𝗔𝗦 𝗚𝗢𝗪𝗘𝗡 𝗟𝗘𝗔𝗩𝗘𝗦 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗖𝗜𝗧𝗬 𝗖𝗢𝗠𝗠𝗜𝗦𝗦𝗜𝗢𝗡, 𝗚𝗢𝗜𝗡𝗚 𝗕𝗔𝗖𝗞 𝗧𝗢 𝗕𝗖𝗜𝗖, 𝗛𝗘𝗥 𝗟𝗘𝗚𝗔𝗖𝗬 𝗢𝗙 𝗕𝗜𝗞𝗘 𝗧𝗥𝗔𝗜𝗟𝗦 𝗔𝗡𝗗 𝗖𝗬𝗖𝗟𝗢𝗕𝗜𝗔 𝗜𝗦 𝗪𝗘𝗟𝗟 𝗘𝗦𝗧𝗔𝗕𝗟𝗜𝗦𝗛𝗘𝗗

           

    

As City Commissioner Rose Gowen leaves the city commission, we've thought about her legacy, the city's bike trails.  No, most Brownsvillians don't ride bikes in the 95F heat, but the trails are an amenity, mostly used by mothers and their kids to go to a neighbor's house or to grandma's.  

It's been over ten years since Gowen's original term on the Brownsville Community Improvement Corporation(BCIC) expired 1/31, 2014, but, according a contributed article in El Rrun Rrun, she's back as board chairman, a role giving her oversight of $5M+ in "quality of life" funds from sales tax revenue.  

Gowen, a bicycle visionary, who's primarily responsible for Brownsville's hike & bike trails, pitched the idea that bicycle tourism would be an economic driver for our town, telling us years ago that bicycle tourists "have an annual income of $190,000, no $200,000 and an average of at least two advanced degrees," in other words enriching Brownsville not only economically, but also intellectually.  

           

Bicycle tourism just never developed as promised, despite the city renting a spot inside the Harlingen airport for $7,000 annually proclaiming our town the "Bicycle Capital of the Rio Grande Valley."  Even the claim that "1,000 riders per day" used the Battlefield Hike & Bike Trail was simply an untruth told in applying for a grant to extend the trail through downtown.

During the tussle involving reducing one of the  town's east/west arteries, E. 6th Street, from three lanes to two, to make way for a bike lane, some of our readers referred to Gowen as "rude," "arrogant" 

and "drunk with power," their words, not ours.

When a citizen, Jaime Parra, respectfully told Gowen he didn't think the E. 6th Street project was a good idea, she responded:  "You can vote for whomever you want next time. . . . but you know who I came from and if you have any remaining respect for my father I would ask that you give me the respect of listening to what I have to say."

A project I personally opposed, that was promoted by both Gowen and then Mayor Tony Martinez, was selling the city's Lincoln Park to the University of Texas system for $6M, likely to use the monies to enhance the bike trails.  Losing a beautiful green area in he city for buildings on a UT satellite campus made zero sense, especially with raw land available adjacent to the park.(Gowen must have been embarrassed a little when it was revealed that, as an employee of the UT system, she had a clear conflict of interest.)

                      

A Fort Worth Bicycle Seminar(The taxpayers paid $1400 per person, including $56 meals per diem for the two day trip to learn more about cycling)

Gowen also should be credited with establishing the annual downtown cycling event, CycloBia, an idea picked up by city officials on a very expensive junket to Bogota, Colombia.  Travel alone, at least 16 trips, cost taxpayers $312,541, but that was just the tip of the iceberg.  The city also rented and staffed an office in Bogota for a couple years.

Clearly, our city's bike trails and the annual downtown cycling event are part of Rose Gowen's legacy, but at considerable cost to the city's taxpayers.