Holier than thou

April 2, 2014

The El Paso Times editorial Stubborn judges should back down took the El Paso Council of Judges to task for their “unilateral decision to raise indigent defense fees”.

They wrote:

“These judges, who were not elected to make budget and tax decisions, have decided nonetheless to levy added costs amounting to about $500,000 the remainder of this year and $1 million next year. That forces the people who were elected to make such decisions — county Commissioners Court — to cut money elsewhere or raise taxes”.

Actually

The judges do have the right and the responsibility to set the rate of reimbursement.  The Times knows this and even wrote in their December 27, 2013 editorial:

“The Council of Judges’ recent unilateral decision to raise attorney fees in indigent defense cases by $15 an hour is a classic example of the dysfunctional system set up by the Texas Constitution.”

Further, according to the Times:

“The judges requested a $10 an hour increase for attorney fees in indigent defense cases before the county budget was adopted in October. Commissioners rejected that proposal because the funding wasn’t available.”

Who’s wrong

The judges made a request for an increase in the reimbursement rate as part of the normal county budget process.  The commissioners decided not to honor it.

The judges have the authority to set the rate.  Commissioners have to pay it.  Pretty simple really.

We elect judges in Texas.  If our voters don’t approve of what they have done we will see new judges in the next election.

The all knowing Times

The Times evidently feels that their judgment should trump the Texas Constitution.

They also evidently feel that while it was good for the city to pay more than market value for the Times building it is not good for lawyers to get paid a fair rate to defend people who cannot afford a lawyer.  Now they are taking on the United States Constitution.

How would the Times have responded if the city had used eminent domain to steal their building, or if the city had used code violations to condemn the building and then steal it?

Unjust enrichment

Before the rate increase local lawyers were paid $75 per hour when they worked in court.  Most of us pay more for plumbing.

We deserve better

Brutus

9 Comments | City government, County Government, El Paso Times | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Another suggestion for the Times

March 16, 2014

A Times reporter suggested in a comment on this blog that if we have stories that we think the Times should write about we should come forward with our suggestions.

Suggestion

You might write an article telling us how each of the members of city council, the mayor, the city manager, and the city attorney explain that the city is continuing to sue the Texas attorney general to block the release of correspondence.

The city attorney was told by this new council to bring the issue to closure.

Yet we are continuing to spend taxpayer money to try to deny us the right to view the records.

We deserve better

Brutus

3 Comments | City government, El Paso Times | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Tortured English

March 13, 2014

The El Paso Times published this interview with the incoming superintendent at the Ysleta Independent School District.

We are all probably getting used to typographical errors, especially in text messages.  Many of us would like to see our newspaper avoid those errors.  Maybe the new superintendent has difficulty with the English language and the reporter quoted him accurately.  Either way, this article had several problems.  I present some of them below:

“And if we determine that it was intentional and malicious and done with the express to circumvent accountability measures then you cure it.”

“He or she are the valve. “

“So I think they already taken steps forward to address it.”

“I’ve learned with my recent experience that if you move too aggressively to reorganize or downsize — even if it is exactly what an organization needs, even if you are going to address a significant deficient, even if it’s for all the right reasons — it would be premature to begin to calculate how you are going to save money.”

“It was a delegate issue that involved consolidating or eliminating positions and those positions are held by people and no matter how well you try to deliver the message. It does create stress and anxiety in an organization.”

“The board of education ask that it be done and it was done.”

Solidarity

I’m not normally the first person on the union band wagon but statements from the new superintendent make me wonder what the employees of the district have to look forward to.  When asked about his job difficulties in California he said:

There is no collective bargaining in Texas. We don’t spend a lot of time negotiating and laying the ground work. We move quickly on behalf of kids.

That’s simply not the environment in California. With the strong union presence it takes time and you have to sort of navigate those politics.

We deserve better

Brutus

3 Comments | El Paso Times | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Water torture

March 12, 2014

The other day city council decided unanimously to not increase the impact fees that the city charges when new buildings are built.

Some members of council expressed their opinion that raising the cost of a piece of land in the city causes people to build outside of the city limits.  We then essentially lose the property tax revenue even as those new county residents come into the city and use our facilities.

I can’t take a side on the issue, I simply don’t know enough about it.

The Times wrote an article about the vote and included a quote from the head of our water utility:

“We are OK with the 12-month delay,” Balliew said.

One of the driving forces behind the proposal to increase impact fees is the need to do a $43 million expansion of the Jonathan Rogers Water Treatment Plant over the next five years. Balliew said the utility will seek state money for the project from various sources including Proposition 6, which was passed by the voters last November and set aside $2 billion of “rainy-day funds” for water and sewer projects around the state.

Another double whammy?

State funds are available yet they wanted to roughly double our current impact fees.

I mentioned the situation to a few citizens and their responses were remarkably quick and similar.  In essence they said “Sure, that way they get an increase in local fees and can get state money to pay for the expansion too.  You don’t think the fee will be reduced once the project is paid for, do you?”

We deserve better

Brutus

3 Comments | City government, El Paso Times, State Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Times now our judge

March 11, 2014

The Times wrote an article the other day that included this:

Jorge Artalejo, 52, a substitute teacher and gadfly at local government meetings took away enough of the votes cast in the race to force a runoff.

Gadfly?

Merriam-Webster online defines gadfly thusly:

one who is obnoxiously annoying

In whose opinion?

Is the Times now the judge of each of us?

Muckraker

11 Comments | El Paso Times | Permalink
Posted by Muckraker

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