Park Cities voters can expect big changes to local government in May, along with the opportunity to weigh in on the future of public transit.
Because no University Park city council seats are contested, the city will not have a general municipal election. But there will still be several new faces among city leaders this spring.
University Park Mayor Tommy Stewart, who was first elected in 2020, then re-elected twice, didn’t file to run this year. Attorney Randy Biddle will succeed Stewart. Biddle filed unopposed for the mayoral seat.
Melissa Rieman, who was elected to the city council in 2024, will remain in her seat, as will attorney Phillip B. Philbin.
Rieman is a former president of the Friends of the University Park Public Library and member of the parks advisory committee. She was named University Park’s Citizen of the Year in 2022 and chaired the centennial celebration planning committee.
Philbin served as a member of the planning and zoning commission and zoning ordinance advisory committee and chaired the legislative committee before his election to the city council.
Current Mayor Pro Tem Mark Aldredge and city council member Bob Myers won’t be returning to the city council. They’ll be replaced by attorney Alex Bell, who was Citizen of the Year in 2024, and property manager Darrell Lane.
In Highland Park, incumbent Mayor Will Beecherl filed unopposed to run for re-election. Six candidates are vying for five seats on the town council.
Current town council members Don Snell, Leland B. White, and Alan Friedman filed to run for re-election, while Lydia Novakov and Marc Myers won’t be returning to the town council.
The additional town council candidates who will appear on the May ballot are Mike Tibbals, Margaret S.C. Keliher, and Mark P. Marynick.
Voters in both Highland Park and University Park will also decide on May 2 whether the municipalities will remain Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) member cities.
Highland Park became the first of DART’s member cities to call for a vote in November. University Park’s city council also voted unanimously to hold a special election on the issue in January.
Neither the city nor the town has been persuaded to call off its vote by efforts to reform DART’s governance and return some tax dollars to member cities.
Farmers Branch, Irving, and Plano, however, have opted to cancel their DART withdrawal elections following the changes.
A plan approved by the DART board recently would return 5% of annual sales tax collections to its 13 member cities in fiscal year 2026. The refunds would increase by 0.5% annually to a maximum of 7.5% over a span of six years.
Cities that approve the plan could use returned funds for projects that support local mobility needs, according to the agenda packet for a Feb. 20 DART board meeting. The Regional Transportation Council has agreed to match a portion of the funds DART would return in the amount of $75 million over six years.
Before the DART board greenlit its offer, the Dallas city council approved giving up the city’s majority control of the transit agency’s board for the first time in its history.
Visit peoplenewspapers.com for more election news, including a complete roundup of March primary election results for races impacting the Park Cities. For primary races in which no candidate received more than 50% of the vote, a runoff election is set for May 26.
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