Louisiana officials listed building a new city in Vermilion Parish among “anticipated needs to win” SpaceX’s $100 billion spaceport, according to confidential state records obtained by the Gulf States Newsroom.
The records offer another glimpse into the private negotiations that preceded the announcement of Louisiana's SpaceX project. Previous Gulf States Newsroom reporting found that dozens of state and local officials signed nondisclosure agreements (NDAs) restricting what they could disclose about the negotiations.
The secrecy has drawn scrutiny from residents and prompted a lawsuit alleging that two Vermilion Parish government bodies violated Louisiana's Open Meetings Law when they approved parts of the SpaceX deal.
A March 12, 2026, briefing prepared by Louisiana Economic Development (LED) was marked “Highly Confidential — Attorney Client Privilege,” and officials were instructed in later project communications not to refer to the company by name. The briefing explicitly lists “the construction of a new city in Vermilion Parish” among the anticipated needs to win “Project Osprey,” the state's code name for the SpaceX development.
The briefing offered little detail about the idea. Nearly all the information beneath the city proposal was redacted, leaving unanswered questions about where the city would be located, who would govern it and what role SpaceX might play.
The unredacted portions of the briefing lay out SpaceX’s reasoning and site criteria. It said the company was weighing global options with large amounts of land and trajectory space, far from population centers. It cited continued company growth, discussion of orbital data centers and a commitment tied to NASA’s 2028 goal of returning to the moon. It also said a long-term lunar base requires a third gateway to complement Texas and Florida operations.
Records show that the next day, LED's chief business development officer, Paige Carter, sent the same group a presentation outlining the development of Starbase, Texas, an incorporated city built around SpaceX’s operations.
The presentation noted when Starbase was incorporated, described it as home to SpaceX’s headquarters and launch site, and laid out the powers its municipal government holds over surrounding roads and public access. It also detailed Texas laws and financial incentives that helped facilitate the company's operations.
Studying the Starbase model
Starbase, located in Cameron County, Texas, was incorporated in May 2025. The LED presentation described it as the home of SpaceX's headquarters and rocket launches, with more than 500 residents — more than half of them company employees living on company-owned land. The city was also considering annexing an additional 7,100 acres.
Starbase’s incorporation was largely a company affair. Only 283 people were eligible to vote in the May 2025 election, and a Texas Newsroom analysis of voter rolls found two-thirds of them either worked for SpaceX or had already signaled support. The measure to incorporate the new city passed 212 to 6, and voters elected a SpaceX vice president as mayor and two other company employees as city commissioners.
In a 2024 letter seeking the election, the company’s Starbase general manager said SpaceX already managed roads, utilities, schooling and medical care there and needed the ability to grow the site as a community.
The LED presentation highlighted several ways Starbase's municipal government could accommodate SpaceX's operations. A 2025 Texas law allows the Texas Space Commission to coordinate with city governments to temporarily close highways and other venues for public safety during space-related activities. Starbase's government had authority to close a nearby state highway and beach for launches.
Before the law, SpaceX needed county commissioners to approve beach closures, a process the presentation said “community pressure” could complicate.
The presentation also outlined Texas' constitutional protections limiting liability for certain spaceflight activities, as well as a 10-year property tax break available to SpaceX through an agreement with Cameron County.
The records do not explicitly say Louisiana intended to replicate Starbase. But the presentation's focus on municipal powers, land annexation, road closures and legal protections offers a window into the model state officials were studying as they considered a new city for the project.
A sweeping legislative effort
The March briefing also identified potential legislation addressing noise and nuisance complaints in the surrounding area.
By April 22, LED had updated its Project Osprey briefing, describing legislation as an “extensive” need involving a “multi-bill legislative package” being developed in coordination with the governor's office.
The updated document did not include the explicit reference to constructing a new city that appeared in March. It also did not explain whether the proposal had been abandoned, incorporated into another part of the planning process or removed from the document. LED and SpaceX did not respond to requests for comment.
The April briefing continued to describe the project as requiring extensive state coordination on land acquisition, transportation, federal permitting and electricity.
The state's initial plans called for a development that could eventually involve at least $20 billion in capital investment — potentially reaching $50 billion — and at least 3,000 jobs. Those figures were included in the April briefing and were tied to the project's first phase: developing what officials described as the world's largest launch site.
Records show the state was developing a broad legislative strategy while keeping the company's identity and project details from public view. In an April email circulating the updated briefing, LED officials reminded recipients not to name the company and said maintaining strict confidentiality was essential.
That approach was consistent with Gov. Jeff Landry's broader use of NDAs in economic development negotiations. Previous Gulf States Newsroom reporting found that more than 100 state employees signed NDAs with the governor's office, including agreements related to major industrial projects.
Coordinating with government agencies
The records also show an expanding effort to coordinate the SpaceX project with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and other government agencies.
An agenda for a July 9 meeting outlined plans to coordinate federal, state, local and private-sector partners on the project's permitting requirements and infrastructure needs. The agenda identified potential Corps authorizations and called for officials to evaluate possible agreements to facilitate permitting review.
It describes the goal as a “whole-of-government approach,” lists 27 expected attendees and specifically names a “Section 214 Agreement,” a federal provision that lets the Corps accept outside funds to speed permit reviews. It also lists Section 408 requests, which govern changes to Corps-built works such as levees, among the needed authorizations.
The meeting included senior officials from the Corps, LED, the state Department of Transportation and Development, the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority and the Department of Conservation and Energy — all of whom signed NDAs related to the project. The records also list representatives from three electric cooperatives, an engineering firm, economic development group One Acadiana and a law firm.
Electricity was identified as an extensive project need in LED's April briefing. The utilities involved included Jeff Davis Electric Cooperative, SLEMCO and 1803 Electric Cooperative.
The records also show that SpaceX had a role in determining who participated in subsequent meetings. In late July, LED officials asked state agencies to provide the names, titles and email addresses of their representatives so the final attendee list could be shared with the company.
An in-person meeting involving the company, the Corps and state agencies was scheduled for Aug. 4.
The records do not indicate whether the public was ever given an opportunity to learn about or comment on the proposed city before the SpaceX spaceport project was announced.
Land negotiations and unanswered questions
The proposed rocket launch site faced significant land acquisition hurdles from the beginning.
The March briefing identified primary and secondary sites that were privately owned by ExxonMobil and subject to a 100-year, non-terminable hunting lease held by the Vermilion Duck Hunting Club.
Selling the property would require negotiations among ExxonMobil, the hunting club and the company seeking to develop the site, according to the briefing.
The document said “GJL” — likely referring to Gov. Landry — offered to lead support efforts in the negotiations and was fully engaged in resolving the land sale, litigation and indemnification issues. LED had no role in those negotiations at that point. Gov. Landry’s office did not respond to a request for comment.
In an April 6 email, Carter told the transportation and coastal agency heads she had SpaceX’s approval to share the company’s assessment of highway and marine access, shoreline work and bridges, along with a map of updated property boundaries. The text describing how far the anticipated property extends is redacted.
The land negotiations also became part of the transparency concerns surrounding the project. The lawsuit filed by Vermilion Parish residents and a nonprofit primarily focuses on Open Meetings Law violations by the industrial board, but it also alleges that the police jury approved a settlement with ExxonMobil without properly listing it on the meeting agenda.
The petition says the settlement helped clear the way for the state to acquire land later sold to SpaceX at below-market values. The governor's office said the settlement was discussed in executive session and approved in an open meeting afterward.
By the time state officials were coordinating with federal agencies, utilities and local partners, the project had grown well beyond a conventional development deal. Redactions in the records make it unclear whether the idea of creating a new city advanced beyond early discussions.
But the March briefing and Starbase presentation show that months before the public announcement of SpaceX’s rocket launch site, Louisiana officials were already considering how much of the state’s government and infrastructure might need to change in order to accommodate the company.
This story was produced by the Gulf States Newsroom, a collaboration between Mississippi Public Broadcasting, WBHM in Alabama, WWNO and WRKF in Louisiana and NPR.
