TEXAS — Located 30 miles south of Laredo, the earliest Spanish settlers planted roots in what is now San Ygnacio in the mid-1700s. The township began in the 1830s. Descendants of the border town’s founding father still live in the historic town.
Others, like retired physician and artist Eric Avery, settled much later. Avery has lived in San Ygnacio for 40 years.
San Ygnacio is recognized by the state of Texas and the United States as a historic landmark.
“You mean, the historic preservation of the historic buildings here of the last surviving colonial fort in Texas,” asked Avery.
For decades, the quiet and quaint town has mostly gone unnoticed and undisturbed, until now.
“The riverbank is being cleared because the wall is going to be placed,” said Avery.
San Ygnacio is the latest border community pushing back against the federal government’s effort to fortify the U.S.-Mexico border.
“It’s absolutely heartbreaking to see all the destruction they are doing,” said local property owner and activist Elsa Hull.
The federal border barrier project in this part of the state revealed something most in San Ygnacio didn’t know — lands once believed to be private property belong to the U.S. government.
“And they are moving fast,” said Hull, discussing how fast construction crews have cleared sections of trees and brush.
According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and the International Boundary and Water Commission (IBWC), lands near the banks of the Rio Grande that border San Ygnacio belong to the federal government.
IBWC maps uncovered by Spectrum News show areas nestled between the historic town and the Rio Grande are in the floodplain. The land in question was condemned by the federal government in the 1950s when nearby Falcon Lake was constructed.
Protecting private property is what Hull thought she was doing. It turns out that previously believed private property belongs to the federal government.
Federal land or not, the people who live in this quiet town are determined to stop the construction of the border wall.
“There’s real questions being asked about what they are doing,” Avery said.
Avery and Hull are both landowners and active members of the No Border Wall Coalition.
Spectrum News asked Hull how long she is willing to carry out this fight to stop border wall encroachment.
“As long as I can. Until they drag me away,” Hull said.
On Thursday, after Spectrum News left San Ygnacio, Hull was arrested for interfering with construction crews. Charged with criminal trespass, she was released a short time later from the Zapata County Jail.
Zapata County deputies arresting San Ygancio resident Elsa Hull. (Courtesy No Border Wall Coalition)