Rumor has it....

Since May, we've been posting about the long rumored Tim Love Woodshed restaurant on the banks of the Trinity River.  As we told you recently, nine times out of ten, rumors in Cowtown usually turn out to be true.  Lots of people have been asking questions about the Woodshed for awhile now, seems our "news" finally decided to play too.

Read the article in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, don't miss the comments from THE PEOPLE.  Seems we aren't the only ones who suspect WHO's next. 

I suspect one day we'll turn on the news and see the video of the FBI raid on their offices, carting out box after box after box of documents not unlike what has been happening in Dallas with their crooked South Dallas politicians.

If the head of the Trinity River Vision Authority was hired without a proper job search, and the contractors and PR firms are too, what makes local restaurant owners think the River Shack would be any different?  Wake up, people.  No wonder Love didn't know how much it costs now to open a restaurant.  And don't forget, the former Gideon Toal who received many no bid TRV and Tarrant County contracts gave the Woodshed an award.  How cozy. 

Remember, this is the same water district that can't figure out how to supply us water for the future.  But they serve one hell of a barbeque, with a side of BS at no charge.

Without open bidding, the Trinity River Vision Authority signed a 10-year lease with Tim Love and spent $970,000 building a restaurant structure at the most popular riverbank trailhead, hoping that the celebrity chef's Woodshed Smokehouse will generate hundreds of thousands of dollars annually in a profit-sharing rent arrangement.

Unlike municipal lease deals, those offered by water districts do not require competitive bidding under Texas law, said Anthony Magee, a Dallas attorney with Gruber Hurst Johansen Hail Shank who is familiar with such issues.

"Gosh, I wish we had an opportunity to bid on this," said Shannon Wynne, CEO of Dallas-based 8.0 Management, which operates three Fort Worth restaurants, Flying Saucer, Flying Fish and the downtown open-air 8.0. "I had been looking up and down the river for a location like that for 18 months.

"I don't know how Tim got the call, but he's a lucky guy to get it," Wynne said. "We weren't asked and so I was upset. I asked J.D., 'Who did you all ask?'"

"I think there would be other people interested if they had known about it," said Shaw, who is on the board of the state restaurant owners association. "I just can't believe Tim was the only one interested. Who did [Granger] approach? Did he send out letters? Did he just sit in a bar and talk about that?"

Neither Love nor Granger recalls who approached whom first about the site.

Because of its location, on the bank of a narrow section of the Trinity River's Clear Fork, the site was extremely difficult to develop, and the Army Corps of Engineers made clear that it could only be rented, not sold, Granger said.

In the end, Granger said, he reviewed two proposals and selected Love's. One thing that the high-profile chef -- who owns Lonesome Dove, White Elephant Saloon and Love Shack -- could bring to the table is an ability to generate interest in North Texas and beyond, he said, noting that Love had mentioned the Woodshed on national television.

Last week, Love agreed in principle to cut back slightly on interior space so that the structure is small enough not to require ceiling sprinklers, said David Hall, the city's assistant director of planning and development. Originally, the leased premises measured 10,295 square feet of enclosed and unenclosed areas.

The lease agreement, made available to the Star-Telegram after a Texas Public Information Act request, has the Woodshed paying 6 percent on the first $500,000 of sales, 5 percent on the next $500,000, and then 4 percent on sales over $1,000,001.

"If it goes south, the tenant is in a better situation than the water district," he added. "It was stupid on the water district's part not to bid it out because I think they could have gotten a lot more favorable lease.