4 April 13–19, 2023 dallasobserver.com DALLAS OBSERVER Classified | MusiC | dish | Culture | unfair Park | Contents surveyed and mapped all the possible dam and reservoir sites. That’s when the North- east Texas land was marked for a reservoir named after Marvin Nichols, the board’s first chairman, appointed in 1957. Every five years, 16 regions across Texas submit their water supply plans to the state. These plans help determine the statewide water plan. Dallas-Fort Worth is in Region C. Cuthand is in Region D. There are 23 new major reservoirs recommended in the state’s current water plan. Bezanson said she and others worry about how destructive these reservoirs can be. “They disrupt people’s lives,” she said. “They force people to sell their land. They’re taking land out of production for agriculture.” Marvin Nichols would disrupt timber cut- ting in Northeast Texas, the biggest industry in the region, Bezanson said. But she said people like Perry are looking for other options. They are starting to ask themselves, “How do we re- ally want to approach water supply?” At least she hopes this is the case for peo- ple like Jim Marshall, who stands to lose land to the reservoir. Marshall, 60, grew up in Central Illinois with a family that’s owned and operated farmland since they immigrated in the early 19th century. His wife had a similar upbring- ing in Louisiana. Now the two own land in Northeast Texas that could either be flooded or used for environmental mitigation if the reservoir is built. Federal law requires that land be set aside for the wildlife that could be flooded out by projects like the reservoir. Between the land covered in water and what might be taken for mitigation, some estimate the proj- ect could require nearly 200,000 acres of Northeast Texas. Marshall and his wife moved to Texas about 20 years ago looking for farmland. Eventually, they found Red River County. Marshall said it’s a very undeveloped county with “lovely pasture and hay meadow land mixed with woodlands, which is unusual in the state of Texas.” It has reliable rainfall, “so for agriculturalists like us, it really seemed ideal,” he said. Marshall is a children’s physician at the Cooks Children Medical Center in Fort Worth. The family owns about 917 acres and raises black Angus cattle. “So, we own the mama cows and the bulls, and we sell the calf for beef, and we raise hay for our own [herd’s] consumption.” They also have a significant portion of the ranch set aside for wildlife habitat. “I would say we’re a pretty typical cow-calf, Angus operation in East Texas with the ex- ception that we specifically purchased a fairly large piece of bottom land to dedicate that to the riparian environment that obvi- ously needs protection in our world,” Mar- shall said. He said the family knew about the reser- voir when they bought the land, but it seemed like it would be a while before it was built so they weren’t too worried at the time. “Just about as soon as we moved to Texas back in 2002, one of the first articles I re- member reading, it was either a Dallas paper or a Fort Worth paper, was a full page, above the fold headline about this reservoir that was going to destroy this beautiful part of Texas. I read that and thought ‘Well, that sounds awful,’” Marshall recalled. But it seemed like it would be a long time be- fore construction on the reservoir would begin so he didn’t initially follow the story. In 2016, water plan- ners for regions C and D agreed to hold off on building the reservoir un- til 2070. “So, we knew about it, but it seemed so far away, you know, a gen- eration and a half, that it didn’t impede our purchase,” he said. Eventually the build date was moved up to 2050. “The threat certainly has increased lately,” he said. He said the reservoir still seems like a real possibility. Whenever opponents bring up alternative water sources to Region C, no one will listen, he said. “The only thing we hear kind of out of the side of people’s mouths is ‘Well, that’s not what we planned’ or ‘That’s not in the plan’ or ‘We might do that in the future,’” he said. “We don’t understand why that’s not the first thing on the list.” “Our sense of it is that when alternatives come up the unstated understanding is that it doesn’t matter. ‘We’re going to build that reservoir,’” Marshall said. The construction of the reservoir would be destructive, but even the threat of Marvin Nichols is having effects on people who live nearby. “Every time this comes up, it scares peo- ple, so people stop making progress,” Mar- shall said. “They stop making plans. They stop building barns. They don’t keep up their fences. “… It’s actually almost more devastating than just knowing that it’s going to be gone and here’s the timeline. Some of my elderly neigh- bors, it’s about all they can talk about and they don’t know where to turn. They don’t know what to do. There’s no answers, and it’s very hard particularly on elderly people and people with limited resources, like most rural people. So, it’s a problem even as a threat that’s tangi- ble, and I feel bad for those folks every day.” Marshall’s calf business is set up as a family corporation. He said it costs him money to op- erate but with it he’s able to employ family mem- bers. All of them are still pursuing their education and, meanwhile, learning the trade. “It’s a net zero for me in the end,” he said. “All farming and ranching these days, the land owner basically makes money by operating the land as long as they can, preserving its value and then selling it at some point. “We all say the farmer or the rancher is the only guy who lives poor and dies rich. … The margin is so incredibly thin it’s very difficult to make a living without capi- tal from some other job. Our investment re- ally is in the land and the people, and that’s the way my family has always operated our farms. “There’s just no profitable money in agri- culture, so you only do it if you love it and you have to have an off-ranch or off-farm operation to make it work,” he said. He said his whole ranch would be lost to the reservoir. If it’s not underwater, it’ll be taken away for mitigation. “Underwater or not under water, it’s the same destruction of a way of life,” he said. Marshall said he might get paid for his land, “but money’s not land you can walk around on.” He would lose a lot, but he said it’s likely nothing compared to what families who’ve lived in the area for generations would lose. Aaron Rolen lives in Cuthand, a small town of a couple dozen people. “Basically when people think of Cuthand they think of the Cuthand Church,” Rolen said. It’s about 300 yards away from his home. “If you wanted to get the best view of what it’s like in Cuthand, who the people are in Cuthand, whether you’re religious or not or spiritual or not, just show up on Sunday at Cuthand Church,” he said. It’s a tightknit community, he said. There’s a new cafe down the road called Mal’s Place that’s become popular in town. He goes there two or three times a week to meet with his neighbors. There’s a community fish fry fundraiser every year at the Cuthand fire department that raises between $25,000-$50,000. Rolen grew up in Cuthand. “I joke with people that I’ve really gone a long ways in life. I live about 100 yards down the road from where I grew up,” he said. Rolen was born in Longview but he moved to Cuthand when he was 2 years old. When Rolen was a teenager, his family moved to the nearby town of Bagota. But, his grandparents continued living in Cuthand like they had since the ’70s. He went to South Dakota for college. After he met who would later become his wife, the couple moved to the DFW area. They ended up in McKinney but eventually wanted a change of pace after having kids. They built a house on a small plot in Cuthand next to his grandparents’ ranch. They’ve lived there since 2019. He remembers hearing about the Marvin Nichols Reservoir periodically as a kid. “I suppose, looking back on it now, it was prob- ably every time the Texas Water Develop- ment Board was putting together its plan,” he said. “As a kid, I didn’t care. I didn’t know anything about it.” He said there are some who say the res- ervoir is inevitable. Some think they can only prolong the process. Others, though fewer, believe they can stop it. Rolen said talk of the reservoir died down after the two regions decided not to build it until 2070. In 2019, though, Region C said it wanted to start building the reser- voir in 2050. That’s when it popped up on Rolen’s radar again. If he was asked about this 10 years ago, he would’ve said the reservoir was inevitable. But today, he thinks it can be stopped. “I think with social media and how small the world has gotten, it is a lot easier to Unfair Park from p3 >> p6 HE SAID HIS WHOLE RANCH WOULD BE LOST TO THE RESERVOIR. IF IT’S NOT UNDERWATER, IT’LL BE TAKEN AWAY FOR MITIGATION. Nathan Hunsinger Marshall uses his land as cattle pasture.
