Coppell Chronicle Vol. 3, No. 18
City Councils Talk Lots of Trash • Coppell Leaders Share Their Wish Lists • Absences Mean Less Funds for Schools • Officials Take Discussion of Veterans Outside
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas asked Texans to conserve power last week, and I hope I’m not breaking that news to you. But I wonder if anyone at Uline got the memo. The manufacturer of shipping and packing supplies vacated its enormous warehouse on Bethel Road more than a year ago, but the empty space is still lit up like an operating room on a nightly basis.
I sent an email to the only address on Uline’s website last week to ask why all those lights are on if nobody’s home. I have not received a reply.
City Councils Talk Lots of Trash
Elected officials in the Coppell area have had some trashy discussions this month.
On June 13, the Coppell City Council was briefed on the city’s contract with Republic Services, which has been collecting trash and recycling in Coppell since 2014. Before that, Waste Management did the dirty work. Republic’s contract expires on Oct. 31, 2026, but the city holds the option for a five-year renewal.
Assistant Director of Community Development Luay Rahil had a question for the council: Do they want to renew Republic’s contract, or do they want to hire a consultant to test the market? That would cost about $100,000 and take about 18 to 24 months.
None of the council members seemed eager to hire a consultant, especially because Rahil said his initial discussions with such experts indicated that Coppell would ultimately end up with Republic again. But the council did have questions about how Republic’s service compares to that of Waste Management.
Rahil, who was on staff before the switch was made, said his office fields most complaints about trash and recycling. “When [we were] with Waste Management, you’d hear some residents say, ‘I want Republic,’” he said. “When you go with Republic, you hear some residents want Waste Management.” The level of complaints has remained steady, “regardless of the name of the company,” Rahil said. “It’s the same amount of calls and the same kind of calls that we receive.”
Coppell’s contract with Republic calls for 3 percent rate increases on an annual basis, and a survey of comparable cities showed that’s a pretty good deal. Rahil warned the council that, due to inflation, those rate increases will probably be in larger increments if the city renews the contract.
“No matter what, trash is getting more expensive,” Council Member Kevin Nevels said in summary.
Republic’s trucks take Coppell’s trash to the Camelot Landfill in Lewisville. On June 5, that city’s council was briefed on the status of Lewisville’s three landfills. Yes, they have three of them. Here’s my summary of an in-depth presentation from Lewisville Utilities Manager Katelyn Hearon.
I put a question mark on the “Closing?” column because those dates are up in the air. For example, the DFW Landfill is scheduled to close in 2024, but Hearon said that might not happen until 2026. “As they are significantly slowing what they are accepting, you’ve got some settling,” she said. “They’re finding room, so they think they can stretch that out.”
In 2018, Republic announced its intention to “mothball” the Lewisville Landfill, which meant it would significantly scale back operations; the plan was to accept only one load per quarter for a period of 10 years. But that plan had to change.
In anticipation of the DFW Landfill’s impending closure, Waste Management in 2022 closed that landfill to all waste except what’s hauled on the firm’s own trucks, which meant “everything had to go then to Camelot,” Hearon said. However, the Camelot Landfill has a 5 percent annual growth cap imposed by the City of Farmers Branch “to try to extend the life of that landfill for their residents.” That meant Republic had to reopen the Lewisville Landfill to relieve the burden.
“It kind of maintains the balance,” Hearon said.
Speaking of balance, Irving officials have been trying to balance their residents’ trash needs with a tight labor market. Irving directly employs its garbage collectors, and a staffing shortage forced the city to cut back collection to once a week last year. Travis Switzer, Irving’s Solid Waste Services Director, explained that move during a September interview with the Irving Community Television Network.
On June 8, Switzer told the City Council that he had 64 collectors on staff, but he could still use 10 more. That stat was an aside during Switzer’s presentation, which was mainly about issuing a request for proposals from consultants. Switzer wants to hire a consultant to provide analysis of hybrid and automation systems.
I wasn’t sure what “hybrid” meant in this context, but Irving Communications Director April Reiling provided some clarity. It’s a system in which residents can choose to put their trash and recycling in bags (manual collection) or carts (semi-automated collection), which crews manually attach to a “tipper” mechanism installed on Irving’s trucks.
Switzer estimated that the type of analysis he’s looking for will cost more than $100,000. As Nevels said, trash is getting more expensive.
Coppell Leaders Share Their Wish Lists
Chances are you didn’t attend the City of Coppell’s budget town hall back in April. I didn’t either, but I’ve watched the recording, so I know it didn’t take long for everyone in the room who wasn’t a city employee to stand up and introduce themselves.
I’m bringing this up now because the City Council is scheduled to have four budget workshops next month, on July 13, 18, 24, and 27. Based on their discussions during those workshops, a budget for fiscal 2024 will be crafted in time for the council to formally consider it in late August.
The centerpiece of that April town hall was a parade of department heads describing their proposed projects for the fiscal year that begins in October. Here are some highlights of their presentations, along with quotes that either provided more details or just made me chuckle.
Jared Anderson, Director of Enterprise Solutions
Archiving software: “We identified a need to make sure that we have some longer-term archives, so when people file open records requests, we can go back in time.”
Smart City branding and marketing: “We don’t brag on ourselves a lot, so this would give us an opportunity to do that.”
Network security and architecture: “I can’t talk too much detail in the sense of network security, but we’re doing some improvements in security, related to our network.”
Danny Barton, Police Chief
Begin replacing the Automated License Plate Recognition (ALPR) cameras that have been posted at intersections since 2016: “This is probably the best crime-fighting tool we have.”
Enter a lease program to deploy mobile ALPR cameras that can be used in multiple locations: “Catalytic converter thefts is probably the biggest crime going on in the nation, so we needed a way to target parking lots.”
Soundproof the Justice Center’s interview room and update its cameras: “I know no one in here has ever been interrogated by the Coppell Police Department — I hope.”
Kevin Richardson, Fire Chief
A new fire station on Moore Road, next to Austin Elementary School: “We had provided information with our elected officials and are in the process of trying to seek funding to move forward for adding Fire Station #5.”
New tables and chairs for the training room attached to Fire Station #3: “It was constructed almost 19 years ago, and those tables and chairs have been worn pretty bad, and they need to be replaced. The room is used by a lot of other people, not just the Fire Department.”
A vehicle storage building at Life Safety Park: “The term ‘vehicle storage’ isn’t for our vehicles. It’s really for the training props that they have on site there. They have bikes and training props and jeeps for the kids.”
(See “Fire Station Plan Alarms Some Neighbors” in Vol. 3, No. 1.)
Mike Garza, Director of Public Works
Royal Lane reconstruction: “Once we’re completed with South Belt Line this summer, we will begin construction on South Royal from Sandy Lake Road down to 635; full reconstruction similar to what we’re doing with South Belt Line.”
Service Center expansion: “This is the location that houses our Parks operations team as well as our Public Works operations team. We share a facility at the Service Center, and we’ve kind of outgrown that facility.”
Brine storage facility: “We stockpile material, and by the time we need it, if we haven’t had a snow or ice event in a couple of years, that material has gone bad, and so this brine storage facility will allow us to maintain that material for longer periods of time if we don’t use it.”
Mindi Hurley, Director of Community Development
A food truck park in Old Town: “There would be some money dedicated for creating the infrastructure to support that food truck park, as well as some dollars to help with the operations of that.”
A Code Compliance vehicle: “With the aging of the community and the increase in rental properties, we did get approval to hire an additional Code Compliance officer this year, and so we have … proposed for a vehicle to support that individual.”
A new employee with the title of Village Coordinator: “Out of Vision 2040, there was a task force created for the Future Oriented Approach to Residential Development, and that group has come together and proposed a virtual village concept in the City of Coppell to support our residents that are 55 and plus.”
(See “City Considers Funding Senior Village” in Vol. 3, No. 2.)
Jessica Carpenter, Director of Community Experiences
New furniture at the Cozby Library and Community Commons: “A lot of the furniture in that building is actually original to the original building, back in 1995, so it’s time for some of that furniture to be replaced.”
New turf at Coppell Middle School North: “You’re probably wondering, ‘Why would the city be involved in that project?’ So we have a lot of interlocal agreements with the ISD — we maintain really strong partnerships with the school district — and a lot of our youth sports associations utilize the fields within CISD.”
Nearly 60 new picnic tables in the city’s parks: “Those are becoming end of life. A lot of them had some [Americans with Disabilities Act] concerns as well.”
If you want to read even more about parks projects, meet me back here next week. Vol. 3, No. 19 will include an article about the Parks and Recreation Board’s latest priorities list. That edition will be for paid subscribers only, so …
Absences Mean Less Funds for Schools
The next time my rising freshman asks if he can stay home from school just because he’s tired, that’s going to be a tough sell. Attendance equals dollars.
Barring any legislative changes during a special session, the state bases school districts’ funding on their average daily attendance. During the Coppell ISD Board of Trustees’ most recent budget workshop, Chief Financial Officer Diana Sircar said the budget for 2023-2024 is based on a 95 percent attendance rate. Past practice was to assume a 96 percent attendance rate, but the actual rate for 2022-2023 was 95.6 percent. Prior to COVID, the district’s attendance rate typically approached 97 percent.
“A point in the attendance rate equates to about $900,000 in revenue, so it’s a significant amount of funding,” Sircar said.
According to the Texas Academic Performance Reports on the Texas Education Agency’s website, Coppell ISD’s attendance rate for 2018-2019 (the final pre-pandemic school year) was 96.8 percent, which was better than the statewide rate (95.4 percent) and the Region 10 rate (95.7 percent). It was also better than the neighboring districts’ attendance rates for that school year:
96.4 percent in Grapevine-Colleyville ISD
96.4 percent in Lewisville ISD
95.8 percent in Irving ISD
95.1 percent in Carrollton-Farmers Branch ISD
The state’s basic allotment for school districts is $6,160 per student. It’s been at that level since 2019, when lawmakers raised it by $1,020, which was an increase of nearly 20 percent.
Sircar said Coppell ISD would need a $310 increase to the basic allotment to erase the $3.5 million deficit for 2022-2023. That would be an increase of 5 percent.
To erase Coppell ISD’s projected $13.6 million deficit for 2023-2024, Sircar said, the basic allotment would need to be increased by $1,175. That would be an increase of 19 percent.
Officials Take Discussion of Veterans Outside
The Coppell City Council, the Coppell Parks and Recreation Board, and a task force comprised mostly of veterans all got together on a recent Saturday morning so Samit Patel of Olsson Studio could guide them through his firm’s vision for transforming Town Center Plaza into a tribute to our nation’s armed forces.
Your correspondent tagged along for this June 17 walking tour. As I whispered to my sleeping wife that I would be gone for an hour or so, she said, “Where are you going?” Figuring that she was not alert enough to digest all of the details in the preceding paragraph, I said, “A bunch of public officials are getting together, and I want to see what happens.” She turned over and asked, “Will there be fighting?”
I am happy to report that no combat took place during this military-themed exercise, but there was one minor skirmish. Phil Laberge, the gentleman who has appeared at multiple public meetings to tout Andrew Brown Park East as a better location for the project, was among the attendees. When I noticed that he was carrying some sheets of paper, I thought to myself, “Oh, man. He’s going to want to make a speech.”
(See “Vets Memorial Sent Back to Drawing Board” in Vol. 3, No. 13, and “Veterans Memorial Likely Headed to Plaza” in Vol. 3, No. 15.)
Sure enough, when Patel wrapped up his presentation, Laberge asked Mayor Wes Mays if he could present an “opposing viewpoint.” Mays told Laberge he was free to talk to anyone; however, because the walkthrough was not an official meeting with a designated “citizens’ appearance” portion, nobody would be compelled to listen.
Based on the focus group’s feedback, Olsson Studio’s design calls for a battle cross sculpture plus six granite panels bearing plaques for six branches of the U.S. military: Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, Space Force, and Coast Guard. The focus group’s preference was to not list the names of individuals.
Many of the attendees on June 17 told Patel that the event helped them better appreciate his firm’s design for the plaza, a design that Mays and Council Members Don Carroll and Kevin Nevels have endorsed at previous meetings. Will a majority of the council officially direct Olsson Studio to flesh it out further? That remains to be seen.
Congratulations are in Order
• Congratulations to Anthony Black, who grew up in Coppell but transferred to Duncanville High School for his senior year. After playing basketball for one season at the University of Arkansas, Black was the sixth pick in Thursday’s NBA Draft. He was selected by the Orlando Magic.
• Congratulations to Coppell Police Officer Alex Benitez, who received an Enforcement Hero Award from Irving-based Mothers Against Drunk Driving for making 11 DWI-related arrests in 2022. That number led the Coppell Police Department, which made a total of 56 such arrests last year.
• Congratulations to Cathy Whiteman, who recently retired after 30-plus years as a host and producer for the Irving Community Television Network.
• Congratulations to the Coppell ISD Communications Department, which earned two Awards of Excellence, one Award of Merit, and four Honorable Mentions in the National School Public Relations Association’s Publications and Digital Media Excellence Awards. I read about these honors on Coppell ISD’s newly redesigned website.
Chronicle Crumbs
• There are two new memorial benches in Old Town Coppell. On June 2, the city dedicated a bench in honor of longtime volunteer Earl Rogers, who was a member of the Coppell Parks and Recreation Board when he died of heart failure in December 2021. That bench is in the Old Town Garden, which is next to the Coppell Senior and Community Center. A few weeks before it was dedicated, a bench donated by the Rogers family was placed across the street from George Coffee + Provisions in honor of Earl’s granddaughter Caitlin Rogers, who was killed in a murder-suicide in February 2022.
• Coppell ISD residents have priority in purchasing the bonds that voters approved in May. If you already have an account with Raymond James or any of the co-managers (BOK, Frost, or Huntington Capital), call your broker to place an order. Otherwise, call the Raymond James trading desk at 214-692-9866 to open an account before July 10.
• The final item on the agenda for tomorrow’s Coppell ISD Board of Trustees meeting is the approval of a new Chief Operations Officer whom the agenda does not name. Dennis Womack held that job for two years, but McKinney ISD hired him last month to be their Assistant Superintendent of Business, Operations, and Technology.
• The City of Coppell announced that, as of June 30, TikTok, WeChat, and similar apps will be inaccessible if you’re connected to public Wi-Fi in city facilities or parks. This move is being made to comply with legislation that Gov. Greg Abbott recently signed into law. Can the city government just make TikTok not work anywhere in Coppell? Asking for a friend.
• State Rep. Julie Johnson made it official on Monday: She’s running to represent District 32 in Congress, because U.S. Rep Colin Allred is giving up that seat so he can challenge U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz. Among Johnson’s rivals for the Democratic nomination will be Jan McDowell, who has run for the District 24 seat in the last four election cycles. (The links in this Crumb will show you the gerrymandered boundaries of those neighboring districts.)
• On Tuesday afternoon, I received a campaign text message from Cassandra Hernandez, who said she’s seeking to succeed Johnson as the representative for District 115 in the Texas House. Hernandez was the leading Democrat in last year’s primary for District 70, but she lost a runoff to Mihaela Plesa, who won that seat in November’s general election.
• When making a motion to OK the plans for a Kroger fuel station on June 13, Coppell City Council Member Don Carroll said, “We’re going to have to end up trusting each other that we’re going to take care of this stuff and be good neighbors.” Carroll acknowledged that he was echoing his own comments from April, when he moved to approve a demolition permit for a dormant church in Old Town. “We all have a common goal of trusting each other,” he said then. Perhaps this will be the theme song for Carroll’s 2026 re-election campaign.
• My wife/editor/ombudsperson alerted me to a New York Times story with a chilling headline: “How Local Officials Seek Revenge on Their Hometown Newspapers.” Thankfully, the ad-free newsletter you’re reading is immune to such tactics. Our local officials will have to seek their revenge in other ways.
Community Calendar
How to Make Great Coffee Every Time: Coppell resident Justin Runyon, who sells his Runyon Coffee Roasting Coffee beans at the Coppell Farmers Market, will be at the Cozby Library and Community Commons at 2 p.m. today to discuss how coffee is grown, sourced, and roasted. This free event, which is for adults 18 and older, will include tastings of different preparation methods.
Wings of Fire Fest: Fans of the dragon-centric series of “Wings of Fire” novels are invited to stop by the Cozby Library and Community Commons for crafts, activities, and games between 2 and 3 p.m. on Wednesday.
Friends of Coppell Nature Park Guided Hike: The wonders of insects found in the local ecosystem will be the focus of the guided hike scheduled for 6 p.m. on Wednesday. Hikers are asked to wear protective clothing and bring water. Registration is required, and children must be accompanied by an adult.
Party in the Park: Coppell’s big Independence Day celebration will start at 6 p.m. on Saturday in Andrew Brown Park East. There will be food trucks, lawn games, and live music by Micky and the Motorcars and The Spazmatics. An 18-minute fireworks show will start at about 9:45 p.m.
Parade Down Parkway: Coppell’s Independence Day parade will kick off at 9 a.m. on July 4. Participants will start in the Saint Ann Parish parking lot, travel north on Samuel Boulevard to Parkway Boulevard, then head west to Town Center Boulevard.
Sparks & Stripes: The City of Irving’s Independence Day parade is scheduled for 9 a.m. on July 4 in the Heritage District. A fireworks show preceded by live music is scheduled for the evening of July 4 at the Levy Event Plaza in Las Colinas.
Electronic Recycling Event: The Coppell Community Chorale will take any unwanted items off your hands between 9 a.m. and noon on July 8 at the Coppell Arts Center.
Young Frankenstein: Theatre Coppell will stage nine performances of the musical based on Mel Brooks’ classic comedy. The first one is scheduled for 8 p.m. on July 14 at the Coppell Arts Center.
Lewisville’s three landfills will likely become parkland after they close for good, but Hearon’s presentation did not address where waste would be taken after that. So I put that question to Republic Services’ media relations department. The unsigned reply to my email said, “Once a landfill nears capacity, an expansion would be required or an alternative site would need to be identified.” Oh, you think so, Doctor?
Thank you for all the Coppell news! WOW! There’s lots to digest and think about!