SANTA ROSA — This small community took a big step Wednesday in its recovery from two major floods with a groundbreaking for a new $2.7 million park.
Santa Rosa Community Park’s overhaul will be funded by the county in partnership with the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department through its Non-Urban Outdoor Local Park Grant Program, which is contributing $750,000.
“Today, it’s all about Santa Rosa, and that’s a great feeling,” said Refugio “Cuco” Rickford, a city alderman. “We’ve been wanting to get these upgrades on the park and finally it’s a reality. A lot of great work, a lot of hard work.”
The project on what is approximately a five-acre tract will include a splash pad, lighted and covered outdoor basketball court, family pavilion, a new playground, trail improvements, landscaping with native plants and butterfly gardens, improved lighting and parking and refurbished restrooms.
Peacock General Contractors Inc. will perform the upgrades to the existing park here, and they should be done, weather permitting, sometime in spring 2023.
“We’ve added to and remodeled various parks throughout this county, most recently at Benavides Park in Brownsville,” said president Tre Peacock. “We plan on bringing that same professionalism to this park.”
The twin 500-year flood events hit Santa Rosa, a city of about 2,600 people, especially hard. Just to the south are the lowlands surrounding Tio Cano Lake, which are especially prone to flooding which then spread across the area.
“It happened about three years ago that we went through two major floods that happened in Santa Rosa, and it put us back quite a bit,” said Mayor Bobby De La Fuente. “It didn’t destroy our community, but it made it better, stronger.
“And then COVID happened … and it put a damper on everything, city-wide and worldwide,” he added. “But now, finally, through all the hard work by all the other officials and everybody who was involved, the school board, and also my administration, we finally got it together. A new Santa Rosa will be here soon.”
Cameron County Precinct 4 Commissioner Gus Ruiz said he has a personal memory of one of the flood events because he was here in Santa Rosa when it began.
“I remember it very distinctly because on that day, on the very minute, the very month, when it started raining, when those flood rains came in June of 2019, me and my wife and son were here inside the gym as they were hosting summer basketball league games,” Ruiz said.
Ruiz used that remembrance to emphasize the power of the human spirit.
“So folks my message to y’all is yes, there’s a lot of bad stuff that’s happened to us here locally and in the state, around the country and around the world,” Ruiz said. “But we are, as human beings, we are resilient people, and today gives us a big glimpse and faith that we’re all going to rise up and move forward as long as we are united for a cause, which we are today.”
