Four candidates are running for the District 1 City Council seat that represents much of El Paso’s Westside after the area’s current representative, Brian Kennedy, resigned midway through his term this summer to run for mayor.
All four candidates – Sam Armijo, Alejandra Chavez, Tom Handy and Monica Reyes – are political newcomers and have diverse professional backgrounds. They each said high property taxes are the biggest problem voters are facing.
The City Council is nonpartisan and comprises eight district representatives who annually set a tax rate and adopt a budget. City representatives also make wide-ranging policy decisions affecting areas such as street maintenance, parks and recreation and police and fire officials salaries and pension funds. They also vote on big-ticket items such as the Northeast amphitheater and proposed Downtown deck park, and are charged with appointing a city manager and city attorney.
City representatives are paid $51,600 a year and serve four-year terms.
However, because Kennedy was elected in 2022, the winner of the District 1 race in November will only serve through 2026 – the remainder of Kennedy’s current term.
In addition to property taxes, the candidates all said their other top priorities are ensuring El Paso stays safe and improving street conditions. But they differed on some issues, such as the deck park proposal.
Three of the four candidates – Reyes, Chavez and Handy – said the park is a good concept and would support advancing the idea, but said the city should not ask local taxpayers to fund construction. Armijo said he would try to prevent construction of the deck project if he enters office.
Here’s more on the candidate’s background and some of their goals.
Sam Armijo
Armijo, 85, is a former nuclear scientist who holds several patents related to nuclear technology and received a doctorate in material sciences from Stanford. He retired in 1999 following a 37-year career with General Electric – where he managed the company’s business of selling nuclear fuel to power plants around the globe – and then served on a committee advising the Nuclear Regulatory Commission about nuclear reactors. He was also an adviser for the cleanup of the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan over a decade ago.
A graduate of Cathedral High School and Texas Western College, Armijo said he moved back to El Paso from northern California three years ago.
He said he now wants to help guide El Paso forward and address high taxes by slashing city spending. He said another priority is lowering crime by raising the number of police officers in El Paso from about 1,100 currently to at least 1,300. An early-career officer in the El Paso Police Department earns over $67,300, so an increase of 200 officers could cost more than $13 million.
The police department will receive $214 million in funding in the city’s budget this year, over one-third of the city’s general fund expenditures. The city for the upcoming fiscal year is dedicating 56% of its budget to public safety.
Additional officers could make El Paso more attractive to companies that are thinking about setting up shop here, he said.
“You bring in corporations when you have a well-managed city that’s not heavily in debt, that is safe, it’s got good streets, it’s got good infrastructure, and it doesn’t have to bribe a business to come in with tax breaks,” Armijo said.
“If you have key employees or key people you want to manage, would they be happy coming to El Paso?” he said. “I don’t think (they) would be.”
Armijo said he would pay for additional police officers by cutting spending elsewhere. He said the city’s Office of Climate and Sustainability – which is developing the climate action plan for the region – is an unnecessary expense.
The city’s climate action plan will be completed in about a year and aims to improve air quality and address the record heat El Paso has experienced, among other goals.
But how the city will fund climate-related initiatives such as solar panel shades or electric vehicle chargers or anything else is unclear, and City Council could influence how big of a priority the plan will be for the city.
For his part, Armijo said he’s unconcerned about climate change and that El Paso “should not waste one dime on climate activism.”
El Paso “should spend its money on better streets. It should spend its money on police, its parks,” he said.
He also pointed to the city’s proposed library budget for next year of $12.3 million, which is a $1.7 million increase from this year.
“I’d put every dime of that (increase) into the police,” he said. “I don’t think too many people will let their kids go out on their own to go walk to the park.”
Armijo acknowledged some voters may have reservations about voting for a candidate in their mid-80s. But he said he’s been “blessed with very good health.”
“I could just sit in front of the TV,” he said. “It’s not my thing.”
Alejandra Chavez
Chavez, 47, was the owner and chef of Thyme Matters restaurant on Mesa Street, which she operated for 20 years before selling the business last year. A mother of three school-aged children, she said she quickly realized after the sale that she missed interacting with locals and “creating a daily impact” on people’s lives. That motivated her to seek office, she said.
Chavez graduated from Loretto Academy and the University of Texas at Austin, and worked for the commodity trading giant Cargill. She then worked as an analyst for a year at Enron, the multi-billion dollar energy trading firm that collapsed in the early 2000s. Afterward, she pivoted and moved to Italy to attend culinary school before moving back to El Paso and opening Thyme Matters in 2003 with a loan from the Small Business Administration.
She also named property taxes as her top priority to address if she wins the race.
“The best avenue to tackle (high taxes) is going to be expanding the commercial tax base,” she said. The city can generate more commercial property tax revenue – and require less from homeowners – by attracting new companies here. One way to do that would be to emphasize public safety, she said.
“The truth is, we also have larger than expected response times from our Police Department,” she said. “I do think we need more police officers.”
El Paso can also grow commercial tax revenue by offering programs for local small businesses such as workshops, networking opportunities to build “social capital,” and improving businesses’ access to financing to start up or to grow, she said.
Chavez also pointed to three road-related projects that she would push to have the city complete.
The first she mentioned was an extension of Resler Drive past Loop 375 and into a neighborhood in the Enchanted Hills area where residents and first responders need easier access. City staffers last month said they have “started design” on that road project.
“The Resler Connect project has to be a priority, specifically for district one. The funds are there. We need to get the project started and completed,” Chavez said.
She said she’s also concerned about accidents on Country Club Road, especially near the road’s roundabouts. And she discussed Frontera Road, which she said needs to be repaired and upgraded. And a nearby housing development in Sunland Park threatens to introduce heavy traffic along the residential road, which should instead be diverted to Sunland Park Drive, she said.
“That project continues to be up in the air, and needs to be championed,” she said.
On the issue of climate change in El Paso, Chavez said the city’s climate plan should strike a balance between what the business community and environmental organizers each want. The Proposition K measure – also called the Climate Charter – that El Paso voters rejected last year “went too far” and could have harmed the city’s economy, she said.
Tom Handy
Handy, a 51-year-old veteran, spent 20 years in the Army as an intelligence officer, and was deployed four times: in Jordan, Afghanistan and twice in Iraq. He was stationed at Fort Bliss in El Paso in 2013 and has stayed since.
Since retiring from the Army, Handy has worked as a writer for different platforms, often writing about topics such as finance, investing and cryptocurrencies.
He also cited property taxes as his biggest focus, but said he’s trying to bring different ideas to the table compared with his opponents.
Tom Handy, a candidate for El Paso City Council District 1, speaks at a candidate forum
on Sept. 20, 2024. Handy shared his vision for lowering property taxes and providing
incentives for solar energy to reduce the city’s environmental impact. (Rumi Sevilla/El
Paso Matters)
“Every time the (Central Appraisal District) comes down and gives a new appraisal for what (homeowners) have got to pay for taxes, you hear a lot of people complaining about it. They all want to move to New Mexico, or (say) ‘I’m not going to stay here any longer,’” Handy said. “I think it’s going to hurt El Paso. They can’t keep raising taxes every year.”
The Central Appraisal District sets home valuations but does not set tax rates or collect taxes – the governing bodies of local taxing entities such as the City Council set tax rates based on the valuations and collect property taxes to fund their budgets.
El Paso should look at how San Antonio capitalizes on its history to bring in revenue from historic tourism, Handy said. He pointed to the fact that in San Antonio – about three times the size of El Paso – tourism has brought in around $19 billion annually in revenue in recent years, compared with about $1.8 billion annually in El Paso.
“We have so much history, I don’t think the city uses enough to highlight that,” he said. “If we let people know what’s here in El Paso, we can pull in more revenue.”
“Some people say it’s been tried before. But it all depends on who’s on the City Council,” he said of pushing historic tourism. “We have a new City Council coming in next year, that’s going to be a complete changeover.”
Handy previously worked with the local Veterans Business Association, and said the city could do more to utilize the experience and expertise of veterans and military members stationed at Fort Bliss.
Handy – who said he’s a top reviewer of El Paso restaurants and businesses on the Yelp platform – said he’s spent between $13,000 and $14,000 on his campaign so far. He’s knocked on 12,000 doors in the district, and said he’s also focused on using social media as a low-cost campaign tool to reach voters.
Monica Reyes
Reyes, 55, has spent her nearly 30-year career in education since graduating from St. Mary’s University in San Antonio. For over a decade, she’s been the executive director of the Department of Student Support Services at the Canutillo Independent School District. In that role, she said she developed programs to help students and families in need, including a food pantry, a storage of shoes and a library since there isn’t a public library in Canutillo.
Monica Reyes, a candidate for El Paso City Council District 1, speaks at an El Paso Chamber candidate forum Sept. 20, 2024. (Rumi Sevilla/El Paso
Matters)
Reyes said she learned from her father, Silvestre Reyes, who served as a congressman for 16 years, the upside and also the challenges of stepping into public office. But she said she was motivated to run in part to ensure her children – including a son in college in San Antonio – and others like them have opportunities in El Paso to build long-term careers instead of moving elsewhere after high school.
“I was able to see how he communicated. I was able to see how he listened,” Reyes said of her father’s time in public office. “I’m walking into this not deaf, dumb and blind. I know what I’m getting myself into, and I know the vulnerability of it.”
Her primary focus, she said, is “holding the line” on property taxes and cutting spending in the city budget to ease the tax burden on homeowners.
“I’m about trying to be fiscally responsible, fiscally conservative. I want to focus on the budget,” she said. “I have my home. I’m a single parent trying to get a kid through college. The other one is a junior in high school. So, I pride myself on being part of the community that is trying to do what’s best for her family.”
Like other candidates, she also cited the fact that over half of the roads in El Paso are considered to be in fair or poor condition, so she said a goal would be to focus the city’s resources on fixing streets.
“A person who gets located here because of their job or family, and what happens is they see the property tax rate, and they say, ‘What do you have to show for this high property tax rate? Where are the amenities?’” she said.
As far as climate-related challenges, Reyes said helping people convert to refrigerated air conditioners from swamp coolers could potentially help with the rising temperatures and record heat El Paso is experiencing.
And on the topic of attracting businesses, she said the city could look at appraisal caps for commercial properties to limit the taxes new businesses might pay – something the city would have to lobby the Texas Legislature to enact – or offer other tax incentives.
More importantly, she said, El Paso needs businesses that are connected and invested in the community long-term, and not just for the term of a tax abatement.
Mentoring and helping local entrepreneurs so they stay and build businesses in El Paso is also key, Reyes said.
“I think connection is very important, along with the incentives,” she said.
The money race
Candidates must submit detailed, public campaign finance reports in early October. But the candidates already have to share information with the city about donations they’ve received above $500.
So far, Chavez has raised over $61,000 in monetary donations, according to information she submitted to the city. Among her notable donors are businessmen Woody and Josh Hunt, who each gave Chavez $2,500. Developer Jerry Rubin, the executive chairman of River Oaks properties, gave $3,000. Rick Francis, chairman of WestStar Bank, and developer Douglas Schwartz also contributed $2,500 each to her campaign.
Armijo and Handy said they’ve brought in some small donations, but are largely self-financing their campaigns. And Reyes said her campaign account has about $42,000 in it, mostly from small-dollar “grassroots” donations.
Oct. 7 is the last day to register to vote, and early voting is Oct. 21 through Nov 1. Election Day is Nov 5.
The post Who’s running to represent the West Side’s District 1 on El Paso City Council appeared first on El Paso Matters.
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