The Texas State University System will not be voting to sell University Camp at the Board of Regents’ scheduled meeting on Nov. 16, according to a Nov. 9 FaceBook Live video from Texas Representative Erin Zwiener.
Zwiener said Texas State University Chancellor Brian McCall reached out to her on Nov. 9 to inform her Texas State will not be voting to sell the 126-acre property.
“That’s not a final decision from the university,” Zwiener said in her Nov. 9 FaceBook Live video. “My ask was, ‘Please give the community time to interact with this. Please give the community time to look at options.’… We are going to be sitting down with the folks at Texas State University to talk about options.”
Texas voters overwhelmingly approved Proposition 14, which creates the Centennial Parks Conservation Fund to improve and create state parks, in the election on Nov. 7. In her Nov. 9 FaceBook Live video, Zwiener said because the Texas Legislature and Texan voters are in support of more parkland, now is not the time to sell public land to a private owner.
Zwiener posted a letter she wrote to Texas State President Kelly Damphousse and Chancellor Brian McCall expressing gratitude for Texas State’s decision to not proceed with the sale of University Camp.
“My hope is that if Texas State University decides that [University Camp] does not align with its educational mission, it will make every effort to keep [University Camp] in its natural state and in the hands of public access,” Zwiener said in her letter to Damphousse and McCall she shared on FaceBook.
On Nov. 9, the original agenda for the Board of Regents meeting on Nov. 16 had a meeting item on page 371 that detailed the sale of the property. Later that day, it disappeared from the agenda and page 371 read, “This page is intentionally left blank.”
According to the original meeting item, the prospective buyer, Needmore River Ranch, would pay the appraised price of $4.6 million and make an “unrestricted donation” of $4.4 million to Texas State to be paid out over three years, according to the agenda.
In total, Texas State would receive roughly $9 million for the sale of University Camp; $4.6 million for the sale and $4.4 million from the unrestricted donation, according to the deleted meeting item.
According to the deleted meeting item, Texas State would use the money from the sale to “have funding available for other strategic initiatives.”
The University Star will provide updates to this story as more information becomes available.
