City Council Meeting

Normally I avoid politics, but I made sure to attend the Tomball City Council meeting Monday night since Grand Texas was on the agenda. Mind you, no votes or decisions were made by the council, and it was clear they wanted information, mostly since all they knew about this disaster in waiting of a theme park was what they read in the papers.

The meeting was packed, with an overflow crowd standing on the sides of the room and even spilling out into the hall. The Grand Texas supporters, (most of whom I strongly suspect work for one of the developers partners and were told be there or be fired), numbered about a dozen. They were easy to spot, they all wore cheaply made Grand Texas stickers. Those of us opposing the project and the curious in the audience didn't wear any stickers. I felt like we were in a guerrilla war and wanted to blend in with the civilian population.

Before the Council started discussing business, they allowed meeting attendees a few minutes to say what's on their minds. Anyone at the meeting is first encouraged to fill out a short form with their names and addresses, and can then write down a subject and vote in favor or against. My neighborhood had already selected a spokesperson for us. He did a great job, pointing out how this theme park would be detrimental in terms of noise, crime, and decreased property values.

Five other speakers from close by neighborhoods also spoke. Each was respectful, had done their research, and presented strong cases. Afterward the votes of those who filled out the forms were tallied, and it came out to 5 in favor, 26 opposed. Interesting so few of the sticker wearers voted, though even if all did they would have still been badly outnumbered.

One oddity, and this showed the lack of integrity of the developer, was that the Mayor said she had received a request that each speaker say if they lived in the Tomball city limits. Considering his whining about "outsiders" opposing his project, it's obvious he was the one who made the request. While it is true that the neighborhoods that would be most impacted by this park are literally across the street from the city limits, I thought his shenanigans showed even more of the developers lack of character. We'll ignore the little fact that he lives in The Woodlands, which is much farther than across the street from Tomball, like about 15 miles away.

Plus, there is nothing stopping Tomball from annexing these neighborhoods, (right now they are in an unincorporated part of Harris County).

The developer was allowed to give a presentation, and as expected he launched into an infomercial. He tried to alleviate concerns over noise, which generated a derisive "Wrong" and a bunch of snickers from the back of the room, and then made unsubstantiated claims traffic wouldn't be an issue. He then said that the park's attractions that would generate the most noise would be severely restricted in days and times of operation. Considering these are the only attractions charging admission, and it's even more a head scratcher how this place is going to make a dime of profit.

He was caught on one inaccuracy by a Council member. Another wanted to discuss what he's been reading in the pretty active blogs about the park, but was told by the mayor that this could be construed as personal issues and not for discussion in a council meeting. That was disappointing as it would have really livened things up.

The developer made one very odd statement, that during the wild west shootout re-creations, the guns would use blanks instead of real bullets. I guess that's a good thing, since I don't think anyone wants to go to a park with live bullets flying around.

I sat behind the developer the entire meeting and I feel I earned my right of sainthood by not repeatedly smacking him in the back of the head. My impression is he is not very impressive, and has received a taste of what he's up against. I hope at this point that his financing falls through, and he slinks away never to bother Tomball again.