The prospect of Eagle Pass, Texas, becoming the first municipality in America to see the total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024, triggered visions in the border town of big crowds preceded by a big music festival.
The city’s marketing and tourism director, Aide Castano, told a 2023 meeting of the Eagle Pass Rotary Club that the city of 28,000 should prepare to host nearly quadruple its population for the event.
“Mark your calendar for the eclipse, get your grocery shopping done, we’re gonna have 100,000 people in Eagle Pass, we’re gonna have millions of dollars in sales for downtown Eagle Pass,” Castano said by the recollection of resident Amerika Garcia-Grewall, who attended the meeting.
Garcia-Grewall further recalled, “One of the real estate agents is like, ‘Airbnb will make $10,000 in the eclipse weekend.’”
The producers of the music festival named it 57 South Music Fest, after U.S. Highway 57 South, which reaches the border at Eagle Pass and the designated venue, city-owned Shelby Park. The scenic 47.4 acre grassy expanse on the banks of the Rio Grande River has been the site of successful carnivals and events, including an annual international friendship celebration. The 57 South producers posted what seemed like a formula for a resounding success.
“17 Bands, 3 Nights, 2 Stages, & 1 Total Eclipse – April 5-7, 2024”
The city posted its own appeal: “If you’re a music lover and a celestial enthusiast, then there’s no better time to start planning your trip to Eagle Pass, Texas!”
But nobody foresaw that Texas Gov. Greg Abbott would seize control of the park on Jan. 10 as the base for Operation Lone Star, a $10.5 billion political stunt in response to the ”invasion” of migrants at the southern border. He ordered Texas Army National Guard soldiers, supported by state law enforcement officers, to place steel shipping containers and string razor wire along the water’s edge. He barred federal Border Patrol agents from the site of the planned music festival.
A Texas National Guard soldier patrols near the Rio Grande river at Shelby Park in Eagle Pass, Texas.
The city thought about canceling the 57 South but instead arranged to relocate it to the grounds of the Kickapoo Lucky Eagle Casino, which has capacity for 10,000. The Native American-owned property is 10 miles from the original venue as a bird flies, but 15 miles by car, a 20-minute drive from Shelby Park and the city’s commercial center. There was still hope for big crowds, and some of the area hotels prepared to take advantage of the influx. The local Hampton Inn hiked its regular rate from $224 to $1,417 for the night before the eclipse.
One indication that things might not meet the expectations of the profiteers came as the price for a one day festival pass fell from $80 to $50. A two-day pass that previously cost $160 fell to $95. A three- day pass dropped from $225 to $135.
Another bad sign came on Feb. 22, when the city announced that its financial and business director, Jesus Rodriquez, had been fired, effective immediately. The city gave no explanation for the dismissal, but his responsibilities included the finances of 57 South.
Meanwhile, Abbott and Donald Trump staged a mutually beneficial photo op in Shelby Park on Feb. 29. They spoke of an “invasion” from the south, though the number of migrants arriving there had plummeted from more than 2,000 a day to a few dozen. That may have been in part a delayed response to Abbott’s soldiers and razor wire, but the drop coincided with sharply increased migrant interdiction efforts in Mexico.
“Mexico really stepped it up,” said Garcia-Grewall, who makes regular visits to Mexico delivering food to a once-packed but now nearly empty migrant shelter in Piedras Negras, sister city to Eagle Pass.
Back in Eagle Pass, Garcia-Grewall attended a March 14 town hall meeting, where it was revealed that an armed camp and talk of invading hordes apparently are not conducive to tourism. The city told the gathering that it was halving the anticipated eclipse crowd to 50,000.
On April 2, a local music producer who was not involved in 57 South addressed the Eagle Pass City Council meeting during the public comment section. The producer, Tony Rodriguez, said it was his understanding that the city had spent $3.2 million on the event and had sold only 3,500 tickets. Garcia-Grewall says that when speaking to people at the same meeting she was told that the city had spent $3.5 million and only 2,500 tickets had been sold.
“We would have had to sell those tickets at $1,400 each in order to break even on cost,” she told The Daily Beast.
The Daily Beast could not confirm those numbers. The event’s producer, Just 1 Management, did not respond to a query, and the city had failed to comply with public record requests by the Eagle Pass Business Journal.
After the public comment session, the council members went into executive session and then voted unanimously to initiate a forensic audit of the festival’s finances. City Manager Homero Balderas, Marquez, and Castano did not respond to requests for comment from The Daily Beast. Castano did speak to Texas Monthly, saying planning for eclipse weekend began in 2002.
“I remember one of my coworkers said, ‘This is like our Super Bowl,’ ” she is quoted saying.
But then Texas became a place where a perfect spot for a music festival was seized by troops under orders from a governor spending billions to boost his political fortunes.
On Friday afternoon, the town was said to be quiet, with little evidence of an impending influx of visitors. The festival would soon begin, and whatever crowd materialized was boosted by tickets that a local radio station—a co-sponsor—was giving away.
At 3:30 pm, the festival commenced on the casino grounds. Rodriguez, the local music producer, saw only 30 people at 4 p.m. Two hours later, he counted just 150.
“The worst flop ever,” he said.
The original venue, Shelby Park, had its full contingent of soldiers and law enforcement officers behind the razor wire.
“The State of Texas is making it look like a war zone, even though we're one of the safest places in Texas,” Garcia-Grewell said. “And the city of Eagle Pass was not able to counter that. They won't say anything against the state of Texas because Eagle Pass is so dependent on state funding.”
She likened the situation to a domestic violence situation in which the victim will not speak out because the husband is in financial control.
“The city of Eagle Pass is in an abusive relationship with Governor Abbott,” she said.
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