Lake and river adventurers have a new spot for equipment, apparel, and rentals. Opening in March, WaterTied at 706 Second St. in Marble Falls is geared toward paddling, fishing, sailing, and other aquatic pursuits.

The family-run operation promotes the “power of water.”

“Life is so connected to technology and comes with its own complications and stressors,” shop owner Ali Bosch told DailyTrib.com. “This is just a way for people to disconnect from that, connect with (water), and benefit from those powers.”

One side of the store will be dedicated to merchandise (starting in March), the other to kayak and paddleboard rentals (starting in April).

“We’ll be carrying gear and accessories that are really functional, fun, and fashion-forward and all water-related,” Bosch said. “We’ll have something for everyone in the family: kids, adults, even the dogs.”

The store’s name describes its mission.

“The idea … is we’re tied to the water in the activities we choose, which also ties us to each other,” said Bosch, who runs WaterTied with her children.

She hopes her new business makes a positive impact on the Highland Lakes community.

“The intention isn’t just about doing activities by the water, but also connecting with the community to give back to society by taking those activities and providing service to those around us that could benefit from it,” Bosch said.

She plans to reach out to local nonprofits to facilitate those partnerships.

“We want to get involved with organizations whose values align with ours so we can also provide (activities) to people that might not necessarily have that ability,” Bosch said. “People going through crisis can really benefit from having that type of experience.”

WaterTied-hosted programs are also in the works.

“We’re going to provide programs like guided paddles, lessons on how to properly kayak and paddleboard, fishing lessons, and a boating safety course,” Bosch said.

Patrons, nonprofits, and jobseekers may contact customerservice@watertied.com or 830-253-5117 for more information.

nathan@thepicayune.com

Two Republican candidates for the Texas House District 53 seat introduced themselves to Llano County voters on Thursday, Feb. 8, during an informal meet-and-greet at the Kingsland Branch Library. Hatch Smith and Wes Virdell gave brief introductions, shared their concerns for the district, and talked about their positions on key issues, such as the region’s water supply and proper representation at the state level. 

The event was hosted by the Kingsland Chamber of Commerce.

“The Kingsland Chamber feels that it is important to offer our residents a forum in which both sides have a chance to speak and represent and let us know about the issues they care about,” Chamber Marketing Director Terri Schexnayder told DailyTrib.com before the event.

Smith and Virdell were together at the same political event in Llano County for the first time since campaigning began in January.

They’re vying for their party’s nomination in the March 5 primary to run in the November general election. District 53 includes 16 counties and around 200,000 residents. Of those, 22,000 live in Llano County.

Virdell spoke first after winning a coin flip.

The Brady native talked about his idyllic upbringing in McCulloch County, his service in the U.S. Air Force as an intercontinental ballistic missile technician, and his time training fellow airmen. 

“I got to interact with thousands of troops for a 3½-year period,” Virdell said. “I learned a lot from it. I learned what bad leadership looks like. I learned what good leadership looks like.”

He enlisted shortly after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and served until 2008. After leaving the Air Force, he worked alongside his family in a diesel repair business in Brady. By 2011, he began participating in state politics, attending meetings concerning gun rights at the Capitol. 

Virdell served as a volunteer Hill Country coordinator for the Gun Owners of America in 2021 and was hired as the Texas state director for the organization in 2022 following the Uvalde school shooting. 

He said he’s concerned with a lack of honest representation by the state’s Republican legislators.

“There’s lots of people that tell you that they are conservative and all that, but they have no history of being Republican,” he said. “We have to quit sending cowards. We have to quit sending spineless people who back down and won’t stand up for your liberties.”

Smith took the stage after Virdell and gave a brief breakdown of his extensive history in Llano County.

“I grew up just down the road in Llano,” he said. “I employ a lot of people here, I have clinics here, a hospital here, I’ve ranched here all my life. I have generational friends here. I’m acutely aware of what is going on in Llano County.”

Smith spoke about his family’s deep ranching roots in the area, which reach back to the 1850s. He also shared his background in finance and investment banking during which he worked with small banks across the country after attending Cornell University and Southern Methodist University.

He returned to Llano to get into the family business of ranching. In 2019, he helped keep the Llano Hospital from being closed and negotiated a partnership with MidCoast Central Medical. He is now the CEO of the hospital and has opened additional clinics in Llano County.

Smith said he was galvanized to run for office after seeing a lack of dedication to rural infrastructure while serving on the Lower Colorado River Authority Board of Directors and the Governor’s Broadband Development Council.

“Six months ago, I had no idea I’d be running for political office. I’ve never had huge ambitions to do that. But having been on the governor’s broadband council, the LCRA, and now working in the healthcare industry, I saw that there is not enough attention and there aren’t enough people fighting for some of those things in rural Texas,” he said.

His main concern for Llano County and the rest of the district is water. He believes that changes have to be made at a state level to ensure water stability for District 53.

dakota@thepicayune.com

Demolition will begin by the end of February on three buildings at the northeast corner of U.S. 281 and RR 1431 in Marble Falls following a unanimous vote by the Marble Falls Economic Development Corp. Board of Directors on Wednesday, Feb. 7.

The three structures at 1001, 1003, and 1009 Main St. were purchased for $2 million in an EDC partnership with the city of Marble Falls in November 2023 following an online backlash to a  proposed car wash at the site. The buildings at 1001 and 1003 were a bait shop, while Art of the Meal most recently held the 1009 address.

San Antonio-based Flash Demolition will tear down the buildings.

“Several of the structures are non-conforming and/or dilapidated,” EDC Executive Director Christian Fletcher told DailyTrib.com. “We can’t really envision the future of that site with the structures there.”

The city and the EDC do not yet have any plans for the property.

“We would like to help the property achieve its highest and best use through proper activation,” Fletcher said. “We are confident that we’ll find some partners to help us develop a really cool project in that area.” 

nathan@thepicayune.com

The Highland Haven Board of Alderman unanimously selected Andy Adams as the Burnet County municipality’s first-ever city administrator during its regular meeting on Tuesday, Feb. 6.

Adams previously served as Recreation Division manager for Little Elm, a city of roughly 51,000 people in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. 

“We think he’s going to be a good fit for our community,” Mayor Olan Kelley told DailyTrib.com.

Kelley is currently working on a contract to bring Adams to Highland Haven. 

“The board gave me permission to start working on it (Feb. 6),” he said. “I’ll be getting in touch with Andy soon in order to move forward with the negotiation.”

Adams was one of many candidates to apply for the new position.

“I couldn’t even tell you how many (applicants),” Kelley said. “There were quite a few.”

Highland Haven aldermen and city officials have considered adding a city administrator to the staff for about five years.

“It’s not something we’ve taken lightly,” Kelley said. “We’ve been slowly looking for a good point to bring somebody on board.”

Duties in the newly created role include overseeing the daily operation of city services, acting as the city’s public information officer, promoting the economic well-being of the city, and carrying out directives approved by the mayor and Board of Alderman. 

“We wanted someone with some institutional knowledge that can stay with our community for a long period of time and move our programs forward,” Kelley said.

The bulk of those responsibilities were previously handled by the mayor’s office.

“Frankly, the mayor has been running everything,” Kelley said. “Our community has gotten to a point where they need someone other than just a mayor to manage the day-to-day operations.”

No timeline exists for when Adams will transition into the role.

nathan@thepicayune.com

The Texas Historical Commission recently approved an Undertold Marker for Stringtown Cemetery and a 50/50 matching grant of $15,000 for the Burnet County Historical Commission, which is restoring the all-Black burial ground near Oatmeal. The cemetery dates back to 1877. 

The local commission applied for the marker and grant in November and announced the good news at its regular meeting on Tuesday, Feb. 6. 

The group’s next step is putting together a five- to 10-page history of the cemetery for the Texas Historical Commission, which will use the information for wording on the free marker. 

The THC began the Undertold Marker program in 2006 to address gaps in local history and uses historical marker application fees to pay for the monuments. 

“The people at the state historical commission are really interested in recognizing freedom colony cemeteries and their stories,” said Lela Gore, chair of the Certified Local Government Committee for the BCHC. The committee handles all grant applications for the commission.

Freedom colonies cropped up near small towns with sunset ordinances like Bertram’s, which did not allow Black people in the city limits between sunset and sunrise. The colonies were settled by freed slaves after the Civil War. 

The BCHC will have three years to meet the requirements of the 50/50 grant by restoring Stringtown. That includes clearing brush, cleaning and fixing headstones, and researching family histories and unmarked graves. The cemetery has about 70 graves, 50 of them unmarked, according to a commission survey done in 1982.

The BCHC also plans to fence the property and hopes to set up a cemetery association to take over maintenance and care in the future. 

Once the work is done, the Texas Historical Commission will reimburse the county group $7,500 of the approved $15,000 matching grant. 

Stringtown Cemetery was featured in the February issue of The Picayune Magazine, which is currently in newsstands and mailboxes and on countertops at local businesses. You can also read the story in the digital version of The Picayune at DailyTrib.com.

Anyone with information about descendants of early Burnet settlers buried in Stringtown Cemetery may contact Nichole Ritchie at 512-645-8658. To help establish a cemetery association for Stringtown, call Burnet County Historical Commission Chair Rachel Bryson at 512-876-5600.

suzanne@thepicayune.com

Twenty-one volunteers showed up for a trap-neuter-release cat management clinic in Granite Shoals on Monday, Feb. 5. The city’s newly formed Feral Cat Advisory Committee hosted the event in the aftermath of a cat-killing discussion by a different committee that turned the town upside down late last year.

The growing population of wild cats in Granite Shoals became a flashpoint for community activism in December, when a recording of a public meeting on how to handle feral felines was shared online. The recording included an in-depth discussion between the city’s Wildlife Advisory Committee and then-City Manager Peggy Smith on lethal management of the animals, including whether to trap and shoot multiple cats and how to handle mass burials.

Following the recording’s release, dozens of residents expressed outrage at the content, resulting in Smith’s resignation. Wildlife Advisory Committee Chair Todd Holland resigned soon after, saying he was moving out of the city and no longer eligible to serve. 

Also in the aftermath, the Hill Country Humane Society severed its ties with Granite Shoals. The City Council then created the new feral cat committee to come up with humane ways of handling the feral population.

Lionhearts TNR was one of several cat advocacy groups to offer help. Director James Tieman conducted the trap-neuter-release workshop on Monday at the Granite Shoals Airport to get the new committee started on its mission.

“The volunteers needed a good orientation on how to use traps,” Tieman told DailyTrib.com before the presentation. “My goal today is to teach as many people as we can how to do TNR and how to use a trap properly.”

Volunteers will be trained to set traps, transport cats to veterinary appointments, make sure they recover from their spaying or neutering operations, and release them back at the proper location.

According to Tieman, and many animal rights organizations, the TNR method is effective in keeping the wild cat population down. The cats are also vaccinated in the process. One ear is clipped so the animals can be easily identified as having already undergone the TNR process. 

The Granite Shoals Feral Cat Advisory Committee is also being supported by Hill Country Cats, Living Love Animal Rescue, HOPE Animal Clinic‘s Dr. Natalia Lord, and the Hill Country Humane Society.

Committee Chair Michele Landfield told DailyTrib.com she hopes the committee consistently maintains the number of volunteers that attended Monday’s clinic.

“We want to see a lot of volunteers trapping and pitching in,” she said. “When it all went down with the Wildlife Advisory Committee, I knew somebody had to step up and get things rolling.”

To learn more about the Feral Cat Advisory Committee, call the city at 830-598-2424 or email citysecretary@graniteshoals.org. 

dakota@thepicayune.com

The two Republican candidates running for the Texas House District 53 seat are both attending the same political event in Llano County for the first time on Feb. 8. Hatch Smith and Wes Virdell will visit with voters at an informal meet-and-greet at 8 a.m. Thursday at the Kingsland Branch Library, 125 W. Polk St.

Smith and Virdell are on the March 5 primary ballot seeking their party’s nomination for the November general election. 

Thursday’s event is hosted by the Kingsland Chamber of Commerce. Attendees can arrive early at 7:45 a.m. for coffee before the event begins. 

Each candidate will be given 10 minutes to make an introduction, after which they will stick around for coffee and conversations with the audience.

Texas House District 53 is currently represented by Andrew Murr, who chose to not file for re-election. He has held the seat since 2014. 

The district is composed of 16 counties spread across a wide swathe of Central, Western, and South Texas, including Llano, Bandera, Crane, Crockett, Edwards, Kerr, Kimble, Mason, McCulloch, Medina, Menard, Pecos, Real, Schleicher, Sutton, and Upton counties. The estimated population of the region is about 200,000. Llano County makes up around 11 percent of that with roughly 22,000 estimated residents as of 2022.

Early voting for the primaries is Feb. 20-March 1. Election Day is March 5.

THE CANDIDATES

HATCH SMITH

Smith is a Llano native and lives in the county. He is chief administrative officer of the MidCoast Central Medical Center health system. He also operates a multi-generational family ranch in Llano County, owns RedSmith Genetics, and manages a cow-and-calf operation, D.P. Smith and Sons. 

He was appointed to the Lower Colorado River Authority Board of Directors and the Governor’s Broadband Development Council in 2022 by Gov. Greg Abbott. 

His platform includes border security, rural infrastructure improvements, tax and regulation cuts, Second Amendment rights, anti-abortion laws, and support for rural education.

Among Smith’s supporters are former Gov. Rick Perry, the Texas Farm Bureau, the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association, the Texas Hospital Association, and Save Lake LBJ.

WES VIRDELL

Virdell was born in Brownwood but raised in Brady, where he now lives. He is the Texas state director for Gun Owners of America. He also operates his own business, Virdell Transport, and supports his family business, Virdell Diesel Service. 

Virdell is a U.S. Air Force veteran who served from 2001-08. He was selected as a state delegate for the Republican Party of Texas in 2020 and 2022. 

He is running on a platform of gun rights, anti-abortion laws, election reform, parental rights, border security, abolishing property taxes, and medical freedom.

Among Virdell’s supporters are Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, Gun Owners of America, Texas Right to Life, the True Texas Project, and the Llano Tea Party.

dakota@thepicayune.com

The city of Marble Falls was awarded a $725,000 grant from the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department to help build Park View Park, a 12-acre greenspace in the northeastern part of town.

Located at the corner of Park Ridge and Park View Drive, the new outdoor feature will have a half-mile walking trail, playscapes with a natural aesthetic, a small ropes course, structures for shade, a restroom, and a dedicated parking lot.

“We sincerely thank TPWD for their commitment to supporting local communities in their efforts to enhance public parkland,” Parks and Recreation Director Lacey Dingman said in a recent media release. “This grant is a testament to the collaborative spirit between state and local entities working towards a common goal of promoting recreational opportunities.”

The TPWD’s Urban Outdoor, Non-Urban Outdoor, and Small Community Recreation Grants is a highly competitive program. Across Texas, 79 applicants submitted requests for over $20 million, which comes from the Land and Water Conservation Fund, the Urban Parks account, and the Texas Recreation and Parks account.

“We are delighted to have been selected among the deserving recipients of this grant from the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department,” Dingman said. “The grant validates our vision for Park View Park and emphasizes the importance of creating accessible and enjoyable public spaces for our community.”

editor@thepicayune.com

The Marble Falls City Council approved $3 million worth of renovations to the city’s fire station during its regular meeting Tuesday, Feb. 6. Plans include expanding administrative offices, redesigning living quarters, and revamping the HVAC system.

The item passed on a 5-0 vote. Mayor Dave Rhodes and Councilor Bryan Walker were absent from the meeting.

The facility at 700 Avenue N was built about 25 years ago to serve Marble Falls’ volunteer fire department. Living quarters and offices were retrofitted to accommodate the city’s switch to a full-time department in 2003.

“We have just outgrown the current design,” said Assistant City Manager Russell Sander, who was chief of Marble Falls Fire Rescue from 2016-23 before accepting his current job.

The station also has problems with its HVAC system, which has taken a beating from the extreme summer heat, Sander said.

“We can’t get it below 80 to 82 degrees,” he explained. “We’ve also got what I’d call some moisture issues with the A/C system during the summertime.”

And the floor of the living quarters needs work.

“The upstairs floor is sagging,” Sander said. “It’s been getting worse. We’re not quite sure what’s going on with that, but it does slope to one side.”

The city might replace the station’s garage doors as part of the project.

“Those are also 25 years old,” Sander said. “There’s some newer technology that we’re looking at.”

Trimbuilt Construction‘s $3 million bid was in line with cost projections from earlier in the process.

“It was not a sticker shock,” Sander said.

About $300,000 worth of that bid would go toward contingencies.

“When you’re doing a renovation like this, you’re going to have to expect that you’re going to run into some problems,” Sander said. “We’re hoping we don’t run into too many, but there is a contingency in there in case we do.”

The city anticipates work to begin in the next 90 days.

“Once it starts, it’s about an eight- or nine-month process for construction,” Sander said.

Firefighters will live in temporary quarters adjacent to the station while construction is underway.

nathan@thepicayune.com