Returning to office

April 4, 2017

According to the Times city representative Niland will return to city council Tuesday, April 4,2017.

They say she has been absent since December 20, 2016.

She evidently has been handling a divorce.

An open records request should tell us whether she has continued to draw her city paycheck.

According to the Times article she has the authority to move her two children to Travis county or to Florida.

Will she move out of town and thus escape the high taxes that she helped foist upon us?

We deserve better

Brutus

12 Comments | County Government, El Paso Times | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Electric bill increases

March 31, 2017

El Paso Electric has filed a petition with the Texas Public Utility Commission asking for permission to increase it’s rates.

While they propose to raise the average monthly bill by 10% they are asking for permission to raise the rates they charge our public schools and city and county governments 15.5%.

Currently their “general service rate” (smaller commercial customers) is $.06927 in the summer and $.03408 in the winter (per kilo watt hour).

Schools and local governments pay $.10817 in the summer and $.09071 in the winter (per kilo watt hour).

Our local governments are already being charged more than our businesses.

This, of course, is added to our tax bills.

We deserve better

Brutus

 

4 Comments | City government, County Government, El Paso Independent School District | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Pretending not to know

March 14, 2017

What should we make of the fact that several of our local officials read the local blogs and  do not take steps to fix the problems that are pointed out?

Do they really think that we will forget?

We deserve better

Brutus

11 Comments | City government, County Government, El Paso Independent School District | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Sales tax receipts falling

March 8, 2017

The city and county have another budget problem to contend with:

2017salestax

The Mexican peso dropped in value during that period.

Now Mexican shoppers have less money to spend in El Paso shops.

Will our local elected officials compensate for the revenue loss by spending more money?

We deserve better

Brutus

7 Comments | City government, County Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Rental rates drop

March 3, 2017

Our local economy is showing more signs of distress.  This article in 247wallst.com shows us one area where we are suffering:

rentdrop

Lower rental rates will lead to lower property values.  The owners will see to it that their appraised values are lowered and the result will be lower property tax revenue to the city, county, hospital district, community college, and the school districts unless they raise their rates.

A drop of 7.1% in a single year is huge.

We don’t believe that “It’s all good”.

We deserve better

Brutus

10 Comments | City government, County Government, El Paso Independent School District | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

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