Come home, and make it soon! Some problems that led to Garland's hospital closing could be avoided with a strategic demographic shift in our city

Come home! Older parts of town need refueling. The extensive renovations and restorations in Travis College Hill Historic District on Garland's 11th Street are an example of what can be done throughout the entire older parts of Garland. (Photo by Deb Downs of Take to Heart Images)

By now, Garlandites are becoming highly verbal on the frightening details: closing Baylor Scott & White at Garland could add at least 10 to 15 additional minutes to an ambulance ride from central Garland to the nearest hospitals in Richardson, Plano, Dallas, or Rowlett.

Also, another gruesome statistic is making the rounds: for every six-tenths of a mile further to a hospital, the death rate goes up 2 percent. Translated that means because of the hospital's closing, 20 to 30 percent or more Garlandites could die on the way to the hospital in an ambulance. That does not count those who attempt to use a private automobile to go to an emergency room.

The security for the elderly, for the sick, for the injured that Baylor Garland once provided will simply disappear along with the hospital. All of us must face the reality squarely and recognize fully what the closing of Garland's third-largest employer and our hedge of protection truly means.

If you happened to listen to Saturday's budget hearings before Garland City Council, you heard Fire Chief Mark Lee state that the department already is making contingency plans for emergency services after the Garland hospital closes. Lee told council that the department has personnel for the longer response times, but what about "ambulance overload"—responding to a second call while the first one is delayed making an emergency run? Adequate equipment will be a challenge, he stated.

I know from personally talking with Garland EMS ambulance drivers that extra minutes spell death for some patients. These heroes in our community are also worried that our hospital's closing will overload nearby hospital emergency rooms and slow the medical process further.

Not only is time crucial in medical emergencies, one of my nonwhite, working-poor friends living in Central Garland without health insurance or Medicaid approached me and asked whether it was true that the hospital was closing. "What are people going to do?" he asked. "Where will we go? When you're really sick, you can't ride a bus to downtown Dallas to get help."

All good questions. Every answer depends on where the person in need lives or is injured or needs immediate assistance. Garland has a wonderful fire department; the men and women who drive our ambulances will do everything humanly possible to get us help. But there are limits to what even they can do. They can provide artificial respiration for just so long before brain damage sets in!

The optimists among us are voicing hope we can yet attract another hospital some day. City leaders knew since at least last February that the hospital closing was a possibility. Some naturally ask, Could more have been done to halt momentum toward closing?

Without a dramatic shift in our demographics in central and south Garland, the chances of reviving or attracting another hospital are slim.

I've asked many sources, "Will Garland be the largest city in the United States without its own hospital?" Nobody seems to know the answer. When I look at all the statistics, that seems like a real possibility.

The blame game has already begun, while the emergency situation remains real!

Finger-pointing is not necessary. The government's census statistics have been telling us the truth for several decades. Garland's impoverished people, who will suffer the most from this unfortunate closing, live mostly in central and south Garland, nearest the dying hospital. The numbers have been stacked against us for years. No hospital enterprise in this economic environment wants to touch a poor community without health insurance or funds to pay the outrageously expanding bills. (Keep in mind—25 percent of our population has no health insurance; 47 percent of our citizens live at or below the federally established poverty level; uncollected bills at the hospital escalated from 5 percent a few years back to 16.5 percent, or some $20 million, now) .

The solutions will take years to implement. Forget Washington. Forget Austin. Those leaders there could care less whether Garland has a hospital. And instead of relying on those quicksand pits, we had best figure out what we ourselves can do. This is going to be a case of having to "pull ourselves up by the bootstraps".

And time is of the essence, too! Some of our citizens will literally die because of this travesty.

Veritex Bank of Garland is moving to Main Street to help revitalize the inner-city core. Three historic houses (the last of which remains here) have been preserved and moved to other lots in the downtown area to clear the way for bank construction.

 Here's what you, the citizens and former citizens of Garland, can do, starting right now:

1. If your income level is above the poverty line, please squelch that planned move north of Belt Line, especially to the George Bush Freeway area. We need your income level here in the central and south to help us balance the poverty engulfing us.

2. Stop the White Flight now! Most of our impoverished citizens are nonwhites. Even nonwhites who prosper often move north of Belt Line. If you are white or affluent nonwhite, don't even think about leaving us here in the central combat zone. We need you here.

3. For those of you who've escaped your responsibility to Garland as a community, come back home. Come home from Frisco, Plano, Sachse, Murphy, Rowlett, Richardson, and other wealthier Dallas 'burbs. If you earn your salary or income in the poorer parts of Garland and then go home to the more affluent parts of the DFW Metroplex to live and spend your money, look yourself in the mirror and ask, "Am I really a part of the problem and not a part of the solution?"

Too many of our community and business leaders slip away to those more affluent cities—or Firewheel—at night, when we need their presence and incomes in the poorer parts of Garland 24-hours a day. Our leaders in the inner city and southern part of Garland need to live among us here. Stay and build up Garland's schools, which are commendable. Your kids might even improve the graduation rate in some of our high schools in this area. Set aside the yen to live on the golf course or among "your kind of people" only.

One fabulous new development at the Wyrick farm, located along Shiloh near Buckingham, will feature new homes that will be in the league with many additions in other northern-rim DFW suburbs. When it opens, make sure to check out those homes, buy one, and join us in rebuiding central and south Garland.

Come home to central and south Garland and buy or build new homes to help us rebuild our basis for getting back a hospital.

4. Consider joining us as "urban pioneers". We live in central, older Garland. Even though it has its burdens, we love living, working, and being a part of downtown Garland. We can afford to live elsewhere. We have multiple options. We are not stuck here. Because we love Garland, we CHOOSE to be a part of this community—to spend our money in Garland (particularly stores in the central core area) as often as we can, to support our local businesses whenever possible, to attend community events, to be a REAL part of community life here and not just part-timers or exiles.

5. And here's a message to our Garland church leaders, especially those in our larger downtown churches which seem to dominate the downtown area. Come back to the inner-city. Don't pretend to do "ministry" by living in any of those other wealthier 'burbs while handing out meals to the homeless or providing food and clothing to those that live in the poorer parts of Garland.

Ask yourself if you are enabling the problem or helping us find solutions to the issues we face. If you answer correctly, it will shock you.

Tell your flocks to come back, too. Tell them to sell their fancy new homes in those 'burbs and buy houses in the inner city and fix them up. Add your income to the leavening that needs to occur here. If you want to have a REAL ministry here, come back and live among us. Find out what is really going on—how the community is changing and what you REALLY can do to minister to this community instead of what you imagine from afar that you can do! Don't enable the slippery slope. Help us work to reverse it!

Prayerfully consider whether being a "commuter" church is God's will for your congregations. Or for you church leaders either. Period! You've missed your calling by running and hiding. Parking lots owned by churches don't pay taxes. They don't show up on the census reports and help raise the income levels that are scaring off these gigantic hospital operations that worship the god of profit. Stop tearing down homes in the inner city and southern part of Garland. Instead, build yourself a new home on an empty lot somewhere in the so-called "decaying" central and southern Garland areas. Consider turning one of your mostly empty parking lots into housing for the most affluent in your churches! Yes, the MOST AFFLUENT!

If all the exiles who moved away to more affluent parts of the DFW Metroplex would come back and fix up their homes, this could propel Garland back into the league with the other prospering 'burbs.

The same is true for our city leaders! We need a moratorium on mayors who live in Firewheel or other wealthier parts of Garland. After he was elected mayor in 2013, Mayor Douglas Athas got our hopes up by expressing fondness for rehabbing a vacant house on our street. Unfortunately no move was in the offing. Firewheel definitely does have its allure!

Friends of ours have built beautiful new homes in this inner-core area. Be courageous as they are! Or be like us and our neighbors and purchase older homes, then restore those houses until they shine like new—and make the neighborhoods in the inner city bright spots on the map once again, too.

Yes, the solution is all around us. Don't wait on the folks in Austin and Washington to "do something"; we are just another sad statistic on their charts.

Garland doesn't have to be a "Tale of Two Cities", the wealthier one to the north and the poorer one to the south. Each of our citizens holds in his or her own hands the keys to the solutions that we need so desperately.

Please join us in changing this community for the good—one family or one household or one person at a time! 

Come home! And make it soon. We need you! Please.

City reverses course: ALL candidate election materials, including petitions, now are available online to be examined privately

City Secretary Rene Dowl has added local election petitions to the online Garland "elections packet". Thank you, Rene!

Garland citizens now can privately download to their personal computers and review ALL of the city's "elections packet" materials, including the necessary petitions to have signed, without concern that their exploratory efforts are becoming fodder for the rumor mill.

Garland's City Secretary and City Attorney's offices this week opted to jettison a manufactured "requirement" forcing all citizens to sign an easily-obtainable document in order to see and retrieve the total election package—which they need to decide whether to run for public office or are just curious about what all is involved in being a candidate.

City Secretary Rene Dowl said Tuesday the petitions that candidates are required to circulate to acquire sufficient signatures of support—25 for city council spots and 100 for the mayor's seat—to be placed on the ballot have been added to the online packet, which potential candidates or just citizens merely exploring the process can download.

Earlier Dowl's office put all but the petitions online for citizens to download privately at will. Dowl's office continued to follow previous policies for the petitions until research showed no justification for it.

Dowl promises that no one will be monitoring who actually downloads the documents from the computer.

She also said further research shows that the city's procedure of requiring citizens contemplating a possible run for public office to sign a form in order to release the "elections packet" to them was never the law nor an ordinance in the City of Garland. It was written into the City Secretary's list of duties, but no one knows why or how that entry occurred, she said.

The Dallas County Elections Department in Dallas and the Texas Ethics Commission in Austin last week affirmed to me that no county or state laws require ordinary citizens to have to sign to receive the election packets, including the citizen petitions.

Those officials suggested to me that the city needed to look into where and how the practice originated. I am very appreciative of our City Secretary and City Attorney for doing just that and acting swiftly to correct the matter. Kudos to all involved!

Only when the elections materials have been completed, the petitions signed, and the materials filed with the City Secretary should signatures and identifying information be collected and released to interested parties via the Texas Public Information Act.
 

In the Garland election process, many deadlines exist for candidates for public office.

The election materials help potential candidates, especially novices that may feel inspired to become more involved in the community and pursue political office but wonder about the cost, the requirements, the deadlines, etc., determine what is involved in appearing on a ballot for office.

Previously, political insiders could misuse the list of inquirers to subtly or overtly lobby potential candidates not to run—a clear violation of the freedoms we Americans enjoy to choose our elected officials without interference or inappropriate pressure.

Dowl and I agreed that that so-called "requirement" was actually like the story many have heard about "Grandma's ham recipe",  requiring the end of the ham to be cut off—family members just "knew" that was how one was supposed to cook a ham. As that story goes, no one knew the origin of the requirement to cut off the end of the ham until one older family member remembered that Grandma didn't have a pan large enough in which to cook the ham, so she removed that part of the ham to make it fit her pan.

How this procedure of requiring ordinary citizens to have to sign for the public documents, giving not only their names but addresses and phone numbers, got started, Dowl says she does not know.

Both the City Secretary and City Attorney's offices were very much aware of the fallout that occurred two years ago (2016) when I innocently picked up an election packet—at which time I was required to sign a list in the City Secretary's office that I had obtained the documents. As I reported in my last blog on January 11, immediately thereafter I encountered puzzling behavior and sudden overt actions by some Garland political insiders who seized on the information, started a false rumor that I was preparing to challenge Councilwoman Anita Goebel, and argued forcefully that an incumbent should not be opposed in an election.

Just the mere act of picking up an election packet seemed to indicate that I was "coloring outside the lines" and violating the unwritten rule that a councilmember is elected, in effect, for six years, not just for the official two-year term for which the person initially runs.

Certainly, there is nothing wrong with a worthy incumbent who has performed well being returned to office. But citizens in America have every right to file for office to oppose that incumbent when his or her current two-year term is up, and let the voters decide who fills the job for the next two years.

What happened to me in 2016 is history. Goebel ran unopposed in 2016 and completes her third and final term in May. I did not challenge her in 2016 and never had any intention of doing so, as I repeatedly stated at the time. The practice of requiring citizens to sign to receive the election packet is no more. Rules are in place to make sure insiders cannot arbitrarily obtain information that is not theirs.

These are important dates as Garland moves toward the May 5 election.

With five key council races (mayor and council districts 1, 2, 4, and 5) on the ballot for May 5, the citizens of Garland should look at the requirements online and freely decide if they or one of their friends, neighbors, or co-workers in the city might be qualified—and have the desire—to run for one of these positions of public office. We need additional skilled and qualified people to run in all of these races.

The election this May promises to be quite controversial, pitting soon-to-be former Mayor Douglas Athas and his allies against what some have termed the "Gang of Six" (two of which face re-election in May and two of which complete their final terms in office in May) and their allies in a continuing saga and battle over the demolition of the old armory—that has already occurred—and proposals for a dog and skate park at Central Park.

While the Central Park issues are highly important, the City of Garland has many other matters that also need to be addressed thoughtfully, carefully, and accurately in the approaching political season. Those include what the city is going to do about the loss of our only hospital, why our city's collective dream of having our own full-service community college has faltered badly, and what direction the city is going to take to truly involve all citizens, white and nonwhite, in the political life of our community.

Dowl said no one will try to track the computers onto which the election packets are downloaded. She said, however, that when people go in person to her office at city hall, a log is kept for statistical purposes of those who request printouts of the petitions or other election materials. That list now is available only to people who request the information in writing following the procedures outlined in the Texas Public Information Act, Dowl said. The law provides that the city must honor open-records requests within 10 days of receiving them in writing. Previously, phone-call requests from interested parties were sufficient to obtain the information. As of Wednesday, Dowl said no written open-records requests have been received for the list of those who come to her office for the petitions.

Still, the safest and most confidential way to secure your election packet to ponder what you want to do is by going to the link below and printing out your own copy on your own printer. One word of warning: the packet is huge. You may just want to read much of it online and selectively choose what to print.

Please follow this link and go to "2018 city election candidate packet" and prayerfully consider your future:

https://www.garlandtx.gov/gov/cd/secretary/default.asp

All Garland citizens need to be abreast of current political activities in our city and be prepared to make the best voting decisions possible for the future of our community.

No legal reason ever existed in Garland for election materials such as the candidate petitions to be held so tightly by the city. Citizens are now able to freely examine and download ALL candidate packet materials.

So you think you want to run for public office in Garland? Never forget—it's a very, very, very small town.

Would-be Garland candidates take note: your goldfish-bowl lives are about to begin. Even though forms are now available online, the petitions are not and require a personal visit and signature at the City Secretary's office. 

"Don't want you to think I didn't speak to you on purpose," barked a top supporter of District 2 City Councilmember Anita Goebel, a wannabe Garland politico and one of the many Anita supporters that does not live and does not vote in District 2.

The setting was the funeral of a former Garland officeholder who passed away in early 2016. The individual making the statement earlier had edged past me in the forward pew, seeming to ignore my wave while the individual broadly and overtly greeted everyone else within eyesight.

After the service the individual circled back around with that curious statement—as though underscoring to me the intended slight. Strange, I thought but kept mum.

At a funeral came the first not-so-subtle message I had done something terribly off-track. At a second one few days later, that packet I picked up randomly had definitely lit up the grapevine. Would-be candidates can be prepared for lots of inquisitions.

Just days later another high-profile, local funeral occurred. Certain key civic leaders, usually always cordial in public, averted their eyes or quickly found others to corner or visit with when Kay and I approached them during the after-service reception.

Why were these people acting so weird? What had suddenly gone wrong?

Plenty, I was to learn over the next few days.

I had violated the unwritten rules of The Club, the small, exclusive group of Garland kingmakers that gets to say who runs for spots in local election—Garland's political elite, some of whom don't actually live or vote in the city or a district in which they like to meddle.

This curious and tight Garland fraternity is composed of some current and former city councilmembers, current and former mayors, businessowners, real-estate investors, and other political operatives in this "small" town, which I might mention also is the 87th-largest city in the U.S. and the 12th-largest in Texas.

A few days beforehand, I had innocently, without gaining The Club's advance permission, stopped by the City Secretary's office to pick up the packet for filing for the upcoming 2016 city council election. I had heard much about these mysterious packets, so with an election coming up soon, I knew they would be available. On a lark, I decided to stop by the City Secretary's office and request a packet to see what was in it. I was immediately struck by how thick it was.

How dare I do something so outside the proscribed way of doing things?

I had already expressed my support for our incumbent city councilmember, Anita Goebel, so I never dreamed that the action would be picked up and twisted by The Club's rumor mill and would paint a target on me.

I was merely curious, with no intention of running unless Goebel for some reason decided she'd had it with politics and wanted to bail, as some current talk had suggested. What forms did one have to file? I wondered. What did filing cost? What personal financial data was one required to release? Could anyone obtain it? Dozens of questions filled my mind—questions that could be answered only with a packet in hand.

I thought it was a bit unusual that I was required to sign a form stating that I had obtained one of those election packets. I attributed that to regulation city procedures but still pondered, Who needed to know who picked up one of these?

The next day I dropped by Mayor Douglas Athas' office to visit with him about a totally unrelated matter. "Now what's this about running for office?" he immediately hopped off-subject from my conversation. He had jumped to the false conclusion, as did a number of other members of The Club, that I was planning to run for the District 2 council seat against incumbent Anita Goebel, who at that time was a political ally of his.

Athas quickly advised me—un-soliticed by me—that I would lose if I ran against Goebel. Very difficult to unseat her, an incumbent, he counseled.

Who said anything about running against Anita? I wondered. I told him I had no intention of running against Anita, that I was only curious about the "election packet" that was always spoken of in such hushed and reverential tones by all the political insiders in town.

I had a difficult time getting Doug back on track to talk about the matter for which I had gone to see him. He seemed almost preoccupied with my having obtained the packet.

I emphasized to him the word "NOT" when I answered him. "I am NOT planning to run unless the office is vacated, which I don't expect it to be."

However, I wasn't certain he heard my emphatic "NOT".

That night I began to receive the first of five phone calls, in rapid-fire order, from members of The Club inquiring about my intention of using the election packet.

Only one District 2 voter contacted me. The others who made calls lived in other districts or not in Garland at all.

Former District 2 City Councilwoman Perky Cox called to encourage me in my presumed race against Goebel. (As I mentioned in an earlier blog, Perky had wanted me to succeed her in 2012, but I declined at the end of Perky's final term to make the commitment. Goebel won after Perky and Perky's candidate, Eric Redish, had a parting of ways on the night of the general election in which Redish narrowly lost; without Perky's support Redish fell to Goebel in the runoff election.)

"What race against Goebel?" I inquired, still puzzled. "I have said I am not going to run against her."

But the election packet? Perky queried.

Just curious, I stated again. Picked it up on the spur of the moment. How had she known?

City-hall grapevine, she reported.

Exactly opposite of Athas (as one would expect from two earlier enemies), Perky argued that I should, indeed, square off against Goebel in 2016.

Not gonna do it, I asserted. End of conversation.

Later the person who didn't not "speak to me on purpose" at the funeral wrote on a Facebook page resounding praises for Anita and a barb aimed at every citizen of District 2—no one in District 2 was capable of succeeding Anita in office, the person vowed.

No one? That was a really odd thing to say, I thought. Such a bold statement coming from someone who didn't even live in our district seemed weird at best. 

The next morning the phone rang and I heard the voice of an influential local operative, who again lives outside of District 2. "So what IS the deal with the packet?" I was asked. "She hasn't been a bad council member."

"Wasn't planning to run against her," I said. (What is that supposed to mean? I pondered. Had someone stated in 2016 she was a bad councilmember? Certainly not I.)

I repeated to him my by-now broken-record answer I gave to Perky and the mayor as well as many others who called or stopped me wherever I went. Should I just make a placard and wear it upon my body any time I went out in public? 

And so it went for several days until filing for open council seats in 2016 ended. The cold shoulders, the averted eyes, the blank stares—all from people I had once presumed were friends. The strategically placed phone calls. Now I know better. As Mayor Athas had told me the first time we met shortly after he was elected, we are associates—never friends.

That experience was truly my first tipoff about Garland's rigged election system.

In 2016 (just as she had in 2014) Goebel ran unopposed and was re-elected to her third and final term by herself and other sitting councilmembers. Kay and I congratulated her on her win.

With this system in place, is it any wonder so many other elections here are canceled because there are no opponents running against the incumbents? The gig was clear: people not in The Club or blessed by The Club have little chance of winning city elections. The Club will make sure of that!

Is it any wonder councilmembers such as Goebel get elected with about 2 percent of the vote of eligible voters in their districts. No wonder the majority of current city councilmembers were never actually elected by the public—only by the city council itself, after only one candidate filed and others were discouraged—I would even use the term bullied—from filing to run. No wonder everything in this town seems so rigged by that tiny group of well-to-do Anglos with a sprinkling of non-whites thrown in for cover.

No wonder members of The Club frown at the thought of our rising percentage of Hispanic potential voters actually registering and voting. My political tutor once told me to forget my pledge that if I ever ran for public office, I would do everything within my power to bring in the disenfranchised voters such as the Latinos.

Candidate forms, minus the necessary petition forms, are available confidentially at the city's website. Click on City government, then on City Secretary button. Those forms are number 4 on the list. The petitions still must be picked up at City Hall. At that point the would-be candidate's intentions are public record.

As I have emphasized in this blog, councilmembers are PRESUMED to be elected for three full two-year terms. It is presumed that they will be re-elected automatically unless they have performed badly in office. If you ever doubt the power of the incumbent, listen to Monday night's city council work session (January 8) at which proposed changes in the city charter were discussed. How many times were the words uttered (or the concept espoused) of "three two-year"s? The incumbent WILL be there for six years, the underlying theme is heard over and over.

In case you missed it (it wasn't exactly widely trumpeted), January 17, 2018 is the first day a potential candidate for the upcoming May municipal elections can pick up and turn in a packet, including the marked petitions for their supporters to sign and which must be certified by the City Secretary. The last day for filing is February 16. These dates were first posted on the city's website on January 3, 2018.

Thanks to District 5 Councilman Rich Aubin, who in his early days in office at my suggestion requested that the packet be made available to the public on the city's website. City Secretary Rene Dowl says she does not know—and does not try to find out—who downloads the online forms.

These petitions to be signed by candidates' supporters are not available online and can only be picked up in person in the City Secretary's office. Naturally, one has to sign for them, giving all pertinent personal information—everything The Club needs to launch its campaign.

That list of those picking up petitions or filing for office is available to anyone by request made to the City Secretary's office, according to the Texas Open Records Law, states City Secretary Dowl. Dowl says by law she must make the information available to anyone requesting the list.

Based on my experience two years ago, my hunch is The Club will know within seconds after you pick up your packet and will be sharing that information with one another—cherrypicking along the way who to support, who to harass, and who to bully.

Such is political life in this very, very, very small Texas city—second largest in Dallas County—and yet a veritable tiny burg where political life is concerned.

"Why did this ever have to become such a mess?" is the only pertinent question when one well-executed dog/skate park duo is observed

Talamae and Drew of suburban Phoenix enjoy bringing their two large dogs to the nearby dog park, whose simple design is appealing to them. Garland has proposed an elaborate $1.1 million dog park.

(Because photos are truly worth a thousand words, this particular blog contains more pictures than usual. Please see all photos including extras at the end.)
 
Many times in this blog I have mentioned intimate, first-hand knowledge of a successful dog park and skate park situated alongside each other and working splendidly.

As I have said, this park lies just more than a mile from some investment properties we own in Arizona.

While we visited Phoenix during the recent New Year's holiday to prepare for new tenants, Kay and I decided to do a more strategic, thorough job of checking these parks out than we had in our previous, casual visits with grandkids present.

So, with notebook and camera in hand, we made several targeted tours of the town of El Mirage's Gateway Park, interviewing users as well as those who keep these parks safe.

As discussed, this dog park and skate plaza combo is part of a major development that was planned as a complete unit from the ground up. Gateway Park also features walking trails, basketball courts, soccer fields, a children's play area, a water feature, a small restaurant, and the city government complex including a police station.

About a week after the December 21 so-called public-input meeting about design of a dog park and skate park in Garland's Central Park Kay and I set out to query ordinary citizens to see what their unvarnished take was on the suburban Phoenix park that they were using.

One young husband and wife, Drew and Talamae, who regularly bring their two large dogs to the AZ park, loved the way their park was designed separately for both small and larger dogs. They like the simple entrances and exits to both sides that provide better control for dog owners arriving at and leaving the dog parks. They also like the simplicity of the dog park's landscaping and elements, including some creative but simply designed water fountains that provide drinking water for owners as well as a pup-level drinking station for dogs.

When we commented to them that Garland was considering a highly developed $1.1 million dog park with water features for the dogs, they wondered why that huge cost was necessary. They saw it as an extreme luxury. They were puzzled why Garland would spend the money to put water features in the dog park when Central Park itself does not include water features for children.

They also said they would not bring their dogs to this particular AZ dog park if the city had placed the dog and skate features adjoining each other. In the AZ park, the dog and skate parks are about 75 feet apart, separated by a road and parking serving both elements as well as the other features, such as walking trails, basketball courts, soccer fields, the children's play area and children's water features, a small restaurant, as well as many other features of the park.
 
While the husband and wife said they wish their home were a little closer to the dog park, they personally would be offended if either park was situated right outside their front door and could imagine that others would, as well.

They said they constantly monitor their dogs' interaction with other dogs and leap in quickly if they detect any kind of burgeoning tension with another animal. They try fastidiously to abide by all the dog park rules and expect others to do the same.

Dog Park rules are precise and citizens try to follow them carefully.

These users said they felt certain the skaters, if operating immediately adjacent to the dog park, would annoy their dogs and create difficulty for them personally.

The combined acreage of the two dog parks, for both large and small dogs, would probably amount to under one acre. The couple said they believe the size is completely adequate for their dogs' needs.

Over at the skate park on New Year's Eve morning, we encountered a young family where the daughter had received a new scooter and her brother had received a new skateboard for Christmas. The father said this was the family's first venture to the skate plaza. He said the family liked the stringent rules governing this particular skate park, which itself was about one-half acre. He said the family especially likes the rule prohibiting bikes in the skate plaza.

This auxiliary sign in the skate plaza emphasizes only three rules. The larger, more detailed sign pictured elsewhere in this blog spells out plentiful details for the safety and protection of skaters and observers.

The father said it did not bother him that the dog and skate parks were situated in the same general area because the road, parking spaces, and landscaping dividing them provide a protective barrier.

On another day we talked with a police officer who is based at the city's station in the same complex as the two parks. Officer T. McCracken said this is the fourth jurisdiction he has served that has had both a dog and skate park situated within it. He said he believes this park works better than any of the other three, particularly because no bicycles of any kind are allowed in the skate park.

McCracken said that he was not aware of any gang or other illegal activity at this suburban Phoenix park during his time on the force. He said he considers the skate park a plus and not a minus for the city and is not a site that officers believe they have to "fuss over" constantly. He said he believes the skate park's location, which is down the street and within walking distance of a housing development but not situated immediately adjacent to it, contributes to the "targeted" use of the park. He said people who visit there seem strategically to have set out to skate as opposed to a park near a housing development where potential skaters or visitors might "amble by" and thus be induced in to cause trouble.

He said he did not believe necessarily that the police department's presence was the only reason for the skate plaza's success, since the skate plaza preceded the police department there by several years.

The presence of the police station so near the dog park and skate plaza helps act as a deterrent to crime. Security cameras in the skate plaza and the overall design that allows citizens utilizing other features in the park to observe activities at the skate plaza also help reinforce the security in the park.

At the very beginning of the current public discussion about Garland actually building dog and skate parks, I spoke with Garland Parks Director Jermel Stevenson, whose resume includes the Phoenix area, and several Garland city councilmembers about our admiration of this AZ park. I've even provided Stevenson and others with Internet links to information about this park. As has been their styles in recent months, their responses have been more formality than listening ears. (Not until the December 21 meeting was I sure that Stevenson could remember my name. After I introduced myself to him for about the 20th time, he insisted he knew who I was, but this had never previously been apparent.)

My previous contention surfaces again here: Do Garland citizens REALLY count? Here was a vitally impactful suggestion by a citizen that earlier might have helped prevent the current mess in which the city finds itself. But did anyone ever take the time to follow through? Are only the high-priced consultant services that take taxpayer dollars the only ones that are given a nod?

Obviously, we are very fond of this AZ park and have believed for many years that it could serve as an excellent role model for Garland in its quest to figure out what to do with set-aside funds for both a dog park and a skate park. But to our knowledge, NO ONE has EVER taken us up on our suggestion to learn more about it.

What we like about this AZ park are:

1. Its simplicity: the dog and skate parks and other elements in the park are functional, practical, reasonable, and effective. The whole park itself impresses and draws visitors—not just the skate and dog features. For Garland to build these two features at its Central Park without a major plan supported by citizens for all of the park would be a disastrous mistake.

The skate plaza at the suburban Phoenix park prohibits bicycles and does not try to be "all things to all people" like the proposed skate park in Garland. Skaters and police say prohibiting bicycles in the skate plaza is especially effective.

2. The way the dog-and-skate elements blend into the overall planning and design of the entire larger park in which they are situated—all the elements work together as a whole. Unlike Garland where projects too often are done piecemeal and helter-skelter, this park was planned and developed as a complete unit from the ground up. The situation in Garland's Central Park is a total mess because of local politics and a complete lack of thorough, businesslike, professional management—also because everything being done there right now appears to be totally uncoordinated and completely random and unfortunately often based on political whim! Pieces of a puzzle need to all fit together so that the completed work appears logical, coordinated, and well planned.

3. The fact that these two AZ themed parks—very controversial in our own Garland community—are widely loved, accepted, and used in the Arizona community in which they are situated. If building that park was ever controversial, we never heard about it. We watched it being constructed from the ground up and often asked each other why Garland couldn't build the same kind of park the same way.

Precise and carefully administered rules make the skate plaza safer and more appealing to citizens. A graffiti hotline is one of the items the sign mentions.

4. The intricate governing details about how each of these two elements in the overall park are managed is impressive and appealing. One has the feeling no stone was left unturned in planning how the dog and skate parks would fit into the overall community life of the park and the neighborhood where they are situated. Rules for use of both elements in the park are precise, well-thought out, and carefully administered. (See photos of posted rules accompanying this blog.)

Appropriate and abundant signage throughout this entire park give an overall impression of professionalism and quality.

Back in Arizona, everyone seemed to like the fact that the AZ skate and dog park elements are controlled with very precise rules that are enforced by the nearby police station and on-duty parks personnel.

Kay and I are particularly impressed with posted signs asking citizens to call 911 immediately if they see anyone attempting to mark graffiti in the park. Based on the design of the park with only one entrance, we have the impression that if such a call were received, the police would immediately seal off the park and go in after not only the graffiti artist but anyone else acting illegally there.

The sign advises to call 911 anytime a park visitor sees anyone trying to deface the park with graffiti or other matters. A graffiti hotline is also mentioned.

Garland spends way too much time trying to deny that crime and other illegal activities occur in our parks, when rolling up our sleeves and going to work to find creative solutions would be a much better use of time and city funds.

The integrated nature of the whole park with its interwoven features, such as the walking and running trails, also allows citizens not utilizing either the dog or skate parks to immediately spot and report problems to the police or park employees—kind of like an informal "citizens on patrol".

And the nearby police station? An added bonus that not only provides security but also leaves the impression that the city makes safety in the park a top priority. As I've said many times, Kay and I wish we felt that same sense of safety and security at Garland's Central Park, located about the same distance from our home in Garland as the AZ park is from our investment properties.

Garland CAN learn from other cities—and from its own citizens. We don't always have to try and reinvent the wheel based on local politics at a given moment! When others anywhere in the U.S. do it right, Garland needs to stop, listen, and learn.

After spending time in these well-executed facilities accomplished so effortlessly, Kay and I could only shake our heads and ask ourselves, "Why did this ever have to become such a mess?" in light of the current political upheaval in Garland.

The population of El Mirage, situated 10 miles from Phoenix, is 31,000. The park is called Gateway Park.