Our recommendation for McKinney mayor
Incumbent Fuller faces challenge by Meredith.
Three names will appear on the ballot for McKinney mayor May 1, but incumbent George Fuller is the candidate with the most experience and greatest vision for the city.
Fuller, 58, is a real estate developer and owner of a guitar shop. With his wife, Maylee Thomas, he also leads the nonprofit Love Life Foundation. Fuller is a deal-maker. In the hour we spent with him, he talked about no less than six deals struck by him or his staff in various parts of the city for new developments, road construction, or keeping businesses from moving to nearby Frisco. He is realistic about the challenges facing the city in areas like transportation, housing and managing growth, and he seems to have a plan to meet them.
Under a light drizzle on Friday, the homeless inhabitants of Camp Rhonda, an embattled community that has moved from one site to another, frantically packed their belongings in Pioneer Plaza. The city had given them a deadline to leave, and time was running out.
Camp Rhonda moved to the plaza last week to protest the city s ongoing sweeps of homeless encampments and its unwillingness to find solutions for the homeless population. Along with the activists who came to their aid, Camp Rhonda s homeless have demands. They want a seat at the table with city officials, a voice in any conversation about solutions and a safe place where they won t have to worry about sweeps.
Associated Press
Sacramento Kings forward Harrison Barnes plays during the first half of an NBA basketball game, Friday, Feb. 26, 2021, in Detroit.
NBA player Harrison Barnes is giving Dallas $30,000 to help house people experiencing homelessness. The gift will be used by the the City of Dallas Office of Homeless Solutions (OHS) Fund at the Communities Foundation of Texas to help about two dozen people gain permanent housing.
Barnes is a forward for the Sacramento Kings, but he played for the Dallas Mavericks from 2016 until he was traded to the Kings in 2019. He said in a statement that he and his wife were moved to make their donation after watching last month s winter storm ravage Dallas.
Dying in the streets: the homeless population is growing older and sicker
The number of elderly homeless is expected to triple by the end of this decade
Tracy Larue, 48, stands next to the personal belongings of an elderly homeless man she said she knew was found dead early Wednesday morning under Interstate 45 and Harwood Street in Dallas, Wednesday, January 17, 2018. (David Woo / Staff Photographer)
“These people are dying in the streets.”
That’s how Wayne Walker, executive director of OurCalling homeless ministry, described the situation facing Dallas’s aging homeless population last month. Walker estimated that 10% of the city’s homeless are very sick, in need of hospice care.
Kevin Stuart had once accepted his homelessness as a fact of life. He even preferred it. On the streets, he could do meth without worrying about work. So, unless the weather was bad, he had no reason to go to a shelter.
In 2019, though, he decided enough was enough. He wanted his life back, but getting back on the straight and narrow meant he d need resilience. He recalled two months he spent in a shelter. There, the staff eventually told him they needed to reassess his priority status, a fact that frustrated him. I threw my hands up, he told the