Indeed it was Mac Brown who signed the first desegregation order, but it was Barefoot Sanders who kept it in effect for thirty years as the DISD collapsed around him. Blaming white flight on the parents seems to be the only argument that liberals can make in face of the facts, as if parents don’t have a responsibility to their children to get them the best education they can. For the last ten years, Dallas has experienced black flight for the same reasons. Are we going to blame those parents too? Wake up and smell the coffee, Stoller.

It’s times like these when the 1960’s Dallas of spitting on Adlai Stevenson, and anti-UN screeds comes to the surface all over again. We’ve made so much progress!

Sorry, Wick, I don’t buy your Starbucks. The historical pattern of the voters’ treatment of public schools has been one of abandonment and neglect. The DISD didn’t descend to its current state overnight, or by the stroke of a judge’s pen, or because of just one factor. It got here because the community at large made the choices (real estate development, road-building, tax policies, public housing, lack of support for integration efforts, failure to demand and support responsible school board members) that all but insured the failure of this system.

To the great Bob Stoller: So now it’s not just parents who are to blame, it’s everybody — except for the man who took onto himself absolute control over the district for 30 years. Nice.

It doesn’t take a village to ruin a village. Even the Jackson 5 knew the truth: one bad apple can spoil the whole bunch.

Well Bob Stoller, using your crazy liberal logic, I don’t want to hear anymore leftists blaming the state of our country on George Bush. It’s everybody’s fault.

When DISD stops sucking (for most) then people will start sending their kids there again. Maybe. Probably not. Oh well. Go St. Mark’s!

PS. I blame the DISD administration, I think a lot of the teachers are great and try really hard in an awful system. I also blame Bush. And whoever it is that thinks standardized testing equals learning. And a bunch of other people. Just not the teachers. Got it?

Perhaps the demise of DISD and the inner city began with the blanket rezoning of established close-in East Dallas residential neighborhoods for apartments, creating slums. There are lots of reasons for cities evolving. Fortunately those areas are coming back, it just took 50 years.

SB, I actually agree with you there.

I’ll also allow that liberals can be hamfisted and blinkered when it comes to making efficacious policy decisions. Desegregation was a necessary thing, but the effort was prosecuted stupidly.

Without blaming parents who fled the DISD (and so many other urban school districts), I do laud those who stayed. If we want to play the parental blame game, there’s plenty to go ’round for parents who don’t value education or take an involved role in their kids’ schooling. I’ll leave it at that.

In response to SB,

The Dallas numbers of the 49% white population probably include Lake Highlands and Far North Dallas which are in the Richardson ISD.

Also, I think the tax rolls still show that the City of Dallas/Dallas County residents north of 635 pay for 80% of the county’s and city’s annual budget.

I am sure Wick and all the Parkies get down on their knees every night to thank Highland Park Judge Taylor for excusing them from the school desegregation suit.

HP - still Ivory Soap white after all these years!

And property values went through the roof!

Thanks, Judge Taylor where ever you are!

ROJ, my kids are already there. Someone has to not be ***********.

Lakewooder, I now live in Lakewood. For whatever reason that the HPISD was not consolidated by Judge Taylor, all in Dallas should be glad. Had there not been a solid, stable, middle to upper income residential base, the Park Cities and HPISD, in the inner city, Dallas would be a far worse place now. The Park Cities provided the base on which Oak Lawn, the M Streets, maybe Lakewood and more, were able to rejuvenate and become the thriving residential areas that they are. If the Park Cities had gone the way of Swiss Avenue, or near East Dallas, we would all be in a real mess. Cities come back by osmosis, spreading block by block.

Six murders a year? I don’t like those odds.

Let me guess. Decatur?

SB-

I was talking about the schools too, would you like a tour? neither Lakewood Elementry or Preston Hollow Elementry are 80% Hispanic– add to the list Stonewall, Hexter, Pershing, Anne Frank, others too I’m sure.

The single family homes in those areas are white, the multi family units are not. The schools naturally reflect this.

No comment on the busing? You can only knock down straw men?

Lee - had there been no place to run, perhaps the desegregation plan ‘might’ have worked. Fortunately not many ran from Lakewood because of their love for the schools and strong support of public education. Now we are actually getting reverse white-flight from RISD and other areas to our schools.

I’m not sure what you mean by going the way of Swiss Ave..the court order began not long before the renaissance of Swiss started about 1975. Look up the history of HPL or Preservation Dallas. And there was never busing in East Dallas (Woodrow cluster)- parents raised money to intervene in the suit to keep our ‘natural integration status’ - arguing all the way to the Supreme Court - and won.

In any event, the Park Cities went from a well-to-do burb(s) with many middle class people to the Frankenstein it has become today. So - many people were well-paid by skyrocketing home prices and pent up demand from white-flight.

Of course some may see it as a Pyrrich victory since all sense has gone out the window and a couple of generations of bigoted brats have been raised in what is accurately called “The Bubble”.

A little online trolling at the end of the day reveals Lakewood Elementary School to be 67% white, 25% hispanic, 4% black. Only 8% limited English.

Preston Hollow Elementary 19% white, 66% hispanic, 13% black. 44% limited English. hmm, could these numbers reflect ideological differences? nahh, liberals are all talk.

For what its worth my Hexter is 38% white, 35% hispanic, and 26% black. 16% limited English. Gotta love East Dallas!

I’m Wick, remember? I’ve already said it.

Wait that’s Pyrrhic - it’s been a long time since Mrs. Dunlap’s English class.

Wussy

I reveal the truth in journalistic arrogance and I don’t expect it to be well recieved by media types. If it is getting old, I can, like most people on this blog do, come up with another name, or you could refrain from reading it. If you really read my post and the response. There is never an answer, and the question legit. So attack the messenger and deflect. I don’t hate Wick Allison. I think he has a huge platform in which to make his views known, and he does. The blogosphere allows those that have a different opinion to speak back.

Do the postings that always agree with Wick Allison, and there are many, get “old”? Do they add to the “debate”? One might say your attacks on me don’t add to any debate and get a bit old.

One can assume that the issue of racial diversity at D Magazine is a very touchy subject and is not to be questioned. Got it.
(D)alllas, is enhanced by it’s by the varoius ethnic groups that inhabit it.

@DeeRag– You are welcome to continue this dialogue but further to my point it doesn’t have anything to do with the original topics of white flight, Barefoot Sanders or Jerry Buchmeyer. So please feel free to send it either to my private email address (ittybittywussy@gmail.com) or some other place where you/we can start a sub-thread about how evil Wick Allison is and/or how D Magazine is something more than a lifestyle product.

ericthegardener — I think I’m the only D editor who doesn’t live in Dallas proper. Someone has to swim against the tide.

..and because at a Dallas ISD high school one can begin Advanced Placement courses as early as freshman year, there are kids who have entered college as 2nd semester sophomores due to their AP success and or dual enrollment with Brookhaven. That saves some $$ too.

There is a very in depth explanation about the Unacceptable rating at:

http://backtalkeastdallas.type.....-fall.html

Pecos 45,

Take heart! In a year, it may be a rich black guy!

Hey Looker, Let’s remind these folks that in addition to loving Barry Goldwater, we also love Jesus who loves all children.

To JustMe,
Woodrow is great. It is academically unacceptable because of one student population and in one course area. Schools in Texas are rated based on 36 criteria. Woodrow has to meet 21 criteria. Woodrow met the marks in all but one - AA population in 10th grade science. In contrast, Woodrow has the highest gains in all other student population and all subject areas compared to any high school in the district. It was confusing to me at first to understand the nature of reconstitution but it is for the good of the school - to get rid of teachers who are not performing well.

I believe the community support for Woodrow is very strong. Students from private schools are now transferring to Woodrow because of its strong AP program. Why do you think Becky Oliver - FOX 4 investigative reporter - send her child to Woodrow Wilson High School? Because she believes Woodrow is an exception of everything bad going on in a public high school.

Well I moved in the Lake Highlands
area in the 1960’s as a child and have
seen all the changes. It gradually got
worse in the mid 1980’s and by then it was pretty bad in the 1990’s when most of those apartments that were built in the
1960’s - 1970’s were not taken care of and just letting anyone live there for cheaper rent. The zoning and rules were changed by stupid judges who of course live in Highland Park. They were letting low income and low mentality families live there instead of single adult communities, especially off Skillman Road and near Park Lane before Greenville Ave. Those stupid judges then brought in more theft, drunks, violence, prostitution and drugs in the area where beautiful homes and parks exist and that is a fact. Now hopefully those stupid judges have retired or croaked, they are now rezoning certain areas and demolishing those infested apartments with new and nice community townhomes and houses along Skillman which will hopefully attract more businesses in the Lake Highlands area like CVS, LA Fitness and MiCocina instead of thugs just walking the streets.