BILL HUDSON'S X-MAS VISION OF SUGARPLUMS

By JUAN MONTOYA

Not content with having been one of the developers that the Brownsville Public Utility Board ratepayers subsidized to the tune of nearly $40 million in the past 10 years, Bill Hudson has written Santa his wish for yet another handout.

Bills' visions of sugarplums are based on the $46 million in "stimulus funds" that the federal government awarded the BPUB for infrastructure improvements. He now wants the city to cut the impact fees it passed recently after nearly a decade of subsidizing local developers with the ridiculously low impact fee of $280 per lot.

The city commission voted to assess an impact fee of $2,600 per lot on developers to offset BPUB's cost of extending infrastructure such as water and sewer lines to new construction projects.

After three costly studies, experts recommended that the fee be set from as high as $4,000 (+) per lot to $3,456.

Instead, a majority of the commission – with Mayor Pat Ahumada holding out for he higher fee – voted to assess developers $2,600 per lot, effectively forcing ratepayers to continue subsidizing developers by about $1,500 per lot.

However, Hudson, not content with the break to be borne on the backs of ratepayers, now wants the city to use the stimulus money to lower the fee.

After lauding the efforts of the utility staff and city management, he floats his lead balloon in a letter to the Brownsville Herald just eight days before Christmas.

"On a positive note, I presume that the city can now cut the impact fees, since it got the national tax base to foot the $46 million for these infrastructure improvements," he wrote.

We know Ahumada will not go quietly on this request, and neither will PUB member Ramon Hinojosa who vowed to fight any attempt by Brownsville's developer darling to get at the funds.

"Not if I have anything to say about it," Hinojosa said.

Instead, others are beginning to look at the city agreements that were entered with Paseo De La Resaca municipal utility districts 1, 2 (MUDs). Apparently, the deal included a clause that allows PUB crews to provide the Bill's resacas with water and to maintain the lights on both subdivisions' streets.

"The agreement states that the city will provide the maintenance until there were no more empty lots in the subdivisions," said a researcher. "If Bill decides to hold on to some lots, this could mean the city will be providing maintenance for these districts forever."

People with lots in both subdivisions also point out that residents get billed more than $200 per year per lot for "maintenance" and wonder where the money goes.

"If the PUB is already providing the maintenance for the MUDs out there, why is Bill charging maintenance to the lot owners?" they ask. "We're going to find out."