WALLER COUNTY, TX (Covering Katy News)—More than 160 business and economic development leaders gathered at Beckendorff Farms for the second annual Waller County Economic Development Partnership’s Infrastructure Conference on Thursday, August 15, 2024.
The event featured a dynamic panel of experts who delved into critical topics of energy, mobility, and drainage. Contributions came from a diverse group of government officials, business leaders, engineers, urban planners, and community stakeholders.
Texas State Representative Stan Kitzman delivered the keynote address, highlighting Waller County’s appeal to businesses and commending the WCEDP for curating a notable panel to address the pressing issues facing economic development.
“It’s important to give our partners, community stakeholders, elected officials, and the public an opportunity to discuss the challenges of a fast-growing county,” Waller County Economic Development Partnership Executive Vince Yokom said.
Having reliable infrastructure in place now is essential to creating jobs in the future, according to Yokom.
“It’s not enough to have a great workforce, corporations also want to know how fast they can be up and running once they select a site to locate,” Yokom said. “Without vital infrastructure in place they will look elsewhere, and we’ll lose the opportunity to create great paying jobs for our residents, and we’ll also lose the property tax relief that comes from diversifying your tax base.”
The conference featured three panels, each discussing their own topics which were drainage, mobility, and electrical infrastructure.
“I was very impressed by the experience and excellence of our subject-matter expert panelists,” Waller County Judge Trey Duhon said. “The conversations were very informative.”
Former Harris County Judge Ed Emmett joined Waller County Engineer Ross McCall, former TxDOT Director of District Operations Quincy Allen, and TxDOT Director of Special Projects Sue Thiess on the mobility panel, which was moderated by James Koch, VP at Advanced Infrastructure Group and former director of Transportation, Planning, and Development for TxDOT.
Thiess emphasized that expanding and adding new roads is a process that takes planning.
“It does not happen in six months or two years. Road construction takes many, many years.” Thiess said.
In the Post COVID world, Emmett emphasized that more freight will be on our roads as manufacturing operations move closer to the United States in an attempt to solve supply chain issues that happened during the pandemic. It’s a process called onshoring and its happening now and creating the need for additional road and freeway capacity.
“Almost 20,000 trucks per day are crossing the border at Lorado, Emmett said. Guess where those trucks are going? Some are going to Dallas Fort Worth. The other’s that are coming to this area are coming across I-35 and across I-10 and that’s just going to continue to grow with more and more onshoring, manufacturing coming out of China and coming back to Mexico. Truck driving is going to grow.”
Emmett also says logistics has changed greatly over the past 30 years.
“If you go back to the late eighties and early nineties, railroads didn’t want to carry containers, they wanted nothing to do with intermodal freight,” Emmett said. “All you have to do now is look at all the double stacked trains coming all the way from the Port of Long Beach or coming into the Port of Houston. That’s going to continue.”
The drainage panel was moderated by Alia Vinson of longtime WCEDP member from the law firm Allen Boone Humphries Robinson (ABHR). Panelists emphasized the need for a regional approach to managing flooding and drainage.
Using data to maximize collaboration and planning was one of the keys to a regional approach expressed by panelist and Waller County Engineer Ross McCall.
The panel included Halff Water Resources Team Lead Andrew Moore, AIG Technical Services Vice President James Koch, and Imelda Diaz of Diaz Engineering and former Director of Engineering for Harris County Flood Control District.
In light of the recent damage from Hurricane Beryl, the discussion on electrical power infrastructure was particularly relevant. The panel explored various aspects of the ERCOT system, including its operations, the challenges of procuring critical components like transformers and circuit breakers, recent funding developments for electrical infrastructure, and the potential of Small Modular Nuclear Reactors (SMRs) providing clean, reliable energy.
Dr. Sean McDeavitt, a professor of Nuclear Engineering at Texas A&M, spearheaded the discussion on SMRs. He highlighted that while this technology has existed since the 1960s, it is only now being recognized as a viable option for clean energy generation.
The panel also included Constellation Energy’s Casey Kelly, vice president of State Government Affairs–South, which operates several power-generation facilities. Rounding out the panel was Kevin Sarvis, manager of Transmission Accounts and Support at CenterPoint Energy, and Zachary Stephenson, director of Regulatory and Legal Affairs for Texas Electric Cooperatives, who represented transmission and distribution providers.
The panel went into detail on the differences in regulatory challenges for power transmission, distribution, and generation.
The conference concluded with remarks from Waller County Judge Trey Duhon. As he begins his third term, Judge Duhon highlighted that during his tenure, his County has faced 10 weather events necessitating FEMA assistance. Against this backdrop, he emphasized the conference’s crucial role in future planning, particularly given that Waller County is one of the fastest-growing counties in the nation.
The Waller County Economic Development Partnership vision is to build a vibrant and strong local economy by retaining and attracting top companies that provide good jobs while respecting the environment. The WCEDP believes a good quality of life, however you wish to enjoy it, starts with a good job.