CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — City manager Peter Zanoni's authority to execute contracts for the inner harbor desalination project came under the microscope at Tuesday's council meeting.
Council members Carolyn Vaughn, Eric Cantu and Gil Hernandez asked that the resolution be put on the June 24 agenda. Zanoni was not present at Tuesday's council meeting as council members discussed a resolution to rescind that authority.
The city's legal department and Drew Molly with Corpus Christi Water warned that it's not known what impact passage of that resolution could have on the project, particularly it's timing. Vaughn took issue with Molly, who was not able to answer specific questions she had about the project.
"Citizens need to understand and they don't understand," Vaughn said. "You can all say what you want to they don't understand we've not communicated that to them. All I want to do is have the city manager accountable whenever he spends something that it gets approved. That's not asking too much."
Hernandez asked for more transparency on how money was being spent for the project.
Councilman Roland Barrera expressed his frustration.
"Once again we're telling all our partners that we're not gonna provide a regular predictable regulatory environment because come Friday, I'm gonna put a 3 signature memo all of a sudden with no backup information," Barrera said. "And I'm gonna tell these multi-billion dollar companies that I'm not sure what I'm going to do next week and I'm not gonna give you any documentation."
Cantu said he doesn't want to kill desal, but he also doesn't want to give the city manager a blank check.
City legal was concerned the resolution would rescind contract with Kiewit, the company selected for the design of the project. Tensions then escalated among city council, which led to Mayor Paulette Guajardo to call for an abrupt recess.
"If this absolutely has to be done today, I'm gonna recess this meeting and we're gonna do it right," Guajardo said. "And if it takes 2 hours for everybody to sit at the table because y'all want to sit at this table today, You don't wanna take it and logically sit down at a conference table and talk about this, then that's what we're doing"
When city leaders returned, the resolution was amended to modify that resolution. Effective July 1, the city manager must present any decision involving the inner harbor with city council if the price tag is more than $50,000.
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