We had another example this week of people in our local government not knowing their proper place.
According to an article in the Times, our county commissioners voted to allow a company to perform land surveys on some county property. The company evidently is considering building some sort of pipeline.
This post is not about the whether we should have the pipeline or not. We have almost no information about their plans.
What this post is about is how the commissioners used their power to deny someone what they have the legal right to do, just because the commissioners thought they could.
The current county judge was quoted this way in the article:
“If we had continued to deny them that right, then they could have taken us to court, we would have spent money fighting it and we were guaranteed to lose because they have that right,” County Judge Veronica Escobar said.
She said that the Commissioners Court’s decision earlier this month to deny the company entry to survey county land was an attempt to try to buy some time to convince the company to host a town hall type of meeting.
Abuse of power
She acknowledged that the company has the legal right to perform the surveys. She acknowledged that the commissioners denied the company that right earlier this month. She acknowledged that they denied the company the right to perform the surveys because they wanted the company to do something.
They (commissioners) had no right to deny the request. They gave in when confronted with a legal battle that the current county judge confessed the county would lose. That battle would have been paid for by the taxpayers.
Have we reached the point where people in office have forgotten that they are public servants? That means they must serve the public, not occasionally but every time they act officially.
What we are seeing is elected officials using their power to get what they want, even if their actions are illegal.
Different rules for the elected?
This quote highlighted the double standard that we are seeing:
“The right thing in our view was for them to be good corporate citizens and participate in a true public meeting, a public meeting where every member of the community is able to listen to the same information and to listen to all the questions and responses to their questions,” Escobar said.
None of us have time to recount the numerous instances where she and her colleagues have not given us the benefit of the process she tried to demand from the company.
Both the city and the county are increasingly bullying whoever they want.
We deserve better
Brutus
elpasospeak 
What can you expect from this person? Escobar is a pretty typical El Paso politician. She does some pretty rotten things, and then tries to explain them with obfuscation and by distracting the electorate. Just like the mess with EPCH & UMC (instead of standing up, and owning her own role in that mess, she tries so hard to push the blame elsewhere). If she and her court wanted the pipeline people to hold a meeting, why didn’t they just ask them?
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Uh huh..brought to you from the same cretins that brought you Children’s Hospital! I will bet dollars to tacos that El Paso’s straight ticket voters will re elect the whole $hitload next election.
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Most of them have never considered themselves public servants. Royalty, yes. Privileged, yes. Above others, yes. They are there for what they can gain for themselves by using the power of the office and our resources to their benefit.
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This is really good, DK and the commenters all hit home runs. Hopefully this a sign that people are paying attention.
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