By FRANCISCO E. JIMENEZ
Staff Writer
reporter@sbnewspaper.com
Port Isabel/San Benito Navigation District Port Director Steven Bearden is shown speaking during a San Benito Rotary Club Meeting Thursday at Blanquita’s Mexican Restaurant. (Staff photo by Francisco E. Jimenez)
The new Port Isabel/San Benito Navigation District (PISBND) Port Director was the guest speaker at a San Benito Rotary Club meeting on Thursday, July 14 at Blanquita’s Mexican Restaurant.
Steve Bearden of Santa Rosa recently took over as Port Director for the district, a position previously held by Bob Cornelison for approximately 30 years. At the meeting, Bearden gave a comprehensive presentation of the deep water port and his work as port director.
“It’s marketing, management of the assets of the port, making sure that the tenants have what they need, and maintaining the roads and equipment that belong to the port, and management of the employees,” said Bearden to the Rotarians in attendance. “It’s a wonderful job. It’s a lot of activity that we’re creating. On the marketing side, it has been very challenging, but we’re moving along.”
Bearden, who assumed the position of Port Director on Jan. 1 of this year, brings a surplus of experience to the job, which includes management and regulatory experience.
“I worked as a farmer with some management. From there I moved to Austin. I worked with the Texas Department of Agriculture for several years,” Bearden said. “I was manager of different programs, and ended up manager of the pesticides program for the state, that brings a lot of the regulatory type experience that I’ve got. I also worked another five years as the manager of the regional office for the department of agriculture in San Juan. I also spent six years as CEO of the Rio Grande Valley sugar growers, which is over a $1 million per year operation.”
PISBND is one of 12 deep water ports in Texas. The port, which is known to go as deep as 36 feet in some areas, was formed in 1929.
While Bearden plans on continuing in the direction of Cornelison, he also plans on bringing some changes to the port within the next couple of years.
“My plan is to take what they already established, the direction, and try to continue to move it forward as he (Cornelison) had been doing. I remain in contact with him on a weekly basis,” Bearden said. “The changes that we’re going to see someday as we develop the port will be more activity, more employment at the port which is our ultimate goal, bringing in other companies and developing the entire port facilities, which is probably another 3,000 linear feet of port land.”
Bearden added, “We’re courting several different types of companies. Some will be the offshore supply boats, those types of companies,” said Bearden. They will have facilities there for repairs, equipment on the rigs, and moving that equipment back and forth to the rigs, along with boats that haul the water, the mud, there will be facilities that make mud for drilling which is part of the drilling requirements, along with moving diesel fuel and food stuff to the rigs to keep them supplies.”
“The other types of companies would be the companies that would actually do work on rigs. They would bring rigs in to the harbor where they would do a great deal of the work there that doesn’t have to be dry docked. Those are the two primaries that we’re looking at right now,” he concluded.
To see this story in print, pick up a copy of the July 17 edition of the San Benito News. Or view our E-Edition by clicking here.
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