New Entry Garden for a High-Visibility Garland Corner: When People Work Together, Big Things Happen

Vintage commemorative bricks outline the site for the new 11th-Street Entry Garden and Monarch Butterfly Waystation.

Garland's 11th Street runs in front of the new 200-square foot entry garden, to be filled with native plants, especially those that attract monarch butterflies.

A terrific partnership of neighbors, nonprofits, businesses, and our city government is about to turn a high-visibility but nondescript corner of Garland into a place of beauty and resourcefulness.

This example of how a neighborhood creatively works with multiple private and public partners is shaping up at the new 11th-Street Entry Garden and Monarch Butterfly Waystation at the entrance to South 11th Street from eastbound West Avenue D.

 

This small but significant project combines a high degree of talent and much symbolism in one 200-square-foot spot. It reflects the kind of Garland Kay and I have long known and hope to see continue into the future—one where citizens and others work together for the common good of all.

As one of our favorite sayings goes, "What we are together is more than what we were apart." Community espirit de corps is truly showcased here.

Not so long ago this corner property in the Travis College Hill Historic District was owned by a local church and was subject to "demolition-by-neglect", with the goal among some that the property ultimately would become a black-topped parking lot—and a scar on our neighborhood. Instead, neighbors, the deceased donor's family, and Garland's Code Enforcement office worked in concert to return this historic home to private ownership. A lovely young family owns the home and lives there now.

Like the house itself, the once Yard-of-the-Month landscaping is being beautifully revived by the new homeowners after years of calculated neglect.

And so it was that the entry-garden project began in the minds of neighbors not so long ago.

First, the new homeowners agreed to allow the 200-square-foot, circular entry garden to be installed on the southwest corner of their lot, under a vintage magnolia tree situated near the intersection of new sidewalks and retaining walls and to be filled with beautiful native plants and butterflies.

Next, Garland's city council agreed to provide at no cost a quantity of 100-year-old salvaged bricks from a building on the city's Square once owned by our neighborhood's Crossman family, who lived for many decades on 11th Street and cast a long shadow over much of early Garland. The commemorative bricks are now cleaned up and shining like new pennies; the name of Ferris Brick Co. in Ferris, TX, or its "Lone Star" subsidiary, can be seen on them. They tell a wonderful story not only of the Crossman legacy in the neighborhood but also of early construction days in Garland after the great fire of 1899 destroyed much of downtown and citizens turned to bricks and mortar instead of wood for better fireproof construction. The bricks are now set in place around the new garden.

Chiseling the decades off the 100-year-old commemorative bricks that now outline the 11th-Street entry garden

 A variety of Home Depot stores in the area provided the funds for metal edging to outline the new garden as well as sand and other necessities for setting the bricks and making bare land ready to blossom.

Neighbor Jim Bird offered expert guidance for installing the bricks on the sloping hillside that shows off the antique bricks.

Keep Garland Beautiful's Reba Collins provided a detailed plan for the garden, including not only a list of native plants to use but also a list of the special places at Fair Park and even Frisco, among others, to secure the best varieties. Planting will start in mid-October.

Reba's plan included exactly what is needed to have a Monarch Butterfly Waystation—to be officially registered with the national Monarch Watch Program as a certified monarch butterfly haven. Gracious Reba even sent us the proper paperwork to register the garden.

Reba Collins of Keep Garland Beautiful sketched out a master plan that will feature native plants and iris offered by homes in the neighborhood.

As planning commenced, a local builder stepped in with a donation of just exactly the right-sized landscaping boulders to add a special dimension to the garden.

Garland's esteemed and noted historian Mike Hayslip, who lived for many years across the street from Travis College Hill, arrived with the right color of heirloom irises to donate to the landscaping. The bed will feature irises offered from other neighbors' flower beds as well.

Friends of Garland's Historic Magic 11th Street, a local nonprofit with a heart for preserving and re-developing our special part of downtown Garland, is providing funds for some of the garden's native plants, including those purchased with special donations memorializing Hortense Weir Smith, who was born on the street and who died last spring at age 97 shortly after our annual Historic Home Tour in April. The Friends organization has also served as the conduit for other donations, including some listed above.

Hortense Weir Smith is being memorialized with landscaping donated in her memory. She was born on 11th Street and died last spring at age 97 after helping phenomenally with historic research.

Labor for the garden is being provided by a variety of neighbors and friends of the neighborhood.

The only remaining need is a vivid color interpretive sign telling the story of the garden and its native plants, the monarch butterfly, the donors including a tribute to Hortense Weir Smith's incredible memory of people and events on the street, the Crossmans and their role in Travis College Hill, and the history of the neighborhood itself.

Since the 24-by-36-inch sign is similar to one provided by the city for Garland's earlier Monarch Butterfly Waystation at Armstrong Park near I-635, we've asked the city's Office of Neighborhood Vitality, through a matching grant, to partner with us in securing the artistic sign.

A vivid color, interpretive sign similar to one the city installed in Armstrong Park is planned for the new 11th-Street Entry Garden. 

Even that sign will receive two other special donations: one is from Garland citizen and Plan Commissioner Chris Ott, who volunteered to make at his Rotary Performance shop on Buckingham the metal framework to hold up the sign, which then will be undergirded with more historic bricks. Chris is one of the directors of Friends of Garland's Historic Magic 11th Street. Also, award-winning photographer Jim Bird has agreed to capture the color photos of plants, butterflies, and people that will be featured on the sign.

It is truly amazing what Garland people and organizations working together can achieve.

May it ever be so in our city!

Garland Council prolongs Tinsley-Lyles House decision; finally puts up $20,000 to study cost to restore, rehab

The 1870s vintage Tinsley-Lyles House in its setting in the old Heritage Park, where apartments now stand.

Garland City Council again kicked the can down the road on what to do with the vintage Tinsley-Lyles House, affirming its commitment to spend $20,000 more for an architectural and structural study to assess the condition of the historic dwelling and ascertain possible uses.

In work session Monday night, council formally removed from next year’s budget a proposed $75,000 for any actual repairs to the house. Mayor Douglas Athas said the money could be added back in or increased, depending on what the study shows and what council determines later.

The $20,000 is in addition to the $316,028 that the city already has spent on the historic house since 2013, when demolition of the house was last proposed.

Becky King of the city manager’s office presented the history of the house, mostly from the time it was first donated to the city in 1979 by Garland entrepreneur Jay Jones to its current unrestored status today. She said numerous groups over the years have proposed restoring the house but without success. Among those was the Leadership Garland 2009 Class, which first thought the restoration could be done with volunteers for about $1,000 but backed out when the estimate at that time came in for $88,960 for exterior work only.

King said Preservation Garland has raised $2,000 and hopes to raise about $900 more before the end of the year—for a total of $2,900—for work on the house.

Restoration costs for a home the size, age, and condition of the Tinsley-Lyles House and owned by a governmental entity could easily top $250,000 to $300,000 or more—and that doesn't begin to count the cost of sustaining the house year after year.

Sign from an unknown era sadly illustrates city efforts since 1979 to preserve and save one of Garland's oldest structures.

Councilmember B.J. Williams mistakenly referred to the Friends of the Tinsley-Lyles House as though it were an existing organization. The embryonic group disbanded and went onto other involvements nearly two years ago after wearying of lack of answers to key questions the group had asked the mayor, a councilmember, and city staff.

Williams asked for nonprofits to return to the city to say in light of the new proposed report what they would do to carry out fundraising endeavors. However, as last week’s blog reported, the single-purpose (fundraising only for the Tinsley-Lyles House) Friends Group ceased to exist after the city stonewalled on answers to three key questions the new proposed $20,000 study ostensibly will answer:
 

1. What is the ultimate end use for the house?

2. What are the most accurate estimates for restoring/rehabilitating/repurposing the house?

3. What secret or private agreements has the city made with any other organizations or persons in regard to the future of the house?

The questions remained unanswered at the end of Monday night's session, with the possible exception of vague references to plans for Preservation Garland to manage and oversee the house.

As my blog series last week pointed out, the city missed its golden opportunity for fundraising for the Tinsley-Lyles House when it failed to act swiftly in 2015 in the afterglow of the success and celebration of the Pace House, another historic home the city in 2013 planned to raze, but which today is now in private hands, is beautifully restored and maintained using only private funds, is generating annual tax revenue for the city, and is listed as a "Contributing" structure in Garland's Travis College Hill National Register Historic District.

Instead of capitalizing on the Pace's success, the city instead bungled and stumbled with the Tinsley-Lyles House restoration.

Even though the Tinsley-Lyles House is older than the Pace House, because of where it is situated now and the foundation on which it rests, the Tinsley-Lyles structure likely will never qualify for "Contributing" status on the National Register of Historic Places and, thus, the accompanying federal and state tax credits that could be used for its restoration.

Mayor pro tem David Gibbons noted that much of what King reported about the expenses for the Tinsley-Lyles House during the past two years was news to the Council.

“This city has never committed any usage for these historic buildings except for storage,” said Gibbons. “We have a museum that is open only four hours a week, a historic house that no one can access, and a rail car used for storage." He said the plea for more money for the Tinsley-Lyles House is occurring while citizens are crying loudly over potholes in their streets and other infrastructure issues.

District 5 Councilmember Rich Aubin said he supports spending the $20,000 for the study because he wants to see “a full range of what should be done with this building." Without the study and a plan, "the $75,000 is just pulling us down the rabbit hole.”

New District 3 Councilmember Jerry Nickerson said he would like to see the Tinsley-Lyles House in a park-like setting, in more context with its era. He painted a verbal picture of accompanying late 1800s elements, which he quickly noted might require one-half million to a million dollars.

“I don’t think that there’s any organization in town” that can raise that kind of money, he said.

As I have said—and will continue to say—now is the time for the City of Garland to take a tough look at the situation regarding this historic house and make the difficult decisions. Either paint or get off the ladder, as the old saying goes.

The concluding portion of my blog series stated that the city should consider turning the house over to a business use and let the restoration/renovation be paid for by private enterprise, but that was not even considered or discussed at the work session. 

I'm left wondering how many more years Garland city councils will spend debating what to do with this structure, which already could have been restored by now had the city managed the situation differently.

The second floor of the Tinsley-Lyles House, which often has been a magnet for homeless.

A Tale of Two Historic Garland Houses: Our city's four options for resolving the Tinsley-Lyles House crisis

(Third and final in a three-part series) 

Bright and cheery, the Pace House's central hallway with its original light fixtures and transoms never fails to charm visitors.

Dark and dreary, the interior of the Tinsley-Lyles House awaits its future after an unnecessary 3-year delay due to city politics.

The City of Garland squandered a sparkling opportunity that well could have raised—totally from private funds—enough money to restore the historic Tinsley-Lyles House without requiring one additional penny from the taxpayers' pockets. It was a unique window of time that sadly has passed.

In light of that mess-up, what are the remaining options now for the city? Garland has four possibilities (with a few subsets) for what to do with the Tinsley-Lyles House.

1. It can simply tear it down, toss the remains in the landfill, and move on—perhaps finding some kind of adaptive reuse for the new, large, expensive foundation on which the house now sits. Throwing the city's history in the trash can (the Tinsley-Lyles is one of Garland's oldest remaining structures) would be a terrible waste of our city's resources.

2. Find a taker for the house, who then could move it to a vacant lot and restore it for private use. More than 500 people came forward after This Old House magazine, a Long Island-based national publication with a circulation exceeding 1 million, ran a story in its "Save This Old House" feature on both the Pace and Tinsley-Lyles Houses. Eventually only three actually submitted valid applications for the Pace House, with the only logical option for the city being the proposal that my wife and I made to move it to a vacant lot we already owned in Garland's Travis College Hill Historic District. We know firsthand the financial pain and physical toll that caused us. We own no more vacant residential lots that could be used to accommodate the Tinsley-Lyles. I know of one Garland citizen who at the time (three years ago) was an ideal fit for the Tinsley-Lyles project, had it gone into private hands then, but his interest has moved on to other commitments, as well.

The welcoming Pace House back porch is the setting for refreshments when guests pour through during the annual historic home tours on Garland's 11th Street.

3. Design a firm plan for the ultimate use of the house, then the city appropriate whatever funds are needed for that restoration, refurbishment, or adaptive reuse. Keep in mind that government-owned projects are always notoriously more expensive than privately-owned projects. Having worked with numerous preservationists, I doubt the house can be remodeled or restored by the city in its present nonresidential location for less than an additional $250,000 to $300,000 or more (after already having spent $316,028.18 on that project). Annual upkeep would have to be figured out, too. That could run anywhere from $40,000 to $75,000 a year for starters. And over the years the costs will go up.

If the city keeps the house, the first question really remains, how should the house be used? Unfortunately our city politicians have tap-danced on this question all along. Since city leaders have been so reluctant to be transparent about whether they have privately made any secret commitments, their dancing makes me wonder what surreptitious agreements truly had been reached with Preservation Garland Inc., which so far has not been successful in raising the funds necessary to restore or even sustain the house and has helped bring on the current crisis with the historic home.

Some have suggested the structure become a genealogical library. The Garland library board has made it clear that it does not favor this. Others have suggested it as an office for the Garland Convention and Visitors Bureau. Its location away from the main flow of traffic seems to diminish that idea. 

Preservation Garland Inc., has repeatedly talked about making the Tinsley-Lyles into a house museum of early Garland life. The crucial report by the "Summerlee Commission on Financial Sustainability of History Organizations" released in mid-2015 presented strong evidence that house museums not tied to major national, state, or local events or personalities all across the country are in deep financial trouble. The report says the only hope for saving these house museums is for local, state, and national governments to step in and provide the necessary funding. The report also recognizes the unlikelihood of this happening, because of so many pressing infrastructure issues facing governments at all levels. The report recommends finding some way to downsize the number of these house museums. 

I personally know the author of that Summerlee report—Texas preservationist and Baylor University professor Gary Smith. In conversations Gary told me that what Kay and I did in taking the historic Pace House really should be the model for dissolving hundreds of house museums all across the country. 

Tinsley-Lyles House in original condition about the time it became the property of the city in 1979.

4. Sell or lease it to some business or retail entity that can pay to have it restored and convert it into a retail or office space operating from its present location. On the site where it is now, the building might make a nice restaurant, clothing store, or other retail establishment—or maybe even a law office or architect's office. It could give downtown Garland some additional sound retail that it sorely needs. Unfortunately, no federal and state historic tax credits would be available for restoring this project. The Tinsley-Lyles is not part of a National Register Historic District. Even if it were to ever become part of such a district, too many serious mistakes, such as location and foundation, may already have been made for it to be a "Contributing" building.

After fighting so diligently to save this historic structure in 2013-2014, I personally am weary of all the political infighting, arguing, controversy, backbiting, and inertia surrounding the Tinsley-Lyles House. A decision needs to be made about its future—and that decision needs to be made soon and be permanent!

Because of its historic value, tearing it down isn't the right option.

Leaving it standing as is to keep deteriorating ("demolition by neglect" is the term for this practice) isn't the correct choice either.

Giving it to someone with the funds, energy, determination, and an appropriate residential lot to move it and restore it and use it might be a possibility. But remember: many are willing, but few actually respond. Most of those indications of interest or outright offers for the Pace House and the Tinsley-Lyles House originated from outside the City of Garland. Is giving it to another city what Garland really wants to do?

Using it as a living museum—once a popular idea and once my top preferred choice—now has been proved to be not wise because so many of these house museums have become albatrosses around the necks of communities all across the country due to rising maintenance costs. This solution is possible, but only if the city or a group of citizens with a bona fide track record steps up with an ironclad commitment to pay for it over the next 40 to 50 years.

Since squandering their golden opportunity in 2015 following the grand success of the saving and celebration of the Pace House, the city and Preservation Garland Inc., must now look for new ways to solve the problem they created—without shoving the expense on to the backs of the already overloaded Garland taxpayers.

The public should not be forced to pay one added nickel for these mistakes.

Since during the past three years the city has already invested nearly a third of a million dollars in this historic home with so little to show for it, and since the paltry $75,000 currently proposed for renovating it will barely start the adaptive-reuse process that is necessary, I'm leaning toward the city’s pulling the $75,000 out of the budget now. Since $75,000 is not enough, further requests likely will follow—thus reigniting this hurtful fight again and again. The more incensed people get, the more "Tear it down!" is likely to become the battle cry. 

The city must make it crystal-clear to Preservation Garland that the house belongs to the city, not it, and then start an intensive search for a quality business willing to lease the structure from the city—even at $1 a year for the first five or 10 years in exchange for rehabilitating it—and turn it into a classy restaurant or other appealing and needed place of business in the downtown area.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation, of which Kay and I are participants and fans, promotes the idea of adaptive reuse as what preservation is really all about these days. Keeping the historic exterior framework but adapting the inside of the house to a new purpose like a privately-operated business venture seems like the most economical, sensible, and forward-moving way to go right now.

Think about it! And then call your city councilmember and tell him or her your decision.

Let's put a period at the end of this fruitless dialogue about the future of the Tinsley-Lyles House—an issue that handily could have been—and should have been—resolved three years ago!

A Tale of Two Historic Garland Houses: The second, an embarrassment that is "woefully, pitifully unnecessary"

(Second in a series of three)

Louis and Kay Moore on Pace House Moving Day—Public enthusiasm and euphoria on that day easily could have vaulted the Tinsley-Lyles House to success, too, but city politics and bungling kept any such victory from being achieved.

Friends of Tinsley-Lyles House fundraising was set to roll (as demonstrated by this trifold flyer ready for wide distribution), with blue-chip personnel in place, until unkept promises, unfulfilled commitments, unanswered questions, unsquelched misinformation, and old city political alliances intervened.

The current predicament of what to do with Garland's Tinsley-Lyles House—the boondoggle sitting on an abnormally high concrete foundation behind the city's downtown public library—is a result of unkept promises, unfulfilled commitments, unanswered questions, unsquelched misinformation, and old political alliances that appeared to become more important than practicality.

A 2014, much-lauded, sound, do-able, "win-win" plan I presented to City Council to direct the two houses' future—"The Way Forward"—has been only halfway realized and has been allowed to be overrun by egregious and totally unnecessary mishandling of the Tinsley-Lyles House side of the deal.

In "The Way Forward" document I presented to council on February 3, 2014, these solutions were enthusiastically supported: 1. The Pace House would return to the private sector, with the city donating the structure to the bidder making the soundest pitch; 2. The city would retain the Tinsley-Lyles House, with a separate charitable foundation (apart from either existing preservation group—Preservation Garland Inc. and Landmark Society)—formed for the specific, single purpose of raising funds to restore and maintain the dwelling in perpetuity. 

Part of the latter's appeal to the council was the wonder-upon-wonders feat that Garland's two oft-contentious preservation organizations—the decades-old Garland Landmark Society and newly-formed Preservation Garland Inc.—had agreed to not oppose the creation of the new nonprofit to raise funds to restore and operate the Tinsley-Lyles House. From the transcript of the February 3 council work session, I stated that The Way Forward plan "can resolve the issue and unite the community and set the stage for better stewardship of these two historic structures." 

In a private meeting at 2:30 p.m. on Saturday, February 1, 2014, over dessert, at our home near downtown Garland, two key Preservation Garland leaders agreed to support the new, independent fundraising entity and pledged to set aside public rancor with Landmark. Simultaneously, in a separate meeting, a Landmark representative agreed not to publicly oppose the plan as it went forward. 

A groundswell of support, out of gratitude, privately arose. One prosperous and well-connected Garlandite, immensely relieved and thankful that the issue might be settled amicably, without strife that had surfaced in the past, pledged an unspecified amount of funds to the cause and offered her spacious home to host a major fundraising event. 

However, in a meeting on March 3, 2014, just before council was to be polled on a final decision and much to my surprise, representatives of Preservation Garland pressed for permission to address the body. (At a work session, a citizen is only allowed to address the council when specifically called on by a council member.)

As the polling approached, Councilmember Anita Goebel stated to the council, "Before we make any decisions, I’d like to have the Preservation Garland to give us a presentation on what their plans are for the house if they receive it." Three members took their seats in front of the council. I learned only just beforehand that this was going to happen. I was not invited to participate, sit with the three, or to speak; much to my embarrassment the key Preservation Garland spokesperson intimated inaccurately that I was lock-step with their efforts that night.

Setting aside its private pledge to avoid public rancor and to let the new, independent nonprofit carry the ball in fundraising, Preservation Garland suddenly and without explanation began asserting itself to become the fundraising arm. Despite its pledge on February 1, 2014, to avoid personal attacks, a key Preservation Garland leader also publicly began speaking of the other organization's leadership in a demeaning manner. Then-Councimember John Willis afterward told me my face looked utterly crestfallen when those remarks emerged.

In a transcript of the public hearings of the March 3, 2014, work session, Mayor Douglas Athas repeatedly specified that no decision would be reached that evening on who would occupy the Tinsley-Lyles House, who would operate it, or for what purpose the structure would be used. He specified that the council poll to be taken that evening was for the specific purpose of retaining or demolishing the two houses. 

The transcript of the meeting shows that Athas stated: "Our decision tonight is whether to keep the house in the city's custody or return it to the private sector."

Councilmember Anita Goebel stated: "Mayor, I don't know if it's appropriate, but I think we ought to save the house, keep it as city property, and let the Preservation Garland pick up after we move it."

The mayor reiterated that while the council appreciated Preservation Garland's update that it had just given on its work, the vote that evening merely was to keep or demolish the two houses. He obtained city staff's support to work with a nonprofit, should it emerge, to raise funds for the refurbishing. 

When the vote was taken, the council was favorable toward what I had outlined in "The Way Forward" plan that I had authored. Willis cast the lone dissenting vote, favoring that both houses be awarded to the private sector and that the city retain neither.

However, the damage was done. Preservation Garland's public demeaning of the Landmark leadership, aired on the city's TV broadcast, dampened the enthusiasm that had swelled from the private sector when it appeared that a harmonious decision, with unsavory remarks aside, would be reached. The individual (allied with the Landmark leadership) that had offered to host a major fundraising effort was less eager to go out on a limb. So was a local bank president who had pondered helping lead the fundraising efforts to restore the Tinsley-Lyles House. 

Furthermore, despite the Mayor's repeated clarification, the Preservation Garland leadership emerged from the meeting believing (with some council encouragement) that as a result of that meeting, Preservation Garland had been "given" the Tinsley-Lyles House to take total charge of. 

I personally felt betrayed. Endless volunteer hours on the part of a loyal, private citizen had been spent to hammer out a workable compromise that was disregarded in what felt like the blink of an eye.

Remembering the actual truth of what occurred in the March 3, 2014, council meeting, and with encouragement and the go-ahead from the city manager's office, my wife, Kay, and I pushed on to form the independent organization that became known as Friends of Garland's Historic Tinsley-Lyles House, as the mechanism to raise funds to restore the historic home in a way that preserved early Garland life. It was patterned after the short-term, one-topic-only citizens group that raised money for the Pace House restoration in 1985 when the home was moved from its original location on 1st Street at State to behind city hall. The records of that community-wide, community-building, historic fundraising were found in a box in the attic of the Pace House when it arrived on our lot.

Members of the new Friends nonprofit were some of Garland's most proved, successful, blue-ribbon fundraisers for other philanthropic projects. In the past, their combined fundraising efforts had raised countless hundreds of thousands (and possibly even millions) of dollars for worthwhile, charitable causes in Garland and Dallas. 

These charter members (all Garland residents) eagerly signed on to join Friends of Garland's Historic Tinsley-Lyles House in the rush of enthusiasm that followed the April 11, 2015, historic home tour on 11th Street after the newly refurbished Pace House was dedicated and a Texas Historical Marker awarded to Travis College Hill. More than 500 people poured into the Pace House and into the vintage neighborhood to witness a fresh Garland commitment to historical preservation and into the quality restoration that had been done on the Pace. 

On May 28, 2015, the Friends of the Tinsley-Lyles House organizational meeting was held in the Pace House living room. Organizers sensed that in the afterglow of success of the Pace House relocation and the historic home tour that had just drawn scores of people interested in history, fundraising for the Tinsley-Lyles House could be kicked off successfully, with a new wave of supporters willing to be tapped. With some of the same skilled, zealous people helping steer the ship of the Tinsley-Lyles House fundraising, the just-realized, tangible success on the Pace would signal that it could be done again. 

Before actual fundraising could begin, however, the veteran, much-respected fundraisers in the group cautioned that, based on their past experiences, three critical questions must have concrete answers from the city:

1. What ultimate long-term usage did the city envision for the Tinsley-Lyles House? Organizers believed that it would be difficult to approach donors about a vague restoration effort that lacked specifics.  

2. What repairs and restorations were necessary for the structure and what would all this cost? We did not want to start a fundraising campaign that was inadequate to actually meet the needs for the work necessary. Returning and asking people for more donations when your first estimates are wrong is considered a no-no in fundraising.

3. Were there any secret or non-public commitments that city leaders had made to any group or person regarding the usage or future of the house? Some of our organizers were concerned because Preservation Garland leaders had continued wrongfully to espouse, since the March 3, 2014 council meeting, that the city had "given" that organization the house and believed the city could be paying to fix it up as an office for the organization. Mayor Athas, despite his insistence at the March 3, 2014, council meeting, appeared to have done nothing to correct the misinformation. Athas and the head of Preservation Garland were longtime political allies. I and others wondered why the mayor himself did not strongly intervene and set the record straight with his ally, the council, and the public.

The Friends group had initiated the group's nonprofit application in Austin, which had to be completed before the IRS would issue the group's 501(c)(3) designation. With my vast background in nonprofits, I knew that after we secured the answers to the three crucial questions, completing the process for tax-exempt nonprofit would be merely a speedy formality. 

On July 31, 2015, Friends organization members Don and Barbara Baynham and Louis and Kay Moore and Preservation Garland representative Jerry Flook met at city hall with Mayor Athas, Councilmember Goebel, and city employee Becky King, and laid out the three crucial questions for response.

At the meeting, the city promised to get back to us soon with answers. 

More than two years later no answers have ever been forthcoming. 

At a later point after our July 31 meeting, the city tried to hire Dallas preservation architect Norman Alston, who grew up in Garland, to develop a plan and cost estimate for the restoration/repairs. He requested $15,000 for his services. Councilmember Goebel nixed that plan—stating that enough city money had been spent on the old house already.

Then, in May 2016 at a Dallas gathering of preservationists, which Kay and I attended, those familiar with the situation in Garland rolled their eyes about the huge concrete, non-historic-looking foundation on which the Tinsley-Lyles had been relocated. At that gathering I also learned—in Dallas, not in Garland, and from a Dallas citizen, not a Garlandite—that when the house had been moved from its trailer behind the Patty Granville Center, a super-important wood pin in the original 14 X 14 log cabin encased in the Tinsley-Lyles House had been broken irrepairably. I wondered why no one in the city had shared that crucial fact with me and others involved with Friends of Garland's Tinsley-Lyles House—or with other interested Garland citizens as well.

Our organizing members had earlier decided not to move forward on further organization or fundraising without first receiving concrete answers to all three questions. 

Individual organizing members had quantifiable success records with fundraising in the past and could have immediately put their hands to the plowshares for this Garland project, but naturally, while the city delayed month after month in providing answers that were necessary to move forward, these organizers' ardor cooled. 

During this time, these hard-working, Garland-loving, organizing members were out elsewhere, raising untold thousands of dollars for other preservation and non-preservation organizations in the Dallas area that they were involved in. The time and energy these talented people expended on other projects easily could have been devoted to the Tinsley-Lyles restoration project. 

These citizens ultimately deemed that their considerable skills were of no consequence to the city and moved on. Eventually the Friends of the Tinsley-Lyles House organization died on the vine for lack of support from the city and its leaders.

Meanwhile, the house has been allowed to sit on its high-up perch un-restored, becoming a haven for homeless who lived underneath it—eventually prompting the expenditure of more city funds to build interim solutions to protect the home from the possibility of vandalism and perhaps even an accidental fire. 

Preservation Garland Inc. finally attempted a fundraiser that did not draw the hoped-for participation and dollar amounts. No exact amount was released of what was raised nor of how much of city funds were expended to support the failed fundraiser. The group has tried a few other small fundraising efforts with uncertain success.

So, there the house sits to this day—an endangered remnant of the city's dwindling historic home inventory. It is an embarrassment that is woefully, pitifully unnecessary.

Next: What options does the city have now for what to do with the Tinsley-Lyles House?