Answer Line: Light display at city entrance needs a part

Published 10:39 pm Thursday, July 24, 2025

QUESTION: When the city of Longview was working at the intersection of Mobberly and Estes Parkway as part of the bond work, the city installed a light display at the intersection. The light display hasn’t been working for sometime. What’s going on?

ANSWER: The city has had some trouble getting a part needed to repair the lights.

“A specific part is needed to restore functionally to the light, which comes from Canada and has been stuck in customs,” city spokesman Richard Yeakley said in an email. “ We are continuing to work with the vendor to resolve the issue.”

THINGS I WANTED TO SHARE WITH Y’ALL:

The city of Longview is hosting a groundbreaking ceremony for the new pool that will be built at Stamper Park at 9 a.m. Aug. 5. The address is 400 Fair St.

The pool will be built at the site of the original Stamper Park Pool, which closed in 1998.

At Thursday’s Longview council meeting, City Manager Rolin McPhee announced the city had, just before the meeting, signed the $4.3 million contract with Tyler-based Riley Harris Construction to build the pool.

Also, District 3 Councilman Wray Wade has been leading an education campaign to discourage celebratory gunfire in the city on holidays such as New Year’s Eve or the Fourth of July. Residents sometimes fire guns into the air in celebration, posing a risk to people in the vicinity.

“We kicked off this in earnest on New Year’s Eve and have continued our education campaign each  major holiday,” Wade said. He noted a “significant” reduction in calls on July Fourth this year, compared with 2024. The number of “gunshots heard” calls received by the police department dropped 82% year over year, from 17 in 2024 to three this year.

Wade said that’s a “significant reduction,” and thanked the police department and the city communications team for supporting the initiative.

— Answer Line appears Wednesday and in the Weekend edition. Email questions to answerline@news-journal.com, leave a message at (903) 232-7208 or write to P.O. Box 1792, Longview, TX 75606.