Developer buying Fairfield Lake State Park may plan to sell water to DFW, says TX official

The private developer purchasing Fairfield Lake State Park and the surrounding land plans not only to develop the property into a gated community of multimillion dollar homes, but also to sell water from the lake to the parched Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex.

At a Monday hearing of a subcommittee of the state House Appropriations Committee, a Texas Parks and Wildlife official raised alarms about the impact that could have on the lake, warning that the water level could drop significantly.

“When that happens, with my modeling, this lake is no longer the lake as we knew it,” said Parks and Wildlife Commission chair Arch “Beaver” Aplin III.

At the same hearing, lawmakers also pushed Parks and Wildlife officials to explain why the department didn’t act sooner to save Fairfield Lake State Park. And a representative of the developer flamed those officials for the way they’ve handled the negotiation process.

“I think the issue is we have negotiated in good faith, earnestly, and the favor wasn’t returned,” said Blake Beckham, an attorney for developer Todd Interests.

The 1,800-acre park in Freestone County, partway between Houston and the Metroplex, has been open to the public for nearly 50 years. But the state has never owned the land. Instead, the state leases the park property from the power company Vistra Corp., which is selling a total of 5,000 acres including the park and lake.

Private developer Todd Interests, based in Dallas and run by Shawn Todd, plans to transform that property into a high-end neighborhood. Vistra notified the state in February that the park lease was being terminated. The park officially closes to the public on Tuesday.

The fight is moving to the state legislature as advocates call on lawmakers to do what they can to keep the park open.

“We want to expand the system,” said Luke Metzger, the executive director of Environment Texas, an advocacy group. “We can’t allow it to contract.”

He was among about eight people, including a lawmaker and Texans with ties to Fairfield, gathered inside the state Capitol on Tuesday to oppose the park’s closure. They held signs calling for the park to be saved.

“You’re paving paradise to put up a parking lot,” read one sign made by Corrine Wilder, who grew up on the park when her father served as superintendent.

State lawmakers and residents have balked at the loss of a state park, especially in the centennial year of Texas’ state park system. While Parks and Wildlife officials say they’re now prepared to purchase the property, that would require Todd Interests to step back from its under-contract deal. Some lawmakers have said the state should’ve moved to buy the land sooner, in order to avoid this scenario.

The situation has set off a fierce debate about property rights and public access to the outdoors, particularly after state Rep. Angelia Orr filed a bill seeking to use eminent domain to obtain the park land.

And in a state as water-starved as Texas, adding water rights to the conversation ups the ante yet again.

Water rights

Todd Interests’ plans for the property are not public, and owner Shawn Todd has mostly stayed of the public eye during the park saga.

But some details have trickled out from state lawmakers and officials.

Aplin, the Parks and Wildlife Commission chairman, said during Monday’s hearing that the developer had shared during conversations his plans to modify the water rights on Fairfield Lake and sell water to the Metroplex.

North Texas faces a growing need for water. The region is projected to see a water shortage of 423 billion gallons per year by 2070. Currently, the water in Fairfield Lake — which is a reservoir that was constructed in the 1960s and used to cool Vistra’s former power plant — cannot be piped off property and sold.

But at Monday’s hearing, a Texas Commission on Environmental Quality official, Kim Nygren, testified that current landowner Vistra has filed for an amendment to the water rights. That amendment would still only allow the landowner to use the water within Freestone County. However, that amendment would set the stage for a fairly straightforward additional amendment that would allow the owner to pipe the water out of the county, Nygren said.

Aplin said that Todd indicated to him that that is exactly his plan, to sell the currently authorized 14,000 acre-feet to the parched Metroplex. And, according to Aplin, taking that much water out of the lake would have “devastating effects” on the reservoir.

“The agency’s model says that it reduces the acreage from 2,047 acres of water to 1,200 acres of water. The modeling says it changes the shoreline from 26.8 miles of shoreline to 12.5 miles of shoreline,” Aplin said. “Our modeling says it’s not the lake that we see now.”

Beckham, the attorney and Todd Interests’ representative at the hearing, declined to confirm or deny the developer’s plans with the lake water or with the property as a whole. Those plans are private, he said.

“I’m sure the people buying lots don’t want to have an empty lake in front of their house,” Beckham said at the hearing. “Nobody at Todd Interests is stupid. We’re gonna be good stewards, we’re gonna be conservationists. But our ultimate plans are, number one, undetermined at this time, and they’re confidential.”

Negotiations

While Beckham wouldn’t talk about Todd Interests’ plans for the park property, he did criticize Parks and Wildlife officials’ handling of the negotiations.

He said first that the state had ample opportunity to buy the property from Vistra before Todd Interests even stepped on the scene. State lawmakers have also raised this concern, the Star-Telegram previously reported, and asked why Parks and Wildlife didn’t buy the property when Vistra first started talking about selling in 2018. (Parks and Wildlife officials have said the department didn’t have enough funding at the time.)

Once Todd Interests entered a contract for the property, Parks and Wildlife officials had conversations with the developer about potentially stepping away from the property and letting the state step in.

Beckham told lawmakers that those negotiations were “difficult” and “haphazard.” He also accused Aplin specifically of demanding that Todd Interests walk away from its deal.

“We were told to walk away from our contract rights,” Beckham said. “That’s not supposed to happen in Texas.”

Aplin pushed back on that, saying that he was making an ask, not a demand.

Both Beckham and Aplin said Todd Interests made offers to sell portions of the property to the state, but Aplin said those offers were unreasonable. Aplin described one offer from Todd Interests where the state would pay $50 million and give the developer 250 acres, in exchange for the developer walking away from the deal.

The negotiations between Todd Interests and Parks and Wildlife officials have ended, Aplin said. And by the time of the hearing, it wasn’t clear if Todd Interests would be open to restarting any type of talks.

Rep. Dustin Burrows, a Republican from Lubbock, questioned Beckham on this. “Your door is closed, is that what you’re telling us?”

“Yes,” Beckham answered. But a moment later, he added to his answer. “Shawn Todd and Todd Interests has great respect for the governor and for the state, and if there needs to be further talks, we will show up.”

Burrows accused Beckham of saying two different things.

“No, I told you the same thing,” Beckham replied. “If somebody wants to talk to us, we’ll talk.”

Burrows pushed Beckham again, asking if it would be a waste of time to have that conversation at this point. Beckham repeated that the developer would sit down the governor or other state leaders.

“Okay, so the door’s still open to buying y’all’s interest,” Burrows said.

“I’ve said what I need to say,” Beckham replied.

For now, Fairfield Lake State Park is closing to the public. State lawmakers said at the hearing that they’re still hopeful that something can be done to return it to a publicly accessible space.