The Museo's dream team. Illustration by Jeremiah TeutschWhen District 1 Councilman Diego Bernal and state Public Utility Commissioner Rolando Pablos teamed up a year ago to save the Museo Alameda, even PdA – dreamers that we are – couldn’t have guessed at this week's surprise happy ending for the long troubled pink and silver building on Market Square. It’s nuptials, of course, with Texas A&M University-San Antonio. (Rumors of the courtship first leaked in February.)
Under the terms of the deal Council approved Thursday, A&M-San Antonio will use the building to develop an Educational and Cultural Arts Center, a festive footprint right in UTSA's downtown front yard. The center will be operated in partnership with the City’s Office of Cultural Affairs, and although the long-troubled Museo will be gone, the mission to document Latino experience and culture in the United States remains.
"It's not a takeover," said Pablos, who has served as the Museo's board chair and last-ditch-hope since early 2010. "It's a passing of the baton."
In fact, the math of the new A&M deal doesn’t look all that different from the City's current arrangement with the Museo.
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