For reasons I don’t fully understand, Neil Emmons and Jeff Strater aren’t the best of friends. But according to The Dallas Morning News, the two openly gay Dallas city plan commissioners were in full agreement today. The DMN reports that Emmons and Strater were the driving force behind the Plan Commission’s surprise vote against changing the name of Industrial Boulevard to Riverfront Boulevard. Meanwhile, Strater reportedly urged the commission to change the name of Industrial Boulevard to Cesar Chavez. You can read all about it here.
UPDATE: Strater informs me that he and Emmons actually vote the same about 98 percent of the time and have disagreed rarely in the three years they’ve been on the Plan Commission together. They were also both Hillary Clinton delegates to the Democratic National Convention. Maybe I shouldn’t have brought up the fact that they’re not the best of friends, but hey, it made a nice hook! Anyhow, congratulations to Strater and Emmons for trying to block the Riverfront Boulevard idea. How can city officials, in their right mind, conduct a survey on renaming a street and then completely disregard the results? I’m sorry, once you do the survey, you gotta go with it, even if you don’t like the results for whatever reason, including the fact that you may be racist. How the hell you think we got stuck with the name Instant Tea?
How did you get stuck with the name Instant Tea?
John is too young to understand the historic reference of “tea,” as in gay bar lingo in the early 80s when people would “spill the tea” when they gossiped.
The name Instant Tea for our blog was chosen by a vote of our readers
We conducted an unscientific survey through our Web poll. I’m not saying Instant Tea is a bad name. I don’t really give a shit what the blog is named. It’s a blog. Who cares what it’s called? But the point is, we said that’s how we were going to name it, and we stuck with the plan. It would have been disingenuous to bail, for example, if we didn’t like the results. And in the case of city officials, it raises serious questions about their motives for bailing.
I can tell you their motives. They figured developers cold sell pricey condos on Riverfront Blvd. and might meet resistance with Cesar Chavez Blvd as the tony address. Hey, we are a city run by and for developers, just look at the make up of the council.
As to the name Instant Tea, I guess I am old enough to love it. I remember many days sitting at a table in a bar on Cedar Springs stirring the Tea on passersby. Good, catty fun!
Because the poll was an absolute disaster. How were the names chosen for the poll? Was the poll scientific in any manner? Did they do anything to prevent multiple votes, did they get the word out? Who authorized the poll on city council?
Let’s start completely over, people can sent out petitions and with enough votes the name can go on the ballot in November but let’s not pretend that the original poll was an accurate or fair reflection of the desires of a majority of the citizens of Dallas. Put it on the ballot and if Cesar Chavez Blvd wins (I am sure it will meet the requisite amount of signatures needed to get on the ballot), go for it but to suggest their internet/phone poll is any more an accurate reflection of the desire of the citizens of Dallas and valid for making a major decision that affects many proprety owners on Industrial is ludicrous. Were you even aware that the poll existed before it blew up into the huge deal? I wasn’t but I sure would have liked to have placed my vote in a fair and accurate manner.
Boo on Chavez because Austin in D/T there is a street named Cesar Chavez. This is Dallas not Austin. 😛