Undercover hospital board

November 18, 2014

We know that our county hospital is in financial trouble.

Wanting to be an informed and engaged citizen as the Times suggested recently,  I decided to read some of the minutes of the recent hospital board meetings.

The last set of minutes that they have posted on their web site is for the June 16, 2014 meeting.  Since then the board has met more than 15 times.  It’s kind of hard to be informed when here we are in November and we cannot read about what they have done since June.

Their finance committee’s activities are a special area of concern.  Unfortunately their last minutes are for April 24, 2014.

I guess they will let us know when they need more of our money.

We deserve better

Brutus

 

 

1 Comment | County Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

What’s good for the goose is good for the gander

November 17, 2014

Our city attorney is having difficulty with some of the members of council.

Evidently some of the members want to change the manner in which her performance is reviewed.

She says that the new methods would not be consistent with her contract and has asked council to please respect her contract.

I agree with her.

It would also be nice if she and the team in place before our new city manager came in would have respected the contracts of the city’s vendors.

The old group strong armed and fired vendors with valid contracts frequently.

There are a whole bunch of companies that simply will no longer do business with the city.

We deserve better

Brutus

6 Comments | City government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Times still out of touch

November 16, 2014

The November 6, 2014 editorial in the Times spoke of the fact that our former EPISD superintendent is now out of jail.

The Times wrote “Garcia’s criminal enterprise — steering a $450,000 no-bid, little-work contract to his mistress, implementing one of the nation’s worst school cheating schemes — was facilitated by a complacent school board.”

Later they wrote “But EPISD’S failures, and other recent El Paso corruption cases, must be a constant reminder of the need for an informed, engaged citizenry.”

I agree.  Part of the process of having an informed citizenry is having a newspaper that provides such information to it.

Our post EPISD purchasing pointed out that our current appointed board of managers has approved allowing our current superintendent to may buy board purchases of up to $250,000 each year for each vendor he chooses to do business with.

The Times says the prior board was complacent.  Is this board now to be called complacent?

And what about the Times?  Complacent?

We deserve better

Brutus

1 Comment | El Paso Independent School District, El Paso Times | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

A driving point from a reader

November 15, 2014

One of our readers asked that  we write a post about a common driving problem.

Her concern is the number of people who zip over in front of an 18 wheeler denying the truck the space it requires to stop safely.

To add insult to injury it is the driver of the truck that will get a ticket if the truck cannot be stopped quickly and a collision occurs.

The reader asked that we remind everyone that it can take a long time for a truck to stop.

Common courtesy should enter into the discussion also.

We deserve better

Brutus

Leave a Comment » | Uncategorized | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Blind man’s bluff

November 14, 2014

The El Paso Independent School District (EPISD) says that they want community input before they decide what to do about the physical condition of our schools.  They have posted a survey on their web site and tell us:

“This questionnaire will gather input from the community on district-wide facility related challenges, gauge the perceived effectiveness of possible corrective actions, and be used by the Steering Committee to develop recommendations that will then be presented to the Superintendent.”

The first page of the questionnaire looks like this:

EPISDfacilitiessurvey

We are evidently supposed to answer the questions after reading a worksheet.  No such worksheet is available on the web site at the time of this writing as far as I can tell.

I’m having difficulty here.  I cannot decide whether to record strong support for option one or for option two.

What are your thoughts?

Be sure to give the district your input — they say they really want it.

We deserve better

Brutus

 

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

« Previous Entries
Next Entries »