EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) — An El Paso law firm is giving the University of Texas at El Paso $5 million to help establish a law school at the university.

The gift from Tawney, Acosta & Chaparro, P.C. was announced on Thursday, April 8. A celebratory ceremony included UTEP President Heather Wilson and law partners James Tawney, Alejandro Acosta and Daisy Chaparro Cavazos.

“El Paso is ready for a law school that matches the scale, talent and needs of our region,” said James Tawney, founding parter of Tawney, Acosta & Chaparro, P.C. “This gift provides access and opportunity. Too many talented students in our region, especially first-generation and Hispanic students, face barriers to pursuing a legal education because of cost, distance, or the need to stay close to family support systems that are critical to their success. El Paso institutions have proven that when our students are able to pursue advanced degrees in their own community, they stay, build their careers here, and give back in meaningful ways.”

The gift matches an original $5 million challenge grant committed by the Paul L. Foster Family Foundation last fall, bringing the total raised for the prospective law school to $10 million.

“The legal community is answering the call to make a law school,” UTEP President Heather Wilson said. “Every day, I grow firmer in my belief: There will be a law school in El Paso one day – and it will be at UTEP.”

Those two gifts, totaling $10 million, brings the university about halfway there to being able to have a law school, Wilson said.

She called the gift from Tawney, Acosta & Chaparro “transformative gift.”

“The hard part of a law school is starting it up,” Wilson said. “The first 11 years, it doesn’t pay for itself, because you have to get the faculty, develop the curriculum and enroll the first students. By year 11, it is OK. It covers its cost. It’s the startup that is the challenge.”

Wilson said that with growing support from people in the region, “there is a strong feeling that now is the time that we need a law school in West Texas.”

“We need to continue to build support from the community, especially the legal community. There is a shortage of legal talent here in this region,” Wilson added.

A Texas Legislature-commissioned feasibility study, completed in 2024, found that establishing a law school at UTEP would fill a gap in the region’s and state’s need for legal services. The study also found that, properly managed and supported, a law school would support itself after a start-up period of 10 years. The cost to start up the law school is about $20 million over that 10-year period, plus the cost of a law school building, UTEP said in a news release.

With sufficient support from the community, UTEP will engage in conversations with the University of Texas System Board of Regents and Texas Legislature to seek needed approval and additional capital support, potentially submitting a formal request to start a law school during the 2027 legislative session, the university said.

UTEP continues to work with local leaders to secure philanthropic and business commitments from the El Paso community to start the law school, the university added.

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