Winter Texan V8RV.com Winter Texan Guide

Once abundant and productive, turtles in general, especially the Kemp's ridley, have declined to the point of endangerment. In fact, the Kemp's ridley is the most severely endangered sea turtle in the world. Just 50 years ago the species had numbered more than 40,000 females nesting in a single day. Now that number has dwindled to less than 2,000 nests annually. But great effort is being made to save the turtles.

Registration and refreshments will kick off the day at 8:30 a.m at the Edwin Atwood Park Pavilion located at Beach Access 5 off of Highway 100 on South Padre Island. Beach Cleanup will run from 9:00 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. with a "What did you find?" session where volunteers can discuss interesting and unusual findings, concluding the day's events.

"I encourage all Winter Texans to bring their family and friends out for the day to keep the island they call home for several months a year beautiful," Dewhurst said. "Volunteers will get to make many great memories while serving their winter community."

The Winter Texan Beach Cleanup program takes place every year along the Texas coast and is part of the Land Office Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup. Thousands of people turn out each summer and winter to help keep the coast clean and preserve Texas natural resources and marine wildlife.

"It awes me to see visitors from across the country and around the world chip in to do their part for Texas beaches," Dewhurst said. "It's always amazing to see the value that Winter Texans put on our beaches, and we're lucky enough to have the chance to enjoy them all year."

Dewhurst paid a special thank you to this year's sponsors including: Walmart, Circle-K South Padre Island, and HEB Port Isabel - refreshments; Keep Texas Beautiful - volunteer souvenirs; Bicycle World of the Valley - promotions and contest awards. Dewhurst also thanked the Cameron County Parks for hosting the event and main co-sponsor, The South Padre Island Convention and Visitor's Bureau for their important contribution to the Winter Texan Beach Cleanup.

For more information on the South Padre Island Winter Texan Beach Cleanup, call (956) 761-6433 or 1-800-998-4GLO

Winter Texans welcomed back as they have economic impact in Valley

By Matt Whittaker
The Monitor

McALLEN, November 23, 2005 — Dorotha Knox and her husband, Raymond, 79, have been wintering at McAllen Mobile Park for the past 13 seasons. The North McColl Road RV oasis offers a warm haven for the couple as they flee frigid Yorktown, Ind., temperatures.

They’ve settled into the Rio Grand Valley like a pair of snowbirds in a nest, and on Friday they were moving into a home they’ve bought in Edinburg. The couple hasn’t decided whether they will continue traveling seasonally, but one thing’s for sure: They enjoy keeping busy with crafts, woodworking and card games with friends in the balmy South Texas climate.

“We like it down here,” said Dorotha Knox, a 71-year-old retired seamstress and secretary. “People are friendly. It’s just a nice area to stay for the winter.”

The Knoxes, who arrived at the end of September, are part of the traditional group of Winter Texans who typically stay in one place for the colder months. But that group is being replaced by those from the baby boomer generation, who are generally more active, spend more money and travel to several different locations during their seasonal sojourns.

Despite changes in the makeup and travel patterns of the yearly visitors, both the McAllen Chamber of Commerce and University of Texas-Pan American experts agree that Winter Texans will bring in hundreds of millions of dollars to the Valley’s economy, although they disagree on the size of that economic impact.

The chamber estimates that 110,000 Winter Texans will come to the Valley during the peak months of January through the first part of March and will generate $225 million for the area’s economy. That number is down from the 2002-2003 season — when 123,000 Winter Texans generated $250 million — because the older generation of Winter Texans is dying or moving into retirement homes, according to the chamber.

Students at the University of Texas-Pan American and University of Texas at Brownsville and Texas Southmost College also did a study that put the Winter Texan economic impact much higher for this past season.

From surveying 120 Winter Texans at the three Valley malls, the students extrapolated that 127,000 Winter Texans spent approximately $420 million over their time in the Valley, an increase of $170 million from two years before.

The dollar increase was attributed to the larger number of Winter Texans visiting the Valley and to their increased spending while in the area.

Penny M. Simpson, director of the Center for Valley Markets and Tourism Research at UTPA and an associate marketing professor, said the 2002-2003 Winter Texan economic impact was abnormally low because travel was still depressed from the 9/11 terrorist attacks and subsequent war in Afghanistan. Now, according to Simpson, those numbers are coming back to normal levels.

First-time Winter Texan visitors accounted for 7.5 percent of all visiting during the 2004-2005 season, up 1.5 percent from the 2002-2003 season, according to the university study. At that time, there was a 4-percent decline because of the Sept. 11 attacks, but the past season’s findings suggest that the number of new Winter Texans to the Valley may be returning to a traditional 10 percent to 12 percent increase.

While the chamber in the past has gotten its Winter Texan estimates from the UTPA studies done every two years, chamber President and CEO Steve Ahlenius said it won’t be using the $420 million figure in its winter visitor economic impact estimates.

“I just don’t think it’s a half-a-billion-dollar impact,” Ahlenius said. “I think that number is way out of line. We’ve told them that, too.”

Fewer traditional Winter Texans could come this year as they age into their mid- to late-80s and their children urge them to travel less and move into retirement homes, Ahlenius said.

In their stead come emerging baby boomer Winter Texans who are more physically active — golfing, birding, hiking, biking — but stay in the Valley for shorter periods of time than their older counterparts. Those from the younger generation typically will stay two to three weeks and then move on to another sunny clime. Traditional Winter Texans generally stay for three to four months.

That won’t necessarily have a negative impact on the Valley because the baby boomer Winter Texans generally have more disposable income and will spend more while in the Valley even though they won’t be here as long.

“I’m optimistic that we’re going to have a pretty good season,” Ahlenius said. “A fairly good number of them coming back this year.”

January is usually considered the first peak Winter Texan month, but “scouts,” as Ahlenius calls them, generally start arriving in November. Winter Texans will likely begin coming after the first big cold snap in the Midwest, where many call home.

“I keep hoping for a good blizzard,” Ahlenius said.

Gas prices have dropped to below $2 from nearly $3 at their peak over the summer, which removes much of a potential impediment to Winter Texan travel, Ahlenius said.

Heating oil prices have been projected to be higher this winter than in the past. But since that price, like gasoline, is tied to the price of a barrel of crude oil, which has fallen recently, Ahlenius said the price of heating oil may not have a negative effect on Winter Texan spending.

Oil prices affecting heating oil and natural gas costs could be lower than expected, Ahlenius said. “They’re moving lock step with the gasoline prices.”

This hurricane season will likely have little impact on Winter Texan travel to the area, Ahlenius said. Last year’s season damaged Florida more severely than this year’s, causing a larger influx into South Texas as fewer people went to Florida.

Arizona is the other state typically a target for winter visitors from colder parts of the United States. But Florida and Arizona typically have a different type of winter visitor from the Valley. Those states, according to Ahlenius, generally draw winter travelers who have more disposable income — people with second homes or expensive condominiums.

But in the Valley, most Winter Texans rent less expensive pads at recreational vehicle parks. During their stay in 2004-2005, 78 percent of Winter Texans lived in RV or mobile homes that they owned or rented, 15 percent rented a motel, apartment or house and 6 percent owned a house, apartment or condo, according to the university study.

“It’s more affordable here than it is in Arizona or Florida,” Ahlenius said. Another attraction to the Valley is its closer proximity to Mexico than Florida, and there is more Winter Texan cross-border traffic in the Valley than in Arizona, he said.

“Florida is way too busy,” said Winter Texan Orval Eikenhorst. “In Arizona they told us to go home.”

The 83-year-old Nebraska man was sitting with his fiancee, fellow Winter Texan Esther Reinholdt, also 83, from Iowa, at Sunday’s Feast of Sharing at the McAllen International Civic Center. The couple, to be married in January, had finished their early Thanksgiving meal and were relating things they had in common — both their spouses died after battling Alzheimer’s disease, both have been coming to the Valley for nearly three decades and stay in Pharr, and both share a distaste for Florida and Arizona.

Reinholdt and her late husband wintered in Phoenix one year. Another year they tried the Sunshine State but came back to the Valley by that January.

“People were not friendly like the people here are,” Reinholdt said of the two states. “The weather is better down here.”

In Arizona, she said people said: “We can’t wait for you people to go home. We’re tired of waiting at the cash register.”

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Winter Texans welcomed back as they have economic impact in Valley