Travis County Commissioners Court
December 4, 2007
Item 9
9. Consider and take appropriate action regarding recommended revisions, including public access, to the balcones canyonlands preserve land management plan. (commissioner maybe we ought to hear from commissioner daugherty and see what he and the mayor did. Was there newspaper coverage of that or media coverage?
>> just a little bit.
>>
>> [inaudible - no mic]
>> that meeting was in open -- opened as required by law.
>> it was at the council chambers. Judge. And -- and mayor wynn, and myself, we -- we did a support resolution that you all -- i think that i have given everybody a copy. A copy of. Along with that, you have also received a copy of the letter that we had received from u.s. Fish and wildlife. With regards to their opinion about what was being asked. With -- with respect to -- to -- to public access. I mean, in -- in short, i think that -- that the -- the resolution or the statements supporting the public access actually puts in motion over the next effectively next 12 months the -- the notion that we are going to have a committee that is going to be put together where -- where this committee will -- will identify certain areas where there will be trail access. And the nature of that access that will have to come back before the coordinating committee and this committee. The committee is also part of -- shows what the committee is going to be made up of. Myself and the mayor, we might attach somebody from each of other offices in conjunction with the folks that we have on this -- about this the city of austin bcp staff having one, travis county b.c.p. Staff having one, fish having one, the citizens advisory committee chair and -- and the scientific committee chairs along with the b.c.p. Secretary which is willy conrad or who is willy con conrad. So i anticipate that i probably will have bob moore from my office as the appointment there. I don't anticipate that we will have any issues with having somebody else on there. But effectively i mean that's what we did. And -- and i knew that -- i had expressed in -- in open dialogue that day that we took this action, that -- that we were probably going to want to agendize this particular item for the court. Because i did anticipate that there may be some court members that would just like to personally weigh in on how they feel about -- about what the coordinating committee had done. You know, we did feel like with fish's letter with the movement that we were taking here with -- with spending the next 12 months looking at this, that we did as the coordinating committee have the ability to -- to take that action and it not necessitate a -- at least a guideline change, which is effectively what i think fish, you know, had indicated. So that's the reason that i think that the mayor and i felt like we could move forward with this -- with this resolution or this statement supporting looking at more public access. So that's effectively what we have done.
>> okay.
>> this -- does this language that's here that's posted today, does it give us as individual court members to -- to state our position on this -- on this particular issue of public access and that's what --
>> marietta, does it? Legally, i mean if somebody wanted to -- to vote on how they feel about the action that was taken from the coordinating committee, is that something that we could -- in a motion --
>> not knowing the details or the background -- it would be something that we have to look at.
>> commissioner davis I知 happy to have this back in whatever agenda item that you would like to have because i was really doing it in consideration of you because you pretty much indicated to me that you really would like to have the ability to do that. I知 happy to --
>> [multiple voices] i just thought that the language that was coming forth would allow us to do that or this language that's posted is -- is really accommodating for the meeting that you have with the mayor. And that's -- that's what I知 getting a little confused. I was hoping that -- that whatever the language come back, you know, whether -- whether yea or nay as far as public access was concerned was something that i thought we were going to look at, not actually what you and the mayor discussed.
>> we wouldn't have taken the action that we took had we not gotten the letter from fish saying what you all are indicating that you are willing to look at, in our opinion that is something that you are the coordinating committee can do. That's the reason that the mayor and i elected to do that.
>> this letter of november 27th that you are referring to?
>> well, let me see. When was -- oh, you mean the fish letter?
>> uh-huh.
>> yes.
>> okay. I took that letter to essentially be saying -- i don't believe that they are weighing on the authority of the -- of the committee versus the commissioners court. I took that letter to -- to say they didn't have enough information to weigh in on the appropriateness or lack thereof of increased access.
>> and i think that if you -- i mean you're the attorney. I知 sure that you can read that letter and probably get a lot of -- of different interpretations of what it says. The service believes there is flexibility built into the b.c.p. With regard to public access and that certain proposals may not require amending the permit.
>> I知 only commenting that i don't think -- i don't think that it addresses commissioner davis's issue.
>> i agree, sarah.
>> that's all that I知 saying.
>> i don't think it does either.
>> but the letter -- how did you all interpret the fish letter of november 27th? I interpreted it to mean just ask us about public access is insufficient. We need to know specifically what you -- what you proposed to do, then we can tell you whether it's all right, whether it constitutes a minor change and not an amendment or whether it's an amendment and last time we seemed to be unanimous in our position that if it's an amendment the commissioners court lands on it. If it's not an amendment, then the coordinating committee may well have the authority to do it, but the commissioners court can still later take action. You know, we can let the coordinating committee whether we agree with the action taken or not. But i interpret this letter to say basically somebody needs to go to the drawing board and let us know specifically what kind of access you want, right? And what impact that may have on endangered species. Since our conversation a group came by and chatted with me about canyon vista. Their position was before we acquired it there were 12 all over the place, 12 miles worth of trails. When we acquired it three or four years ago and fenced it off, they haven't been using those since by and large. Their position was instead of giving us all of those 12 back. We kind of viewed part of it as being grandfathered the 12 miles didn't hurt anything. If we were to go back and get a half of them, then we think we could do that in such a way we wouldn't impact them anyway. My thing was at some point maybe staff would have to look at this and land on it. But when i saw this, my first thought was in order for fish to give us its position, it needs to see a specific proposal for greater access. So it's kind of like throwing the ball back to us. And it also seemed to say you may be able to do this in such a way that you don't adversely impact endangered species and it may be all right plus a minor change, but it may well constitute an amendment, which kicks it into a higher level, based on what you plan to do, show us more specifics. Am i exaggerating?
>> i think you're correct. In your assumptions of both what the letter says, then also fish and wildlife would like us to come back with much more details as to exactly where do you want to go, what do you want to do there, what season of the year what controls are you putting on that, if you have law enforcement or trail guides or whatever. So i think that the letter from fish and wildlife service is basically not taking a position yet and -- until they get them more information from us. I did want to comment on a few things on the canyon vista tract.
>> okay.
>> be aware that the landowner who transferred that land to us, we contacted them after the county acquired the property and we asked about access and they said they never gave permission to anyone to access that property and any access that was before us was trespassing. So please be aware of that. Also, be aware that in our permit and in our interlocal agreement and shared vision agreement with the city of austin, there are specific properties that are listed as grandfathered. They don't use that term. But they allow the access that was there before. The canyon vista tract is a newer acquired property, it is not one of those properties that had preexisting access that was allowed. Also i disagree with the statement that -- that the -- that the canyon vista group said the 12 miles of trails --
>>
>> [one moment please for change in captioners] .
>> .
>> .
>> maybe do it in a better way. Every time i see a set of maps, looks like i kind of reach a different conclusion. A lot of them looks like there's a straight shot from a to b and other look like it's a to b but c, d, e, f along the way, where you leave the trail and kind of branch off into smaller trails. If i were crolge it i'd want one trail to lead from a to b and to cut the side trails out. See what I知 saying. That's just the kind of country boy's opinion applied to a map. I read that later as saying okay if you are interested in pursuing this, then you all get together and come up with specific recommended greater access or more limited access, give us that, and then we can tell you what we think.
>> judge, the reason i think that the mayor and i felt comfortable with this is effectively all it really has done is put in to motion the need to get out and identify exactly what people are saying that they want. I mean, with this committee. Then it's a matter, when you have the specificity from that, then fish, like i said, will give us what that was. But the marching orders pretty much had to be, i mean the reason we're going through this process is because there are folks that want more public access. Until we identify exactly what those, where those places will be, and to what degree can people use them and at what times of the year, i would think that in a year's time, the specificity will come back, then we will really, you know, i would imagine, that unless fish, hey, what you got there does not necessitate court action, and that may even not mean a whole lot if the court really wants to weigh in on it. But i do think that, you know, the reason i was trying to be very open the day of the meeting is because it was pretty clear to me that some of the folks on the court wanted to at least be able to say, you know, I知 not really supportive of more access. So i was just trying to be conscientious about that. This may not be the right way.
>> my question i guess is this. And is it, well, is there action required, since you and the mayor in the meeting you all have, and you have already done what you have done, sent it up to fish and wildlife, is there anything required for this court to do until we hear from fish and wildlife?
>> commissioner, only, if you are asking me personally, only if you choose to do that. I was just trying to leave that door open because i thought it was pretty clear to me, that you--
>> in other words, we can't stop what you are doing anyway. You and the mayor have been on the committee and stuff like that. Whatever y'all come up with, you go forward. Until we hear from fish, my question, is there an action required.
>> from my standpoint there's not. But again, I知 just trying to be considerate. In the event somebody wanted some sort of agenda izeed language that would allow them to say, you know what, clearly there may be an attitude from some folks, commissioner, i don't quite frankly care if that was your feelings, commissioner daugherty, i would like to send a clearer message the people contacting my office and would like people to know that I知 not supportive of that. That's all i was trying do with this thing. That is the reason i said what i said the day that we took the vote. If you are fine with where we are at this stage, I知 fine with where we've ended up.
>> the statement leaves the status quo in place, right?
>> yes.
>> the statement leaves the status quo in place until further work is done on specific greater public access that can be shown to fish.
>> it does set in process, though, a substantial planning effort. I think the staff is looking at some of the concerns related to that.
>> but can you plan in such a way that some you grant, some you could not? See what I知 saying? If i were doing it, then i don't know that i would just take the position that carte blanche , no because you don't know the specifics. And the if the goal is to protect endangered species, you may be able to do that in such a way that you can grant limited controlled public access to the a greater extent in some locations. I agree with you, it does require work that probably has not been done at this specific level to this point, but it seems to me that unless we tell fish that we are not going there we're just going to handle this on a general level, then we have to do it.
>> i think we want to make sure that the court understands what this resolution means as far as what kind of, what will it mean for staffing, costs, et cetera. I think that is an important issue for this court to understand.
>> before you go there, may i ask?
>> yes.
>> i would like to ask, i think it has been described to us, and i think that this is plain, that before the commissioners court really has a dog in this hunt, if had this does in the require an amendment to the permit, it's fully within the purview of the committee and doesn't come to us. But even so, i'd like to stay informed as far as the intent of the committee in having put the proposal mplay, the policy statement. So i had a couple of questions before we go to how the actual proposal would work, to you, as far as getting inside yours and the mayor's mind as far as the intent goes on the wordinging. Just in the wording of the policy statement. Also in light of matt watson's e-mail that, he states as the aide to the mayor, if it's product, the product of the process, is not adequately reflective of the clearly stated intent of the coordinating committee, and I知 jumping forward, if the convening committee comes up with a product the mayor disagrees with we will change it. I知 taking that to mean that the coordinating committee would change the outcome should it not meet their intent. So i just wanted to be clear on what the intent was. So going to the policy statement in the third paragraph, the public access may include any one or combination of the following recreational activities. Is it the intent of the committee that this process could result in either increased or decreased public access?
>> well, i would think that most i can't get in the mayor's head, but i can tell you that this process didn't start with people trying to figure out how to limit. I mean, that is not what the access deal was about. I mean, i think that it is, let's just call it what it is. And what it is is that you've got people wanting more access. But also--
>> the process seems to, i mean, the appropriate recreational activities from the list above shall be determined on a tract by tract basis, taking into consideration the season and the risk of the taking as defined by the b ccp. I am taking that to mean that this will be a scientifically based process, and should the indicate that no more access should be allowed, that that would be the result of this.
>> sara, i can't imagine that the people, let me tell you, the folks that i know that are involved in this, they didn't just start reading it last week. Most of the people involved in this can talk about the like the bible. They can bury you with information. I do think that there is at least a risk that if you are going to go, and i do think that science is what even the users know is going to probably trump. Because i think that the users recognize that fish is probably going to use as their backup, science. Because science is what i think the whole bcp was pretty much predicated on.
>> so if the science indicates through this process that's been set in motion by this policy statement, if the science indicates that the access, that increased access should not be permitted, is that something, I知 just concerned about this statement that, i can guarantee you that if the convening committee comes up with a product, i take this to mean that the committee disagrees with, that the committee would change it.
>> i don't know.
>> is the intent to increase act balcones preserve to limit?
>> to me the intent so to have as much as access that you can as u.s. Fish and wildlife is accepting of. And i think that will be predicated on science more than it will be just desire to go out and use trails. And i, i will stand up in front of any one a year from now, that if science says fish says yes, we agree with the science that you can't do that, then you tell the users, you picked the wrong trail or the wrong tract or you picked the wrong thing to do on that particular trail at that particular time. But i think this, during this whole process, i never found anyone that wasel to stand up and say, we really don't care what the intent of the bcp was, where there was opinion all over the board. And i never could get my arms around it. Everybody has selecttive memory as to what was done when the bcp was first put together. I mean, there are some people that will go to the mat with you over, we only passed this thing with the caveat that public access was something that was part of it. But then you also have a number of people that would come up, again, reading through all the documentation, you know, they could find places that would refute that. Clearly, i think that the convener, we're trying to find a spot where people, where the scientific world can live with the access world, and both of them know that there's probably got to be some give and take. Now, again, i don't want to speak for the mayor. Again, the reason that this is so difficult for us, i physically literally can't talk to the mayor about this crazy subject. He and i are the only two committee members. I mean, unless i say box, will you call so and so over there and run in there and ask the mayor, and even that, our attorneys would probably go, oh, don't do that or don't tell anybody you're doing that. So it's really a real mess to try to get this thing done. I don't think we ought to get had thing any more complicated other than there are a large number of people that want access there are certainly a large number of people that are very skeptical and very leery about additional access. There's got to be someplace in the middle that we cannot have just open wear far in this community to the point where we are going to have somebody that says i don't care what the deal says. There's not a fence there. I know it's a presive, I知 going in it. And we are witness that that is the case. So i think that this committee will work towards sign-off on something. I think where the dividing point will be is whatever is submitted to fish, fish is going to go, I知 comfortable with that or I知 not comfortable with it. I mean, I知 not willing to try to take fish to the mat any more than i have been willing to challenge fish on a number of things that i think from a practical standpoint there are many people in this community that don't understand. But you can't recreate the last, you know, 20 years of history on this bcp.
>> hold on. Sorry, commissioner, if i could just finish this up.
>> okay.
>> i toltally understand the difficulty and i don't mean to, i totally understand the difficulty of the two-member committee, and I知 just trying to get inside the intent because i am concerned. I too want to see as much public access as possible because as i've said before, one of the ways that we can increase the probability of the balcones canyonlands surviving is to get more people to love it and know about it. One way to do that is to provide access to the exthe tent that we can. But it does concern me. And this is not your statement. It's not the statement of your staff. And it's not any of the statements of any of the people inside the travis county commissioners court. So i do get concerned about statements such as if the convening committee comes up with a product that we disagree with, we'll change it.
>> yeah.
>> because it indicates a political result rather than a policy result.
>> sara, ask the mayor. You can ask him.
>> uh-huh.
>> that's true. Good point.
>> ask the mayor and say, quite frankly, we're asking gerald this thing. Not only does he not know, he couldn't even ask you. So we need to go back and tell gerald what you mean by that.
>> that's an excellent point. A point well taken.
>> bob, do you have anything to bring?
>> i think one thing that might help you all to hear in consideration here, you have to consider there are two committees being talk about. I think the mayor's comment had to do with the convening committee and that was looking at what the committee would be that is going to look into this issue. And so what he was saying is, he will change it if he feels that the convening committee is not fair and equal in giving consideration to both sides.
>> that is very illuminating, bob. Thanks. That makes a lot of sense.
>> I知 glad to know. Your staff knows more than your commissioner because fortunately your staff can talk to the office.
>> are we on the convening committee?
>> the committee had its first meeting this afternoon at three and I知 hoping to get there.
>> are we on the convening committee?
>> yes.
>> well, don't we need for y'all to let us know specifically what needs to get done if we move to the next step? Because i think y'all are about to tell us what are the costs, right?
>> the convening committee isn't even the stakeholder committee. That is just to try to start thinking about what does this mean, how do we figure out who is on the committee, you know, how long of a process is it, who are we going to hire, people to be the facilitators for these meetings and so for. So staff are feeling like you are putting us in a process that is going to take a year, than that is going to be a whole lot of work for staff, and we just need you to be aware that when the city did this similar process for their water quality protection land, it took them 18 months and they met every two weeks and it cost them a good deal of money, about $70,000 just to figure out what would be the plan, and then there are additional costs for implementing the plan. So that is one thing the court needs to be aware of, that the city, I知 sure, is going to be coming back, the city and county going to want this to be a shared cost thing just for the master planning process itself. It's possible that could be done cheaper. I知 just telling you what was done for the water quality protection land that mayor wynne was suggesting we do this the same way.
>> judge, i think that, see, i wasn't aware that you all had a meeting at three o'clock. But i think we need to let them at least huddle up at this first meeting, try to determine, you know, which direction they are going to go. And i would think that with it being christmas it may be hard to call another meeting between now and christmas. But by the first of january, perhaps, or middle of january, a second meeting so that you can come back and brief us, and sara can ask the mayor, you know, a couple of questions. She can relay those answers to me.
>> we need to invest additional resources, the sooner we know that, the better.
>> that was also mentioned.
>> if we don't do it in house, city and county, then, i mean, a professional consultant assistance is required, we know generally you don't get that free of charge. So the question is what amount do we need, what are the partners and what will each contribute. At some point we would know specifically what the project i.
>> oh, yes.
>> right?
>> we will come back to you and let you know what the group is thinking and give you choices in this. Because we know this is, it's putting the county on a road and that you immediate to know not only the first step but sort of where that may lead on down the road. Figuring out what is the master planning process and then depending on what the group comes out with, then once this year is up, there will be implementation of whatever the decisions that are made, and there are costs associated with that too, both costs to the permit and implications as far as staff is concerned. It may be that the preserve land is looking somewhat more like our county park land and that we'd need to staff up with additional biologists and rangers and who is going to build trails, maintain , where are people going to park, bathrooms, et cetera, et cetera. There are a lot of implications if we go on this road. We will keep you informed as we go what our estimates of what that may mean.
>> judge--
>> you said cost-wise as far as moaning and funding, whatever it takes to do that.
>> we'd have to--
>> also, the police--
>> you guys totally control.
>> policing that may need to take place that makes sure whatever happens a, that the habitat is not disturbeded. I think what has been discussed here, i hope we aren't taking any action as far as I知 concerned. I think still a love of things are laying out there. My position i think may be pretty clear. But for sure there's a lot of unidentified costs that we're talking about that somebody needs to look at the money, the money aspect of a whole lot of this stuff.
>> before we get on a lot of other stuff, i really want to just go ahead and say, I知 real concerned that we not disturb that land.
>> i wasn't through yet but go ahead.
>> the original purpose for it, why we got into it and put a lot of work into it. I think that the voters certainly said that we needed to protect the engagerd species, and i think that it's essential that we follow what voters have said to us. So before we get off on complicating the issue much more i really would not be in favor of disturbing the preserve. There's a purpose for buying preserves with public money, and that is to protect an endangered species. And people have access to land everywhere. And probably because of that, we have endangered some species. I think we need to take care of that original purpose for going into this whole thing.
>> margaret, that's a good point let me ask rose or kevin will probably know this. Was there a distinction between what the city passed bcp-wise. The county failed theirs, right?
>> the bond election you're speaking of, yes.
>> but what is confusing about this , and i didn't know this at the time, but that the city's bonds that they passed to secure at least some of their money was used for the bcp purposes, apparently had language that access was part of the language. Is that true?
>> that is true. But as far as I知 concerned, just because you have access, just like the public has access to this building, but that doesn't mean the they have access to every location, everywhere in this building. The same on the preserve. About a third of the preserve currently has public access. And those bond languages for city properties, there are places within those bond properties that have some public access or have full and open public access but then there are other properties that don't. So first off, i don't work for the city, but it would be my interpretation that just because the bond language says there's public access, that doesn't mean that the public can go everywhere any time to do anything that they want to. There's certain locations that they can and certain times they can.
>> i don't think they are asking to do that, rose had a is where we get in a cross i mean, everyone is willing to say you can't just, i mean, get a hundred abreast and hold arms and just go running into the preserve. You can't do that. I mean, but there are so many places where people are saying there's such limited access that we want to have more than what we have, and there are some places where we just, i mean, even though we've set up a system that says here is how you do access to preserve, you got to do this y'all know that the fight we have is that some people say that's onerous or that is just unreasonable, we don't want to do that. Which is the reason why it's such a hard subject matter to get your arms around, because not only is it selective memory but it's interpretive. You know, read that paragraph, and heyrb you tell me what the paragraph says and somebody else read the paragraph and guess what, it's kind of like are you all in the same book? I mean, that is what happens with this subject matter.
>> gerald, in essence, what commissioner gomez said, we have iterated and reiterated that several times. I remember when this thing first came up as far as public access. I said then, and i haven't changed my mind. No one has yet convinced me that public access is necessary to a preserve in which we have invested millions of dollars to protect species. Now, I知 still there. No one still has convinced me. I hear scientific studies that they are talking about that say yes, you can, another scientific study analysis says no, you can't. But in my opinion as i stated earlier before, no one yet has convinced me that public access is necessary in the bcp. Black-capped virio and all those other species need not to be disturbeded. I don't know how much plain i can make it. I keep posing the question is the language sufficient. That position to be restated or rephrased again, i don't really know. But whatever it is, whenever we come back, i haven't seen anything to change my mind on that statement. I知 just letting everybody know where I知 coming from. I知 going to stay consistent, and i try to be. Right now no one has con ed --convinced me to change my mind on what i just stated.
>> as far as the language, the city bond issue that passed, on the ballot it specifically said public access for passive activities. Now, fish defines for us what passive activities are. Hiking, photography, nature study. I think that was it. No biking, no horse back riding, no motor vehicles, no groups larger than unless escorted by a tour guide. Now, to the extent that county and city staff is offering those opportunities to do every one fills up. The more we can do that, the more we are doing the passive type activities. And also, the better we're educating people that live around the preserves and have interests in the preserves, why they are there. Thank you very much for recalling, commissioners davis and gomez, specifically where we did do this. That was the deal. To set aside the preserves and pre--protect what is inside so development can proceed outside the preserve. That was the original deal. I think we should stick with it because we haven't fulfilled our commitment for full acquisition yet. Meanwhile we seem to be getting sidetracked into all this access master planning. The coordinating committee's policy statement was passed, well, every group, the citizen's committee, the scientific advisory committee, the city's two boards and commissions, parks and recreation and the environmental board, regardless of all the whereases that differ from one of those sets of recommendations to the others, every one, each one was consistent with respect to citing the need for scientific evidence to demonstrate no effect on the protected species prior to granting further access. I talked about this last week. If you return to the colored page, that is the graphic that i referred to. I've consulted with the people reviewing that report. It should be out early next year. Hopefully sometime in january. And as soon as it is,, we'll see to it that it's made available to you. But the difference, part of the study, it was all funded by the army's construction research laboratories at fort hood. Part of the work was done at travis county at the park specifically owned, the much contested turkey creek trail. The graphic that is shown there demonstrates the difference between nesting successes in territories that are intersected or adjacentant to trails versus those that are outside any biking trails. The difference between 72 and 37 percent decrease in nesting success on trails that are near or adjacent to the biking trails. That is a take in one out of every three nests. Everywhere those trails are. Not just one time but every nesting season. That take is not authorized in the permit. That says if you want to do those kinds of trails, we need revise the permit that involves reconvening the nepa process and doing a supplementary e is. That is going to be very lengthy. And also, under current state law, to do the mitigation for doing those trails, we are going to have to pay for it up front before we give that access. That is my an understanding of current state law parks and wildlife and legislature weighed if in on this process after travis county's permit was secured. Now it is a very different game to seek a permit as a public body or even to amend the one that you already have. I urge you, stick with the original deal. Let's finish it. Let's finish the preserve acquisition. If we get sidetracked into this access master planning, that is going to be expensive, lengthy, and consume funds that you could be spending on acquisition because you are going to have to provide parking lots, restrooms, upgrade all your monitoring and law enforcement.
>> david, i hear you. And i have been begging for one thing ever since i started this project. And you know what that is. That is a definitive something from u fish --u.s. Fish and wildlife. If they will give us one page that supports everything that you are saying, it's a no-issue deal for us, david. That is what we really need. They are the entity that set this thing up. And nobody is comfortable. You are are right i don't flow if it will take more time to do particularing lots and all the things you have to do, or to buy another 60 to 70 million worth of property because we all know that to complete the bcp we are talking about needing another 2500 acres. The low hanging fruit is off the tree.
>> right.
>> so we are talking about perhaps a 60 to 70 to $100 million. And by the way, the other factor in that is forget much federal money. Heck, we are trying to get federal money to do everything in the world for all of our communities. Unfortunately, some of the things that was told us to do and that we were also going to get the federal dollars, so we got that pipeline being stopped. And we're also being told, because i do understand that the only way that we got to 34,428 versus the hundred thousand plus that it necessitated to really protect the species, you know, that was just a deal cut that says okay, go out and do this thing and you can develop the rest of western travis county. But we all know that the predicament that we are in now of trying to identify 60 to $100 million, the coming will happen before that takes place as far as I知 concerned. I don't know where we find that. We're to the point now where there are some people with the thought that we go to dc and we beg to say, tell us the plan is over. This is as close as we can get within some sort of cost that we can do this thing with. But we have to get over this business, and i respect my colleagues that say, i want it to be what we said it was going to be going into this thing and what people voted for. I can appreciate that. I just, this is one of those times that i wish that i wasn't on the deciding end of this deal because I知 conflicted out either way you go. You are not going to win on this deal. You want people with more access or the science, you know, folks, and i believe in our staff. I do believe the more that you enter the preserves, there is at least a higher likelihood. Even though you might be able to show that there are numbers that have flourished. We all know that if these guys are so skittish about something just looking in their direction, that entering the preserve does have some effect. But i don't think that we win this thing, david, by me saying we are going to finish the preserve first. You know, at some point in time, you know as well as i do, you really want to get this community jazzed, you fill up this room, you can fill up memorial stadium on people that want access. You might be able to fill up half the stadium with people that don't want access, but we all know that it is a very elevated, emotion-wise, issue in this community. I think that all that the mayor and i are trying to do is so okay, fish, if you are just not going to definitively tell us, don't even think about access, which i wish they would just give me a real clear one-paragraph deal and i would say, hey, the guys that tell us what we can do, they won't give us that.
>> we can look at where fish has gone in the past. One of my handouts there is a letter sent to mayor watson in august of '97. I understand this letter was in response to the continued use by mountain bikers on the forest ridge tract. And that access or use was being allowed, where it had never been authorized. Than is what promoted this letter in august of '97.
>> there's also an additional letter of 2001 from fish, stating that it's--
>> that is the other letter that i handed out. And on page 2 there, it specifically says no more trail.
>> it also cites a $47 per acre per year for management saying actual costs for effective management are much higher. What are our current dollars per acre per year for management?
>> that is a difficult thing to answer because different properties have different costs. Some are right next to neighborhoods that have much higher costs and are are more remote and have less. Some are conservation easements, some fee system simple. It's a significant thing.
>> have we had a significant increase since 2001 for management?
>> no, we have not. A little bit more.
>> a little bit.
>> additionally, the policy statement states funding for acquisition of preserve habitat or species management within the preserve shall have priority over funding for recreational access. So i take that to mean that the intent of the policy statement is that this investigation of increased public access should not have a negative effect or compete with dollars for acquisition and management of the preserve? Is that the intent? I would take that pretty literally, sara. I think that that, i was glad that fish, there's a pretty definitive statement. I can't read a lot of ambiguity into that. Those are the kind of things that we are looking for.
>> and there is one area of ambiguity, i think, in regard to fish weighing in on this. It seems plain that fish would not weigh in until after a year has gone by, a process that is going to have costs associated with it. And my an understanding, i mean, the water quality land access process costs how much?
>> i think about $70,000.
>> and that--
>> i think it was significantly more than that. I think that was the cost of the facilitators. But to have staff, all the months they were really tide --tied up, that was in the early stages of that being put in that department after it had been taken from parks and recreation. Staff was mostly working on tha.
>> point well taken.
>> more than anything else.
>> so even though this body doesn't have skin in the game as far as decision of having a process, i would ask that the process come up with a budget. Because of course, this body will have something to say about contribution toward a process and where that money will come from. And i for one will say up front, i will not vote in favor of dedicating any funds that could otherwise be used for management or acquisition purposes. I will not vote for diverting any of that money toward a process to look into increased recreational use.
>> i think most of the access people that i've talked to would understand that statement, sara. I think they were in agreement with that part of it. You know, we also openly discussed that there were financial my implications that we were going to have to look at from the county. Hey, it may be time, y'all, quite frankly, to look at how this thing is structured from the coordinating committee. I would thick that the coordinating committee is a creation of the commissioners court and the city council in how we put the thing together. I will tell you, i bet you there are two of us on the coordinating committee that would jump at a notion of how might we come up with something other than what we have. Quite frankly, i think we are getting into an arena where there are a lot of people, the frives court members and probably seven council members, that want to have more say than just letting one mene person go over and speak. I don't know what the process is. Now, maybe you all that really understand it, it may be time to look at that, judge. But i do think that we have some time to let, you know, our staff go and have this first meeting and try to have something else set up, you know, by the middle of january so that you come back and say, okay, you know, where are we now so you can brief all of us.
>> will that give you a opportunity to have a couple of meetings instead of just one?
>> I知 sure it will.
>> why don't that then. --we do that then. Aim for the second tuesday in january. If something dramatic happens before then, let us know. We'll put it on the agenda sooner.
>> i would also ask, just as another thing to the county attorney's office , it came to me late, the provisions inside chapter 82 regarding the creation of preserves. And i would be curious to know from legal how provisions of chapter 82 vote into law in 1999 would effect us because those were voted into law after the preserve was created. I am concerned that if we do go past a certain point, i would like to know whether some of those new provisions kick in. I think those would be really harmful. If they do kick in. I'd like a legal opinion on tha.
>> we'd have it back on january 8 with appropriate wording, which may well be different than this. Based on issues that we discussed today, the may be one of those multipart items. Thank you all very much.
>> thank you.
>> thank you, david.
The Closed Caption log for this Commissioners Court agenda item is provided by Travis County Internet Services. Since this file is derived from the Closed Captions created during live cablecasts, there are occasional spelling and grammatical errors. This Closed Caption log is not an official record the Commissioners Court Meeting and cannot be relied on for official purposes. For official records please contact the County Clerk at (512) 854-4722.
Last Modified:
Wednesday, December 5, 2007, 18:30 AM