In the crowded District 8 City Council race, five candidates are vying to represent South-Central El Paso, Downtown and part of the Westside.
Incumbent Chris Canales is seeking a second term and faces competition from four political newcomers: nonprofit executive Matthew Guzman, restaurant owner Arturo Alluin, former salesperson Laura Ochoa-Todd and former city employee Johnny J. Gonzalez.
Alluin and Guzman have outraised and outspent their opponents by a significant margin this election season.
The candidates disagreed on whether city funds should be put toward the planned Downtown deck plaza, a multipurpose park that would cap Interstate 10 and is tied to the highway’s expansion.
The Downtown Deck Plaza Foundation leads the project to be built by the Texas Department of Transportation. The project is estimated to cost $207 million and has received funding commitments of more than $74.5 million, including from private philanthropists and some contributions from the city and county.
Canales and Guzman agreed the city needs to reign in sprawl to ease taxpayers. Last year, City Council deleted zoning changes from its agenda that would have eased restrictions for property owners who want to build a backyard casita on their properties. Supporters of the ordinance change say this will open up more infill housing to help curb outward migration.
Some candidates criticized the city’s Meta data center agreement, which gave the company an 80% property tax break for 25 years, as well as $12.5 million in city funds to improve the roads near the facility in the Northeast. With the tax abatement in place, the city estimates the data center will still pay about $15 million a year in city taxes, making it the city’s biggest taxpayer.
Residents, however, have questioned whether the benefits outweigh the risks, which include pollution. El Paso Electric initially said that solar power would supply the Meta data center, but then applied to build a gas power plant.
El Paso City Council is made up of the mayor and eight representatives who make policy and budget decisions for the city, including setting a tax rate. They hire and oversee the city manager, city attorney and chief internal auditor. City representatives are nonpartisan positions. They serve a four-year term; city representatives are paid $72,800 a year.
Jorge “Chris” Canales
Voters elected Canales, 34, in 2022 to represent District 8. He is the former chief of staff to his predecessor, Cissy Lizarraga, and a referee for the United States Soccer Federation. He and his wife, Nora, foster dogs and have volunteered for El Paso Animal Services.
City property taxes have increased every year that Canales has been in office.
Canales said the loss of federal funding under the Trump administration has been one of the city’s budget challenges, but it is not sustainable to continue raising property taxes or whittle the budget down every year. For fiscal year 2027, the City Council chose not to fill more than half of the city’s vacant positions.
“But I still think the number one thing that causes pressure on the tax rate is urban sprawl,” Canales said. “The area we have to serve with public services is growing, so it’s the same number of people paying for more things.”
El Paso’s population of taxpayers has stagnated in recent years, but spread further east, leading the city to spend money on new public safety facilities, roads and parks to serve the furthest edges of the city, in addition to staffing all these services, Canales said.
The zoning authority is the biggest power the city can use to determine land use and support infill, he said. Canales supported the 2025 proposals to ease restrictions for minimum parking requirements and casitas, accessory dwellings that sit on residential properties. He also proposed then an amendment that owners have to live on the property where the casita is located, but the motion failed.
After completing an outreach study, however, the city plans to bring those items back to vote before the end of this year, he said.
To grow the commercial tax base, Canales said the city has been using Chapter 380 incentive agreements to attract businesses that can shoulder a larger proportion of property taxes. He would like the city to pursue tenants to the advanced manufacturing district at El Paso International Airport, and make a more concerted effort to develop the solar industry. The advanced manufacturing district sits on airport property, where construction is scheduled to be completed this spring.
Canales said the city’s Chapter 380 agreements, aside from the high-profile Meta agreement, tend to fly under the public’s radar, but cited the Eaton Corporation agreement as a positive example. The facility on the Westside manufactures electrical components and committed to creating hundreds of new jobs, including engineering positions.
Canales was on the City Council that unanimously voted in 2023 for the Meta agreement. At the time, they believed the “level of investment for this could be transformational and reduce the burden on residential taxpayers,” Canales said.
But the scale of the project has ballooned. He has since voted against recruiting and incentivizing future data centers in El Paso, which passed, and for terminating the Meta agreement, which did not pass.
“I don’t think we should be courting this type of development because of the strain that it causes on us in this environment that we’re in – the desert, in long-term drought,” he said.
He admitted the city did not put in place a community benefits agreement in 2023 to offset demands on local resources. He said data centers were not in the public spotlight three years ago like they are today, he said.
Canales, who has expressed reservations about the Downtown deck plaza over its shaky funding sources, also opposes using property taxes in the form of bonds for the park.
In 2024 City Council agreed by a 5-2 vote to chip in $750,000 to the deck park. Canales voted against the contribution because he disagreed with which pot of money the city should pull funds from. The project later hit a snag after it did not win a $5 million federal grant that would have paid for construction blueprints.
“At this point, I don’t see any way forward where that’s a viable project,” Canales said. “It would have to take some massive change in the federal government’s posture toward these kinds of projects or some huge infusion of money from the state government that I just don’t think will ever come.”
Matthew Guzman
Guzman, 41, is the executive director of the Mary L. Peyton Foundation, a nonprofit that provides financial aid to El Paso residents experiencing hardships. His wife is an anesthesiologist. Prior to moving to El Paso in 2015, Guzman worked as a financial adviser in Chicago.
Guzman said he stepped down from the board for the Downtown Deck Plaza Foundation after he decided to run for office, but still supports the project as a way to make the area more attractive for both residents and businesses.
He hopes a large donation to the deck plaza to be announced Wednesday will open the door to more philanthropic investments. He also hopes having an El Pasoan sit on the Texas Transportation Commission will bring in state funding, which would lessen impacts to taxpayers.
“I do think there’s going to be some city funds involved, and I think that’s probably fair because at the end of the day, it’s a public park like any other public park in El Paso,” Guzman said. “But the thing that makes this project unique, and I think feasible, is the public-private partnership.”
Guzman said he would support packaging the deck plaza with upgrades to the El Paso Convention Center as a bond item, leaving it to voters to decide in a future election if they want to fund them. These are projects that bring an economic return to the city, he said.
In 2025, the City Council approved a $3.17 million expansion of the convention center by purchasing vacant properties nearby. The goal is to host larger conferences and conventions, bringing more visitors who stay in hotels and spend money in the city.
Guzman said he would vote to increase property taxes depending on what the taxes were used for in the budget and has floated the idea of residents paying a transportation utility fee, which would be dedicated to street maintenance.
But he added the city should focus more on attracting businesses, he said.
Guzman said the city could use federal funds to build out the utilities and infrastructure in places such as the advanced manufacturing district, creating “shovel-ready” sites where companies can just plug in their facilities.
He said federal funds could come from grants through the federal Economic Opportunity Zones. These zones are economically distressed census tracts where the Internal Revenue Service spurs private investment by offering tax breaks, which can be paired with federal grants. The advanced manufacturing district is not an Economic Opportunity Zone, but it is designated a duty-free foreign trade zone.
“I think we’ve been really focused on subsidizing companies to move here without a plan to create an ecosystem,” Guzman said. “You look at places like Austin … they utilize 380 agreements like most cities do, but they did so in a way where they created a series of anchor tenants and then built the ecosystem around those anchor tenants and now they’re a tech powerhouse.”
He gave Meta as an example of an anchor tenant. Satellite businesses are the equipment manufacturers and storage facilities for those goods, he explained. This creates more longevity than a one-and-done tax break, he said.
Guzman said his support of another data center depends on the city’s capacity for it. He agrees with the City Council’s decision to not incentivize them. In June, the City Council unanimously voted to negotiate a community benefits agreement with Meta. The best way forward for the current Meta deal would be for the city to focus on what investments it can extract from the tech company through that agreement, he said.
Guzman said two areas caught his concern in the city’s 2027 budget: El Paso Zoo and the increased budget for Animal Services.
Animal Services has a budget of $17.4 million, with nearly $12 million coming from the general fund and the rest from operating revenue. Guzman said the animal shelters require maintenance, staffing and taking care of animals – all of which come at a cost, but do not bring an economic return to the city.
Guzman incorrectly said most of the department’s budget increase in the last few years came from the voter-approved adoption and services centers and that the city did not communicate to voters much they would cost in the long run.
The city’s animal shelters were not voter-approved bond projects, however. Voters did approve El Paso County’s first animal shelter in 2024, which is not yet in operation yet and would fall under county government.
Guzman also disagrees with the city ending its contact with the Zoological Society, a nonprofit that raised money for the zoo, and for making the city “responsible for running the zoo” in 2024. The city of El Paso has always been responsible for maintaining the zoo, however, and zoo staff are city employees.
“We have no business as a city running the zoo when we have a nonprofit that was capable of fundraising for all of these types of things,” Guzman said. “The city doesn’t have the means to fundraise for a zoo, this is taxpayer-funded now.”
The city is not responsible for collecting donations to the zoo. Months after breaking its partnership with the Zoological Society, the city entered an agreement with the nonprofit Paso del Norte Community Foundation to serve as its fundraiser.
Guzman said his finance background makes him more business-minded than Canales, but he agrees with Canales in using zoning ordinances to create more affordable housing and urban density. He supports easing the restrictions on casitas, but said the ordinance should apply only to certain neighborhoods that would benefit most from housing flexibility.
Arturo R. Alluin
Alluin, 35, declined to be interviewed for this story and did not respond to El Paso Matters’ candidate questionnaire.
Alluin has touted himself as a “pro-business” candidate on social media and owns several restaurants in El Paso: a franchise location of Sushi Itto and Mykonos Mediterranean Steakhouse, reported as Meduza in his expenditures from campaign funds. He owned the Melting Pot at the Fountains at Farah, which closed at the end of September.
El Paso Matters reported in September that Alluin allegedly assaulted his then-girlfriend at the Hotel Paso del Norte in 2021. They began dating when she was his employee at the Melting Pot, the woman said. She accused Alluin of slapping, choking and pushing her, causing her to hit her head on a bathroom wall and fall to the floor, according to police records El Paso Matters obtained through the Texas Public Information Act.
Police reports show Alluin was charged with assault causing bodily injury and arrested in 2022, but the case does not appear in criminal court records. The restaurateur declined to comment on the arrest and said the case was expunged by a court order this year, though he declined to provide El Paso Matters with a copy of such an order.
READ MORE: El Paso police arrested city rep candidate Arturo Alluin on suspicion of domestic violence in 2022
On issues, Alluin has advocated for transitioning El Paso from a city manager-led government to a strong-mayor system because he thinks voters should have the power to elect the most executive leader in the city. He also said the city would save money by cutting city management.
Currently, El Pasoans vote for the city representatives who have the power to hire or fire the city manager. Alluin did not clarify which management positions he would cut or who would run the day-to-day operations of the city if there were no managers.
In an Instagram video, Alluin advocated for removing Downtown parking meters to boost local businesses. The city generates about $1.25 million from parking meters, which is reinvested into the parking meters and the general fund. Alluin said the city would make up the shortfall from sales tax collected by businesses.
The city collected about $150 million in sales tax revenue last fiscal year, not including revenue specific toward operating the Sun Metro public transportation system. The funds go into the general fund for city services such as police, fire, parks and streets..
In another Instagram video, Alluin said he wanted to streamline permitting for businesses, but did not specify which permits or offer a plan on how to do so. He also talked about investing in children, but did not specify how or with what funding.
Laura Ochoa-Todd
Ochoa-Todd, 70, is a retiree and former salesperson. She has previously worked as a supervisor of administrative services, a real estate agent, a credit counselor, a project coordinator for the city housing authority and in retail, she said.
Ochoa-Todd said she would have voted differently from Canales on three items: the Meta agreement, the increases in property taxes and the last pay raise for City Council members.
City representatives do not directly set their salaries. Their recent 15% raise is based on an amendment to the city charter that voters approved in 2018 calculating how salaries for the mayor and City Council are set. City Reps. Cynthia Boyar Trejo and Lily Limón voted against the city budget but will still receive the new wage. The budget passed after hours of tense debate.
Ochoa-Todd did not offer a clear plan to make up the funding shortfall if the city were to lower property taxes. She said the city can grow its commercial tax base by showcasing El Paso’s lower rent and lower-paid workforce compared to other major cities.
The city should focus on that plus “some incentives also, but don’t give them the city.”
She described the tax breaks for Meta as “outrageous” and wants the city to renegotiate the current contract, if possible. City officials have said they cannot break the tax abatement agreement with Meta without “significant legal challenges.”
Ochoa-Todd said she opposes any future data center projects in El Paso. If the public utility leaders want to claim the data center won’t use massive amounts of water or electricity, they should show the proof, she said. El Paso Water estimates the data center will consume an average of 400,000 gallons of water per day. The city-owned utility currently pumps an average of about 110 million gallons of water to customers every day.
Ochoa-Todd said the city should focus on finding wasteful spending, citing “bloated” salaries for the city manager and deputy city managers.
She said the city should not use any funds for the Downtown deck plaza and questioned the budget increases for public safety, which are driven largely by police and fire departments’ collective bargaining agreements. She said she was not aware city finances are audited and has not looked at the city’s 2027 budget that the City Council approved this fall and is available online.
Ochoa-Todd said she believes the District 8 team does not communicate with the South Side of El Paso enough and neglects Segundo Barrio aside from an annual block party. Property owners have roofs falling in, she said. The district should try to raise funds from private businesses to fund improvements in the neighborhood, not just throw a party, she said.
“They’re pretty upset over there and the reason is communication,” Ochoa-Todd said. “Some of these people don’t speak English.”
Juan “Johnny J.” Gonzalez
Gonzalez, 65, is a retiree who’s worked in many jobs from mailperson to furniture restorer to park groundskeeper for public employers, including for the city of El Paso, the University of Texas at El Paso and El Paso Community College, he said. Gonzalez said he was briefly the secretary for former Mayor John Cook, but was let go after the probationary period. He holds six associate degrees from El Paso Community College, including in business and political science.
Gonzalez said he would vote to lower property taxes. When asked how the city would fund services with less property taxes, he said he would not increase salaries for city staff until finding areas in the budget to cut. Some salary increases, such as for police and fire departments, are based on collective bargaining agreements.
“The Fire Department, they don’t need to go in a fire truck to go around the city,” he said. “We can use private companies instead of the Fire Department.”
Gonzalez said Meta “suckered” the city into their agreement and the data center has been the “biggest crime for me” in El Paso. He added that tax incentives should have public approval first.
Residents do not have direct vote or final approval on Chapter 380 agreements, but can give input at City Council meetings and elect the city representatives who approve the agreements. The Meta data center flew largely under public radar in 2023. When asked how he would seek public input, Gonzalez said through more community meetings.
Gonzalez said he has never attended a community meeting about the data center, but knows about it from what he’s seen on the internet.
Campaign contributions: Who donated to who?
Alluin has raised the most campaign funds among the District 8 candidates this year, receiving more than $40,000 since Jan. 1, according to his campaign finance reports. He also loaned himself an additional $35,000 and has spent more than $45,500.
His largest donations included $3,000 from Tiffini Barraza, host of the Borderland Bosses segment on Sun City SITREP podcast, and $2,300 from his mother, Ruth Ojeda. He also received $2,500 worth of media production services from Nadim Algos in non-monetary contributions, according to one report.
Guzman has raised more than $34,000 this year and spent more than $13,000.
His largest donations include $2,500 from philanthropist Ginger Francis; $2,000 from Miguel Fernandez, CEO of telecommunications company Flo Networks; and $2,000 from Ted Houghton, owner of insurance agency Houghton Financial Partners.
Canales entered the race with more than $10,000 collected during his tenure. He has raised $2,300 and spent more than $4,000 this year. None of his contributions exceeded $1,000.
Ochoa-Todd hasn’t raised any money and spent about $2,500 this year on printouts from personal funds.
Gonzalez hasn’t raised or spent any money on his campaign so far.
Early voting runs Oct. 19-30. Election Day is Nov. 3.
The seats for District 1, 6, and 5 are also up for election. If no one candidate receives more than 50% of the votes Nov. 3, the top two candidates in that race will head to a December runoff.
Disclosure: Ted Houghton and Miguel Fernandez have been financial supporters of El Paso Matters. Financial supporters play no role in El Paso Matters’ journalism. The news organization’s policy on editorial independence can be found here.
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