A revamped committee is set to study improving Brackenridge Park. Here’s what that means.
Preserving the historic structures and environment of San Antonio’s largest park and planning for its future is the focus of the Brackenridge Park Stakeholder Advisory Committee’s first public meeting on Jan. 8.
The 23-member committee has been meeting since early June. It aims to help the city create an inventory of suggested projects and determine how to prioritize them as it moves forward with restoring and improving the 400-acre park.
The committee’s mission “will not replace the previous plans for the park,” said Shanon Shea Miller, the director of the city’s Office of Historic Preservation in an email. “Instead, it will consolidate their goals and objectives and provide an inventory of projects that have been evaluated under new, objective criteria and recommended for prioritization.”
Funding from the Midtown Tax Increment Reinvestment Zone is being used for the new planning effort, which will draw from three previous studies of the park: the 2017 Brackenridge Park Master Plan, the 2021 Brackenridge Park Cultural Landscape Report and the 2019 Midtown Regional Center Plan.
The public meeting invites San Antonio residents to speak with members of the committee through round-table discussions and “on-site activities (written and verbal)” the city stated in a news release earlier this week. It will take place at 5:30 p.m. at the D.R. Semmes Family YMCA at TriPoint, located at 3233 N. St. Mary’s St.
“During the workshop, attendees will have the opportunity to engage with members of the Brackenridge Park Stakeholder Advisory Committee on progress made towards developing considerations related to the park’s river, land, archeology, architecture and connectivity elements,” the news release stated.
Discussions surrounding updates and improvements at Brackenridge Park have been contentious over the past two years. Making major changes to the 125-year-old park often has resulted in pushback from neighboring residents and special interest groups.
While updates to the declining park were approved by voters as a part of the 2017 municipal bond, residents who say they want to preserve the park’s birds and trees have rallied against city plans for the park at every turn since early 2022.
Following a series of public meetings, a public apology from the city and a redesigned project that reduced the number of trees slated for removal to facilitate the restoration of historic structures, City Council approved an updated version of Phase 1 for the project this past fall.
In addition, plans to expand the 94-year-old Sunken Garden Theater within Brackenridge Park drew objections and demands from residents to reduce the project’s scale.
In June, City Manager Erik Walsh reconstituted the Brackenridge Park Stakeholder Advisory Committee, which consists of nearby neighborhood associations, institutions, and park operators to start to “facilitate public engagement and information sharing as the city begins to consider future projects within Brackenridge Park.”
This is the same committee that met in 2022 to review the bond project design for the park, Miller said. The committee was revised to broaden community input and streamline accountability, she added.
Five members were added to ensure the committee has the representation of park users, advocates and those knowledgeable about the culture and history of Brackenridge Park, Miller said, and two new co-chairs were appointed: Terry Brechtel, interim CEO of the Brackenridge Park Conservancy, and Assistant City Manager Lori Houston.
The group includes five representatives of neighborhood associations near the park, a representative from the city’s tourism bureau, the presidents of Trinity University and the University of the Incarnate Word and Conservation Society of San Antonio Executive Director Vincent Michael.
Committee members representing entities that are funding and managing different projects in the park were removed from the committee and placed on a technical committee that will support the bond projects and planning effort, Miller said.
The stakeholder committee does not aim to replace public input, but to be an additional avenue for input into plans and projects in Brackenridge Park, she said. Individual projects will still include opportunities for public input, she added.
“Through public input, the committee will agree on evaluation criteria to inform the project inventory,” Miller wrote.
See the full list of committee members here.
