American-Statesman Staff| Austin American-Statesman
Wildcatter, philanthropist and environmental provocateur Jim Bob Moffett has died, University of Texas officials have confirmed.
He died Friday in Austin of complications from COVID-19. He was 82.
"Jim Bob was a Texas legend. He was very instrumental in the success of our athletic department,” Chris Del Conte, UT’s athleticdirector, told the American-Statesman on Saturday. “He was one of the original wildcats. Just a legendary Texas oilman. He was bigger than life. He'll be sorely missed."
Moffett's son, Bubba, told Nola.comon Saturday that his father had been ill for several years before he contractedCOVID-19.
Moffett played tackle for legendary UT football coach Darrell Royal, studied geology and went on to become a major donor, only to later threaten to sue three professors.
Theformer mining executive and multimillion-dollar UT donor's plans for a huge development upstream of Barton Springs galvanized the city's environmental movement in the early 1990s and birthed a more aggressive breed of activist.
The drilling company he co-founded was part of one of the largest mergers in Wall Street history. Itbecame one of the world's biggest miners of gold and copperwhile drawing scorn in Austin and elsewhere for alleged ties to human rights abuses in Indonesia.
Moffett was born in 1938 in Houma, La. After his parents divorced, his mother moved him and his sister to Houston. Moffett attended UT on a full football scholarship. He went on to earn a master's degree from Tulane University in New Orleans.
He formed McMoRan Exploration with W.K. McWilliams Jr. and B.M. Rankin. In 1981, Moffett put together one of the largest corporate mergers in Wall Street history, combining McMoRan Oil & Gas Co. and Freeport Minerals Co.to form Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc.
The company's operations halfway around the world put Moffett in the crosshairs of campus controversy.
Critics had long regarded the company as a symbol of neocolonialism, citing environmental problems caused by mining, as well as allegedkillings, torture and other abuses of indigenous people by soldiers for the Indonesian government, a business partner in the operation.
Closer to home, Freeport spawned a grassroots movement to protect water quality when it spun off FM Properties, now known as Stratus Properties, to develop subdivisions in the juniper-draped hills along Barton Creekwest of Austin.
More: Documentary explores long history of Austin's green identity
The proposal included amix of 3,000 homes, 3 million square feet of commercial development and golf courses on 4,000 acres in an ecologically fragile stretch of hills in Southwest Austinbetween Barton Creek and Southwest Parkway. The development was to be built over a network of underground waterways that feed Barton Springs.
Environmentalists argued that Moffett's development would wash building materials, dirt andpollutants that accompany everyday human life into the aquifer, ultimately fouling the springs. Rather than treat the situation as a political dispute in which both sides had legitimate interests — an approach that many activists said had led them to compromise too easily — activists framed the issue as cruel business interests threatening Austin's most beloved civic feature.
The fight culminated in a City Council meeting June 7, 1990. It is widely considered the high point of Austin civic participation: 17 hours of songs, poems, threats and pleas persuaded a glassy-eyed City Council that had seemed likely to approve the proposal to unanimously reject it. From that decision rose the Save Our Springs Coalition (now the SOS Alliance)and landmark rules that limit development in that portion of Austin.
The Texas Supreme Court would ultimately strikedown the company's effort to invalidate the city's restrictive SOS Ordinance.
Multiple UT endowments carry Moffett's name. He and his wife donated $2 million for a renovation of Royal-Memorial Stadium. They also donated $2.5 million for the $30 million molecular biology building that bears their name, with Freeport also paying more than $1 million. But there was no ribbon-cutting when the building opened in 1997. The full name is chiseled into stone just below the roof line, but it is barely visible from the sidewalk because of a curved front wall.
Faculty members, students, environmentalists and human rights activists had fought the UT System regents' decision to name the building for the Moffetts. They objected to Freeport's gold-drilling operations in Indonesia, which were tangled up in heated legal disputes; the company threatened to sue three professors for what it called false allegations of human rights violations.
There were no lawsuits, and ultimately thedispute faded.
Despite the rancor, Moffett told the Statesman at the time that hissupport for his alma mater would endure.
"I'm going to continue to give money to the university,'' said Moffett, who would retireas chairman of Freeport-McMoRan in 2015,after activist investor Carl Icahn took an 8.5% stakein the Phoenix-based company. "Just because a bunch of people tried to make a political issue ... isn't going to stop me from supporting the University of Texas."
