Carrera: How COSTEP fights misconceptions about the RGV

BROWNSVILLE, Texas – COSTEP’S economic development director, Rick Carrera, says there are a number of misconceptions about the Rio Grande Valley that he has to correct when he interacts with site selectors and goes to trade shows.

The most pressing is that the region is a dangerous place to live, work, and play.

“The biggest misconceptions that we are fighting right now is…. we are fighting a narrative that is being distributed out there that we are not the safest place to be,” Carrera said.

“Nothing could be further from the truth. This is a very safe area to be in. A lot of our cities are ranked as some of the safer cities to be in the area. Our crime rates have been dropping for years now.”

COSTEP stands for the Council for South Texas Economic Progress.

Carrera says the misconception about the safety of the border region may come about because many migrants are crossing the Rio Grande every day.

“But that doesn’t impact us day to day. I have to explain that to some people… (that) we also go to work, we also go to school. Life goes on as it is intended to go on for everybody here.”

Carrera acknowledged there are a large number of migrants crossing the Rio Grande. But that does not border communities are not safe, he argues.

“Us as a collective in the Rio Grande Valley and the Rio South Texas region, I think if we keep pushing that narrative that this is a safe place to be, we are in a good spot. We can combat that.”

Carrera made his comments in an exclusive interview with the Rio Grande Guardian at the recent RGV StartUp Week, held at the eBridge Center for Business & Commercialization. Carrera was on a panel with Daniel Silva, president of the Rio Grande Valley Partnership. They discussed regionalism.

Another misconception Carrera has to deal with when he goes to seminars and conferences outside of Texas is the notion that South Texas ends at San Antonio.

Carrera said that when he was visiting with some national site selectors, he was asked about the location of the Rio South Texas region.

“When I explained I was from South Texas I had to throw the word ‘Deep’ in there just to help clarify. Most people when they think of South Texas, they think of San Antonio.”

Carrera said it helps when he mentions South Padre Island and SpaceX’s rocket launching facility at Boca Chica.

“Even so, there was still some explaining that I had to do to give them a geographical lesson.”

Because many people do not know where the Valley is, Carrera and his colleagues take a lot of marketing pieces with them. “They identify where on the map we are.”

Asked what big projects COSTEP are working on, Carrera said: “We recently landed something big. We are working on a couple of other good leads.”

The big project Carrera was referencing was Westa Foods, which is building a $25 million state-of-the-art flour mill at the Port of Brownsville.

Carrera said COSTEP continues to work on Fam Tours. Fam stands for familiarization. These tours are organized to bring national site selectors to the region.

“In the next several weeks we will have concluded the (current) Fam Tours. Those that we have operated or conducted so far, we have been met with very positive results and at the end of the day it is about creating awareness,” Carrera said.

“When we bring the site selector community down here to visit, we take them on a tour of the area. Our end game is to create as much awareness of the region as possible.”

Carrera added: “Going back to that previous discussion about combatting that (negative) narrative, sometimes you have got to do that a little bit at a time. And so, if we can combat that by getting the site selector community who are exposed to greater masses than where they have come from, because a lot of them are not from Texas, a lot of them are from the Pacific Northwest, some are from the Northeast, some are from South Carolina, they are from all over the country. If we have to do that, a Fam Tour at a time, we are ready to do that.”

Here is a video recording of the Guardian’s interview with Carrera:

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