Does “defending a industrial spaceport surroundings,” together with “important infrastructure and high-value know-how property,” in a neighborhood “formed by aerospace exercise, coastal ecology, and a pioneering spirit of exploration” sound like your dream job? Effectively why not apply to be the “future chief of police” of Elon Musk’s firm city in Texas?
As famous in a narrative final month on ValleyCentral.com, which is affiliated with Brownsville, Texas space TV information station KGBT, town of Starbase (sure, it’s an actual, included metropolis) authorised an ordinance (sure, it has the authority to make legal guidelines) establishing a municipal police division. That can embrace a chief of police and eight officers, with that chief, in accordance with ValleyCentral, elected by town’s fee.
To that finish, apparently, town simply printed a job itemizing in search of candidates for a job titled “Public Security Director / Future Chief of Police.” The somewhat puzzling hybrid title could stem from the sheer velocity at which the institutional trappings of a metropolis are being assembled in Starbase. The town was included about ten months in the past, has a mayor, and will probably be holding an election on Could 2 of this 12 months in accordance with its web site.
ValleyCentral makes it sound like policing is a considerably pressing matter in Starbase as a result of a $3.5 million contract with the Cameron County Sheriff fell by way of. What have been meant to be five-year positions as Starbase-based deputies weren’t interesting to potential recruits. Metropolis Administrator Kent Myers instructed ValleyCentral “We didn’t have plenty of success find deputies by way of the county, so we determined to vary path.”
The job advert says this place will contain making a “future-ready workforce” that may prioritize, “Integrating superior know-how and analytics into operations.” Starbase’s supreme applicant, the advert says, is a “visionary, moral, and revolutionary chief with unquestioned integrity.”
However that supreme candidate can even “thrive in a startup-like surroundings.”
As for what the sociological image appears to be like like within the space for somebody contemplating being prime cop there, the very first thing to bear in mind is that it’s a brief drive from the Mexican border the place, as of 2026, drug trafficking stays a problem of concern on the federal degree. And in accordance with a report from 2023, Cameron County was on the record of the 45 counties (out of 254 counties complete) in Texas thought-about to be in poverty.
Nearer to Starbase, there was appreciable agitation over SpaceX’s management of an ostensibly public seashore, and a statue of Elon Musk within the space was vandalized final 12 months. So social unrest as a result of dislike of SpaceX and Elon Musk look like potential areas of concern.
However it’s presumptuous to attempt to paint an image of the crime state of affairs in Starbase as a result of it’s in some ways nonetheless only a development web site. The inhabitants was about 500 as of final 12 months, which is the approximate standing capability of a Cheesecake Manufacturing facility. And the infrastructure to help a police division isn’t even in place but in Starbase. TechCrunch seen some authorities filings final month exhibiting that town will possible quickly have a courthouse. Widespread sense-wise, it stands to cause {that a} jail will quickly comply with.
