There are many positive things happening in our city that I would like to focus on with you. The new police headquarters are soon to be completed, and it is a beautiful but functional building. Move-in is scheduled for March, and then the old Municipal building, which now serves as the police headquarters, will be renovated to accommodate the Municipal Courts.
The Dallas Arboretum’s new visitor center is well under way with an opening scheduled for the middle of March. Activity downtown is robust with the Nasher Sculpture garden scheduled to open in October of this year, and the Latino Culture Center is scheduled for a September opening.
In addition, projects are now going forward with funding from the City Center Tax Increment Fund that ultimately will pump more than $108 million into the downtown area.
In District 10, our Audelia Branch Library will begin its expansion and renovation in February, and although it will cause a closure of approximately a year, when done it will address the needs of the still busiest branch in the system.
A bike trail has opened at Royal and Greenville that now takes the recreational traffic under the bridge and around the Royal Oaks Country Club perimeter. This is a project that could not have been accomplished without the help of Royal Oaks. Now this intersection is safer, with pedestrians and vehicles separated.
The streets in our district are now listed as the third best in the city, thanks to past bond issues that started with former council members Dean Vanderbilt and Donna Halstead, and continue today.
DART stations are open and functioning well. The bridge at Miller and LBJ and new ramps have opened and helped with the congestion at Skillman and LBJ. The Richardson School District is working feverishly on the new Audelia Creek Elementary School and is moving quickly to begin construction of the new Ferris Branch elementary location.
I have served the district for seven years now and see many positive signs for our continued movement forward. One thing that will have to happen to keep District 10 and the city moving in this direction will be the passage of the bond proposal in May. There is much discussion about the size of the bond issue that will be presented to voters, but no disagreement on the demand to take care of pressing needs. I hope to prevail with a no-tax-increase bond proposal. The uncertainty that currently exists in the economy demands that we be conservative in our approach to this important decision.
The current $371 million proposal is scheduled to occur over four years. If conditions improve, this could be accelerated to two or three years and another proposal brought forward to the voters. Needs were great in 1985, and a large bond proposal was passed that was scheduled to occur over four years. The economy turned south, and it took more than 10. I think we should learn from mistakes.
