By Juan Montoya
In what has become the modus operandi of local schemers to take some public resource, the UT System Regents are unrelenting in their campaign to take the local community's college real estate and assets by claiming that unless the trustees act before March 15, Western civilization as we know it will be destroyed.
And, unless the Texas Southmost College district trustees sign on the dotted line by then, it'll be thier fault.
This is the message that local heart surgeon and TSC trustee Robert Robles is making to local elected bodies, service clubs, and now, his own choir, medical professionals in the district.
We have intercepted a letter written to the TSC board president Kiko Rendon that is being mass mailed by Robles to local doctors that emphasizes that "there is a sense of urgency to this transition, and that the community will not endure years of uncertainty about the future of our two institutions."
Now, we have seen as Robles kowtowed to TSC-UTB President Juliet Garcia and have seen him traverse the district with his Chicken little message of doom trying to pressure the majority on the board to turn over the assets of our little college to the big dogs in Austin.
However, credit should be given to Kiko, Adela Garza, Trey Mendez and Rene Torres for withstanding the blitzkrieg launched by Juliet and her minions to hand over the goods.
This latest strategy by Garcia, Robles, David Oliveira, Robles and his fellow surgeon Robert Lozano is just one more wrinkle of the same strategy.
What is very interesting to those of us who have watched this from the sidelines has been what is not said in the public presentations by Robles, et al. For example, they do not say that under the preferred option listed by the UT System chancellor Francisco G. Cigarroa (another medical doctor), he states that "the University of Texas would either receive Texas Southmost College's assets as a gift or lease Texas Southmost College's assets on a no-cost basis, and the local taxing entity would be phased out.
Sounds good at first blush, doesn't it?
However, the UT System does not want the district's debt and would not accept this "gift" until the bond issues and other obligations that the college district has outstanding are paid in full.
Given the system's reluctance to pay the college district the $16 million in rent arrears in the existing partnership agreement, what makes us think that they will pony up given the austerity measures the entire state educational system is implementing?
They will readily take in the $15 million gathered locally by the taxing district and wait until the gift comes with no strings attached.
As the late Frances Verner used to say: "Isn't that rich?"
Quoting from the Regents own blueprint to take over little TSC, here's what the UT System needs to do:
"The most honorable thing to have happen is for the University of Texas System to at last assume full financial responsibility for UTB-TSC. After all, having a component of the system tax the citizens of the surrounding are, to the tune of some $15 million annually, is a situation unknown elsewhere in the System. It is also a situation that in system terms, is profoundly counter-productive, creating a second-class status for the institution even as it imposes major economic burdens on one of the poorest communities in the nation.
"As everyone knows but nobody wants to speak, the partnership was originally conceived and established less for its institutional merits than because it was the best, perhaps the only way to lure the UT System to Brownsville...The time has come for UT System to step up and provide funding analogous to that provided other system components - that is , full funding."
As one insider with close ties to the TSC board has said of the Robles campaign: "Lies lies and more lies, but he has the community believing his lies, especially the medical community."
In what has become the modus operandi of local schemers to take some public resource, the UT System Regents are unrelenting in their campaign to take the local community's college real estate and assets by claiming that unless the trustees act before March 15, Western civilization as we know it will be destroyed.
And, unless the Texas Southmost College district trustees sign on the dotted line by then, it'll be thier fault.
This is the message that local heart surgeon and TSC trustee Robert Robles is making to local elected bodies, service clubs, and now, his own choir, medical professionals in the district.
We have intercepted a letter written to the TSC board president Kiko Rendon that is being mass mailed by Robles to local doctors that emphasizes that "there is a sense of urgency to this transition, and that the community will not endure years of uncertainty about the future of our two institutions."
Now, we have seen as Robles kowtowed to TSC-UTB President Juliet Garcia and have seen him traverse the district with his Chicken little message of doom trying to pressure the majority on the board to turn over the assets of our little college to the big dogs in Austin.
However, credit should be given to Kiko, Adela Garza, Trey Mendez and Rene Torres for withstanding the blitzkrieg launched by Juliet and her minions to hand over the goods.
This latest strategy by Garcia, Robles, David Oliveira, Robles and his fellow surgeon Robert Lozano is just one more wrinkle of the same strategy.
What is very interesting to those of us who have watched this from the sidelines has been what is not said in the public presentations by Robles, et al. For example, they do not say that under the preferred option listed by the UT System chancellor Francisco G. Cigarroa (another medical doctor), he states that "the University of Texas would either receive Texas Southmost College's assets as a gift or lease Texas Southmost College's assets on a no-cost basis, and the local taxing entity would be phased out.
Sounds good at first blush, doesn't it?
However, the UT System does not want the district's debt and would not accept this "gift" until the bond issues and other obligations that the college district has outstanding are paid in full.
Given the system's reluctance to pay the college district the $16 million in rent arrears in the existing partnership agreement, what makes us think that they will pony up given the austerity measures the entire state educational system is implementing?
They will readily take in the $15 million gathered locally by the taxing district and wait until the gift comes with no strings attached.
As the late Frances Verner used to say: "Isn't that rich?"
Quoting from the Regents own blueprint to take over little TSC, here's what the UT System needs to do:
"The most honorable thing to have happen is for the University of Texas System to at last assume full financial responsibility for UTB-TSC. After all, having a component of the system tax the citizens of the surrounding are, to the tune of some $15 million annually, is a situation unknown elsewhere in the System. It is also a situation that in system terms, is profoundly counter-productive, creating a second-class status for the institution even as it imposes major economic burdens on one of the poorest communities in the nation.
"As everyone knows but nobody wants to speak, the partnership was originally conceived and established less for its institutional merits than because it was the best, perhaps the only way to lure the UT System to Brownsville...The time has come for UT System to step up and provide funding analogous to that provided other system components - that is , full funding."
As one insider with close ties to the TSC board has said of the Robles campaign: "Lies lies and more lies, but he has the community believing his lies, especially the medical community."
1 comment:
Maybe it is time to merge with UT-Pan American?
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