It looks like the state is going to fund the street car project after all.
There will inevitably be real estate opportunities as a result. Building a store or restaurant along a fixed rail path is considered by many to be safer than along a bus route. The reason is simple, it is harder to move rail.
The properties on the street car route will become more desirable as stores and restaurants than they are now.
It will be interesting to see who ends up owning them.
We deserve better
Brutus
11 Comments | 
State Government | 
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Posted by Brutus
The tenure of our appointed EPISD board of managers cannot last forever.
The state law that allows the education commissioner to strip our elected board of their power (even after the voters elected some new members) only allows the appointed board of managers to operate for two years.
If my memory is correct the board of managers was appointed December 6, 2012.
That means that there are only six more months before the board of managers should be dissolved.
Texas Education Code section 39.112 defines the rules:
At the direction of the commissioner but not later than the second anniversary of the date the board of managers of a district was appointed, the board of managers shall order an election of members of the district board of trustees. The election must be held on a uniform election date on which an election of district trustees may be held under Section 41.001, Election Code, that is at least 180 days after the date the election was ordered.
Section 41.001 of the Election Code specifies the second Saturday in May of an odd numbered year. That will be May 9, 2015.
Even though the commissioner made the appointments December 6, 2012 the board of managers was not sworn in until May 7, 2013.
Section 39.112 specifically starts the clock on the day they were appointed. If they do the right thing and order an election for next May there should be time for political campaigns to be run.
If on the other hand they claim that they have not served their two years until May 7, 2015 we will have a problem.
We deserve better
Brutus
2 Comments | El Paso Independent School District, State Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus
One sign that the economy in the United States is doing better than the economies of some of our neighboring countries is the number of people that emigrate to our country.
Evidently the numbers of these people are overwhelming our facilities.
Our feral government has chosen to ship hundreds of them to El Paso. By ship I mean fly them to El Paso and abandon them on our streets with no money or place to stay.
According to the Times none of our local officials were notified before hand. We now have hundreds of destitute people arriving. Common decency requires our citizens and our local agencies to help feed and shelter these people.
The feds have not told us. They simply have injected this man-made disaster into our community.
When bridge crossing times (for those who want to enter the country through a legal port of entry) became too long the feds told us that we would have to pick up the bill for more feral workers.
Now they have decided to drop another one of their problems in our lap.
One local wag frequently points out that immigration is a state issue according to our constitution. Naturalization, according to him, is the federal issue.
Yet the feds have chosen to claim control of our international borders. A fine mess of it they have made. When states try to take measures to control immigration, they get sued by the feds.
We deserve better
Brutus
2 Comments | City government, County Government, Federal Government, State Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus
It will be interesting to see how the Upper Rio Grande Workforce Commission handles the situation when they hire our ex city manager as their temporary director.
From what I can tell the commission was created under subchapter F of chapter 2308 of the Texas government code. The commission’s geographic area is the western most counties of Texas including El Paso county. The city of El Paso and it’s mayor are also members.
The controlling state law requires that any staff that works at the workforce commission must be separate from the staff that works at the counties and the city:
Sec. 2308.267. STAFF. (a) A board may employ professional, technical, and support staff to carry out its planning, oversight, and evaluation functions.
(b) A board’s staff shall be separate from and independent of any organization providing workforce education or workforce training and services in the workforce development area. A board’s staff may not direct or control the staffing of any entity providing one-stop workforce services.
Section 2308 defines workforce training as:
“Workforce training and services” means training and services programs that are not workforce education.
The city of El Paso provides personnel training through several departments, including police, fire, and environmental services. The city’s website confirms this.
So the staffs must be separate if the city provides training, which it does.
The city’s contract with the ex city manager declares her to be an employee, not an independent contractor.
Our city council may elect to change their contract with the ex city manager to allow her to work at the commission while she is still onboard at the city. The problem is that the workforce commission cannot hire her if she is still an employee of the city.
Will they? Probably. We have local governments that rely upon their attorneys to declare illegal actions legal.
You might argue that it is only a technicality as to whether she is an employee or a contractor. That would be ignoring the fact that the state legislature thought it was important enough to make it the law.
We deserve better
Brutus
2 Comments | City government, County Government, State Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus
Lost in the controversy over whether city council violated the Texas open meetings law when they held an emergency meeting to discuss the Lincoln Center situation is what else the city might have done instead of suing Texas.
Unfortunately our city resorts to lawsuits when issues could be handled without going to court. To add insult to taxpayer injury they typically use out of town law firms.
In this case a simple phone call might have sufficed. The mayor (or the acting city manager) could have called the retired general in charge of TxDOT and explained our situation. We could have asked TxDOT to stand down for 30 or 60 days while the city figured out if they would buy the building.
TxDOT did stand down after they were served with the restraining order.
Did we have to declare war before trying to come to a peaceful resolution?
We deserve better
Brutus
1 Comment | City government, State Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus
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