a resident … told us they were able to simply walk up and get the vaccine without needing to register.” This, Johnson wrote, was not part of the original process. Upon further inquiry, Johnson heard that Jenkins had requested a select group of residents to keep the arrangement hush-hush. The mayor credited this allegation to “someone who I trust a great deal.” He closed his letter by threatening to “reevaluate our contract” with the county as the city’s public health authority if communication didn’t improve.

Johnson said he would be open to a change in the registration protocol, but he found it “incredibly disappointing” that Jenkins would talk out of two sides of his mouth: telling the general public to register and schedule an appointment while telling others in the know that they didn’t need to do so, all without communicating any of this to the city. “It’s unacceptable that we were not notified about such a major decision,” he wrote.

But Jenkins tells a different version, calling Johnson’s letter “inaccurate.” Jenkins says the outreach was not to those who knew the right people, but rather to seniors in ZIP codes that lack adequate healthcare services and vaccine access. Jenkins says a council member shared the Fair Park registration link with the general public, resulting in Monday-Wednesday’s appointments being filled by a “group [that] was overwhelmingly white, under 75, and from the city’s most affluent ZIP codes.” The unauthorized appointments were not honored on Tuesday and Wednesday, and vaccines went unused.

Jenkins says the county then attempted to “balance the demographic makeup” of those receiving vaccines by reaching out directly to churches, health centers, senior centers and others that work with Black and Hispanic residents. Jenkins says this was to help remedy the imbalance of appointments.

Jenkins blames the confusion on the mayor. “Your and other’s decision earlier today to broadcast that vaccines are available to anyone over 75 without an appointment has undermined that effort and made it less likely the vaccine will get to the people at the highest risk in the hardest hit, most underserved ZIP codes this week,” his response says.

Jenkins seemed to take issue with Johnson’s communication style, closing with, “I trust in the future you will route any questions through the Dallas City Manager’s Office, the city’s (Office of Emergency Management) leads for this response, our [sic] call directly.”