Slow down, save a life

July 13, 2016

Well.

It seems that the city is finally going to try to do something about the death trap known as I-10 here in El Paso.

Item 28.1 on the Tuesday, July 14, 2016 city council agenda reads:

Discussion and action to authorize the Mayor to request from the Texas Transportation Commission a reduction of the speed limit on Interstate 10 due to increased collisions during the recent construction period.

According to the backup material the police department reports that during the period April 1, 2015 to June 20, 2016 there were 359 accidents, 76 reported injuries, and 4 deaths on the stretch between Redd Road and Porfirio Diaz.

Maybe slowing traffic down will help mitigate the problem.  We have all noticed the increase in aggressive driving recently.

Thank you mayor.

Brutus

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

A public official who speaks honestly

July 12, 2016

Recently our chief of police was quoted as saying:

“Black Lives Matter, as far as I am concerned, is a radical hate group.   And for that purpose alone, I think the leadership of this country needs to look a little bit harder at that particular group.  The consequences of  what  we saw in Dallas is due to their efforts.”

Many of our local elected officials then wrote a letter to our mayor including this statement:

“That is why we urge you to publicly repudiate the statement, forcefully and unequivocally, and hold Chief Allen accountable for damaging the public trust and bringing disrepute to our community.”

One former city representative was quoted in a Times article thusly:

“I think it was incredibly irresponsible of him.  I have no confidence in him any longer as the chief of police.”

City representative Robinson made more sense than all of the others combined when according to the Times he said:

“All lives matter,” and declined to comment further.

I don’t know

I don’t know anything about the group called Black Lives Matter.

What I do know is that when an individual like chief Allen, who rarely speaks out in public,  makes a statement I start by giving it more credence than anything that anyone in the pack that is calling for his head says.

I would imagine that as chief of police he has access to much more information about the group than we get told by the people who spoon feed information to our local media.

This police chief is an outstanding public servant who goes out of his way to stay out of politics.

Now that you mention it

Moving on from their politically self serving actions, I would like to call attention to their position that public officials should be held responsible for their actions.

I agree.

Several of the bunch that signed the letter have done a lot to damage the public and the public’s trust and have certainly brought disrepute to our community.

I suppose it would be foolish to expect them to step up to the plate and make amends.

And by the way maybe the elected officials who signed the letter should learn something about our city charter.  The police chief reports to the city manager, not to the mayor nor to city council.  Then again maybe they are just trying to manipulate the mayor.

We deserve better

Brutus

29 Comments | City government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

EPISD bonds–too much at one time

July 11, 2016

The $500 or $600 or $700 million that the district will end  up asking us to vote for cannot be handled by the district in a span of time that makes it reasonable to give them that much money.  Once we give it to them future boards will be free to “repurpose” it as circumstances change.  They have done it in the past and will do it again.

As a case in point please remember that in 2007 we voted to give them $207 million.

Take a look at this June 29, 2016 presentation to the current facilities advisory committee:

2007bond

Nine years after we voted to give them money they are still “In Design” for major projects.

EPISD tells us that changing demographics are causing them to have to close and consolidate schools.

If nine years after allowing $207 million the district has not even begun projects, what can we expect if we give them five or six or seven hundred million dollars today?

Their financial calculations (such as they are) assume that they will issue all of the new debt at today’s interest rate.  The only way to guarantee that would be to sell all of the bonds immediately and thus have us pay interest on money that we cannot use because the construction planning and building process at EPISD cannot schedule all of their proposed projects at once.

The safer way for the public to do this is to grant the issuance of a significantly smaller sum of bonds and then watch to see if the district can complete the projects that we vote for in a reasonable period of time and with reasonable costs.

EPISD should ask for less money and then come back to the voters in following years if they have handled our money wisely.

Stay tuned over the next few days as we point out other problems with their plans as they stand now.  Once again, our goal at this point is to try to help the school board see what we perceive to be problems with what the district is considering so that a reasonable bond referendum can be offered to the voters.

We deserve better

Brutus

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

Lecturing her bosses

July 10, 2016

Holy mackerel!

Our city council is planning to hold a special meeting Monday, July 11, 2016.

There is one item on the agenda:

Presentation by the City Attorney on the Council/Manager form of government.

The item as listed on the agenda was placed there by our city attorney.  Of course there is no backup material.  Rules are evidently not applicable to her.

She is the city parliamentarian but allows council to violate rules regularly.

Let’s be sure to watch and see how she colors her presentation to accommodate her agenda.

We deserve better

Brutus

12 Comments | City government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

One more time?

July 9, 2016

We are supposed to be getting a new county hospital administrator any day now.

Item 19 on the June 14, 2016 board agenda read:

 Discuss and take appropriate action regarding the 2016 Performance  and Objectives of Mr. James N. Valenti, President and Chief  Executive officer of the EI Paso county Hospital District pursuant to Texas Government Code $551.074.

The minutes have not been posted but the video just came out.

Incredibly when the agenda item was brought up for consideration in open session (after executive session) there was a motion and a second to approve an action.  The item passed unanimously.

There was absolutely no public discussion.  This is a clear violation of the Texas Open Meetings Act.  Now we will have to wait to read the minutes of the meeting.

Any predictions?

We deserve better

Brutus

10 Comments | County Government, State Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

« Previous Entries
Next Entries »