6 July 3 - 9, 2025 dallasobserver.com DALLAS OBSERVER Classified | MusiC | dish | Culture | unfair Park | Contents “I think people didn’t quite know how to refer to this area because people had forgot- ten about it,” he said. Carden held a community meeting in the summer of 2024 to talk with Brentwood neighbors about his plan for the system, and immediately, Lavine was on guard. As a de- veloper interested in providing housing di- versity, Carden had planned for a mixture of townhomes, studio apartments and one- story units to accommodate anyone from a young professional to a senior with mobility issues. The neighborhood, though, didn’t like the idea of apartments contributing to the already transient environment they’d worked to counter. Leaving the meeting, Lavine took one of Carden’s business cards and said, “I’ll be giving you a call.” When they spoke, Lavine explained that the neighborhood hoped to see more per- manent housing types that would encourage residents to become “stakeholders in the community.” While housing advocates across Dallas are pushing for an influx of af- fordable housing, the Brentwood neighbors asked for something more elevated to bridge the half-million-dollar new builds and the historic single-family starter homes. “It was a tough conversation. I had my opinion and then he had his, and what I can honestly say is the conversation went really well because tempers did not fly,” Lavine said. “I think the reason why these projects don’t [typically] go like this is because the developers are not talking to the community and the community is not talking to the mu- nicipality and the city of Dallas is [not talk- ing to the developer]. … We live in a society where communication is just hard and it breaks down and it seems like it’s just get- ting worse.” Carden adjusted the plans after a series of neighborhood meetings. The “Grant Street trio” — three sets of townhouses built at Grant Street’s dead end that is connected to the trail system — will have 38 units instead of the 67 Carden initially planned for. Twenty-two of those will be for sale, with the rest for rent. The townhomes are three stories tall, with two or three bedrooms in each. He was “cool with pivoting,” he says, but the tradeoff was eliminating studio and one- bedroom units that could have provided more affordability. The annual income needed to qualify for the townhomes will be $90,000. “The idea that a community that is a pri- marily minority neighborhood could want more elevated housing choices, it’s some- thing Dallas has to kind of reconcile,” Carden said. “Urban and Black and nice can all exist in one community.” Carden also started building community cleanup funds into the budgets of each of his projects. While those have sometimes gone toward literal cleanup efforts, they can also go toward projects that the community asks for, such as a neighborhood security pro- gram. He’s installed security cameras that have thermal and infrared capabilities and cost $3,000 a month to maintain on his empty lots. Block captains throughout the neighborhood have access to monitor them, and footage can be pulled if needed for a criminal complaint or police inquiry. He’s threading a very small needle with the program. Carden said he isn’t blind to the history of overpolicing that Black and Hispanic communities have endured, and in the wrong hands, an agreement between a private developer and a police force could become problematic quickly. That’s why the system, while sponsored by Carden, can be accessed and controlled by the neighbor- hood. Lavine also emphasized that it’s a con- cept that could “go left or right” and that Carden’s building a foundation with the community was crucial for the program’s success. In general, the program has been met with pleasure and “some dismay,” Carden said. “I don’t believe I have to be a nonprofit to do good things. And I don’t think this is something that has to be a charity case. I just think it’s straight-up good business to say that my property values and my sales prices and my rents benefit if everyone feels safer,” Carden said. “As long as the overall system is doing well, I do well.” With Progress Comes Baggage O n the afternoon of March 26, the Dallas City Council chamber was full of frustrated Dallasites dressed in yellow shirts emblazoned with “NO.” They gathered to make a final stand against a developer who neighbors claimed had ig- nored their wishes. The developer claimed the neighbors never brought forward a good-faith agreement that would work for both sides. Later that evening, those neighbors would leave City Hall feeling ignored and trodden over as the City Council voted 10-4 to approve the Pepper Square redevelop- ment, and within weeks, a neighborhood co- alition would file a lawsuit against the city. The rezoning case was a live wire that turned the District 11 City Council race into a single-issue election centered on develop- ment and density. In the lead-up to the flurry and fury that was Pepper Square, three rezoning cases along Grant Street in Brentwood were over- shadowed. As each case was announced, Carden stepped up to the microphone and outlined his plan for the neighborhood, his hope that the city could become interested in the adjoining trail system he started, and the need for the city to implement design standards for smaller-scale streets, which are traditionally located in underserved neighborhoods. Lavine voiced support for the projects as they were listed. The irony of Carden’s proposal being overshadowed by Pepper Square is that his plan mirrors what neighbors in North Dallas say they’d hoped for: pockets of owner-oc- cupied townhomes balanced with greens- pace, and plans for mixed-use retail sprinkled in. At a time when initiatives like Forward Dallas and cases like Pepper Square have ig- nited Dallas’ conversations about develop- ment, Council member Chad West described Carden as “exactly the kind of person we need.” All three of Carden’s cases were approved, but not before District 4’s Council member Carolyn King Arnold, in the final throes of her time at the horseshoe, issued a warning. “Stay woke on this project, seriously. Be- cause people promise us things,” Arnold said, motioning towards where Lavine sat in the audience. “We need to understand that promises are just that. Promises. And that is why I believe this community has lost faith in the system. … Victimized by progress. But we’re going to try it.” While she voted to approve the rezon- ings, she said her “heart was heavy” to do so. She encouraged Carden to take displace- ment and increased crime seriously while moving forward with his development. Carden is OK with the skepticism. He’s been dreaming for Brentwood for 10 years, and finally the vision is within spitting distance. The Grant Street trio is in full design phase and should break ground this time next year. While he has early design ideas for a mixed-use development that will sit across from the Morrell DART station, the mockups are preliminary. He needs to go through the community feedback process, then a rezoning application, before con- struction can start. A smattering of townhomes that will sit on the ridge, along the tail system’s western edge, will begin construction in late 2026. A smaller mixed-use residential develop- ment located at the intersection of Claren- don Drive and Ewing Avenue, just to the west of Brentwood, will break ground in September. “I want to create a place where people want to live, while also making sure the peo- ple who want to stay can stay,” Carden said. “I want the kids in that community to be able to go anywhere in the world, but de- spite having all those skills and resources, I’d want many of them to still choose to stay here.” ▼ FREE SPEECH FIRST AMENDMENT? WHAT FIRST AMENDMENT? A NEW CONSTITUTIONALLY DODGY TEXAS LAW THREATENS CAMPUS SPEECH. BY GREGORIO OLIVARES GUTIERREZ F or a bill intended to strengthen the “expressive rights” of students and employees at Texas’ public universi- ties — at least according to its author — Sen- ate Bill 2972 takes an odd approach. Signed by Gov. Greg Abbott on June 20 and taking effect on Sept. 1, the new law restricts who can join campus protests and how, when and where they can do it. It also provides police officers with wide latitude to decide whether protesters can cover their faces, a fact sure to further chill the hearts of international students already fearful of being targeted for deportation for daring to believe that America’s commit- ment to free speech applies even when the person in the White House doesn’t like what’s being said. State Sen. Brandon Creighton, author of SB 2972, argued during a Senate hearing that the bill was intended to strengthen ex- isting state laws surrounding the expressive rights of students and employees at Texas public institutions. Creighton said that the legislation would help prevent chaos and disruption by allowing university governing boards to determine what parts of campus may be used as public forums. Students, political organizers, and law- yers who defend First Amendment free- doms might be relieved that Creighton didn’t say he deliberately wanted to weaken free speech rights. One hates to imagine what an anti-free speech bill from Creigh- ton would look like if this is meant to strengthen it. SB 2972 makes sweeping changes to 2019’s SB 18, which Creighton co-spon- sored. That law broadened protections on free speech at public campuses. At first, conservatives angered over the hostile re- ception given to right-leaning speakers on left-leaning campuses supported it. Six years and countless pro-Palestine and pro- immigrant protests later, the conservative Legislature appears to have had a change of heart. >> p8 Nathan Hunsinger Carden proposes bringing owner-occupied townhomes with greenspace and mixed- used retail to Brentwood. Unfair Park from p4
