Coppell Chronicle Vol. 2, No. 50
Plans Heat Up for Fifth Fire Station • Council Stands Pat on Homestead Exemptions • More City Facilities Have Gone Cashless • Rappers Have Found a Home in Coppell
Good afternoon to all of my new subscribers who signed up after reading an unprompted (but much-appreciated) shout-out in the “Moms of Coppell” group on Facebook. Word-of-mouth promotions like that are always welcome.
Speaking of moms, the mother of my children reminded me that Saturday was the 22nd anniversary of us becoming a couple. (Marriage would follow 15 months later.) If we hadn’t gotten together at that time, then we wouldn’t have started having kids in 2005. If we hadn’t started having kids, then we most likely wouldn’t have moved to Coppell in 2012. And if we hadn’t moved to Coppell, then I certainly wouldn’t have launched this newsletter in 2021.
The butterfly effect is wild, man.
Plans Heat Up for Fifth Fire Station
Last week’s edition included unsubstantiated speculation from your correspondent about the fate of Austin Elementary School. When I wrote that, I didn’t know the Coppell City Council had OK’d the idea of constructing a new fire station on that campus’s doorstep.
That informal approval happened on Jan. 28, during the council’s budget retreat, when Fire Chief Kevin Richardson presented an update of a proposal that I chronicled last September. At that time, Richardson said building a fifth fire station on Moore Road would cost $7.5 million. Since then, the estimate has crept up to $9 million thanks to inflation.
On Jan. 28, Richardson again explained that the National Fire Protection Association says firefighters should be able to reach 90 percent of their coverage area within four minutes. He said establishing a fifth station on Moore Road would ensure that Coppell’s bravest could reach 91 percent of their coverage area in 240 seconds or less.
Richardson said his department has implemented improvements to reduce firefighters’ travel time, but they are limited to reaching 86 percent of their coverage area within four minutes, due to the locations of Coppell’s four fire stations.
“We can’t teleport,” he said. “We just can’t do it.”
The map above is labeled “Option 3” because the Fire Department had explored other options, including moving Fire Station 1 to land that Coppell ISD owns on Sanders Loop, near the intersection of East Belt Line Road and South Belt Line Road. City Council Member John Jun asked about that option on Jan. 28, and Richardson reminded the council that the Sanders Loop property is within the City of Dallas. Setting aside the philosophical question of building a Coppell fire station in another municipality, Richardson said he didn’t relish the idea of navigating the permitting process at Dallas City Hall.
City Manager Mike Land said he talked to Coppell ISD Superintendent Brad Hunt before Richardson’s previous briefing about the properties on Sanders Loop and Moore Road. The City of Coppell owns the latter land, which was the original home of Fire Station 2 before becoming a venue for Theatre Coppell and other arts groups.
“[Coppell ISD] didn’t have any particular plans for what to do with that property either, because they hadn’t really explored it a lot,” Land said on Jan. 28. “They just knew it was in front of Austin Elementary, and they might have been able to do something with it.”
A few minutes later, Jun asked if there were any other options for the Moore Road property, “other than the possibility of swapping or exchanging with the CISD.” Land then coughed in a way that sounded, to my ears, like “You’re bringing up a topic that shouldn’t be discussed in open session.” (The retreat was recorded on audio but not on video, so I can’t decipher facial expressions as cavalierly as I’m interpreting coughs.)
Richardson presented a timeline that said construction of Fire Station 5 could begin one year from now, with a completion goal of July 2025.
If you have questions about all of this, then you’re in luck: The city has scheduled a neighborhood meeting for Feb. 23, at a time and location to be announced. Feel free to print this flyer and stick it to your fridge.
Council Stands Pat on Homestead Exemptions
Last month’s budget retreat was the first such affair since the City Council opted to increase the homestead exemptions for seniors and disabled residents from $75,000 to $100,000. In preparation for the council’s annual discussion of such exemptions, Director of Strategic Financial Engagement Kim Tiehen created this chart that compares Coppell to our next-door neighbors (Carrollton, Grapevine, Irving, and Lewisville) plus the other two “Metrocrest” cities (Addison and Farmers Branch).
Tiehen noted that Coppell has the third-lowest tax rate in that group, but the two cities with lower rates — Grapevine and Lewisville — have much smaller homestead exemptions for seniors and disabled residents. As she often does, Tiehen reminded the council of the see-saw effect: As exemptions go up, taxable values go down. If taxable values go down, then the tax rate has to go up to maintain revenues.
“If Grapevine and Lewisville were to increase any of their exemptions,” Tiehen said, “to generate the same amount of property tax revenue, their tax rate would need to increase.”
Coppell was able to defy the see-saw effect — our tax rate went down even though our exemptions went up — because the city sold 475 acres near North Lake in late 2021. Another part of the council’s discussion on Jan. 28 involved what to do with the remaining $1.8 million from that sale, which must be spent by the end of this fiscal year (Sept. 30). They opted to earmark it for the design of a new service center plus medians, street lights, and trails along Belt Line Road.
Here’s one more interesting chart from Tiehen’s presentation. It shows that the number of parcels claiming a general homestead exemption has dropped in each of the past two years. Tiehen theorized that may mean Coppell has a growing number of rental properties.
That same chart shows that the number of parcels claiming the additional exemption for seniors and disabled residents has been steadily increasing.
“The story that’s telling me is our seniors are not moving, that they are staying here,” Tiehen said.
The council told her to keep all of Coppell’s exemptions as is for now.
More City Facilities Have Gone Cashless
You may have noticed that City of Coppell facilities are increasingly declining to accept cash as a form of payment. Director of Community Experiences Jessica Carpenter recently presented this timeline to the City Council:
2016 — The concession stand for adult athletics goes cashless.
2017 — The Snack Shack at The CORE’s outdoor pool goes cashless.
2020 — The CORE goes fully cashless during post-COVID reopening.
2020 — The Coppell Arts Center opens as a cashless facility.
2023 — The Coppell Senior and Community Center and the Wagon Wheel Tennis and Pickleball Center go cashless.
“All of these transitions happened extremely smoothly, with very little negative feedback from our customers,” Carpenter said during the council’s Jan. 24 work session.
(Some of that negative feedback was received by Council Members Kevin Nevels and John Jun, who reported later in the meeting that they had a lively discussion with Senior Center patrons who would prefer to flash their cash.)
Carpenter’s tag-team partner during the Jan. 24 briefing was Director of Strategic Financial Engagement Kim Tiehen, who cited two primary reasons for going cashless — to reduce the potential for fraud and to increase safety. Tiehen wasn’t kidding about that second reason. When Jun asked her how many city facilities still accept cash, Tiehen said, “About two.” Jun then asked which two facilities, but Tiehen declined to name them during an open session, for safety’s sake.
A secondary reason for moving away from cash was to eliminate the risk of accepting counterfeit bills. Tiehen said ne’er-do-wells have tried to pass funny money at The CORE and at Coppell’s municipal court.
On Dec. 22, the Cozby Library and Community Commons announced on Facebook that it would be going cashless in 2023. Less than a week later, that announcement was rescinded. Jun asked what the current plan is for the library.
“We put a pause on that for now,” Carpenter said. “We do think that facility could have the opportunity to go cashless.”
With safety in mind, Tiehen said the “very minimal” amount of cash at the library is limited to the copier and vending machines, and City Manager Mike Land added that the library did away with fines for overdue materials years ago. Carpenter said the library may consider a policy of allowing people with library cards to get a certain number of copies for free.
That would align with the experience of a Wagon Wheel Tennis and Pickleball Center patron who wanted to use cash to pay for a Snickers bar last month. This person had no other payment options on them, so the staff said the delicious treat was on the house. Nonetheless, Carpenter said, this conscientious chocoholic came back later with a debit card to settle up.
Rappers Have Found a Home in Coppell
The Grammy for Best Rap Performance will be awarded today, and the nominees include well-known artists such as Doja Cat, Kendrick Lamar, and DJ Khaled. It’s possible that a future edition of this award might go to an up-and-comer such as Big Nardo or DoshisGoCrazy. If so, Coppell will be a chapter in that success story.
Big Nardo and DoshisGoCrazy are two of the performers who have recorded tracks at RZO Sound. Established in Grand Prairie in 2018, the studio moved to an industrial building on South Coppell Road a few years ago. One of its owners, Abraham “HonestE” Alandou, spotted a “For Lease” sign while making deliveries for his day job.
As someone who publishes a newsletter while holding down an unrelated full-time job, I appreciate a quality side hustle. Alandou and his partner, Brad “Brad Easy” Labio, both work for a firm called Fastenal while pursuing their passion in their spare time. They met at the University of North Texas, where Alandou majored in electrical engineering and Labio studied music.
RZO — which stands for resonance, zen, and originality — is a stone’s throw from residences in the Old Coppell Townhomes neighborhood. I asked Alandou if those neighbors can hear the recording sessions, and he said somebody would have to be standing right next to the studio’s windows to do that. However, he admitted that things can get loud in the parking lot at times.
“You always want to do a car test right after you make music,” Alandou said. “If it doesn’t sound right in the car, then it won’t sound right anywhere.”
To be clear, RZO is not exclusively a rap studio. Alandou said their facility is “everyone-friendly. We don’t want to limit ourselves.” However, Labio said, “With the way Dallas is, everyone wants to be a rapper.”
Snoobie92, who boasts a million followers on TikTok, is among the rappers who have recorded tracks at RZO. He said Alandou and Labio provide a great atmosphere for creativity and collaboration. Snoobie92, whose real name is Kenneth Stewart, laughed when I asked whether he would ever have a reason to visit Coppell if RZO weren’t located here.
“Man, that barbecue place,” he said, obviously referencing Hard Eight without coming up with its name. “That would be my main reason right there.”
Chronicle Crumbs
• Among the casualties of last week’s frigid weather was the “community conversation” about Old Town Coppell that had been scheduled for Jan. 31. During the City Council’s budget retreat, John Jun asked whether the announcement of that Old Town forum was too close to the event itself. This answer from Mayor Wes Mays got my attention: “The developer has had conversations with a majority of the council, and we know that his application is going to be coming up very quickly. So, you know, this is one of the few cases where timing was an issue.” As I reported in the Dec. 18 edition, developer Chris Collins is confident about winning the council’s approval of his plans to revamp the southwest corner of Bethel Road and Main Street.
• The Special Olympian who lives in my house would gladly roll strikes and spares on a daily basis, if only his stingy dad would agree. To keep our bowling budget under control, I researched the cheapest options in our surrounding cities. Main Event, which has locations in Grapevine and Lewisville, charges $30 per hour on weeknights plus $4.25 for a pair of shoes. Pinstack in Irving charges $26 per hour on weeknights plus $4.50 for a pair of shoes. But the best deal is at Round 1 in Grapevine: If you bowl on a weeknight or before noon on a Sunday, one game is $6.50 per person, and a pair of shoes costs 4 bucks even.
• Congratulations to Ryan Murphy, who led the Coppell High School varsity girls basketball team to a milestone victory on Friday, when CHS beat Plano East, 38-29. That was the Cowgirls’ 100th win since Murphy became their head coach in 2019.
• Coppell’s Little Greek restaurant, which has been shuttered since late 2021, plans to reopen its doors on Denton Tap Road as early as tomorrow.
Community Calendar
Cozby Cares — Animal Services: Cozby Cares programs are intended to be a fun way for Coppell teens to earn service hours. This week, they will make dog chew toys, as well as no-sew cat or kitten beds, for Animal Services. All materials will be provided. The fun starts at 5:30 p.m. on Wednesday at the Cozby Library and Community Commons.
State of the City: Mayor Wes Mays will review the 2023 vision for our fair suburb during a luncheon scheduled for 11:30 a.m. on Thursday at the Coppell Arts Center.
Coppell Lions Club Pancake Breakfast: The 36th annual fundraiser is scheduled from 8 to 11:30 a.m. on Saturday at the First United Methodist Church of Coppell. Tickets are $5 per person, with $20 being the maximum charge for a family.
Dyslexia Awareness Day: Coppell ISD senior Samantha Saenz will discuss how she overcame her struggles with dyslexia at 10:30 a.m. on Saturday at the Cozby Library and Community Commons. The event will also feature a panel discussion, activity stations, snacks, and prizes.
Texas Black History: Dr. W. Marvin Dulaney, Deputy Director of the African American Museum in Dallas, will discuss why we celebrate Black History Month at 2 p.m. on Saturday at the Cozby Library and Community Commons.
Teen Mardi Gras Celebration: Teenagers are invited to drop by the Cozby Library and Community Commons between 3 and 5:30 p.m. on Feb. 17, when they will be able to learn more about Mardi Gras by eating, dancing, crafting, and answering trivia questions.
The Odd Couple: Theatre Coppell will stage nine performances of Neil Simon’s classic comedy starting on Feb. 17 at the Coppell Arts Center.
Regional Neighborhood Summit: I’d never seen Coppell, Flower Mound, and Lewisville collectively labeled as the “Tri-Cities” until I saw a promo for this event scheduled from 8 a.m. to noon on Feb. 18 at Life Safety Park.
Frost Fest: This free festival for families will feature a variety of snowy activities, no matter what the actual weather looks like on Feb. 18. It’s scheduled from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Levy Event Plaza in Las Colinas.
Texas A&M Singing Cadets: The finest voices from Aggieland will perform at the Coppell Arts Center at 3 p.m. on Feb. 19. This concert is hosted by the Coppell A&M Club. Whoop!
Preschool Fair: The Coppell Early Childhood Association will host an informal open house between 10:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. on Feb. 25 at the Cozby Library and Community Commons.
No Tune Like a Show Tune: The Coppell Community Chorale will belt out Broadway’s best at 3 p.m. on Feb. 26 at the Coppell Arts Center.
Mom of avid bowler here. If you're looking for great, reasonably priced bowling, check out the ITRC (international training and research center) in Arlington by six flags. The bowling museum attached is pretty cool too!
Diverse issue, Dan! Fire station, homestead exemption and rappers (who knew!)- good stuff. Thanks for keeping us well-informed.