CASCOS COUNTY REPORT PREEMPTS TREVINO, WOOD

By Juan Montoya

Those of us who read Cameron County Judge Carlos Cascos' progress report in the RGV Guardian will readily see that the judge's list of achievements and needs very neatly dovetail to preempt potential challenger Eddie Treviño's (and John Wood's) thunder.

On Sunday, Treviño's quarter-page Brownsville Herald ad pledged to be inclusive and reach out to all the cities and towns in the county, apparently a jab at Cascos who has received some negative feedback from some elected officials in places like Combes and Santa Rosa.

Most of this flak has been the result of the distribution of the Hurricane Dolly disaster funds. When the cities learned that there would be money available to repair some of the infrastructure damaged by the storm, they filled out a wish list that totalled more than $50 million. The county had received only some $19 million to dole out to the impacted communities.

After the list of some 50 disaster-related projects were ranked and culled, many claims were denied because they were the result of poor maintenance or were not directly related to the storm. Some who did not get what they wanted cried foul and made noises about going to Austin to overturn the county's rankings.

Among these were Santa Rosa and Combes. Silvestre Garcia (Silver), mayor of Combes, was once employed in former Cameron County Judge Gilbert Hinojosa's office as a special assistant. As was his wont to do, Hinojosa also hired politically connected people from these areas to buttress his political fortunes. For example, Frances Domenski, a politiquera san parallèle in El Ranchito was one of Gilbert's office receptionists. What did she do? Mostly dozed off in her chair, but she served a purpose.

And who can forget Remi Garza, son of lawyer Yolanda Garza and Raul Garza, her doctor husband from San Benito? He was paying Remi $60,000 a year without a college degree while a certified urban planner in the same office was getting paid far less. Remi's function? To keep the San Benito vote in Gilbert's pocket.

However, all this empire building at county expense did not help Gilbert when he lost to Cascos in a bitterly-contested race four years ago. His carefully placed pawns in the rural areas could not overcome the anti-incumbent (read Hinojosa) feeling in the county and crossover Democrats picked Cascos.

Precinct 2 Commissioner John Wood quickly saw the opportunity to ally these former Hinojosa proteges in his bid for the county judgeship. He engineered a plot to take from the $4 million in Dolly disaster funds earmarked for the county departments and to dish them out to the squeaky wheels in the rural areas during a county meeting. They would, of course, be thankful later when he ran for office.

He played the role of their knight in shining armor to the hilt, even berating county staff for not acquiring funds for the projects that were not funded with Dolly monies.

Treviño, apparently seizing on the theme, harped on this fissure in his ad.

Cascos, in what can only be called his State-of-the County report in the Guardian, moved to blunt the attack.

"Upon taking my oath of office as your County Judge, I pledged to work to build consensus with the County Commission, as well as reaching out to the municipalities and elected officials throughout Cameron County and South Texas to improve the quality of life for all our residents," he wrote.

"Given the unprecedented economic conditions we faced last year and in spite of the uncertainty that has plagued the nation and our region; we continue to move in a positive direction. We have developed open lines of communication with many of our municipalities and other governmental agencies to develop a spirit of working together for the enhancement of our region."

In his report, Cascos hit on every issue that his opponents on the Democratic ticket can raise against his administration. He stressed fiscal conservatism, infrastructure improvements, drainage issues, economic development, etc., etc., etc.,

He also urged county residents to participate in the upcoming 2010 Census saying " It takes about ten minutes to fill out these forms. Making sure that all our residents are counted is extremely important to the future of our region in terms of federal dollars and federal representation. Ten minutes of your time will determine our community’s future for the next ten years. The future is in our hands and I urge everyone to take part in this nationwide effort in making sure that we have an accurate count."

In fact, even veterans were included in his appeal. He reiterated his support to issues important to this sector of the Cameron County electorate. And he did it superbly.

"To our Veterans, thank you for your service and I remain committed to being an advocate for each of you," adding that he supported the establishment of a Veterans Affairs hospital in South Texas.

No, this wasn't a paid political ad. Mom and apple pie were the only things missing. But Cascos showed that he has become superbly adept at anticipating his eventual Democratic challenger's platform by blunting those issues with which he/she may seek to make hay in the election come November.