Fort Worth is on track to finish a park. Mosier Valley residents have waited 10 years

Diana Medrano moved to Mosier Valley from Euless in October 2012, looking for a home for her growing family.

Mosier Valley was quiet, with little traffic, and plenty of agricultural land just south of Euless on the east side of Fort Worth. She learned about its history as a freedmen settlement, communities built by formerly enslaved people after the American Civil War. When her extended family visited they discovered the Mosier Valley cemetery where many former slaves are buried.

In 2014, she learned about a new park at the site of the former Mosier Valley School at 11220 Mosier Valley Road, which would focus on recreation and the history of Mosier Valley.

The city says it is on schedule to complete the park. But Medrano and others have become frustrated with the timeline considering the land was acquired 10 years ago.

“I am here to plead that the city stop kicking the can down the road and start constructing and finish what it should have done years ago,” Medrano said during a public comment meeting at City Hall on March 6. “My children should not have to be here tonight, instead they should be enjoying a completed park. So I leave you with this question: Is now finally the time for Mosier Valley?”

The history of Mosier Valley

Mosier Valley was founded in 1870 on the north bank of the Trinity River by Robert and Dilsie Johnson and 10 other emancipated slave families. They received 40 acres as a wedding gift from plantation owner Lucy Lee. Soon more African-American families arrived and built their own farming community.

The community grew cash crops like cotton and corn and held farm animals. Residents were handymen and nannies for residents in Hurst, Euless and Bedford.

Mosier Valley reached its peak in the early 20th century as the population grew to 300. A schoolhouse, Mosier Valley School, was established in 1924. In 1949, it became part of the Euless school district.

That year the Euless school superintendent decided to close the Mosier Valley School and wanted to bus students to Fort Worth. Mosier Valley parents opposed and, with the help of the NAACP, blocked the superintendent’s plan with an opinion from an federal judge that declared Mosier Valley students had the right to be educated and equally funded as their white counterparts in the district.

Segregation laws prevented Black students from integrating into Euless schools in 1950. In 1968, the Hurst-Euless-Bedford school district was integrated 10 years after it formed, and the Mosier Valley school was closed. The Texas Historical Commission placed a historical marker at the site.

Fort Worth annexed Mosier Valley in 1963, but residents did not receive street lights, garbage collection or water and sewer lines until the late 1990s.

What is happening today at Mosier Valley

Council member Gyna Bivens’ district includes Mosier Valley. She visited after she was elected in 2013 and saw a neglected community with weeds engulfing the park area. She collaborated with Tarrant County Commissioner Roy Brooks and the late Rev. Lloyd Austin of St. John Missionary Baptist Church to clean up the area. She also created a committee to give ideas for the development of a master plan.

In February 2014, the city acquired four acres of the old school site from the Hurst-Euless-Bedford school district to create Mosier Valley Park. In December 2017, it acquired an additional acre.

The master plan was posted in August 2015 and a public meeting was held for review and comment. The first phase, completed in May 2019, included a parking lot, walkways and construction of a concrete cap on the school’s foundation that will be used for a plaza.

In 2018, the city applied for, but did not receive a community development block grant for $500,000.

A 2022 bond package will allocate $750,000 to the park. The bond money is not available immediately because the city sells the bond funds over five years alongside other projects.

“I know that people are frustrated over what they deem as delay, but what I see is no action for decades,” Bivens said to the Star Telegram. “And so I don’t mind delays to get something right. I’m real concerned to make sure as best we can, that people who still live here have a voice and have some input.”

Confusion over public art project

Some residents said they wonder whether there will be public art at the park, as was planned years ago.

The Fort Worth Art Commission in 2017 recommended $80,000 for a public art project and the money was included in a 2022 plan. But the money was missing in 2023 and 2024.

Joel McElhany, Fort Worth’s assistant director of parks planning and resource management, said he misspoke when he said during a Feb. 17 public meeting that there were no funds available for public art.

Asked about his comments, McElhany referred the Star-Telegram to the Public Art Commission, which said funding has been postponed until it hears from the Park and Recreation Department.

“The moment someone stops looking, the funds go away,” said Medrano, the resident. “That’s unfortunate, that’s the impression they gave.”

At the site of the park, people are confused by a wall with three holes, Medrano said. Artwork commemorating the history of Mosier Valley and the school is planned for the space.

A 2017 placeholder sketch by the city’s design consultant shows an image of Ollie Park Sr. and his wife, the couple who donated the land for school, hanging on the wall along with a description of the art.

Timeline

The city has a history of being behind schedule for projects. In 2019, 71 of 185 projects in the 2014 bond project were unfinished. The reasons include weather delays, a limited amount of contractors and lengthy negotiations with utility companies and with property owners about acquiring land.

McElhany said the city is on schedule with the park. The second phase includes a pavilion, walking trail, activity court and security lights. Construction is expected to start in January. The Parks and Recreation Department will work with a consultant to expedite the process, if possible, and the city plans to finish the project within five years, he said.

“I can’t make a promise on that until we work with them and when we work through some options,” McElhany. “But yes, we are on schedule when we said we’re going to kick the project off.”

Benny Tucker has been the president of Mosier Valley Community Area Council, a neighborhood association, since 1993. He owns property and a business, Earth Haulers, in Mosier Valley but lives in east Fort Worth.

Tucker says he is frustrated because of the length of time it has taken the city to fulfill its promise since they bought the land in 2014.

Tucker says the majority of the descendants of Mosier Valley have moved away or died. The majority of residents today have no connection to the neighborhood, he said.

“The park and the cemetery will be the only two things remaining that could survive as a memorial for the former descendants, the former slaves, the former landowners that made Mosier Valley what it is,” Tucker said.