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Texas Parks are Being Loved to Death


mack_turtle
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https://www.texasobserver.org/is-texas-overcrowded-underfunded-state-parks-system-being-loved-to-death/

worth a read. have you been to a Texas State Park recently? I camped and hiked at Inks Lake last weekend. it was not very crowded and everything was in good shape.

 

"the counties of Bexar, Hays and Travis and their seats — San Antonio, San Marcos and Austin, respectively — have created more public land in the last 20 years than either the state or federal governments. In fact, Texas leads the nation in local ballot initiatives to invest money in parks and other green space."

Edited by mack_turtle
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https://www.texasobserver.org/is-texas-overcrowded-underfunded-state-parks-system-being-loved-to-death/ worth a read. have you been to a Texas State Park recently? I camped and hiked at Inks Lake last weekend. it was not very crowded and everything was in good shape.

 

"the counties of Bexar, Hays and Travis and their seats — San Antonio, San Marcos and Austin, respectively — have created more public land in the last 20 years than either the state or federal governments. In fact, Texas leads the nation in local ballot initiatives to invest money in parks and other green space."

 

This sounds good. But Texas would have to also rank somewhere near the bottom if not THE bottom of amount of open land space available to the public in relation to land mass. Other states have problems on how to manage so much BLM land. Everything here seems to be gobbled up by private ranches, corporate entities , municipalities, or preserve land. Just my un informed rant. Hopefully this is a move in the right direction for more publicly available land.  

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Rode at San Angelo State Park on Sunday and stayed overnight. Nice trails, they were a little wet/muddy in some places due to recent precip. I'd recommend a stop for anyone traveling in the area wanting to ride. Good singletrack, some sections connected by old COA park roads, good views, signage, some gnar on Playground, Armadillo, and Roller Coaster and a lot of twisty, flowing trail with enough ups and downs to accumulate about 2000' of elevation change in 15 miles.

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Yep, I can see the overcrowding - mostly at popular parks closer to cities.  It's especially hard to get non-primitive camping reservations.  

MTB trails generally aren't too crowded because people are going for other things.   Like Pedernales - the park can be packed for the river but you'll only see 5-10 people on the trails.  

 

Also agree w/ FirstBlood.

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47 minutes ago, Leafkiller said:

I would love to make another trip to E Rock but I don't think I could stomach the crowds that are out there these days.  I still prefer Mineral Wells as my favorite park. Just love the rock climbing area there.  Plenty of fond memories as well.

There's a rail trail from Mineral Wells to Granbury: Lake Mineral Wells State Park & Trailway

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We (the state) pay a special use tax for sporting goods that was intended to be directed towards State Parks. Well, it was so successful that they raid the sporting goods tax for use in the general fund and keep the state parks starved. So the money is there. The land is there. It's the Texas lege that prevents it from being funded more generously. Freedom...

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9 minutes ago, Anita Handle said:

We (the state) pay a special use tax for sporting goods that was intended to be directed towards State Parks. Well, it was so successful that they raid the sporting goods tax for use in the general fund and keep the state parks starved. So the money is there. The land is there. It's the Texas lege that prevents it from being funded more generously. Freedom...

apparently my info is, to my delight, outdated. Between the inception of the tax in 1993 and... recently, the state was allocating from mid-30% to as little as 20% of the estimated sporting goods tax revenue to state parks. As of 2015, the lege fixed this bullshit and as of 2016-2017 biennium (sp?), TPWD is getting over 90% of the estimated revenues, like nearly $300 million bucks. WOW. I hope we see a MASSIVE uptick in park land development but I'm sure they have many priorities after being starved for so long.

I'd be happy with really nice restrooms at the existing parks. They're really a shame compared to Colorado State Parks that I've stayed at.

Then I'd love to see the Kronkowski parcel that was donated a few years ago developed with some sweet bike trails. The tract is ~2 miles from Tapatio Springs and has amazing potential.

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6 hours ago, First-Blood said:

This sounds good. But Texas would have to also rank somewhere near the bottom if not THE bottom of amount of open land space available to the public in relation to land mass. Other states have problems on how to manage so much BLM land. Everything here seems to be gobbled up by private ranches, corporate entities , municipalities, or preserve land. Just my un informed rant. Hopefully this is a move in the right direction for more publicly available land.  

Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk

 

 

 

 

 

Hopefully. Ive lived in multiple states with not only public land, but also open travel designation. For such a vast state that has an irrational sense of pride, the parks and public land here are a joke.

6 hours ago, fontarin said:

 

MTB trails generally aren't too crowded because people are going for other things.   Like Pedernales - the park can be packed for the river but you'll only see 5-10 people on the trails.  

 

Also agree w/ FirstBlood.

For sure. We did juniper and a few other trails and only saw 2 people over the course of 3-4 hours.

44 minutes ago, Anita Handle said:

We (the state) pay a special use tax for sporting goods that was intended to be directed towards State Parks. Well, it was so successful that they raid the sporting goods tax for use in the general fund and keep the state parks starved. So the money is there. The land is there. It's the Texas lege that prevents it from being funded more generously. Freedom...

and "progress".

I'd gladly pay 3-4% state income tax instead of the retarded property tax system they use here IF it didnt get pilfered for big business interest.

Edited by ATXZJ
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20 minutes ago, Anita Handle said:

apparently my info is, to my delight, outdated. Between the inception of the tax in 1993 and... recently, the state was allocating from mid-30% to as little as 20% of the estimated sporting goods tax revenue to state parks. As of 2015, the lege fixed this bullshit and as of 2016-2017 biennium (sp?), TPWD is getting over 90% of the estimated revenues, like nearly $300 million bucks. WOW. I hope we see a MASSIVE uptick in park land development but I'm sure they have many priorities after being starved for so long.

I'd be happy with really nice restrooms at the existing parks. They're really a shame compared to Colorado State Parks that I've stayed at.

Then I'd love to see the Kronkowski parcel that was donated a few years ago developed with some sweet bike trails. The tract is ~2 miles from Tapatio Springs and has amazing potential.

Or maybe they didn't fix it? Shit, I'm confused as hell now. It looks like they passed a law to force 94% of the sporting goods tax revenues to go to the parks but then some douchebag from Round Rock passed a law overturning it in 2016. Yet the numbers seem to indicate that TPWD was allocated nearly $300 for 2016-2017.

More digging is needed.

https://www.texastribune.org/2017/05/04/house-panel-revisits-state-park-funding-boost/

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3 hours ago, Anita Handle said:

We (the state) pay a special use tax for sporting goods that was intended to be directed towards State Parks. Well, it was so successful that they raid the sporting goods tax for use in the general fund and keep the state parks starved. So the money is there. The land is there. It's the Texas lege that prevents it from being funded more generously. Freedom...

Are you talking about the tax on fishing and hunting sales that go to Texas parks and wildlife or is this a different tax? 

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23 hours ago, mack_turtle said:

"the counties of Bexar, Hays and Travis and their seats — San Antonio, San Marcos and Austin, respectively — have created more public land in the last 20 years than either the state or federal governments. In fact, Texas leads the nation in local ballot initiatives to invest money in parks and other green space."

I think this should read - "Austin created more public land in the the last 20 years than either the state of federal governments. In fact, Texas leads the nation in local ballot initiatives to invest money in green space and lands the public cannot use." The Balcones Canyonlands Preserve and the City of Austin Water Quality Protection Lands both qualify as 'local ballot initiatives that created public lands' and they should be considered 'green space'. But parks??? Not hardly. There is some very limited change in how the public is allowed to use that land. But most are fenced off and marked "No Trespassing".

After dealing in a much more positive way with the BCP and WQPL, I have a better understanding of why the lands are fenced and the public kept out. I don't like it, but I understand it better. We might get more access in the future, but it will always be limited access. And it will take a lot of volunteer time and effort.

Edited by cxagent
Correct typO
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In reading this thread and the links, I am stuck by the confusion. It appears to me that the confusion was not an accident.

ARR was recently approached to support a lobbying effort to get the sporting goods tax money dedicated to parks. The legislature keeps raiding that money for anything/everything but parks.

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5 hours ago, Anita Handle said:

I'd be happy with really nice restrooms at the existing parks. They're really a shame compared to Colorado State Parks that I've stayed at.

Inks Lake Sp, and Guadalupe River SP to be specific along with a bunch of other parks are either in the middle of or scheduled in the next year to have completely new bath houses/restrooms in the parks. Inks lake and Guadalupe River specifically bulldozed at least some of the restrooms and started building fresh, completely new ones.

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2 hours ago, cxagent said:

More info. I have not verified all of this on either side. However, I think Texas needs to stop raiding parks budget and properly fund parks.

 image.thumb.png.99b2b4d0c915d470adfdb773f89f4b57.png

Parks Advocates Recruitment Letter-FINAL.PDF

That the state has underfunded TWPD and starved it of funds that were supposed to be allocated to it for many years is an easily verified fact. I'm finding it difficult to understand what has happened, legislatively, over the last 2 or 3 years and what the current status is. The budget *looks* like it has been increased but there is conflicting info on the statutes governing allocation.

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