Ian Juarez PORT ISABEL – The Bejerano McFarland Park in Port Isabel is receiving a major facelift this year.
Cameron County has been recently upgrading many parks in the county such as the Olmito Nature Park and Santa Maria Park.
Just last year, La Esperanza Park in Brownsville completed its own changes, including a splash pad, butterfly garden and soccer field.
“Most importantly in Bejarano-McFarland Park, to provide the children of this community an opportunity to be able to come here and enjoy the park,” said David A. Garza Precinct Three Cameron County Commissioner.
Garza said how he hopes the changes to Bejerano McFarland Park will make it a local staple.
“Making it an all inclusive park, which means that children of all abilities or adults for that matter, can come and recreate here at the park,” Garza said “There’s probably close to 3,000 people that live in this colonia, and we thought that we needed to provide something here for folks to be able to enjoy.”
Garza said the seven-million-dollar overhaul budget was obtained through Texas Parks and Wildlife and will not affect locals financially.
“We don’t use local tax dollars directly for the parks. It’s done through the park system. Like I said, that is an enterprise fund that is fully funded by visitors to the area. So, all now an economic benefit for this community,” Garza stated. “We hope as more people start visiting
this park, they’ll stop in some of the businesses that are along highway 100 and be able to contribute to the economic vitality of the businesses.” Cameron County shared a draft of the upcoming changes coming to Benito McFarland Park including solar lighting, a covered basketball court, splash pad and improved trail.
These changes are part of phase one for the park overhaul.
Garza said phase two will contain things like a nature scape, a kayak launching area and an outdoor classroom.
Joe Vega, Cameron County Parks director, praised Laguna Madre Bay for its natural resources and said the park wants to improve the quality of life for the nearby residents.
Garza shares a similar sentiment on the importance of the park to its residents.
“There’s kids that live in these homes that you know they need, they don’t have a front yard, they don’t have a backyard,” Garza said. “They, you know, they just come after school and they’re home and, you know, in a small piece of a trailer house and, you know, we don’t want them on the street. We want them to be here till 9:00 at night with lights and feel safe and secure with their parents. Yeah, so that’s what it’s all about.”
According to Vega, the park has been improving since 2002, starting out with just a wooden playground.
“This playground here is an existing playground, but we added a couple of, inclusive features to this playground for people with for kids with disabilities,” Vega said.
Construction for Benito McFarland Park is set to be completed sometime this March.
