Who they are
FACT: Trinity Terrace is a continuing care retirement community in downtown Fort Worth: three towers, the newest 23 stories, opened in 2017. It’s operated by Cumberland Rest, Inc., a 501(c)(3) nonprofit that has been tax-exempt since 1943 and reported $52.45 million in revenue in fiscal 2024. That’s all public record: read the IRS filings yourself.
What they want to build here
FACT: Trinity Terrace purchased the 27.73-acre Kite Farm on White Settlement Road, one of the largest undeveloped tracts left in the area, with Trinity River frontage, and sought rezoning for a campus-style luxury senior living development, reported at a $350 million investment. For scale: the entire village’s property tax base was reported at roughly $440 million. Coverage: Fort Worth Report, KERA. Trinity Terrace’s own website describes land “on Fort Worth’s west side” for its biggest project yet.
FACT: Mayor Jones supported the rezoning, per that same news coverage. A rezoning connected to the project was brought to the city and rejected. The project is still alive and may come back.
FACT: One clarification worth being precise about: the rezoning the city approved in August 2026, 220 Redbird Lane (Shaddock Homes), is a different project. No Kite Farm application has appeared on any posted agenda since the first one. When one does, you’ll read it here first.
The mayor’s two positions on White Settlement Road
FACT: On June 12, 2023, Mayor Jones sent a signed letter on city letterhead to the Fort Worth Zoning Commission, copying the Westworth Village council and city administrator, formally opposing ZC-23-067, a rezoning request for 2.95 acres of multi-family housing at 4500 and 4570 White Settlement Road in Fort Worth. Read the letter. His stated reasons: “explosive apartment growth” in Fort Worth’s River District; that “grossly increased traffic and congestion is the inevitable result” on White Settlement Road; that residents “detest its effect upon our little town”; and that more multi-family units would have “an inevitable negative impact upon Westworth Village.”
OPINION: Months earlier, the same mayor had been advocating for the $350 million Trinity Terrace application on the same road inside Westworth Village, a project whose own traffic study projected 1,432 new daily trips. Opposing 2.95 acres of apartments in Fort Worth for traffic reasons while championing a 27.73-acre campus at home is a contrast we think residents should see side by side. Both positions are documented above; the inference about what explains the difference is ours.
Why “tax-exempt” is the whole question
FACT: Being a 501(c)(3) exempts an organization from federal income tax. Texas property tax is a separate question with its own test: Tax Code § 11.18(d)(19) exempts a nonprofit retirement community only if it offers independent living, assisted living, and nursing care on a single contiguous campus and provides at least 4% of net resident revenue as charity care. Even then, only if the owner applies to the county appraisal district and is approved. It is never automatic.
FACT: Trinity Terrace’s downtown campus has that exemption. As of July 2026, Tarrant Appraisal District records list the 1600 Texas Street property, appraised at $103.9 million, as exempt under § 11.18(d)(19). When Tarrant County approved roughly $72.6 million in bonds for Trinity Terrace in 2024, one county commissioner voted no, saying the charitable designation “is really pushing the boundaries and stretching the definition.”
FACT: The Westworth land is a different story, for now. TAD records show Cumberland Rest acquired the 27.73-acre Kite Farm parcels in August 2022 (eleven accounts, roughly $4.2 million in market value), and no charitable exemption has been granted on any of them. About $2.5 million of that value is fully taxable today; the rest sits under the old farm’s agricultural appraisal, taxed on productivity values of a few hundred dollars per parcel. Texas law adds one more wrinkle: converting agricultural land to development triggers rollback taxes.
UNVERIFIED: Whether a Westworth campus would seek, or would qualify for, the § 11.18(d)(19) exemption is an open question. We have found no public statement from Trinity Terrace committing either way. It is a question the council could ask, on the record, before any rezoning vote.
FACT: Cities sometimes negotiate a payment-in-lieu-of-taxes (PILOT) agreement with a tax-exempt owner to offset lost revenue. The mayor has repeatedly claimed a PILOT agreement exists for the proposed development. After a complaint to the Attorney General, the city produced what it has: an unsigned 2023 redline draft, 116 tracked changes, no signatures, never finalized, and not included with the original planning and zoning submission. The full story: The Records They Wouldn’t Release.
OPINION: Maybe this project is right for the village and maybe it isn’t; reasonable neighbors can disagree. But if a tax-exempt project of this size is coming, the village should be negotiating from strength, in public, with the numbers on the table, not learning the terms after the fact.
Where this connects to everything else
SPECULATION: The June 18 legal-fees vote and the P&Z shake-up both happened while this project was still alive. Whether those actions were taken to clear a path for the rezoning is our speculation. We say so plainly, but it’s the question that ties these pages together, and residents deserve a plain answer to it.