A Dec. 20, 2018 meeting of environmentalists with representatives of U.S. Border Patrol to discuss the November wholesale defoliation of 16 acres of river vega east of the Juarez-Lincoln Bridge, yielded little in the agency’s willingness to re-vegetate the sandy tract that in a heavy rainfall could erode into the Río Grande, the only source of drinking water for millions of Texans and Mexicans.
According to the World Wildlife Fund, the Lower Río Grande is one of the 10 most endangered rivers in the world along with the Salween River (China), La Plata (Argentina), the Danube (Germany, Austria, Hungary), the Ganges (India, Bangladesh), the Murray-Darling (Australia), the Indus (China, India, Pakistan), the Nile (northeastern Africa), the Yangtze (China), and the Mekong (southeast Asia.)
The meeting, which was held at the office of City Council member George Altgelt, included members of the Río Grande International Study Center (RGISC) and Monte Mucho Audubon Society (MMAS), and John Porter, director of the City’s Environmental Services Department.
The Dec. 20 meeting was a mirror image opposite of an April 26 meeting at City Hall with the same environmentalists and then-interim BP Chief Jason Owens and top Laredo assistant chiefs and agents.
At that time, Owens – in response to RGISC and MMAS concerns over the destruction of the ecologically rich vega along Las Palmas Nature Trail, Father McNaboe Park, and the Hachar Tract in South Laredo — abated those concerns by saying that a mutually beneficial partnership between the agency and the environmentalists could be forged, a relationship that called for discussion before allowing bulldozers to clear the river bank of Carrizo cane.
“We walked away from the April meeting believing that we had commitments that would be honored. We took USBP at its word — that any such de-vegetation actions along the river vega would involve dialogue with us,” said Tricia Cortez, executive director of RGISC.
“We told them we understood that USBP needed to carry out its important mission to protect the border, but we wanted them to understand that it could be done without the wholesale destruction of critical — and valuable — wildlife and avian habitat,” she continued.
“And they told us they could go back to the scientifically sound methods of Dr. John Goolsby of USDA-Weslaco to minimize the Carrizo cane’s biomass via biological agents and mechanical topping with specially fitted tractors,” Cortez said, adding, “That method has worked in the past, and has been peer-reviewed by scientists, but in November they chose an easier path for the short term that will have grave consequences for the land they cleared by bulldozer.”
Cortez expressed the lack of trust that now exists between USBP and stewards of the environment.
From the look of the denuded riverfront bordering Las Palmas Nature Trail, the newly minted interim Laredo sector chief, Felix Chavez, didn’t get the message from Chief Owens. And judging from what Chavez telegraphed to the Dec. 20 meeting via BP agents Nicolas Martinez and Servando Iruegas, Chavez’s priorities were to establish a line of sight that removed every blade of grass (not just the Carrizo cane) and all but a handful of native trees on the 16 acres, to level the land and destroy the natural course rainfall travels to the river, and to leave a wall of invasive, water-guzzling trash trees (salt cedar) next to Las Palmas Nature Trail.
The leveling of the land that abuts Las Palmas Trail, which sits on a bed of fine river silt, has turned it into a swamp that is now impassable for birders and nature enthusiasts — a terrible surprise for out-of-town birders who will visit the park during the upcoming Laredo Birding Festival in February. The standing water in the park has the potential (if not already a reality) to become breeding grounds for mosquitoes that carry Dengue and Zika viruses.
In a heavy rainfall, water will find its course to the river and may take with it tons of silt no longer held in place by grass and trees.
Agent Iruegas said that the November clearing of the vega had been necessitated by an alien smuggling operation in the Azteca neighborhood and their communication from their rooftops above Water Street to signal drug carriers on the Mexican riverbanks. The cover of the Carrizo and the lack of visibility of illegal activity, especially at night, he said, made for dangerous circumstances for Border Patrol agents in a high apprehension area for the smuggling of people and drugs.
Agent Iruegas said more than once that USBP would not re-vegetate the area and did not have the funds to do so, a cost estimated to range from $65,000 to $80,000. He suggested the City pick up the tab.
That decision, however, does not rest with Agent Iruegas. Assistant Chief Charlie Arsuaga, who oversaw the no-blade-left-behind environmental assault, did not attend the December 20 meeting.
Las Palmas Nature Trail
According to Cortez, Las Palmas is one of the most unique natural areas left in Laredo — a small, contained, and richly diverse eco-system that hugs the banks of the river and starts underneath International Bridge II and ends a mile downstream at the mouth of Zacate Creek.
“The trail itself is only three-quarters of a mile, and one extraordinary part of it is a large old-growth grove of Washingtonia palms,” she said.
The area is known for sightings of never-before-seen birds in the continental United States, such as the Amazon Kingfisher and the rarely spotted Blue Bunting. Cortez said such sightings have brought thousands of visitors to the Las Palmas Trail, which she said is one of Laredo’s most important eco-tourism sites.
Cortez said that local environmentalists have hopes that Las Palmas Nature Trail will be designated as Laredo’s first Bird Sanctuary with a City commitment to develop and maintain it with the assistance of RGISC and MMAS. “We want Border Patrol to become a fully vested partner in this endeavor,” she said.
The nature trail is also home to several threatened species of mussels, as documented in the research of biologist Tom Miller of the Lamar Bruni Vergara Environmental Science Center and an international group of scientists from other countries. The mussels include the Mexican Fawnsfoot (Truncilla cognata) and the newly federally listed endangered Texas Hornshell (Popenaias popeii).
The geology of Las Palmas Nature Trail features a stunning 40-million-year-old Eocene era sandstone bluff and a lush tree canopy that lends an other-worldly tropical feel to one of the city’s most accessible environmental treasures.
According to Cortez, the relationship between USBP and environmentalists has followed a ‘frustrating pattern.”
She said, “We discover the destruction of a unique ecological area, call a meeting with USBP, do a scout with USBP, receive verbal reassurances from USBP that practices will be modified, and soon thereafter witness another USBP environmental assault of that same area. This is unacceptable on a river that is so fragile and for whom it is the only source of drinking water on this border.”
According to Cortez, the constant encroachment into so small and ecologically sensitive an area has begun to degrade the Laredo landmark.
“This kind of degradation will also have negative consequences for the avian, terrestrial, and aquatic wildlife that this riparian habitat supports. Las Palmas Nature Trail is an ecological resource unique to the region and especially to the city,” Cortez said.
The RGISC director said the stripping of the river vega adjacent to Las Palmas represents “a case-study of the tensions between federal and local interests. In no way does this imply that one trumps another. Simply, it is clear that more collaboration is needed to ensure that both the City’s goals to protect this area from further destruction and collapse into the river itself, and the USBP’s goals to address security risks, are met.”
She continued, “These are not mutually-exclusive, and the City’s desire to preserve this treasure for present and future generations should prevail.”
Cortez said it is RGISC’s goal to see a City commitment to protect carefully identified stretches of the river that include but are not limited to the Hachar riverfront tract in South Laredo, España Park, Las Palmas Nature Trail, land near the international rail bridge leading upstream to the Jefferson Street Water Plant, and Father McNaboe Park, among others.
