This is a slightly different article than that posted in the law forum.
By R.A. DYER
rdyer@star-telegram.com
AUSTIN -- Over the objections of some conservationists, a pristine mountain range adjacent to the Big Bend National Park has been put up for sale by the Texas General Land Office.
The land offer comes after other controversial proposed sales of state-owned wilderness areas to private interests, including last year’s proposed General Land Office sale of 400 acres at Eagle Mountain Lake in Fort Worth, and the 2005 proposed Texas Parks and Wildlife Department sale of 46,300 acres at Big Bend Ranch State Park.
Those properties ended up staying in government hands after public outcry: The Eagle Mountain Lake property went to the Tarrant Water District and the Big Bend tract remained in the state parks inventory. The latest transaction, however, continues on course.
At issue is 9,269 acres containing the Christmas Mountains, which is next to the northwest corner of Big Bend National Park. The property was donated to the state in 1991 by the Virginia-based Conservation Fund and the Pennsylvania-based Richard King Mellon Foundation under the condition that it remain protected from commercial development.
To benefit school fund
It is not part of the parks system inventory, but rather is held for the Permanent School Fund, which finances public education, according to information from the General Land Office.
The agency put the property up for auction last month and closed bids last week, Land Office spokesman Jim Suydam said. He said that the agency is not equipped to act as a steward for the land and that various encumbrances placed on it will prevent commercial development.
"It's Commissioner [Jerry] Patterson's fiduciary duty to earn money on these lands -- it's an impeachable offense for him not to," said Suydam, explaining the decision to sell the land.
But some conservationists are expressing dismay and say the Christmas Mountains should remain in public hands. They note that it was donated with the public in mind.
"The entity donated this land for the express purpose of providing public land," said Luke Metzger, director of Environment Texas. "When all the experts say we need more public lands, the state is moving in the direction of giving lands away to private interests."
Suydam said the General Land Office offered the tract both to the National Parks Service and the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department before putting it out to bid. The cash-strapped National Parks Service and the state parks department both declined the property.
The General Land Office later received six bids from the private sector, Suydam said. A special panel that includes Patterson will consider the bids in coming weeks, he said.
Officials with the Conservation Fund and the Richard King Mellon Foundation, which donated the land to the state, have declined to comment. But in e-mail correspondence reported by The Austin American-Statesman, Richard King Mellon Foundation officer Mike Watson wrote that if the auction goes through "the state [should] not look to the R.K. Mellon Foundation for any future help."
In another e-mail reported by the newspaper, Conservation Fund Executive Vice President Richard Erdman wrote that "it was the hope ... that this land would be made available to the general public for hunting and other recreational uses." Terry Ervin, a retiree who lives on 160 acres abutting the property, said that the Christmas Mountains reach about 6,000 feet in altitude and that the site includes some abandoned mines. He said the terrain is mostly desert, and with plenty of cactus -- but almost no water.
"It's very beautiful to look at," Ervin said. "Basically, it's very rugged and dry. In the past it had some water wells with windmills to water livestock." ... And there is an artificial lake that is seasonal and sometimes it has water." It's got some unique Chihuahua desert vegetation."
Use restrictions
The encumbrances that will be permanently enforced on the land would restrict almost any sort of development, including the construction of roads, Suydam said. The office released documents showing that the encumbrances would allow construction only of a rudimentary building for a land manager and would prohibit use of any off-road vehicles. The encumbrances permit hunting, but with restrictions.
As part of the bid process, the General Land Office also required potential buyers to submit land management plans.
Suydam said Patterson and the two other members of a panel known as the School Land Board could decide this month whether to accept one of the six bids or reject all of them.
"The land does not need to be owned by the state to be considered managed -- the permanent encumbrances greatly limit" what you can do with it, he said.
R.A. Dyer reports from the Star-Telegram’s Austin bureau. 512-476-4294
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