Big, bold, and fast growing, San Antonio is a major economic driver in the Hill Country region. Mayor Ron Nirenberg shares his thoughts on the city’s inherent strengths and future opportunities.
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Story by Pamela Price
With the U.S Census Bureau reporting in late May that San Antonio is projected to become the 6th largest city in the United States, 2019 seems like a good time for our readers to consider the Alamo City’s broader impact upon the Hill Country region.
Luckily, San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg agreed recently to take a few minutes out of his busy day to explore some of the issues of concern to our readers. A native Texan, summa cum laude graduate of Trinity University, and a former two-term city councilmember for District 8 on the city’s northside, Nirenberg became the Mayor of San Antonio on June 21, 2017. Given that he’s now in the midst in a hotly contested mayoral run-off campaign slated for Saturday, June 8 (early voting began May 28 and runs through June 4), we were especially grateful that he was willing to chat via telephone.
Editor’s Note: This conversation has been edited carefully for brevity and clarity.
TW: Can you tell us about your perspective on San Antonio as a driver in the regional economy?
Mayor Nirenberg: The country is taking notice of the growth that’s occurring on the IH-35 corridor. Austin and San Antonio now form one of the major megalopolis regions and that brings an incredible amount of economic strength to Texas. San Antonio’s steady, stable economy was built on the foundations of the military and hospitality industry. Over time our economy has diversified thanks to new industries—technology, cybersecurity, biosciences, biomedical engineering, and advanced manufacturing as well as professional services, like financial services, banking.
From our growth strategy, I think San Antonio has stood out as a very forward-thinking community, especially as a new urban environment and in how it cares for our environmental assets and the Hill Country. I’m talking here specifically about the progressive efforts led by environmentally conscience public servants on things like aquifer protection and land use planning, with the latter being somewhat of a more recent phenomenon.
TW: Yes, we collectively seem to grasp easily that the aquifer is important, but protecting the land, too? That’s a little harder for people to grasp even though they’re interconnected.
Mayor Nirenberg: They’re all the same roots of the same tree. Protecting them both optimally has been an entry point for a lot of the new solutions we’ve arrived at lately. San Antonio was settled centuries ago specifically because of the availability of water and so our community has, for hundreds of years, had a very high water IQ. That’s allowed us to think more progressively about what we’re doing now.
TW: What about the Alamo City’s cultural assets—from the historic missions to performing arts spaces, what role do they play in the San Antonio’s economy?
Mayor Nirenberg: We have a very unique cultural identity, and the the arts and cultural community has been part and parcel of our competitive advantage an urban economy. So we have to continue to make great efforts to make sure that arts and cultural assets are protected as our city grows.
TW: We had a chance recently to visit San Antonio’s Southside and were amazed at what has been done along the Mission Reach, right down to the new VIA bus options that connect the area to downtown. It’s obvious that there’s been some boldness, some intentionality.
Mayor Nirenberg: It’s exciting to see it, but it’s challenging work, too. As we plan, we have to balance our development strategy with historic preservation issues. And those are often difficult conversations.
TW: We’ve touched upon cultural assets, water and land protections—those are all important. Can we talk about green spaces and your work with them over the years?
Mayor Nirenberg: Yes, I’ve been interested in the protection of green spaces and water conservation and environmental protections since my work in public service began. I would point specifically to my work to create a public-private sector coalition to save the Bracken bat cave. The Bracken cave project involved habitat protection and land use issues plus aquifer protection. We accomplished a number of significant goals in an area that is, as you know, difficult to manage given the competing jurisdictions.
[For readers unfamiliar with the Bracken bat cave project, then-Councilman Nirenberg successfully forged a deal to protect the world’s largest colony of Mexican-freetail bats from a proposed 4,500-unit Comal County housing development in the mammals’ flight path on the Edwards Aquifer Recharge Zone. Thanks to his efforts, a number of communities and entities came together in 2017, eventually securing $20.5 million to purchase a 1,521-acre tract of Hill Country land now managed by the Nature Conservancy.]
I’m also a champion for the city’s Edwards Aquifer Protection and Linear Creekway Parks Program, which has achieved its highest levels of voter approval. With those efforts, we can continue to preserve waterways and create conservation easements that are the foundation of long-term water security in San Antonio and allocate trails that form a basis for mobility but also achieve land use goals and opportunities for recreation.
TW: Yes, we tend to think of trails as only about building spaces for recreation, but it’s more complicated than that.
Mayor Nirenberg: Yes, and I think, going forward, we obviously want to continue our efforts to protect the aquifer and coordinate our land use strategy. We also want to accelerate the growth of the city’s greenway trail system. People are now recognizing it as an opportunity to move around, not just recreate. It’s also critically important that we provide that opportunity equitably across town and not just in certain areas.
TW: Absolutely. Now, as we wrap up, let’s change gears for a moment and talk about Father’s Day, which is coming up fast. What’s your favorite way to mark the holiday?
Mayor Nirenberg: My son, Jonah, and my brother, Mark, have birthdays only two days apart that typically fall near the holiday. So, my favorite part of Father’s Day is having the Nirenberg men celebrate together. We barbecue and just hang out. It’s a kind of time that we don’t get enough of, but it’s very treasured, that party for all of us.
TW: Thank you, sir, and enjoy your summer!
Reader, do you live in San Antonio? If so, don’t forget to vote in the June 8th mayoral race! Find your polling location here.
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