SATIRE: This is parody. Not a real news report.
BROWNSVILLE — Flanked by easement maps and a mound of dirt officially estimated at one million cubic yards, the Brownsville Navigation District announced Monday that its SpaceX agreements are worth “north of $125 million,” a figure officials reached by pricing two natural gas pipelines that have not yet moved any gas, several channel-crossing fees, a few short-term business park leases, and the dirt.
“It’s just arithmetic,” said Gilberto Zamora, the Port’s newly created Deputy Comptroller of Anticipated Revenue. “Two pipelines at roughly $2 million a year in throughput fees, times 50 years. That’s $103 million before you’ve crossed the channel or leased anybody a parking spot. Whether the gas is flowing today is really more of a spiritual question.”
Zamora then gestured at a slide reading “$125,000,000*,” where the asterisk turned out to be a second slide listing “many variables,” including whether the pipelines get built, whether the leases renew, whether the easements are eased, and whether the year 2074 cooperates.
Port Defends Math, Notes It Only Counted Things That Could Happen
Officials pushed back on suggestions the number was optimistic, pointing out their restraint. An early draft of the summary, they said, also counted 50 years of future seagull concessions at the business park and the appreciating sentimental value of the channel itself, both cut for being “too speculative.”
“We only counted real maybe-money,” said Navigation District Commissioner Constance Peña. “There are many variables, and we respected every one of them. For instance, we did not price the sunrise. That’s the kind of discipline you want from a port.”
Dirt Receives Standing Ovation as Only Line Item With a Physical Address
The one deliverable reporters could independently verify Monday was the dirt — up to a million cubic yards of it, earmarked for the rocket company at Boca Chica at as much as $5 million, or about five dollars a yard, a rate staff described as “market value for dirt with rocket adjacency.” The pile got its own agenda item, a modest bunting, and the longest applause of the evening.
“You can touch it. You can load it in a truck. That’s more than most nine-figure announcements can say,” Zamora said, inviting board members to each kick the dirt once, ceremonially. “Fifty years from now, whether the pipelines have paid out or haven’t, this dirt will still have been dirt. That’s called an asset.”
The Port said it will update the figure as variables resolve, and is already preparing a similar forecast for future revenue from announcing future revenue.
