Never waste a crisis

September 17, 2013

10 year storm

25 year storm

100 year storm

What do those terms mean?

Following the big storm of 2006 city staff went into spasms over the opportunity to use the storm as an excuse to create a municipal drainage utility.  Or, in other words, another taxing entity.  Homeowners with “typical” (according to the utility) homes now pay about $3.00 a month into this utility.

Double tax

Storm water issues used to be paid out of the city general fund.  Creating the utility not only generated another source of revenue for the city, but it gave our city staff the opportunity to move millions of dollars worth of city functions and expenses over to the utility.  Did our tax rates go down?  No.

This statement in the El Paso Times tells us a lot about how effective our efforts have been:  “… the stormwater system in Central El Paso can maintain a 10-year storm now that the Gateway Pond, located at Gateway West and Luna Street, is complete. The Gateway Pond was filled to the top Wednesday and needed El Paso Water crews to pump water out of it.”

Let’s see, we had a storm in 2006 then we built a pond to help us withstand a 10-year storm.  In 2013 we had to pump water out of it to avoid flooding.

I suspect that we will hear that the utility needs more money, after all you can’t control nature.

Be comforted by this statement on the utility’s web site:  “We expect the greatest portion of the capital improvements to be completed within three years.”  They don’t mention any dates.

This is another example of what happens when you take responsibility away from elected officials and vest it in a special organization.  City council can now “look into” the matter instead of bearing responsibility.

We deserve better

Brutus

 

1 Comment | City government, El Paso Times | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Editorial earthquake

September 2, 2013

The El Paso Times editorial of September 1, 2013  “Property tax path not sustainable” is remarkable.

The editorial points out “That increasing tax burden on homeowners is simply not sustainable.  That $600 increase over the past decade was money that homeowners couldn’t spend on major purchases or for their children’s education.  The tax increases have increased hardships on tens of thousands of families.”

Has something changed?

Does the Times suddenly really care about education?

I’m trying to figure out what the Times’ position is.  They  have supported the public spending spree we are witnessing, yet now they are saying that we cannot afford it.  These explanations come to mind:

  • They think that we need to stop the capital spending for a while.  After all we have already bailed them out of the building they could not afford as part of the city hall destruction, ball park construction, temporary city facilities binge that has cost us well over 120 million dollars so far.  Yes we tore down our children’s science museum and have no plans on the drawing board to replace it in the next three years, but all in all it is time to curtail the spending.
  • Somehow they did not know that the public works spending would increase taxes.  The editors recently learned that in order for governments to spend money they must collect taxes and fees.  Now they have learned and realize that their rent is going to increase.
  • They have decided to take their own advice.  They wrote “First, the public should not stand for grandstanding on tax and spending issues…If an elected official is going to oppose tax increases, he or she also must identify specific spending reductions.  El Paso cannot afford politicians who pander to various constituencies by supporting spending increases on the one hand while opposing taxes on the other.”  The same goes for newspapers.
  • September 1 in the newspaper world is like April 1 for the rest of us.

The editorial goes on to advise “Additionally, the governments should join together for taxpayer town halls, where the community can help identify spending priorities — and identify areas where local governments might cut back.”

Town halls?

Really?  In a community where city council denied the citizens the right to have an election that they called for by petition?  In a community where both city council and the El Paso Independent School District board of managers rearranged their agendas to make it more difficult for members of the public to be heard?  In a community where city council has been spending tax payer money to deny public information requests that the attorney general of Texas wrote must be released?  When we have a city manager who praises a city representative for being thoughtful and deliberate even though she considers her constituents?

Crazy ideas

In the spirit of the Times’ suggestion let me offer just a few ideas  that the average “crazy” in town might offer:

  • Don’t finish the Luther building.  The city IT department is located somewhere else and we have not heard that it is not capable of functioning.  There is already talk of building a new “municipal complex” in the next few years, thus wasting the money we are spending moving into temporary quarters.
  • Build one new health clinic.  The CEO of our county hospital told us that we would save 17 million dollars each year in emergency room costs if we built 150 million dollars worth of clinics.  Why not build one clinic, see if the apportionate savings materialize and then use the savings to build the next clinic?
  • Don’t let the city make the school district move their administration building, thus costing us at least 40 million dollars.
  • Stop supporting athletics programs at the community college
  • Stop the financing.  Start using the savings from one project to fund the next one.
  • Stop transferring the administration of public spending to non-elected groups like the Camino Real Regional Mobility Authority.
  • Get administrators in our local governments that care about the taxpayers.

Feel free to contribute your ideas through the comments mechanism of this blog.  We may not be a town hall but at least your ideas will be shared with the public.

I read the post that Brutus will publish tomorrow.  Don’t miss it.  Our situation is not improving.

Eternal vigilance is the cost of liberty.

Cato

1 Comment | City government, County Government, El Paso Independent School District, El Paso Times, Uncategorized | Permalink
Posted by Cato

Re-prints

August 30, 2013

Cato wrote about our former mayor trying to change the rules for his convenience.  The ex-mayor must think that he is special.

There were a couple of other things that I saw in the El Paso Times article.

The reporter wrote that council amended an ordinance and that “Cook was present at that meeting”.

Present?

Not only was he there, but he signed the ordinance!  Seeing that would require actually looking at the ordinance.  That would require investigation instead of just being the propagandist for the city.

If he thought the ordinance was unfair or unconstitutional he should have vetoed it.  Evidently when he thought it applied to other people it was acceptable.  When it is applied to him we have a different matter.

Misdemeanor

Quoting from the Times:

“City ordinance No. 017112 states that “any officer or employee who engages in lobbying activities that would require registration under the city’s lobbying ordinance during this 24 month period commits a misdemeanor.”

Horse feathers!

It says no such thing.  That is unless ordinance number 017112 that is posted on the city web site is not the real ordinance number 017112.  The city has been known to change the language of an ordinance after it is passed.  You know you just have to allow for Scrivener.

The ordinance does not include the word misdemeanor.  It does say that when elected city officials leave office they cannot act as a registered lobbyist or represent another person or organization in any formal or informal appearance before council or a city board or department.  To do so would be “unlawful”.  City code makes any unlawful act that does not have a specific penalty a misdemeanor.

Where did our reporter come up with what she wrote?  If she wants to take material from “talking papers” provided to her by the city, she should have the honesty to quote it as such.

Muckraker

 

2 Comments | City government, El Paso Times | Permalink
Posted by Muckraker

A government agency with some common sense

August 23, 2013

Word came out that the Texas Department of Transportation (TXDot)  is not going to allocate $1.6 million in federal funding to the bicycle-sharing program that the Camino Real Regional Mobility Authority (CRRMA) has been promoting.

If nothing else this warns us to watch the CRRMA closely.  This is the group that the city is talking about turning over control of the international bridges to.  Evidently TXDoT can see the impracticality of CRRMA plans while city council cannot.  We need to watch what happens to the over 11 million dollars of profit that the city currently makes on the bridges and transfers to the general fund.  CRRMA may have grandiose plans for what to do here in El Paso, but evidently the State of Texas does not agree with them.

A recent article in the El Paso Times quotes a member of a group promoting bicycling in El Paso as saying:

“This was a great opportunity for the community of El Paso.  Austin is getting a program.  Fort Worth is barely getting it set up.  What is so different with those cities that they get one and we don’t?”

Newton

Without starting into the argument about the viability of downtown, or one about the people who frequent downtown, or relative lifestyles among the cities being compared, let’s start with gravity.

El Paso is built at the base of the Rocky Mountains.  We have hills, actually steep streets.  Pedaling a bicycle up a steep street is hard.  Riding one down a steep street is dangerous.

The article goes on to point out “The hope, for example, is that people who need to get from UTEP or the Downtown library to the El Paso County Courthouse will use a bike instead of their car…”

I suggest that anyone who is not familiar with the terrain between UTEP and the courthouse take an air-conditioned car ride between the two.  If the trip starts at UTEP the bicycle rider will have a downhill ride down Mesa.  Oregon would probably be safer.  Maybe the city could create run away bicycle traps to help save the people who lose control.

The trip back up the hill would be slower.  Think of pedaling up Mesa at 2 in the afternoon sometime next week.  It would be hot.  Then again it would probably be good for the hospitals as the riders suffered heart attacks.

Really nice bikes

The plan is that the bicycles will cost between one and two thousand dollars each.  These aren’t the kind of bicycles that the average citizen buys at the store, these are government bikes.  The person who checks one out will have to provide a credit card.  If the bicycle is not returned the credit card will be charged for the cost of the bike.  That probably means that people will not just leave the bikes outside the place they need to go to.

They will have to get the the kiosk to rent the bike.  Then they will take their ride.  Assuming they reach their destination alive they will probably elect to return the bicycle to another kiosk.  Then they will have to somehow get to their final destination.

I could go on, but you get the idea.

We deserve better

Brutus

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

Timely truth

August 21, 2013

The El Paso Times today chose to make it’s headline article today about city council deciding to spend 139 million dollars to make changes at our airport.

They relegated their articles about city council voting for a property tax increase and council voting to release the ballpark emails to the B section.

I guess we know what they think is important.

Freudian slip?

They also wrote in a section titled “Insight on the Budget”:

“What it means:  Homeowners in El Paso will have to pay the city an average of $841.80, or $283.37 more than last year.”

I’m not their editor but I think that they meant $28.37.

Then again maybe they have decided to be honest and the $283.37 number is a fair projection of what will happen to our taxes with all of the debt we are taking on.

No, wait.  Honesty is a word that does not often come to mind when thinking about the Times.

I think “sloppy” is the word I am looking for.

Muckracker.

Leave a Comment » | Ball park, City government, El Paso Times | Permalink
Posted by Muckraker

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