Disregard for the facts

July 2, 2013

The El Paso Times reported on June 29, 2013 that city council will be asked to rob $4.5 million from the Montana Avenue bus project and use it to remodel two more floors on the old Luther Building.  The issue is not on the city council agenda yet.  I suspect that this is a trial balloon designed to see if the voting public is paying attention.

The report told us that other parts of the building were currently being remodeled for $8.9 million with a city spokesman saying that the total cost of the renovations would be $13.4 million.

The same Times reporter wrote on January 23, 2013 that city council had voted to issue a contract for $11.5 million to remodel the same building.

Please explain

I would think that the reporter would feel obligated to set the record straight.  My guess is that what is really happening is that city staff wants to spend another $2.4 million above the $11.5 million that they have already received approval for.  The $4.5 million just happens to be sitting over in a corner because the sequestration situation at the national government is going to delay or cut the federal portion of the bus project.

It seems that city staff thinks that feathering their own nests is more important than the transportation system.

Another problem

In another example where Times employees seem to spend more time writing then they do researching facts, the Sunday June 30, 2013 Times has a column written by their editorial page writer.  He suggests that the new mayor may put the question of city manager vs. strong mayor on the ballot in November.

The city charter can only be amended once every two years.  We did that in May of 2013 and cannot do it again until May of 2015.

Muckraker

1 Comment | City government, El Paso Times | Permalink
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Is Scrivener really the city attorney?

July 1, 2013

I was interested to see what happened with item 1C on last week’s city council agenda.  I watched the video but never could find where they even mentioned it.

The minutes of the city council meeting should be able to tell me what happened so I have been waiting to look at them.  Item one on this week’s (July 2, 2013) agenda seeks the approval of those June 25, 2013 minutes.  The problem is that the minutes themselves are not posted as backup material.

That means that according to ordinance 17616 city council must either table the vote or take a special vote declaring that failure to take action would be detrimental to the interests of the city.  Failure to do so is an ethics violation.

Item 1C would have changed that.  I wrote about the proposed new ordinance in Testing the newbies.  It would remove the requirement for a special vote to proceed with the item and change the direction completely by just allowing  council to either table the item or proceed as though nothing went wrong.  The failure of city staff to provide the proper backup material would no longer force council to take a special vote in order to proceed.  Given events of recent years, this has already proven to be a very bad idea.

From what I can tell item 1C was removed from the agenda because it was sloppily done.  The title of the proposed ordinance indicated that the new ordinance would replace ordinance 17016.  Ordinance 17016 created the capital improvements advisory committee.

Evidently someone caught the error.  The item is now back on the agenda indicating that ordinance 17616 would be repealed, which is the old ordinance that dealt with putting items on the agenda.

The item this week is an introduction of the ordinance.  Next there will have to be a public hearing.  Then council can vote to approve the new ordinance.

The problem is that the backup material that was filed with the municipal clerk on June 27, 2013 still proposes to repeal 17016, not 17616.  They will need to start over again even if council is inclined to vote for the new ordinance.

They might claim as they have in the past  that the mistake is a scrivener’s error, which according to Wikipedia is “a phrase which can also be used as an excuse to deflect blame away from specific individuals, such as high powered executives, and instead redirect it to the more anonymous clerical staff.”

In my book we should expect the city attorney to produce accurate, fair work.  The city parliamentarian could catch this for us, but — you guessed it — the city parliamentarian is the city attorney.

We deserve better

Brutus

2 Comments | City government, Open Government | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Reigning in begins

June 30, 2013

It looks like the new mayor is doing his job.

The July 2, 2013 city council agenda has two items posted in the addition to the agenda.  Both appear to have been placed on the agenda by the mayor.

The first is titled:

Discussion and action regarding a Resolution to revoke authority granted to the City Manager by the motion of City Council dated November 6, 2012, with regard to the leasing or purchasing of office space and parking in the Central Business District required for the relocation of City operations as a result of the relocation of City Hall.

The previous city council passed a motion on November 6, 2012 granting the city manager broad authority to lease property downtown for up to 5 years (limited to $2,500,000 per year).  The new resolution if passed would require the new city council to approve any new leases.

The second item is titled:

Discussion and action regarding a Resolution modifying the authority granted to the City Manager in connection with the awarding of Solicitation No. 2013-109R to Jordan Hunt, a Texas Joint Venture for the construction of the ballpark and requiring the exercise of all such authority be made in consultation with the Mayor of the City of El Paso.

In other words the city manager would have to keep the mayor informed about what is being done.  The resolution would not take power away from the city manager.  Instead it would allow the mayor to know what is happening so that he could re-direct the city manager through city council if he thought things were not going well.

Hallelujah!

It looks like the new mayor wants the mayor and council to take responsibility for what is happening instead of giving all authority to the city manager and then claiming that decisions on matters are not in their purview.  A large part of the mess we are in is a direct result of having a weak council and mayor.

I don’t feel comfortable making a prediction about whether these two items will pass.  What I do know is that any city council member that votes against these will be drawing a line in the sand.

To me this appears to be very smart on the part of the mayor.  I hope that he continues to apply this kind of thoughtful management to the mess that we are in.

We are getting better

Brutus

3 Comments | Ball park, Uncategorized | Permalink
Posted by Brutus

Good reporting

June 29, 2013

I enjoyed this article in the El Paso Times the other day.  It was about the cut backs in the army and how they will affect Fort Bliss and thus El Paso.

The reporter explained that the net loss to Fort Bliss will be 750 soldiers instead of the 3,500 previously reported by others.

What I enjoyed most about the article is that the reporter figured out what people would want to know about the cut backs, researched to get answers and then wrote about them.

Many articles I read in the Times leave me with more questions than I had before I read the article.  This article was different in that it anticipated my questions and then answered them.  I saw no repetition or political bias as I often do in the Times.  The numbers made sense and even added up correctly.

I hope to see more reporting like this.

Muckraker

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Don’t believe all that you read

June 28, 2013

An article in the El Paso Times the other day  said “… the start of City Council meetings was moved up 30 minutes to 8:30 a.m. ”

The reporter was telling us about new rules that council is making about it’s meetings.

My recollection is that council meetings have been starting at 8:30 AM for years now.  I checked agendas back as far as January, 2012 and saw that the meetings have been scheduled to start at 8:30.

As far as I can tell, council did not move the meeting time up 30 minutes.  This may be a small point, but to me it points out that what is printed in the Times is not always factual.  That may be an understatement.

Some of you may say that I am being petty to comment about this.  I believe that the newspaper should be held to a high standard of accuracy.  The articles they publish should be fact checked.  Errors that slip though should be acknowledged and corrected in subsequent editions.

What the reporter might have meant to say is that since the portion of the meeting that allows the public to comment has been moved from the beginning of the meeting to 12:15 PM, the other business of council will now start at 8:30.

That would have been much more accurate.

Muckraker

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