We got a look back at the challenges Chau, an immigrant, overcame to become a judge and now a mayor in the town in Matagorda County.
Chau's daughter Jennifer Kim Chau tells ABC13 her father immigrated from Vietnam after he was left essentially stranded at Fort Knox, Kentucky, while training with the U.S. Army when Saigon fell.
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When Chau arrived in Palacios in 1987, he worked for years for Texas Parks and Wildlife.
While there, he spent years volunteering as a translator and mediator to help ease racial tensions between newly-immigrated Vietnamese shrimpers and the coastal fishing community in the '80s.
Chau formerly served the City of Palacios for over 25 years as the municipal judge and was the first Vietnamese municipal magistrate of the state of Texas.