SpaceX is Brownsville’s largest private employer with over 1,600 employees at Starbase Texas ~71% are local residents, says Mayor [VIDEO]

Featured Image Source: Tesmanian.com/Evelyn J. Arevalo @JaneidyEve

The City of Brownsville Mayor Trey Mendez held a ‘State of the City’ event on Thursday, April 21, where he discussed how local businesses and organizations have improved communities and enabled economic growth. During the press event, he said that SpaceX is now Brownsville's largest private employer with over 1,600 employees at Starbase, located at Boca Chica Beach in South Texas.

“[...] SpaceX employed more than sixteen-hundred direct employees at Starbase with, more importantly, with 71 percent of those residents of the Rio Grande Valley,” said Mendez. The Rio Grande Valley consists of all the cities and towns that share Hispanic culture near the border of Mexico in Cameron County, including Brownsville, South Padre Island, Port Isabel, Los Fresnos, San Benito, Laguna Heights, Rio Hondo, Mercedes, McAllen, Harlingen, and Edinburgh. "Not only have they become our largest private employer, but they recently added a substantial presence within the city for various operations," he said.

Following an investment of $430 million on operations in 2021, “this year they are [SpaceX] projecting to add $885 million dollars in gross economic output for Cameron County, as well as continued job growth. Those are definitely some out-of-this-world numbers,” shared Mayor Mendez. Watch the full 'State of the City' conference in the video linked below.

SpaceX also invested $500,000 to improve the 46,000 square feet facility it has leased at the Brownsville Aerospace Industrial Park near the Brownsville South Padre Island International Airport, shared the city's District 2 Commissioner Jessica Tetreau at the conference.

“Now, who can forget the Tweet heard around the world, last March, from Elon Musk where he committed to donate $20 million dollars to Cameron County schools and $10 million dollars to the City of Brownsville for downtown revitalization,” said Mendez, “Thanks to his generous donation, we have already seen some impressive STEM programs at our local schools and numerous improvements, and business investments in our Downtown.” Mendez shared that the city is prepared to switch out the old downtown parking meters with new ones that feature the ability to accept credit cards and smart payments, not only coins. “[...] Through this project, the city is going to be replacing 386 single space and obsolete parking meters.”

Featured Image Source: Tesmanian.com Journalist Evelyn J. Arevalo @JaneidyEve