Overwhelming

October 19, 2015

It would be really hard to make something like this up.  You really would have to think of the impossible.

A new website www.vivavalenti.com has appeared on the Internet.  The site extols the need to have our county hospital administrator stay on after his current contract expires next year.  Here is what part of the home page looks like:

vivavalenti

The URL was issued October 9, 2015.

It probably will not come as a surprise to some of us that the site is registered to an out of town firm, Wilson Binkley Advertising & Marketing.  They are based out of Las Cruces, New Mexico.

One of the quirks of our form of government is that the residents of Las Cruces benefit from our county and children’s hospital without bearing the tax burden.

The site offers an online petition where you can register your support for the idea of issuing a new contract to our county hospital administrator.

In the nine days the site has been registered (as of October 18, 2015) they indicate that 19 petitions have been signed.

Personally, I would be embarrassed.

We deserve better

Brutus

 

 

4 Comments | County Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Potential forum

October 18, 2015

This came in from Xavier Miranda:

 

9 Comments | City government, County Government, Federal Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

County failures

October 11, 2015

Last week saw more failures for our county judge.

Her county manager resigned after less than one year on the job.

Her county hospital administrator announced that he would not seek a new contract when his current one expires.  It looks like his action was part of a quid quo pro in the much heralded potential settlement between the county hospital and the children’s hospital.

We should try to find competent people to run for office and then work to get them elected.

We deserve better

Brutus

5 Comments | County Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Don’t forget who did this to us

October 8, 2015

Why is it that we have not seen an organization step in and offer to take over the children’s hospital?

Is it the rent that our county hospital is charging or is it that no one thinks that they can operate a viable children’s hospital in our community?

If we gave free rent to one of these organizations could they make it work?

Unless there is a deal in the works that we don’t know about, it looks like the out of town organizations  have looked at this and decided that the project would not be viable.

Whose fault would that be?  Ultimately the voters approved the bonds so it is out fault.  However, let’s not forget the people who were telling us that this was a good idea.  They told us to believe them because they are experts.

It seems that they are expert in something other than telling the truth.  There were plenty of independent studies that told us that this was a bad idea but these people insisted that they were right.

We deserve better

Brutus

5 Comments | County Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Earn our trust

October 2, 2015

The folks over at the Ysleta school district are going to try again.

Earlier this year they held an election seeking approval for $451 million in bonds.  The voters turned them down but it was close.

Now four months later they have announced that they will hold another election in November seeking $430 million.

Last time they published an extensive list of what they were thinking of spending the money on.  This time they have not issued a similar list yet.

Part of the problem the voters had is that the district reserved the right to change how we were told the money would be spent.  This graphic was available on the district’s web site:

yisdproject list

Another issue is the belief that many voters have that our local governments cannot handle major construction projects well.  Since the failure of their bond election we have seen the city bungle construction projects and not move forward on the quality of life bonds that the voters gave them back in 2012.

We have a children’s hospital in bankruptcy.  Our county hospital is losing money without even considering the money that the children’s hospital owes it.  The county allowed the hospital to sell $152 million worth of bonds to build new clinics that would save us $17 million a year in the emergency room according to the hospital administrator.  We have not seen the clinics and we have not seen the savings.

EPISD voted to repurpose $59 million that the voters were told would build a new high school.

The city can’t even build a one square block park, even at the outrageous price of $6 million.  The engineering department has essentially been eviscerated and the city has hired two out of town engineering firms.  Local firms need not apply.  We approved $473 million in bonds for quality of life projects three years ago and have seen nothing significant produced.

My sense is the public knows that YISD needs money.  The voters might be more apt to approve their requests if a more reasonable approach was taken.  They should ask for some money for a deserving project, say around $50 million.  Then they should complete the project thus proving to us that they will do what they promise and that they can handle the construction.

They need to prove that they can handle the money if we give it to them.

We deserve better

Brutus

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

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