The Times reported on an unfortunate situation the other day.
One of our hospitals went to the city and got permits to build $63 million worth of additions to one of its facilities.
Now the city is denying the hospital the right to open the facilities because of a dispute over parking.
This should have been handled as part of the original approval process.
We can all imagine the concerns investors (both in and out of town) will have when the city does this.
How can we attract industry from out of town when we do this to companies?
We deserve better
Brutus
elpasospeak 
So when a business that isn’t related to a donor expands, our socialist reps think they should pay their way. Love it.
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This is not a socialistic move..Think Oligarchy !! El Paso has been bought and paid for years !
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Read what Cissy L. is saying in the article. It’s something like large corporations should pay for their own infrastructure because they’ve got the money to do that. Funny that doesn’t apply to Great Wolf or any venture Foster or Hunt want done.
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This is a great example of how rich connected people get preferential treatment while the rest of us are pretty much told to go pound sand (or in this case go block walk to make residential parking districts).
You should watch City Council for items 19.1-19.3. City council gives a local, connected attorney as much time as she wants so she can give her presentation (that was the first time I have ever seen them just let someone talk for as long as that person wants without bugging them about how their 3 minutes are up). Then you can listen to the whiny rich folks talk about how horrible it was for them having to lose “their” street parking spots to *gasp* construction workers and UTEP students.
It’s amazing to see Svarzbein go from man of the people to rich folk’s lap dog for this item. I guess it shouldn’t be a surprise given who he represents but I hadn’t seen him be so blatant about doing what rich folks told him to do. I watch City Council pretty regularly and they almost never postpone something like this unless they get complaints from rich folks. If this was happening in the lower valley or the northeast you better believe it would have all been approved in 5 minutes flat.
It’s really educational on how entitled these folks are (“their” street parking spaces) and also kind of hilarious since the outcome might be that the City might try to make Las Palmas put in 79 more parking spaces that they don’t need which would mean that those dirty dirty construction workers would be parking in the hoity toity Kern and Rim neighborhoods for another several months while the hospital built something.
I guess that’s what happens when the people running the show and those with money who are running them can’t be bothered to use a little common sense. Instead they drag this out to make the City look bad and they show their true colors as people who think they deserve special treatment.
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Parking is not Free
or
Free the Parking !!!
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How would you feel if it were your neighborhood being overrun because a billion dollar corporation isn’t willing to spend the money to provide adequate private parking for its customers? How would you feel if the corporation and the city decided at the eleventh hour to let helicopters fly low over your house at all hours of the night? Las Palmas intentionally delayed its request for the helipad. I feel no pity for Las Palmas because they and the city both are at fault for trying to steamroll residents just as the city and special interests do on everything else. When the property values and resale of homes in those areas are affected by Las Palmas traffic, CAD will not reduce the appraised values. Property taxes will not go down. Residents are getting screwed. So much for their quality of life.
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If you read the article, in normal working conditions (not construction ) the hospital has about 100 more spaces than are regularly used (based on a usage study). The parking issue is driven by UTEP students who park on the streets to avoid buying parking passes. Council wants the hospital to build a parking garage that won’t solve the issue because the street parkers don’t want to pay. The city should enforce a parking policy that limits non-resident street parking. And realistically because the hospital district has been there for decades, I’m not sure why people are surprised. Folks who choose to live in a mixed use area should be prepared for these kinds of growth related issues. Border patrol and the military fly low over my development all the time, and I live with it. It isn’t that big a deal.
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So much railing against a frickin’ hospital?! Helicopters all hours? In El Paso?! Really?
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