Cityhallmobile

February 18, 2013

Quality of life

Libraries are an important part of this.

The city of Tucson does not operate libraries.  That is done by Pima county.  The 2012/2013 budget for Pima county allocates $34 million to operate the library system.  Given that Tucson includes about half the population of the county, you could calculate that about $17 million is the share for the city of Tucson.  That comes to about $32.32 being spent per person.

El Paso spends $8.9 million or $13.43 per person to operate our libraries.

Disgraceful!

Nationally in 2009 total library expenditures per capita were $36.84, a 10-year increase of 12.6 percent.  The American Library Association report is here.

We talk about needing to increase the education level in our community.  How does this process of tearing down city hall and remodeling multiple new building help that?

We are spending our tax money for the convenience of the cabal running the city instead of on our citizens.

We deserve better

Brutus

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Park yourself in my feathered nest

February 17, 2013

Quality of life

I think that parks and recreation would fall in that category for most people.

The 2013 El Paso city budget allocates $12.2 million dollars for this.  With our population being just at 666,000 that works out to  about $18.32 being spent for each person or almost 3.6% of the city general fund expenditures.

Tucson allocates $54.1 million dollars.  That includes about $3 million for the zoo.  In El Paso the Zoo is a separate budget item so we need to subtract that out.  With a population of about 526,000 they end up spending $97.15 per person or 11.4% of their general fund.

Is it because El Paso is poorer?  According to the census bureau  Tucson’s per capita income is about 8% higher than El Paso’s.  Property taxes?  State income tax?  Those may be different, but it comes down to this:

No matter how you measure it Tucson spends a much larger percentage of their general fund on parks and recreation than El Paso does.

Why?  Think of what must be more than $70 million at this point that they are spending to move city hall.  Our city officials are spending the money on themselves.

Heck, they have even kicked people out of a recreation facility to make room for some of their offices while the construction orgy is proceeding.

We deserve better

Brutus

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True cost of the moves

February 16, 2013

I have written before about getting at the true cost of the moves from the soon to be demolished city hall into the multiple buildings that city council has chosen.

My last number came to $63.9 million.  The city told us it would be $33 million on this page on the city’s web site.

I have been trying to keep that number updated, but it appears that we will not know about major parts of it until they are done.  As Call Me Crazy commented on  More on the roll-out (roll over) plan a city representative was quoted in the Times as saying  “The city has already spent around $300 million publicly funding Downtown revitalization.”  What is that all about?

The deception continues.  The city has been issuing contracts for job order contracts for construction work.  They are using these contracts for work related to the move out of city hall.  Unfortunately state law does not require them to present these projects to city council unless the cost for an individual project exceeds $500,000.

In Minimal due to condition of building we saw that the city has been issuing work orders under the $500,000 threshold for work on these buildings.  Since they do not have to publish the work orders, we will have to wait to get them through what are commonly called open records requests.

The city is under no obligation to produce a document that does not exist.  We must wait to find out the true story.

We will though.

In the mean time I will turn to what the city is not spending money on and how we compare to other cities.

We deserve better

Brutus

1 Comment | City government, Open Government, Purchasing, State Government | Permalink
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Change is in the wind

February 15, 2013

I don’t know what was behind city council deciding to do the right thing and take the petition to stop the destruction of  to the next election.  They have one or two more voting opportunities where they could change their mind.

I do know that I don’t trust them and fear that they have this figured out.  It is an easy prediction that city hall will be torn down before the election.  Then again maybe the judge will let the people decide.

We have unfortunately already spent a bunch of money moving out of city hall and remodeling old buildings.  Some people will take that into account and feel that we have gone past the point of no return.  We will have to honor the contracts that have been issued.

Others will think that we need to send a message to city council and the city staff, even if it means that we end up losing what we have spent.  They have been ignoring us and wasting our tax money.

Think about what will happen if the move proceeds.  City departments will be scattered all over town.  Citizen access will be impaired.  Organizationally it will be harder to manage the city staff.  Staff will become quite effective at running us all around town to get us to give up.  It is a mess and will only get worse.

An election is coming up in May.  Do your job.  Exercise your power as a voter.  You are in charge.

Ask the candidates how they will respond to and treat the voters if they are elected.  If you believe them and like their approach give them your vote.  Then hold them accountable.

We deserve better

Brutus

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Posted by Brutus

Showtime!

February 13, 2013

Great drama!

Last  week’s (Monday, February 11, 2013) city council agenda has item 13A that is a proposed ordinance.  It is the result of a citizen petition that seeks to stop the building of the ball park and the tearing down of city hall unless approved by the voters.  The ordinance would:

  • Repeal the provisions that allowed the city manager “to establish construction guidelines to erect a baseball stadium …”
  • Forbid the mayor or any other person or entity to prepare for the demolition of city hall
  • Only allow the demolition of city hall after an affirmative vote in the May 2013 city election

Don’t hold your breath.  The city has already entered into a $40 million dollar contract to build the new stadium.  It has allocated another $10 million dollars (and contracted for most of it) for engineers, designers, and for other services.

While neither the petition nor the proposed ordinance address the acquisitions of property and the construction services that the city is using to setup new facilities as a replacement for city hall we should be aware that they have already contracted for over $66 million (while they told us it would cost $33 million).

Dissolving these contracts will cost money, regardless of the will of the people.

I predict that we will hear a lot of discussion about how we cannot go back.  “The die is cast” will be the theme.

I believe that the petition was submitted and certified in early September, 2012.  Council took actions to approve the ball park and the tearing down of city hall weeks afterwards.  Council deliberately held off bringing this ordinance forward until they had committed the money.

I don’t know how city council will handle this.  I do anticipate that the ones standing for election might find a way to be absent during the vote so that they can later claim that they were not part of this sham.

If they do manage to pass part of it they will do so already planning to have city hall torn down before the May election, thus subverting the petition.

Once again for the record I favor the idea of the ball park and thank the organizers that bought the team.  Tearing down city hall is another matter.  It has proven to be very expensive.

We deserve better

Brutus

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