Unopposed county commissioners

January 17, 2017

Two of our county commissioners were sworn in for their second terms January 1, 2017.

They were both unopposed.

Choice

Whether you like their past performance or not, wouldn’t we be better off if there was real competition for political offices in El Paso?

An article in the Times wrote this about one of them:

He said there are a lot of challenges in the coming years, including reducing the cost of jail operations, and reversing the tax burden from residential to commercial properties.  He said he expects the county to work toward attracting new businesses to the area to improve the commercial tax base.

Wow!

We have the third highest tax rates among the top 50 cities in the United States and are headed for second place.

Does that make us attractive to businesses?

We deserve better

Brutus

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

Can’t this be fixed?

January 16, 2017

*****edit*****

We were looking at the wrong property.  The post was not correct so we are taking it down.

Our apologies.

Brutus

 

 

5 Comments | City government, El Paso Independent School District | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

What’s in store in 2017?

January 12, 2017

What should we look forward to locally in 2017?

Will we see a newspaper that allows their reporters to ask the obvious questions of our local politicians and then write articles that serve the interest of the citizens instead of the newspaper?

Will we see a district attorney that handles cases based upon alleged crimes instead of who the parties are?

Will our county judge be held responsible for the messes she has presided over?

Will our city manager make time to answer phone calls from citizens?

Will our government employees realize that they work for the citizens, not the other way around?

Will EPISD handle our bond money well?

Will we end up having the second highest tax rate among the top 50 cities in the U. S. ?

We deserve better

Brutus

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

TEA high school grades (A-F)

January 11, 2017

The recently published Texas Education Association A-F ratings show this for our local high schools:

a-f2016teahighschools

We deserve better

Brutus

17 Comments | El Paso Independent School District | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

TEA ratings (A-F) of our school districts

January 10, 2017

The Texas Education Agency (TEA) has published their state legislature mandated A-F 2016 ratings for Texas schools.

The A-F ratings system is a new one and is sometimes criticized for the methodology used.  The system is evolving but at least applies a fixed standard against each school district and its schools.

The system may be improved in the future.  The 2016 ratings give us a look at how our school districts are rated.  Remember that they are rated using the same methodology as all other Texas school districts.

The TEA has provided grades in four domains:

Domain I–student achievement (STAAR test scores)

Domain II–student progress (compares each student’s STAAR scores from last year to this year)

Domain III–closing the gaps (achievement of economically disadvantaged students)

Domain IV–post secondary readiness

The results are summarized below.  Beside each letter grade is the numerical score TEA gave the district.

a-f2016tea

We deserve better

Brutus

 

 

8 Comments | El Paso Independent School District | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

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