City manager urges disaster preparedness

By CATHERINE DONNELLY
By Editor in News
November 23, 2023​​​​​​​

The Port Isabel City Council discussed several pertinent issues during the governing body’s regularly scheduled meeting Tuesday night November 14.

The gas semi-trucks that exploded and caught on fire in Brownsville caused a three-alarm response the night before, according to Jared Hockema, Port Isabel City Manager, and used up the city’s firefighting foam that was on hand.

“This type of incident drives home the fact that we currently have no capacity or resources to deal with a disaster of the nature and scope of what could happen at one of the three LNG plants in various stages of being built on 48,” said Hockema, referring to Texas State Highway 48 which parallels the Port of Brownsville shipping channel.

This discussion led to the issue of SpaceX’s plan to apply to the Texas Commission for Environmental Quality (TCEQ) for a proposed wastewater treatment plant at SpaceX. The stormwater permit had still not been applied for at the time of the meeting.

“The public depends on access to our natural resources and wants to continue enjoying our pristine environment — that’s why they visit Port Isabel and South Padre Island,” Hockema said. “This area is very popular for fishing, and we have a unique and vulnerable ecological location. We need to make sure the water treatment plant doesn’t impact these things.”

Also discussed were plans in the works to improve the site of the historic lighthouse by replacing a storage building with a classroom for the site. Port Isabel’s Lighthouse is the 4th most visited historical site in the state of Texas. The city will chip in $2,000, and the Texas Historical Commission will pay for the rest so that they can begin to hold monthly classes highlighting the history of the Lighthouse and the area. The old fencing has already been replaced with historically appropriate fencing for a more accurate historical aesthetic.