Next time you're passing between Brookmeadow Dr. and Jacobs Well Road, just try to count the number of billboards, signs and banners; there are 22 billboards, signs, and banners, not including the ones for existing businesses
Send your comments and news tips to online.editor@valleyspringcomm.net or to hskillman@austin.rr.com
Editor's Note: Hellooo . . . county commissioners, county environmental health department, TCEQ . . . anybody home? Why is this profligate clutter of signs allowed, spoiling the view and entry way into Wimberley? And why was a piece of property in a flood plain approved for development? One business now up and running and another planned have very large impervious cover footprints. All this is a recipe for significant increases in storm water runoff carrying toxic pollutants into our creeks, aquifer and river. Anybody . . . ?
An Open Letter
By Hanlon Skillman
Several years ago a man named Mike Holbrook, a developer formerly with the Quicksand Group in Wimberley, purchased the 25-plus acres we call "the triangle;" it is the triangular piece of property where RR 12 and Jacobs Well intersect.
Together with Marty Munoz of the County Environmental Department, I researched the "triangle" land and found that it is in a flood plain. Immediately the property was listed with a local realtor and real estate company. They erected 4 billboards asking just under 1 million dollars for the flood plain.
Holbrook then “flipped” part of the flood plain acreage to an out-of-town hardware store.
Just one problem. The newly purchased property had no water.
Holbrook then purchased our Mountaincrest neighborhood well from an attorney in Houston. This little well serves 70 or so homes in my neighborhood. Several of us in three adjacent neighborhoods gathered signatures opposing this sale, but the sale eventually was approved by the TCEQ (Texas Commission on Environmental Quality).
Mountaincrest's little community well is now serving commercial interests and ( . . . gulp!) was purchased by Aqua Texas.Holbrook attached a large water pipeline to service his newly purchased commercial property in the floodplain. He told our neighborhood group that all development on the property would have rainwater collection. Then the unthinkable occurred.
Holbrook “flipped” the well to Aqua Texas.
Very recently, 3 new billboards have appeared, announcing, "Reserve Your RV & Boat Storage Space Now, 500 spaces available....” Imagine how much oil, grease, gas and diesel is going to drip there, a stone's throw from the actual Jacob's Well.
How is the future development on this land going to be safe from erosion? The flood plain has been stripped of native trees and grasses which might have in the past helped mitigate erosion and flooding. Recently, the county, noticing that serious erosion is occurring, paid the hardware owner a visit.
Next time you're passing between Brookmeadow Dr. and Jacobs Well Road, just try to count the number of billboards, signs and banners; there are 22 billboards, signs, and banners, not including the ones for existing businesses. Look at the piled up rocks and the soil erosion in the flood plain under development.
Just last week, a very large, in-your-face, red and orange for sale sign from another local Real Estate concern appeared across RR 12 from my neighborhood. It's about a mile from our well. Where will the water come from for this commercial development? From our little well, across the road, at the top of the hill?
Looks like all the cheesy development – billboards, signs, banners, whatever, that is not permissible in the Village is now ending up in the county's unincorporated area and the city's ETJ wasteland.
Soil erosion from runoff at the site
What grime and grease looks like up close on an asphalt surface
12 comments:
If our County Environmental Health Department isn't interested in visible problems throughout our county, can you imagine how serious the problem has become for thousands of out-of-sight non-compliant septic systems EHD approved over the years and then forgot! Not even citizen complaints could get official attention until the Ramus debacle revealed the EHD corruption.
Cleaning up widespread septic pollution in Hays County first requires cleaning up the County's EHD.
Mr. Skillman,
I agree this is a terrible project and a blight to our community. This kind of development needs to be stopped and not allowed along our road ways. The visual of 500 storage units in a creek bed is bad enough, not to mention the run off from this proposed density will flood and pollute Hogg Creek that runs through the middle of Woodcreek and into Cypress Creek. This area may be just inside the City of Woodcreeks ETJ and would need to follow the Cities water quality ordinance. The entire site is in the flood plain and building should not be allowed. Ranch Road 12 is a scenic road and this type of development is deplorable and a threat to the beauty and environmental health of our community. Stop the madness!
Hey O'Dell and your pals. It's obviously not against the law to do any of the things described in this "open letter". It's a free country, free state, and free county. These are businessmen, and there's nothing wrong with making money. You people need to leave these guys alone!
I would think the water usage by the Hardware Store and the proposed Warehouse would be quite low, lower than a whole bunch of quarter acre lots with houses. When the Hardware store was being built a rainwater pit (or whatever it is called) was dug to control and collect the parking lot and roof runoff. Look right in front of the entrance between the lot and RR12. This would keep the rainwater off of RR12 and surrounding channels then it could recharge the aquifer.
Also note that neither of these projects will appreciably increase population density in the area and would be a better alternative than homes. The sports field and the rodeo arena at the VFW are both causing pollution of the ground water, not to mention light pollution by the ball fields which are many times left on all night.
*BTW the area is not in the Woodcreek ETJ.
You wouldn't want to buy a home in a floodplain, would you? I didn't think so.
Why do you think ballfields and the arena are causing pollution to the groundwater.... How about runoff from 1,089,000 square feet of parking lots and pavement? Oil, grease, metals associated with vehicles- where to- into a "rain pit"- which then goes where.....?
I don't want that "gunk" recharging my aquifer, do you? I didn't think so.
Besides erosion is happening as we speak, and the roads will FLOOD even worse than they have 4xs in the last 10 years.
It could have been an open space, a park with the trees.........it is a floodplain, after all...I'd rather drink that runoff..... wouldn't you?
If you all don't like what the landowner is doing with his land, go buy it and turn it into a park. Stop trying to take the use of his private property for public use through government regulation.
Only a ignorant fool would want to see our beautiful scenic roads filled up with storage units, signs and more ugly metal buildings. To somehow claim that this is of no concern to the community and the property owners have a right to do what ever he wants is nonsense. This area is in a flood plain and should not be built on. Wimberley's charm is it's rural character and clean flowing streams and tree covered hills. If you build crap development along the roads approaching the City you destroy the attractiveness of this place and encourage the lowest level of human greed to prevail. Our community needs to wake up and work with the County and State to pass a scenic ordinance to protect the approaches to Wimberley and Woodcreek. The Winters By-Pass should be left a park way as should all of FM 12. We need a scenic designation to stop the greedy fools from paving over our paradise.
“Wimberley's charm is it's rural character and clean flowing streams and tree covered hills.”
Are you kidding? Are you stuck in a time warp? That statement has credibility about the Hill Country, mostly west and north of Wimberley. The village has none of those things. It has no rural character just some run-down antique shops that are in bad need of a face-lift. Urban blight is not charm. It has only one stream, Cypress Creek, which is stagnant and polluted; it only really flows when it rains. I guess there are some trees on the hills but there are as many homes and cell phone towers. If anyone wants to improve the place for people including tourists, the “don’t build it” people hamstring any chance of improving the cities appearance in any way. As long as you would rather they build stores and other businesses in Dripping Springs and Austin, that is where the money and jobs will go.
BTW: The last two photos are rigged to reinforct the authors weak opinion.
Charles in a word - shut up. You are what is wrong with the system as much as is Pat Rose. You continue to feed the system that feeds on hatred of someone who has something you don't - classic class envy - and you want to foist you hatred and ugliness of life onto everyone else. Take a break.
Rather - the common sense approach is that if the citizens of a community want a piece of land preserved for "parkland" that they don't have to pay for but get to enjoy, then they should put up or shut up. Conversely, those property owners who do own properties that have environmentally sensitive attributes have a responsibility to the community to take care as to what they develop on these tracts. Is it enough to do just the minimum that the State may require? Or is it not about time that we take responsibility for our own actions and do more than just enough to get by?
The development community needs to step up to the plate and begin to take the long view on the projects that they build, and begin to build for the next 100 years rather than the next two, just to increase their profit. One can make a decent return on investment and still put in a more quality development that is more responsive and responsible to the environmental concerns that are truly concerns - water scarcity (meaning proper water stewardship), water quality (meaning that you don't pee in your own drinking water, so why do you want to do that to someone else), proper waste disposal (and yes Virginia, there are good septic systems, and even ones that David venHuizen hasn't designed - though he has some good ideas that ought to be paid attention to, and it is here that at least he is willing to offer solutions unlike Charles who continues to beat his tinny tune about how corrupt his political enemies are).
How about some level-headed common-sense for a change? That's all that I ask - and leave the irrational fringe lunatics from both the right and the left behind. To hell with the Democrats and the Republicans - they only care about themselves and the next election anyway - how about consideration for Hays County folks first and foremost when it comes to local issues?
But we NEED those storage units for the economic stimulus program to work properly. It will create jobs, heavy construction equipment will be sold, steel and concrete and other materials will be produced, and then we can pay mr. what'shisnamedeveloperman to store our stuff that we buy with the money we all made off of the project...cuz we don't have enough room in our houses becuz of all of our other stuff....profit, profiteering, ROI, and life goes on...or does it? Perhaps it will for a time. 10 years, 20 years, perhaps even 100 years more before we really start bumping up against the realities of this planet's finite resources...realities that will become extremely unpleasant to live with, or die with...
From elsewhere in this blog, "The Story of Stuff"...it's the American Way, and if you sound off against it, or even think one little tiny thought against it, well then you're just un-American, right? That would at the very least make you a pinkocommiefag, or perhaps a socialist, or maybe even a full blown terrorist...?
The Story of Stuff (full version on YouTube)I just wish I was better at sarcasm...
I think Edward Abbey said it best - "True patriots must be willing to defend their country against their government."
It is important to go directly to the responsible parties to learn the facts. From the county, you might learn the county's EHD has been out to the site recently to check for storm water runoff violations (which they should have doing all along); check with Pct. 4 Commissioner Ford instead of Pct. 3 Commissioner Conley to check whether the county is following up as it should have been doing all along; check with the developer, Mr. Holbrook, to ask about his plans for his storage complex; check with the City of Wookcreek to see if part of his property and storage facility are inside Woodcreek's ETJ. Finally, check with Mr. Hanlon. You might be surprised at what you learn. Point is, INFORMED opinion always helps to move a good debate forward to resolution.
Bottom line, we should all be doing our level best to prevent any more poisoning of our drinking water and mucking up our community. I'm sure our kids and grandkids will appreciate it very much.
which old time wimberley family sold the property to the big bad developer anyhow. shouldnt those people be named and placed in the crowd of bad actors. and, by the way, if the city would annex all of paradise, many more restrictions could be placed on development. anyone here want to be in the city?
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