This is your weekly news roundup, which takes a quick look at some developments in government, politics, education, environment and other topics across El Paso.
Got Christmas Trees and Turkey Grease? Holiday Trash Pickup, Drop-Offs Set
The city’s Environmental Services Department has set the holiday schedule for trash and recycling pickups: Gray and blue bins normally picked up Thursday and Friday will be picked up Saturday, Dec. 27, during Christmas week.
For New Year’s week, the city will service gray trash bins normally picked up Thursday and Friday on Saturday, Jan. 3.
The city will not pick up blue bins on the make-up days, but will get them on the next scheduled recyclable collection day.
Check collection schedules for your address here.
Citizen collection stations will be closed Dec. 25-26 and Jan. 1-2. The sites will reopen at 7 a.m. Saturdays. The collection stations are at 2600 Darrington Road, 1034 Pendale Road, 121 Atlantic Road, 4501 Hondo Pass Drive, 2492 Harrison Ave. and 3510 Confederate Drive.
Live holiday trees and turkey grease can also be taken to the citizen collection stations. Trees can be dropped off beginning Dec. 27. Trees cannot have ornaments, lights, frost or glitter or any other decorative items. Water bills are not required to drop off the trees, grease or oil.
Information: Environmental Services Department or 915-212-6000.
University Medical Center of El Paso Releases CEO Job Review
The University Medical Center of El Paso’s Board of Managers rated CEO Jacob Cintron’s performance at 86.3% for the 2025 fiscal year, a score the board cited in approving a 14% pay raise last week.
In addition to the salary increase, Cintron also received a bonus of more than $346,000, bumping his fiscal year 2026 pay up to $1.1 million.
Records provided to El Paso Matters show Cintron fully met most of his incentive metrics in the 2025 fiscal year, which included benchmarks for finance, quality of patient care, patient services and long-term planning. He partially met two metrics measuring the number of full-time employees per occupied bed and inpatient satisfaction score, according to his evaluation.
READ MORE: UMC El Paso CEO Jacob Cintron to collect nearly $1.5 million after pay raise, bonus
The board cited this evaluation, coupled with a 2025 Gallagher Human Resources Compensation Study of Hospital CEOs, as reason to approve the pay raise.
The board also approved fiscal year 2026 goals for the hospital district, which is budgeted for more than 24,000 patient admissions and more than 1.2 million outpatient visits. The goals include developing a physician recruitment plan for the hospital’s bond project rollout and having one obstetrician under contract by September 2026 to address declining birth rates.
UTEP’s Rubin Center Longtime Leader Kerry Doyle to Retire
The Stanlee and Gerald Rubin Center for the Visual Arts at the University of Texas at El Paso will need a new director starting this spring because Kerry Doyle, its longtime leader, will retire after almost 19 years at the center, the past 13 as its director.
Doyle told El Paso Matters via text that it just felt like the right time for her to leave. Her last day will be April 30. She said she is most proud of building a focus on work that was student-centered, interdisciplinary and had deep ties to the border.
She plans to stay in the region and work with the Gaspar Enriquez Cultural Center in San Elizario, which the Rubin Center helped establish in October 2023. Among its many goals are to serve as a training ground for future museum and arts professionals.
LEARN MORE: ‘Blood, sweat and tears’: Gaspar Enriquez Cultural Center to open in San Elizario
Angel Cabrales, associate professor of art at UTEP, said Doyle brought in contemporary artists that most students never would have met, including Chico MacMurtrie in 2021. Some of his students worked on one of MacMurtrie’s robotic pieces that has been shown internationally.
“(Doyle’s) an incredible person and she’s going to be missed so much,” Cabrales said.
Eduardo Diaz, a former administrator at museums across the country, remembers being impressed by Doyle at the 2009 Smithsonian Institution Latino Museum Studies summer program. He was the program’s director.
“It was very clear to me that she was an extraordinary administrator and visionary,” he said by phone. “What she’s done at the Rubin Center reflects that.”
Doyle, an expert in U.S.-Mexican art and culture, curated contemporary art by international artists whose projects promoted community engagement and pushed beyond performative trends.
She earned and managed grants from such organizations as the Lannan and Harpo foundations, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the Texas Commission on the Arts and the Paso del Norte Health Foundation.
El Paso County Receives $12.8 Million Grant for Transit Hub
The county will be able to build a transit operations and maintenance facility on Windermere Avenue in far East El Paso with a $12.8 million grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Transit Administration.
The funding is part of the Low or No Emission Grant Program and Grants for Buses and Bus Facilities Program, and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.
The El Paso Transportation Authority, or ETA, transit administration facility will house operations and maintenance operations for 36 transit vehicles and six support vehicles.
“We are grateful for this significant federal support, which marks an important step toward building a cleaner and more modern transit system for El Paso County,” ETA Executive Director John Andoh said in a news release.
The county and the ETA currently lease land for its facility.
The land for the new facility has been purchased, the environmental study and design work is being done in partnership with the Camino Real Regional Mobility Authority. The CRRMA oversees road and transportation projects with and for local governments and has partnered with the county for several projects.
The construction bid will be issued in 2026, although a specific construction start date has not been set.
The post Holiday trash pickup schedule shifts, UMC CEO review, Rubin Center director to retire appeared first on El Paso Matters.
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