BND board aims to bring closure to bridge project dispute

There appears to be consent among Brownsville Navigation District board members that it's time to close the chapter into the $21 million that BND spent on a non-existent bridge.

The board met Wednesday and without discussion, unanimously voted to pay $302,561 in legal fees to three law firms regarding the litigation with James D. Dannenbaum's Houston-based Dannenbaum Engineering Corp.

BND board Chairman Martin Arambula said Thursday that the unanimous vote was indicative that board members wanted "closure."

Furthermore, Arambula didn't mind that District Attorney Armando Villalobos did not give BND notice of the intended forfeiture of $1 million from Dannenbaum's firm, perhaps stripping BND's right to claim the money for itself.

The $1 million is part of the $15.5 million that BND paid to Dannenbaum's firm. Villalobos maintains that the $1 million was stolen or misapplied from BND.

Villalobos did not respond to a request for comment for this article.

Villalobos filed the notice of seizure and intended forfeiture in state district court on April 21.

The petition gave notice to Dannenbaum's Treasurer Dwight Uithoven "and to all persons possibly holding an interest in such property" that they had 20 days from the date of citation to respond if they wanted to challenge the forfeiture of the money to the state.

District Judge J. Manuel Bañales forfeited the money to the state the following day, April 22.

BND CEO Eddie Campirano and BND attorney Dan Rentfro said Thursday that they didn't see any notice of forfeiture and were not notified.

"I haven't even thought about it. I haven't researched it. Nobody has asked me," Rentfro said.

"As far as I know, the port is not contesting that. They did what they did. We did what we did. As far as the port, it's done," Rentfro said.

Arambula said he wasn't notified, but wasn't concerned.

Arambula said that Villalobos is very receptive to discussing the possible sharing of funds with BND.

"I'm just happy that all this has been resolved," said Arambula, who added that he is just happy that the funds will return to Cameron County instead of where they were.

The $1 million arrived in Cameron County Wednesday. The sender was Dannenbaum Engineering Corp and the cashier check was drawn on an account at Compass Bank in Houston. The check was in a county vault and county Treasurer David Betancourt was working on setting up an account so that it could begin to draw interest.