This map was part of the water park presentation given to city council the other day.
What the map does not show is that the company is building a similar resort in Scottsdale Arizona (Phoenix) that is scheduled to open in 2019.
Our circle will be considerably smaller.
We deserve better
Brutus
7 Comments | 
City government | 
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Posted by Brutus
Today is Veterans day, a day where we honor those who have served in the United States armed forces.
By the way the official spelling does not include an apostrophe. The day does not belong to the veterans but instead is about them.
Memorial day is a holiday in May where we honor those who died while serving in the United States armed forces.
Armed forces day also occurs in May. It is a day where we honor those currently serving in our armed forces.
I thank all of our veterans.
Freedom is not free.
Brutus
1 Comment | Uncategorized | Permalink
Posted by Brutus
This came in from Max Grossman:
Dear Friends,
Like thousands of other El Pasoans, I finally received word of my new property tax assessment. The breakdown for 2017 and 2018 looks like this:
Taxing entity 2017 2018 % change
—————————————————————————–
CITY OF EL PASO 0.803433 0.843332 +4.97%
EL PASO COUNTY 0.452694 0.447819 -1.09%
EL PASO I.S.D. 1.310000 1.310000 0
EPCC 0.141638 0.140273 -0.97%
UNIV MED CTR 0.251943 0.251943 0
——————————————————————————
TOTAL TAX RATE 2.959708% 2.993367% +1.14%
Thus, the City of El Paso was the only taxing entity to raise our taxes, and they did so by almost 5%. Moreover, in the last six years the City of El Paso has raised our taxes from $0.66 per $100 valuation to $0.8433, an increase of 27%! Yes, we have actually joined the “3% Club” with Detroit!
For 2018, the value of my home was assessed 16.15% higher, but then my attorney sued to lower that increase to only 7.69%, which is still huge. Between that and my fleecing at the hands of the City, my property taxes are $684.46 higher for the coming year. That is money that I will not spend in the local economy, hurting local businesses and pressuring wages.
Our Mayor, who had promised to hold the line on taxes, and our City Council are 100% responsible for the tax hike, which is a direct result of their reckless borrowing and spending, their inability to contain our debt, their failure to respect established budgets, and their insistence upon increasing the cost of the already-bloated QOL bond projects, especially their “Arena,” by issuing new debt that was never approved by the voters.
*************************************
We invite our readers to tell us what happened to their tax bills this year.
We deserve better
Brutus
15 Comments | City government, County Government, El Paso Independent School District | Permalink
Posted by Brutus
This slide explains the water park viability as well as anything we have seen:
The red coloring is part of a page in an economic impact analysis that the city has posted on their website. You can read it here.
Simply put the analysis concluded that the hotel would only generate an internal rate of return of 4.2% unless someone kicked in some free money (government incentives).
The authors stated that investors would need an internal rate of return of between 14 and 16%.
They stated “As a result, in the absence of additional financial incentives, the Proposed Hotel is likely not feasible.”
Aren’t we nice?
We deserve better
Brutus
11 Comments | City government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus
City council is planning to pass an ordinance requiring entrance fees to use the new eastside sports complex.
The ordinance exempts residents of both PID (property improvement district) 2 and TIRZ (tax increment refinance zone) 9 because of the money that those properties contributed to the building of the complex.
My question is how will the city know which people to exempt? How will people prove that they live within those two areas? How much will it cost to have people administer the exemption?
We deserve better
Brutus
7 Comments | City government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus
elpasospeak 
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