Hispanic Heritage Month starts today and Pease Park Conservancy is honored to have cultivated a team with such rich and diverse backgrounds!
Representation matters and thanks to these incredible individuals, we have been able to broaden our community offerings and how we serve Spanish speakers through bilingual communications, programming, and our Ecologist School Field Trips. Join us in celebrating the value and leadership they bring to the organization and its mission by getting to know them!
As Latino Conservation Week comes to an end, we want to reflect on the many different ways in which Latinos are playing a role in conservation. From organizing events for groups to spend time in nature like Latino Outdoors’ initiative does, to working in land management, parks departments, and leading research across various topics concerning conservation - the work doesn’t end here! We hope you’ll stay connected with this initiative led by the Hispanic Access Foundation!
Thank you for your feedback and concerns regarding the splash pad at Pease Park.
At this time, public safety remains our top priority. We cannot reopen the water feature until we are absolutely certain it is safe to do so. The sophisticated controller equipment that continuously monitors water quality, dispenses the chemicals, and automatically shuts off the splash pad when water quality is out of balance must be operating properly to ensure that it is safe for play. Unhealthy water quality can cause illness and death.We want to assure you that we are working diligently to diagnose the problem and make the necessary repairs. We are working with GPSI, the firm that designed and built the splash pad, as well as IPS, the manufacturer of the controller equipment.
For the past 10 years, the week of July 15 through July 23rd has been recognized as Latino Conservation Week - An initiative led by the Hispanic Access Foundation to further amplify the presence of Latinos in the outdoors. During this time organizations and community groups across the country have gathered and participated in various events to promote conservation efforts in their local environments.
In honor of Latino Conservation Week, we spoke to Josie (San Antonio Regional Coordinator) and Bianca (Program Coordinator) of Latino Outdoors about the history of Latino Outdoors, the work that they do and why it’s important to build an inclusive outdoors:
One of February’s long celebrated moments of remembrance. Since 1976 we have made it an American practice to “seize the opportunity to honor the too-often neglected accomplishments of Black Americans in every area of endeavor throughout our history.” — Pease Park Conservancy is working to center narratives, prioritize experiences, and most importantly to restructuralize how public land is cultivated and shared.
The “Austin City Plan of 1928” was adopted by the Austin City Council to address the “Negro Problem”. At the time, Austin’s city leaders claimed that providing “separate but equal” facilities and services in multiple communities across the city was too expensive. Enforcement of the City Plan included termination of city utilities in order to force Black residents to leave neighborhoods like Clarksville, and move east.
Starting next Wednesday, March 3rd, construction work will result in the temporary closure of: the pedestrian bridge at 15th Street, access to the trail behind the construction trailer, and the full length of the eastern trail from the pedestrian bridge on the south to the low-water crossing at the north end of Kingsbury Commons
Pease Park is emblematic of racial and economic injustice in Austin, and presents an opportunity to acknowledge this history of slavery, segregation, and exclusion in order to create a public space that is truly welcoming to all. This is the first in a series to acknowledge and recognize Black Austinites who were/are integral to the history of Pease Park and its surroundings.
We are getting close!! Kingsbury Commons is just a couple months away from completion and things are really pulling together! Our construction crew has poured the concrete for most of the pathways, the basketball court, the Tudor Cottage, and the brand new water feature. The Tudor cottage has received a fresh coat of paint and new shingles for the roof. A lot of the plantings have been planted and the new irrigation system has been installed throughout Kingsbury Commons. Giant limestone blocks have been added to the outdoor plaza and, just today, the construction team installed the new natural timber play equipment. It’s been a tremendous and exciting journey to where we are and we can’t wait for everyone to get the chance to see all the new features!
This past weekend, just north of the historic 24th street bridge, a generous group of volunteers helped clear out five patches of invasive Johnson grass, clear out the thick undergrowth of intrusive Bermuda grass, plant an assortment of 80 native plants in their place, and restore a rich, organic layer of topsoil mixed with native grass seeds in the area.
Recently, the Texas Conservation Corps came out and made a huge impact in the Caswell Shoals area of Pease Park. In collaboration with the Watershed Protection Department, TxCC cleared not only all of the ragweed from the northern edge of the bikeway to the southern edge of the pollinator garden, now known as the trail meadow, but they also cut and treated invasive Ligustrum plants with herbicide.
As you may know, fall is the time of the year ragweed starts to go to seed and allergies start to pick up. Every year, countless volunteers help Pease Park Conservancy by pulling up and/or chopping down ragweed during our large volunteer events. However, such events were not possible this year due to COVID19 restrictions.
We have passed halfway! The Kingsbury Commons Project is now 54% complete and we are starting to go vertical. Just over the past few weeks the project has really begun to take shape with the formation of the walls for the new restroom and storage building, and the formation of the treehouses skeleton. It is truly remarkable and exciting to think that in such a short time, all of Austin will get to enjoy these new amenities.
Making news again this summer is the blue-green algae blooms that have been found in Lady Bird Lake at Red Bud Isle, Vic Mathias Shores, and Festival Beach. While blue-green algae may not be entirely new to Austin, as it has been here in a limited way for some time, the widespread proliferation of it is a new phenomenon
In this episode, we hear from MuseWork and RECLAIM about the second theme in the Pease Park Interpretive Plan, which focuses specifically on the cultural history of Pease Park, including acknowledging that Governor Pease, who donated the initial tract of land for Pease Park in 1875, was an enslaver and that there were enslaved people who worked on the land that is now part of the park.
