Focus on the Border Fence: UT Brownsville Holds Back Border Fence

August 15, 2008 · At the Ft. Brown Golf Course the “Little T” summer golf program is in full swing.

On this summer’s morning the student golfers, who about 11-years old, are testing their putting skills. They line up their shots and imagine being the next Tiger Woods.

The practice putting green less than 50 yards from where a Department of Homeland Security had planned to build its steel 18-foot high border fence.

The golf course is part of the University of Texas at Brownsville campus and according to the Homeland Security’s plan the entire course would have been on the Mexican side of the border fence.

Along with the historic remains of the Ft. Brown battlefield – the golf course would be severed from the campus.

Adrian Garcia is one of the part-time golf coaches working with the children. He speaks excitedly about the border fence and what it means for the future of the golf course.

“People don’t understand – if the fence went up we’d have to close – period. Who is going to insure us?  Because of the gate.  They were going to lock it up,” said Garcia.

But now Garcia doesn’t have to worry. Recently UT and Homeland Security reached a court ordered agreement.

UT-Brownsville President Juliet Garcia explained the deal to a cheering and jubilant crowd at press conference following a federal hearing where the deal was tentatively approved.

“DHS will not build a fence on the university campus. The second part of that agreement is that they will not condemn or seek to condemn any of the university’s property,” Garcia said.

Instead of having to deal with the federal government’s fence, the university will upgrade an existing fence on the campus.

That fence, which is left over from when the university acquired the land from the Department of Agriculture varies in height from 6 to 8 feet.

Under the agreement it will be raised to a standard height of 10 feet. Homeland Security will equip the fence with cameras and other security technology.

“But it can be a very friendly fence. I kind of see it with bougainvillea and vines climbing all over it,” said Garcia.

The fence might become friendly but it wasn’t a friendly process to achieve this agreement.

Michael Putegnat, the university’s chief negotiator, said many people told him that school had zero chance of stopping Homeland Security.

“Because after all we’re just a little university in a far away corner of Texas and the United States government is that big operation that you’ve noticed in the dismal swamp near Virginia,” said Putegant.

It was congress with the Secure Fence Act that ordered 670 miles of fencing along the Mexican border by the end of this year. And Brownsville was targeted as a high-priority area for fence construction.

Putegnat said at first the Department of Homeland Security refused to even negotiate with UTB.

“They believed they had the only answer which was an 18-foot fence and so once they arrived there they didn’t see the point of considering it any further,” he said.

But the University refused to cooperate with the Homeland Security. In October, the school denied a request to survey the campus.

“We couldn’t have this appearance of a Berlin Wall going through our campus – it was against our principals – what we were conveying when we were dealing with the world and what our students thought,” Putegnat said.

In January Homeland Security sued UTB for access to the campus. That brought in U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen – who ordered both sides to compromise. They ended with a deal that looks like a victory for the university. Other border institutions facing their own DHS border fence problems noticed.

Putegnat says it’s wasn’t a coincidence that just days after UTB announced it’s deal with Homeland Security that the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission rejected a federal border fence plan on state parkland.