The City Council rejected the treatment plant last year over cost and environmental concerns, but plans resurfaced as the city\u2019s water woes continued.<\/p>\n
A bitterly divided Corpus Christi City Council voted early Wednesday morning to delay a decision on reviving an almost billion-dollar water plant it had rejected nine months earlier.<\/p>\n
The 7-2 vote came at 2:20 a.m., almost 15 hours into a meeting that drew extensive interest from residents who argued for and against building a desalination plant that council members voted down last year over environmental and cost concerns.<\/p>\n
The proposed plant is not expected to begin delivering water until late 2029, but supporters fear that without long-term supplies, the city\u2019s economy will freeze, driving away residents and businesses and crippling the important tourism industry.<\/p>\n
Opponents expressed deep concern about the proposed plant\u2019s impact on Corpus Christi Bay, and some doubted the fairness of an environmental study that concluded the plant\u2019s salty discharge would not affect sea life.<\/p>\n
The coastal city, Texas\u2019 eighth largest city, is\u00a0staring down a persistent drought<\/a>\u00a0that has placed it on course to being the first U.S. city to run short of water sometime next year. Desalination \u2014 the process of turning seawater drinkable \u2014 has been seen by some as the cure to get the city through future dry spells.<\/p>\n Wednesday morning\u2019s vote delayed action until Sept. 1, about a year after the council\u00a0abandoned the initial effort<\/a>\u00a0to build the Inner Harbor plant.<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re asking us to go out on a limb and I\u2019m not comfortable with it,\u201d said Council Member Gil Hernandez, who first suggested delaying the vote. Hernandez was among the five council members who voted last year to pull the plug on the project.<\/p>\n Several council members were also troubled by the water department\u2019s inability to secure contracts with industrial companies to purchase water from the proposed plant.<\/p>\n With frustration clear in his voice, Council Member Eric Cantu told Corpus Christi Water Chief Operating Officer Nick Winkelmann that he was disappointed contracts have not been secured.<\/p>\n \u201cYou want us to pay all this money and not have a guarantee from the refineries that they\u2019re not going to bail on us and go find their own water or buy their own water source,\u201d Cantu said.<\/p>\n Council Member Roland Barrera, who voted in September to continue the desalination project, said he understood why companies have been slow to commit to a contract with the city.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s very hard to enter into a contract without any certainty that you\u2019re going to have a product, and right now this council has been very indecisive,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s very difficult to engage into a contract \u2026 when you don\u2019t have that certainty.\u201d<\/p>\n Council Member Carolyn Vaughn responded: \u201cI don\u2019t think this council has been indecisive. That is what I call due diligence.\u201d<\/p>\n The vote to delay came after the city water department\u2019s bond rating was downgraded Monday by Fitch credit rating service. The rating was lowered from AA- to A- for, among other things, city leaders\u2019 tendency to defer decisions related to key water supply projects.<\/p>\n \u201cFitch believes these delays limit planning certainty and reflect weaker governance during a period of elevated operating risk,\u201d\u00a0the company said<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were downgraded because [desalination] was killed last year,\u201d said Mayor Paulette Guajardo, who supports the project. \u201cBe accountable for your votes.\u201d<\/p>\n The city\u2019s water department, the mayor and some City Council members view the Inner Harbor Desalination Project as the key to a long-term, steady water supply capable of producing up to 30 million gallons of drinking water a day, even in a drought.<\/p>\n Last year, the same council members voted 5-4 to pull the plug on the Inner Harbor project after nearly decade of planning amid fierce criticism over potential harm to the Corpus Christi Bay\u2019s ecosystem and the ballooning price tag \u2014 from $160 million when it was first approved in 2019 to $1.2 billion when the plant was abandoned in September.<\/p>\n Time and the heightening crisis have not changed the minds of project opponents, including many who voiced concerns about the impact on Corpus Christi Bay\u2019s ecosystem.<\/p>\n \u201cThe question is: Do we want to be known as the city sucked up by Exxon, or the city that stood up to the people killing the planet?\u201d Corpus Christi resident Guillermo Gallegos told the City Council.<\/p>\n More than 100 residents signed up to speak to the council, most of them to address the desalination plant during a public comment period that stretched beyond six hours.<\/p>\n Opponents also accused the City Council of prioritizing industry \u2014 the largest consumers of the city\u2019s water \u2014 over the city\u2019s affordability and the environment.<\/p>\n \u201cWater is not a commodity to be sold to outsiders while citizens and our habitats come last,\u201d a young speaker told the council, adding: \u201cWe cannot drink money.\u201d<\/p>\n But Brittany Clendening said the city\u2019s economy is on the line.<\/p>\n She said she moved to the city in 2020, when \u201cwe had new investments, we had new restaurants, bars, and coffee shops opening all the time, but ever since curtailment, we haven\u2019t seen that.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cContinued delays in securing water will cause job loss and could push us into a regional recession,\u201d Clendening said.<\/p>\n For the initial project, the city in 2017 received a\u00a0$2.75 million<\/a>\u00a0loan from the state for the project\u2019s preliminary stages. The state provided another\u00a0$222 million<\/a>\u00a0in loans three years later, then agreed to loan the city\u00a0more than half a billion dollars<\/a>\u00a0in addition, of which $10 million has been disbursed.<\/p>\n After the City Council pulled the plug on the desalination plant in September, the decision drew criticism from across the state, including Gov. Greg Abbott.<\/p>\n \u201cCorpus Christi is a victim not because of lack of water. They\u2019re a victim because of a lack of ability to make a decision,\u201d Abbott said at a news conference in March.<\/p>\n