City Green Lights Marquette Development

Galveston County Daily News, November 29, 2007
by Leigh Jones

GALVESTON — The crowd in the city council chambers sat in stunned silence late Wednesday night as the city’s elected officials unanimously approved a development agreement for the largest master-planned community ever proposed for the island.

The development agreement paved the way for the council members to approve a zone change and two specific-use permit requests for The Preserve at West Beach, although they had not voted on those elements of the project by press time.

Developer Marquette Land Investments plans to build about 4,000 homes, a 15-story resort hotel, an 18-hole golf course and a marina on 1,058 acres of former ranchland along FM 3005, between 8 Mile and 11 Mile roads.

The project also includes a 361-acre preserve that encompasses wetland and upland prairie property.

About 200 people, spread between three rooms at city hall, attended the meeting, most to voice opposition to the project.

Outnumbering Marquette’s supporters by a margin of less than 2-1, opponents begged the council not to approve a project they said would forever destroy the last remaining swath of natural habitat on the island.

Members of the Beach to Bay Preserve, a group formed to spearhead opposition to the development, brought a stack of petitions containing 1,329 signatures asking the council to halt Marquette’s plans.

One woman described the property as Galveston’s irreplaceable treasure, likening it to the Mona Lisa.

“People come here because our landscape is beautiful,” said Karla Klay. “We have to consider that this is our masterpiece and take care of it. We don’t have to promote this type of development.”

Opponents also questioned the development agreement, which limits Marquette to the master plan it submitted to the city months ago.

The city’s legal counsel promised the agreement would bind all future owners to that plan, although the project’s opponents said they did not trust the assurance.

Marquette has made no secret of its intention to sell the project’s nine tracts to builders who will make the plan a reality.

Under the terms of the development agreement, Marquette will pay for new traffic signals around the development, will give the city property to build a new fire station and will widen 11 Mile Road.

Marquette has also agreed to help pay to extend the Texas General Land Office beach reconstruction project in front of the property. But, because of ongoing negotiations with the state, managing partner Darren Sloniger was not willing to disclose the amount of his contribution.

The agreement also sets aside the site of an old lace factory at a long-ago abandoned town named Nottingham.

The city has promised to provide the developer 1,000 water and sewer connections, about a quarter of the number the project will eventually generate. The future homeowners will pay for the remaining connections through a Municipal Utility District and an additional layer of property tax.

Recreation zoning without the development agreement would have allowed the developer to build many types of facilities that area residents said would not fit in the community.

The development agreement was negotiated to allow Marquette to have the recreation zoning it wanted with restrictions that were supposed to make neighbors more comfortable about future construction after the developer sells the property.

But, even with assurances from the city’s legal team that the agreement is enforceable and will bind the property to Marquette’s plan in perpetuity, the project’s opponents were still suspicious.

They said they did not believe it was enforceable or would last forever, leaving surrounding homeowners without any assurances about what would eventually be built on the property.

Marquette’s initial rezoning request would have converted most of the property to recreation zoning, but on Wednesday Sloniger announced the company was reducing its request to make area residents more comfortable.

The new request included recreational zoning only for the portions of the development that contain the golf course, the high-rise hotel and the marina.

The recreation zoning still covers much of the land, and opponents did not seem impressed by Marquette’s concession.

But the developer’s proponents praised the company’s efforts, describing the project as a responsible planned development.

“Change is inevitable,” said Ben Raimer, president of the Galveston Chamber of Commerce. “It will happen here whether you like it or not. But you can influence how it occurs. This proposal gives us a chance to influence what happens here in the future.”

Marquette must still get approval for the project from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers before moving forward with construction. The developer has not submitted its corps permit application. The federal review process likely will take several years.