Once viewed as inevitable, a long-discussed plan to build a $91 million bridge to replace a drawbridge that connects Pelican Island and Galveston is now in limbo.

The Pelican Island Bridge replacement, which has been in the works since 2013, had looked to be on the path toward a funding agreement as recently as spring.

Then the city of Galveston walked away from the project, questioning the commitment of the Galveston County Navigation District No. 1, which owns and operates the current bridge, to maintain the new structure. Finger-pointing between city officials and the navigation district ensued, and now the future of the bridge proposal is uncertain — roughly $26 million short of the necessary funds to build it. Local officials are hoping for a lifeline in the form of an $18 million funding request placed with the Houston-Galveston Area Council.

At the heart of the disagreement is the future of the navigation district itself, a small local tax entity with an annual budget of about $2 million whose sole purpose is owning and operating the current Pelican Island Bridge. A district employee now operates a drawbridge that uses a beam or truss deck that can be raised to an incline or vertical position, allowing vessels to pass underneath.

Galveston Mayor Jim Yarbrough said the city understands the navigation district’s hesitance to commit to owning and operating the new bridge, given that the local sponsor would be primarily responsible for cost overruns. But he added that unless the Texas Department of Transportation agrees to take ownership — unlikely, for now — it makes sense for the navigation district to continue in that role.

“I don’t want to put the blame on anybody,” Yarbrough said. “At issue is, what’s the navigation district’s role in this? Obviously putting money up is part of it. There are some that say they own the current bridge and they ought to be the fiscal agent and they ought to be the local sponsor for a new bridge. And to me, common sense says that’s legitimate.”

Dennis Byrd, the chairman of the navigation district, disagrees. Byrd has concerns about the district becoming the primary local sponsor of the new bridge, reasoning that the proposal — a conventional 75-foot span with four lanes, as well as pedestrian and bicycle crossings — would no longer require a human operator.

The district has committed $10 million toward demolition of the old bridge, which is included in the $91 million estimate. Galveston County and the city of Galveston each pledged $5 million while the Texas Department of Transportation has committed to spending $45 million.

“The city and the county, they have a larger tax base,” Byrd said. “We’re the smallest tax base out of all three. We’re in favor of building a new bridge, we support it, but we don’t have the money to do it.”

That position has put the district at odds with the city.

A May meeting attended by city, Galveston County and navigation district officials devolved into a blame game when, according to Byrd, Yarbrough and Galveston City Manager Brian Maxwell walked out of the meeting in frustration that the navigation district would not commit to more funding.

“They were trying to work out a deal for funding of the new bridge,” Byrd said. “At that meeting, my board was meeting the next day, and at the meeting there they wanted me to give them an answer that day. I said, ‘I can’t give you an answer today, because our board doesn’t meet until tomorrow.’ That’s when Yarbrough and Maxwell said, ‘Well, the navigation district’s out.’ And they got up and walked out the room.”

Several months later, in September, Maxwell posted a comment on the Galveston County Daily News website, blaming the navigation district for walking away from the project.

“The original plan had them as the sponsor with the county and city participating to help pay for it along with Texas A&M. They decided they do not wish to participate in a new bridge and want to now do ‘other things,’” Maxwell wrote.

The back and forth irritated Byrd, who noted that the city and county were each putting up less of the local share than the navigation district was.

“We didn’t walk out of the meeting. The mayor and the city manager walked out of the meeting,” Byrd said. “And nobody ever said anything about coming up with another $5 million to match our $10 million. It kind of left a bad taste in our mouth, to be honest with you.”

Yarbrough also maintains that the city of Galveston charter prevents it from taking on additional debt without approval from voters, which could hamstring the city from taking on the liability of being the primary local sponsor of the new bridge.

Whether the navigation district wants to continue as currently constituted is an open question. Yarbrough acknowledged that the district may have outlived its usefulness.

“They’re not gonna own this new facility, they don’t want to own this new facility,” the Galveston mayor said. “That begs the question, you were established to build and maintain a bridge. Now you’re saying you don’t want to be in the bridge business and we’re gonna tear down your existing facility once the new facility’s up and running. What do you exist for?”

When the navigation district was created, it set its geographic boundaries at the old city limits for Galveston, which only went to 103rd street, where the Galveston seawall ends. As a result, the district cannot collect taxes from the island’s affluent West End extending to Jamaica Beach — or roughly one-third of Galveston’s population. The result is a tax base so small that it makes it difficult for the navigation district to endure.

The district has spent up to $2 million recently for electrical work on the current bridge, which is on its last legs. TxDOT is also helping to pay for structural maintenance, and has indicated that these repairs will prop up the bridge for another decade.

One of the only bridges of its kind in Texas, the Pelican Bay Bridge was built in 1959 at a time when few bascule bridges were constructed. Today, an average of 9,100 vehicles a day pass over the bridge, most carrying commuters to and from the Texas A&M University at Galveston campus on Pelican Island.

But once the current bridge expires, the navigation district effectively becomes a shell entity. Yarbrough floated the idea that the city could absorb the navigation district in order to leverage its ability to float bonds for the Port of Galveston, but Byrd wants that decision to be made by the district’s taxpayers.

Aside from such questions, the future of the bridge proposal is now contingent largely on whether the Houston-Galveston Area Council’s Transportation Policy Council and Texas A&M University can help close the funding shortfall.

In October, the city of Galveston and Galveston County wrote the council, a regional organization made up of 13 county governments in southeast Texas, appealing for $18 million in federal funds to help build the bridge. The navigation district co-signed the letter. Galveston County Judge Mark Henry recently told the Houston Chronicle that a memorandum of understanding has been drafted that earmarks $18 million from the HGAC as well as $8 million from Texas A&M, which would effectively bridge the project’s funding gap.

But Alan Clark, the director of transportation planning for HGAC, said that the $18 million is far from a done deal and that the Transportation Policy Council must go through a lengthy process to advance the money, with a final decision not likely until around next March. Working in the bridge proposal’s favor: Galveston County Commissioner Ken Clark, a supporter of the project, will chair HGAC’s Transportation Policy Council in the new year.

“I can’t say today that it is certain because that is a decision of our policy council and we haven’t developed even a preliminary ranking of all the projects we’ve received,” Clark said. “I think everybody is generally aware of the importance of the project.”

Texas A&M officials say they have also not committed to a dollar amount. Bill McClain, a spokesman for Texas A&M at Galveston, said the university’s financial commitment will be based in part on an agreement that the bridge will still be routed around the campus on Pelican Island, instead of through it. The new four-lane bridge would have a higher volume of traffic — including more industrial vehicles — and there are concerns that the increase in motorists could affect public safety on the campus.

Even if funding for a new bridge comes together, the outstanding question of who would take control of maintenance and operations remains unanswered. Most of the project’s stakeholders agree that either the city of Galveston or the county navigation district will need to step up.

“We know how to maintain roads, but we don’t really have any bridge capacity here,” Yarbrough said. “That’s just not our deal.”

Said the navigation district’s Byrd: “We can’t worry about a new bridge right now. We’ve got a 60-year old bridge that we’re rehabilitating to the best of our ability right now.”

nick.powell@chron.com