Mosquitoes found with West Nile in Stafford: Page 2A
A Missouri City firefighter shows an act of kindness for a disabled girl. See the story on page 1B.
WEDNESDAY • AUGUST 22, 2018
Fort Bend / Southwest • Volume 42 • No. 1
Visit www.FortBendStar.com
Two killed, one injured in shooting Alleged shooter, one other dead at Ben E. Keith Distribution Center By Michelle Leigh Smith
832-532-0040 Proageinstitute.com
1235 Lake Pointe Pkwy, Suite 103 Sugar Land, TX. 77479
Free Aesthetic Consultation
Mention this ad for
10% OFF
Gourmet Hot Dogs Bar-B-Que Tues- Friday 11-2 & 4-7 Sat. 11-7 Sunday 12-3
Available at The Alamo Café inside The Texas Gun Club. 206 Brand Lane Ste 100, Stafford www.tmd30.com That’s My Dog 832-539-7243
FOR THE FORT BEND STAR
A fatal workplace shooting left two dead after a woman employee at Ben E. Keith opened fire on her co-workers in the massive food warehouse around 2:30 a.m. Monday. According to the Missouri City police, she killed her manager and shot another colleague in the leg. Both the alleged shooter and her co-worker were taken to Southwest Memorial Hermann Hospital, where the woman died as a result of her injury. The suspect, identified by police as employee Kristine Peralez, 29, shot two other employees at the facility. Peralez was apprehended and transported to Memorial Hermann to be treated for a
A Missouri City police car sits in front of the Ben E. Keith Distribution Center Monday morning following a fatal shooting that left two dead. (Submitted photo)
gunshot wound to her chest. The two victims were Manager Francisco Reyes and Fredencio Janas.
Reyes, 31, died on the scene and Janas is being treated at Southwest Memorial Hospital for a gunshot wound to his leg.
Police Chief Mike Berezin said there were 20-25 employees in the warehouse at 1 Ben E. Keith Way near the 700 block of Cravens Road at the time of the shoot-out. He and his investigative team had not yet said what may have prompted the deadly shooting. Immediately after the shooting, it was unclear if Peralez died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound or due to police gunfire in the parking lot. “When the call came in to the city’s dispatch center, our officers quickly responded with assistance from area law enforcement agencies who helped secure the scene,” Berezin said. Police arrived in the parking lot outside the warehouse and discovered
SEE SHOOTING, PAGE1B
Fort Bend Star shines brightly at 40
Special birthday bash draws crowd to museum to celebrate By Joe Southern JSOUTHERN@FORTBENDSTAR.COM
Roaming among the dinosaurs and gemstones, hundreds of guests turned out Saturday to help The Fort Bend Star celebrate its 40th anniversary with a special event at the Houston Museum of Natural Science at Sugar Land. Scattered among the exhibits were nearly 30 vendors with booths offering a variety of products and services. As a gift to guests, the Star gave away special T-shirts. There were also food trucks out front and bounce houses for children out back. As an unannounced bonus, U.S. Rep. Pete Olson appeared and delivered a Congressional proclamation commending the Star on its anniversary. It was 1978 when a “West Texas broad” named Beverly Carter published the first edition of a weekly newspaper called The Southwest Star. Today The Fort Bend Southwest Star, commonly called The Fort Bend Star, serves a community vastly different than the small towns that dotted Fort Bend County in 1978 when Carter set out on a mission to “provide news of local events, meetings, and honors, and to provide a media through which local businessmen and merchants can reach the consumer.” Sugar Land, Missouri C i t y, Stafford, and other communit ie s o f
U.S. Rep. Pete Olson, right, stopped by the Houston Museum of Natural Science at Sugar Land to deliver a Congressional proclamation commemorating the Fort Bend Star on its 40th anniversary during a party at the museum. Pictured from the left are Editor Joe Southern and Publisher Frank Vazquez. (Photo by Brooke Nance)
eastern Fort Bend County have grown and changed significantly since the launch of the Star, but the newspaper’s mission has never changed. “We pride ourselves on being a free publication. We love delivering a product to our readers and doing it for the sake of keeping our community informed,” said Jonathan McElvy, who, with Frank Vasquez, purchased the Star last year and have been publishing it since 2014. When Carter began printing the paper from an office at the corner of Murphy Road and Highway 90A, she began with a staff of 10, including herself, her children Michael Fredrickson and Sherry Nitsch, and seven other women, mostly former teachers and many of them Texas
The first edition of The Southwest Star, which is now the Fort Bend Southwest Star, published in 1978.
Tech alumna. “We hate to admit it, and it is probably not very professional to do so, but we feel it is our duty to inform you that the SOUTHWEST STAR is the latest in a long succession of hare-brained moneymaking schemes that the group pictured above has attempted. We only hope it will not be as ill fated as some of the others,” Carter wrote in her first opinion piece, written as an introduction of the staff. Eventually she penned a regular column called Bev’s Burner, where she kept the heat on local politicians and the pressing issues of the day. Carter passed away in 2013, recognized statewide as a pioneer for women in journalism with a reputation for her dogged pursuit of the truth and accountability in local
Landfill dispute raises stink in Pearland
government. “She was feisty, determined and unflappable in her quest to give the community a voice in their government. She started the newspaper by pounding the streets, council chambers, government offices and beer joints of Fort Bend to bring her readers some insight into their community through her fledgling newspaper,” the Star wrote in an obituary. As the Star rose in prominence in the community, Carter branched out. She started the Fort Bend Business Journal in 1982 and in the 1990s she launched the Fort Bend Community TV cable channel as well as Star Digital Studios, a video production company, which was operated by her daughter until her
The edition of The Fort Bend Southwest Star announcing the death of founder and publisher Bev Carter.
Redistricting plan going to Sugar Land council From staff reports
By Theresa D. McClellan THERESA@FORTBENDSTAR.COM
FOR THE FORT BEND STAR
Something stinks in Pearland, but the answer to the cause is different depending on whom you ask. For the homeowners in the Shadow Creek Ranch subdivision, a bricked enclave of six and seven-figure homes in the master-planned community bordering Fort Bend and Brazoria counties, the heavy sulfuric-smelling fumes come from the nearby 30-year-old Blue Ridge Landfill in Fort Bend County. Land developers created the sprawling Shadow Creek Ranch community in 2001 and as it grew the homes got closer to the landfill. Residents, however, didn’t notice obnoxious odors until about three years ago in 2015. As more residents com-
The City of Sugar Land’s Redistricting Advisory Committee unanimously approved a recommendation for revised single-member city council districts in Sugar Land. The recommendation will be presented to city council on Aug. 21. At-large city council members will not be affected by redistricting proposals, and redistricting decisions will have no impact on decisions regarding land use or any city services. City council is scheduled to hold a workshop on Aug. 28 to discuss the committee’s recommendations. The process will include a public hearing on Sept. 4 to provide citizens an opportunity to share comments.
This Google Maps image shows the Blue Ridge Landfill and the neighboring Shadow Creek Ranch.
plained to public officials and challenged authorities to do something, Republic Services, owners of the Blue Ridge Landfill which has been around since the early 1990s, said that since 2016, they put $7 million in infrastructure upgrades into the property to handle the odors. The smells persisted, so residents and governments
lawyered up with the city of Pearland and the state of Texas, acting through the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ), and filed suit against the landfill company telling them to clean up their act. “It’s like a cheesecloth over a diaper genie,” said Ed
SEE LANDFILL, PAGE 2B
untimely death from pneumonia in 2011. Carter and the Star won numerous state and national awards over the years, with the halls and walls of the former office on Techniplex Drive covered with plaques and certificates and numerous others stuffed in boxes and tucked into corners. “County residents have consistently been able to obtain in-depth reporting from the straight shooting Carter, along with her unique take on politics, policy, community, religion and virtually any other subject that intrigued her. Known for her strong sense of public integrity, Bev and her ‘Star’ reporters pounded the pavement in Fort Bend to bring their readers insightful and concise information about their community,” the newspaper wrote in Carter’s obituary. “News without spin was the norm from Carter, and her investigative reporting brought much notoriety to the small, community newspaper that grew into a staple of the Fort Bend community.” On occasion, Carter made the news, having been interviewed for the television shows “48 Hours” and “Nightline.” She also filmed a segment f o r SEE STAR, PAGE 8B Discove r y ID’s “Behind
Members of the public are allowed to submit plans to the city council for consideration. All plans must follow the criteria and guidelines established by the city council. Those criteria and guidelines are available at www.sugarlandtx.gov/Redistricting. Plans must be submitted in person at the city council meeting on Aug. 21. The redistricting website will also include the committee’s recommendation and future city council meeting dates and times. “As part of this open, transparent process, the public is invited to attend the meetings to learn more,” said Executive Director for Special Projects Jim Callaway. “We have created a project website with a variety of educational resources to help our residents better understand the process. There will
also be opportunities to share comments with city council. Redistricting has no impact on school district boundaries or precinct voting for county, state and federal elections. Only the city’s single-member council districts will be affected.” The committee was appointed by city council in June to make a recommendation on a redistricting plan for city council’s consideration. City council will ultimately decide which redistricting plan to approve. The annexation of Greatwood and New Territory increased the city’s population, requiring the city’s four single-member city council districts to be adjusted. Single-member council districts must be of substantially equal
SEE DISTRICTS, PAGE 3B