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A D V E R T I S E M E N T
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A D V E R T I S E M E N T
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A River Ran Through It
To the editor: A Labor Day rally on the banks of the Clear Fork of the Trinity brought out hundreds of concerned citizens to protest Chesapeake Energy’s plans to cut down old-growth trees on several acres to drill Barnett Shale gas wells (Static, Sept. 5, 2007). Chesapeake has since given assurance that its footprint will be made as small as possible and that they will cut only those trees necessary for their drilling pad.
One wonders why environmentalists and history lovers have not gathered at the confluence of the Trinity’s Clear Fork and West Fork, where many pork barrels’ worth of taxpayer dollars will be spent to cover that historic landmark with a 33-acre “Town Lake,” the magnificent obsession of our free-spending congresswoman and the compliant Tarrant Regional Water District, in order to enrich eminent-domain-abusing land-grabbers and displace 90 property owners. The confluence was there eons before Chesapeake’s pecan trees peeped through the earth. Trees will grow back. Job, in the Old Testament, wrote: “For there is hope of a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again.” A confluence covered by a polluting, silting Town Lake is forever.
By the way — one reason Chesapeake is able to cut down those trees is an adjacent landowner’s signature on a lease, for a bonus payment of $14,750 per acre. Who was that owner? The Tarrant Regional Water District! Hooray! Open the floodgates wide! More money down the river!
Don Woodard
Fort Worth
No “Lite” Spending
To the editor: Fort Worth Weekly’s “Inspection Lite” story by Peter Gorman (Oct. 10, 2007) certainly raised some eyebrows with taxpayers, since we are the ones who will foot the bill for all the shenanigans the Fort Worth City Council implements. The mandatory inspection certification program, requiring college classes for up to four years, makes about as much sense as setting a milk bucket under a bull. Senior inspectors should have been exempted. The program is overkill for code compliance and a sure-fire way to hasten the loss of veteran employees. Could Doug Rademaker have a financial incentive for coming up with this program?
Randy Danford was indeed a sacrificial lamb. Now that the exposé has been circulated, the public ought to be hollering all the way to city hall, demanding a recall of the program that’s costing us in overtime and loss of experienced inspectors. Profligate spending needs to stop here.
Thanks for shedding light on this important issue.
Cheryl Payne
Fort Worth
Mama Kay
To the editor: Contributor Dave McNeely’s guest column of Oct. 24 (“Trading Rick for Kay”) was a tribute to our long-reigning U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison. Her name recognition and her quick responses to constituent concerns should give her a boost up the ladder to the governor’s perch.
As governor she would truly wear the label as our state’s matriarch — fitting, since she made Texas proud with years of service to Texas at the state and national level.
Ethyl Brown
Fort Worth
Too Barnett to Be True
To the editor: Staff writer Peter Gorman’s “Paper Promises” (Oct. 31, 2007) was an interesting piece of journalism and very enlightening in explaining the everyday operations of collusion, fraud, and deceit that some of these gas lease companies employ to cheat unsuspecting (and mostly elderly) folks. Seems there are always those ready to exploit people who come from a generation for whom a simple handshake was a binding contract. Those days have long passed away.
Tri-Star and its cronies have left integrity along the way and have compromised the legal system that ought to prosecute them to the fullest extent possible. The company’s leaders ought to be tarred and feathered.
Fort Worth Weekly’s investigative team has put up the “posted” alert to warn us all that we should never do business with a company that pushes you to sign agreements without first consulting an attorney to read the contract and make positive that no changes or alterations can be phonied up in the final signing.
The article is a reminder of the old saying, “If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is.”
Faith Ibarra
Fort Worth
Correction
In last week’s cover story (“Barton’s Bad Year”), the source of a contribution to Mansfield Mayor Barton Scott’s campaign was misidentified. The donation was made by the Linebarger, Goggan, Blair, and Sampson law firm, not Mario Perez. Fort Worth Weekly regrets the error
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