This came in from Helen Marshall:
Did you notice that when you tried to look at the San Jacinto Plaza cam, it is managed by “Capital Improvements Department?” Mr. Gonzalez has axed engineering and created a new department; city council was informed but has not discussed or approved this. The new department has “reached out” to private corporations HNTB and Freese and Nichols. Interesting that HNTB has moved its El Paso offices from the Eastside into the Mills Building. At least the HNTB employees will get a good view of what is not happening at the Plaza in front of the Mills Building….
http://www.elpasoinc.com/news/local_news/article_9d277082-3f7c-11e5-9de9-0bee4b5844ee.html
elpasospeak 
So why wasn’t a public council meeting held to discuss this and other department changes? Could it be that one or more council members would object and that would cause a stir among the public, that would also slow down the internal work and we can’t have that. Same reason we have the ballpark. Who will be held accountable if the city wide department changes don’t work out? Ultimately the Council is responsible because they are Mr. Gonzalez bosses. So is there no supervision of Mr. Gonzalez? Just give him a raise and let him do his thing with the City of El Paso? Yeah, we deserve better.
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Read Larry Romero’s guest column in the Times today. His defense of Gonzalez’s raise is disingenuous and condescending.
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Too right. Given that Ms. Niland is using Las Cruces and Van Horn as measuring poles, why is council comparing his salary to those of managers in San Antonio or Fort Worth??
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🙂
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Gonzalez has “reached out” to Freese and Nichols in the past.
Click to access Road%20to%20Performance%20Excellence%20Brochure_0.pdf
The Freese website says their El Paso office opened last year, which was coincidental, fortuitous timing.
https://www.freese.com/contact-us/locations/el-paso-texas
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