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In the decade since SpaceX arrived at Texas coast, billionaire Elon Musk‘s company has created thousands of jobs near the Mexican border, launched rockets and sprouted new homes – all over the area called Starbase.
Now SpaceX wants to make Starbase a recognized city.
Nearby residents are seeking an election to incorporate the area, which is located in the southern tip of Texas on Boca Chica Beach. On Thursday, Musk announced on his social media platform X that “SpaceX’s headquarters will now officially be in Starbase City, Texas!”
But turning Starbase into a new city in Texas with its own government won’t happen overnight, and questions remain, including what SpaceX and residents might get. The idea is already drawing pushback from local activists who have expressed concern about SpaceX’s environmental impact.
To become a city
SpaceX operates in Cameron County, which has a population of approximately 426,000. Judge Eddie Treviño Jr., the county’s top elected official, said SpaceX’s petition filed this week formally begins the city status process.
“Our legal and electoral administration will review the petition, see if it complies with all the legal requirements or not, and then we will go from there,” Treviño said.
He did not offer a timetable. But if the process moves forward, Treviño said the county elections department will next create the authority to decide who will vote and then plan the vote.
Neither SpaceX nor local officials have said how many people live in the area who would become Starbase residents. More than 3,400 full-time SpaceX employees and contractors work at the Starbase site, according to a local impact study released by Treviño earlier this year.
Possible changes
Robert Greer, an associate professor at Texas A&M University’s Bush School of Government and Public Service, has studied how cities get involved. He said the city would have to create its own charter, provide services, pass local ordinances and collect taxes. It could also shift the tax burden to residences or businesses.
“If you create your city, and it’s a relatively small area now, you have some kind of control over that area,” Greer said.
SpaceX officials said it was necessary to make Starbase a city to continue the growth of the workforce in the area and the development of the company.
“The inclusion of Starbase will streamline the processes needed to build the amenities necessary to make the area a world-class place to live—for the hundreds who already call it home, as well as for future workers eager to help build humanity’s future in space,” Kathryn Lueders, general director of Starbase, wrote in a letter to the district this week.
SpaceX has faced local opposition to its influence in the area. They recently faced a lawsuit from Save RGV, a regional non-profit group that claimed SpaceX was dumping polluted water into a nearby bay. In response, SpaceX said a state audit found no environmental risks and called the lawsuit “frivolous.”
“Some of the questions we have are what this will mean in terms of regulation and oversight by the county,” said Jim Chapman, a Save RGV board member.
A growing Texas footprint
Musk has long had business roots in Texas and has spread them far and wide across the Lone Star State. The billionaire moved to Texas in 2020 and has relocated or expanded many of his companies in the state, citing the state’s favorable business climate.
TeslaThe massive 10 million square foot (930,000 square meter) Gigafactory, where the company manufactures its Cybertrucks, opened near Austin in 2022 and will also serve as the company’s headquarters.
In 2021, Musk moved his Boring Co., a tunnel-building business, to Bastrop, another Central Texas community near Austin. Musk said he had a vision to build a “Texas utopia” where employees could live and work. The company has its own small mobile home community and store called Boring Bodega, which serves as a convenience store, lunch spot, barber shop, bar, and public playground.
2023. Musk and the governor of Texas Greg Abbott broke ground for the Tesla lithium refinery site near coastal Corpus Christi. Lithium is a key ingredient used to make batteries for electric vehicles.
And in September, Musk moved X’s headquarters from San Francisco to Bastrop, leaving the California site that had been the company’s home since 2011.
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Vertuno reported from Austin, Texas.