Port Arthur council reopens ground-lease negotiations for Pleasure Island wind and solar project; several exec-session items tabled

Port Arthur City Council voted April 28 to reopen negotiations with Diligent Offshore Services LLC on a ground lease for tracts on Pleasure Island for the development, construction and operation of wind and solar generation facilities, and the council tabled several other executive-session items to the next regular meeting.

The council’s action followed an extended executive session that began in the late afternoon and ran into the evening. Council members moved and seconded a motion “to reopen negotiation for ground lease with Diligent Offshore Services LLC” for tracts described during the meeting as containing approximately “13.79 acres, 900 acres, and 13 [xx] acres” on Pleasure Island. The council approved the motion after a voice vote and a subsequent roll call; the roll-call record in the transcript shows Mayor Pro Tem Beckham voting no, Council member Doucette yes, Council member Frank yes, Council member Hamilton Everfield no, Council member Lewis yes and Mayor Barty yes. A vote by Council member Kinlaw was not recorded in the roll-call transcript. The motion carried by recorded vote (yes: 4; no: 2; absent: 1, per the meeting record).

Council members also voted to table the executive-session items that were not completed during the evening’s closed meeting and to address them at the council’s next regularly scheduled meeting. Items not fully discussed in the closed session and deferred for later consideration included litigation matters identified in the agenda (H and P Engineering and Construction Inc. v. City of Port Arthur; Kirk Thomas v. City of Port Arthur), a matter described as “Project Carol Cannell,” and other listed executive-session topics. The council chair stated the deferred items will be placed on the next regular meeting agenda.

Members raised questions during the open session about recording procedures for executive sessions. The city attorney and city secretary told the council that, under state law as cited at the meeting, the city secretary is required to prepare a certified agenda of closed meetings and that recordings of closed sessions, while some municipalities do audio recordings, are not releasable except pursuant to a court order. The city secretary said she did not have equipment in the conference room to record the executive session that evening. A council member had asked whether the Texas Municipal League (TML) had been contacted; the meeting record indicates the city manager had been asked about contacting TML and the city attorney had not been the party to contact TML.

The council opened the executive session citing multiple exceptions under the Texas Open Meetings Act and related state law provisions: to seek legal advice (Tex. Gov’t Code §551.071), to discuss economic development negotiations (Tex. Gov’t Code §551.087), and to discuss personnel matters including evaluations (Tex. Gov’t Code §551.074). The stated executive-session agenda items included Treasure Island Buildings A and B, a proposed ground lease by Diligent Offshore Services LLC for Pleasure Island tracts, pending litigation matters, Project Carol Cannell, and a street remediation and reconstruction program (the council later removed the street remediation item from the closed-session list at a council member’s request).

The council recessed from closed session and reconvened in open session to announce actions. The presiding officer closed the executive session at 7:09 p.m. on April 28 and said any actions arising from executive-session discussions would be made in open session. The council’s direction to reopen negotiations with Diligent Offshore Services LLC was presented as a motion “as stated” during the meeting; the motion text and the parcel acreages were taken from the council discussion and the meeting transcript.

The council did not provide parcel identifiers, exact legal descriptions, lease terms, rent or financial details, or a schedule for further negotiation in the open-session remarks. Those details were not specified in the meeting record and were not released at the time the council voted to reopen negotiations.

Heading into the next meeting, the council chair said the deferred items would be placed on the next regularly scheduled meeting agenda for further discussion and possible action.