Citizens working to preserve and enhance the state park system for the benefit of the people of Texas and their guests.
Below are news articles that have appeared recently in the Houston Chronicle and the Star Telegram.
Continuing budget problems apparently will result in the loss of another state park, and the loss of revenue and new repair costs related to the hurricanes could make budget headaches even worse, according to Parks Director Walt Dabney.
The Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission will this week (Nov. 2 &3) consider whether to continue negotiations to transfer Lake Houston State park to the City of Houston. Pending the TPW Commission decision, a public hearing on the transfer is tentatively set for Dec. 5 at the Spendora Community Center. The TPW Commission could approve the transfer at its Jan. 26 public meeting in Austin. [See text box below right].
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Lack of funding hurts TPWD - Lake Houston State Park is nice, but agency unable to improve it By SHANNON TOMPKINS, Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
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RESOURCES |
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NEGOTIATIONS
• The Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission will this week consider whether to continue those negotiations. Pending the TPW Commission decision, a public hearing on the transfer is tentatively set for Dec. 5 at the Spendora Community Center. The TPW Commission could approve the transfer at its Jan. 26 public meeting in Austin. • The park would be cooperatively operated by the city of Houston, Harris County and Montgomery County. |
Texas needs more large state parks within reasonable reach of its largest metropolitan areas.
The state, over the past decade, has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to confirm this. Study after study funded with money generated through campers, hikers, anglers, hunters, paddlers and birders have shown that the Texas public aches for state parks within a 90-minute drive of the state's largest metropolitan areas.
So obvious has this paucity of parks become, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department has for the past several years repeatedly announced obtaining new state parks as its highest priority.
"Improving access to the outdoors by opening a minimum of five, 5,000-acre or larger state parks near major urban centers," is the first goal listed in TPWD's Land and Water Resources Conservation and Recreation Plan, the agency's long-term planning document.
So why is TPWD considering giving away Lake Houston State Park, a 5,000-acre state park about 30 miles from downtown Houston?
Dollars, not sense
Money. Actually, it's a lack of money. That, plus a poverty at the state level of political and bureaucratic leadership willing to demand a state park system funded well enough to provide the outdoors opportunities Texans repeatedly say they want.
The situation surrounding Lake Houston State Park provides a case study in the problems facing Texas' state park system.
Lake Houston State Park covers almost 5,000 acres straddling the Harris and Montgomery county line.
Twenty-four years ago, TPWD bought most of the current park from a timber company.
It added a couple of hundred acres a decade later when it purchased what had been the Peach Creek Girl Scout Camp.
The tract, bordered on the east by the East Fork of the San Jacinto River and bisected by Peach Creek, is a wonderful piece of East Texas bottomland forest.
It has all the requisites for a tremendous natural recreational resource — a large tract close to a major urban area, significant and diverse natural resources relatively undisturbed by development, plus water for fishing and boating.
But the park never flourished. It wasn't even opened to public use until 1992.
Money was the reason. Little was spent to make Lake Houston State Park accessible or attractive to the public — because little was available.
TPWD's state park division has consistently been starved for operating funds.
The Texas Legislature, which sets appropriations for the state parks, has been unwilling — unable, legislators say — to increase park funding for more than a decade.
But the Legislature hasn't been shy about reducing park funding over the past few legislative sessions.
Funding dries up
Over the past five years, the Legislature has cut appropriations for local park grants from $25 million per year to $5 million.
At the same time, the Legislature has reduced by about $2 million the amount of general tax revenue appropriated for state parks — this despite costs of operating current state parks rising by more than $7 million in the past five years.
TPWD has been hard-pressed to simply maintain, much less improve or expand, its 120 or so parks.
The agency has 127 unfilled personnel positions in its state parks division — about 10 percent of its work force — because of lack of funding. Department officials are looking at further reductions in the coming year.
Just as telling is the edict handed down to TPWD by the state government that the agency will not be buying any big tracts of land for new state parks.
The Legislature consistently refuses to appropriate money for new state parks. The only way TPWD currently is allowed to obtain new parks is if the land is given to the agency, and the donation also includes a fiscal endowment large enough to perpetually pay for operation of the park.
Meager defense
TPWD itself has not been particularly animated in its defense of the parks. The state park system is the only part of the agency that isn't almost completely self-funded through license sales and federal tax reimbursements.
The agency has to go begging to the Legislature for park money; something it doesn't have to do for fish and wildlife programs. No one likes to beg.
So Lake Houston State Park, purchased before the collapse of park funding, sat moldering for the past quarter of a century.
Although it has great potential, the park has serious access problems. The road leading to the entrance floods fairly regularly, as does much of the rest of the park; it is, after all, a bottomland tract in the flood plain.
Plus the road goes through a residential area, and the neighbors are not thrilled about transient traffic.
The park's facilities are old and in poor condition. It has a staff of only four. For all these reasons, Lake Houston State Park sees light visitation.
Over the past fiscal year, the park saw about 22,000 visits, said Scott Boruff, TPWD deputy executive director for operations.
The park generated about $70,000 in revenue this past year. Annual expenses for operation and staff salaries were about $190,000.
Compare that with the numbers for Brazos Bend State Park, a park similar in size and distance from Houston.
Brazos Bend drew almost 325,000 visitors this past year and generated about $610,000 in revenue, Boruff said.
So when the city of Houston, Harris County and Montgomery County approached TPWD this year with an offer to take the park and spent their money to improve it, TPWD bit.
"The bottom line is, (Houston and Harris and Montgomery counties) have the ability to properly manage the park and make it more accessible than we are able to," Boruff said.
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(c) 2005 Star-Telegram and wire service sources. All Rights Reserved.
AUSTIN - Already lacking money to fill key posts and properly maintain its facilities, the Texas Parks & Wildlife Department faces new maintenance headaches and lost revenue because of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, the state parks director said Thursday.
Several Texas parks were damaged by the storms, and four remain closed and without electricity and water service, said Texas State Parks Director Walt Dabney. During the crisis, the system provided mostly free shelter for as many as 10,000 evacuees, he said.
"If we don't get any help from FEMA on this, this will further compound our bad [financial] situation," said Dabney, referring to a department request for financial assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
Dabney said the parks department waived about $250,000 in fees so evacuees could camp and stay in shelters for free. Officials must also pay to repair wind and storm damage, although they have not completed their assessment of those costs.
Already, the parks system has left several posts unfilled and has skimped on maintenance because of tight budgets, Dabney said.
The loss of revenue and new repair costs related to the hurricanes could make budget headaches even worse, he said. "We make more than half of our [$50 million] operating budget on camping fees, entrance fees, that sort of thing, so losing revenues exacerbates [the budget difficulties] even more," he said.
Dabney said the Sabine Pass, Sea Rim, Village Creek and Martin Dies state parks remain closed because they lack electricity and water service and because of damage. "There's huge numbers of trees down in the trails, and in some cases there are hazardous trees that have to be brought down to ensure safety," he said. He said Hurricane Rita damaged several other parks, but they have reopened. There were no hurricane-related injuries in the state parks. "Typically, it's been facility damage and debris removal in those parks in the eastern part of the state," said Dabney. "We had camping sites, screened shelters, park residences -- all those had damage." He said a few evacuees remain sheltered in state parks.
Meanwhile, the Texas Public Utility Commission reported Thursday that 539 customers in Jasper and Newton counties remain without power because of Hurricane Rita.
There were 1.5 million customers without power shortly after Rita made landfall Sept. 24. All told, 126 to 141 Texans died because of Hurricane Rita, according to a recent survey by the Star-Telegram.