NEW RUNWAY EXPANSION WILL MEAN ADIOS SUNNY SKIES

By Juan Montoya

For decades now, city officials, planners, and economic developers have lobbied the Federal Aviation Administration to lengthen the main runway at the Brownsville-South Padre Island international Airport on the city's southeast side.

And for years, plans have been drawn up to accommodate larger planes, service anticipated SpaceX freight loads, and compete with the Valley Regional Airport in Harlingen. A Capital Improvements Projects projection by the city's financial consultants shows that lengthening the runway will cost at least $83 million, the majority of that ($74.7 million) is expected to be acquired through grants.

But before a runway can be built, the city must clear residences and housing developments that are on the approach lane of the runway. And smack in the middle of that approach is a former colonia called Sunny Skies. Recently, letters from a land appraisal company has arrived to the panic of colonia residents.

(In the Google photo at right, Sunny Skies is the development in the extreme lower right-hand corner on South Indiana Avenue. Click to enlarge.)

Sunny Skies was illegally established in the early 1980s. The developer – an administrator at the local Social Security Office – formed the irregular lots himself and not one was in compliance with state or county regulations for water, sewer, paved roads and other services.

When the county and state stepped in and halted his business, the developer (who was not the owner) declared bankruptcy, there were several liens, property taxes were owed, and titles to the properties were clouded, officials found.

At that time Frank Bejarano was the director of the Cameron County Planning and Management county planner and it was up to him with the help of contract lawyers and state officials to take on the role of developer to untangle the legal nightmare. They formed a non-profit corporation to clear liens, foreclose on the original developer, secure street easements, and convert contracts for deed to warranty deeds.

Even then, officials found that the colonia, which had one water spigot at its entrance which served the 250 or so residents for more than 15 years, would require a lot more work to bring it into compliance with the various county, state and federal departments involved in its legalization. After another five years of work by Cameron County, community leaders, the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs, Texas Rural Legal Aid and the Sunny Skies Land Corp., the colonia was finally finished.

Before that happened, the lone spigot by S. Indiana had been shut off at least once by El Jardin Water Supply manager B.C. Price who complained that the residents had extended the line to the end of the road in the interior of the colonia without permission. He only relented and hooked it up again after residents removed the clandestine piping and promised not to do it again.

At the end of the process El Jardin eventually extended its lines into the colonia, and the Brownsville Public Utility Board provided sanitary sewer along the half-mile or so right-of-way of the cul-de-sac.


In fact, the last lot was sold to a local resident less than five years ago. No one can estimate the cost over those two decades or more of work, but millions have been spent on that project.

Now, with the coming expansion of the airport runway, the city must now spend another chunk of money settling with the the residents of the 41 properties and negotiate their departure.

It is a bittersweet event for those who worked on Sunny Skies – including former commissioners Lucino Rosenbaum, the late Pete Benavides and current commissioner Sofia Benavides – to see the fruit of their labors be abandoned and the colonia (now a legal subdivision) be vacated.

"It depends on whether you want to improve the airport and the local economy, or you want to keep the airport runway at its current size and limit its potential," a city official said. "In the long run, Brownsville needs to improve its airport and capacity to handle bigger planes to encourage development. It's something we think needs to be done."