HOWE’S HAPPENINGS Song of the Week “Bright Lights” Gary Clark Jr. This week’s song isn’t the most lyrically rich, but this song and artist always make me think of the good that comes from living in bigger cities in my experience. Gary Clark Jr. is from Texas’ very own music scene. If the music hubs of TexasAustin and my hometown of Denton could’ve gotten their politics straightened out I think they would’ve remained cool. Music has always brought people together in a way nothing else can. On that note- is there something in the front page article about Howe maybe trying to get an amphitheater at the future Central Park? Fingers crossed! EDITOR’S NOTE—This column is reserved as an editorial column and may not necessarily reflect the policy of this publication.
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Thursday, March 27, 2025
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Town Hall Meeting Gives Valuable City Updates
Tuesday Town Hall Meeting Ashley Husbands This last Tuesday, County Commissioner Josh Marr hosted a Town Hall meeting for updates in Grayson County and the city of Howe. Speakers included City Administrator Monte Walker, Howe ISD Superintendent Kevin Wilson, Grayson County Judge Bruce Dawsey, and County Commissioner Josh Marr, and was moderated by Karla McDonald, City of Howe Mayor. To begin the meeting, Howe City Administrator, Monte Walker opened with an update of what has been happening in the City. Walker covered challenges, projections, strengths and weaknesses in the city of Howe. The following is some of his commentary regarding the City: “The biggest challenge that we face is infrastructure obviously,
Photo Credit: Ashley Husbands
sewer and water. We are contracted with GTUA on water so all of our water source, most of it comes from Lake Lavon, especially on the east side. Right now, we are transitioning on the west side in the near future, once school is out. Any time you initiate a new water product, especially going in a different direction, you can imagine all of the sediment in those lines for all of those years, when water was moving north to south, and when you push a different chloramine in a different direction it ripped off all the sediment in those lines. The only way to get rid of that is by opening up the faucet and letting it flush out. It was awful for the citizens of Howe (in the previous flushing) , I wish we didn’t have to go through that but we did and I am glad it’s over. We are now going to transition to the west side, we don’t feel like the west side will have near the impact the east side did because the water is traveling in the
same direction, and the infrastructure over there is as not nearly as aged as on the east side.” On the sewer side, we are in very deep conversations, I think we are getting very very close to a solution with a third party to handle our sewer. They will construct a wastewater treatment facility, we will own a collection system, they will operate it for us. They will also clean up some of our infiltration issues that we have. Every city faces infiltration issues in their sewage system, ours is no different, when it rains that rainwater gets into our sewer collection system. The only difference we have as opposed to other cities is that we get metered on it. So, we have to pay whatever goes through the lines to Sherman, so that’s been a huge problem for us over many years. This partnership we are hoping to enter into will get us out of that situationwith our contract with Sherman… once we
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have that sewer system in place things really open up for Howe. The days of being a small town are going to be behind us because like it or not we are right on 75. That is not a place for a small town, we are going to experience rapid growth. In looking at the strengths and weaknesses in the town, Walker stated that in comprehensive plans our strengths include “our ISD, our 75 location, our local bank, our churches, this very building that was renovated (Summit Gardens), the community support, we have a unique library which is half the city and half the school shared into that library, emergency services which we have initiated over the past couple of years with an EMS program. Our weaknesses include our sewer contract, our lack of grocery stores, lack of jobs, parks and streets. Our streets have been neglected for
about 10 years and we just recently spent 311,000 to completely rebuild 11 streets but I know that is not enough. We have got to continue to do that, it is a battle we will have to focus on until we get them all where we need to be. Exit ramps are not good for Howe, we really need some ramp reversals extremely bad off of 75 and our east/west access- I know the county needs east/west access in a number of points throughout Grayson county and we have an opportunity for 902 to be rerouted to connect 902 East to West. Opportunities include commercial development, managed growth, education, future improved parks, campus security, nearby jobs. Threats include the Sherman Sewer Contract- we are about to get rid of that threat, aging infrastructure, crime- we got a new police department, we have overhauled that entire police department, we are very happy with what Chief Sullivan has done. One threat is over-