Special to the PRESS
Port Profiteering from Destruction of Laguna Madre Ecosystems
Dear Editor,
Recently Port of Brownsville commission chairman, Ralph Cowen, was crowing about the astute business acumen the Port was displaying by kicking out the U.S.Fish and Wildlife Service’s (USFWS) decades-old lease of about $3,500 a year for the 2,280 acres which now is option-leased to the three LNG companies, which are planning to desecrate and contaminate the Laguna Madre ecosystems, for the princely sum of $4.4 million, as of the end of 2015. The Port expects to collect another $1.3 million in 2016.
Refusing to renew the USFWS lease cuts the bottom one-third of the ecosystems off from the northern two-thirds of the LANWR. Then leasing to three proposed LNG plantsis a travesty for our children and grandchildren who might one day want to know what a special environment we currently enjoy and market to visitors from all over the RGV and Texas, with our green ecotourism and vacation destination jobs. This is the Green Gem of the Texas coast!
Make no mistake, LNG plants process natural gas, which is a fossil fuel, and emit enormous amounts of greenhouse gases and other pollutants which are dangerous to the health of the nearby residents and all of the ecosystems of the Laguna Madre. Even if only one LNG plant is built, it will be the single worst polluter in all of Cameron County, emitting more greenhouse gases than all of the cars, trucks, and tractors in Cameron County combined.
The only win-win scenario I can envision is for the LNGs to be stopped from building their plants, and the Port can pocket the dollars it received from the lease-options.
Then the lease with the USFWS should be renewed for the Living Legacy to our future generations!
Rick Teter
Laguna Vista
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