Right on the head

July 10, 2013

This entry on refusethejuice.typepad.com does a fine job of explaining some of our problems in El Paso.  We need more jobs.

We deserve better

Brutus

4 Comments | City government, County Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

No play

July 10, 2013

This week’s city council agenda asks for permission to issue a three year contract for parts and labor to a local Ford dealer.

The deal is the result of a real bid instead of using a buy board.  This is good.  I congratulate the local dealer.

What bothers me about it is that while there are four Ford dealers in El Paso, only one of them bid.  Why?  It is possible that the other three did not want the business?  Why?  Something is wrong.  The annual amount of business involved for the dealership is almost half a million dollars.

I don’t know why only one local dealer submitted a bid.  My guess is that the three others think that dealing with the city is not worth it.  Maybe they thought they did not have a chance.  On the other hand some might say that there was collusion among the dealers.  I doubt it.

I do know that when only one firm out of several submits a bid there is probably something wrong.  City management in prior years considered this kind of situation a red flag and would work to get competition going.

By the way, one out of town dealer also submitted a bid.  This dealer’s part prices were consistently lower than the one city staff wants to give the contract to.  The out of town dealer was disqualified.  From reading the agenda backup it looks like not quoting a price for local labor was the reason.

If the bid specifications clearly required a local service shop, then why did the out of town dealer spend the time and money  to bid?  Once again I am guessing here when I say that I suspect that the specifications were not clear on the labor issue.  A look at the backup material shows city staff not paying attention again.  This was a Ford related bid.  The bid tabulation shows “SERVICE AND REPAIR OF VARIOUS GMC/CHEVROLET MODELS PERFORMED BY MECHANICS CERTIFIED BY GMC/CHEVROLET”.  The bid tabulation is primarily an internal document.  I hope that the bid specifications did not contain this error.

Evidently Scrivener has a relative working in the purchasing department.

I know many business people  in El Paso that simply will not even bid for city business.  The consensus within this group is that it is too hard to get beyond the favoritism and then too unpleasant to deal with the city if they do get the business.  To them it is simply not worth the trouble.

We deserve better

Brutus

2 Comments | City government, Purchasing | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Feeder schools

July 9, 2013

An interested reader was kind enough to try to correlate feeder schools ratings to the high schools they feed.  He was able to figure out both the Ysleta and Socorro feeder patterns, but not the El Paso Independent School District.  He did not give me permission to use his name, but did freely share his research.

I hesitate to draw any conclusions for the data but print the chart here for your information. I would be interested in hearing from those of you in the know.

High School School District Rating Middle School Rating
Bel Air Ysleta ISD B Hillcrest C
    Ranchland Hills C
Del Valles Ysleta ISD B Camino Real B
    Valley View C
Eastwood Ysleta ISD B Eastwood Knolls B
    Eastwood Middle B
J M Hanks Ysleta ISD C Desert View C
    Eastwood Middle B
Parkland Ysleta ISD C Parkland C
Riverside Ysleta ISD B Riverside C
Ysleta Hs Ysleta ISD C Ysleta C
    Rio Bravo C
Americas Socorro ISD C Capt Walter E Clarke C
El Dorado Socorro ISD C Spec Rafael Hernando B
    Sun Ridge C
Montwood Socorro ISD C Montwood Middle B
    William D Slider B
Socorro Socorro ISD C Salvador Sanchez C
Socorro Middle B

My question is “Why can’t we help our schools to achieve an ‘A’?”

We deserve better

Brutus

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

Paying twice

July 8, 2013

Today’s county commissioners court agenda contemplates approving the hospital district  projects that the court approved $152 million in bonds for earlier this year, of course without asking the public.  Local physicians are furious over this.

Once again our local officials choose to tell us only part of the story.  Our two cents covered this in more detail.

Please remember that the CEO of the hospital has told us that the hospital is operating at a profit.  Then why is $29 million being allocated to remodel four floors of the old hospital?  The answer is simple — if the hospital had to pay for upkeep of the facility out of normal operating funds they would not be profitable.  All facilities, commercial and governmental, have to budget for periodic refreshing.  If operating revenues cannot pay for this, the facility is not profitable over the long term.

The  CEO also has told us that building the outpatient facilities will save us $17 million a year in operating costs at the hospital emergency room.  Will these savings be used to pay for the bonds?

If not, then we are paying for both the bonds and the $17 million annually that they will doubtless spend on something else.

We recently had a city election where the voters signaled what they feel about city government.  Was the county listening?

We deserve better

Brutus

2 Comments | County Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Why Houston?

July 7, 2013

Item 5B on this week’s city council agenda relates to air conditioning equipment for our zoo.

The city proposes to spend almost $120,000 dollars for various units, once again without bidding, but through a buy board.

Four percent of this money is paid to this Houston based buy board.  A review of the contract documents relating to this vendor reveals that the vendor was not the lowest price  offerer.  The contract was issued in 2010.

Air conditioning equipment and services are available through the  El Paso based Region 19.  We would have to pay a percentage to this buy board also but at least that money would stay in El Paso.

Them again if this item had been taken out to bid we might have found lower prices than through the buy board.  I don’t understand how the city can determine that the buy board is more cost effective than bidding without in fact bidding.

Adding insult to injury, this money is coming from our quality of life bonds.

We deserve better

Brutus

2 Comments | City government, Purchasing | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

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