By JIM VERTUNO

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Elon Musk has for years made Texas a business home and playground, launching rockets, building cars, and dreaming about creating a utopian enclave for his workers on the rural outskirts of the state capital.

Now, a new Musk project is on the brink of victory: an election Saturday to officially turn a small patch of coastal South Texas — home to his rocket company SpaceX — into a city known as Starbase.

If Musk prevails — which appears likely, since the small number of residents eligible to vote include his employees — it will be a victory for the mega-billionaire whose popularity has waned since he became the chain-saw-wielding public face of President Donald Trump’s federal job and spending cuts, and sunk more than $20 million into a failed effort to tip Wisconsin Supreme Court elections. Profits at his Tesla car company have plummeted.

As of Tuesday, nearly 200 of 283 eligible voters had already cast an early ballot, according to county election records. The list of names so far does not include Musk, who voted in the county in the November elections.

The cosmic dateline sounds like a billionaire’s vanity project in an area where the man and his galactic dreams already enjoy broad support from residents and state and local officials. But there are creeping concerns that the city vote and companion efforts at the state Legislature will give Musk and his company town too much control over access to a popular swimming and camping area known for generations as the “poor people’s beach.”

Setting up a company town

Saturday’s vote to establish Starbase is seen as a done deal.

The proposed city at the southern tip of Texas near the Mexico border is only about 1.5 square miles (3.9 square kilometers), crisscrossed by a few roads and dappled with airstream trailers and modest mid-century homes. The polling site is in a building on Memes St., a cheeky nod to Musk’s social media company X.

Musk first floated the idea of a Starbase city in 2021. SpaceX officials have said little about exactly why they want a company town, and did not respond to messages seeking comment this week. But a fight over beach access highlights at least part of what could be at stake.

SpaceX rocket launches and engine tests, and even just moving certain equipment around the launch base, requires closing a local highway and access to Boca Chica State Park and Boca Chica Beach.

Closure currently requires collaboration with surrounding Cameron County. Two bills being considered by state lawmakers would move most of that responsibility to the the new city, just as the company seeks permission from the Federal Aviation Administration to increase the number of launches from five to 25 a year.

SpaceX officials say the bills would streamline beach closures and operations at a company that has contracts with the Department of Defense and NASA for use of its heavy rocket Starship, including a goal to send astronauts back to the moon and eventually Mars.

“This fully reusable rocket system keeps the U.S. ahead of global competitors like China, and its being developed right here in South Texas,” SpaceX Vice President of Starship Legal and Regulatory Sheila McCorkle wrote to state lawmakers. She noted the company’s $4 billion investments and thousands of jobs in Texas.

“We need to carry on our mission of turning South Texas into the Gateway to Mars and making humankind multiplanetary,” McCorkle wrote.

Public pushback

A legislative hearing this month on the beach access bills drew just a handful of company executives and environmental activists but generated hundreds of comments from supporters and opponents.

Dozens of people who identified themselves as SpaceX workers, scientists and engineers living in the area submitted identical statements: “It improves coordination around beach access during spaceflight activities without increasing closures. This is key to public safety and continued growth of the space industry in Texas.”

Others praised SpaceX’s mission, jobs and investments in the area.

Opponents countered that the state would be giving Musk and his company too much control over a beach that draws tens of thousands of visitors every year.

Cameron County Judge Eddie Trevino Jr., said the county has been a good steward for beach closures and that there is no need to move the authority to the new city.

“SpaceX is a strong economic driver in our region, one of which we are extremely proud,” Trevino said in a letter to state lawmakers. “However, we believe that this bill does not serve the public interest and has received an overwhelmingly negative response from our local community,”

Another proposed bill would make it a Class B misdemeanor with up to 180 days in jail if someone doesn’t comply with an order to evacuate the beach. But that measure would only take effect if beach closure authority is shifted to the new city.

In a temporary setback for Musk and SpaceX, a state House panel this week rejected a bill that would shift control of closing beaches for rocket launches from the local county government to the new city.

Bekah Hinojosa, co-founder of the South Texas Environmental Justice Network, has organized protests against the city vote and the beach access issue. The group will hold another protest on Saturday, even though the city will likely be easily approved.

Hinojosa said her organization tried to organize a block walk around SpaceX to encourage voters to reject the city vote. The company’s private security escorted them away, she said.

“We’ve been sounding the alarm about Musk and SpaceX for many years,” Hinojosa said. “Now that the rest of the country is starting to listen, if feels like we’re finally being heard.”