Please don’t revitalize us any more!

August 1, 2014

Let’s look at downtown revitalization as a result of the creation of the ball park.

Texas requires that a mixed beverage gross receipts tax of 6.7% be paid by the owner of the establishment (not the customer) .  The state maintains a web site where we can see receipts for each facility (bar, restaurant …) in the state that sells such beverages.  Let’s call those places bars for the sake of simplicity.

The file that the state made available in April, 2014 reflects taxes for March and earlier (sometimes a bar will report late).  The amount for our bars in 79901 (the downtown district) was $80,020.75.  This was before our ball park opened.

The July, 2014 file from the state shows $86,368.28 in receipts for the 79901 area.

Looks good

It appears that we have had a $6,000 or so increase in collections after the ball park opened.  That comes to roughly 8%.  More beverages were sold.

Except

One thing that is different between July in April is that our ball park was open in July and not for the period represented by the April file.

How much did the ball park contribute to the $86,368.28?  The answer is $11,883.52.  That means that business for the rest of the 79901 area was down to $74,484.76, a decline of $5,535.99 or  almost 7% lower.

To get to real sales numbers, the state says to  divide any of the numbers above by 14 and then multiply the result by 100.  Using that technique the downtown bars lost $39,542.78 in sales.

The winner is

The state pays the city the money that is collected.

I don’t expect that the bar owners downtown will send thank you notes to the city for cannibalizing their businesses.

We deserve better

Brutus

15 Comments | Ball park, City government, State Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Take it from the kids again

July 29, 2014

The Texas comptroller of public accounts published a report titled “Your Money and the Taxing Facts”.  The report discusses taxes in Texas.

One subject her report addresses is local property taxes in 2010.  The breakdown was provided with four categories:

Entity                             % of local total statewide

Cities                                        16.78

Counties                                   16.31

Special districts*                       13.38

School districts                          53.52

 *these include hospital and community college districts

Not us

I was surprised to see that:

Our city takes 25.26% of our local property taxes compared with the 16.78% cities take on the average statewide.

Our county is right in line at 16.13% compared with 16.31% for counties statewide.

Our special districts are at 12.61%, thus under the statewide average of 13.38%

And for those of us in the El Paso Independent School District we are paying 45.99% in school taxes compared with 53.52% in the remainder of the state.

Vote for change

Some at the city have called us “crazies” for being concerned about their spending habits.

These numbers need to be justified or they need to be changed.

The simple facts are that we spend almost 8% less of our local tax money on education and almost 9% more on our city government than the rest of the state.

If no other numbers call us to action, these should.  The fact that we have the 7th highest tax burden of people in the largest 50 cities in the United States should have been enough to call us to action.  The fact that we are short changing our children and feathering the city’s nest is just wrong.

We deserve better

Brutus

 

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

Stating the obvious

July 14, 2014

James commented the other day about an agenda item on the Tuesday, July 15, 2014 city council agenda.

Our airport manager wants permission to sign a contract for over $292 thousand for advertising services without bidding it.

The backup material claims that the advertising services are exempt from bidding requirements under section 252.022(a)(16) of the Texas Local Government Code.

The proposed contract is for “the development of an advertising campaign to attract public attention to El Paso International Airport as a gateway for the City of El Paso.  The Scope of Work includes video production services to provide principal video, post production services and delivery of one finished 30 second television spot and one finished long-form video not to exceed 90 seconds in duration”.

You decide

Texas local government code section 252.022(a) says:

This chapter does not apply [to] … (16) advertising, other than legal notices.

So what is advertising?  Most of us would think that the work described here  is preparation of material to be used in advertising — advertising is the process of publication and making visible the material that will be created here.

However, Merriam-Webster gives the following as it’s third definition of the word:  the business of preparing advertisements  for publication or broadcast.

Section 252.022 was modified by our legislature in 2007 to exclude advertising from competitive bidding requirements.  Before that advertising had to be handled competitively.

Not final

City council can still subject this contract to a competitive process if it wants to.  The state law simply allows council to avoid competition here, it does not require them to.

What for?

Our intrepid Reality Checker commented on this blog that most people already realize that our airport is a “gateway to El Paso”.  I certainly hope that our city does not decide to spend money to inform people that interstate 10 is a gateway also.

Hopefully city council will examine the need for spending this money.  Will one 30 second video really cause more people to use our airport?

We deserve better

Brutus

 

 

9 Comments | City government, State Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Render unto Caesar

July 6, 2014

An El Paso Times editorial the other day “Humanitarian costs should be borne by feds” bothered me on several levels.

Yes, I agree that the feral government has no right to dump a problem that it created onto our local plate.

Obligation

How is housing, feeding, clothing and providing for the safety and welfare of people that it has detained properly deemed to be “humanitarian”?  To me it seems to be an obligation, after all the people are in custody.  Are they supposed to starve to death?

Political

The Times started it’s editorial by blaming the majority party in the house of representatives for failing to do what the Times wants.  They then supported the idea of the President taking action even while admitting that they had no idea what the President might do.

Who created the problem?

Those of you who have followed this blog for a while know that I believe that immigration is a state issue while naturalization is a federal issue as our constitution is currently written.

For various reasons the feral government has usurped the powers of the states to control immigration.  Recently we have seen the state of Arizona being sued by the feds for enacting a law that authorized state and local law enforcement authorities to enforce existing federal laws relating to immigration.

Evidently the feds believe that the states should stay out of the business of enforcing immigration laws.  Who does that leave other than the feds to enforce the laws?

The DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals)  program was created by the President two years ago.  Some say that it sent the message that dependent women and children that enter the United States illegally will not be deported but instead our government will attempt to find homes for them.

Private vs. government

Regardless of where you stand on the immigration issue it is a fact that we have women and children in need of help.  I believe that humanitarian help should come from private citizens and organizations, not taxpayer funded governments.  Once someone is detained though it is the responsibility of the detaining government to care for the individual.

I also believe that the feds should not aggravate the problem by letting people in who do not qualify legally.

Should we change our laws and make it easier to qualify legally?  That’s a whole different discussion as far as I am concerned.

We deserve better

Brutus

 

 

7 Comments | Federal Government, State Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Independence

July 4, 2014

Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.  Benjamin Franklin

Let not any one pacify his conscience by the delusion that he can do no harm if he takes no part, and forms no opinion. Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing.   John Stuart Mill

We deserve better

Brutus

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

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