How to Unmake a Museum: North Texas on Slow Path to Change Its Mind

by Paula Newton June 5, 2013
Rendering of the not-to-be-built Arts Center of North Texas

Rendering of the not-to-be-built ACNT

Arts Center of North Texas (ACNT), approved by voters in the early 2000s, was meant to include several performance halls and outdoor sculpture gardens. But the project, jointly owned by the cities of Plano, Frisco, and Allen, hit a major snag in May 2011 when, after a petition from the Frisco tea party, the city voted to pull out. Finally last fall, Plano and Allen voted on a resolution to dissolve ACNT, returning the land and restricted funds back to the original donors.

Frisco, though, has yet to vote on the dissolution resolution, citing “unanswered questions.” The cities have now hired an outside law firm to research the various gifts in order to help them decide how to divvy up the leftover funds and recoup a small part of their losses.

So, after a decade, there will be no Arts Center but the Arts Center won’t go away. Progress is being made, though, according to the article in Pegasus News. Plano City Manager Bruce Glasscock reports that “future meetings are being planned.”

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Meredith Jack June 6, 2013 - 09:04

Somehow, this seems so archetypical of north Texas and the Dallas area in particular.
Cynically, I suspect that this will end up in a Dickensian situation that the only entity to get any money will be the law firms hired to parse the distribution.

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