City Council could tug at unwinding Alamo plan
The city councilman guiding the much-debated makeover of Alamo Plaza said there is no longer any room for agreement between conservative state leaders’ vision for the1836 battleground and the plan’s official goal of telling the site’s full 300-year story.
So, depending on City Council feedback at a special meeting today, San Antonio could soon begin “unwinding” the plan’s key legal arrangement, the long-term lease of Alamo Plaza to the Texas General Land Office, Councilman Robert Treviño said.
“We should always leave the door open for reconvening that potential partnership, for sure. It’s very difficult to see how that can occur right now,” added Treviño, chairman of a six-member Alamo Management Committee making key decisions on the project.
The future of the public-private effort has been uncertain since the Texas Historical Commission recently voted to block relocation of the plaza’s signature 1930s monument, the Cenotaph.
The plan calls for the Land Office to manage part of the city-owned plaza as an outdoor interpretive space. Treviño said he will forcefully speak against proposals by Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and THC Chairman John Nau to focus solely on the 1836 siege and battle in the site interpretation.
“I will certainly make my opinion known that the direction John Nau and
the lieutenant governor want us to go is not a direction that is in the best interest of our city,” Treviño said.
Today’s session is only a briefing. The council later will decide whether to proceed with the plan on adjusted timelines, in partnership with the Land Office and nonprofit Alamo Trust, or possibly dissolve the lease.
The historical commission’s 12-2 vote on Sept. 22 to deny relocation of the Cenotaph gives the city legal authority to reconsider the 50-year lease, which “talked about executing on a very complete project,” Treviño said.
“If we cannot do the project as described, andmajor elements of that project cannot be completed, then I think we have to revisit it,” he said.
Representatives with the city had told the historical commission the Cenotaph, a monument honoring fallen defenders of the Alamo battle, needed to be moved to provide a “period-neutral” view of the Alamo and Mission San Antonio de Valero, the first permanent Spanish mission site in what became the city of San Antonio.
But the commission ruled there was no compelling need to move the monument. Commission members noted it was part of the historic fabric of the plaza, reflecting an artistic style prevalent during the Texas centennial celebration of 1936. Its ultimate location by the Long Barrack, a spot where many had died in the battle, was chosen the following year.
Councilman Clayton Perry, who joined Councilman John Courage in voting against the Alamo plan and lease of the plaza when the council approved both in a 9-2 vote in 2018, said he supports keeping the Cenotaph in place as “an integral part of the battle.”
“That was one of my key points when I voted against this plan to begin with, was to leave the Cenotaph where it’s at,” Perry said.
But Treviño said the commission had “disrupted” the Alamo plan. He noted the possibility of returning to the THC — when it has different members — at some point in the future with another proposal to move the monument.
“There might be an opportunity to work with timelines and different scenarios to go back to the THC, a THC that would allow us to move the Cenotaph and go from there,” he said.
Still to be resolved are repairs to the Cenotaph that engineers have said will be needed eventually, and a possible redesign of the south end of the plaza, where the monument was to have been placed under the city’s proposal.
Patrick has offered to lead a charge to secure another allocation of state funding from the Legislature for the Alamo project, including development of a museum that would emphasize the siege and battle.
But city officials say Patrick’s focus on the battle threatens the holistic approach to the site’s history — before and after 1836 — outlined in a 2015 cooperative agreement between the city, the Land Office and the Alamo Trust.
Since the commission voted to keep the Cenotaph in place, several members of the Alamo Trust board have resigned, including developer Gene Powell and Fort Worth philanthropist Ramona Bass.
That could hurt the trust’s commitment to privately raise funds for the project, beyond the $100 million allocated by the state and $38 million committed by the city. Officials have estimated the total project cost at up to $450 million.
In a statement, the Alamo Trust said it is “assessing the impact” of the THC’S decision. Along with board members, “a number of the most prolific fundraisers” who had committed to the plan abandoned their support “due to the project being stalled,” the trust said.
Although some have said the project could continue with the 56-foot-tall Cenotaph in place, the commission’s ruling means “the battle of 1836 will likely be the only story told,” according to a city staff memo to the council.
Treviño said today’s meeting gives the council a chance to “reset, get our feet underneath us and have a broad discussion about what all this means.”
Perry opposes much of the plan, including lowering part of the plaza by 18 inches and encircling it with a 42-inch handrail. But he supports the concept of a museum housed in three stateowned buildings that he believes could be remodeled and preserved.
A compromise on interpretation is still possible, one that would be a factual representation of the site that connects with visitors who want to learn about the siege and battle, Perry said. The fighting — which unfolded as delegates about 100 miles to the east met to declare Texas independent from Mexico — is what resonates in the public imagination, he said.
“I know there’s a lot of movement to include all 300 years, and that’s fine. But the reason people are coming to the Alamo and that site is because this is the cradle of liberty,” Perry said.
The project’s master plan calls for “preservation and interpretation based on historical and archaeological evidence,” including a factual portrayal of slavery as practiced by the arriving Anglo population — a harsh reality for visitors who relish the simpler tale of some 200 Texian and Tejano volunteers overwhelmed by a force of 1,600 Mexican soldiers.
Treviño said most San Antonians want the Alamo to be “inclusive, telling all the stories, and not about making anyone feel that they are the villain of the story, especially at the expense of (preserving) a mythology.”
“We know that there is a push to continue sort of the old way of looking at the world, which, quite frankly, this election is showing us that this country is ready to move forward,” he said. “We could make that decision today and tell that history and help heal a country. Ironically, this is kind of what we’re all going through right now as a country.”
The meeting, set for 1 p.m., will be held via videoconference and streamed live at sanantonio.gov/ TVSA, with audio access available by phone at 210-207-5555.