I owe every resident of Dallas an apology. I could have solved the city’s budget woes and fixed the long-term problems facing the city, but I choked. I did not display grace under pressure. What didn’t I do? I didn’t buy Dallas’ Internet domain name when it expired yesterday morning — because then I would have held it hostage until the city met my demands (non-negotiable, of course) to reform how Dallas is run.

More, after the jump:

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Yesterday’s fiasco would be funny if it didn’t demonstrate, yet again, the problems the people downtown have in running the city. It is almost impossible not to renew a domain name. Ours here are automatically renewed, and I have five domain names that I somehow, every year, manage to renew — and, as my critics like to point out, I’m an idiot. Yet the only excuse the city can give is that the email reminding officials to renew went to the wrong email address.

That’s silly. How did it get renewed last year? And the year before? Did it go to the wrong address then? Or did it go to the right address then and the wrong address this year? And didn’t someone who manages the Web site have a note on the calendar? "Domain name expires on March 8."

But if I had been quick enough, and I’m sorry again that I wasn’t, I could have fixed all of that. I would not have returned the city’s domain name unless the following demands were met:

• Halt all work on the Trinity toll road project. Eliminate all toll road funding from the budget, saving millions. It’s not going to be built any way. And, though I realize this would be difficult, stop Dallas’ Only Daily Newspaper from writing another of those long, windy, toll road stories.

• Get out of the hotel business. Unwind the city’s position in the convention center hotel as quickly as possible. If we lose money, we lose money. It’s not like it was ever going to make any.

• No more signature bridges until we repair every pothole. And I mean every pothole.

• Restore 2008-9 funding to the rec centers and libraries. Cut money from the city manager’s office and eliminate funding for the city heliport to pay for it. Didn’t know we had a heliport, did you?

• Tell the city staff to find something to do other than harassing community gardens and community garden markets. Put them to work in the restored rec centers and libraries, perhaps?

If I missed something, let me know. And, as a public service to city officials, I have marked my calendar for March 4, 2011. I’ll post something then to remind them to renew the domain registration. Will four days be enough lead time?