KERR COUNTY — Tracy Moore stood on the stage at Crider’s Rodeo and Dancehall, watching as a crowd gathered to sing along with Texas musician Gary P. Nunn while couples were two-stepping their way around the dance floor.
For a century, the business on the banks of the Guadalupe River has been a destination on summer weekends. That came to a halt last summer when floodwaters swept through the property on July 4, the venue’s 100th birthday.
The months since have been spent rebuilding — a process that seemed never-ending until suddenly it was nearly done, said Moore, the venue’s owner.
Crider’s reopened in mid-May with a benefit concert featuring Nunn and raising funds for the San Antonio Botanical Garden’s project to replant trees along the river. For the first time since the flood, people made use of the new concrete dance floor and gathered again in a familiar space.
“It’s still Crider’s,” she said. “I wanted people to walk through the gate and say, ‘I’m home.”
The venue’s reopening was a milestone for Hunt, an unincorporated community in west Kerr County that was hit hard by last July’s flood.
Crider’s is “the anchor of the summer season,” said John Dunn, president of the Hunt Preservation Society, a nonprofit helping lead the recovery effort in the area. “This isn’t just the reopening of Crider’s. It’s the reopening of Hunt.”
The flood took a brutal human toll, killing 119 people in Kerr County. The natural disaster also wreaked havoc across the community in other ways, causing millions of dollars of damage and dealing a devastating economic blow to the county.
Hundreds of businesses were damaged or affected by the flood, and some of them have closed permanently. The county is heavily dependent on tourism, which has taken a hit in the wake of the deadly flooding and rebuilding efforts, costing the area much-needed jobs.
While many businesses are still working to rebuild and reopen, officials and business leaders hope the return of landmarks like Crider’s is an indication that this year’s summer tourism season can boost the local economy.
But the county’s economy is not fully recovered from the disaster, and it’s not clear how long it will take for that to happen.
Loss of jobs and tourism dollars
The economic recovery in the Kerr County area “is progressing but not complete,” according to an economic impact analysis published in March by the Texas A&M University’s Hazard Reduction and Recovery Center. Businesses that were damaged still needed help with repairing and rebuilding, while businesses that are open are still reporting fewer customers and lower revenues, the report said.
A survey conducted by the Kerr Together Long-Term Recovery Team in early 2026 found that 26 businesses had closed, though some of those may have been only temporarily closed, the report said.
More could follow. Todd Bock, director of the Kerr Economic Development Corp., said there are some businesses on the verge of closing, depending on how this summer season goes.
About two-thirds of 79 business owners surveyed by the Texas Division of Emergency Management last November said their business had major damage or was destroyed, according to the A&M report. Only 27% of businesses said they had insurance, limiting their financial resources for repair and recovery.
Many of the business owners have struggled getting financial help, Bock said.
“There are no feasible tools to help businesses recover,” he said. “Even on the federal and state level, you are limited in the resources you can apply to business recovery.”
Philanthropic aid — from the Community Foundation of the Texas Hill Country, from local chambers of commerce and other donors, including churches — has helped close some gaps, but some businesses are still struggling.
The effects aren’t limited to those directly damaged by floodwaters.
A disaster like the July 4 flood has layered impacts, said Laura Schmahmann, an assistant professor at Texas A&M who co-authored the economic report. In addition to physical damage, there are also the indirect effects that come from “changes to business as usual,” she said. That’s especially true in an economy like Kerr County’s, which is heavily reliant on seasonal tourism and summer camps, which were both disrupted last year by the flood and again this year by the lingering effects.
The county has “a lot of highs and lows throughout the year” she said — meaning it’s harder to be resilient year round, compared to larger, urban economies with more stable populations.
Fewer visitors means less traffic in retail stores and restaurants, which are major drivers of the local economy. In 2024, 19% of all Kerr County jobs were in retail, and another 17% in accommodation and food. The county had over 550,000 overnight stays in both 2023 and 2024, and visitation accounts for hundreds of local jobs, the report said.
While hotel stays didn’t drop immediately after the flood, that was likely due to residents who were displaced and needed a place to stay, as well as visitors involved in recovery efforts. “The full extent of the decline in tourism is unlikely to be clear until the end of 2026,” the report said.
Two major unknown factors are how long it takes to rebuild and reopen accommodations that were damaged — RV parks, vacation rentals, etc. — and whether summer camps return to their pre-flood capacities, Schmahmann said.
It’s also not clear if tourists will return in the same numbers to Kerr County, or if they’ll be turned away by concerns about a flood happening again, by traumatic experiences from last summer or other deterrents, she said.
The study projected substantial economic impacts from those possibilities. Lower summer camp capacity this year could result in more than $10 million in lost revenue and the loss of 98 to 199 jobs, while tourism impacts from lost visitation could result in losses of 36 to 144 jobs and between $5 million and $20 million in economic losses.
While the report said there isn’t enough data for quantitative modeling for other types of businesses, “anecdotal evidence suggests that businesses are reducing hours for existing employees and/or relying on grants or savings to fund their businesses in the short term,” which are temporary solutions but may ultimately result in more closures.
The report said that 2026 “would need to be a strong tourism year to not only rebound to pre-flood status but to recover losses during the downtime in 2025.”
Some local leaders are trying to make that happen, with a campaign led by the Kerrville Convention and Visitors Bureau “to welcome the tourism back into our community,” Bock said.
A blueprint to follow
At Crider’s, Moore is ready to welcome back tourists and locals alike, with a full summer season planned of weekly concerts and rodeos.
Dunn said the venue’s path to reopening is “the blueprint” for other businesses to follow.
“They rallied their own personal resources, as a private business owner, of course you have to do that, but they also took advantage of the assistance that was available, through volunteer organizations, donated materials,” he said. “It was really the family that had to drive it. The business owner has to drive recovery.”
At first, the process of rebuilding was slow, Moore said, waiting on grants and approvals. As soon as those were in place, “we were full steam ahead.”
She took the opportunity to make a few improvements, she said — upgrading the bathrooms that were built in 1947, for one.
It was a rush finishing in time for the benefit concert: those bathrooms weren’t quite finished, and neither was the green room for musicians.
But the important parts were ready for customers, who “just want the dance floor and the band,” she said. The rebuilt venue has reminders of the people lost last summer, with memorial plaques attached to new picnic tables lining the edges of the dance floor. In the new bathroom, the words “Dancing for Nay Nay,” adorn the sink — a reference to Renee Smajstrla, Moore’s great niece, who died at Camp Mystic.
Return of summer camps
Fifteen of the summer camps that operate in Kerr County and neighboring Kendall County have reopened, according to the Kerr Together Long-Term Recovery Group, which is coordinating flood response.
One, Camp Mystic, remains closed while locked in a high-profile legal battle with many of the parents whose children died there.
Another camp, Heart O’ the Hills, moved from its former site on the South Fork of the Guadalupe River, just upstream of Crider’s, to a new property on the North Fork. It opened in June.
After the flood, state legislators approved a slew of new requirements intended to improve camp safety. While one major new mandate, installation of fiber optic internet service, was delayed this year, other new rules did take effect and required major changes at some camps.
“It’s not clear if and how long it will be until summer camps are at the same level they were, or if they ever will be,” Schmahmann said.
“Camping is also a cornerstone of who we are in Kerr County, and helps keep our community strong and our economy thriving,” Kerr Together said in a news release in May. “Camps are woven into the fabric of our lives here.”
Dunn said that while this summer won’t see the full economic impact that it typically brings, he’s hopeful visitors will return and businesses will benefit.
“It’s going to be scaled back,” he said. “We won’t be at full capacity at camps, and our short-term rentals aren’t all entirely put back, so we can’t accommodate tourists at the number we did before, but I still expect to see a lot of tourists coming to the area.”
‘Got knocked down pretty hard’
A few miles down the river between Hunt and Ingram, Jack Hudson said he’s hoping for the same.
Hudson owns Quality Patio Furniture, and he said the visitors who come through in the summer are a key part of his clientele — though at the moment, he’s also got plenty of orders from locals who lost their furniture in the flood and want to replace it, too.
During the flood, water reached more than seven feet high inside his workshop, and in his home next door. He and his wife, Jennifer, survived by clinging to their porch railing for hours, waiting for the water to recede.
They moved back into the home in February, and reopened the business in April.
“We did get knocked down pretty hard,” he said. The flood damaged and destroyed much of his equipment, which he’s still gradually working to replace, sometimes still reaching for tools before he realizes they’re not there.
“We accepted any and all help,” Jennifer said, from volunteers who helped clean out the debris, to replacement equipment donated by Global Empowerment Mission, a Florida-based disaster relief organization.
Now that the business is up and running again, with three employees at work and a list of orders to catch up on, Jack said he’s hoping to see some of the typical summer traffic pick back up, too.
For others in the area, demand never waned, but they’ve been struggling to keep up after losses.
Vlasek Pump Company, a water well, pump and septic business, lost nearly all of its vehicles during the flood, but was immediately getting calls for service in the wake of the disaster.
Water systems were inundated, wells damaged and water lines mangled, and they needed repairs, said Chris Sevey, who runs the family-owned business with his wife, Sydney.
“We had to get back up and running,” he said, but as a for-profit business, they didn’t qualify for much financial help replacing the lost equipment.
Area churches and other donors have helped, he said, with donations that initially helped cover payroll and then with buying new equipment to keep going.
Nearly a year later, Sevey said business is now the busiest he’s seen, with the typical summer work of irrigation systems and work at vacation homes and summer camps, on top of the rebuilding and repairs. As residents and businesses rebuild, “we’ve been able to start turning meters on,” he said.
“The reality of this is hard, to pull it out of a complete and total loss,” he said. “But there’s no quit in us at all.”
Committed to the rebuild
Other businesses are still in various stages of rebuilding and haven’t reopened yet.
The Dam Center in Ingram is still empty, as owner Steve Edelstein continues repairing the retail center. On a recent afternoon, Kirt Gustafson was spraying primer on new drywall inside the former and future home of Vintage Hair Co.
The salon had moved into the space just two weeks before the building flooded, with water reaching more than seven feet inside.
The building, which sits across Texas 39 from the dam that creates Lake Ingram and is a popular swimming destination, held seven commercial and residential units before the flood. All of them sustained major damage.
Vintage Hair will be the only tenant to return, Edelstein said, but he has commercial tenants lined up for six of the units, and is hoping to have them moving in this summer.
The process has been slower than he hoped, he said, in part because of the costs of rebuilding and limited funds.
“We’ve been very fortunate, we’ve had a lot of grants,” he said, citing support from the West Kerr County Chamber of Commerce, several local churches and LiftFund, the San Antonio nonprofit that has been providing small business support with funding from the Community Foundation of the Texas Hill Country. Global Empowerment Mission donated the drywall and some of the electrical and lighting materials, he said.
But there isn’t enough money to hire an actual contractor, so “we’re just doing what we can,” Edelstein said. He’s been relying on savings and trying to get the work completed so he can start collecting rent again “before my savings run out.”
AJ Nelson, owner of Vintage Hair, said she’s crossing her fingers she’ll be back in her space as soon as possible. Since the flood, she’s been working out of another salon in Kerrville, renting space from a friend.
“It was a little bit of a shock to go from owning my business, to now I have to pay to go somewhere else to work,” she said. “It’s been kind of a puzzle, just taking it day by day.”
She said she was approved for a loan from the U.S. Small Business Administration for about $40,000, at 4% interest with a 30-year repayment term — but ultimately thought it was too risky to take the loan.
“I will almost be 80 by the time that’s paid off,” she said.
Like Edelstein, she said she’s received money from Global Empowerment Mission and LiftFund. She tentatively plans to be back in the Dam Center this summer.
Rebuilding plans also continue at the Hunt Store, a popular gathering place in the center of Hunt that was devastated by the flood.
The shell of the store still sits fenced off, with the words “Hunt Strong” on the facade.
John and Vikki Dunn, who owned the store for a decade until they sold it in 2024, recently bought it back and are putting together a plan to reopen it, operating first out of a smaller building next door.
They’re aiming to have the “Hunt Mini Store” open and selling food, drinks and some basic necessities in the next two to three weeks, John Dunn said, along with live music offerings, operating once again as a community hub. That will remain open while they put together a full rebuilding plan for the store.
“We’re committed to the rebuild,” he said.
Every dollar matters
Other businesses are somewhere in between — their doors are open, but they’re a long way from being back to normal.
In Ingram, the Hill Country Arts Foundation is running its summer camps and hosting events, but much of the property is still out of commission.
The Guadalupe tore through the Point Theatre, an amphitheater that sits on the riverbank, as well as the building that held the box office, an indoor theater and office space, and the ceramics studio, which was brand new before the flood.
The theater was designed to survive a flood and responded that way, Executive Director Sarah Tacey said — the river rushed through the walls, tearing them down, but the roof and floor remained intact.
“So this, we can fix,” she said — although it’s still going to cost “a whole lot of money.”
Exactly how much is still to be determined, but her best estimate is tens of millions of dollars. The foundation received $260,000 in grants from the Tres Grace Foundation and the Community Foundation to hire Lake Flato Architects to develop a long-term redesign for the campus.
For now, the foundation is operating out of the Duncan-McAshan Visual Arts Center, which was spared by the flood.
Summer camp started in June, though with shorter and smaller sessions, and the pottery studio has a temporary home for now.
Rachel Lovelace, the foundation’s director of visual arts, said she was initially unsure how to move forward.
“It was something I was going to let the community decide for itself,” she said, and they quickly did.
Artists, even those who’d lost loved ones, were still bringing in art for upcoming shows, salvaging what they could from the damaged spaces, and wanting to hold scheduled events as much as possible. “It was just kind of a force,” she said.
For 67 years, the arts foundation has been “a place for people to get together,” Lovelace said. While things might look a little different now, that’s still the case.
She and Tacey said that even though this summer won’t look the same, they’re hoping to see visitors return and help businesses recover.
“Eat lunch, come and see all of the galleries, go to the boutiques,” Lovelace said, because every dollar spent locally matters. “Right now is the best time to come and visit us.”
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