Coppell Chronicle Vol. 2, No. 39

Old Town Business Owners Oppose Proposal • Mathew's Term Has Dramatic Start • Where Are All the Kindergartners? • One Department for Many Experiences

Old Town Business Owners Oppose Proposal

The Coppell City Council is expected to debate the merits of moving this church during a Dec. 13 meeting.

The fate of a long-dormant church in Old Town Coppell is up to the City Council, which may make a decision next month. On Thursday evening, people on both sides of the issue got to practice their arguments.

The Coppell Planning and Zoning Commission held a public hearing on a proposal by developer Chris Collins to replace the church and its attached annex with six mixed-use buildings. The city’s staff recommended approval of Collins’ plans with a long list of conditions, and the final one was added on Thursday morning: “Demolition or removal of the buildings shall require City Council consideration.”  

Collins, who has a contract to purchase the church property at 509 W. Bethel Road from Steven Chadick, said Thursday’s hearing was the result of a process that began in March. The hearing was delayed twice while Collins worked with city officials and the Coppell Historical Society on ideas to preserve the buildings.

“I take this personally as an issue that needs to be resolved and worked out, for the entire city,” Collins said. “But at the same time, if this doesn’t move forward, someone is going to develop it.”

The owners of nearby businesses that occupy older buildings showed up Thursday to voice their opposition:

• Sarah Carrick of Jacaranda Gift Shop: “If we don’t protect this southwest corner of Bethel and Main, a precedent will be set for the remaining corners of this intersection. This means, in a matter of a few years, the essence of Old Town will cease to exist.”

• Nathaniel Pugh of Tattered Style: “Restaurants and retail are the life of a town. Following through with the demolition of these buildings will result in offices, as we’ve already seen — not new restaurants, not unique retail shops. Can you think of one citizen of Coppell who wants more offices? Me neither.”

• Joe Shirley of Bethel Road Barber Shop: “We need to come up with a new name for the area. If it’s not going to be Old Town, maybe it needs to be New Town Coppell.”

[Announcer’s voice: “We interrupt this article to bring you a message from the City of Coppell, which encourages all residents to support local businesses on Small Business Saturday. Now, back to the newsletter.”]

The commissioners also heard from former mayor Candy Sheehan, who implored them to maintain the city’s vision for Old Town.

“You’ve had previous council members and commissioners and elected officials and city managers fight for that vision. We need to keep it,” Sheehan said. “You know, having more look-alike businesses come in wasn’t the vision.”

Presenting a different point of view was Jeff Varnell, a former chairman of the Coppell Chamber of Commerce, which once used the church as its headquarters. Varnell deemed it a “deficient” building due to a variety of issues, including holes in the floors and leaks in the HVAC system.

“The building is old. It’s certainly not historic,” he said. “If that building was worth having, the Chamber would have bought it.”

As reported in last week’s edition, Coppell Historical Society President Chris Long has asked the council to consider moving the church — and the Cottage Salon across the street — to the vacant lot in front of the Coppell Senior and Community Center. Long envisions the church being an affordable venue for meetings while anchoring a village of artisans’ shops and pop-up businesses.

Greg Frnka, the architect designing Collins’ mixed-used buildings, estimated that Long’s idea would cost $3.3 million to execute. That estimate will need to be revised, because Long told the commission on Thursday that Jean Murph no longer wants her house at 532 S. Coppell Road to be part of the proposed village. (Collins has contracts on the land under Murph’s house and the Cottage Salon.)

Commissioner Jim Walker brought up the fact that Collins has pledged $130,000 to help pay for the potential relocation, and he asked whether a GoFundMe could be established to make up the difference. Collins said that would be more productive than the petition to save the buildings that, as of noon today, had more than 900 signatures.

“Somebody’s got to start somewhere,” Collins said of the funds he has offered. “If I create a problem, I want to be part of the solution.”

Walker expressed the prevailing sentiment of the commissioners, who took a series of 5-1 votes on Collins’ proposals, when he said, “I respect the right of the person who owns it to sell it, and I respect the right of a gentleman who’s come in and tried to do everything he can to show good faith to the community and the Historical Society and to the neighbors to design it and build it in a way that at least comports with what’s already there.”

The dissenting opinion in each of those 5-1 votes came from Commission Chair Edmund Haas, who had concerns about the density and height of Collins’ proposed buildings as designed by Frnka.

“It just feels a little too heavy,” Haas said, “and I’m just a little concerned that it’s too much.”

The City Council will have their say on Dec. 13.

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Mathew’s Term Has Dramatic Start

Jobby Mathew joined the Coppell ISD Board of Trustees on Monday, when he was warmly welcomed by all but one of his new colleagues.

Mathew replaced Tracy Fisher, who had to resign after more than 10 years as a trustee because she was a candidate for the State Board of Education. He represents new blood on the school board in two other ways. Not only is Mathew the first Irving resident to become a Coppell ISD trustee, his son and daughter attend the district’s newest school, Canyon Ranch Elementary.

“We had always heard about Coppell ISD, and how great it was, even before, with friends and family who lived here, and that’s why we intentionally moved here, to be in this district,” he said after taking his seat on the dais.

An attorney for Microsoft, Mathew has a long record of service to Coppell ISD, including time on the Student Health Advisory Council and the Bond Steering Committee. Until last week, he was the president of the Coppell ISD Education Foundation. His wife, Santhi Mathew, is an assistant principal at Rockbrook Elementary School in Lewisville ISD.

“Seeing the dedication and love she has for kids, and just helping them, really inspired me to want to get involved,” Mathew said, “and I’m very grateful to be in the position that I am.”

Mathew was one of 14 people who expressed interest in replacing Fisher during an application window that was open for nine days. During that same period, the community was invited to weigh in on whether a temporary replacement was needed before next May’s election.

On Monday, Board President David Caviness said the trustees received many great applications, “and we had a pretty lively conversation surrounding that.” (We’ll have to take his word for it, because that conversation happened behind closed doors.) Superintendent Brad Hunt said all 14 applications were posted on the CISD website for the sake of transparency.

Neena Biswas begged to differ. Before Caviness could entertain a motion to adjourn Monday’s special meeting, which was convened only so Mathew could be sworn in, Biswas said, “I believe this process was extremely not transparent.” She said the community wanted Fisher’s seat to remain open until the May election. “I don’t know who overruled that decision.”

I can help clear up that mystery. As chronicled in last week’s edition, Nichole Bentley made a motion during the board’s Nov. 7 meeting to leave Fisher’s seat vacant. Anthony Hill seconded that motion, which failed on a 3-2 vote, with Biswas being absent. (She was present before the trustees went into their extended closed session.) Manish Sethi then made a motion to appoint Mathew; Caviness seconded that motion, which passed 5-0.

“I don’t believe it was a fair process,” Biswas said on Monday, but her commentary was paused when Bentley made a motion to adjourn. That motion was approved, 6-1, and you know who cast the dissenting vote.

Biswas had more to say during the board’s regular meeting, which immediately followed the special meeting. She said she could not vote to approve the minutes of the Nov. 7 meeting, which indicate she bounced after 20 minutes. Biswas said she walked out to protest the “sham” process that led to Mathew’s appointment. Without attribution, she said someone referred to the rubric used to score the 14 applications as “Brad’s rubric.” She also said, “There was a lot of involvement with people who do not need to be involved, if this was truly a board decision.”

Leigh Walker told Biswas she disagreed “with almost everything you have said,” and Sethi disputed specific points. He said what Biswas called “Brad’s rubric” was created by the board’s three officers (Caviness, Hill, and Bentley), and the community’s input on whether or not to appoint a replacement for Fisher was “all over the place.”

In May, members of the community who bother to vote will get to decide who replaces Fisher for the final 12 months of her vacated term. They’ll also decide who will fill the seats held by Biswas and Caviness for the next three years.

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Where Are All the Kindergartners?

Any parent of a young child can tell you that kindergartners are problematic in general, but this year’s crop of Coppell ISD kindergartners are problematic for a specific reason.

Demographer Bob Templeton gave one of his periodic reports to the Board of Trustees on Monday, and one of his key takeaways was that lower kindergarten enrollment may lead to changing long-term enrollment patterns for the district.

Four years ago, Coppell ISD had about 80 more 12th-graders than kindergartners. This school year, the difference between the two grades is more than 300 students.

Templeton said the size of the current kindergarten class (723 students) is significantly lower than what he forecasted, which he said was “somewhat problematic.” The kindergarten enrollment is always the first number he looks at it, because “it just sets the tone for an overall change.”

Templeton said the dwindling kindergarten numbers can be partly attributed to the national birth rate going down. But he said it’s also due to the pandemic-fueled expansion of home schooling, as well as the growing number of charter schools.

Charter schools can be attractive to younger families out of convenience, Templeton said, because most of them educate kindergartners through eighth-graders on one campus. Families tend to return to public schools after the middle-school years, he said, because charters can’t compete with public ISDs when it comes to extracurricular activities such as fine arts and sports.

However, the two charter schools I know of in Coppell don’t follow that model. Coppell Classical Academy goes through fifth grade only, while Universal Academy goes all the way through 12th grade.

Two of Templeton’s other key takeaways were that Coppell ISD added more than 200 students this year, but the district is likely to reach its peak total enrollment within the next two years.

His fourth and final key takeaway was that rising interest rates have tempered demand for housing.

Between the spring and fall of this year, Templeton said, the average home price in Coppell has risen from $343,200 to $365,700. Thanks to the doubling of interest rates, he said, the average monthly mortgage payment jumped from $1,905 to $2,765, an increase of 45 percent.

“Your housing stock is very strong, but it’s also very expensive,” he told the school board. “There’s not a lot of what I could call affordable housing, or housing that’s under $350,000, so therefore, it’s harder for younger families with really young kids to buy in the district.”

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One Department for Many Experiences

Back in June, I reported that the staff of the Coppell Parks & Recreation Department was kicking around ideas for a new name that would encompass the broad scope of their responsibilities, which include a performing arts center, a cemetery, and a library.

This month, Director Jessica Carpenter informed the Parks and Recreation Board of her department’s next name: Community Experiences.

“Now that Parks & Rec and the library are fully integrated — we’re programming together, and we’re doing all things together — it does make sense now,” Carpenter said during the Nov. 7 board meeting. “It really made sense a long time ago when we took on Rolling Oaks Memorial Center, when we took on the Arts Center, and now since the library is up underneath us, it’s really expanded what traditional Parks & Recreation does in most communities. Our purview is much larger.”

Carpenter said the Community Experiences Department will roll out a new logo, a new mission statement, and other branding initiatives in 2023.

“We’ll look a little bit different, but we’ll still offer all of the same amazing things for the community,” she said.

Two other City of Coppell departments have been rebranded this year. Last month, the Finance Department changed its name to the Strategic Financial Engagement Department. In July, Human Resources assumed the alias of Employee EXperience, with a capital X. City spokeswoman Hannah Cook said that letter has officially been lowercased, which pleases this wordsmith.

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Chronicle Crumbs

• Things to keep an eye on if you’re a tenant or a landlord: On Nov. 8, for the third time in as many meetings, the Coppell City Council had a closed-door discussion regarding “enforcement of Building and Maintenance Code for substandard buildings and structures for Riverchase Apartments.” They also had a private chat “concerning legal authority to regulate short term rentals” for the second time in three meetings.

• A section of the trail that connects Andrew Brown Park West to Andrew Brown Park Central will be closed for at least six weeks, starting tomorrow. Click here for more details.

• Dec. 2 is the deadline to nominate a Coppell ISD teacher or student for a Super Star award.

• AutoZone is moving into Valley Ranch Centre, the shopping complex on the southeast corner of MacArthur Boulevard and Belt Line Road. Its rival O’Reilly Auto Parts is firmly entrenched on the northeast corner. Vroom, vroom.

• Wild Fork Foods — a purveyor of high-quality meats with stores in Lewisville, Frisco, Prosper, and Wylie — plans to open a new location on the northeast corner of MacArthur Boulevard and State Highway 161. The Irving City Council approved the required zoning change on Nov. 10.

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Community Calendar

A Little House Christmas: Theatre Coppell will stage nine performances of a Christmas story based on Laura Ingalls Wilder’s series of Little House on the Prairie books. The first show is scheduled for 8 p.m. on Dec. 2 at the Coppell Arts Center.

The Nutcracker: Ballet Ensemble of Texas, which is based in Coppell, will present four performances of the Christmas classic — 2 and 7 p.m. on Dec. 3, plus 2 and 6 p.m. on Dec. 4 — at the Irving Arts Center.

Holiday Parade and Tree Lighting: The parade down Samuel and Parkway boulevards will begin at 6 p.m. on Dec. 3, and the tree lighting will follow at Andrew Brown Park East. If you’d like to have a float in the parade, you need to register by 5 p.m. on Nov. 25.

Change the World Animal Event: Members of Girl Scout Troop 7236 will be at the Cozby Library and Community Commons between 1 and 2:30 p.m. on Dec. 4 to raise awareness of animals that are up for adoption. Attendees will have an opportunity to make pet toys and win door prizes. For more information, email troop7236@hotmail.com.

HarpEssence Holiday Concert: You can listen to four concert grand harps at 3 p.m. on Dec. 4 at the Coppell Arts Center. Admission is free.

Holiday Craft Fair: Crafters from the Coppell Senior and Community Center will have a variety of items — including knitted and crocheted items, tote bags, and ornaments — at the Cozby Library and Community Commons from 1 to 4 p.m. on Dec. 10 and 11.