{"id":248861,"date":"2026-04-14T07:36:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-14T07:36:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/248861\/"},"modified":"2026-04-14T07:36:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-14T07:36:10","slug":"statue-of-former-san-antonio-mayor-to-be-unveiled-at-north-side-park-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/248861\/","title":{"rendered":"Statue of former San Antonio mayor to be unveiled at North Side park"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">A statue of former San Antonio Mayor Phil Hardberger will soon be installed at the North Side park that bears his name.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Local businessman and philanthropist Harvey Najim commissioned the life-size bronze statue of Hardberger by Laredo artist Armando\u00a0Hinojosa. It\u00a0will be near the Urban Ecology Center at the 330-acre Phil Hardberger Park.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Hardberger, 91, said Najim called him about a year ago and said he wanted to have a statue of him made to commemorate his legacy and inspire younger generations. Hardberger said he was &#8220;totally floored&#8221; by the &#8220;touching and thought-provoking&#8221; gesture.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Workers photographed Hardberger from &#8220;every conceivable angle&#8221; and took a variety of measurements, from the tips of his fingers to the main part of his hand and from his ear lobes to his hairline, he said. He said he wanted to be posed informally, and the statue positions him mid-stance carrying a coat, his hair ruffled.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">The statue will be unveiled April 28 at the park, where Hardberger often gives tours.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">RELATED: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.expressnews.com\/projects\/best-day-ever\/san-antonio-phil-hardberger\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Spend a perfect day with former San Antonio Mayor Phil Hardberger;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;Spend a perfect day with former San Antonio Mayor Phil Hardberger&quot;}\" class=\"link \">Spend a perfect day with former San Antonio Mayor Phil Hardberger<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">He was one of San Antonio&#8217;s most popular modern mayors.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">He held the office from 2005 to 2009 after stints as executive secretary of the U.S. Peace Corps, a capital in the Air Force, a trial attorney, assistant director of the U.S. Office of Economic Opportunity under President Lyndon B. Johnson and chief justice at Texas&#8217; 4th Court of Appeals.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">While in office, Hardberger pushed for the Museum Reach section of the River Walk and the redevelopment of Main Plaza, worked on public-private partnerships to help finance the Haven for Hope homeless campus and the Tobin Center for the Performing Arts, and helped orchestrate the city&#8217;s acquisition of a ranch for what became his namesake park.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Today, he sits on the boards of the Phil Hardberger Park Conservancy, the Tobin Center and the Great Springs Project.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">&#8220;I just think the world of him,&#8221; Najim said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">This article originally published at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.expressnews.com\/news\/article\/phil-hardberger-park-statue-san-antonio-22204330.php?utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_campaign=yahoo_syndication\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Statue of former San Antonio mayor to be unveiled at North Side park;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;Statue of former San Antonio mayor to be unveiled at North Side park&quot;}\" class=\"link \">Statue of former San Antonio mayor to be unveiled at North Side park<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A statue of former San Antonio Mayor Phil Hardberger will soon be installed at the North Side park&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":248862,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[40193,94562,94118,94119,82,84,83],"class_list":{"0":"post-248861","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-antonio","8":"tag-harvey-najim","9":"tag-north-side-park","10":"tag-phil-hardberger","11":"tag-phil-hardberger-park","12":"tag-san-antonio","13":"tag-san-antonio-headlines","14":"tag-san-antonio-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248861","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=248861"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248861\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/248862"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=248861"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=248861"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=248861"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}