Fair Park building boom must have community input

All but one of the Dallas City Plan Commission members recently approved a zoning application for a trendy new apartment complex just two blocks away from Fair Park.

Unfortunately, the one “no” vote came from the person who actually represents Fair Park, Tabitha Wheeler-Reagan, who said she and some of the area’s constituents were left out of the public discussions with neighborhood groups about the project.

The project is just barely in Wheeler’s District 7, right on the edge of its boundary with District 2, so it would have been nice for her to have been looped in on the community conversations about it.

Instead, Wheeler said, she just learned of the project two days before the commission’s May 4 briefing and vote, and she wasn’t happy about it.

“It looks like the beginning of Bishop Arts onto the community surrounding it,” Wheeler told her colleagues, adding that the project “does not fit in with that community.”

If true, it’s disappointing to once again hear this familiar complaint from an area with a long history of being shut out of important conversations at City Hall. We hope a hastily planned May 23 meeting with some residents who live not far from the proposed complex will allay their concerns.

Larkspur Capital is hoping to build a seven-story apartment complex near Haskell and Parry avenues, just south of Interstate 30. The 2.7-acre site is adjacent to the Santa Fe Trail and the DART Green Line right of way. A Larkspur representative told the commission the project would also include 10% affordable housing, street-level retail and a “cantina” on the edge of the trail.

It’s the developer’s latest apartment project to the east of Deep Ellum. Leasing is already underway at the eight-story Willow near I-30 and Commerce Street. Its planned, 19-story Juniper complex is just a block away.

City staff told the plan commission they support the project because it meets several city housing, transportation and economic development goals, especially for southern Dallas. They also pointed out that the current zoning allows for industrial buildings of up to 200 feet, far taller than the proposed project.

We also support it, especially because it would provide more of what the city desperately needs — affordable housing. It would also be a big improvement to the site, currently occupied by several low-rise warehouse buildings and the old Goat Ranch dive bar.

A consultant representing Larkspur told the commission that he thought the firm had addressed notification issues after meeting with District 2 council member Jesse Moreno, the Deep Ellum Foundation, Fair Park First, some business owners in the area and the Dolphin Heights and Jubilee Park neighborhoods. Consultant Rob Baldwin also said he had had previous conversations last year with Wheeler’s plan commission predecessor, Benjamin Vann.

Still, we sympathize with Wheeler, who said residents in the Mill City neighborhood south of Fair Park should have known about the project, too. “When I leave here, today, I will feel like I failed South Dallas and Fair Park,” she said.

There’s still enough time for any resident concerns to be addressed before the matter goes before the Dallas City Council in June. Meanwhile, we hope community discussion around the next big project in the area — and there will be more — is more inclusive.