Privatization For Texas’ Fair Park

City park officials will consider a privatization proposal for the 277-acre complex in the coming months, according to the Dallas Morning News. But some officials say ending city management of Fair Park might face hurdles because it has multiple tenants and organizations, unlike the zoo.

The zoo was spun off from city control and management handed to a private board, followed by record-breaking attendance and improved maintenance, with new programs and exhibits, the paper reports. While the plan reportedly is being greeted with enthusiasm by the Dallas City Council, the city’s Park and Recreation Board and others are more skeptical.

“Whenever people use the zoo as an example, I tell them it’s a good example of what happens when all the pieces are in place,” Lois Finkelman, a former city councilwoman and zoo board chair, told the Morning News. “But Fair Park is more complicated.”

Willis Winters, head of the park department, points out that just conducting an inventory of Fair Park’s assets is likely to be difficult.

“With the zoo, you just had a zoo,” he told the paper. “With Fair Park you have the State Fair, you have museums, you have cultural institutions, you have a football game. The bottom line is, this is going to take longer.”