Neglected parkland
Lawmakers can stop deterioration of Texas state parks by restoring diverted funds.
Planning to go to Garner State Park in the Texas Hill Country to escape the hubbub of city life? If so, you may have to wait for hours in a stalled line of cars before entering. Budget cuts mean there’s not enough personnel to staff the park entrance.
Once you get past the long line at the entrance you might sleep in an antiquated cabin in need of maintenance, which funding shortages have forced park officials to defer. Visitors to this hugely popular state park are there to enjoy the Frio River frontage, the 11 miles of scenic trails and the park’s Ashe junipers and bald cypresses, not to deal with malfunctioning taps and bathrooms. Yup, budget shortfalls again.
Unfortunately, Garner is not the only state park facing problems. Our entire state park system is neglected and the Texas House and Senate are poised to underfund them again by a staggering $100 million at a time when park usage is growing.
Twice, the Legislature has signed into law bills that would provide state parks with a steady and consistent — if not sufficient — source of funding. But the Legislature has lacked the financial discipline to adhere to a plan of its own making.
Two decades ago, the Legislature assigned a hefty portion of the sporting goods sales tax proceeds — levied on everything from canoes to tennis balls — to state parks. Rather than using the funds for the purpose intended, the bulk of the proceeds typically were diverted into the general revenue fund to pay for schools, prisons and roads.
This diversion left park officials standing in line for much-needed funding, and park visitors waiting at understaffed entrance booths.
Last session the Legislature passed a law essentially telling itself that it couldn’t divert. The law unambiguously dedicated 94 percent of the sporting goods sales tax for state and local parks in the future, according to George Bristol, former chair of the Texas State Parks Board Advisory Committee.
Unfortunately, there was a glitch in the law. And guess what? This session, lawmakers have their hands in the sporting goods sales tax cookie jar again. Both the House and the Senate budget have failed to fully appropriate funds already designated for the parks, leaving the huge gap in funding.
Rep. Ryan Guillen, D-Rio Grande City has introduced HB 78 to permanently fix the situation and to require the Legislature to dedicate 94 percent of the sporting goods sales tax for the purpose for which it was intended. Lawmakers should act this session to lock up the cookie jar once and for all by passing this amendment. To let an oversight get in the way of state parks’ full funding, when the intent of the law is clear is unconscionable.
Sustained underfunding has had serious consequences for our beloved parks. Any homeowner knows you can only defer maintenance for so long before serious problems arise. Yet the repair and maintenance backlog of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department is staggering. The agency reports that it has more than $580 million in needed maintenance projects at 91 state parks, from repairs to a New Deal-era bathhouse at Abilene State Park to wildfire-damaged fencing at Bastrop State Park, according to the Austin American-Statesman.
There’s also the opportunity cost of the underfunding. Texas owns beautiful swaths of land that are already in the parks system but that can’t open to the public without an initial investment.
Opening additional parks would be one way to alleviate the traffic jams at existing parks. Besides that, think of all the visitors who could be hiking, camping and paddling on 17,351 acres of marshes, grasslands and woodlands of Powderhorn Ranch, near Matagorda Bay along the Gulf Coast, if there were funds to develop the park land. Similarly, Palo Pinto Mountains State Park near Fort Worth only lacks funding for roads and streets before tourists can gaze on Raptor Ridge’s 1,400-foot peak and can enjoy the lake, two creeks and forests containing live oaks, cedar elms and native pecan.
Texas parks play a key role in the state’s tourism as well as in shaping citizens’ identity as Texans. Not all Texans can afford private clubs or big back yards, but everyone should be able to enjoy nature at a state park without waiting in a long line.
Texas parks play a key role in the state’s tourism as well as in shaping citizens’ identity as Texans.