But, I Thought Governor Perry Did Not Want To Sell Parklands

A few weeks ago, the Governor’s office and the Texas General Land Office were adamantly denying any plans to sell any park lands whatsoever. This was all during the furor surrounding the possible sale of lands in the Black Gap Wildlife Management Area.

You will no doubt recall that, in my initial post on the Black Gap Bumble, that I mentioned an eerily similar situation at Eagle Mountain Lake, where 400 acres of state park land was being sold to private developers.

Now, in this morning’s Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Austin writer R.A. Dyer tells us that the governor has been indeed saying one thing and doing another.

Though Perry has tried to distance himself from the controversial sale of public lands like those in the Black Gap area and Eagle Mountain Lake, he has, in fact, been aggressively pushing for the sale of the Eagle Mountain Lake land:

Gov. Rick Perry’s office worked aggressively behind the scenes to facilitate the auction of 400 acres of state parkland in Tarrant County to the highest bidder — despite growing outcry over the loss of Texas parks — according to documents obtained by the Star-Telegram.

While publicly distancing itself from the dealings, the governor’s office appears to have privately pushed for an auction that would guarantee that only one-fourth of the property remained green space, according to e-mails and documents obtained through the state’s open-records law.

The governor’s proposal would also set aside several gas well drilling sites on the 400 acres, according to the documents. The property is at Eagle Mountain Lake, just northwest of Fort Worth, and has become the subject of intense interest by several residential developers.

“This is a terrible deal for Texas parks,” said Luke Metzger, an advocate with the Austin-based Environment Texas. “Clearly, the governor’s office is talking out of both sides of the mouth — on the one hand, Governor Perry says he wants to create a world-class parks system, but then behind closed doors he’s pushing to develop and drill this natural treasure.”

A spokeswoman for Perry has said that the governor wants the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department and the General Land Office to come up with a plan for the property that best suits the state’s needs. She denied that the governor’s office pushed any plan or made any recommendations for the site.

“We’re monitoring the situation,” spokeswoman Kathy Walt said.

First off, if Kathy Walt has one more “situation” to “monitor” this year, she’s going to need 14 eyes and nine paris of hands.

Second, this highlights more Perry hypocrisy. Not only does he want to sell the land, he wants to open it up to the oil and gas industry.

Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson, who previously denied any possible sale of land in the Black Gap area and rushed to defend Governor Perry in the midst of an election year mini-scandal, is now being dumped on by the Governor’s office in an ironic twist:

The parks department bought the 400 acres at Eagle Mountain Lake in 1980. But in late December, after the state land office declared it an unused state resource, Perry’s office authorized its sale. As a condition, Perry’s office stipulated that the parks department retain proceeds from the sale and the mineral rights.

Beyond that, whether to go forward with any deal was up to Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson, said representatives for both the governor’s and Patterson’s offices. “He [Patterson] makes those decisions,” Walt said. She made similar assertions in a Aug. 22 article in the Star-Telegram.

Patterson, however, says it’s the governor’s decision:

But in a June 9 e-mail to a political supporter, Patterson said “the final decision on the property will be made by the governor.” In the same e-mail, Patterson wrote, “I hope to have the governor’s decision by summer’s end, and we could paper the deal very quickly after that.”

Luckily, the denials by either party matter not. The Star-Telegram obtained a stack of emails that tell the story:

In another e-mail, a staffer in Patterson’s office writes: “Expect a call from . . . an attorney in the governor’s office, who is trying to put together the terms and conditions under which this property could be offered at a bid sale.”

In a June 5 e-mail, land office Asset Manager Hal Croft describes a phone call he received from an attorney in the governor’s office.

“She called to discuss some plans ‘they’ have for the disposition of Eagle Mt. Lake. They being the Governor Office, however it is clear that they have been talking with [the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department],” Croft wrote.

The “plans” he described in that e-mail would set aside 100 acres for a conservation easement and reserve several sites for natural gas drilling. At least one well already operates on the park property.

“She [the attorney from the governor’s office] said they would like a sealed bid sale on the tract,” Croft wrote. He concluded with a plea for assistance. “Help, I need some direction!”

Oh! Sealed bids! Paging Halliburton!

The “Help! I need some direction!” comment might as well become Perry’s campaign slogan.

How aggressively was the OOTG (that’s Office Of The Governor for the acronym-challenged) pushing the deal? Try this on for size:

On June 12, another land office staffer reports “almost daily calls” from the governor’s office.

Let me get this straight: We have a school finance crisis, an electricity crisis, a ‘property tax crisis,’ an election going on, kids without health insurance, terrible problems with the state’s health and human services programs, and someone in the governor’s office is putting all of their energy into selling park land?

What is wrong with this picture?

Walt, of course, trys to waltz (catch the play on words?) her boss out of the problem. Given what the emails actually said, however, her denials waltz him right off a cliff:

Walt, the Perry representative, said the governor’s office wanted to clarify how a bid sale on the property would proceed. She said the transaction described in several e-mails did not reflect official proposals from Perry or his staffers, but rather an attempt to monitor ongoing proceedings at the land office.

“It was not an idea being pushed by the governor’s office. I don’t know where it originated. I don’t know if the proposal had been made by an outside party,” Walt said.

Since Jerry Patterson was out of the country today (is he on vacation?), one of his spokesman came up with this brilliant statement that historians and constitutional scholars will tell you most people figured out in 1887:

A spokesman for Patterson — who was out of the country Tuesday — said the land office operates independently from the governor’s office.

Of course, that’s in theory, not necessarily practice, evidently.The strangest part about this? Developers are already putting up money for the ’sealed bid’ process:

The correspondence also illustrates aggressive behind-the-scenes interest from several developers.

At one point, land office staffers appeared to have become flummoxed by an apparently unexpected $250,000 earnest money check sent to the agency by Fort Worth’s Mira Vista Development Corp.

In a May 24 letter, Mira Vista Vice President Thomas Nezworski urged land office staffers to “proceed with an actual sale in a timely manner in 2006 so as to preserve the maximum value of this asset.”

The company also sent a $10 million purchase contract, according to the e-mail. The check was returned to the developer.

And, this, another gem from Kathy Walt:

Walt, the Perry spokeswoman, said she did not know whether the governor’s office had been contacted by lobbyists or developers interested in the property.

Let’s face it: neither is a good thing.

At the moment, the entire thing is halted by a 120-day moratorium, which was forced on the GLO after serious outcry, including complaints from U.S. Congresswoman Kay Granger.

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