Can you believe that 6 of our 8 City Representatives voted against citizen oversight of bond expenditures?
From Adam Powell at ElPasoTimes.com:
The El Paso City Council rejected a plan to make bond oversight a permanent fixture at City Hall.
On Tuesday, April 1, the City Council voted 6-2 to kill a motion from city Reps. Lily Limón and Chris Canales to extend the life of the Bond Overview Advisory Committee. Only Limón and Canales voted in favor.
The six-member Bond Overview Advisory Committee, or BOAC, was established in 2012 as a way to track progress and lend transparency to the execution of the projects approved in the 2012 Quality of Life bond. The committee is set to expire in 2028.
What’s that all about?
Six members of City Council don’t want their constituents to know how the City is spending their tax dollars.
For the record, the “Representatives” voting against transparency are District 1 Representative Alejandra Chavez, District 2 Representative Josh Acevedo, District 3 Representative Deanna Maldonado-Rocha, District 4 Representative Cynthia Boyar Trejo, District 5 Representative Ivan Niño, and District 6 Representative Art Fierro. Except for Representative Fierro, all the other Representatives who voted against extending the remit of the Bond Overview Advisory Committee have only served on City Council for three months.
Obviously, they’re getting bad advice.
The two Representatives who backed extending the BOAC, District 7 Representative Lily Limón and District 8 Representative Chris Canales, have both worked for the City the longest. They are less susceptible to the machinations of the bureaucracy, and I have to believe that bureaucracy was machinating.
City Rep. Art Fierro was among those who expressed concern that a permanent BOAC might slow progress on work on Pebble Hills Drive, especially given that the committee, along with many other city committees and boards, struggles to attract a quorum.
How could a committee that can’t reach a quorum delay a construction project? BOAC approval isn’t a requirement.
The single word that the City fears the most is Oversight.
Read: Read More