The Corpus Christi City Council will soon decide whether to move forward with formal proceedings related to a petition requesting removal of Mayor Paulette Guajardo.
The City Council on March 24 is expected to consider the next steps — if any — for the petition, filed in August by Rachel Caballero, a Corpus Christi resident and frequent attendant of council meetings.
Documents show it was signed by six city residents, meeting the threshold to file the petition.
Allegations made in the document relate to a controversy involving $2 million in tax incentives that was awarded to company Elevate QOF LLC for development of a downtown Homewood Suites hotel in 2024.
Questions about circumstances of the award have revolved primarily around a slide used in a PowerPoint presentation that had initially been used as part of Elevate QOF’s request.
The screenshot of a Federal Emergency Management Agency site did not appear on the PowerPoint slide as it did online. There has been dispute over whether it had been an inadvertent formatting error or an intentional effort to mislead officials.
Corpus Christi Mayor Paulette Guajardo signs her oath of office during a swearing-in ceremony at City Hall on Jan. 14, 2025.
The allegations made in the petition run closely to some of those made in a lawsuit against the city filed by hotelier Ajit David.
The petition asserts that Guajardo was made aware several times of concerns that the screenshot may have been altered before putting an item on a City Council agenda to award tax incentives to the project, and subsequently voting in favor of the tax incentives.
“This is ‘misconduct’ and ‘malfeasance’ on the part of Paulette Guajardo and grounds for removal,” the document states.
Guajardo, in a March 19 message to the Caller-Times, wrote that she “would urge the Council to dismiss the complaint,” adding that “it has no legal or factual merit.”
“The matter has been examined and rejected by multiple law enforcement agencies, and it represents an irresponsible use of public funds,” she wrote.
The tax incentive
The slide in question included a screenshot of FEMA’s website, capturing an image of a news release announcing that flood map changes would take effect in October 2022.
The date it was released — April 13, 2022 — does not appear on the slide.
Developer Philip Ramirez in December 2023 told the Type B board the flood map changes had been unforeseen.
The funding request was for two purposes, he had said — one for floodplain mitigation and the other to help with the costs of building certain amenities.
Hotel controversy: Here’s what led up to the now-closed Homewood Suites investigation
Like the presentation to the Type B board, a presentation to the council in February 2024 showed the FEMA website slide, and the ordinance approved in the first reading referenced, in part, “costs associated with FEMA AE Flood Zone requirements.”
The council, prior to its second vote, was notified three times of allegations related to the slide, according to a Corpus Christi Police Department investigation report.
Approved verbiage of the ordinance changed from the first reading to the second reading. The second version stated that the incentive was for “street level retail, public space, and outdoor dining area activation including gray box and finish out including necessary floodwall and dry flood proofing to allow for consistent street level access.”
Construction continues on a Homewood Suites hotel in downtown Corpus Christi on Feb. 6.
The investigations
Five months after the council approved the tax incentives, David filed suit against the city.
In it, he asserted that the council had incorrectly approved the $2 million award based on an “ongoing false narrative,” in part related to allegations that the image included in PowerPoint presentations had been altered.
In documents responding to David’s suit, city representatives denied allegations.
Similarly, court records show Elevate QOF LLC also denying “any allegation and/or insinuation of wrongdoing.”
In August 2025, the city auditor’s office recommended an independent external investigation into the situation be launched. By September, local law enforcement agencies became involved, largely focusing the investigation on Ramirez.
The CCPD investigation, in part, involved a review of depositions taken in David’s lawsuit. Those who have given depositions include several city staff and council members, including Guajardo.
The Corpus Christi Police Department ultimately did not bring charges after detectives were unable to establish probable cause or find any violation of state or federal criminal law, according to a presentation by the department made before the council on Feb. 17.
An administrative investigation report later produced by independent outside attorneys — intended, in part, to address questions about process and ethics — also asserted no criminal wrongdoing in a review of the situation.
The attorney, Daniel Ray, told the City Council that while it appeared the image on the slide had “been intentionally altered to cover the dates,” there was “no prosecutable criminal fraud or forgery that’s been established.”
The petition
There will be three options the City Council can take on March 24 related to the petition to remove the mayor, according to officials.
Those would be to refer the matter to the ethics commission for a recommendation, to schedule a hearing or to take no action at all, according to an Aug. 29 memo, penned by City Secretary Rebecca Huerta.
A hearing, she wrote, would “be conducted in a manner similar to a court trial.”
“During the notice period, the petitioners are required to draft written articles of impeachment, and the challenged member may summon witnesses to testify,” Huerta wrote.
Ultimately, a “final decision to remove a member shall be by the majority vote of all council members holding office, with the exception of the challenged member,” she wrote, quoting the city’s charter.
City Councilman Gil Hernandez, one of three council members who requested that discussion on the petition be put on the agenda, said he didn’t intend “to go in with a preconceived notion.”
“I’m trying to keep an open mind on this … because ultimately a case has to be proven,” he said. “Right now there’s just a lot of conjecture.”
Articles of impeachment
In the City Council’s March 17 meeting, Caballero announced that she had filed what are described as “articles of impeachment.”
Articles of impeachment generally outline specifics of what is being alleged.
In a March 19 message to the Caller-Times, Caballero wrote that she had filed the petition and articles of impeachment because “the mayor lied, under oath, during a deposition of a lawsuit filed against the city.”
“She has a code of ethics she must follow and she is not,” Caballero wrote. “We, as a community, want ethical and moral representatives. We are fighting for accountability and ethical behavior from our elected officials.”
Guajardo responded to the accusations in a March 20 message to the Caller-Times.
“I categorically deny these allegations,” she wrote. “They are unfounded and not relevant to the matter at hand. I have conducted myself with integrity and transparency throughout this process, and these assertions do not reflect the facts.”
Guajardo the previous day had suggested that Caballero’s “actions appear to stem from opposition to seawater desalination, rather than any substantiated claims.”
Caballero, in a March 20 message, responded to the assertion, stating that it was a “distraction being used to deter from the real issue of an elected official’s unethical behavior & oath violation.”
Kirsten Crow covers city government and water news. Have a story idea? Contact her at kirsten.crow@caller.com.
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This article originally appeared on Corpus Christi Caller Times: Here’s what may happen with petition to remove Mayor Paulette Guajardo