English Bulldog Puppies for Sale in Brownsville, TX

There’s a lot to love about Brownsville, the oldest and largest city in the Rio Grande Valley. It’s a city steeped in history with a colorful, cross-border culture, a celebrity-fueled arts scene, and a thriving economy that is on an upward trajectory. By most metrics, it seems as if the city "on the border, by the sea" is a place filled with opportunity — except maybe if you’re a woman.

A new analysis by WalletHub, a personal finance website, recently ranked Brownsville as the worst city in Texas for women. WalletHub took a deep dive into 182 of the largest cities in the nation for its 2025 ranking of the Best & Worst Cities for Women, using a number of metrics to determine which ones have the best — and the worst — living standards for women.

“WalletHub compared 182 cities across 15 key indicators of living standards for women. Our data set ranges from the median earnings for female workers to the quality of women’s hospitals to suicide rates for women,” WalletHub analyst Milvionne Chery Copeland wrote in the September 22 ranking.

While Brownsville ranked near the bottom at No. 176, other Texas cities did not fare much better. Of the 16 Texas cities on the list, only three cracked the top half — all of them affluent cities — while six others joined Brownsville in the bottom 25%.

WalletHub analyzed the 150 largest cities in America, as well as “at least two of the most populous cities in each state,” in order to give a picture of how women fare in all 50 states, even if a state doesn’t have a large metropolitan region. Further, the finance site only took into account individual cities, choosing not to include surrounding suburbs, as it examined “Women’s Economic & Social Well-Being” and “Women’s Health Care & Safety.”

WalletHub then gathered data on variables, such as median earnings, the gender wage gap, unemployment rates, community support for women-owned businesses, and women’s healthcare issues, such as access to abortion, uninsured rates, the availability of women-specific hospitals and preventative healthcare. Life expectancy, obesity, suicide rates, and the prevalence of sex crimes committed against women also factored into WalletHub’s equations, which were weighted on a 100-point scale. The higher a city’s score, the better off women are there.

“Living in the right city can significantly improve a woman’s economic status, health, and safety,” Copeland said. “The best cities for women offer job security and high pay, enabling women to achieve greater financial independence.”

So what makes Brownsville one of the worst places for women? One of the main factors is a high rate of women who are uninsured. Brownsville and Laredo tied for last place in terms of how many women are uninsured. The uninsured rate in the two South Texas cities is 18 times worse compared to South Burlington, Vermont, which had the lowest uninsured rate of all the cities on the list.

Texas cities at the bottom half of the list include: Grand Prairie (97), Irving (101), Garland (103), Dallas (106), San Antonio (112), Arlington (120), and Amarillo (127), while El Paso (147), Corpus Christi (155), Houston (159), Laredo (171) and Lubbock (172) joined Brownsville in the bottom 25% of the list. Fort Worth just barely eked into the top half at No. 87, while Austin (21) and Plano (18) were the highest-ranked cities in Texas. Meanwhile, Columbia, Maryland, ranked top in the nation overall, and Jackson, Mississippi ranked dead last.

Singapore-based Seatrium Limited has announced the divestment of its AmFELS Yard in Brownsville, Texas, to Karpower Valley LLC for S$65 million (USD 50.6 million), marking a significant realignment of its U.S. operations while strengthening ties with floating power provider Karpowership.

The transaction, executed through Seatrium’s subsidiary Seatrium AmFELS, Inc., represents an accretive divestment that will enable Seatrium to enhance capital and operational efficiencies while unlocking value from surplus facilities.

Karpowership is the world’s largest owner and operator of the floating power plant technology, known as Powerships.

Under the terms of the agreement, S$50 million of the consideration will be deferred and paid one year after closing. The book value of the divested assets, sold on an “as is, where is” basis, stood at approximately S$39 million as of June 30, 2025.

“We have a strong and longstanding relationship with Karpowership, and are pleased to entrust the yard to a partner with whom we will continue to deepen our collaboration,” said Seatrium CEO Chris Ong.

Despite the yard divestment, Ong affirmed that “the U.S. market remains important to us. We will continue to leverage our global footprint and integrated One Seatrium Delivery Model to deliver world-class solutions to our U.S. based and global customers in the offshore and energy sectors.”

Following the transaction, Seatrium will transition its strategic presence in the U.S. to focus on engineering innovation and technology capabilities through its technology centers and offices in Houston, Texas, and a service center in Vicksburg, Mississippi.

The sale comes just over a month after the two companies strengthened their partnership with the naming of Karadeniz LNGTS Americas in August at Seatrium’s shipyard in Singapore. This vessel represents the fifth member of Karpowership’s LNGTS (LNG Terminal Ship) fleet, which can be paired with the company’s floating power plants known as Powerships.

The relationship between the two companies extends beyond the yard sale, with the firms signing a Letter of Intent in August for Seatrium to convert three high-capacity LNGTS and Karpowership’s next generation of Powerships, which feature modular systems adaptable to project needs and the ability to integrate advanced technologies like Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Storage (CCUS) systems.

Karpowership has established itself as a significant player in the global energy market, currently representing 1% of global installed Gas-to-Power capacity with ambitions to double that to 2% over the next decade. The company operates 50 Powerships with an installed capacity of 10,000 MW and 11 LNGTS units across 20 countries.

The completion of the AmFELS yard divestment remains subject to customary closing conditions, including the transfer of the lease to Karpowership’s related entity by the Port of Brownsville. Seatrium has committed to completing all ongoing projects at the facility by the end of 2025 to ensure a smooth transition.

This strategic divestment highlights the ongoing consolidation and realignment in the maritime and offshore energy sectors as companies adjust to evolving market conditions and emerging opportunities in cleaner energy solutions.

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