Wendy is popular among most Fort Worth folks, but remember Brender was opposed to her at first. Next say what you want about police and firefighters but when their mailings hit stating she was opposed to fighting crime and securing our neighborhoods, it will be effective. Mailings to West Fort Worth blaming her for putting public housing project in their backyard and then redistricting that area out of her district.

Then the nasty stuff starts…success story, husband puts her through law school, taking care of her kids after graduation she is let go from Kelly-Hart and sues Dee Kelly (so long downtown and Bass money) gets divorced in not the best situation and has a title of VP at Republic Title that was part of divorce settlement. Not the fairy tale success story that itis made out to be.

Meanwhile she lays out all rent stuff etc on Brimer. Finally everyone gets on the Firefighters for filing a suit. The same folks print as gospel anything put out by Matt Angle at the Lone Star Project, Matt the brother of J.D. Angle the campaign consultant for Davis, the significant other of the Councilman Joel Burns who tryed to swear himself in early to help Davis campaign. Oh what a web there is almost like trying to dot the lines of what Rivercrest family is married to what other Rivercrest family.

That’s an interesting point about standing regarding Trinity Trees. You are also correct about the previous suit being dismissed over standing, but another issue the last time around that could come into play again on this suit is timing. The courts didn’t look favorably on the timing of the suit last time, and I imagine that the courts will wonder why Brimer waited six months to file suit. When the dust settles on all of this, I believe that the courts will not want get involved in this suit.

You make another interesting point about the district map. How did the Republican get Brimer into this mess when they drew the lines several years ago? However, I think this election will be won or lost in the Mid-Cities. Wendy has good name ID and rep in Fort Worth and I think she will be hard to dislodge there. Will she play well in traditional Republican voting precincts in Arlington and H-E-B? We’ll see. She’s got a pretty compelling story — single mom who worked her way up from TCJC to Harvard and became a successful small business woman. If she’s able to get that story across, she could do well. If Eppstein is able to just get voters to think Wendy=Hillary, it could be a tough go.

But that’s where I think something else could come in to play — the down-ticket ramifications of the presidential election. Will some conservatives who are unhappy with McCain just stay home? Will droves of first-time voters for Obama come out and cast straight-ticket votes for the Dems?

However, its easy to see how Brimer is scared. An incumbent with his track record running so close an opponent this far out from the election is not a good sign.

No, Senator Brimer’s critical mistake was in allowing his district to become dominated by Fort Worth. When he was originally elected to the seat the district was almost wholly an Arlington district. So while he is technically an incumbent, he lacks name recognition in Fort Worth.

You make a good point about the “throw da bums out!” sentiment. That may carry Ms. Davis to victory. However, my feeling is that is more of a national thing. Texans tend to keep their politicians feeding at the public trough for long periods. If you look at the precincts that make up that district they all went heavily for President Bush last time. Yes, Fort Worth’s demographics and politics are changing. But I’m guessing they haven’t changed that much. My predication: Brimer 54% Davis 46%.

(In the interest of full disclosure let me say that years ago I did a little bit of work on a personal project for Senator Brimer. However, I have actually never met the man in person.)

How can people not know Mr. Brimer? Didn’t he get us the NFL Network so we can watch Cowboys games?

My answer is no. Here is some language from an XTO lease, “lessee is prohibited and shall not establish a drill pad site on land bordering the street of Eighth Avenue between the two subdivisions nor bordering the same two neighborhood subdivisions of Berkeley Place and Ryan Place. Any such action by lessee to utilitze any 8th Ave. drill site location shall immediately serve to void this lease in its entirety…”

I see your point now. That never occured to me that people might’ve actually signed a lease thinking that action, in and of itself, was going to keep a well from going in on 8th. Anytime I talked to someone about it I made sure to discuss the fact that it wasn’t like we were stopping the drilling outright, but just removing our acreage from any activity on that site - and this might be a difficult concept for some to grasp.
Was it actually mentioned at the BPA meeting? I really thought it was - but if it wasn’t at that one particular meeting, I would certainly contend it was discussed at some point in some form of communication about 8th avenue. But I’ve been learning about the issue and discussing it for so long now, it may have not been mentioned and I would’ve thought it had been.

I spoke to many at that time who believed that they were guaranteeing the 8th Ave site could not be used at all. Nobody at either of the two Neighborhood Association meetings I went to told people that there was the possibility that Chesapeake could still use the site to produce different minerals. (I wasn’t at your meeting, Chris… did anyone explicitly explain this to your members?)

Because the neighborhoods I visited omitted this, nobody believed me when I tried to explain that Chesapeake could still drill from that site, regarless of their XTO lease signing party. Oh well.

Chesapeake always had access to the site, and all the leases meant was that they couldn’t produce Berkeley, Mistletoe, or Ryan Place minerals from that site. Nothing was ever in place to prevent them from drilling North or South.

Horizontal drilling is a bitch. Even if nobody in a neighborhood sign a lease, they might have to deal with a drilling rig that is producing others’ minerals.

The only ironclad ways to stop drilling in your neighborhood are either going to be city regulation or divine intervention. Since I’ve learned not to count on the former when it comes to the Barnett Shale, I’m going to keep hoping for the latter.

I agree with Chris’s take on the XTO leases. It seems that Chesapeake would be bound by the terms of the lease even if they bought them from XTO. I would also be curious about the $8.7 million figure in Steve’s Deep Throat email. To my mind, it would take a lot more than $8.7 million in improvements along 8th to make any headway with the neighborhoods.

And now it makes sense. Acapulco = beach = bamboo. I get it.

I’m glad it is being opened by someone with some experience in the restaurant business. The finish out looks amazing, but the quality of the food will determine this place’s longevity. I do wonder how the tequila bar aspect will play out – will it stay open past normal dining hours and become more of a bar at night?

The person who’s email you’ve posted has some extremely important points - most importantly that the original plans called for many more wells than 2. This is bad. I think the math is a little off, however, but the point of 2 years of inconvenience (to put it mildly, and please don’t rip me apart for thar word choice) - it’s probably pretty close to accurate. Either way it’s a whole lot of frac-ing and a whole lot of trucks and a whole lot of risk to introduce to nearby homeowners.

But I’m a little concerned/confused by the latter part of the email that says those who signed leases and thought they were protected were fools. Just so that everyone understands, the leases offered by XTO for the neighborhoods surrounding 8th contained language that specifically prohibits a high-impact well being built adjacent to the neighborhoods. (In the interest of full disclosure, I signed one of those, so I may, in fact, be a fool)

By signing, you were removing your tiny acreage from the acreage available to the 8th Avenue pad site, thus limiting the viability of the pad site.

Does it specifically “protect” you from a well in your backyard? No, it does not because the acreage of a home is tiny compare to the acreage of the railyard and the other properties being pooled for the 8th avenue site. But, if XTO were to buy my little lease from Chesapeake, they would be buying a lease that specifically prohibits drilling in a high-impact area, so they would have bought an agreement that prohibits the very wells in question. That’s kind of the purpose of having the language in the lease.

Now of course, if these leases expires becuase our minerals haven’t been exploited, then we’re back to square one.

However, you must return the favor when the 8th Ave site comes up for hearing again.

I hope Mayor Mikey and the rest of council is reading this site and listening to most of FW when deciding on the new regs. I know Joel is on our side.

Don, I’m buying my pitchfork tomorrow for the 1820’s style Frankenstein mobbing of Mayor Mikey!!!

One fact that I have not seen pointed out is that Chesapeake is requesting to drill
18 (EIGHTEEN) wells at the 8th Ave. site.

If you attended the first meeting on gas drilling at Daggett Elementary where
Chesapeake presented their plans for 8th Ave. you will remember that at that time
they were going to request 10 (ten) wells. At that time ten wells meant an
approximate time frame of 450 days or approximately one and a half years. Now IF
the 8th Ave. drill site is permitted the neighborhoods would be looking at
approximately two years and three months of drilling. Two years of noise. Two
years of trucks on 8th Ave. Two years of fracing. Two years of misery for the
surrounding neighborhood residents.

Another interesting “fact” that has not published is that Chesapeake has $8.7
million to spend on the 8th Ave. drill site. Why so much? Because the 8th Ave.
drill site is going to be their “urban drilling well site model.” This will be
their “showplace” to prove to the City and the Nation that “urban drilling can be
done and be beneficial to the surrounding communities.”

XTO has certainly kept quite on the 8th Ave. drill site uproar. Is there a reason
for this? Too busy acquiring Hunt Oil? Or could it be because there is nothing in
the neighborhood XTO lease agreement that prevents XTO from selling their leases to
Chesapeake? Or will XTO buy the drill site from Chesapeake? They would only have
to wait till 2010 when the leases expire. I can’t image Chesapeake spending so much
money on eighteen wells when they will only drill north, west, and south - leaving
out everything to the east. There will be some form of an exchange between these
two companies - and the neighborhoods who thought that they had “protected”
themselves from gas wells in their backyard will learn that they were fools.

Acapulco Taco Stand andTequila Bar is opening there. It’s the latest from chef Paul Willis, who at various stops in his career has devised menus for (1) Lucille’s, (2) H3 Ranch, (3) Cabo Grill, (4) the newer Margie’s and (5) Fuzzy’s.

He says it’ll be more flashy than Fuzzy’s, with a selection of tequilas.

No opening date yet.

If can ever help, don’t hesitate to call — 817-390-7538.

The people I have spoken to close to the issue with the Eighth Avenue drilling site have said just what Chris said: Chesapeake contends they must apply for a permit or they’ll be sued by Bill Davis.

If this were true there would be hundreds of such lawsuits, basically every time a lease expired. I have never heard of such a suit, nor have I seen a clause in any lease that said anything would happen (other than the lease terminating). If the lease was not expiring you could also declare force majeure, which is what Chesapeake did in Haltom City when they could not get a permit.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Force_majeure

I ask this rhetorical question because, that is precisely what is happening in east Fort Worth at a potential drill site adjacent to Tandy Hills Natural Area. This privately owned site is one of the last remaining pieces of original, FW prairie. It is, perhaps, more incredible than Tandy Hills, itself. Chesapeake wants to build a road through it and drill several gas wells - maybe compressor stations, too.

This site is also adjacent to and part of the West Meadowbrook neighborhood. The Carter Ave. pipeline that Chesapeake wants to run through 4 blocks of front yards (http://startelegram.typepad.com/barnett_shale/files/eastside_neighbors_oppose_natural_gas_pipeline.htm) would connect this site with the one at I-30 and Riverside.

I say all this to remind and plead with southside residents to come support your eastside brethren and sistren when the time comes. That time will be in mid July at a public meeting TBA. This site is our line in the sand. We need you to support us as we have and will continue to support you.

One lesson we should all get from urban gas drilling is that, WE CAN NO LONGER BE NIMBY’S. It’s a disgrace that our town has come to this, but if we have to live with gas wells we must work together, for all neighborhoods to, not just limit the damage but demand and end to the tyranny of gas extractors. One reason this happened is that, the drillers divided and conquered us, one bonus check at a time.

I agree with John, above. Maybe we need a city-wide, 70’s style protest, whatever that means. I imagine he means a mass demonstration of resistance. If this issue does not cry out for an act of civil disobedience, I don’t know what does.

To begin, let me say I never meant to impugn the trustworthiness of the neighborhood associations’ leadership, and I apologize if I came across that way. In my experience they are great people who probably do not get enough credit for their hard work on our behalf.

If, as you imply, these talks are just a courtesy and will lead to a better understanding between all parties involved, that’s great. I think that might raise the issue of how there could be good faith talks if the neighborhoods already know they can’t be swayed, but that is neither here nor there. I guess the whispers I’ve heard have just given me a different take on the situation. I get the impression that Chesapeake/GT put something on the table that is worth deliberation, and the continued talks are necessary to hash out some more details before the neighborhoods can give it further consideration. Could this impression be entirely off base? Possibly, maybe probably. But given the change in tone during the last week I don’t think it’s imprudent to bring it up and ask for a more thorough explanation.

On what grounds could Davis sue Chesapeake? They have probably spent $50,000 just trying to get the variance. If anything, he would sue the City of Ft. Worth for inversely condemning his land.

But as John says we can converse with Chesapeake and discuss things intelligently. They really seem to want neighborhood buy-in. Are they going to get it? Somehow I doubt it - unless they can convince Sue Richards (Invisible Girl-Fantastic Four) to do her thing and make a force-field around the drill pad that also keeps out all noise from the frac-process and completely assures the safety of all residents.

But, can everyone get together to talk? Sure. Talking’s always a worthwhile process that reasonable people should engage in. If nothing else, we can all politely agree to disagree and the neighborhoods will not support drilling - and then I would hope that Chesapeake would understand that people really really really don’t want gas wells within 200-300 feet of their homes in the middle of the city(!For cryin’ out loud)

And no, the head of the various associations don’t have an agenda to dupe you and weren’t trying just get Chesapeake back to the table for some more dealing. If you’re feeling “burned” or “used” by the fact that your neighborhood association reps are talking to the Chesapeake, I would submit to you that dozens of people have been actually working hard on this issue for over a year to actually understand it and determine what can be done about it.

The neighborhood leaders are just acting like adults and showing good faith in talking with Chesapeake. All the leaders are aware of all the “bad” stuff and will ultimately do right by the residents of each of those neighborhoods. I am absolutely, 100% against the site as well.

I don’t think there is a larger agenda and its absurd to think that those leaders would do that to their own neighborhoods.

My hope is that Chesapeake will do the right thing and withdraw the variance completely. But I think Bill Davis would love that b/c he would get to sue them and make even more money.