Update, 1:40pm: A revised press release from the mayor’s office now indicates the settlement was for all 6 trees, not 4 as previously indicated. We’ve updated the story below.
A just-announced legal settlement signed late last week means that the owner of the Wendy’s franchise at 5003 Kirby Dr. will be paying a $300,000 fine to the city for the late-night chopping-down and mulching-up of oak trees in the public right-of-way in front of the restaurant late last month. Six trees lining Kirby and North Blvd. were removed in the nighttime incident (illustrated in the before-and-after photos above), which was first reported on Swamplot. Crews from Freddy’s Landscaping and More carried out the tree-removal work under contract; the settlement, however, is to be paid entirely by Mohammed A. Dhanani and HAZA Foods, the Wendy’s franchise owner. All construction work on the restaurant, which was closed and undergoing renovations when the trees were removed, had come to a stop after city officials became aware of the clandestine street-visibility-improvement operation.
Judging from court filings, there appears to have been some sort of resolution to the 
Engineers for both sides may be spending much of the coming weekend testing the Southampton soil surrounding the site of the 
When you’re looking to buy a home, do you sign an agreement with an agent before that agent has shown you any properties? Testifying in a trial going on now at the Harris County Civil Courthouse downtown, a former VP of sales for real estate firm Urban Living says it was the firm’s policy not to show customers any homes unless they’ve signed a buyer representation agreement first. And that’s what’s landed Christopher Drummond, buyer of the townhouse drawn above at 4245 Dickson St. in Magnolia Grove, in court: 
The Woodlands Development Company is trying to hold the line in its legal battle against a growing number of homeowners claiming that repeated damage to their homes is the result of movement along 3 separate geological faults running through the community. According to reporter Cindy Horswell, the company is going further than simply claiming that the building and ground cracks and resulting new alignments in the properties must have been the result of something other than surface fault lines. 
