They don’t have to tell the truth when they circulate the petition to approve a new public improvement district.
Section 372.019 of the Texas local government code:
After notice and a hearing, the governing body of the municipality or county may make supplemental assessments to correct omissions or mistakes in the assessment relating to the total cost of the improvement.
So go ahead and agree to build what they want.
Remember the $50 million dollar ball park that ended up costing $76 million?
We deserve better
Brutus
elpasospeak 
Remember too that the voters approved an $8 Mil Olympic sized pool for the west side. The inexperienced local architect they choose produced a $16 Mil design instead, and the city just choose to accept that design and to fully fund that. Any other city would have chosen an architect very experienced with this size of a pool facility and the design would have been held to the budget of $8 Mil. Now the city is planning to tell the east side residents there is no money left for their $8 Mil voter approved pool and they should just accept a little one. Why are city staff who give design contracts to their friends who have no applicable experience and were only in business for about three years at the time still employed at the city? Why did they not simply reject the design that was double the budget we approved? You are right, we deserve better, and we deserve accountability for the $16 Mil pool. And anyone at the city complicit in this or complicit in additional and on-going design awards to that firm should be held accountable. But what we will get instead is lots of praise by city officials and the EP Times for the west side pool when it opens soon and no talk about having doubled the voter approved budget. In fact if the east siders complain enough then the problem of conformance to the voter approved budgets will be compounded because the city staff will undoubtedly approve another $16 Mil for that pool too and probably again will use the same architect with no pool design experience.
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And let’s not forget the Tiguas had a competition size pool that couldn’t make enough money to support its operating costs. I know that we are probably assuming that the pool of competitive swimmers will grow if we have two city pool facilities large enough to host competitions but the reality is that top swimming coaches are probably still going to prefer other cities over El Paso, so the kids that really have potential will probably end up training elsewhere. We will simply have paid close to $40 mil for two complexes that benefit a small group of people, when $16 mil probably could have covered the needs of the folks who just want to have a place to swim.
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So now we’re asked to subsidize parents’ dreams to have their kids be Olympic swimmers? Meanwhile, we’re still without a children’s museum to replace the perfectly good museum that was demolished so that some rich guys could have a ballpark to enhance the value of their downtown real estate. Our priorities are totally screwed up.
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It was not a perfectly good museum. It was a poorly run, poorly maintained facility with only a modicum of exhibits. And, if it had been taken over and run correctly, it was too small to host an exhibit of any depth. It needed to go.
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Insights was very limited. That said, a local businessman started a second museum that was large enough to host exhibits (and did). He offered to sell it to the city (along with adjacent properties that would have allowed for expansion) or do a public private to keep it open and there was no interest. The city claimed the attendance numbers weren’t high enough. Gee, wonder what the attendance numbers are on Digiwall? Instead we’ll do without a children’s museum for a decade or so and then spend 10x for something that won’t be much better in terms of learning opportunities and eventually find that there is no money in the city budget to fund large exhibits on a regular basis.
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Now we are to believe $5 million is going to bring in new companies and higher paying jobs?
I did not realize call centers were in such global demand.
City plan for El Paso Electric fee could affect customer bills
http://www.ktsm.com/news/local/el-paso-news/city-plan-for-el-paso-electric-fee-could-affect-customer-bills/1045825895
The City of El Paso is looking to increase the franchise fee by 1% for the El Paso Electric Company to use city streets, rights of way, and public places.
If passed, that would mean an extra 90 cents per month for the average residential customer as soon as May, according to El Paso Electric.
El Paso Economic Development Director Jessica Herrera said the money generated by the fee hike—about $5 million—would be used exclusively to attract new companies to the Sun City and bring in higher paying jobs
“We really need to stay competitive,” Herrera told KTSM. “We’re competing globally.”
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The article also states: According to city documents, the City would also be able to use the money for other economic development purposes such as “infrastructure as reasonably determined by the City.”
Soccer stadium? Q of L cost overruns? After all they constantly say those will bring economic development.
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