San Antonio Express-News (Sunday)
Brooks CEO eyes life beyond redevelopment
Over the last 20 years, the redevelopment of the former Brooks Air Force Base has helped prove that top-dollar retail, hotels and all kinds of housing can be built profitably on the South Side. Much of the credit for that goes to Leo Gomez.
During his decade as president and CEO of the nonprofit Brooks Development Authority, he has struck deals for the construction of apartment complexes such as NRP Group’s The Kennedy, for retail spots such as Chef Johnny Hernandez’s La Gloria Mexican Cuisine, for the local plant and U.S. headquarters of Japanese machine maker Nissei and for a full-service Embassy Suites hotel, among other projects.
Gomez is now approaching a new chapter — with Brooks and in his life. With only 307 acres of the base’s 1,308-acre footprint left to be redeveloped, he and the development authority’s other leaders are considering what it might do beyond Brooks. He expects those 307 acres to be done in three years — “five years at the most,” he said.
At 58 years old, he’s looking forward to retiring at 62, when he will devote himself to his hobbies of hiking and hunting, he said.
The Brooks nonprofit has already ventured outside the former base’s boundaries by buying a defunct golf course nearby as part of the local effort to establish an arboretum. As usual, the former base itself is bustling with growth: The urban homebuilder Terramark is building Southlake, a cluster of 63 townhomes — the first for-sale homes at the community. A neighborhood of single-family rentals is also under construction, and the first phase of the WatersEdge class A office complex is nearing completion.
Gomez recently discussed his vision for Brooks’s future, the difficulty in attracting local retail and whether he’s certain he will retire at 62.
The following has been edited for brevity and clarity.
Q: How do you feel about single-family rentals as a means of development? Would it be better for them to be privately owned homes?
A:
I think having a mix is the answer — for sale, for rent, multifamily. In a mixed-use community, like we are aspiring to build, it’s really about having a good mix and good choices.
Q: Do you know what’s going to be built on the remaining 307 acres?
A:
We know what we plan. The focus is on residential and office development and more retail and entertainment.
Q: What kind of residential?
A:
Single-family, forsale, for sure. We don’t intend
to do any more single-family for rent. These will be 500 units; that’s plenty. We don’t have many single-family, forsale available. We’ve got plenty of multifamily — quality multifamily.
Q: So the Brooks Development Authority will have a future beyond Brooks the place.
A:
Absolutely. It will always be a property manager. It will always be a landlord, and it has to run the property owners’ association. It will still have opportunities to redevelop property as tenants come and go. And it will still be able to develop property within the surrounding area, where it makes sense and where we find the right partners.
Q: Was that always the plan, to look for other places after this was built out?
A:
Define “always.” I’ll say it’s been in the statute that authorizes the authority from the get-go. Was it in the land-use plan and master plan when Brooks Development Authority began? No. The focus was on, “We got 1,300 acres. What are we gonna do with 1,300 acres?” I would say when we got to the 600-acre-mark-plus of the already-developed property is when we started looking outside of boundaries.
Q: You’re helping set up the arboretum. Will you be developing around it?
A:
Theoretically, that’s possible. We could do some things right along Military (Drive). We could do some things at the intersection of (Interstate) 37 and Military Drive here. We could do some things at the intersection of 37 and (Loop) 410. We’re looking at those possibilities. We’re also looking at parcels immediately south of us and some parcels up and down Presa (Street).
Q: Would you say that after the campus is built out, your mission will be to keep developing the South Side?
A:
I wouldn’t go as far as saying the South Side —
the Brooks region. The Brooks region is actually a defined region by the city of San Antonio from the SA Tomorrow plan. The Brooks region in the plan is actually about 7,500 acres. That includes our 1,300 acres. Our intent is to develop our 1,300 acres and be an influence in the development of the area around us.
Q: How would you influence other developments?
A:
Develop it ourselves; help developers secure property; help developers and other stakeholders envision what could go on certain parcels. I think we can be influential in what happens up and down the street or up and down the highway from Brooks.
Q: Any particular kind of development you’d like to see?
A:
Well, more significant employers, like you’ve seen coming to the South Side. Greater: SATX is working on identifying and developing some megasites for prospects to San Antonio. I would suggest a lot of those megasites are actually on the South Side, and some are within the Brooks region, or close. If you look for available 500acre parcels within 15, 20 minutes of downtown, the more likely area of San Antonio is going to be south of downtown. If you can do that around a town
center — if you can envision Brooks being a town center of the region — then all the better. So that’s what we’re looking at. That’s one of the reasons we have such a strong partnership with greater: SATX.
Q: They would be for manufacturing? Where are they?
A:
Yes. They haven’t been pinpointed yet. It’s part of the initiative to eventually identify them and have them prepared.
Q: If you could go back in time to when you took this job and show yourself what’s been built since then, what would your reaction have been?
A:
First of all, I would have wished I had $36 million myself to buy it back then, because I know what it’s worth today. Let me say that in a nutshell: Brooks and its surrounding TIRZ (or, tax increment reinvestment zone) land was valued at $36 million back then. Today, that same land is worth over $1.3 billion. This year alone, we’re doing over half a billion dollars in development. It’s incredible what’s happened out here. It doesn’t overly shock me, when I stop and think about it, for the same reasons I believed there’d be good things coming way back then. You know, South Siders have always had the ambition to be much more
than what they were. They’ve always had the disposable income to justify it as well. They just lacked believers from outside this region. If there’s anything we did successfully at Brooks over the last 10 years, it’s we built believers.
Q: Was that just due to prejudice about the South Side?
A:
Well, yeah. I mean, if you’ve been here for 30, 40 years, what do you think is on the South Side? You build these perceptions over time, and you go to where you believe the market is.
Q: Are you dealing with different problems because of your success, such as affordability?
A:
Not yet. I know that day is coming. But we are taking proactive steps in working on some affordable developments. We’ll have affordable housing joining our mix, not just on the Brooks campus but in some areas around Brooks. The challenges continue to be infrastructure and striving to be proactive in dealing with what we know is coming in terms of traffic. That’s the bottom line. An interesting challenge: The current funding formulas with most infrastructure funds, whether they’re state or federal, give points to highly congested areas, or areas that have high traffic accident counts. Well, we don’t have those yet. Where are the points for proactive economic development? Trying to get those things funded, so that we don’t end up with those congestions, is our biggest challenge.
Q: How much are the Terramark homes selling for?
A:
Without the available amenities for upgrades, they would start at about $235,000. They’ve sold one close to half a million.
Q: When you hear that they’re selling single-family homes for close to half a million at Brooks, how does that make you feel?
A:
It makes me feel like what we’ve been saying for a long time is indeed true. The money is here. The demand is here. People in this corner of San Antonio want what everybody else in San Antonio has. And it goes beyond the people in this corner of San Antonio. It’s also attracting families and young folks from Atascosa and Wilson counties. You’re gonna see a lot of young folks and families from Atascosa and Wilson coming to Brooks.
Q: Are you happy with the current retail?
A:
I would love more local flavors. We’re doing great with the popular chains. Thank God we have La Gloria (Mexican Cuisine) and Chef Johnny (Hernandez) here. We’ve got another local operator that will be operating another restaurant here, hopefully sometime soon.
Q: Why has that been difficult, attracting local retail?
A:
It’s just a fact of life for small business. At what point can you get bank financing? At what point do you establish enough credit to be able to do that? At what point do you establish enough cash on hand to cover your first six months of operation? There’s nothing unusual about that. The difference is what communities and what neighborhoods get together to figure out how to facilitate that. So we have a responsibility here at Brooks to build the relationships with the banks that understand that that’s a goal of ours. But then we too have to put some money on the table. I’ll be visiting with somebody in child care today. We don’t have a child care center at Brooks. Why not? Well, what does it take to start up a child care center? You know, are we going to help them, or are we going to wait until some large operation that can afford to do so thinks it’s an opportunity here at Brooks?
Q: For sure, you’ll be retiring at 62, then?
A:
I won’t be employed by someone who expects me to be there Monday through Friday. Might I do some consulting work? Might I do some book writing? Might I do some speaking? Might I do some part-time professorship? Probably. I will be doing a lot of hunting and hiking. Those are the things I have a passion for.