$13,285,000 more for the ball park

February 24, 2017

When the ball park bonds were originally sold the city told us they would make a large bullet payment of $17.4 million on the bonds in 2023.

We wrote about that in No Principles back in November of 2013.

No one should be surprised that city council knew that coming up with an extra $17.4 million dollars all at one time would not be possible.

The solution

The new management at the city has taken the steps necessary to keep us from having to cough up the money in 2023.

The April 11, 2016 meeting of the Downtown Development Corporation (city council in sheep’s clothing) gave permission to sell refinancing bonds.  The refinancing bonds will be used to buy back bonds that were issued in 2013 and thus eliminate the bullet payment.

Interest rates have gone down and money can be saved by locking in a lower rate through refinancing.

Unfortunately they felt the need to finance the $17.4 million also.

The result?

From the refinancing resolution:

the aggregate amount of payments to be made on the Series 2016 Bonds shall not exceed the aggregate amount of payments that would have been made on the refunded Series 2013 Tax Exempt Bonds had the refunding not occurred by more than $13,285,000, net of any issuer contribution

Even with the interest savings we still are going to pay up to another $13.2 million in interest because of the need to finance the $17.4 million bullet payment.

The problem here is that financing numbers did not work back in 2013.  The city put the $17.4 million in as a bullet payment to make it look like they financing was viable.

Does it ever end?

We deserve better

Brutus

7 Comments | Ball park, City government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Above some laws?

February 23, 2017

Neither of our west side city representatives has turned over text messages relating to the serial quorum of city council that they were evidently involved in.

One said that he had no responsive texts.  The other said that “she has adhered to all laws that she is supposed to adhere to” according to a recent article in the Times.

Other text messages that have been produced by city council members evidently prove that she was part of a chain of text communications.

Above the law?

Are there some laws that she does not have to obey?  I wonder if we can get her to produce a list of them.

In charge

According to the article she said “All I am in charge of doing is (turning over) what I have in possession at the time of the request”.

Other than the grammatical error the statement calls into question how she is in “charge” of this.  Does she think of herself of being in charge?

Open records experts are telling us that it is illegal for the city representatives to destroy public records.  Cell phone text messages that involve city business are public records.

Is she deleting her text messages?  That would be an overt act in violating of the law.

She does not have to run for office during this election cycle.

We deserve better

Brutus

 

5 Comments | City government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Repeat after me–It’s all good

February 22, 2017

Item 5.4 on the Tuesday, February 7, 2017 city council agenda was posted as:

That the City Manager be authorized to sign an Advertising Service Agreement by and between the City of El Paso and The Laster Group, Inc. dba Culture Span Marketing a Texas company, to conduct an advertising campaign to attract public attention to the El Paso Quality of Life projects and projects associated with improving the quality of life of the citizens of the City of El Paso, for an amount not to exceed Two Hundred Twenty-One Thousand One Hundred Sixty Dollars ($221,160.00).

Someone evidently feels that the taxpayers need some education.

Some of the members of city council will stand for re-election this May and probably think that some advertising could help their chances for re-election.

We doubt that the campaign will draw public attention to the cost of the projects.

Spending a quarter of a million dollars to help their campaigns is shameful.

No Bids

Once again the city seems to be trying to stretch the rules.

From what we can see the contract was not put out to competitive bid.  The agenda posting included this note:

This is a purchase pursuant to the General Exemptions advertising, other than legal notices, Section 252.022(a) (16) under Chapter 252 of the Texas Local Government Code.

Section 252.022(a)(16) exempts advertising from the state’s competitive bidding requirements.

This contract was for advertising services–deciding what advertising to do, not advertising itself.

We deserve better

Brutus

12 Comments | City government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Help from a reader

February 21, 2017

In Crumbling roads we pointed out that the city’s pavement condition index was not working.

Mr. Michael Bray (one of our loyal readers) contacted the appropriate department and got this response:

Mr. Bray, there were some technical difficulties with the address locator part of the web site application.
The application is now functioning properly.
Please do not hesitate to contact us if you are still having issues accessing the information.
Our thanks to Mr. Bray.
If you want to see how the city has rated a local street, click on this link:
pavement condition index
You might be surprised at how good your road is!
The index was based on a 2008 study.  The city could ask their employees to rate the streets as they drive on them and bring the condition index up to date.
We deserve better
Brutus

8 Comments | City government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

EPISD–not downtown

February 20, 2017

Where will the new EPISD central office building/s be?

The Times printed an article suggesting that the old Hotel Dieu site and/or the high rise adjacent to it might be chosen.

The EPISD board publicly stated that they will move downtown to support downtown development.

Neither of the two properties mentioned above qualify.

We deserve better

Brutus

20 Comments | El Paso Independent School District | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

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