It looks like the mural outside an Arlington taco shop will be sticking around -- at least for now.
Juan Velazquez painted the mural outside Gilberto's Taco Shop depicting the moment when Rougned Odor punched out Jose Bautista during a Rangers-Blue Jays game in 2016.
Under the city's Unified Development Code, murals can only go up in downtown and the Entertainment District.
Gilberto's, on Park Row Dr., is in neither.
As such, a city staffer sent the business a note saying that the mural does not comply with city code and should come down.
On Tuesday, the city said in a release that it would hold off on any enforcement until the City Council weighed in on potentially making changes to the ordinance.
Wednesday, Mayor Jim Ross met with both the business owner, Jose Ruiz, and the mural's painter, Juan Velasquez.
"We are not going to enforce the city ordinance on that mural right now," Mayor Ross tells KRLD News. "We're going to sort of stay any enforcement action. And we're going to give the City Council an opportunity to reevaluate whether or not they think we should do something different on this mural ordinance and allow this gentleman to continue to have the mural there."
Mayor Ross says he's a huge fan of Velazquez's mural, which is based on a viral photo taken by Richard Rodriguez, at the time a staff photographer for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.
"The mural is a beautiful, beautiful piece of art, and it has tons of community spirit," says Ross. "It's exactly what we want in Arlington."
Ross says he would like to see the ordinance changed so that business owners can freely express their creativity.
"This is a young entrepreneur that's opening his second restaurant here in Arlington, and he's just doing a wonderful job trying to make ends meet," Ross says. "And he's done something that I think is super cool with the mural."
The mayor continued, "Hey, listen, do we want to be restrictive on the mural ordinance, when we have these type of businesses doing such incredibly cool things here and showing such huge community spirit in the city of Arlington?"
Velazquez says he's happy that his mural is staying up, but he's continuing the fight at city hall to protect other artists.
"Technically, even if they do allow the murals to stay there, they still don't allow murals outside of the downtown and Entertainment District in Arlington," says Velazquez. "And I don't feel like that's right."
Velazquez says he wants to be a part of the process in making changes to the city ordinance.
"I'm going to make some time to read the code that they have and try to implement something that makes sense." Velazquez says.
Mayor Ross says in areas where murals are allowed, there's an approval process in place.
"We would make sure that they weren't lewd or they weren't doing something illegal or vulgar or anything such as that," Ross notes.
Velazquez is perfectly fine with that.
"Obviously, you can't do nudity and bad words and stuff like that," Velazquez says. "But as long as it's not any of those things, I don't see why you wouldn't be able to have a mural in your business. Especially if you own the business, that's private property."
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