Coppell Chronicle Vol. 1, No. 13

The Last Word on Masks • Old Town Boutique to Get Bigger Home • Restaurants Need Lots of Help • Runoff Voting Begins Tomorrow

The Last Word on Masks

Texas Gov. Gregg Abbott must enjoy infinite wisdom. He doesn’t want the federal government sticking its nose into the Lone Star State’s business, but he has no problem telling Texas municipalities how to handle their affairs. From his perspective, only the level of government he controls knows what’s best.

To that end, the governor issued an executive order on Tuesday that prohibits counties, cities, and school districts from requiring masks after June 5. Any local officials who violate his executive order are subject to fines of up to $1,000.

Consequently, Coppell ISD Superintendent Brad Hunt announced on Tuesday that masks will be optional for the 2021-22 school year. That decision was in the works before the governor issued his executive order, but the superintendent announced the policy change ASAP, presumably to ward off another round of anti-mask comments from parents during tomorrow’s Board of Trustees meeting.

(Personally, I’ve never been bothered by wearing a mask, because it made me like some of my biggest heroes. If Spider-Man, The Mandalorian, and Pudge Rodriguez could do their finest work with their noses and mouths covered, they surely I can endure masking up long enough to grab some eggs and milk from the dairy section.)

In the same announcement, Hunt also said CISD will not offer any type of virtual learning during the upcoming school year, for two reasons:

1. The Legislature has not yet approved any funding for virtual learning beyond the semester that ends Wednesday.

2. CISD received a “low number of applications” for its proposed Virtual Academy.

I asked the district for more specifics regarding that “low number,” and I was told fewer than 5 percent of CISD families applied.

With the governor’s executive order in place, I’m confident (and hopeful) that this will be the final Coppell Chronicle article about masks. If it’s not, then either the COVID-19 pandemic roared back in a big way or we were hit with an entirely different worldwide health scare. Perish the thought.

Enough about masks. Let’s discuss other items of clothing.  

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Old Town Boutique to Get Bigger Home

The Coppell City Council had a vague item on the “executive session” portion of their April 27 agenda: “Discussion regarding property located south of Bethel Road and west of S. Coppell Road.” At the very end of that meeting, the council unanimously approved a motion to sell “property generally located at Lot 3R, Block D of the Old Town Addition” to the Coppell Economic Development Foundation “for economic development purpose of construction and maintenance of a two story retail/office and residential space for the sale price of $171,000.”

On Thursday, we got more information about this real estate deal during a rare meeting of the Coppell Economic Development Foundation’s board. The property in question is the vacant lot at 755 W. Main St. The city is selling the land to the foundation, so the foundation can immediately sell it to Gary and Michele Cramer. They’re the owners of Let It Shine, a boutique around the corner from the vacant lot.

Mindi Hurley, the city’s Director of Community Development, told the foundation’s board that the Cramers approached the city about buying the lot because they have outgrown the Houston Street building where they have sold women’s clothing since 2015. Hurley said the Cramers want to construct a two-story building that will allow them to live above their store; I confirmed those plans with the Cramers when I stopped by Let It Shine on Saturday.

(Side note: I’d never been in Let It Shine before, so I’d never met the Cramers, who reside in Tarrant County. As Mr. Cramer kindly answered my series of fact-checking questions, Mrs. Cramer said with a smile, “This is more information than we give our preacher!”)

I don’t know much about the Coppell Economic Development Foundation, or why the city couldn’t sell the property directly to the Cramers. Because I write this newsletter on weekends, I didn’t want to pester any city employees for an explanation on their days off. But as I looked into the foundation’s recent history, I discovered there’s not much to know.

The foundation’s board met only once in 2020, and that December meeting lasted just 17 minutes. In that short amount of time, the board approved the minutes of their lone meeting of 2019, elected their officers, and adopted a resolution ratifying their actions in 2019.

That resolution couldn’t have taken long to draft or review. According to the minutes of their December 2019 meeting, which lasted all of two minutes, here’s all the actions they took that year: approve the minutes of their November 2018 meeting and adopt a resolution ratifying their actions in 2018.

The board met for almost 15 minutes on Thursday morning, and thanks to this real estate deal, they actually had something interesting to do — you know, besides approve the minutes of their December 2020 meeting and adopt a resolution ratifying their actions in 2020.

“From time to time, we will have these types of meetings to handle these types of items,” Hurley said of the real estate deal, “but they are few and far between.”

During Thursday’s meeting, Hurley gave the newer board members — and yours truly — a brief history lesson, and as a storyteller, I really appreciated that she began her spiel with “once upon a time.” The land we know today as Old Town Coppell was sold to the city by Don Carter, the original owner of the Dallas Mavericks. When it was nothing but soccer fields, the city had multiple offers from industrial developers who wanted to fill it with more warehouses.

“The city refused every one of those offers because they had a vision for this walkable, pedestrian-friendly, mixed-use development,” Hurley said.

In 2013, the city entered into an agreement with a group of developers called Main Street Coppell, Hurley said. Main Street Coppell bought lots in a series of transactions and had options to purchase more. But in 2018, after dozens of townhomes and a handful of commercial buildings were in place, the city paid $335,000 to Main Street Coppell, terminating the group’s options to buy the two remaining properties.

Given the square footage of the lot that’s being sold to the Cramers, Hurley calculated its 2018 sales price as $121,000. After the foundation’s board unanimously approved a motion authorizing its president, Aaron Straach, to sign documents for a $171,000 sale, board member Jeff Roller jokingly said, “Good to go, Aaron. You just made us $50,000.” Straach’s tongue-in-cheek reply: “I do what I can for the city.”

One other property was part of that $335,000 transaction in 2018: 446 Houston St., the vacant lot due east of Twisted Root Burger Co. At the end of Thursday’s meeting, Straach asked about the prospects for that piece of land. Hurley said there’s nothing to report, but the City Council really wants to see a restaurant on that site. Considering the pandemic’s effect on the food-service industry, it may be a while before we get any news on that front.

Speaking of Twisted Root …

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Restaurants Need Lots of Help

Twisted Root Burger Co. announced on Facebook that it will reopen at 11 a.m. on Wednesday, after being shuttered by the pandemic for more than a year. That reopening date is subject to hiring enough employees by then.

The people who run Twisted Root are so desperate for staffers, they’ve made this offer: If you refer a prospective employee to them, and that person works at Twisted Root for at least three months, then you get a free burger every month for a year.

This problem isn’t unique to Twisted Root. The nationwide labor issues that are plaguing the restaurant industry have been covered by CNN, NPR, and The Dallas Morning News, among other media outlets.

To put a hyper-local spin on it, I spent part of my Saturday afternoon conducting an inventory of every restaurant in Coppell. I saw “Help Wanted” or “Now Hiring” signs outside the following eateries:

[deep breath]

• 151 Coffee

• Cicis Pizza

• Dairy Queen

• Domino’s Pizza

• Dunkin’

• Einstein Bros. Bagels

• Hard Eight BBQ

• Jersey Mike’s Subs

• J. Macklin’s Grill

• Liberation Coffee Co.

• Little Greek Fresh Grill

• Local Diner

• Palio’s Pizza Cafe

• Papa John’s Pizza

• Pizza Hut (both locations)

• Schlotsky’s

• Smashburger

• Smoothie Factory

• Sonic

• Subway (the Eleanor’s Square location but not the other two)

• Taco Bell

• Twisted Root Burger Co.

• Wendy’s (both locations)

• Whataburger

• Wingstop

• Zoe’s Kitchen

There are also “Now Hiring” signs outside Market Street. Although most restaurants won’t hire someone younger than 16, I confirmed with a Market Street manager that the supermarket hires baggers at 15.

Moral of the story: If your teenager tells you he or she can’t find a summer job, he or she isn’t trying hard enough.

Speaking of people looking for a job …

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Runoff Voting Begins Tomorrow

Early voting begins tomorrow for the runoff election between Davin Bernstein and Don Carroll, who are vying to complete Wes Mays’ unexpired term on the Coppell City Council. (Mays was elected mayor on May 1.)

Early voting will happen at Coppell Town Center, between the listed times on these dates:

• May 24-27, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.

• May 28, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.

• May 29, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.

• May 30, 1 to 6 p.m.

• June 1, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.

If you work outside Coppell, one of these early voting locations may be more convenient.

On Election Day (June 5), you can vote between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. at Coppell Town Center or any of these Coppell elementary schools: Cottonwood Creek, Lakeside, Mockingbird, Riverchase, or Wilson.

I linked to the two candidates’ websites above. If you’re still trying to decide who will get your vote, here are some other resources:

• My questionnaire for the Place 3 candidates

• The Dallas Morning News’ Voter Guide, which includes Q&As with each candidate

• The League of Women Voters’ questionnaire

• The Coppell Chamber of Commerce’s video interviews with each candidate

• The video of the Neighbors for an Informed Electorate (NICE) forum, which both candidates attended

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Community Calendar

▪ The Coppell High School baseball team has swept Denton Guyer, Jesuit, and Prosper in the first three rounds of the playoffs. Next up is Keller in the regional semifinals; the schedule for that round had not been released by the time I sent this. If the Cowboys get past Keller, they’ll face either Southlake Carroll or Flower Mound Marcus for the regional championship.

▪ Wednesday is the last day of classes for Coppell ISD. A guided hike through the Coppell Nature Center that evening may be a good way for you and your kids to decompress from all of the Zooming over the past year or so.

▪ The Coppell Arts Center will host a drive-in screening of Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Cinderella on Saturday evening.