The May TIRZ board meeting was rescheduled for tonight at 6:30pm at the Montrose Center at 401 Branard St. Or you can attend by Zoom by registering here https://tinyurl.com/bddkua72

In spite of opposition to the project continuing to increase - around 100 signatures added just since the April TIRZ mtg - the TIRZ refuses to even acknowledge the overwhelming dissent to their plan.  The TIRZ and their PR firm Holloway Services amplify the voices of project proponents while ignoring any criticism or dissent.  Evidence: their new propaganda page on their website where one project proponent email is posted with full text while hundreds of project dissenters comments are listed in tiny font on a spreadsheet that’s difficult to even locate. And our taxpayer dollars pay for this nonsense. 

As Save Montrose Live Oaks has stated ad nauseum, we don’t oppose better drainage, improved sidewalks and new pavement on Montrose Blvd. We oppose a design which adds 10-foot-wide concrete sidewalks which therefore requires removing every tree on the east side of Montrose along with many trees on the west and cuts into the medians by 10’, threatening those trees as well.  

Remember:  the planned 10x10 drainage retention culverts (an expensive intervention which will provide very minimal improvements, per their own drainage study) are planned to go under the west side of the street.  It is the 10-foot sidewalks that doom all the east side trees.  IT IS THE SIDEWALKS that forces the trees to come down.   They keep trying to change the subject and make this project all about safety or drainage or whatever argument they think will fly.  Don’t take your eye off the prize: saving the trees. 

The TIRZ and Abbie Kamin continue to claim that most people are very supportive of this project and wanted to move forward quickly AS-IS,  in spite of the overwhelming response, not only to this petition, but as seen in the hundreds of comments and emails that the TIRZ themselves tabulated in the fall.   90% of the commentary they received opposed the project in its current tree destroying design.  When will they stop bragging about how well they listened to the dozens of people from special interest groups (Bike Houston, Link Houston, real estate developers) who showed up at their January 2023 design review asking for bigger bike paths and open their ears to the hundreds and indeed, thousands of people, who are saying “No! Not at the expense of so many trees!”

The current plan will set a design precedent in place for phase 1 that dooms around 300 trees as it continues down Montrose Blvd in phase 2. 

Please sign up or raise your hand on Zoom to speak at tonight’s meeting, even if just to say “I am here because I want you to change the design to save our mature trees -  both in phase 1 and phase 2. Please count my voice.” 

And let me end on some good news: The historic 160+ yr old Post Oaks, known as the Three Sisters of Montrose, made it through the recent storms just fine. I hope all of you were safe as well.  I also hope we can keep up the pressure to save them.  They remain planned for removal in the TIRZ’s most recently submitted plan. 

Thanks all, 

Jonna