Local government officials, project partners and guests break ground Friday at the site of the new Cameron County Parks & Recreation Administration Building on South Padre Island. (Denise Cathey/The Brownsville Herald)
While the parks system it manages has gotten bigger over the last 30 years, Cameron County Parks and Recreation’s South Padre Island headquarters have not, to the point that things have gotten pretty crowded.
With Friday’s ceremonial groundbreaking for a new administration building, relief is eight to 10 months away, according to Parks Director Joe Vega, who said it can’t come soon enough, comparing the current offices to a sardine can in his remarks to those in attendance for the event under a clear, sunny sky.
“I can only have two people at a time to visit me, and during COVID I could only have one person,” he said. “The existing office is the registration office and administration office, and sometimes we have up to 13 employees working and it’s very crowded in there. That’s not including the visitors that come in to check in.”
The current 1,800-square-foot headquarters, near where the new 8,720-square-foot structure will be built, next door to the Sea Ranch Restaurant near the entrance to Isla Blanca Park, was appropriate for the department’s needs in the early 1990s, though Parks and Recreation has long since outgrown it, Vega said.
“This new administrative office is being built for the needs of today and also for the needs of the future,” he said. “There’s going to be room for expansion, for additional offices. As the parks keep growing the needs keep growing, staff keeps growing.”
The new building will also house a training area, which means it will no longer be necessary to hunt around for space on the Island for workshops, team meeting and the like, Vega said.
“This is going to allow us to do training, especially for beach patrol,” he said. “We have over 40 life guards during the summer and they need a place to train. They’re going to be able to utilize our training facility.”
The new headquarters will also house an emergency operations center in case of major weather events, Vega said. The $4.5 million cost of the project is being paid for through certificates of obligation, he said. The construction contract was awarded to La Feria-based Noble Texas Builders.
Vega said the building’s design will complement what the county did to Isla Blanca Park, which received over $30 million in improvements in recent years. Commissioners have been adamant about improving its coastal and community parks, he said.
Sofia Benavides, county commissioner for Precinct 1, which includes the Island, said she has been looking forward to the groundbreaking for a very long time, adding that the commissioners court has been a getting a lot done in the last several years by working together and with various partners, including local governments.
“We seem to get a lot done when we come together as an area or a region,” said Precinct 3 Commissioner David Garza. “We’re just celebrating the fruition of all of it.”
County Judge Eddie Trevino Jr. said he’s enjoyed watching the partnership between the county and South Padre Island blossom.
“While people do come and go, the key is to keep projects moving forward,” he said. “I’m proud to say that the county and the Island have established one heck of a great working relationship in a number of different projects. We’ve got a lot of different things going on right now.”
Trevino said the county plans to do all it can to attract more visitors to the Island while also enhancing facilities and quality of life for residents.
He took the opportunity to ask for support for Proposition A, which will be on the ballot on May 7. If the proposition passes, the county will be able to use Hotel Occupancy Tax (HOT) revenue — paid by out-of-town visitors to the county who book hotel/motel rooms or rent cars — to finance construction of a 10,000-seat multipurpose arena, an amenity he said will serve county residents and attract visitors from outside the county.
Local governments use HOT revenue for quality-of-life projects and to cultivate economic development, Trevino said.
Voters in 2016 approved the use of HOT revenue for improvements to Isla Blanca Park and construction of the new South Texas Ecotourism Center that just opened in Laguna Vista, but in November voted against an identical proposition to finance construction of the arena, a $100 million project.
South Padre Island Mayor Patrick McNulty expressed gratitude to the county for projects to improve the Island.
“We really do appreciate the investment that Cameron County has been doing the last five, six, seven years on South Padre Island to help South Padre Island become a better place for people to live, work and play,” he said.
