Tuesday, March 14, 2017

LNG Meeting At Alonzo Building Reveals Brownsville's Weakness Against Oppression

As enlightening as the anti-LNG seminar was at the Alonzo Building Tuesday night, it showed me clearly that Brownsville doesn't have the wherewithal, intellect and, yes, skill set, to battle successfully the billionaire LNG companies wanting to rape the Port of Brownsville for a short window of profiteering by compressing natural gas by 600:1 so it can be economically and profitably be shipped to Asia.

Look at the crowd shot above.  Most are anglos from S.P.I., who fully realize the impact of fossil fuel energized plants compressing natural gas for profit, the air pollution, denigration of the estuaries, impact on tourism, birding and life style. 

Brownsville residents, not in attendance, simply don't know and don't care.  They don't know about LNG.  They don't even know who the mayor is. In a very unscientific sample, I've asked my Hinogas propane driver, H.E.B. clerk, Feldman's clerk, Cabler Park visitor and many others:  "Who is the mayor of Brownsville?"  None knew.  Not one.


Donny Williams
Donny Williams of Maryland, battling an LNG plant there, revealed how a billionaire company had funded salaries of the local police department for a SWAT team to combat protesters against LNG, bought new fire trucks for the local fire department and, of course, likely greased the palms of local politicos.  Do you think the commissioners at the Port of Brownsville could withstand such enticements?

Brownsville will likely succumb.  We don't know enough, are not skilled enough to counteract billionaire companies asking for $200,000,000 in tax abatements from the Point Isabel School District.  Rap your head around that request.


Ben Neece
The only local politicos I noticed at the meeting were city commission candidates Ben Neece and Rose Gowen.  

I took voluminous notes at the meeting, but they are irrelevant. Brownsville doesn't know and doesn't care.


31 comments:

  1. Many in Brownsville know, care and take action. We've been fighting this LNG battle for over two years now. The Port Isabel school board has denied the LNG tax abatement requests twice. It's great that you finally attended a meeting.

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    1. Many in Brownsville ? 30 or so people from Laguna vista and Padre is many ? Can you explain the low turn outs at your propaganda events? I can. The people here are desperate for the high paying jobs that LNG is bringing and don't care about your special interest group. Can't wait to see those awesome huge ships traversing thru the channel. LNG on the way! Jimmy got a taste of the cool aid they were serving. Old folks trying to relive their protest days in the 60's!!! Please don't burn your bra, your our saggy old tits will hit the ground! No justice , no peace, black lives matter, blah blah bla....same old story.

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    2. The 3 of the 4 people in the front row are definitely residents Brownsville. Two of them have been around for just under 40 years.

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  2. Pure propaganda from you Jim. You are worse than cnn. The low turn out at these bullshit meetings and protest marches prove to you and your libtard snowflake friends that the majority of people in the valley support LNG! We want and need jobs. The majority of the anti work people are much like you. Well past the age of being viably employable. Either way Your opinion does not matter. LNG IS ON THE WAY!!! Cry all you want.

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    1. Agree. Am pro-LNG, too. Barton is an old man who has no job. What does he care?

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    2. All I see in that crowd is a bunch of pissed off winter Texans who have overstayed their welcome. This is TEXAS! We don't care how you do it in New York, minnesota, Wisconsin or where ever the hell you are from . While you are brooding in your trailer park living on your fixed income, I will be enjoying my new job in the LNG industry building a better future for my family and the RGV.

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    3. In 2015, the city councils of four local communities passed resolutions opposing LNG (Port Isabel, Laguna Vista, South Padre Island, and Long Island Village), the school district that includes the Port (Port Isabel) turned down Annova LNG's request for a Texas Economic Development Act Chapter 313 tax break, and the Cameron County Commissioners' Court tabled Annova's request for a tax break.  

      At present we're networking with the Rainforest Alliance Network to defund Texas LNG, Annova LNG, and Rio Grande LNG (See https://www.ran.org/bnp) and with the Carrizo Comecrudo Tribe of Texas (See http://www.themonitor.com/opinion/columnists/article_7b48232c-f550-11e6-8631-4fe4d65e4520.html).  Etc.  Visit saveRGVfromLNG on Facebook.

      Several Brownsville pediatricians and other health professions see the proposed LNG operations as dangerous to the health of the children living in Cameron County.  They conclude, in part, regarding just Rio Grande LNG:

      ● Emissions of PM 2.5 will cause cardiac and respiratory disease ranging from $120 Million to $300 Million in morbidity and mortality impacts each year of routine operation of the proposed Rio Grande LNG facility.

      ● Emissions of volatile organic compounds will increase the risk of birth defects, cancer and cognitive impairment in the children of Cameron County.

      ● Emissions of greenhouse gases will lead to further deterioration of our environment and contribute to the worldwide problem of climate change

      This assessment regarding the Rio Grande LNG emissions was signed by: Dolly Lucio Sevier, MD; Carmen D. Rocco, MD; Marsha Griffin, MD; Barbara Hill, FNP; Michelle Zeager, DO, MPH; Elizabeth Hernandez, PNP; Erika Lucio, FNP; Maria Castillo, FNP; and Martha E. CastaΓ±uela, PAC.

      The Brownsville City Council and Cameron County Commissioners keep saying this is none of their business because all this is being managed by the Port of Brownsville.  But how is our health and the health of our children not our business???  How is it not Brownsville's business and Cameron County's business?  It's past time for them to join with Port Isabel, Laguna Vista, South Padre Island, and Long Island Village in opposing LNG.

      And for the record, I was born in Fort Worth, TX, back when it was called "Cow Town," two weeks before the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor; am a UT Austin graduate; and have lived with my wife in the RGV since 1995.

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    4. Ohhhh no! , not the Rainforest Alliance! They sound so scary! The only defunding in the near future will be done by President Trump and Perry destroying the EPA and their radical groups like the Sierra club. I hope your group sees to it that none of your above mentioned city's and organizations accept any of the Hundreds of millions in tax dollars and benefits that the LNG industry is going to generate for the Rio grande valley and Texas. ALL industries ask for temporary tax breaks so stop whining with that nonsense. Let me take a guess. You are a retired "educator"? Keep protesting. It's good for you all to get out every once in a while.

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  3. It took me years to finally figure out that Brownsville does not care. In fact, it was just recently that I came to the same conclusion you just stated. Two friends wanted to run for office and I asked them why? If, Brownsville does not care and thrives with a corrupt culture in leadership, why can one think one can make a difference? Brownsville does not care and we deserve what we have on the commission. I am voting for Mickey Mouse at Large and Mickey for Place 3.

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    1. Pat, Pat, Pat. Mickey Mouse? You can't keep voting for yourself, sonso! LOL

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  4. Pat, why do you think Brownsville citizens don't care about politics? Laziness? Ignorance? The real information is "hidden" and not in the public view (ie. Brownsville Herald)?

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  5. LNG is a done deal, just take a cruise thru the Port and you can see the acres they are leveling to accommodate LNG. Port Commissioners decided it since the beginning.

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  6. I support LNG. Lots of sad faces in that crowd because they thought Hillary had the election rapped up. Not only are the LNG facilities and pipelines going to be built, they are going to Be built faster and bigley!!! Trump is takeing care of over regulation put in place by these lazy ass nut jobs. DONE DEAL is right! Remember that these are the same fake environmentalist who protested against wind farms to close to south Padre and also protested SpaceX because the bright lights may keep the turtles awake at night.

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  7. You can see their little shriveled balls quivering as they scream in high pitch voices about how LNG is a done deal. DONT THINK SO sonsos. Every board rejected it. Padre, PI, Port. No one in their right mind is voting to put cancer in our aquifers (drinking water). Trump is self destructing so hard even the GOP is running for the hills, cutting its losses. You sad cucks don't know when to hold and when to fold. Trump already showed the GOP he's a joke and a fake. It's just a matter of time. The less intelligent take a bit longer to process these things it seems. Keep posting your pro-Trump fake breitbart news, as your health care and food stamps are taken from you sad fucks. You deserve it for being completely retarded. Sorry not sorry. No sympathy for you poor fools.

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    1. This is not a voting issue you un informed dip shit. Still bummed about the election are you? Go to be a long 8 years snowflake. Hope I did not trigger you. Sign up for President Trump's tweets to keep up to date.

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  8. Copy from RR

    I hear LNG advertising in Matamoros promising jobs to the illegals too.

    Ever notice how the people in Matamoros never throw their trash in a garbage can? If it's an empty soda can, they throw it on the grass. If its a candy wrapper, they drop it right there in the street, even if there's a trash can 2 feet away. They won't use it. They've got streets full of trash but empty trash cans. They dump raw sewage in their beaches and don't understand why tourists won't go there. They describe America and Americans as "clean". They apparently have no concept of why it matters to maintain a clean living space around themselves.

    This is where the OP 10 23 dumbasses went wrong. Investors, business owners, shrimpers, fishermen, hotels, families who bought real estate on the Port and South Padre, the park servicemen, coast guard, ie WE THE VOTERS who vote every single election in Port races, will NOT tolerate the Mexicanization of our beautiful CLEAN homes, our kids health and investments clogged up by a polluting refinery, smokestacks and the inevitable pipe leak that makes the water burn your skin and the shrimp and fish to die off and float onto the beaches in huge smelly piles of rotting waste. WE ARE NOT MATAMOROS. WE DO NOT THINK LIKE MATAMOROS PEOPLE AND WE DO NOT VOTE LIKE MATAMOROS PEOPLE. WE DO NOT SHIT WHERE WE EAT. WE DO NOT POLLUTE OUR BEACHES AND STILL EXPECT TOURISTS TO KEEP COMING TO OUR RESTAURANTS AND HOTELS. WE DON'T DUMP POISON ON OUR DYING SHRIMP POPULATION, WE DON'T POISON OUR FISH, WE DON'T POISON OUR KIDS, WE DON'T INVITE CANCER ONTO OUR PEOPLE.

    WE the VOTERS who put our money down here are committed to our way of life. Which is a CLEAN way of life. Notice how we chose NOT to put our money down, invest, or buy homes near a filthy wasteland shithole of LNG refineries like Corpus Christi or Matamoros. We chose the PORT because of sunsets and fishing and clean beaches and BBQ. And we VOTE, as evidenced by the complete ass whipping of OP 10:33 and their lame "but LNG is jobs!" candidates and their promised filth.

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    1. Racist Job protesters.... old unemployable white trash. Living large in a port Isabel trailer park. The only thing you will smell in the air is the money we will all be making. Guess you will have to move your trailer away from us dirty Mexicans. Save the rgv from LNG is a racist group. Facebook eco warriors. We the voters who can't get anyone to show up at your meetings or protests! LMAO !!!

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    2. Should have worked harder for your pro-LNG OP 10:33 LOL LOSERS --- you pendejos leave your baby's shit-filled diapers in the parking lot at walmart for other people to step on. You don't vote lol. Your retarded OP 10 33 group backed 5 people who were pro-LNG to run for the Port promising "jobs jobs jobs" and what an ass whooping YOU LOSERS got!! Because you don't vote! That's the truth. Too busy changing diapers and throwing your soiled diapers and soda cans and trash everywhere but in a trash can. You don't vote, you don't care, you're the WIC people, waiting for a job to fall out of the sky for precious little unemployed unskilled you, when you're not wasting your savings on beer.

      Real voters who work and invest in the RGV don't want to sink knee deep into a bunch of your WIC people's filth and trash. WE showed up during EARLY VOTING and ELECTION DAY, and don't forget it PORT. BTW our elected officials already know who shows up to vote every SINGLE year... and it ain't you walmart parking lot diaper dumpers, who want to make our beaches into another dumping ground.

      Not racist by the way. Everyone of every race and creed has free access to use the trash can. It's a question of who cares enough to walk 20 steps TO the trash can to throw away your trash, versus who was raised in a shitty culture that says it's okay to pollute other people's spaces for your own lazy convenience. And that lazy manana mentality doesn't work when it's voting time you snooze you lose you dirty OP 1033 LNG whiners. Keep whining and crying about "jobs" lol learn to keep your polluting trash to yourselves

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  9. With one day notice, it isn't like everyone can just drop their plans to attend. I wanted to go, but had to attend to family matters, but what you say is true, many people are ignorant of
    current issues that affect or have the potential
    to affect our city and they have zero interest in
    educating themselves, much less making the effort to get out and vote. That is a sad situation for future generations.

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  10. LNG jobs?  Even temporary labor jobs are critically important to folks who piece one temporary job after another together to keep food on the table, a roof over their heads, sometimes even managing to send their kids to college.  But good, long term, well paying jobs with benefits?  Consider Rio Grande LNG, the biggest of the three LNG export companies seeking to build and operate at our local Port of Brownsville.  Consider the following excerpt from "US shale gas-advantaged projects strain toward finish line," 11-07-2016, Oil & Gas Journal, http://www.ogj.com/articles/print/volume-114/issue-11/special-report-worldwide-construction-update/us-shale-gas-advantaged-projects-strain-toward-finish-line.html:

    Start of excerpt:

    With construction slated to begin in less than a year, NextDecade has had "intensive discussions with CB&I about their training programs for construction labor," said van Vliet [Rene van Vliet, chief operating officer of NextDecade]. "CB&I has been successful in recruiting and training a significant group of labor from South Texas, in particular the Rio Grande Valley, where our project will be built. Many of these workers are currently occupied on comparable CB&I projects on the Gulf of Mexico, and, as such, will be suitably prepared for our project when it moves forward. In addition, the anticipated timing of our project is advantageous as many other projects will be winding down as ours ramps up, helping to ease the strain on workforce resources.

    "One of CB&I's distinguishing characteristics versus other EPC contractors is that CB&I utilizes its own construction workforce, helping to reduce cost and raise quality," he said. "CB&I does not subcontract all of its construction work and simply act as a managing contractor."

    End of excerpt.

    I was lucky enough to come across this little tidbit and copied it before it timed out.  Now you have to subscribe to subscribe to the Oil & Gas Journal for $89 a year to read it.  In the Big Oil & Gas Business World, you have to pay to play at the high stakes, real money tables.  They don't want plain folks noising in on their business, questioning their promises of jobs, economic growth, safety, etc.  

    Did you know that NextDecade is already planning to build another LNG export operation just like its proposed Rio Grande LNG project near Texas City (http://www.lngworldnews.com/nextdecade-signs-site-lease-for-its-second-lng-export-project/)? 

    Did you know its seeking a "reverse merger" with the Harmony Merger Corporation to become a publically traded company (https://www.benzinga.com/pressreleases/17/03/b9165518/harmony-and-nextdecade-agree-to-pursue-merger-nextdecade-a-leader-among)?  Wheeling and dealing like there's no tomorrow.

    Rio Grande LNG, Annova LNG, and Texas LNG have invested too much time and money seeking Federal Energy Regulatory Commission permission to build and operate here.  They have to seal the deal or go broke. 

    We, on the other hand, have to stop them to protect our health and our tourism and shrimping and retirement communities as well as our environment and safety.

    Visit saveRGVfromLNG on Facebook.

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    1. They got you shaking in your boots old timer. Better move back to ft. worth. Thanks for the tip. Just subscribed to "Big Oil and Gas Business World". $89.00 is a bargain to read about all that good news.

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    2. They got you shaking in your boots old timer. Better move back to ft. worth. Thanks for the tip. Just subscribed to "Big Oil and Gas Business World". $89.00 is a bargain to read about all that good news.

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    3. You got part if it right. They got me shaking in my boots, wanting to kick their faces in before they start pissing their pollution into my lungs. You want some of the action, or you just want to hurl insults from the bushes? You want to suck in their piss, go to the fracking fields and have at it.

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    4. The future LNG sites are already being surveyed and plotted. The Brownsville ship channel dredging project is about to start again. Looks like you all lost another one. Grrrr, angry old man. Don't break a hip when you try to kick their faces in! I thought you libtards were non violent, peace loving people? Probably not the first time someone has pissed into your lungs! GRRRRRR!! Can't wait to break the news about future the fracking near by and close to the river in Mexico.

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    5. So you're fine with just Rio Grande LNG by itself costing
      Cameron County $120 million to $300 million in morbidity and mortality impacts EACH YEAR OF ROUTINE OPERATION?  Calculated from an estimated 12,400 minor restricted activity days; 2,000 work loss days; 400 asthma exacerbations; 120 respiratory and cardiovascular hospital admissions; and 16 non-fatal heart attacks each year [See "Air pollution a concern if LNG comes to Valley," Carmen Rocco, MD, and Dolly Lucio Sevier, MD, 09-07-2016, Rio Grande Guardian, http://riograndeguardian.com/roccosevier-air-pollution-a-concern-if-lng-comes-to-valley/.]

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    6. Can you address the fact that the turn out for your events is dismal? You should Just hold your breath. LNG jobs on the way! Your numbers are estimated and made up to fit your hapless cause. You bore me. Sierra club loosing its funding! EPA will be cut by 62%. You need to be more aggressive because you already lost. Start blocking the highway. We won't break for armchair environmentalist like you.

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    7. No, the time for holding my breath will be when the LNG operations start belching their filth into the air we breathe. Including invisible, odorless stuff that can do permanent damage even to the lungs of a healthy adult (especially those who work outdoors), as well as permanent damage to children not even born yet if their mothers inhale some of this stuff.

      Block HWY 48? The LNG heavy truck and other traffic will take care of that. The four or so LNG related natural gas pipelines running along 48 will take care of it if one or more goes BAM! (Not to forget the Valley Crossing Pipeline that's supposed to take natural gas under our Gulf waters, headed for Veracruz). If shit happens and the LNG container walls fail to stop it, that too could shut down 48. And the LNG companies hide behind the Critical Energy Infrastructure Information clause (CEII) in the FAST Act to keep us from knowing the full extent of the damage and loss of life they could bring our way.

      You haven't spoken to the health problem issues.

      You haven't spoken to the fact that Port Isabel, Laguna Vista, South Padre Island, and Long Island Village have passed resolutions opposing LNG.

      You haven't spoken NextDecade's plans to use CB&I trained workers already doing comparable work in the Gulf.

      If you don't care about the local communities opposed to LNG or about the health problems LNG will bring our way, why should people listen to you?

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    8. What don't you get ? No need for discussion, LNG is on the way! You have lost your fight against jobs and cleaner energy. The people that mattered did listen to us. Trump sealed the deal! Obviously no one listened to your group of sour puss retirees. I guess you heard the Dakota Access Pipeline will start to flow any day now? Such a shame you protesters left such a huge environmental disaster trash mess when you fled your protest camp. I read about all the poor dogs that were abandoned. Shame Shame Shame .

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    9. No, the people that mattered didn't listen to you or to us. We both listen to them but you trust them more than I do. LNG started heading our way in June of 2012 via the Panama Canal Stakeholders Working Group out of the Texas Department of Transportation. In September 2012, the group met at our local Port of Brownsville and 20 plus of our elected leaders and self appointed business leaders wrote Letters Of Support to the Department of Energy (DOE) in support of an LNG export company (Gulf Coast LNG) that disappeared along the way. They didn't ask us about LNG but told the DOE that we wanted it and the jobs and economic stimulus the start-up, out-of-nowhere company promised.

      We didn't hear about it until May of 2014. We were told it was good, all good, no bad. We looked into it and decided different. We were told it was a done deal, but after Port Isabel, Laguna Vista, South Padre Island, and Long Island Village passed resolutions against it, it was no longer the done deal it was supposed to be.

      Were all these people listening to us, however you want to define "us"? Or were they realizing how these LNG operations would damage if not wreck their health, their livelihoods, their communities?

      Have the LNG export companies and investors or the Port Commissioners listened to all these folks who live AND WORK in these communities? Have you spoke to them and listened to why they opposed and still oppose LNG?

      Have you checked out the video of the LRGV Sierra Club / saveRGVfromLNG 02-18-2016 Climate March in Brownsville? See the amateur, iPhone video at https://www.facebook.com/saveRGVfromLNG/videos/1457680777578017/.

      Go ahead. Take a walk on the wild side and also check out a better video of local, RGV opposition to Trump's Border Wall and deportation plans, etc at https://www.facebook.com/saveRGVfromLNG/videos/1457680777578017/

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  11. TRUMP was right. Getting tired of winning so much.

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