• Ross Cunningham •
• Originally published January 22, 2009 at 11:48 a.m., updated January 22, 2009 at 11:48 a.m.

Business leaders, Matagorda County and Bay City officials met for breakfast during the Bay City Matagorda United Plan II meeting to prepare for future growth in the county at the Bay City Civic Center on Friday, Jan. 16. Bay City councilman Joseph Enoch and chairman for Bay City Matagorda United Plan opened the meeting with an introduction of why the plan was put in place. “Basically the reason Bay City United was started in 2001 was because of double digit unemployment in the county and store fronts closing faster than they could be opened,” said Enoch. “Bay City Matagorda United was the first time we got players from the city and county to work together for growth in our community. Before we were hoping that someone would come into the county to help us but that never happened. We had to pull ourselves up from our own bootstraps.” Enoch said that basically our town now is alive and our unemployment rate went down from double digits to 6 or 7 percent and sales taxes are up. Bay City Mayor Richard Knapik reaffirmed Enoch’s comments by saying that unemployment is down three percent and that unemployment in the county is at 7.1 percent instead of 16 or 17 percent five years ago. “We started in 2005 with Bay City United and wrote down what we would like to see happen in the county by 2015 and we have done pretty good in fulfilling those goals in the past four years,” said Knapik. “All down town buildings full and were pretty close to fulfilling that today. Creation of quality jobs and education opportunities we have hit a homerun there. Wharton County Junior College will be a four-year curriculum in Matagorda County and we are half way there with a two-year curriculum. Matagorda Beach will be a new hot spot for tourism couldn’t be truer.” Knapik said other goals reached in the county were new expansion of the medical facilities across the highway from the Bay City Civic Center. The new Matagorda County Regional Hospital is also near completion. Knapik also said that new industry has come into the county to bring new jobs and a four-lane highway was completed from Bay City to Highway 288. The best news in 2005 was South Texas Project Nuclear Operating Company’s announcement for adding units three and four. Matagorda County Economic Development Corporation executive director Owen Bludau shared with the group the economic development plans that will and have brought growth to the county. “The biggest announcement we had for new economic growth in the area came with the news in 2005 of STP expanding with units three and four and it doesn’t get any sweeter than that,” said Bludau. “The four years that I have been in Bay City I have been monitoring inquiries that I get and if they are serious I put them into three categories; leads, projects and under construction. In 2008 we had 18 prospects that were leads that joined the 20 leads we had from 2006 and 2007, which were carried over.” Industries that we have in the county now that have come from leads are STPNOC Units 3 and 4 are a six billion project. Tres Palacios Gas Storage in Clemville is completed and is a $130 million project. Construction is completed and they started storing gas and operating the facility. “White Stallion Energy Center has required a site here and presently are in the permit stage,” said Bludau. “The center is a $2.5 billion project and they expect to be under construction early next year in 2010. We also have an ethanol plant that is in discussion now with our growers and farmers about growing a new crop that would allow them to build $150 million plant here to produce ethanol.” Bludau said that there are other projects that we can’t talk about yet but it is obvious to him that converting the county into energy clusters is a good thing. Bay City Community Development Corporation executive Director D.C. Dunham shared with the group about community and retail development in the county. “We decided to develop our own market tools to really highlight what we are and where we are,” said Dunham. “We believe we can recruit retailers into our area by going to International Conference of Shopping Centers to get exposure for Bay City and Matagorda County. We went to conferences in Las Vegas and San Antonio. The group also looked at what our needs were for parks and recreation.’ Some of our successes are strip center near Wal-Mart Super Center, walking trail at Hardeman Park and the high school. The city remodeled the high school pool and in the future will have a cover built over the pool. Dunham said that we also still have plans for a skate park at Hardeman Park, which is really needed in our community.

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