(KINGSVILLE, May 15, 1996) -- Economic, social, educational, environmental and health issues affecting the future of South Texas well into the next century were debated at a meeting of regional leaders here Monday. The group also sought to identify obstacles to resolving those issues and pinpointing the resources needed for overcoming them.
Texas A&M University-Kingsville hosted an organizational meeting of its newly formed Community Development Advisory Team which drew leaders from Hebbronville, Alice, Falfurrias and Kingsville. Plans are to expand the group and to involve even more communities, said Texas A&M-Kingsville President Manuel L. Ibaņez, who called the meeting.
"The university's mission is to create a middle class for South Texas," Ibaņez told the group. "You can help us do it by identifying the issues we need to tackle and working with us in finding the resources to address them."
Formation of similar teams at each of the Texas A&M University System's 18 campuses and agencies is part of a system-wide effort to build partnerships and increase community involvement, explained Daniel Hernandez, Director of Community Development for TAMUS in College Station. Members of those teams will meet via interactive video June 6 for a briefing by TAMUS System Chancellor Barry Thompson and to discuss mutual interests, issues and goals. The TAMUK group will meet in the university's interactive video facility in Jernigan Library.
Hernandez, pointing out that Monday's meeting brought together representatives of such diverse sectors as the ministry and the military and county government executives to oil company officials, said the goal is "to bring together these differing entities into a common structure for cooperation.
"We are talking about the future of this region, the state and our nation. The system and A&M-Kingsville want to be part of the new Texas, with all that implies," he said.
Among the regional concerns the group identified were protection and utilization of the area's natural resources with the competing needs that raises; health, communications and transportation problems posed by a largely rural, sparsely populated environment; the breakdown of the family unit and an increase in crime; and lack of life skills by some to become productive citizens.
Among the obstacles in the way of resolving these and other issues were a failure to make the region's assets better known, fear of change and lack of a sense of urgency about identifying and addressing problems.
Cited as regional assets which could be harnessed to solve some of the area's problems were ample room for a growing population, higher educational opportunities such as those offered by A&M-Kingsville and the potential offered by a growing tourism industry.
The Texas A&M-Kingsville group will meet again in late June or early July, Ibaņez said, to work on short-term and long-term goals and to delineate community projects team members would like expanded and to explore how TAMUK can partner with them in doing it.
-TAMUK-
-Mary Daniel