If it will cost $10 million to bring the Battleship Texas to Beaumont, that’s too much. Way too much, especially because it’s not clear that the ship will ever generate the kind of revenue it needs to sustain and justify its presence on the riverfront.
That’s the estimate provided to the council by City Manager Kyle Hayes in a recent workshop meeting. And as Hayes pointed out, that doesn’t even include other potential costs, such as putting in a gift shop as requested by the Battleship Texas Foundation as well as a parking lot and possibly a museum.
The state will provide $35 million to refurbish the ship below the water, as the hull has been leaking for years. That’s encouraging, but that money does not cover parts of the ship above the water line. And what about future damage below the water line, a chronic problem with older ships?
The City Council has been rightly skeptical of this proposal by member Mike Getz. It sounds exciting at first glance, and we commend Getz for thinking big. But any venture of this scale must be based on cold, hard realities, and this one has too many red flags.
Mayor Robin Mouton pointed out the main problem with the ship, which had been drawing about 80,000 visitors annually in its current location near the San Jacinto monument and battlefield in La Porte. The Battleship Texas Foundation said the vessel needs about three times that number to pay for its annual costs.
“If the Houston area could not sustain 250,000 visitors a year,” Mouton said, “I don’t see us having 250,000 visitors a year. Is it worth us as a council risking the entire city and taxpayers dollars to see if one project will work in our city when Houston and Harris County couldn’t do it?”
If the battleship can’t attract enough visitors, the city could be stuck with a white elephant — one that takes up a lot of space on a riverfront. By then, finding another city to take it off our hands would be very difficult. Yet you can’t just scrap the battleship because it is one of the Navy’s most iconic vessels. Some future City Council could find itself with a real headache with this ship.
The council should focus on more realistic options for the riverfront, such as a restaurant like the Wheelhouse in Port Neches just a few miles downstream. That restaurant is successful, so it’s reasonable to believe that something like it could succeed in Beaumont — attracting tourists and residents, possibly leading other businesses to open up nearby, all of this creating a few jobs and breathing life into the downtown. That’s not guaranteed, because nothing is, but it’s a reasonable projection.
The future demolition of the AT&T building will open up the downtown riverfront to landscaping that can dramatically improve its appearance and potential. The council should be commended for taking the bold step of buying that building and planning to remove it so that it has a clean slate to work with. Unfortunately, it doesn’t appear that the Battleship Texas should be part of that future.
Beaumont Enterprise
