Port Aransas Mayor Charles Bujan, 77, died Wednesday, Feb. 9, from pancreatic cancer, according to Dave Parson, the Port Aransas city manager. Funeral arrangements are pending.
Mayor Pro-Tem Joan Holt will step into the role until results of the May 7 elections are announced and the winner is sworn in. Bujan was not on the 2022 ballot as he was at the end of term limits for the job. He was first elected to the position in 2016 after four terms on the City Council.
Bujan made a name for himself as a tough mayor, not afraid to take on the big guns to protect his beloved hometown. When COVID-19 locked down the state, he took some heat for closing beaches to anyone not actively exercising. He led the city in a prolonged battle with the Port of Corpus Christi over increased development on Harbor Island, which Bujan and others feared would harm the environment and threaten tourism.
He was a force to be reckoned with after Hurricane Harvey damaged the city in 2017. His own home was flooded with 3 feet of water, but he put in countless hours as a non-paid member of the council helping to rebuild the community. He had since focused his efforts on increasing affordable housing on the island to help with a shortage of workers.
A 183-unit complex began accepting renters in December because of his efforts to obtain the land, form a private-public partnership, and raise the money for construction.
Bujan was born in Port Aransas on Aug. 9, 1944, to Viola and Charlie Bujan. He grew up in Port Aransas during the 1940s and '50s, a member of a Mustang Island founding family.
He spent some of his adult years in Wichita, working for Cessna and Lear aircraft manufacturing plants, before joining the U.S. Air Force. After he was discharged as a sergeant four years later, he moved back to Port Aransas and attended Corpus Christi State University, earning a bachelor’s degree in economics.
Again following a job, he moved to Atlantic City, New Jersey, to work for the Prudential Insurance Co., where he put in 25 years.
He was a fishing guide in Port Aransas and owned Beacon RV, which had been in his family since 1945. He sold it in December 2020. Bujan also was an ordained Baptist minister and volunteered as a chaplain’s assistant at the William G. McConnell Unit in Beeville for 17 years.
He is survived by his second wife, Sherri Bujan; sons Robbie Bujan of Hudson, New York, and Jon Bujan of Houston; stepson Erik Thompson of Port Lavaca; and stepdaughter Jennifer Thompson of Boston.