Most Popular
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A Prison Cover-up During Hurricane Rita
For days after the storm, inmates in Beaumont lived without A/C, electricity or hot meals. Press releases kept saying everything inside was fine. Guards and prisoners agree — that was nothing but B.S.
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Movie Pirates
That couple in the back row — they're making out big time, but not in the way you think
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Former Death-Row Inmate Sent Back to Prison
Martin Draughon returns to the clink after becoming a test case for alleged flaws in GPS monitoring devices
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Barack Obama and Me (262)
It was the year 2000 and I was a young hungry reporter in Chicago covering a young hungry state legislator
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A Prison Cover-up During Hurricane Rita (28)
For days after the storm, inmates in Beaumont lived without A/C, electricity or hot meals. Press releases kept saying everything inside was fine. Guards and prisoners agree — that was nothing but B.S.
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Are You Hot Enough for Citizen Lounge? (11)
All This Useless Beauty
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What's the Problem Houston? (6)
The city's skuzzy alt-rock scene thinks it is dying
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Movie Pirates (4)
That couple in the back row — they're making out big time, but not in the way you think
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A Prison Cover-up During Hurricane Rita
For days after the storm, inmates in Beaumont lived without A/C, electricity or hot meals. Press releases kept saying everything inside was fine. Guards and prisoners agree — that was nothing but B.S.
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Movie Pirates
That couple in the back row — they're making out big time, but not in the way you think
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Former Death-Row Inmate Sent Back to Prison
Martin Draughon returns to the clink after becoming a test case for alleged flaws in GPS monitoring devices
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The Judy's Come Back
Just in time for SXSW, the Pearland New Wavers brush off the mothballs
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Banned Books in the Texas Prison System
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Mp3: Nosaprise's "Grown Folks Music"
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John Royal’s Top Ten All-Time Greatest Sports Movies
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Slideshow: Mudbugs in the Bayou City
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Fighting the Renaissance
Continued from page 1
Published: April 3, 1997"There were about 50 people in the room, all Italians," the younger Martella recalls with some amusement. "When they saw Gladys, it was like, 'What are you doing here? We're not meeting with the blacks until next week.' But why couldn't she be there? She owns land there like everyone else in that room."
At the meeting, Martella says, Laguarta threatened the landowners with eminent domain. Martella took exception to that statement -- after all, where did Houston Renaissance get the right to bargain with the city's power to condemn land? Eventually, Martella was asked to leave.
Laguarta refused to comment on the meeting or anything else. "Why the fuck should I cooperate with you?" he asked. (Earlier this year, he was removed from the Houston Planning Commission after the Press reported that he lived in Bellaire.)
According to Michael Stevens, the mayor's unpaid housing advisor, Martella is right to be skeptical that the city would invoke eminent domain. "That's something that other people are bringing up," he says. "Our focus now is on getting the various financing mechanisms in place."
That may be so, but according to Houston Renaissance documents, the nonprofit has considered creating a special taxation district that, if approved by City Council, would have condemnation powers. It's unclear how seriously that option is being considered. But last year, Renaissance presented the city with an expense report requesting $200,000 to pay the law firm Vinson & Elkins for "organization" of a tax-increment financing district and "eminent domain legal matters."
Ross Martella Jr. hates the idea that his family might lose their land. "They would like to get this land dirt-cheap, probably so they can charge you and me $5 an hour to park on it," he says. "But I've always had dreams of keeping it. Maybe Ross or somebody could open a little Italian delicatessen. I really don't want to sell it.
