On the record is brought to you by Steve and Adele Dufilho.

San Antonio is a fast growing, fast moving city with something new happening every day.

That's why each week we go on the record with Randy Beamer and the newsmakers who are driving this change.

Then we gather at the reporters roundtable to talk about the latest news stories with the journalist behind those stories.

Join us now as we go on the record with Randy Beamer.

Hi, everybody, and thank you for joining us for this edition of On the Record.

I'm Randy Beamer.

There is a brand new man in charge of the Brackenridge Park Conservancy, which is working on all kinds of developments in the historic park here north of downtown.

He is just on his third or fourth day on the job right now.

I want to welcome Chris Maitre the CEO of the Brackenridge Park Conservancy.

Thank you very much for coming in.

Well, no.

Well, thank you for having me.

Now, you had a similar job where you came from in New Orleans.

First, tell us about that and why you wanted to come here.

Sure.

So my job there at New Orleans City Park, very much similar in terms of park scope and scale or urban park within an urban city of fantastic city.

And just like Brackenridge is to San Antonio an amazing asset in the community.

I served as chief operating officer, main, maintained a lot of relationships with the entities in and around the park.

I had supervisory responsibilities for a lot of units that served the public and were back of house facing in terms of some of the things that we provided, amenities and, you know, the grounds and the safety and aspects.

And I know it's early, but what are your goals here?

Seeing the history of the park and the Conservancy started here in, what, 2008.

2008?

Yeah.

So they've outlined the Conservancy has it, but really they embedded a lot of the community engagement and the public engagement that came out of the reconciliation plan through the work of this Brackenridge Park Advisory Committee.

and so my my mission there is really carries some of those initiatives for it.

they've been pretty well outlined.

The community and the public have had a lot of opportunity to weigh in on them.

And a lot of those things outlined with some of my early impressions of the park, as well as some of my historical impressions of the park.

Having visited a number of times and having heard about the park from day one.

You mentioned the reconciliation plan.

That's actually to reconcile three earlier plans.

You talked about different things.

One, was going to change the whole traffic flow or direction of the park, and that was not received well, but just the fact that there were three other plans prior to this.

Does that give you pause in terms of moving forward, that this could be tougher than you think?

No, I don't think so.

I think it obviously was initially a little confounding about those three plans within, you know, short successive time.

But I think what obviously the city government and the public got together and the Conservancy got together and a lot of the stakeholders in and around, Brackenridge got together and really consolidate those plans.

And out of it came the reconciliation, which is really reading up, doing a lot of research on it before I took this position, really excited about carrying that forward.

And where are we in the timeline?

I'm not sure.

We're still very early.

We have to continually keeping gauge.

We have to develop projects and of those projects, and then we have to go back to the stakeholder advisory committee to really make sure it gets vetted well with them.

And obviously there's some funding that's going to be set aside or has been set aside with the trees, the turtles.

And then certainly the Conservancy is going to be out there initially fundraising a lot of that or a majority of that or half of that.

Those numbers fluctuate amongst the different projects that were outlined.

I'm excited about getting out in the community and meeting a lot of different folks that have and share a passion for Brackenridge.

And that was the terms as a tax increment reinvestment zone.

I think it is.

but, the civic, the park there, the conservancy is one of the ways that, one of the ways to support Brackenridge.

But people think, well, it's a city park.

Shouldn't the city be paying for any, you know, renovations, improvements?

And there is a city bond project that's been held up for a number of years.

tell them about why they need a conservancy and why they need to support it.

And sure, it's a great question.

I mean, it's a great question.

And that conservancies have popped up all over the place to support urban park initiatives that the cities, the counties, the state, whatever it may be, can't fund.

you know, there's a lot of funding that's been stressed.

We've heard a lot in the public about, you know, dollars being allocated for different things.

Potentially cutbacks in a conservancy really is there to fill the void.

you've got a lot of passionate people on conservancy boards.

No different than the Brackenridge Park Conservancy Board.

Really passionate about that space and that green space and that acreage.

you know, they're amazed by the with a park is right now and has been for years.

But they also want to look towards the future as a lot of San Antonio and just do as well.

And I think it fills that void.

And it helps city stretch the city dollars.

So, so put it all in.

They can hit a lot of other opportunities, and we can focus on some of the initiatives that our, the public want and the Conservancy wants.

What are some of those things down the road that you think we might be missing?

Those of us who have lived here.

I've heard it said before that because Brackenridge doesn't extend all the way out to Broadway, that there's not a public facing part of the park as big as it might have been had it originally gone to Broadway.

Are the things, you know, signs, just the visibility of it throughout the city?

I think certainly those are those opportunities where you look at the entrances to Brackenridge, right now, they're kind of underdeveloped.

there's a couple.

I think Funston has a really good opportunity there with, attachment to Mankey.

but there's really understated.

You know, when you arrive at a place you want to know you've arrived at that place.

If you look at the roads through the park or around the park, you can't really tell whether it's off of Hildebrand or off of Mulberry.

you know, you don't know if you're there, but I don't know if that's one of our initial, pushes or projects.

I think eventually it will be.

And it could be, because I think whenever you have a sense of where you want to, where you're going, you want to have a sense that you've arrived.

right now, that's not happened.

I don't see it.

There's a couple of good starts there.

but really, it's not going to be our focus initially.

we've got a few other projects, I think, that came out of the reconciliation plan that we're going to be pushing forward.

What are those that you want to get working on for?

Well, I think when you think of a park, you think of families, right?

You think of whether it's picnicking.

And of course, I've been visiting the park, a couple of times.

And you're seeing the families that are picnicking.

You're seeing the families that are fishing.

I mean, just yesterday, you know, dad and four kids hopped out of an SUV and they started casting, you know, and so personally, you know, that's what I remember about my first time in a park with my grandfather taking me.

And I was learning to fish there.

And certainly I had my first playground experience in a park, and I think those are some of the initiatives that we want.

I want to clean up the water, right.

We want to provide places for kids to recreate well, provide safe places for families to, you know, have passive moments in a park, you know, engage with each other, turn off the cell phone and enjoy nature.

Go for a hike.

Go for a bike ride.

Engage with the water.

That's those are some of the things that I think the Conservancy and the reconciliation in the community and the public are really excited about.

And the reconciliation.

Well, you talked about passion.

Some of the people who had been concerned about some of the earlier plans were so passionate.

They don't want any changes made.

But, some of the changes have to be made, I would guess, just to, to maintain the crumbling aspects of the park that are literally in some places crumbling.

Yeah.

And it goes back to your question about the why is the conservancy engaged?

And I think when you look at it, parks historically, because the money has been sent to other locations, the deferred maintenance aspect of urban parks, community parks or state parks, you know, there's not been a lot of resources there.

And I think one of the things we're looking at is a lot of those places where we could host, you know, programs or activities and bring people, bring the locals to the park.

And sure, if tourists come, that's great.

Right?

But really, Brackenridge is a park for everyone.

right now I think we have so many assets in the park, and we're just looking at reconstituting a lot of those, putting that archeological, that architecture back into people's forefront.

myself, I just took a walk along Alpine Drive last night, and what an amazing place, you know?

But, I mean, I didn't see many people on it.

And I think that's some of the spaces that you have in Breckenridge that really were attractive to me, because if I buy a house, I buy a house to kind of re bring it back to its glory in its history.

Right.

And that's kind of what really attracted me to this position, in this park specifically, is the opportunities to really spend some, time and energy reconstitute an amazing park.

Well, good luck with that.

I know it's going to be very easy for you, given the it's going to be fun for you to do this.

And so, have you switched yet to breakfast tacos?

Not yet, but I'm going to get there.

You can tell me the best place to go.

Okay.

thanks very much.

Chris Maitre, CEO of Brackenridge Park Conservancy.

Appreciate you coming in.

Thanks.

Thanks, Randy, for awesome.

Appreciate it.

A brand new report on domestic violence in San Antonio is out.

And joining us to talk about that is judge at the 150th Civil District Court, Judge Monique Diaz.

Thank you very much for coming in.

Thank you for having me.

Now, this is, out of a group called the Collaborative Commission on Domestic Violence, which has been around for a number of years.

But this is not the annual report that you put out in years past.

What is different about this report?

So the CCTV, as we call it, was created in 2019 by the Honorable Judge Peter Sacchi, and it was created with the purpose of bringing together all of the stakeholders in our community to sit around a table, for the first time, officially through a court order and talk about the problem of domestic violence, addressing the gaps in our communities, response to domestic violence and implementing evidence based strategies to respond to that.

So every year since our creation, we have put out annual progress reports covering that the past year of our work.

Since we are now embarking on the fifth year of our work, we have compiled a, for the first time comprehensive progress report that covers the last five years of our work and also touches upon the future five years and what we plan to tackle in our community.

Historically, this has been a huge problem in San Antonio compared to other cities.

How are we doing these days?

And as you've been on that committee for a long time and in the in the courtroom, good news, bad news.

So, Bexar County, in 2018, unfortunately had, the distinction of having the highest number of domestic violence homicides in the entire state of Texas, which caused a call to action in our community and led to the creation of the CCTV.

Since then, thankfully, our domestic violence homicide numbers have, declined.

We have no longer been in first place.

We fall into third and even fourth place over the last five years as we rank across the state of Texas.

Now, domestic violence is is a problem in our community, but it's not unique to our community.

It is a worldwide epidemic.

It's been recognized as one by the World Health Organization.

and it doesn't discriminate.

right.

So it doesn't necessarily disproportionately impact people based on their gender or their race or, you know, economic status.

And so the CCTV, has seen some progress here in our local community.

And in part, we attribute that to the work that we have done in bringing all of our stakeholders together and methodically, carefully implementing evidence based strategies proven to reduce domestic violence in communities.

What are some of the things that have come out of this, committee and are some of the changes here?

So it's a long report, and we encourage folks to go to our website at cdv.org to read the full report with some of the highlights of of the report.

Cover improvements to the protective order process, improvements in the area of law enforcement, improvements in the area of education.

So focus on both intervention and prevention strategies.

We've also introduced a new domestic violence ecosystem model to help illustrate, the role of our various stakeholders in the CDV in reducing domestic violence in our community.

So you'll see that our report is broken down into these four levels of our local ecosystem.

And those involve individuals and relationships and the interventions that we can take on there.

organizations and communities, systems and institutions and cultural and societal issues.

By design, the CDB focuses primarily on improving the systems and institutions and communities and organizations.

So you'll see, kind of those broad areas broken down in our report.

And some of the stakeholders that people might not realize are involved in this.

What groups can they look to for help?

What are some of those groups that you're working with?

So we, have attempted to bring together everyone in our community that has the ability to impact domestic violence.

and so we have at the table members of our judiciary, members of local government, our prosecutors, local nonprofits, health care institutions, education, institutions, faith based leaders and other community leaders.

So we're regularly convening, to address these issues.

one of the things, as far as the protective order process, that involved many of those stakeholders that we're very proud of is we put together some work groups that have helped to reduce the time it takes to serve protective orders upon respondents, improved data collection regarding protective orders.

We've expanded legal services.

So through, the county funding some additional attorney positions to help in protective order cases that involve issues like custody, child support, visitation.

we have also, through the Family Justice Center, created an online protective order application process.

and so and many more, kind of minor improvements, but those are some of the highlights to the protective order process.

And you said there are also some successes partnering with law enforcement.

Yes.

so within law enforcement, we have, you know, the main, providers here are going to be SaPD, BCSo, the Bexar County Sheriff's Office, has a 24 seven navigation line that we created through the CDV in partnership with Strack, the City of San Antonio and Family Violence Prevention Services that houses our local shelter.

So now, when a Bexar County sheriff's officer responds to a domestic violence incident, they have the ability to immediately, conduct a lethality assessment to determine the level of risk that an individual faces and to immediately connect, those involved in that situation with resources like housing, counseling, any services that are needed to increase the safety for that family.

As far as SaPD goes, in 2020, SaPD completely shifted their entire crisis intervention model.

And so now they have crisis advocates and service providers that, assist individuals and family violence cases to improve their safety and with anything they need help with throughout the life of their domestic violence.

And it's not just when a case ends if they still need help after a criminal or a civil case, has concluded, they hold those families hands and help them throughout.

So that's a victim centered approach that helps reduce re traumatization to those folks that might face retraumatized through the criminal justice process.

As a judge, what's the toughest part of of this whole process for you?

when you issue an order and everybody thinks it's done and it comes back or.

It's a good question.

So our power, in issuing orders is only as good as it as it is if we ensure that those orders are being followed.

And so one of the things that we've done through the CDB to improve our ability to strengthen our orders, and the enforceability is we've created a civil family violence prevention program.

and we help support that and create that.

And that's a new program at the civil courts that provides wraparound services for families involved in any domestic violence case, not just protective orders, counseling, supervised visitation, any support that the survivor, the, person who's used harm and the children might need.

And to take it a step further, we know that, respondents of protective orders are prohibited from possessing firearms.

We saw recently the U.S. Supreme Court uphold the federal prohibition and United States versus Rahami against respondents possessing firearms for the life of a protective order.

So I can say that on a piece of paper that you can't possess firearms.

But in order to take the next step, this program helps us with ensuring compliance with those orders.

So a judge can refer a case to this program.

They can follow up with the individual.

I can now order that they transfer their firearms temporarily to law enforcement or to a third party, and we follow up with them to ensure that they are doing that.

That firearm transfer process and compliance process was something that was developed through the CDB.

Well, that's great to hear.

we appreciate you coming in.

I know this is again, one of the biggest problems we have had in San Antonio for decades.

But good luck with all of that.

And you can find out more information again at CDV.

Dot org.

Dot org.

Thanks very much.

Judge Monique Diaz, 150 of the Civil District Court.

Thanks.

Thank you.

On our reporters roundtable this week, we're talking about something called Project Marvel, a phrase we haven't heard in San Antonio until just this week, when San Antonio Express-News reporter Madison Iszler wrote a fascinating article about this project.

Marvel that's been in the works quietly behind the scenes for some time.

Thanks for coming in.

First of all, now tell us about what is Project Marvel?

How did you find out about this project?

Marvel is the city's codename for a larger sports and entertainment district that officials are working on downtown.

And our understanding is that that involves refashioning the Alamodome, expanding the convention center, and a new arena for the Spurs, potentially with other uses around it, such as apartments, hotel, restaurants, possibly retail.

The city has talked about some of these projects already.

The Alamodome in the convention center mainly, but we haven't previously heard them tied together as part of this larger district aimed at revitalizing downtown.

And so we've heard a lot about what the Spurs might do or might want, and whether the Institute of Texan Cultures, that building, would be used by the city, possibly for a Spurs arena area.

But this is, much bigger than that.

And you found out about it through looking for nondisclosure agreements?

Yes, we found out about it through requesting public records.

We've been reporting about the Spurs and the city's interest in bringing the Spurs downtown for the past year or so.

And as part of that reporting process, we started to hear more about Project Marvel and non-disclosure agreements that various consultants, companies, those involved had signed.

And so as part of that request process, we learned about Project Marvel, which the city has been talking about for at least a year, year and a.

Half.

What are some of the surprising things?

Obviously, you've been writing about a lot of these different things and pieces, but what are some of the surprises that you found out when you first learned of some of these?

I think the price tag in an email about a year ago, City Manager Assistant City Manager Laura Houston mentioned that this could cost 3 billion to 4 billion, which would be a major project in downtown.

But again, that would be agglomeration of projects, just not, not one little bit like the Spurs or the Alamodome project.

Any of those would be just part of this much more massive.

Right part of this bigger district.

Yes, it's probably going to cost more, given that construction costs and interest rates have gone up since then.

But it would be a massive project for downtown.

And what about the the whole vision for this?

who's behind it or do we know really?

Is it just kind of something that's come up when different people talk about different pieces of this bubble?

We know that the city has reached out to a bunch of different real estate developers, hospitality consulting firms and other groups as part of this.

Through our records request, we got copies of a lot of non-disclosure agreements that major developers have signed to talk about Project Marvel.

And so we know that the city is having these discussions with some major developers and companies about how this would work, potentially what this would cost.

We also know that folks at UTSA, the San Antonio Stock Show and Rodeo, and the organization that oversees HemisFair, have also signed NDAs related to this.

And UTSA because they own that Institute of Texan Cultures building, which the city, then they may use, what about timelines of these different kinds of things?

What looks to be able to be done sooner rather than later?

I think the biggest question right now is where the money would come from, which would of course dictate part of the timeline.

We don't know what different financing sources the city is looking at on their end.

We don't know how much the private industry would contribute.

We know that some of the money for the dome in the convention center would come from this new tax mechanism that the state approved last year, that would basically involve hotel taxes from three miles of the convention center.

That could pay for part of this.

But there's going to be there's going to need to be more money coming from somewhere to pay for this.

Like, that's what I understand, just talking to someone who may know some of these people that they don't want to, you know, make it a taxpayers, you're going to pay for this or not kind of deal that they realize that the private sector has to pony up.

And that's going to take some time as well to figure out who's going to pay for what, where and how much that this will come in.

That is with the Spurs arena specifically, and that's one facet of this bigger project.

Sources have told us that the Spurs have proposed footing about one fifth of the bill for an arena that could cost 1.2 billion, but that's the only indication right now that we have of what the private industry could be proposing for this.

But they know that if they ask for too much, there would be pushback in that, you know, deja vu all over again.

That's why the city didn't build the Alamodome or the AT&T center.

Now for our space center downtown is because of the pushback from taxpayers worried about how much it would cost.

So I think, to me, what's what's interesting is how this thing has grown into a project Marvel size thing.

And did that surprise you itself?

It did.

And there's a lot, a lot of other projects that are also in the works downtown at the same time that we've talked about before, like the Alamo Visitor Center and the museum, the missions coming back downtown and building a new ballpark, more apartments being built downtown in what's primarily been a hotel centric and office building centric area.

And so it fits into this broader picture of, I think downtown is poised for a lot of change, but how things are going to advance still remains to be seen.

But Project Marble specific specifically, is is basically in the south and southeast and east part of downtown.

We're talking about now the missions have been talking about moving maybe to the northwest part of downtown.

Project marble is in southwest.

Southeast based.

Southeast.

Yeah.

So around HemisFair, around the Alamodome, around the Institute for Texan Culture site, which is where the Spurs in the city are looking right now to put a new arena if they decide to come downtown.

And there's also all kinds of just ideas.

And this they're a bridge across, 37 downtown.

A land bridge could at least has been mentioned as a possibility.

Yes.

I think one of the the things that the city is looking at is how to connect the east side better to downtown.

And so a land bridge came up in one of the emails that we got in our records request, looking at how to connect over the highway, that side of the city to this bigger entertainment district to make it easier for people to get back and forth.

But how parking would work, how the traffic flow would work.

That's another big question at this point, especially given all the construction there is right now downtown.

And this is a project that would obviously last for years and years and years.

So Ron Nurnberg wouldn't be mayor, by the time this moves along.

a lot of people in office now may not be in office.

So we're talking a lot of private people involved.

And also that would show the Spurs commitment to being downtown.

Is this also a way that an NFL team might be enticed to move to San Antonio with something more than they have now at the Alamodome?

I don't think that's on the table at this point, but but who knows really.

I've not heard any rumblings of that.

Right.

Well, come back and tell us.

Thank you very much, Project Marvel, fascinating story in the San Antonio Express-News.

Madisen, thanks again for coming out.

And thank you for joining us for this edition of On the Record.

You can see this show again.

You can check out any previous shows.

You can also download the podcast.

Just go to klrn.org I'm Randy Beamer and we'll see you next time.

On the record is brought to you by Steve and Adele Dufilho