2023 a big news year for Amarillo - here are some of the top stories

Weather was one of the biggest news stories of 2023 for Amarillo and the surrounding area, with multiple nonprofits stepping up to volunteer and raise funds for communities impacted by flooding, tornadoes and other disasters. The city itself saw a turnover in leadership after May's municipal elections, with the lone returning councilmember being Amarillo's new mayor. And the area was brought into the national spotlight as Amarillo College won a major award, to be followed by the departure of its leader, and a court case drew attention and protests to the area, as well as continuing debate. Here are just 10 of the major topics covered by the Globe-News as the year comes to a close.

Flooding

Severe storms drenched the area in late May through mid June, impacting Potter and Randall counties, as well as Armstrong, Carson, Deaf Smith, Moore and Oldham counties. Numerous Amarillo-area residents were displaced and rescued as playa lakes overflowed their banks. The heavy rainfall continued over several weeks and saturated land, flooded homes and damaged properties in Amarillo, Hereford and other areas. At one point, nearly 20,000 sandbags were distributed by Canyon and Amarillo to mitigate flooding.

As Lawrence Lake surpassed its capacity, road closures and evacuations took place in parts of Amarillo as multiple roads in the area were blocked off. Residents south of the Greenways playa lake were left with their homes uninhabitable. The state, cities and counties all issued disaster declarations. Volunteer groups rallied to help flood victims, while utility companies worked to restore power. The Canadian River reached record water levels, with the Potter County Sheriff's Office noting at one point they estimated 3 million gallons flowing each minute at the bridge area.

The city of Amarillo said more than a billion gallons of water had been pumped from city playa lakes. The area has since returned to drought status in the months since, but there has been one positive: As of Dec. 21, Lake Meredith had a current depth of 78.06 feet.

City elections

In May, Amarillo elected Cole Stanley as their first new mayor in six years, who won the election in a landslide against his other opponents, including councilmember Freda Powell. Aside from Stanley and Powell, all of the other Amarillo City Council incumbents had announced they would not be running for re-election, including Mayor Ginger Nelson and councilmembers Eddy Sauer and Howard Smith. Council positions for Place 2 and Place 3 were won by large margins by Don Tipps and Tom Scherlen, respectively, in the May municipal election, with Councilmembers Josh Craft and Les Simpson later winning their seats in the June 24 runoff election.

Changes were evident in some of the procedures and processes from the new council's first meeting. “For the previous two years, I was here to learn and get everything I could done, but I was being blocked and stonewalled in some areas by so many things where I could not affect things. Now it is like the handcuffs are off, so the clock has started,” Stanley said in an interview with the Globe-News in July.

Amarillo College

On April 20, More than 100 people gathered in the Oak Room of the College Union Building on the Amarillo College (AC) Washington Street Campus as it was announced that AC was one of the two winners of the 2023 Aspen Prize for Community College Excellence, sharing the honors and $1 million prize with Imperial Valley College in California. The announcement was viewed via a livestream from Washington, D.C., where AC President Russell Lowery-Hart made a speech after receving the award, as people cheered from the campus room.

As current board chair of the Amarillo College Board of Regents Anette Carlisle wrote in a guest opinion piece, the Aspen victory "is a BIG. DANG. DEAL!"

It was the culumination of things AC had overcome in an eight-year time span, including the THRIVE Scholarship program, bringing back Badger Athletics, being announced Aspen's Rising Star in 2021, launching the Badger Bold campaign and more.

However, the celebration would be followed with a turn of events after Lowery-Hart was selected as the lone finalist as the new Chancellor for Austin Community College in July. He officially announced in August he would step down as the leader of the college, and a search for the next AC president is currently underway.

Perryton tornado

Three people died and more than 100 were injured after an EF-3 tornado ripped through the Ochiltree County seat on June 15. Shortly after 10 p.m. the night of the storm, the county's Sheriff Terry Bouchard spoke to the Amarillo Globe-News outside of his office in Perryton, confirming there were people killed, hospitalized and missing following the storm. "The tornado hit the northwest part of town and traveled southeast to the other side of town, basically creating a path of destruction in its way," Bouchard said at the time. Officials imposed a curfew due to the widespread destruction and downed utility lines. Families displaced from their homes were directed to one of several emergency shelters. Recovery efforts from the storm soon began in full swing, as the community continues to work to rebuild.

More: 'Somebody’s trailer frame hit the house': Perryton man was caught in tornado

More: ‘Bent but not broken’: Perryton parade lifts spirits amid tornado recovery

One week later, on June 22, another EF3 tornado struck in the area further south in Matador, leaving four people dead, 15 wounded and much of that community in ruins.

City manager fired

After the last of its members were officially sworn in, one of the new Amarillo City Council's first order of business in August was making a decision regarding City Manager Jared Miller's future duties with Amarillo, voting unanimously on the parameters of Miller's separation agreement in a special meeting held at city hall.

The previous outgoing council had voted 4-1 to extend Miller's contract and increase his compensation for the position during a contentious meeting in April; his contract had been evaluated each year after his annual evaluation in February. Miller had served as the city's manager since 2017. The separation agreement for Miller's contract said he would get 18 months of his current salary of severance pay plus other benefits, in a lump sum severance payment of $633,726.16 on Jan. 4, 2024, as well as other compensation. The council also officially named Deputy City Manager Andrew Freeman as interim city manager.

Buc-ee's makes it official; other business openings and closings

After more than a year since the business's first announcement, city officials joined other special guests for the official groundbreaking of the new Buc-ee’s travel center in east Amarillo in late October.

Scheduled to be completed in February of 2025, this new travel center marks the first foray for Buc-ee’s into the Texas Panhandle, with the nearest location on Interstate 40 being more than 1,000 miles away. A billboard that had reflected this was recently changed to note the new facility in the works. The store in Amarillo will be similar to stores in Luling and Hillsboro, Texas, which are also about 74,000-square-foot facilities.

In July, as part of the needed process to move ahead with contstruction, Buc-ee's received approval from the Amarillo Planning and Zoning Commission to rezone an additional 3.38 acres of land adjacent to Interstate 40 and Juett Attebury Road for a future site for Buc-ee's in Amarillo. The additional acreage acquired brought the total to 27.73 acres, with the additional property necessary to provide an easement to serve as a truck exit for SpeedCo Inc., a subsidiary of Loves Travel Stops and Country Stores, to the interstate, which had previously rejected earlier proposals that would have to build over the access road to their business.

In openings, Cacique Foods had its grand opening in May at its new Amarillo location on South Georgia Street, with the new, 200,000 square foot, state-of-the-art dairy processing facility bringing more than 200 jobs to the city. In the Westgate Mall in April, Urban Air Adventure Park opened its Amarillo location, with 35,000 feet of activity including various trampoline areas, dodgeball courts, zip lines, climbing and obstacle courses.

Among closings was potentially the last showing at Tascosa Drive-in in October. The drive-in, which originally opened May 2, 1952 and has been owned by Rhett Burns for the past 25 years, suddenly announced its closing Oct. 25. Camping World of Amarillo also closed its location permanently on Oct. 27, just six years after it was acquired from Gander Mountain during that company's bankruptcy liquidation.

Route 66 festival, celebrating upcoming centennial

Following the announcement earlier in the year, the inaugural Texas Route 66 Festival was held in June in Amarillo to celebrate the upcoming 100th anniversary of Route 66.

Kicking off the 10-day celebration was the Coors Ranch Rodeo, along with the Coors Ranch Rodeo Cattle Drive through downtown. During one of the events, the Amarillo National Bank Route 66 Celebration, thousands in attendance enjoyed performances and all kinds of family activities along the historic roadway in Amarillo. Live music was performed in businesses along the strip, such Golden Light Cafe & Cantina and Smokey Joe's, and other activities included a Classic Car Show, Pin Up pageant, corn dog eating contest and more.

The festivities were held to kick off the upcoming Route 66 Centennial celebrations in 2026.

More: Ahead of its 100th, here's a brief history of Route 66 and some notable Amarillo spots

More: Sen. Cruz, others introduce legislation to designate Route 66 as National Historic Trail

Sod Poodles victories

It was a big year for the Arizona Diamondbacks, who made it into the playoffs as a Wild Card and then went on a surprise run to the World Series, where they fell in five games to the Texas Rangers. Despite the series' loss, Arizona's Double-A affiliate, the Amarillo Sod Poodles, had a major year of wins, including the Texas League Championship.

Minor League Baseball named the Sod Poodles as the MiLB Organization of the Year. A press release about the award mentioned the Soddies recording 31 sellouts despite being in one of the smallest markets in the Texas League as part of the reason for the award. Amarillo rallied this season to finish 77-61 overall and won the league championship over the Arkansas Travelers.

Abortion pill lawsuit, protests, debate

The Amarillo City Council continued its debate over an abortion ordinance in December, addressing taking anti-abortion measures to go beyond Texas state law including travel and medications, one of which put Amarillo in the national spotlight earlier in the year.

The Women’s March held multiple protests in downtown Amarillo outside of the Potter County Courthouse starting in March, in response to the initial hearing and subsequent April 7 ruling of Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk on the abortion medication mifepristone. Kacsmaryk, a judge for the U.S District Court for the Northern District of Amarillo, heard the lawsuit from the anti-abortion group Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine via the Alliance Defending Freedom. In its lawsuit, the anti-abortion group alleged that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) did not properly evaluate the safety of the drug prior to approving it in 2000 and also argued the drug should not have been made available through telehealth during the COVID-19 pandemic.

More: A conversation with Attorney David Donatti of Texas ACLU regarding abortion pill lawsuit

Lines formed up to three hours early outside the U.S. District Court in Amarillo for the public and media awaiting oral arguments, which lasted over four hours as the court listened to the plaintiffs and defendants' arguments. In a ruling issued Good Friday, Kacsmaryk suspended the two-decade-old FDA approval of the medication abortion drug mifepristone. The Fifth Circuit of Appeals later ruled the abortion pill could remain on the market, but only under strict conditions, and the Supreme Court followed with a temporary injunction of the ruling. The high court is expected to hear the case in 2024.

WT has big financial year

It was a big financial news year for the Canyon campus, following earlier controversy surrounding President Walter Wendler's cancellation of campus drag show that led to protests, a lawsuit and the move of the event from Canyon to Amarillo. In mid-September, West Texas A&M University (WT) announced that it had upped its One West campaign goal to a $175 million fundraising goal.

The new goal was set due to reaching the original 2025 goal of $125 million in less than two years. At the time, the campaign had raised more than $150 million in donations, including $39 million since the beginning of the new fiscal year. More than 62,000 gifts from close to 8,000 donors have been contributed to the campaign since its inception on Sept. 23, 2021.

Then in October, WT announced the school had received a record $20 million gift from local businessman Alex Fairly and his wife Cheryl, becoming the largest single-family gift in the history of WT. The gift will go toward establishing the Hill Institute, proposed as an interdisciplinary academy of researchers, teachers and students and named after former president Joesph Hill, who served from 1918 until 1948.

This article originally appeared on Amarillo Globe-News: Top 10 2023 stories for Amarillo include flooding, city elections