| UNFAIR PARK | GRIDCOIN Gov. Greg Abbott is welcoming cryptocur- rency to Texas. Some experts fear that could strain the power grid. BY SIMONE CARTER G ov. Greg Abbott is doing his best to woo the Bitcoin indus- try. Over the summer, the Re- publican governor bragged about signing a “law for Texas to create a master plan for expanding the blockchain in- dustry” and noted the grocery chain H-E-B is placing cryptocurrency kiosks in some stores. Last week, Abbott upped his crypto-cred by reposting an old photo with Tesla co-founder and Dogecoin pied piper Elon Musk. Then Abbott announced he’d snagged a key endorsement in his bid for reelection. “Texas is the land of opportunity & inno- vation,” he wrote in a tweet. “I’m proud to receive the endorsement of the Texas Block- chain Council. The Lone Star State is poised to be a world leader in blockchain & crypto- currency.” The Texas Blockchain Council is a Bit- coin mining business lobbying group, but if you’re like us, the very definition of “block- chain” is a bit fuzzy. Crypto website ZebPay describes it as a type of technology that stores various kinds of information, includ- ing records of cryptocurrency transactions. Many on the cutting edge of digital cur- rency are thrilled by Abbott’s efforts to in- centivize the blockchain industry. But other experts say such moves could put enormous strain on Texas’ already creaky power grid, which during last February’s winter storm was “seconds and minutes away” from leav- ing residents in the dark for months. Crypto currency “miners” create new coins by us- ing banks of special computers to generate strings of huge numbers, a process that con- sumes vast amounts of electricity. During an event in October, Republican Sen. Ted Cruz suggested that Bitcoin could actually work to give Texas’ energy infra- structure a boost. Cruz noted that miners can quickly go offline amid peak demand, moving energy back to the power grid, ac- cording to CNBC. “If you have a moment where you have a power shortage or a power crisis, whether it’s a freeze or some other natural disaster where power generation capacity goes down, that creates the capacity to instantaneously shift that energy to put it back on the grid,” he said. Not everyone sees it that way. Ben Hertz- 4 4 Shargel, who works for Wood Mackenzie, which provides commercial intelligence for the natural resources sector, told the same outlet that even though Bitcoin could poten- tially double demand growth, it’s not neces- Pierre Borthiry/Unsplash sarily a good thing. “The analogy I like to use is that if you start smoking two packs a day and then cut back to one pack on holidays, that doesn’t make smoking good for your health,” he said. Abbott insists that Bitcoin mining will work to encourage the power industry to ramp up production. But so far, two miners have agreed to voluntarily pause operations when asked, according to Bitcoin and Ethe- reum news site Decrypt. Certain countries have imposed similar restrictions on miners. Mining operations have been banned during the winter to prevent blackouts in Iran, and China has cracked down on cryp- tocurrencies, Decrypt reports. Kosovo out- lawed Bitcoin mining entirely after grappling with higher energy prices and a winter power shortage. Currently, Texas Blockchain Council counts at least 27 miners in the state. ▼ CRIME BUSTED F FEDS SAY A DALLAS WOMAN CARRIED OUT AT LEAST THREE BANK ROBBERIES IN DALLAS BACK IN THE FALL OF 2019. BY PATRICK STRICKLAND irst, the feds say, a concerned citizen gave away Patricia Maldonado’s iden- tity. Then, Patricia Maldonado’s Face- book photos gave away Patricia Maldonado. Finally, Patricia Maldonado gave away Patri- cia Maldonado. Maldonado, 34, allegedly carried out three bank robberies in Dallas in 2019, the U.S. De- partment of Justice in North Texas said last Wednesday. The way the indictment puts it, Maldonado hit the Comerica Bank on Fort Worth Avenue, Chase Bank on Mockingbird Lane and Chase Bank on Coit Road. Wearing a baseball cap, Maldonado alleg- edly entered the banks, announced that she was packing heat via a little note and then tore off on foot with the cash. After a concerned citizen reached out to the feds and said it was Maldonado in the surveillance photos, law enforcement did what law enforcement so often does these days: checked her Facebook page. There, Gov. Greg Abbott was endorsed by Texas Blockchain Council. they found photos of Maldonado posing next to a silver Jeep Patriot that had been seen at the crime scenes. On Jan. 29, law enforcement arrested Mal- donado at her job. She later admitted that she was the same person in the surveillance pho- tos, the DOJ said. She’s now facing the possi- bility of up to two decades in prison, if convicted. The investigation involved the FBI and the Dallas Police Department. Per capita, Texas clocked in at number seven when it came to the states with the most bank robberies in 2020, according to one tally. Early in the pandemic, crime reportedly spiked in several cities around the country. In North Texas, a spate of gun store robber- ies put the feds on high alert last year. Crime has since slumped in cities like Dallas. ▼ ANIMALS ALLIGATORS LURKING NEARBY? acre Palmetto/Alligator Slough Preserve near Seagoville in 1994. They spent $361,000 on it with hopes of developing it into another nature preserve for the county. There would’ve been elevated boardwalks, hiking trails and parking. But, like many other park projects in the A area, the Palmetto/Alligator Slough Pre- serve fell pretty low on the list of budget pri- orities in the southern part of the county. “I would love to see the project done, but it’s just not a priority,” Dallas County Com- missioner John Wiley Price told WFAA in 2009. “Given the economy, it’s pretty far down the line.” You need a special permit to tour the pre- serve these days because it’s too dangerous to open to the public. After all, the place is home to bobcats, coyotes, diamondback wa- ter snakes, copperheads and other danger- ous animals. The preserve is about 20 miles southeast of downtown. It’s bisected by Hickory Creek, which empties into Parsons Slough, which then empties into the Trinity River. The preserve also has a manmade lake, which used to be the site of a sand and gravel pit. About 15 years ago, Ben Sandifer, a local environmentalist, tagged along a tour of sev- eral nature preserves in southeast Dallas County. The tour encompassed Goat Island Pre- serve, Riverbend Preserve, the Palmetto Al- ligator Slough Preserve (now called the Mary Phinney Wetlands) and the Post Oak Preserve, which lies to the east. “As the crow flies, they’re only a few miles apart but geographically, topographi- cally and habitat-wise, they’re all unique,” Sandifer said. “They all have their own com- plexion and feel to it. One of the most inter- esting is the Alligator Palmetto Slough Preserve, or the Mary Phinney Wetlands as it’s now called.” Around the time he went on the tour, the county was considering funding to build a boardwalk system that would allow for safe access to view some of the wetland areas at the preserve. “The area currently is a matrix of old abandoned gravel pits that have real steep sides to them that are hazardous,” he said. “It’d be very dangerous to walk on or near because if you fell in it’d be really hard, even if you’re an adult, to get out of the water.” Part of where the place got its original name is native palm trees that grow there, the sabal minor palm trees, or dwarf pal- metto. It’s bisected by Hickory Creek on the north side and Parsons Slough on the south side. A portion of Hickory Creek was channel- ONE EXPERT DESCRIBED IT AS A VERY ;SNAKY, ALLIGATOR-EY’ PART OF DALLAS. BY JACOB VAUGHN lligators may be lurking in wetlands just minutes away from downtown. Dallas County bought the 260- ized sometime around the 1930s. But the old creek channel was left behind in several ar- eas where large populations of palmetto flourished. Over the years, the land has been used for agriculture and gravel operations. The Alligator Slough is located at the head of what used to be called Bois D’Arc Is- land, which was formed by a cutoff in the Parsons Slough and the Trinity River. “It created an island – a 22,000-acre island – that when the first European settlers came to this area was a place that was feared by everyone,” Sandifer said. “It was a wild place full of wolves, bears, mountain lions, wild turkey, and alligators.” For a long time, certain sections of the is- land weren’t even mapped and people didn’t know how large it was. Sandifer said this is because it was so dense with “woods, an- cient trees, swamps, creeks, streams, leg- ends of Native Americans in that area, vast amounts of flora and fauna that have now been lost to contemporary Dallasites except for basically one area: that Palmetto Alliga- tor Slough.” About 180 years ago, a famous Dallas sur- veyor named Warren Ferris, surveyed the Alligator Slough property. He submitted his field observations to what was then >> p6 MONTH XX–MONTH XX, 2014 FEBRUARY 17–23, 2022 DALLAS OBSERVER DALLAS OBSERVER | CLASSIFIED | MUSIC | DISH | MOVIES | CULTURE | NIGHT+DAY | FEATURE | SCHUTZE | UNFAIR PARK | CONTENTS | CLASSIFIED | MUSIC | DISH | CULTURE | UNFAIR PARK | CONTENTS dallasobserver.com dallasobserver.com
