How many times are we going to see the Times shamelessly using it’s power to tell half truths in order to try to sway public opinion?
Their editorial the other day lamented the slim pickings that have been provided to us with the four finalists for the city manager position.
They wrote about the candidate from out of town that appears to have had “ethical lapses” (to use the Times’ term).
They also wrote about one of our deputy city managers who bungled the police payroll issue a couple of years ago to the tune of a couple of million dollars.
Not one word
They did not write one word about our current chief financial officer who has appeared before council time and again providing wildly inaccurate financial data.
Could that be because she is the chosen one?
Hypocrites!
We deserve better
Brutus
elpasospeak 
How many Times?
The answer my friend, is blowing in the wind.
The answer is blowing in the wind.
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Where is Leeser in this?
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Leeser, the ‘such a good boy’, seems to be completely oblivious of city mis-government, I think he’s report to be last seen in ‘left field’ at the new baseball stadium!
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The Mayor is silent, which is also cause for concern. It is inconceivable that he was not monitoring the search before the four finalists were announced. He should have shut down the search and forced council to stop this process. Choosing between these four is not an acceptable solution, nor is it acceptable to use that as an excuse to keep Wilson.
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Oscar has no passion for civic duty or good governance. He’s there for the title and a few good parties. That’s it. He will go down in El Paso’s history as our worst mayor.
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the Times never mentions Wilson’s screw ups either. wilson never looked at albuquerque’s contract with the isotopes. she just downloaded marching orders from MS. it took acosta to show how bad the original deal was in comparison to albuquerque’s contract. our deal was so bad it forced wilson to change things. the fact it took acosta to point this out made wilson look like a dumbass.
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Which Wilson is!
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This entire search process is a charade. Are we to truly believe that these are the four best candidates from across the entire country? Two of the best four candidates from across the country are current City of El Paso employees who have no experience as a city manager?
Four candidates and not one Black, Anglo or Asian among them? I guess that is a coincidence. (So much for the city being an equal opportunity employer.)
After all of El Paso’s pain and embarrassment related to corruption, our city council decided to put forth a candidate whose ethics have been seriously questioned and whose poor judgment has actually been proven by his e-mails? Courtney Niland thinks we owe it to him to let her hear his side of the story.
The real irony is that despite all the recent statements about El Paso progress, our new ballpark, downtown redevelopment, an El Paso renaissance, etc., the same people want us to believe that no prospective city managers find El Paso and this job appealing enough to interview for the job. If we can’t attract a reputable, qualified city manager, how will we attract businesses. Some would lead us to believe that we had to settle for an EPISD superintendent who was so unqualified that we now have to pay for him to become qualified.
The Times editorial seemed to make excuses for the weak pool. To think that a person would not sign a multi-year, high-salary contract because of a possible change in the city manager style of government is absurd. Even if the job were eliminated, the city manager would get paid in full per any contract.
Note that the Times went so so far as to suggest getting Wilson to stay beyond the end of her contract. Maybe that’s the real agenda. Clearly there is a group that wants a city manager they can control. That group is well represented on council and in city management.
The real question is: who are the individuals who are orchestrating this charade?
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I heard that our illustrious city government is going to hire a ‘jackass whisperer’ in an attempt to explain to their sheer stupidity to El Paso’s citizens!
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Carmen A-C: YES- Nyland, Lilly, Noe; NO -Holguin, Limon, Robinson. If I’m right, Acosta and Romero are the swing votes.
Your thoughts?
But I want to know where Leeser stands in this. Would he veto Carmen A-C who is so identified with The Club and will keep its agenda rolling along. She did it with the bogus numbers.
I met David Almonte and he is a nice guy and will keep the train on track; can’t speak to the out-of-town candidates. If Carmen is the choice and Leeser doesn’t veto, I think you will see some of the more competent department heads leave as they get favorable offers. The oldsters will stay in place waiting for retirement.
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If, as the Times reported today, Gonzalez is the frontrunner for the city manager position, it now looks as though the special interest puppeteers pulling the strings in city government knew exactly what they were doing by including him as a finalist.
I initially thought that they put Gonzalez in the mix as an easy throwaway to make it easier for Candeleria to get the job. Then I saw Niland’s comment about how she and some others on council want someone with city manager experience, at which time I realized that Gonzalez is the only one of the four finalists with city manager level experience. So we were presented with four finalists, three of whom don’t even meet one of the most important criteria specified by Niland, who is strongly aligned with certain local developers.
I still believe the deck has been stacked, but in a different way than I initially thought. The special interests who control certain city council members apparently want someone with both city manager experience and questionable ethical standards. It is a matter of public record that Gonzalez took baseball tickets from a company and shortly thereafter urged the Irving city council to award a 40% tax break to the company that provided the tickets. Even if he did nothing illegal per se, those events suggest that he is neither sensitive to or concerned about the appearance of impropriety.
Strong ethics do not appear to have been a criteria for selection. Just the opposite. Now we know why Gonzalez is in the lead. Certain individuals want a city manager who can be manipulated to their advantage.
There’s more to the Gonzalez story than just baseball tickets.
http://www.wfaa.com/news/investigates/Criminal-complaint-filed-against-Irving-City-Manager-189269561.html
Who has been calling the shots on this search?
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