Conservation History Association of Texas
Texas Legacy Project
Oral History Interview
Nature Conservancy in Texas

Interviewee: Ed Segner
Date: October 25, 2022
Site: Houston, Texas
Reels: 4542-4544
Executive Producer: Lydia Saldana
Producer: Jeff Weigel
Field Producer / Chief Interviewer: Lee Smith
Videographer: Curtis Craven
Writer / Editor: Ron Kabele
Transcriber: David Todd / Trint
Item: Segner_Ed_NCItem27_HoustonTX_20221025_Reel4542-4544_Audio.mp3

[Bracketed numbers refer to the interview recording’s time code.]

Lee Smith [00:00:17] So where did you grow up?

Ed Segner [00:00:20] I grew up shortly in Dallas, Fort Worth, and then Bryan. My dad was a professor at Texas A&M. And so we spent eight, nine, ten years there and a very short period of time in Norman, Oklahoma. And then I went to high school and junior high in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.

Lee Smith [00:00:43] And was there any aspect or experience in your early life that sparked an interest in the outdoors?

Ed Segner [00:00:49] Sure. I was very active in Boy Scouts and Camp Staff and Order of the Arrow, Vigil Honor, Eagle Scout, so pretty much the works, and trip to Philmont in New Mexico. My dad actually had been on Philmont staff as a college kid.

Ed Segner [00:01:11] And so, I really gained an appreciation for all the great spots and I also majored in civil engineering. And while we think about that, people are being builders perhaps, but they’re also very interested in, you know, floodplains and hydrology. And it’s not too big a reach to start thinking about ecosystems.

Lee Smith [00:01:37] And so, Boy Scouts, that was something that you were able to continue doing even though you were moving around. Is that right?

Ed Segner [00:01:43] Right? Yeah. Yeah. So Oklahoma and and then Alabama. Yeah.

Lee Smith [00:01:51] So you were an Eagle Scout?

Ed Segner [00:01:54] Yeah.

Lee Smith [00:01:55] What was your Eagle Scout project?

Ed Segner [00:01:58] Trail building erosion. Crops or whatever you want as walls on on a major trail at the camp.

Lee Smith [00:02:15] Cast your mind back. And what was your earliest kind of ah-ha moment in the woods or in the bays or something, you know? Was there a moment in Boy Scouts or just when you were out playing sometime?

Ed Segner [00:02:32] Well, on my first camping trip, we did one of those things you’re not supposed to do, and that’s put your hands high on climbing. Put your hands higher than your face. And when the face got up to the top of the rock ledge, there was a rattler sitting up there. Yep. So it was time to go the other direction.

Lee Smith [00:02:55] That made a pretty adrenaline moment for you. And since then, do you have a, are you appreciative of rattlesnakes? Are you scared of rattlesnakes?

Ed Segner [00:03:10] I give them I give them plenty of berth. In fact, when we were down at Matagorda, you know, Matagorda Island, that place is has tons of rattlers. And there’s an observation deck there, and you could just look out. And they’re like, I’m hoping that they move away from the stairs when it’s time to go back down, you know?

Lee Smith [00:03:41] Wow, you could see that many just right there.

Ed Segner [00:03:44] Yeah.

Lee Smith [00:03:45] Wow.

Lee Smith [00:03:47] Was there a family member or a mentor that may have inspired you early on?

Ed Segner [00:03:53] Well, certainly my dad was an active scout, so it was sort of natural to continue. He had a great appreciation for it. He grew up in Austin and, you know, all the West Lake side was nothing but camping ground in those days. So, you know, off of Lake Austin. And all of that’s subdivisions now.

Lee Smith [00:04:18] What about in your education? Was there any teacher or classmate or anybody like that that?

Ed Segner [00:04:28] Well, like I said, I really enjoyed hydrology as a subject. And so I was able to kind of fit that together. And so, yeah, Walt Austin was a great professor in that regard.

Lee Smith [00:04:44] And where was that?

Ed Segner [00:04:45] That was at Rice University.

Lee Smith [00:04:48] So give me your. So you graduate from high school in?

Ed Segner [00:04:52] Alabama, and then went to Rice and majored in civil engineering and more or less double-majored in accounting.

Ed Segner [00:04:59] And so I actually became a CPA and then ended up going to work for a large pipeline company. And so I was able to use both skills, and then went to Wall Street for a while, ended up at Enron, which at that point was basically a pipeline company.

Ed Segner [00:05:15] And then I ended up on the oil and gas side of Enron, which is today known as EOG Resources. And I was fortunate to be president of EOG and retired at 55 and started teaching at Rice University, where actually I’ve been teaching there since 1983 on a part-time basis. But I continue to teach there.

Lee Smith [00:05:45] And what are you teaching there?

Ed Segner [00:05:46] I teach engineering management courses, so I teach ethics, engineering economics, project management, those kind of things.

Lee Smith [00:05:54] So what was your first involvement in some conservation project?

Ed Segner [00:06:00] Well, I got involved with the Nature Conservancy. Enron’s, I think he was vice chairman at the time. His name was Mick Seidel. And Mick was on, I believe, the worldwide Board of Trustees, Board of Directors, for the Nature Conservancy. And so he got Rich Kinder involved in the state board here in Texas, and that would have been in the early ’90s.

Ed Segner [00:06:28] And and then Rich got really busy. And so I ended up taking his place on the Texas chapter. And that would have been somewhere in the ’94, 5-ish range, maybe.

Ed Segner [00:06:44] And so, you know, it was a great time because Enron was looking for sort of a project to sponsor. And our first project that we actually got involved with, which was Rich’s doing as opposed to mine, was the Diamond Y Spring.

Ed Segner [00:07:05] And and then after that, we started looking. We we visited Matagorda Island as a possibility. We visited Dolan Falls.

Ed Segner [00:07:17] But we were kind of already sort of getting committed to the Matagorda Island project. And so we ended up doing that. And the Wynne Lodge was there. That was actually, I think, my first Conservancy field trip stay at the Old Wynne Lodge, which was wonderful actually, and expensive to maintain as any coastal. And it’s particularly … Matagorda Island’s pretty remote.

Ed Segner [00:07:48] And but we basically it was a great place to cultivate. And in fact, on the same trip I was on Cina Alexander Forgason was on that trip. And I think that was her first involvement as well with the Conservancy. So it was a great place to take people and talk about what we’re doing in the state. And Enron, you know, helped with improvements there as well as a boat and probably some endowment funds as well, as I recall.

Ed Segner [00:08:34] But so that was sort of the first project. But basically it was an old Air Force base on the island and then or near there and then the Wynne Lodge. And, of course, whooping cranes.

Lee Smith [00:08:49] What’s special about that area?

Ed Segner [00:08:54] You know, it’s, all the barrier islands in Texas are really special. And in the way they protect the rest of the coast, you’ve obviously got the oyster reefs, you’ve got the, you know, the dunes, the wildlife, and there’s plenty of it.

Lee Smith [00:09:16] Yes, those tidal flats on the back side.

Ed Segner [00:09:19] Yeah, that’s exactly right. And, of course, and then there’s as you move farther down this, down the coast, you end up into the Laguna Madre estuary system, which is I’ve been, I think I’ve been told that over half of the shellfish and fish, you know, for the Gulf of Mexico, that’s the breeding ground and incredibly important.

Ed Segner [00:09:44] So that period right in there was for the chapter was really a great period because you had the Matagorda project going, starting up, you had Dolan Falls, you also had the Davis Mountains. So you had three really significant projects in front of the chapter at the same time.

Ed Segner [00:10:10] Are you a fisherman or a birder?

Ed Segner [00:10:12] I’m really not much of a birder. I love to fly fish some.

Lee Smith [00:10:18] Did you ever fly fish on the…

Ed Segner [00:10:20] I have not.

Lee Smith [00:10:22] At Matagorda?

Ed Segner [00:10:23] No, I never did that. And I didn’t do that either at Dolan. There were places there too.

Lee Smith [00:10:31] You know, we talk about the the wide open spaces of Dolan and Davis Mountains, but there’s also a wide open space sense on those flats.

Ed Segner [00:10:43] Yes.

Lee Smith [00:10:45] Of Matagorda.

Ed Segner [00:10:46] Yeah, absolutely. And of course the the whooping cranes and so forth.

Lee Smith [00:10:53] What is special about that, like how does that inform your sense of self – that that kind of habitat?

Ed Segner [00:11:03] Well, for me, it’s just so quiet. And it’s also it’s a feeding. It’s feeding grounds. It’s it’s and you can actually the really the the noise that you see sometimes is just pools of fish. And you can sometimes see them on the surface. It’s really cool.

Lee Smith [00:11:28] Yeah. Sometimes it’s almost like you’re you’re connected to them because you’ve got your feet in the water there, whatever. And so you’re … The vastness you’re really in the vastness.

Ed Segner [00:11:40] Yeah. And. And it. And because you can. It’s so big. It’s. You’re just a speck. And then, of course, some people are fortunate enough to kayak in there and so forth.

Lee Smith [00:11:53] I digress. So how does the Nature Conservancy collaborate with a variety of partners?

Ed Segner [00:12:02] I think here in Texas that has been the crucial strategy, particularly of the ’90s and, you know, the decade of the 2000s, because, you know, we’re a state that has relatively small federal ownership of land, one of the smallest in the country, I think, and and not huge amounts of state ownership either. And I mean, we certainly have some wonderful state parks and so forth. But, but when you put it all together, the vast landscapes are basically privately owned in this state.

Ed Segner [00:12:42] And so that means that if you’re going to be successful, you’re dealing with the private landowner. And so that was the crux of the strategy.

Ed Segner [00:12:53] And then when you take that one more step forward, even, I mean, we’re so much more polarized today. But even in that period of time, we really wanted the Nature Conservancy as much as possible to be apolitical. And because if you think about it from a big tent standpoint, we wanted to be where everybody could come together to save ecosystems.

Ed Segner [00:13:19] And so that meant that we needed to avoid being big lobbyists here. I mean, obviously there was a time, I’m digressing, but there was a time where some people went after our non-exempt property status here in the state of Texas as a charitable organization. That failed.

Ed Segner [00:13:45] But I think we learned some lessons from that. And certainly the big tent, so we wanted to be available for landowners, wanted to be available for corporations, foundations.

Ed Segner [00:13:58] We wanted to not do anything at all to get on the wrong side of the individual counties. That caused us to do payments in lieu of taxes, because we we are a as a property owner and being a charitable, we are technically tax-exempt. But we made the decision in those days to go ahead and continue to make our tax payments and do it as a payment in lieu of property taxes.

Ed Segner [00:14:32] And that was great in terms of local politics because it really took an issue off the table. It also put us in a position where the counties could say, “Well, yeah, they’re still supporting our schools.” And it made us a friend, rather than the enemy. And so I think those were important things.

Ed Segner [00:14:57] But this big tent thing is important because landowners come in all shapes and forms. They can be ranchers, they can be wealthy Houstonians or possibly wealthy Californians. They … the common denominator is they love the land. And the common denominator is they want the land to be preserved.

Ed Segner [00:15:22] And that kind of also led to the whole idea of conservation easements, which, you know, certainly other organizations in Texas were using as well as we. But certainly I think we would look at some of the ones that we did that were really big. And certainly the Davis Mountains is loaded with with with conservation easements in some major properties.

Ed Segner [00:15:53] But I think the easements are important for, you know, generations of families because then they know that it’s going to more or less stay the way it has been.

Ed Segner [00:16:04] You know, and obviously, each easement is an individual negotiation. And to think about what their needs are and their families’ needs in terms of housing requirements and grazing requirements.

Ed Segner [00:16:22] And obviously, from if we’re the holder, if the Nature Conservancy, is the holder of the easement, then then obviously we’re very concerned about best practices and not over-utilizing the land and things like that.

Ed Segner [00:16:39] You know, another area of the state where major, where we’ve been involved with the conservation easements, has been certainly in the San Antonio Edwards recharge system and then of course, in the Barton Creek watershed in Austin. And looking back on those things, you know, you couldn’t put those together again.

Lee Smith [00:17:03] Well, it’s also there’s not one size fits all. It’s it’s like there’s this, you know, soufflé of conservation you’re trying to make and you use different spices for different properties and situations.

Ed Segner [00:17:17] Sure. Yeah, absolutely. And I think that’s the flexibility.

Ed Segner [00:17:24] And I think that it also, you know, and one of the things that I observed in that period that I used to go to Montana sometimes to fish and stuff and and in some of those places, the folks who had conservation-protected properties, they were actually more valuable than the ones that weren’t.

Ed Segner [00:17:48] And so, you know, when when you were looking at a property and it said your neighbors are all, you know, have heavy conservation easements on them, that was actually saying, “Oh, that means this property is actually more valuable.”

Ed Segner [00:18:00] So.

Lee Smith [00:18:02] Because there’s protection.

Ed Segner [00:18:03] Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

Ed Segner [00:18:05] You know, you could you could almost break it down into two categories of, you know, in terms of land strategies. At one point, the land strategy was, you know, dealing with private landowners who would continue to own or alternatively, if they needed to sell a portion or all, then we would substitute friendly landowners who would accept conservation easements on that property. So that was sort of one model.

Ed Segner [00:18:36] And then the second model that the Nature Conservancy played was being able to act faster than the federal government can act. And so it might be properties, say, in Laguna Madre or something like that where they know they want it and they’re going to get it in two years from now in the appropriation bill, but the seller is not going to wait two years. And so we had the capability as the Conservancy to come in and be the middleman and make that happen.

Ed Segner [00:19:10] So I think and those can be two very distinct strategies, although they certainly overlap in terms of goal because certainly, you know, we are all in favor of additional parts of Laguna Madre being protected as an example.

Lee Smith [00:19:27] So tell me what a conservation easement is.

Ed Segner [00:19:31] Well, it is a legal agreement, and it is, unless otherwise stated, a perpetual agreement. So it is binding and is basically an agreement to restrict the property in some manner. So the most common way of thinking about that (and I’m not a lawyer), but the most common way of thinking about that is to restrict development.

Ed Segner [00:19:57] So if you if you’ve got a landowner or rancher, etc., who’s concerned about someday this property becoming a subdivision, and that’s not very appealing for some ranchers, at all, then an easement is a potential way to go at it because it then restricts future owners to whatever the conditions are that are prescribed in the easement itself.

Ed Segner [00:20:24] So the easement might have certain building sites circled that are permissible for, hey, your family’s going to expand and you might need a couple of more homes or you might need a ranch manager’s home or those kinds of things.

Ed Segner [00:20:44] And then it might have terms with respect to densities of grazing. It might have restrictions on crop. It might it might be incentivizing crop rotations. Any of these kinds of things.

Ed Segner [00:21:01] Water rights could, and water practices, are increasingly associated with these easements as well, particularly as we think about properties that might be in a recharge zone. And so we want to very much protect those karst entry points. And then, of course, the water – make sure there’s no contamination, things like that in those areas or surface streams.

Ed Segner [00:21:35] So it obviously it’s going to be tailored to the individual property itself.

Ed Segner [00:21:41] You know, easements can be controversial in that future owners and generations may not like the terms of them. And as I think about that, the real problem has been that those executing those may not have gotten the best of, you know, sitting down thinking about what it is they need and want.

Ed Segner [00:22:04] But there’s nothing wrong with the concept itself. The beauty needs to be that both parties I mean, both parties want the same thing. And that is ultimately that the property is not going to be developed and and that it will be managed in a best practices manner.

Ed Segner [00:22:22] And so I think one of the keys in making easements work is that both sides have very good representation and, you know, kind of think through what this is going to be.

Ed Segner [00:22:37] But an easement is granted generally to a non-governmental agency. It could be granted to a city, county, state, federal. But most people would rather grant to a non-governmental agency, I think. And so that’s where we come into play and that’s where land trusts come into play.

Ed Segner [00:22:59] And we have a monitoring responsibility.

Ed Segner [00:23:03] Some people, when they grant these easements, they do them gratis. And some people are so generous that they actually give us a endowment for the monitoring, which obviously isn’t that expensive. But, but it’s it’s it’s an important feature to make sure that we are going to have staff to fulfill that function.

Ed Segner [00:23:25] And then occasionally you see situations where the easements are purchased at a discounted price and then sometimes they’re at market value.

Lee Smith [00:23:36] How with your, you know, being background with Enron and whatnot, how did that help you?

Ed Segner [00:23:47] Well, Enron was a major player in the interstate pipeline business, as well as the intrastate pipeline business here in Texas. And so in the early days of Enron, we were basically pipelines and oil and gas. And then we had also a natural gas liquids business.

Ed Segner [00:24:08] And it wasn’t until later that the whole trading in electricity and natural gas that everybody thinks about Enron today and, of course, the eventual collapse.

Ed Segner [00:24:19] But in the early days, it was basically a pipeline company, very traditional engineering-dominated. Lots of guys who liked to hunt and fish. And yet we were committed to education. And so we viewed nature education to be an important component. And we wanted to be good land stewards.

Ed Segner [00:24:45] And obviously, if you think about pipelines, we have easements ourselves, although they may have been, you know, gotten by eminent domain perhaps, or maybe they were just, you know, arm’s length purchases. But but we, too, had to be good land stewards.

Ed Segner [00:25:04] So it all fit together for a traditional pipeline company as we were in the ’90s. And so working with the Nature Conservancy was a natural.

Ed Segner [00:25:19] One of the things that made the Nature Conservancy attractive to companies like Enron was that the Nature Conservancy, unlike some other environmental organizations – Sierra, Audubon, I believe – would not accept corporate money.

Ed Segner [00:25:37] But the Nature Conservancy here in Texas did and does. Obviously, we want to use due care in working with that corporation to make sure that appropriate things happen. But having that kind of partner was attractive because the Nature Conservancy based things on science.

Ed Segner [00:26:04] One of the things that we did really well in those decades right through there was had very good representation on the board from scientists, from A&M, the University of Texas, Texas Tech, A&M – Galveston. I’m sure there were others. I remember from Canyon, Texas, as well – West Texas State.

Ed Segner [00:26:29] So these were, that was an important aspect of driving the organization and doing things that made sense. And so if you were on the corporate side, you could look at that and say, “Yeah, they’re going to do the right things.”

Ed Segner [00:26:41] And then we had people like Jeff Weigel and James King who who understood land. And so the relationship was easy to work with.

Ed Segner [00:26:54] And then when you throw in private landowners – Houston people and Dallas people – who, you know, it’s easy to be a Texan when the land calls you and you just never give up your roots of that.

Ed Segner [00:27:10] And so the Nature Conservancy, with that big tent that we talked about earlier, could bring everybody in to to be. And then, of course, foundations were important as well.

Ed Segner [00:27:23] But it’s kind of funny, I became chair at some point in the early 2000s and the Oklahoma chair was one of my counterparts, Larry Nichols, who headed up Devon Energy in Oklahoma City. So, you know you know, here here you got two energy guys who are trying to be pro-environmental in an industry that’s not known for that. So I think it was good for the rest of the industry to see that too.

Lee Smith [00:28:03] That’s kind of what I was going for. On the outside looking in, having a representative from Enron in close association with the Nature Conservancy.

Ed Segner [00:28:13] Yes.

Lee Smith [00:28:13] Kind of raises their credibility with that whole sector.

Ed Segner [00:28:19] It does. And we had very good support from Shell Foundation through those years. Also, we had the corporate luncheon here in Houston, which Chevron was the perennial sponsor, among others. But and then all the law firms and and it brings in the whole infrastructure. And it says this is an organization that you can do things with and you can do environmental things, but you will be treated fairly.

Ed Segner [00:28:57] And by the same token, obviously, you get the halo effect from the corporate side of saying, “Well, we’re trying to do the right things.”

Ed Segner [00:29:06] And you get some interesting partnerships. I mean, we’ve had a number of partnerships with Dow actually trying to do things in their locations. And so I think, you know, working together, you can end up with a lot better practices.

Lee Smith [00:29:23] And you mentioned that TNC focuses on science for the path to various solutions. Why is that important?

Ed Segner [00:29:36] I think that’s what gives you credibility. I think it also is the element that gives you long-lasting direction. The scientists are usually ahead. And so you’re going to get ideas today that are still going to be applicable 20 years from now. And I think that’s important.

Ed Segner [00:30:03] I also think that having the universities involved gave us a, you know, gave us credibility on campus as an organization, which then and sometimes those organizations, as you know, which therefore made us okay in that set of circle, it also gave us, you know, the trade-off of, you know, having a supply of grad students and undergrads who want to do projects on our preserves. So it’s it’s a great partnership.

Lee Smith [00:30:39] Well, again, on the outside looking in, it, it kind of legitimizes the objectivity of projects.

Lee Smith [00:30:46] Exactly.

Lee Smith [00:30:47] Why is that important?

Ed Segner [00:30:49] Well, I think that, you know, thinking about, you know, if you come at it from an ecosystem standpoint, then we’ve got to integrate land and water. And now you have to start thinking about energy and agriculture as well, all into one strategy.

Ed Segner [00:31:11] And I think the scientists think that way. And I, I think we ended up with better results. I think that they were a part of helping us integrate both land and water maybe earlier. I think we were talking about the integration of land and water, not necessarily before National was, but I think we were talking about it more. And, and I and I attribute some of that to the scientists that we had on board.

Ed Segner [00:31:48] And the other point I would make with that is I think that that makes more sense to the landowners as well. Because they’re able to to continue their ag-related practices on the land side. And but we start thinking about how do we protect the watersheds.

Lee Smith [00:32:11] And we’ve kind of covered this, but I’ve got it down so I’m going to ask it again or we’ll talk about again. So how, tell us how the Nature Conservancy has adjusted policy on property taxes for preserves.

Ed Segner [00:32:25] Well, as we talked about the payments in lieu of taxes, we wanted to … If you go back to, you know, I mentioned that there had been an attack on our tax exemption at one point, which had been successfully defended.

Ed Segner [00:32:42] But if you also think about the Dolan Falls project, I mean, excuse me, the Davis Mountains project, and you’ve got the Davis Mountain Loop that everybody drives, which is wonderful. And the fears in that community were that another national park was going to be created much like Big Bend. And I don’t know whether those ever had any substance or not. Certainly the local lore is that they did have substance.

Ed Segner [00:33:11] There was a very, very small state park located there. I think it’s just a few acres which is really more a place where people stay. And then you’ve got the McDonald Observatory, which is important.

Ed Segner [00:33:30] But the rest of it was basically all private ownership. And so there was this big fear that somebody was going to come in, scoop it up and convert it into a national park.

Ed Segner [00:33:43] And somehow we got tagged with the thought that we were the middleman in making that happen.

Ed Segner [00:33:50] And so there was something called the Heritage Society, the Davis Mountains Heritage Society. And there would be these negative signs along the road and, you know, “Go, go away, Nature Conservancy”, and other things like that.

Ed Segner [00:34:07] So, when you put the tax exemption issue and you put together what we saw with this, the Heritage Society and the signs and all that, that meant we had to show that no, no, that wasn’t what we were doing at all in terms of being a front man. And instead we were interested in protecting the Davis Mountains.

Ed Segner [00:34:34] There were fears that there would be additional subdivisions put into the Davis Mountains, you know, ranchettes and things like that. And, you know, five-acre, ten-acre, chop-them-up kind of things.

Ed Segner [00:34:49] And so by doing the transaction with the McIvors and then in turn converting 18,000 acres, I think it was, into a preserve, and then 14,000 or something like that was, was then broken up into several parcels which friends of the Nature Conservancy and others purchased, with an easement, of course.

Ed Segner [00:35:20] So all of that landscape essentially got protected. And and it’s an incredibly important thing. And there have been some other organizations to come in since us. There have also been further gifts to the Davis Mountains – Warburg Pincus, on behalf of some of the companies that they invest in have made gifts there.

Ed Segner [00:35:44] So I think that we needed to show that when we were going to be the front people for some project, you know, like a Laguna Madre or where we were obviously and clearly were we needed to be up front and say, “This is what we’re doing.”

Ed Segner [00:36:04] And likewise in the Davis Mountains, we needed to be, “No, no. We are committed to private land ownership, but we are committed to preserving the Davis Mountains for the special place that it is.”

Ed Segner [00:36:20] And that was a hard sell. And one of the things that did happen was James King, who was obviously comes with a fabulous name in relationship to the King Ranch families. He relocated to Fort Davis as a way of showing local commitment from TNC, and I think that went a long ways. He actually became a landowner himself, purchasing, you know, 300 acres or so and you know, small compared to some of the other tracts in the area. But nevertheless an important statement.

Ed Segner [00:37:09] And and I think if we look at it, it’s stood the test of time. I mean, it’s been almost 30 years now, or certainly close to it. And no national park has been created. No big new state park. Life has continued on.

Lee Smith [00:37:33] Well, and, you know, we were out there a month or so ago. We didn’t see any signs saying …

Ed Segner [00:37:39] That’s right. Yeah. And the property, the the Conservancy’s part of the property, is open to the public on certain days and times and then also is available for educational purposes. So yeah, and there’s some great hiking trails.

Lee Smith [00:38:01] So they’re walking the walk and they’re talking the talk.

Ed Segner [00:38:05] That’s what you have to do.

Ed Segner [00:38:08] And you know, we mentioned earlier on about the sort of two land strategies, one where you’re dealing with the private landowner and then the other where you really are the front organization. And we’ve done that, you know, for the sales tax property projects in San Antonio and Austin. You’ve got to separate and be up-front as to what it is you’re doing. So nobody gets confused.

Lee Smith [00:38:35] So what is the role of an emeritus trustee?

Ed Segner [00:38:39] Well, when I was chair, we thought about, “You know, geez, we need to have, we need, we need a young, we need to be turning the board over from time to time.”.

Ed Segner [00:38:54] And so we I’m not sure if we created the term limits, but I know we certainly changed them. We may have had term limits at that point. I think we had some kind of term system, but people would stay off a year and then they would come back for another dozen years, that kind of thing.

Ed Segner [00:39:12] And so we said, “You know, if we’re really going to reconstitute the board over time, we don’t want to lose the talents of these people who have been state chairs and other important positions and just been loyal donors and active. We want them to continue to feel welcome and to continue to lend their talents.” And so we did create that.

Ed Segner [00:39:44] And our host today, Carol Dinkins, is one of those and a number of our state, former state chairs, and, as I say, a few others. And a number of them have continued in active roles – serving on committees and things like that, but not as officers. And that’s allowed us to, you know, make the board more diverse, younger. And at the same time not give away that touch with the past.

Lee Smith [00:40:18] Well, the institutional…

Ed Segner [00:40:20] Yeah, it’s it’s institutional knowledge. It’s it’s also examples. A lot of those individuals have been very generous. And so it provides example and leadership to those coming new but that’s sort of part of it. And you know if you’re in a position of being able to do that.

Lee Smith [00:40:47] Well and maintaining again, looking in, maintaining that credibility.

Ed Segner [00:40:52] Yes. Because a lot of those emeritus folks have a name that means something in their local community and thus that implies credibility to the Nature Conservancy itself.

Ed Segner [00:41:08] And those individuals often have still very good contacts and they’re more than happy to, you know, go out on a development call or or assist in thinking about somebody who might be good for the board.

Ed Segner [00:41:29] So it’s, it would be such a loss to, you know, have lost the contact with those individuals.

Lee Smith [00:41:38] Well, there’s also even examples of legacies of of, you know, their children.

Ed Segner [00:41:43] Very much so. Yeah, We’ve we’ve had some second generations, and absolutely. And I mean certainly, you know, we look at the Schweppes and their involvement in the Davis Mountains project itself and then Anne became one of our chairs, Anne Ashman in later times.

Lee Smith [00:42:07] We didn’t really talk about what were the challenges with the Matagorda Project.

Ed Segner [00:42:11] Money. It’s, you know, coastal projects, that are on barrier islands that are remote in the first place. It’s expensive to maintain. It’s expensive to get to. Things break down. And then, of course, we always have the storm risk. But even ignoring storm risk, you’ve got this little thing called salt. So it just makes them more much more expensive than a nice project like the Davis Mountains that doesn’t have quite the same issues.

Lee Smith [00:42:53] So how how did how do you circumvent those problems?.

Ed Segner [00:42:56] Ultimately, the decision was made that the resources of the Texas chapter could be better utilized by thinking about more things like Dolan Falls and the Davis Mountains and other projects. And so but at the same time the US Fish and Wildlife was very interested in adding those acres because they were adjacent to acres they already had. And so that worked out.

Lee Smith [00:43:33] So it’s almost like a poker game that you, you know, put in a bunch of cash for that one hand knowing that in the next hand.

Ed Segner [00:43:43] Yeah. Well, you know, I’m not as active. I wasn’t as active in the Powderhorn transaction along the Gulf Coast as others. But you know, that’s another example of where we were able to be a catalyst, and perfectly prepared to own it and operate it ourselves. But we knew that Texas Parks and Wildlife really wanted to be there in the long run. And so that worked out. And now it’s available to everybody.

Lee Smith [00:44:28] Talked about coastal. So we talked about the Davis Mountains. What motivated its creation?

Ed Segner [00:44:38] I think that the catalyst was the fear of another Davis Mountains resort. And I think that others will have to correct me, but I think that’s commonly what people kind of call it. And it was a I mean, a subdivision that some of the properties, I think, were less than an acre even.

Ed Segner [00:45:01] And some of them had, shall we say, not really very nice homes or any or anything like that. It was more like, you know, not exactly trailers but but but more like what you might put in your backyard for storage sheds and things like that almost. And there were some that were nicer than that, but it was very rugged terrain and concern that that would be expanded.

Ed Segner [00:45:30] And so I think that was one of the major catalysts in in saying, “No, that’s not really what we have in mind for Mount Livermore.” And so I think that sort of started the whole thing.

Ed Segner [00:45:46] And then recognition, “Wow, this is a big area that’s got unique characteristics. You’ve got aspen trees in there. Tell me where else in Texas we’ve got aspens?” And you got some really big animals and all kinds of things. And and so it was a it was a preservation thing.

Ed Segner [00:46:15] And then, of course, you got the dark skies. Fits in with that strategy. So I think there were…

Ed Segner [00:46:26] But the catalyst itself, I think, was the fear of another Davis Mountains Resort.

Lee Smith [00:46:31] On that very special…

Ed Segner [00:46:34] Yes.

Lee Smith [00:46:36] Sky island.

Ed Segner [00:46:37] Yes. And it just wasn’t appropriate, you know, to put a bunch of dirt roads in rocky areas, where the elevation was rising like it is. It wasn’t the right thing to happen. What actually needed to happen in the Davis Mountains is more or less what has happened, and that is the tracts stay big.

Lee Smith [00:47:04] So who were some of the key players in that?

Ed Segner [00:47:07] Well, certainly James King was a very major player, David Braun. I think Robert Potts was involved. Jeff Weigel was involved.

Speaker 1 [00:47:21] How did the Schweppe sisters become involved?

Ed Segner [00:47:24] Through Irving. And Irving was very attached to it. His wife, his wife, which of course would be the sisters’ mother, I think she loved that area. And so I think in sort of her memory, that was a driving force for for Irving.

Lee Smith [00:47:55] So what’s that night sky like out there? And how does that make you?

Ed Segner [00:48:00] Well…

Ed Segner [00:48:00] You remember the first time it stopped you in your tracks?

Ed Segner [00:48:05] The darkness is wonderful. And certainly just being able to see so many stars and. And so it’s and it’s good for Texas to be a leader in having a location for the University of Texas. So, you know, all in favor and.

Ed Segner [00:48:31] I heard one story that the manager of the observatory came home one day, having been away for a week or so and looks at the house and mountain lion’s on the roof, rattlesnake on the porch. It was like, “Huh. Not sure I want to deal with this right now.”

Lee Smith [00:48:58] And so as the Nature Conservancy closes in on its millionth acre, how has it impacted Texas?

Ed Segner [00:49:07] I think it’s an example for what we’ve got to do for the future. And Texas is going to have water issues if we don’t be proactive in being efficient in our water management and practices.

Ed Segner [00:49:25] And I think those relationships that we’ve built are going to be just that much more important because I think ag use of water in Texas is something close to 90% or something like that. And so we’re not going to solve the water equations without working with the ag community and in some manner that also makes them comfortable because it’s difficult for them to give up rights and it’s difficult for them to to be motivated to use best practices. And we’ve got to find ways ultimately to do that.

Ed Segner [00:50:06] So I think having, you know, looking at landscapes and looking at watersheds and working together in the big tent is going to be really relevant.

Speaker 1 [00:50:19] And the Nature Conservancy has an established track record.

Ed Segner [00:50:21] We do. And I think that’s what’s so important. And it’s gotten, and as we’ve gotten more polarized, it’s just that much more important. We have to be the party that people say, “I can trust them.”

Lee Smith [00:50:38] So what advice would you give for someone young that’s coming up and interested in a career in conservation?

Ed Segner [00:50:47] Work with a science-based organization, because I think that they will always be trying to do the right thing. I think, it depends on one’s own personality as to what type of organization you work for, whether you work on the government side, whether you work on the NGO side. Do you work for an organization that’s quasi more political than they are conservation even?

Ed Segner [00:51:21] And I think that’s the sweet spot of the Nature Conservancy, is that we want to be science-based. We want to be open to all the constituencies. And so, you know, one of the things that I’m very interested in is that the TNC always be a good place to work.

Lee Smith [00:51:44] And what’s your outlook for the future of conservation?

Lee Smith [00:51:49] I’m optimistic and I think we have to continue to find ways to come up with projects that make sense, projects that are flexible and find funding sources. And but I also think that one of the roles that we can play doesn’t have anything to do with money. Because of our credibility, we have the ability to bring people to the table to discuss important issues and perhaps to be among those who’s able to put together some common denominator strategy.