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

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

That's why each week we go on the record with the news makers who are driving this change.

Then we gather at the Reporters Roundtable to talk about the latest news stories with the journalists behind those stories.

Join us now as we go on the.

Hi, everybody.

I'm Randi Beamer, and thank you for joining us for this edition of On the Record.

Some changes could be coming to downtown San Antonio, basically, because of a new normal.

And councilman for the district says that we should make some changes.

Pivot, if you will.

Councilman Mario Bravo, District one.

Thank you for joining us.

Thanks for having me.

We were talking to specifically, you got some attention recently because you floated the idea about Houston Street and closing down vehicular traffic, at least for part of a day, maybe at night, that kind of thing.

Tell us about that idea and why we are looking at that.

Sure.

Well, you know, I went out on a limb in talking about it.

It's something that I've been interested in doing.

I don't know if it makes sense right there on Houston Street or not.

Maybe there's better areas for it.

But, you know, I was asked specifically about empty buildings in on on Houston Street in the downtown area.

What what can we do?

And I said, you know, now that we're under a new normal, having experienced the pandemic, we need to think more creatively about how we're using our spaces best.

And then we work was going to lease a big area in that before the pandemic.

And then that's one of the things that people don't have to go into their jobs as much.

They folded.

And so there's more vacancies down there than you'd expect.

People might have thought that the IT industry, tech block and all that would have brought in a lot.

Tell us about where we are in terms of vacancies down there.

And what you think can happen.

Right.

Well, those crest buildings are vacant right now, but what we were doing up until the pandemic was working, those investments were working the we had a contract to fill the buildings completely.

And they the remodel the building on a remodel.

Then based on that, then the pandemic hit that company folded.

So where do we go from here?

And that's why I'm saying we need to think more creatively about how we can use spaces.

There are challenges with shutting down a street and you know, before we do anything, we need to bring stakeholders together, get their input, and then maybe just dip Aato in it and try it out for a weekend and try it out, you know, maybe offer an evening only, but while keeping it open during the day.

How much of Houston Street, you know, from Alamo Plaza down?

Or it could be a few blocks, but I mean, that's the input that we would get from the stakeholders by sitting down with them.

And saying Bourbon Street in New Orleans, they have bollards up and that kind of thing.

Is that what you were envisioning?

Just closing it off, say, in the afternoon?

Evening time possibly to start off with?

Yeah.

And also getting people to come out of Alamo Plaza around Houston Street has been a problem or a concern for decades.

A Tripathi project in.

In the eighties, they closed or they made they made these sidewalks wider and closed it down to two lanes and people were upset with that.

Well, we see it's working.

You know, you can't you can't rush to make those changes.

That's why I think dipping your toe in it, trying it out, show seeing if it works and if it does, getting buy in from the stakeholders and moving forward.

You think there's some hesitance right now for people to lease or develop in that area because the Alamo Plan is still in the works and they don't know how that's going to work.

I mean, that's a good point.

That might be the case.

I mean, people might want to wait until that construction's done to, you know, invest in businesses there.

But, you know, I mean, we've seen businesses go away.

We see businesses come in, right.

Play land pizza left off of Houston Street.

I was really sorry to see them go.

A great mom and pop restaurant and bar.

We like those kind of unique businesses in downtown.

But, you know, Voodoo Donuts is going in in their place.

So it's not like a business that's leaving.

And then we have more vacant space necessarily.

How about residential?

Matt Brown, the CEO of the group that center of San Antonio, says first is residential.

That's the hand.

And then the eggs are other kinds of development.

You see that?

I you know, I think we need both simultaneously Absolutely.

I mean, we need more residential residential housing all over the city.

And I would love to see more of it downtown.

And then those individuals could support the retail.

But, you know, when you want people to live downtown, they also they want to be able to walk to a grocery store.

They want to be able to walk to a coffee shop.

They want to walk to, you know, all kinds of businesses, maybe their office.

But you're going to have more of that.

The Western Urban broke ground or the 32 storey residential building.

Do you see that as an impetus for change there on Houston's going to be enough?

I think yeah, I think it's happening right now.

The decade of downtown was, you know, 20, ten to 20, 20.

But we're also seeing some other successes in other parts of downtown the River Place development and the Houston or the north of Houston area on the northwest side of that's going to be five parcels of land I understand and then the link that people are talking about where where are you in hoping for that link between the river walk and the San Pedro Creek.

Well, so the decade.

Of downtown was the decade of kickstarting downtown.

I think downtown is forever.

So there wasn't just one decade of downtown You know, I love the link project.

I think it's an exciting project.

Since I got into office, I haven't seen that it was a priority in terms of if we're going to spend or invest taxpayer dollars, there's just there's so many kitchen table needs, there's housing needs, there's a lot of other needs.

And so I'd love to see that project move forward.

I just don't see I don't see the path right now.

How how about the Houston Street closing that down?

How would that work in terms of proposing it to the council?

What's the timeline that you envision?

Well, I think I would have to sit down with Houston Street property owners and stakeholders and see how they feel about it.

And, you know, I just I went out on a wing and on a limb and floated the idea.

It's something these are conversations I've had with some property owners.

These are conversations that I've had with some people about just closing down streets in general and creating pedestrian spaces that support retail.

But, you know, Houston Street may or may not be the right place for it, but the step would be meet with the stakeholders.

And if there's consensus there, if there's buy in there, talk about how do we department it, how do we do it just in little, little pieces to test it out.

And then then I would turn around and go back to the council.

But I don't think this is something that if I have if I have buy in from the stakeholders, then I think that my council colleagues would probably defer to me as the District one councilmember and supporting it.

Well, it's interesting.

I wish we had more time.

We could talk about baseball.

Yeah.

Your knee.

Is there going to be a baseball stadium downtown?

I don't know.

I'm not in charge of that.

All right.

I don't I know you'd say that.

Thanks very much, Councilman, for District one, Mario Bravo.

Appreciate it.

Thank you so much.

Recently across the country and here in San Antonio, we've seen reports of a new surge in that new variant of COVID19 as well as reports of some monkeypox cases, nine of them here in the San Antonio area.

Joining us to talk about it and more is Dr. Larry Schlesinger, who is Texas Biomedical Research Institute president and CEO.

Thank you very much for coming in.

Good to be with you.

First of all, this new variant, how how bad is it?

How does it affect people differently than the old one?

It's much more transmissible.

It is it is much more transmissible.

And the symptoms have changed.

So it's more flu, like making it even harder to know whether it's truly COVID19 or perhaps one of the other respiratory viruses that are out in the community.

But it's clear that more and more people are getting this variant.

And the good news is that the majority of cases are mild, self-limited, and we have some therapies now that can help mitigate as well.

And the vaccines that we have so far do prevent some of it or prevent you from getting it as bad as you would have otherwise.

Right.

The vaccines have never been sold to the public, has preventing acquisition of the virus, but instead they continue to reduce the serious life threatening consequences, particularly in the most susceptible.

So I firmly believe the viruses are having a positive impact on what we call the epidemiology of the current outbreak.

These vaccines are having a positive and positive impact.

And now the White House just had a vaccine summit where they're deciding this week whether to allow people under 50 to have the current vaccine or to just wait and push the the next generation that will be out in the fall.

Tell us about that and Texas biomed has been working on that.

Well I think that as more and more cases are being unfolded this is a really good question to ask.

And I think some of it is public policy facing because there will be new generation vaccines in the fall.

And so the question will be more and more fatigue.

Get a shot now, get a jab later versus are we getting close enough that it might be prudent to start educating for the fall and not necessarily focus as much on the current vaccine?

Now, this could all change even under 50 for the most vulnerable population groups.

And that will be decided, I think, in the next few days.

And the whole issue of vaccines has become so politicized, people saying, well, I, you know, you're still going to get it, so why do I need the vaccine?

But we're talking also about the overall vaccination rate that has affected all kinds of vaccinations.

People are less likely, some of them, to get a vaccine when they need to.

This is most worrisome to me.

Now, the data are out by the W.H.O.

and UNICEF that I mean, looking at 20, 21, we have the lowest uptake rates of vaccines in the world over since the last 30 years and totally preventable, particularly childhood infections.

Now, children will be at risk if they're unvaccinated.

The DPT vaccine, the.

DPP vaccine, polio, human papilloma virus, vaccines, all the uptake is reduced.

And you know, the current families don't remember some of these infections and how dire they are.

The polio, nobody.

Know if you have exactly the iron lung patients.

So I think really what we have to focus on building that public health infrastructure and education programs because we're at risk as a global society without these vaccination.

And now you want to tell people that these vaccines are rigorously research, some of it done here in San Antonio.

Absolutely.

Well, I mean, Texas biomed, of course, has done a lot of work and we're very proud just recently of the approval of the Nova VAX vaccine.

Texas Biomet is the close partner NOVA vaccine.

It's done all the preclinical work on the newest vaccine against COVID19.

But, you know, I think what's untold in the public is the ongoing work to get to next generation therapies and vaccines.

Let's get a bigger stockpile so we can be more prepared for more variants and other types of respiratory viruses.

This is the niche Texas Biomed continues to play along with our partners nationally and internationally.

And now monkeypox people hear about that.

There are nine cases here.

What how do you describe that to people and the concern that there is about whether there are enough vaccines for that?

Another beautiful example on the heels of COVID19 that we're reacting again and by reacting, we're already behind a little bit.

Monkey pox is a is a virus somewhat related to smallpox.

We've known about this virus since the 1950s.

There have been cases, human cases for decades.

But the concern now is the number of cases are more rapidly increasing and the W.H.O.

still emergence just announced it as an emergency.

And guess what?

We weren't prepared and the number of vaccines available and these are vaccines that were initially modified from smallpox vaccines.

Those vaccines are not readily available yet.

And so manufacturing is gearing up.

This is this reactive phase again, the good news, completely different virus than COVID19.

And not as lethal.

Not as lethal.

And this is a completely different transmission route.

This is close contact skin to skin or, you know, inanimate objects.

It is not aerosol like COVID19 is so it's very unlikely that it's going to look like COVID19.

On the other hand, if you are exposed to individuals in high risk groups, this is all on the CDC website.

Then you should go see your physician and get in line for the vaccine.

All right.

Well, thanks very much.

Fascinating what you what is going on here in San Antonio about all of this.

Thanks very much.

Dr. Larry Schlesinger, president and CEO of Texas Biomed.

Thank you, Randy.

We'll soon be hearing about a renewed effort to fix up one of San Antonio's most historic and most mysterious places called Mira Flores.

In a moment, we'll hear more about that effort.

But first, have a look at just what it is or was.

Usually what I hear is I've been driving by this property for my whole life and I've always wondered what was there.

I thought it was an old cemetery or some crazy person's playground.

They don't realize there actually was a rhyme or reason to what was here.

And what was here on Hildebrand, just out of Incarnate Word was a very ornate private garden created more than a hundred years ago called Mira Flores.

There's an amazing story here.

It was the brainchild of an Alice rooted his great grandfather, a refugee from Mexico, Dr. Aurelio Snow.

An exile from the Mexican Revolution Escape in May of 1914.

And that dramatic escape was front page news because he'd been Mexico's interior minister and a top doctor as well, running the nation's medical school in hospital.

An already well-to-do, well-known, accomplished surgeon when he came to San Antonio.

And like thousands of other Mexican exiles, he wound up staying in San Antonio.

He built a clinic and pharmacy downtown, then a huge mansion on Broadway near Manik Park.

And in 1921 he bought 15 acres at Broadway in Hildebrand.

And on the five acres closest to the river, he began Mira Flores Garden, commissioning sculptures and television style in full bore or false wood pieces like this hollow tree entry gate and this tree bench.

Created from concrete he did a lot with this property and you can't really tell from looking at it now.

An intricate garden with trees, shrubs, herbs and flowers, fountains, a whole network of water features.

There was a library tower three stories high that you can look out over the property and a little casita, which is still on the property today.

For about 15 years now, the city of San Antonio is on Mira Flores or what's left of it, refurbishing some of what's here.

A few pieces in better shape than most in the remains, hinting at why Rutile built the place.

The statue behind me is an Aztec leader, Guatemala.

Mira Flores was away for a year to remember his homeland because of the revolution.

He could not return there, but it was also a place where he brought people he liked connecting people from different cultures and he liked showing people what Mexican culture in his eyes, what it was really about.

This is a Talavera style bench which you can see is in terrible, sad condition.

There was yet a third level at one time.

So why did Mira Flores change and lose so much of what was here over the years?

Well, part of it being in a floodplain and just time have done some damage, but mainly other owners have had their way or their own visions for it and neglect or rootless old Mira Flores.

In 1962, he told the media with a condition that was keeping the place like a spot of beauty without touching any tree, anything that corresponds to this beauty.

There were a series of corporate owners after a southwestern bell brought in tons of landfill.

They cut up and buried destroyed many of the features, built huge professional level barbecue pits.

In fact, they renamed this area for a time.

They called up Pioneer Park, unfortunately, one of the greatest pieces ever designed by Denise Rodriguez to this huge two story tall faux Bois fountain was destroyed in 2001 by the owner of the property at the time.

Now that move in 2001 did lead to some changes.

In fact, it led to a lawsuit filed by the city.

Then there was a land swap.

So the city owns it.

And as you saw there some work is going on.

Joining us with the latest on the push to fix up Mira Flores and a new book about it is Anne Elise Urrutia and you're making a lot of public appearances and lectures coming up.

Tell us what you you hope for this after going through years writing the book.

Thank you, Randy.

I'm still continuing to write, and I have found that there is more for me to write about the old family, my great grandfather, Dr. Giuliano, I had an amazing medical career and a long life.

So I'll be three years old.

16 kids.

Great story.

Just in themselves.

Yes, that's correct.

So there's a lot of material still there for me to go through, and I'm continuing to write about his life.

But as for Mira Flores, I never intended to affect the future of the current site by writing this book.

What I really intended to do was to recreate literally the garden in words and pictures in a book because this is an endangered landscape.

And I was and I want it to be remembered.

And now Breckenridge Park Conservancy has a I guess, a contract with the city to manage it.

But it's a tough place to fix up because of so much loss.

It is a tough place.

It's a tough situation.

But now that I've finished the book, everybody's asking me, what do I think should should happen?

So I've started to think about that, and I kind of have three, three thoughts about that that I'd like to share.

The first is that we know so much more now than we knew even a few years ago about the landscape.

We know more about the significance.

We know more about the meaning.

The structure of the landscape.

We know when we're standing there looking over the fence into the property, we know what we're not seeing We know what has been lost.

So the second thing is, I would really like to see the city take the opportunity to pause and reevaluate their plans for the site in light of all the new information.

New masterplan.

The last one was in 2007.

That's correct.

And the third thing is that I am hoping that the larger community can participate in re-envisioning and reimagining what this place could be.

As Dr. Urrutia , it would have created it a garden but also as a special place that reflects one of San Antonio's untold stories.

I know it's going to get a lot more attention now with the book and you have some lectures as well as some book signings and things like that where you'll be speaking, and they can find out more about that at your Web site.

They can find out more about that at my Web site.

WW W quintaurruita.com All right.

Well, thanks very much.

Fascinating story.

Mira Flores, the book as well.

And Anne elise Urrutia appreciate your coming in.

Thank you for having me.

On Reporters Roundtable this week, San Antonio home sales have been dropping for the past few months, just as interest rates and mortgages have been going up its trend across the country.

And joining us to talk about that is Madison Iszler of the San Antonio Express-News.

Thank you very much for coming in.

You've been writing about this again for several months.

How how are home sales dropping here?

It's not dramatic, I guess you could say.

Or is it.

It was about 9% in June compared to a year earlier, which is the biggest one that we've seen in some time.

The previous two months were smaller drops.

So that was notable I think in part because people are having to stay on the sidelines who might have bought because of mortgage interest rates.

And then also prices coupled with inventory is still really tight, even though it's getting slightly better.

And what kind of prices are we talking about when we're talking about going up?

But where are they?

Median home prices.

So the median in June was about 380,200, which was about 20% higher than it was a year earlier and almost 40% higher than it was two years earlier, around the beginning of the pandemic.

So that's quite a dramatic increase.

Despite the increase in mortgage rates, which is kind of surprising that there's the prices are still going up and our how much our interest rates going up.

It was like 2.8% a year ago for a 30 year fixed.

Yeah, interest rates have gone up quite a lot from where they were at the beginning or earlier on in the pandemic when they were pretty low, which contributed to a lot of the demand and the buying that we saw because people obviously wanted to get a very low rate.

And so rates keep going up.

Now, I think the Fed is about to raise them again today, if I remember correctly.

So would you describe it as a buyer's market, a seller's market?

What do you think?

Definitely a seller's market.

It's a tough time to be a buyer, especially if you have a more modest budget and you're looking at the lower end of the spectrum.

It's a really tough, tough time to be a buyer.

People might think, though, that, well, prices would drop a little because the mortgage rates have gone up and people can't afford it.

They're going to stay out of the market.

The economists that I've talked to and also some of the realtors think that the price growth will moderate, not necessarily that we'll see prices go down, but that these the 20% increase or the 40% increase.

I just mentioned that we're going to see it go back to single digits.

So smaller, smaller increases.

So people who aren't worried about selling their home, their home valuation, their tax evaluations, may not go up as much dramatically over the next year or so.

Well, we'll have to see.

There's still quite a bit of demand and more people are moving to San Antonio.

San Antonio's growing a lot so there's still a lot of demand for housing.

And more out-of-town companies are buying up houses to use as rental properties.

Yes, there's a lot of interest in the rental market here and single family rental, which, of course, as it becomes more expensive to buy house, a lot of people are having to rent.

Do you have any good news about housing to tell you.

About right.

Now?

Right now.

How about shopping centers?

You've been writing about that as well.

They're staying relatively fall because there hasn't been as much built.

Yeah, there's been very little new retail space built.

And so if you are a business owner who's looking to open a store here or you are a big box retailer looking for a location, you're going to go into an existing retail space.

So that's helped keep a lot of our biggest shopping centers full.

And also some new tenants are moving into some of the biggest space left behind by stores that closed during the pandemic or before the pandemic.

So that's helped, too, with occupancy rates.

Some of it you've written about South Park Mall.

There's a former Sears there.

Yeah.

So there's a big Sears there, and it's basically being split into between Evo Entertainment Group, which is opening a theater entertainment complex with bowling and other things.

And then the other half is going to be a gym, a fitness connection gym chain.

So that's been empty for some time.

And that's that's an example of new tenants taking over a space left by Sears.

All right.

Well, a lot of stuff going on and come back with better news next time on housing sales.

If we're looking to sell or buy house in Madison Iszler .

San Antonio Express-News thanks very much for coming in.

Thanks for.

Having me.

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

You can see this show again or any previous shows as well as Catch the podcast at klrn.org.

And we'll see you next time.

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