Travis County Commissioners Court
October 31, 2006
Item 22
Number 22. Is to discuss and take appropriate action on policy regarding prohibition of metal detectors in Travis County parks. Now I will have the following two questions at least to ask legal counsel in executive session. Number one, what is the state's jurisdiction over county parks? Number two goes to the county's obligation to conduct the surveys and other activities that are culturally related to which joe gieselman makes reference in his backup memo. So what is our obligation to do those actions for either the state or the Texas historical commission and these are legal questions so hopefully will allow legal answers. Now to the nonlegal matters, mr. Gieselman.
>> thank you. And with me is roy turly on my right. Charlesburg and john kuhl all with transportation and natural resources. We have tried to reach kind of a middle road here on the issue of having metal detectors in the parks. And what we've tried to do is in consultation with the state and understanding what they're trying to achieve with the preservation of state an tick with aties is to set aside some of the foorkz the purpose of metal detecting. And it would not open all of our parks to metal detecting, but it would allow the metal detecttory have some venues for recreate fog this purpose. We would still need to have this cleared through the state, and although we thabl if we do -- and although we do believe that if we approach it from this angle they would probably tolerate the request. Let me have roy kind of lay out what we're proposing and then we can go from there.
>> good morning. The proposal is is to basically maintain the existing ban with the following exceptions. These exceptions would be to allow the metal detectors by permit at loop 360 park, del valle park, ben fisher park and allen park. These parks have no known cultural sites. It should be noted that the thc again will perform that review of each of the parks and this may be a cursory review, it may be more in detail. Basically the staff would recommend that the conditions of the permit -- and this would be a permit required -- would include but not limited be free to the user. Each individual would require a personality. There would be no group permits per se. The permit will be valid for one year and the permit must be on the person itself at all times while in the park. All items found would be reported and reviewed by tnr staff. Any items -- yes.
>> you mean must be in the (indiscernible) possession at all times when the person is using the metal detector.
>> not just on them --
>> if you have a permit and you want to go walking through the park, you don't have is to have this permit with you, but to be in the park using a metal detector you have to have your permit.
>> yes, sir.
>> if we catch you using a metal detector without the permit that's a violation. That's what you're saying.
>> correct. Yes, sir.
>> can we clarify that language? We didn't intend for it to be as broad as it is. Sorry about that.
>> any items considered historical in nature would be turned over to tnr staff. We ask that a description of the item lost if they're looking for lost items be included on the permit when searching for lost items. This would be in any park location that they're looking for park items. Permits will be issued for lost items or for general recreation use in those parks. And gerngs the general recreation use parks are allen, loop 360, ben fisher and del valle parks.
>> number three, if our park staff is obtaining possession of these valuable items, what would the park staff do with them?
>> we would probably ask the thc to review them and ask what we need to -- what we need to do with them from there.
>> in the macht we've turned them -- in the past we've turned them over to the 125eu9. State.
>> if I was metal detecting and came across something that was valuable, I would want know that the policy requires tnr staff to do something with it.
>> okay.
>> that question came to me as county judge as well as a prospective metal detectorrist. So we would turn it over to the state. By wait, what does the state do with these items?
>> they actually archive them. Or research. They actually have some of the artifacts that we've discovered in our parks in the past and they record them and they keep them for future research.
>> it's not a big black hole at the state that these are dumped into?
>> judge, john kuhl, environmental officer. They're kept at the Texas arc noj lodge 'kel research -- archaeological research lab betory. As we go through these processes with trained consultants, they're all labeled in what's called a site locality where they were fond and n the depth and all these other pieces ever information associated with them are typically provided. 'That's kind of the issue here is is that when a detector is finding something we will get some sort of on location, but really what it will do is just be an indicator of a site to be there that could be scientifically evaluated in the future because the typical hobbyist is not engage understand a scientific endeavor like the folks that we hire as consultants. So that's sort of one of the rubs that the state has to be honest. But they would go go to a place and they are kept in an assigned drawer for this location.
>> if we hand it toafer the state, the state determines that it is of no value, no historical value, then it's given back to us. And what do we do with it?
>> we can hang on to it. That's for you guys to decide. If it has no value, there's a chance that you could contemplate giving it to the finder. I don't know.
>> good question.
>> if I hand it over to the county, I thought it was interesting. Interesting enough for me to call it to the county's attention. The state disagree and give it back to the county, I think I would want snob phone me and say, hey, do you want this that you found out there last December two years ago more than likely. If you want it, you can come down and get it and you've got 30 days to do it. After that we will probably trash it or whatever. We can close the loop on that, that would be fair. I'm having a hard time sitting here thinking that gold pieces would be discovered, by the way, but who knows.
>> an example of something that can be found, and are found in some of these areas are something like a civil war button or something like that that would give an indication to the thc that maybe there was an encampment, a temporary soldier encamp nment that area that was not known of and you could do a study of that. That's an example that comes from other parks.
>> okay.
>> I'm trying to get to figuring out from your memo as to what exactly is the staff recommendation. Because if we are required to do a basic cultural survey, it seem to me from the work that you have done that for about $5,400 for the four parks that have been mentioned, one in each of the four precinct, for about $5,400 we could make available at a rather prudent and modest sum a recreational opportunity for folks who have expressed a desire for this activity; however, in the same memo that if we are required to do a full cultural survey, if I add up the same numbers, it is $270,000 to do something that I don't really think that I heard 270,000 dollars' worth of users out there and in terms of the expense, and no cost recovery being talked about, and $270,000 in a park -- in the parks budget, we have asked many of our users to help recover some if not all of the costs of running certain kinds of these activities. And these are -- nobody is at zero. There are various things in terms of how much we try and recover the cost. So I'm trying to get a sense of is the recommendation to do this the same if we are required to do a full cultural survey at the cost of $270,000. And not expecting any kind of dollars to help offset any of those costs given the demands on our park system. I know where I would land.
>> the differential is just the magnitude of the investigation. And if thc believes that there is a.
>> likelihood of cultural sites in there at a ploor location, let's say loop 360, they may require us to do a full investigation with a cultural resource company that specializes in using metal detectors to go in, actually vacuum up a site and look for any potential artifacts that may be be of importance. And that's what's driving that aspect of the cost. Now, I think there's reference in the letter in the backup memo that talks about us having to come back to the court if thc determines that this level of survey is required. At that point we would come fwook the court to ask for direction or additional funding. I don't know if -- you reference cost recovery. I don't know what kind of fee structure we would establish for the users to be able to recover that magnitude of cost for this type of activity.
>> or you limit the number be of places that you might want to do it. In terms of loop 360 that is such a small area and quite frankly that might be the place where stuff falls out of people's pockets, etcetera, as you're trying to get on to your boat and quite frankly they did some dredging and construction work there to put in the boat ramp. So that one I think is kind of a no brainer for me. Allen park used to be a quarry, so that has been utilized in terms of they've been digging there to dig as much stuff out of that site as possible. And when they stopped that as being a quarry, it then got turned over to Travis County a million years ago, but I just would question the wisdom of spending $50,000 on allen park, even 15,000 on loop 360 and 30 and certainly 175,000!!?? My goodness, that's 270,000, that's kind of the cost of improving our turf on behalf of thousands of users. And I just don't see that as being wanted if those indeed are what they come back as feedback. It's feedback before we're getting the feedback.
>> if that were to happen, I would hope that everybody that owns one of these things would go to the state and protest -- because nobody in their right mind would think that we're going to spend -- that the county should spend -- the melght metal detectors people shouldn't think we should spend that money.
>> I don't think the expectations that somehow we're proceeding through. Quite frankly if it's a quick and be dirty basic environmental assessment, if that's something that appears opens up four areas in four different parts of the county for this kind of recreational use, hey, I'm in. But if it's not, then 'i have no problem with being where I was before, which basically said all city of Austin parks and wildlife preserves do not 'allow metal detectors. All lcra parks and land do not allow metal detectors. All state of Texas parks and parks and wildlife do not allow metal detectors and the army corps of engineers only allow them to occur on lands where they have already dredged the spoils. So I don't mind being in the same place every other governmental en'tate has landed saying we appreciate your issue here, but no.
>> not every. There are two others just below where you stop reading that allow it.
>> well, georgetown and Pflugerville are just a conversation away. So go for it.
>> roy, tell me what -- tell me one more time how this got started. Did somebody see someone or did we have a park ranger that just said, hey, guess what, I know that you can't do it. How did this really get brought to us?
>> really this got brought to us -- we have two rules in place, one to protect our natural resources and one is is to protect our cultural resources. And in looking at that and in looking at what the thc does as well, felt that we need to clarify this and say that metal detectors can lead to disturbing the natural resources and disturbing the cultural resources. Not that they necessarily will, but that's what they somewhat do if they bring a metal detector out they are going to dig to some degree to look for that item, while they may not dig that deeply. So the metal detectors really came from the rules that we already had in place.
>> you can do some things at some of our parks that's highly illegal. So maybe we ought to just close them. Do you know what, we're giving you a spot where you can do something illegal. We're just going to take away --
>> they don't come up with that recommendation either. He's making a point.
>> [ laughter ] we're not supporting that. You're just making a point, right?
>> [ laughter ]
>> that would be not so okay.
>> Gerald, watch out, now.
>> can we see a copy of the state rules or policies governing these areas?
>> we do have a copy.
>> so no one in Travis County at this point within the boundaries of Travis County in our park system or the city or anybody else is allowing this type of activity within the park.
>> Pflugerville. I believe Pflugerville is is the only one. The lcra does not, city of Austin disnlt. Does not.
>> okay.
>> the city of Pflugerville in their small number of parks, they do apparently allow it.
>> but this issue has not been on the radar until we put it on there because the metal detectorrists said nobody had approached them in the county parks or lcra parks. I asked specifically during the last 17 years, and the ones I chatted with had been at all the parks doing the same thing. Their thing was they're not harming the parks and why are we harming them? So not that the lcra has allowed it, because apparently the lcra has had a policy against it, but have we enforced the lcra's policy?
>> we do try to enforce it if we observe it, but understand that we have a lot of land that we don't always have people --
>> before last spring? Since this issue surfaced I know we've been trying to enforce it, but they were saying until this surfaced last spring they were in the parks, period, including some city of Austin parks.
>> they didn't get caught.
>> they probably didn't get caught is what I'm presuming.
>> so I'm still -- I'm trying to see what your specific recommendation is, specific. Just tell me what it is.
>> we are trying to accommodate the recreational metal detectors in selected parks in our system without opening it up widely to all parks because I think at that point you're going to run head long into the state law, and we're trying to reach a compromise here and allow this activity in our parks. Whether or not we will have to spend the amount of money outlined in this memo is yet to be determined with further conversations with the state staff, but we're trying to get to a point where the metal detectors have a place to go, we're on the right side with regard to the state code and the state agency that's -- and able to enforce the law.
>> I hope the feedback that we also get is whether these folks are going to be satisfied with being told it's del valle, it's allen park, it's ben fisher and the loop 360 boat ramp it because that's not when they gave us their top three or five list of so where do you go? None of those parks were on that list. So we need to make sure that it's --
>> is del valle parks, is that the same as moy I can't? Moya.
>> no. It's the softball complex.
>> so what's the problem with moya?
>> we selected four sites that we thought had the least probability of cultural sites, is basically what was driving that.
>> what problem do we have at moya?
>> we believe that there's a potential for cultural sites because it's along the stream bank, along a creek.
>> that's typically where you will find the indian encampments is along the river beds.
>> I can wait.
>> my concern, though, my allowing this, what type of precedence are we setting that would maybe suggest other parks being -- the one that you're trying to prohibit this type of activity by doing this, what kind of precedence are we setting to maybe open the door for those other parks to be infiltrated by the same prohibition that you're trying to achieve. Is there any case law established anywhere that suggests that by opening your park you must open all parks? Is is there any case law that says if you designate parks these particular parks then everything else is shut off? Where in the legal realm of all of this by opening up these particular park you don't open up the possibility of other parks being infiltrated because we have opened the door.
>> you are in tom's legal realm right now.
>> question number three.
>> he's smiling right now.
>> those are some things -- that's executive session? Okay.
>> so parks that are near water banks we have excluded?
>> yes.
>> and that's why webberville is not on there or any of the other -- is that a scientific fact?
>> yes. We have actually in our prior -- we're required to do the surveys before we develop these parkland, and 'typically we have found sites within our parks that are along tributaries, not exclusively, but there have been.
>> there are no known sites at webberville.
>> I'm sorry.
>> there is -- I know of at least one known site at webberville. I'm sure there are some more.
>> and southeast for sure.
>> we had something at northeast.
>> what do we do about these known sites then?
>> we register them if they're not already prior registered with the state and we protect the site.
>> the reason we do that is that at some point in the future somebody will come out and discover what's there?
>> they may well. You really need to get an arcologist, professional archeologist in here to ash tick late the importance of these sites. There may be some technology that comes in some future diswleangs has a better method of evaluating these sites than what we know right now, and as a result they can garner or glean more information from these sites in some future generation. So basically what they're trying to do is protect these sites for future evaluation. Some of these sites may never get fully evaluated, but I think the intent is is to try to protect the integrity of the sites for future education nal evaluation.
>> so when we say we protect a site, what specifically how do we do that?
>> it's usually directed by the state.
>> I'm thinking about webberville park by the way.
>> number one, kind of like the partnership accurate tick oath, do no harm, we try to ensure that our staff, number one, does not do any trenching or digging or anything that would damage the site. Nobody two, we try to manage the parks in such a fashion where that's presented from -- prevented from occurring by the user as well. You have instances, for example, in Commissioner Daugherty's precinct I've informed him of a park where we had major hunting going on. I'm not suggesting it was going on by metal detectorrists, but that's the culture we have become attuned to, whether it was on y'all's radar or not to protecting. Weech just always had to do that. In Commissioner Daugherty's precinct we actually had to come in there and work with the state and the lcra to cover and protect with 12-inch deposit its of soil, large rocks and native vegetation to disguise that site to keep it from being further looted. It's actually -- it's not an elective thing at least by my interpretation. We as a subdivision of the at a time, political subdivision of the state are required to protect these sites.
>> so we just take --
>> so webberville park, where we believe the site that should be protected. We try to make it look as inconspicuous as possible.
>> correct.
>> what if this is in the middle of the area where they have recreational activities?
>> that's a great question and that is why in the very first place when we design, at least nowadays with these modern parks when we know we are going into a raw piece of land that's why we up front hire the disownts define those sensitive areas and we try to avoid those and not put active recreational areas on or adjacent to those sites particularly if they're assigned a fairly high value by the professional archeologists. And they are. They're not all considered as high a value as others. Typically those that have a history or show to have a history of occupation as opposed to just a transient tool making place or something like that, if they show layers of carbon or burned rock or those types of things that indicate there might be a whole lot of information that might be gained from them, they are assigned a higher value and we are supposed to specifically avoid those areas.
>> the primary goal there was not to necessarily remove the site, but to gain all of the scientific information that could be gained from it before we would obliterate it. And that included pollen analyses, bone fragment analyses that would tell you how that culture was living at that time, what they were eating, what they were doing.
>> tom, you have your three legal questions. We may add one or two to that list. We'll call this up in executive session. Anything else in this item now? Thank y'all very much.
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Last Modified:
Wednesday, November 1, 2006 11:30 AM