Starbase takes next step in massive expansion — here’s what you need to know

The city of Starbase expects to gather petition signatures from more than 300 landowners across the 7,133 acres it expects to annex in the coming months. 

Some of those property owners include the city’s namesake, SpaceX, state and federal agencies, and private landowners. Annexation by petition requires 51% of property owners to agree to it. 

If successful, Starbase would grow from 927 acres to nearly 8,000.

The city held its first public hearing on Wednesday night, following its mid-February approval of its intent to annex the land. Between mid-March and mid-August, the city expects to gather signatures from affected property owners. A second hearing on the topic is scheduled for August 2, and a third one could come as soon as September. 

Longtime Port Isabel resident David Wollaston has some family-owned land inside the proposed annexation. There’s no structure on the site — it’s just undeveloped property. 

Wollaston said he supports the city of Starbase’s plans. 

“It’s all real positive and exciting because the future is here, and we don’t have to go to Houston to see it. It’s right here in our backyard,” he said about SpaceX.

Before 2019, cities across Texas were not required to get residents’ consent to proceed with annexation. After Texas House Bill 347 was passed, cities have to seek voluntary annexation through a petition. If the city can’t collect a majority of signatures, it has to hold an election and let voters in the proposed annexed area decide whether to approve the annexation. 

Who owns the land?

Texas Parks and Wildlife owns more than 200 parcels inside the proposed area, and entities related to SpaceX control more than 80.

The estate of John Caputa, a Chicago radio personality who helped develop the land into a Polish community in the 1960s, owns more than 20 parcels. 

It’s unclear how Starbase is contacting the heirs of those parcels because there is no mailing address on file for them in Cameron County Appraisal District records. 

There are also dozens of landowners with Polish last names and Illinois forwarding addresses consistent with the ethnic community development.

Nearly a dozen parcels are owned by Leland Phillips, owner of Easy Ride Golf Cars, with locations in the city of Mission and in Georgia. 

Property owners should have already gotten at least one letter from the city of Starbase notifying them about Wednesday’s meeting, Starbase City Administrator Kent Myers said. 

“Some of them have been calling and emailing with questions. We have been responding to those and they’ll be getting a petition very soon,” Myers said. “Some think it’s a good idea and some are worried about their taxes, zoning and other issues. So it’s a real mixed bag.”

The case for expansion — and the pushback

Starbase city leaders say its proposed larger footprint, which would extend city limits to the Boca Chica beach dunes and the banks of the Rio Grande River, enables its new police and fire departments to serve as first responders for the entire community without a patchwork of overlapping state, federal, and county jurisdictions. 

Environmental advocates counter that argument. They believe Starbase is using the annexation process to seize control of more land around Boca Chica Beach and to block public access to the park. 

“Boca Chica is meant for the people and wildlife — not for Elon Musk and his company town to use for blowing up deadly rockets and dumping toxic, toxic pollution into our communities. This annexation is wrong for many reasons,” Rebekah Hinojosa, co-founder of the South Texas Environmental Justice Network, said. 

The group recently protested the annexation from inside the proposed boundaries. The organization obtained permission from one of the affected landowners: Robin Gavriel, a resident of Colorado who wants to keep the land as a nature preserve. Environmentalists say Gavriel opposes the annexation plans and worries about future land use restrictions. 

Beyond the annexation case, Starbase is expected to grow through a land swap with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge in which the federal agency would divest 712 acres along Boca Chica Boulevard — otherwise known as State Highway 4 — in exchange for 692 acres owned by SpaceX along State Highway 100 near Laguna Vista and an existing wildlife viewing area.