Jokl: River Walk-type project planned for Downtown Brownsville

BROWNSVILLE, Texas - On Friday, Aug. 1, the City of Brownsville and their outside consultants, Freese and Nichols, hosted a community information session about their new Downtown Renaissance Master Plan.Longtime Brownsville-based realtor Larry Jokl was sitting in the audience. At the end of the presentation Jokl got up and walked to the podium. After being given the microphone, he said he could not understand why the city planners and outside consultants had not discussed the planned Renaissance Park.“We have not heard one word about what could become the largest single project in Downtown Brownsville, and that is the Renaissance Park. Nothing has been said yet,” Jokl said. He proceeded to explain the project.“This project is a collaborative effort between the city and the county. They're going to put together an inter-local agreement, which will be managed by a TIRZ board. That organization will administer what is going to become what we hope will be the largest single project you will see downtown.”TIRZ stands for Tax Increment Reinvestment Zone.“It (the interlock agreement) is going to come, hopefully, into fruition here in the next couple of weeks,” Jokl said. Jokl asked if Brownsville Mayor John Cowen, Jr., was in the audience. Cowen had earlier spoken about the Downtown Renaissance Master Plan. Cowen was still at the event. Jokl proceeded to ask Cowen to nod his head if what he was saying was correct. Mayor Cowen nodded his head.“He (Cowen) is going to meet with the judge,” Jokl said, referring to Cameron County Judge Eddie Treviño. “This is something that… I'm not going into the particulars, other than it will put downtown Brownsville, all of it, on the map for years to come.”Jokl continued: “The project could consist totally of about $500 million, which would be the largest thing that this city has seen in a long time downtown. So I'm very hopeful that I'm going to meet with some of these people, we're going to bring the developer and the stakeholders back into this.”Jokl said he could not go into great detail about the project at this stage.“It’s all still being worked on at this moment. But we want to begin to hear an awful lot about what's going to happen with this project and Downtown Brownsville.” Jokl said. “It's going to help all of the owners of properties in the area. There will be all kinds of new and additional developments, which will take place over the next few years. You’re going to have a riverfront that is going to be totally different.”Jokl added: “They're going to remove a lot of the area between St. Francis and the old bridge. It's going to be something similar to a River Walk. And if this gets started here soon, Matamoros wants to do the same thing. So, hopefully, everybody will begin to hear about it. I wanted to get in front of you because I heard absolutely nothing about it at this meeting.”Editor's Note: Here is an audio recording of Jokl's remarks at the City of Brownsville event. Go to www.riograndeguardian.com to read the latest border news stories and watch the latest news videos.