Along the same lines as the discussion about the sad state of our police cars, another thing that someone would look at when considering whether to move their company to El Paso is the condition of our roads.
Our neighborhood roads are in horrible condition. Anyone looking at them can tell that there will be a huge tax bill coming eventually.
Maybe the city should reprioritize it’s spending policies to make our city streets look less disgraceful. Who wants to move to a losing city?
We deserve better
Brutus
elpasospeak 
The state of our roads disgusts me. Council will spend 1/2 million to make hike/bike trails but never has enough money for roads. They designate funds for roads, spend the money elsewhere then want more money for roads — such as from an extra fee on the water bill. I’m sick of it.
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Been saying this for years! Our streets are falling apart, and that costs us more than tax money! It tears up our cars, increasing our cost of repair and maintenance!
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But Brutus we INCLUDED roads in our QoL… it’s just that, to entice the kind of people cityhall wants we need to build walking bridges to the baseb, I mean downtown revitalization zone, beautify overpasses, and half a million dollar bike paths that lead to the Falls at Farrah… Winner, Winner, Carlos and Mickey’s AUTHENTIC Taco Dinner!
i came across an accident on the Pebble Hills extension east of N. Zaragoza the other night that almost caused additional accidents because of NO street lights!
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Dear Brutus,
This is off topic, but I thought I would throw you a bone to chew on.
City management’s proposed budget assumes $3.5 million from an increased franchise fee to be collected from El Paso Electric.
That franchise fee is yet to approved, so isn’t that sort of like counting your chickens before they hatch; or buying that big new house before you get the raise you’ve been hoping for?
This is a pattern, don’t you think? The pattern continues even under new management, which doesn’t bode well for taxpayers.
Also, just to put things in perspective, regardless how you feel about that EPE franchise fee, one city council member said she would rather back away from a fight with Western Refining, which opposes the increase, rather than try to increase the fee, even in that means cutting services. The key part of that sentence is that she is unwilling to go against Western Refining. One article in the Times and she is already folding her tent.
Chew on that, old boy.
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Point well made.
It seems that we are just watching a scripted play.
I doubt that the city council member had to read the article in the Times. It seems more likely to me that she got a phone call.
Brutus
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Agreed. I thought it was interesting that the city rep anticipates a lawsuit by Western Refining, which suggests that one of Western’s food soldiers has told one or more members of council that Western is prepared to sue.
Are we heading down a path, where the city will be run by corporations who will dictate policy simply by engaging the city in legal battles, at which time the city backs down does as told by the corporations? Maybe we’re already there.
Even if property taxes increase and electric bills go up, Scott Weaver, who is a Western VP and a director of Jordan Foster construction, shouldn’t have any trouble paying his bills. He sold more than $2 million worth of Western stock a few days ago.
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The most important road in EP is I-10…which alot of the times is blocked with traffic,art projects,accidents or construction! Do not forget all the EYE POLLUTION of more advertising billboards. Sadly, this is the route most taken to move out of El Paso….
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While the franchise fee struggle is interesting, the real question is why the streets are so bad. I wrote to Streets nearly six years ago to ask wny Rim Road and Kern Place in general were in such terrible condition and when would they be fixed? No reply, ever. The climate is not great here but there are many places that are worse… I have driven in many countries and the only place outside Africa where the roads were so bad is Patagonia…How much money has been spent every year on the streets? Do they use substandard material and pay superior prices for it in a kickback scheme, or is it really inadequate financing and planning, in favor of other projects? The ballpark cost way too much, but the streets problem predates the ballpark by MANY years.
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I’m sorry that you think El Paso is a “losing city.” In reality, El Paso is trying hard to overcome years of neglect by mayors whose only priority was not to raise the taxes. While other cities across the southwest (i.e. Phoenix, Tucson, San Antonio, etc.) invested in themselves, El Paso became the poor cousin. People moved to the cities that had ballparks, swimming pools, 4 star hotels and parks. El Paso may not be able to catch up, but at least a few of the city leaders are now trying. — I just came back from a trip to San Francisco. Their streets are terrible but I enjoyed myself and spent money right along side thousands of others.
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Funny that you should mention Tucson, a city which values a lot of things more than minor league baseball. We spent tens of millions of dollars and penalized local hotels and all hotel guests to attract the baseball team that Tucson was willing to let walk. We did it to enable two families to profit financially.
You can paint stripes on a pony and call it a zebra, but it’s still a pony. You can build a AAA ballpark and throw in a few swimming pools, but this is still a border town.
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Remember the riots in Tucson when they discovered their AAA team was leaving town?
I don’t either. But hasty action to avoid losing the team was at least one of the glasses of kool-aid that MS and city hall served to the public.
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Builders and developers here do not pay the full cost of new homes, passing the cost on to the tax base – us. This is one of the reasons we need a QoL bond every 10 years to pick up the slack left when there are not enough parks, museums, pools, libraries and public safety stations. Those are all in the developer’s pocket and the CC members on their campaign donation lists who kept it the way it is. Other cities charge development fees to pay for these things which is why they have them and we don’t. LOSER.
The new strategy is disaster capitalism: tear things down and replace them with big projects that benefit mostly downtown investors (where no one lives). LOSER.
All of this – then and now – has LOSER written all over it, and it continues as long as secrecy and cronyism rule in local government. Just try to find out something without having to file an ORR.
We pay for a children’s hospital and find out that UMC thinks it is due rent from it, when UMC didn’t do sh*t for Children’s. But do you think they will share their deliberations in public, with the press there to witness? Think again.
Just watch (you can’t) deliberations for a water park or convention hotel, while your elected reps maneuver to send the money to their benefactors and avoid anything that even looks like real competitive bidding. But they’ll call it that. LOSERS.
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Excellent points. We also have a large number of people who draw heavily on our services and infrastructure, but contribute little, if anything, to our tax base.
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