The city council will begin its Work Session at 1pm followed by a 6:30pm Regular Session – click here for a full agenda and read on to find some topics of interest on this week’s agenda.
MAKING WALKING TO SCHOOL SAFER FOR PECAN CREEK ELEMENTARY
See all of those homes to the West of this elementary school? Because of a lack of sidewalks, unprotected intersections, no crossing guards, and increased traffic due to highway construction, many of these families have given up on letting their kids walk or ride their bikes to school, despite their close proximity. Thanks to a couple of persistent moms, all that will change when school starts up next Monday. Their advocacy for their children got a bunch of engineers, police officers, street department representatives, and even a politician to the table to find a solution. It paid off. Infrastructure got put in, streets were painted, signs were put in, cross guards were secured, and assuming the council votes on it tonight, a new school zone will be established. This is a great example of citizens and government working together to do good.
INNOVATIVE CITIZEN TREE PROGRAM
Remember a few months back when we talked about the possibility of the 20,000 Free Tree Project – an idea to use more of our tree fund money to put trees directly into the hands of citizens, all with the goal of increasing our tree canopy? Lauren Barker and her creative Keep Denton Beautiful team have come up with a plan that takes us in this direction. Tonight we’ll be considering a number of items that allow KDB to help administer tree funds for the following purposes:
- Neighborhood Hosted Giveaway Program
- Business Giveaway Program
- Redbud Giveaway
- Citizen Forester Training
- Children’s Arbor Day On Campus Planting
- Tree Rebate Program
These are great ideas and will serve to further beautify our city. Stay tuned for your chance to get in on the tree action!
MORE BUDGET TALKS
We will be continuing our several week discussion on the upcoming city budget, set to be voted on by the council on September 15. Stay on top of all the presentations and updates here. Starting September 1, we’ll have our first official public hearing on the budget, but we’ve already heard from a number of you. In fact, there look to be 8 people from the Denton Community Market set to advocate for their budget request which includes a market move to East Hickory Street in Southeast Denton. I’ve already explained why I think that is a visionary idea, but look forward to hearing their thoughts and getting feedback from my council colleagues.
TEMPORARY REDUCTIONS TO GAS OPERATOR FEES
Anyone who has been following the Denton gas drilling saga over the last 5 years understands that achieving city goals within the context of little jurisdiction, the threat of lawsuits, and an ever-shifting legal and statutory landscape requires a bit of creativity. For at least three years now, I’ve been on teams with the city brainstorming ways to incentivize operators to do what is best for our city’s neighborhoods and future land uses. One of the problems we discovered early on is that there exists a large amount of gas well plats that were approved while rules were either nonexistent or very weak in the city (in the early 2000s, for example). In some cases, these plats give the operator “vested rights” to drill under old regulations and according to ambiguous notes that might have been placed on the plat. Much of our work in the last couple of years has been to find ways to encourage the vacating of these old plats in favor of new gas well development site plans.
One thing we’ve learned along the way is that all sides want certainty: concerned neighbors want to know what to expect on existing sites around them and what rules apply and it turns out operators want that sort of certainty as well as they are planning out their multi-decade plans for mineral development. Our recent ordinance provided paths for the encouragement of vacating these old plats. What we are doing today is simply creating a temporary fee schedule that encourages that to happen up front so that neighbors, operators, and the city can move forward with a better sense of certainty as to the rules moving forward.
I understand some blog posts have looked at this with great suspicion – I can’t say I blame anyone for that sentiment in today’s environment. But the insinuation that the city is somehow trying to spark more incentive for a gas drilling frenzy at a time when gas prices are low (one of the theories being forwarded) is both unnecessarily paranoid and economically naive. I plan to support this ordinance for the reasons above – I have the best interest of the city in mind.