MELISSA RAKING IT IN? ELITE AD AGENCY GETS AEROMEXICO ACCOUNT

By Juan Montoya
Those of us in the media game know at least a few friends who have lost their newspaper gigs and turned to other areas of employment as reporting positions dry up and the industry implodes.
That's why when a friend of ours heard that City Commissioner Melissa Zamora tapped to "assist in marketing AeroMexico on this side of the border," he called her company to see if they could use his services.
He got marketing assistant David Betancourt Jr. on the line who told him that Melissa was in charge of that account.
Since the announcement that the airline was coming to Brownsville was made just Tuesday, it made us wonder how it was that AeroMexico could have decided what ad agency they would use to promote their flights.
Knowing Mexicans to be unusually savvy about where to put their money to get the biggest bang, we wondered whether using an ad agency that employs a city commissioner was not a calculated effort to court the favor of at least one member of the city commission.
Then we found out that Ms. Zamora also rents a home from the wife of Mayor Tony Martinez and that her company also ran the campaign for incoming commissioner Estela Chavez-Vasquez and the sheer genius of the move revealed itself in its full glory.
Not only did AeroMexico get one vote by using Zamora do their promotion, they got three votes for the price of one. Don't ever bargain with a Mexican in a mercado. They'll eat your lunch every time.
Zamora told her buddies at the local daily where she used to be an editor that "the marketing campaign would likely include television, print media and social media ads, while AeroMexico is expected to start its Monterrey-to-Brownsville marketing campaign soon."
According to Brownsville Economic Development Corporation public relations director Gilberto Salinas, while the airline hasn’t asked for incentives other than help with marketing, at some point — if AeroMexico stays — incentives will have to be discussed.
Remember that any request for funding from public sources inevitably ends up before the city commission, and there's the rub. Can a city commissioner credibly remain neutral and impartial if she (or he) is making his (or her) living from a vendor doing business with the entity?
Now, you read right above. One of the employees at Elite Promotions is none other than David Betancourt Jr., son of Cameron County Treasurer David Betancourt Sr. Now, Dad just happens to be a member of the board of the Greater Brownsville Incentives Corporation, the very economic development board that AeroMexico will approach when – and they will – they decide to stay in business here. Son is a marketing assistant at Elite. How do you think Betancourt Sr. will vote?
And while we're at it, who approached who in this deal?
Did the fact that Zamora may have had inside information on the coming of AeroMexico to Brownsville give her an unfair advantage over other ad agencies in town? Is this the appropriate role for an elected official?
(Since this story appeared, we have received a comment from someone claiming to be commissioner Zamora saying she will do the work for AeroMexico free of charge and that Elite Promotions has nothing to do with her work for them.)
Ms. Zamora has run into this type of questionable acts in the past. We remember that not too long ago she was found to be a "consultant" with a vendor doing business with the city and stopped only when others questioned the arrangement.
Others have pointed out that Mayor Martinez had instructed city contract attorney Mark Sossi to draft a code of ethics for elected official s during one of his first meetings. This might not be a bad place to start.
But don't hold your breath there either. After all, as Argelia Miller has pointed out, Sossi has doled out city work to his former law firm Willette&Guerra, the very firm that sued him and (got a settlement for) $164,000 the firm claimed in court that he had kept instead of turning it over to them. So far, Miller estimats that he has given his former lawe firm about $100,000 over the last year. This is the guy who is going to give priestly Martinez a code of ethics?
Other blogs have in effect stated that the arrangement doesn't pass the stench test. And while Ms. Zamora criticized ousted city commissioner Charlie Atkinson for his alleged arrangement with FlyFrontera to handle their airline's promotion, what makes her actions different?
When asked the difference between FlyFrontera and AeroMexico, she responded that the Mexican airline was an established firm.
“And it’s a reputable airline,” she added.
Oh, yeah, we can't have disreputable companies or individuals in city government, can we?