Blastoff!

July 3, 2014

City staff’s proposed budget for next year is now out.

They are proposing a 3.1% increase in our property tax rate to 69.9 cents per hundred dollars of valuation.

They are also asking each city department to take a 5% budget cut.

Huh?

They want to cut each department by 5% but they need a 3.1% increase in our property taxes.  Yikes!

According to the Times the city needs the increase  “to pay for debt obligations such as the quality of life bond projects approved by voters in 2012.”

Actually

This graphic from the city’s web site tells us that they have only begun to spend the bond money:

qolrollout

A 5% decrease in spending plus a 3.1% increase in taxes comes to an 8.1% swing.  According to the chart above they will only have spent 20% of the quality of life bond money by the end of 2016.  So we evidently need 8.1% to pay for other debt.

Either our taxes are going to go up a lot more in the future or this year’s increase is needed to pay for other things than the quality of life bonds.  Tearing down city hall and buying and remodeling multiple buildings is probably the answer.

New tax rate comparison told us about how we had the 7th largest property tax rate of the 50 largest cities in the United States in 2013.  I guess they want us to do better.

Hold on to your hats!

We deserve better

Brutus

 

 

12 Comments | City government, El Paso Times | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Changing neighborhoods

July 2, 2014

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 | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Things change

July 1, 2014

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.

Not quite so fast

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.

What will happen?

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

Treating us like mushrooms

June 30, 2014

I don’t know of a single children’s hospital in the United States that operates at a profit.

From what I can see they depend upon private donations to keep operating.

Our situation

Looking at our children’s hospital audit for 2013, it looks like they reported a loss of $13 million dollars.

According to the report, revenues were about $86 million and expenses were about $99 million.  Maybe those numbers do not include the money that they are supposed to pay the county hospital.

Can it can be salvaged?

I guess we will know eventually.  Unfortunately the voters won’t be able to hear about the real numbers for 60 days since both sides have agreed to that period of secrecy.

How two government organizations can agree to keep things secret while they work out their differences is beyond me.

We deserve better

Brutus

5 Comments | County Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Community College sports

June 29, 2014

Reading the June 24, 2014 agenda for the public meeting of the El Paso County Community College Board of Trustees I see that they want to rent apartments for some student athletes.

Evidently they have at least three athletic programs:  baseball, softball, and cross-country.  The agenda item proposes spending just short of $49 thousand dollars for apartments for some of the athletes.

The backup material indicates that the budget for the three programs is $746,966 each year.

Admittedly I don’t know anything about the desirability of having athletic programs at our community college.

Hopefully some of our astute readers will weigh in and inform us about the issue.

We deserve better

Brutus

2 Comments | Uncategorized | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

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