Dear Mr. Musk,
Howdy from Fort Bend County! I am writing to you for several reasons…
ONE – ZONE 34
Last Monday, our commissioners court came together to establish Reinvestment Zone 34. These 3,000+ acres could potentially be the spot for your forthcoming Project Crystal Sun. By the way, love the name, huge fan of the sun and the moon and the stars and anything that references them.
My story on the approval was met with loads of likes, interest and comments. No ratio here, you had detractors and supporters who, of course, fell on the usual sides of the political divide. And speaking of political divide… Because our interim County Judge Daniel Wong had previous business dealings with Tesla, he recused himself from the vote and it allowed our two boycotting commissioners to come back to court and vote the zone into existence. You’re already uniting us.
As you may have heard, Fort Bend County is a great place to live, work, and raise a family. We are highly educated. We are beautifully diverse. We vote. We have great schools. We have low crime. We’ve got a lot of talented people that live here. Also, this place is crawling with engineers. You could call us a real holy grail.
But we have our problems just like any other place. That’s where you coming in is a good thing. We can’t keep building houses in Fort Bend County. We have to bring in jobs and industry. If we keep pumping out houses we cannot build the tax revenue needed for our inevitable growth and sustainment (we are expecting 2 million people by 2050, we are approaching 1 million now.)
I don’t have a literal crystal ball (is that something you could make?) but I do have some intelligence, intuition and foresight and I can see Tesla and Fort Bend County building a union that could span centuries of progress and innovation. I personally don’t think Crystal Sun should be your only Fort Bend project. I think renewable energy is the future and you its leader. But that brings me to number two.
TWO – COMMUNITY CONCERNS
Your reputation, of course, proceeds you. And so the conversation has been written before the ink on the reinvestment zone documents had a chance to dry. Here’s a smattering of the concerns shared under my posts on the project:
“Wait until he fires everyone after they relocate to Sugar Land and he hires visa workers for less. I know several people who relocated to Bastrop and got laid off 2 years later.”
“I’m genuinely hoping our local contractors demand payment in full before work is started. Not political but Elon is notorious for not paying contractors the agreed upon price and then forcing them into legal battles later to eventually settle for less. The Houston Chronicle reported at least 29 contractors and suppliers have filed a total of 77 or more liens against SpaceX properties in Texas for unpaid construction work. At least 98 contractors and small businesses have filed mechanics’ liens against Tesla.”
“Robots taking those 10,000 jobs…”
“My next run of t-shirts: Fort Bend County Commissioners gave a billionaire millions in tax subsidies. All I got was this t- shirt…and a tax rate increase!”
“For all those who are defending handing Trillionaire Elon Musk tax breaks and giveaways at the expense of taxpayers and schools, a simple search will tell you that his statements about 10,000 jobs and all the other fluff should be taken with scrutiny. Musk wasted billions of our taxpayer dollars on DOGE and also compromised our personal data with unsecured juvenile hackers. All that glitters is NOT gold.”
The concerns whether completely based in reality are real for the people that live here. And I hope they will be addressed. I believe some will be in the public meetings and subsequent news coverage but I hope that you can understand a factory of this acreage and magnitude will have profound effects on the community and our land.
One concern shared directly to me is Big Creek, the water that runs the edge of the property. It empties into our Brazos River. Some of our drinking water comes from the Brazos. Will that water be protected from industrial runoff?
I’m personally worried about how many oak trees will be cut down and if we could maybe relocate them. But that’s just my little thing. It’s always my little thing. Big fan of trees.
Another concern shared with me is that the county engineers and commissioners have had to sign NDAs and that the community won’t learn the full picture. So many things have been happening in Fort Bend County politics where our leaders make decisions with no public discussion, no public dissemination, no listening to public input and people just have to deal with the outcomes. It is business as usual and everyone else be damned. I’d love to see this and future Fort Bend Tesla projects take a new approach. I’d love to see trust built and transparency prioritized.
HOWEVER! Not everyone in the comments was an Elon critic. Here’s a supportive post from Reddit:
“Great to see the high taxes, high paying jobs, and other downstream economic impact of this plant coming to Fort Bend. Don’t be confused by the uneducated, politically motivated Anti-Elon crowd that likely has never have created a job in their life. A moderate rebate on property taxes does not negate the myriad of taxes a business pays: payroll taxes, sales and excise taxes, medicare taxes, import taxes, social security taxes, unemployment taxes, franchise taxes, ad valorem taxes, etc. This factory will generate tens of millions of dollars in tax revenue a year and bring high paying jobs and downstream economic activity.”
Unfortunately, it had 13 downvotes. Your narrative work is cut out for you. Which brings me to my last two points.
THREE – MY DREAM
Several months ago I had a dream. At that time, I wasn’t even aware you were considering Fort Bend for your factory. My dream was life altering and of all the dreams I’ve ever had it felt the most real. I won’t go into the details but I will say just before the big climax there you were. Standing yards in front of me, giving me a little wave. I was perplexed and gave a little wave back. I have never dreamt about an actual person I did not know so this dream was especially odd for me.
I think things happen for a reason. I think I had that dream for a reason. And I think you are coming to Fort Bend for a reason. While the other billionaires are building bunkers and hightailing it out of the U.S., you came to the Lone Star State. I don’t think it was just for the tax cuts either. I think you are at a crossroads. And if I’ve been reading my cards right, you are weighing some heavy things. I wonder if one of those things is your legacy.
I’ve done zero research on you. I remember being so excited about Tesla and electric cars when you came on to the scene. It all felt so hopeful for the future of humanity. I thought you were a visionary! Also, years ago when I heard you were single, I googled “Elon Musk wife” and read a long piece on Justine. Everything else I know about you has been skimmed from the headlines. My news consumption is HIGHLY LOCAL. But I did look up one thing recently. What your first name means. Oak Tree.
FOUR – AN INVITATION
Elon, I’d like to invite you to Fort Bend County. I think you should see the place you are impacting and meet the decision makers and learn about our challenges. And maybe spend some time with some ordinary folks. I can’t imagine you do a lot of that. I know you have people, advance teams and press teams and legal departments and engineers and yes men. But I think this could be a turning point in your legacy, and of embattled Fort Bend County and the start to a very beautiful and longterm relationship built on trust and transparency. A little I’ll show you mine if you show me yours action, if you will.
You’re already here doing cool things like the Tesla START electric vehicle technician training program at the Texas State Technical College campus in Rosenberg.
We have real problems here. Problems I think you have solutions for. And we have the brain and man power for some of the next amazing innovations on your horizon. So… I’ll hope you’ll come see us in person. I know a plucky, free and fair, local reporter who would love to give you a close up and inside look at a county she loves very much. We’ll invite you to a BBQ, we are very good at those. You just have to leave the yes men at home.
All my love,
All my light,
All my best,
Jess