WHERE THERE'S SMOKE...: THE GARCIA, CABLER, CAMPIRANO SHUFFLE

By Juan Montoya
What started out as speculation on the hiring of former Brownsville Chief of Police Carlos Garcia going to the Port of Brownsville as Chief of Security and City manager Charlie Cabler filling his spot at the BPD has just added another player in the shell game.

(We reported that on Oct. 7, and it came to be just about a little over a month later.)

Now we are told that the city commission wants Cabler out as city manager and that Port of Brownsville Director and Chief Executive Officer Eddie Campirano is the man for the position. Cabler, if you'll remember, brought with him the vast experience he acquired in innovative urban planning as a detective on the city's police force. Nothing that a good piece of rubber hose can't straighten out.

If Campirano, at a $175,618 salary per year at the port replaces Cabler, he will inherit Charley's gig at $159,120, no doubt to be negotiated with the commissioners so that he won't consider it a step down.

But while the port commissioners have turned a blind eye to some of the excesses of the administration out at the Golden Ditch, the crew at city commission may not be as pliable. Still, Campirano, a former adherent to UTB President Juliet Garcia as TSC trustee, has proven to the powers that be that he can be a likeable and accommodating guy if the price is right.

Garcia's son-in-law Herman Rico, by the way, is the port's marketing director at a respectable $73,798 salary and a credit card with a hefty reserve for enticing clients to come do business at the port, although we are still waiting for the results of his spending ways. It's a kind of quid pro quo that Campirano's daughter Marisa was hired as a UTB employee (also at a hefty salary) over other more qualified applicants.

When a position opened up for director of alumni relations in the office of Institutional Advancement at UTB, many qualified candidates applied. Many had master's degrees and had experience supervising and directing entire departments. It just so happened that Eddie's daughter Marisa also applied.

But, alas, Marisa, who is enrolled in the master of public policy and management degree program at UTB/TSC, only holds a bachelor's degree from Southwestern University in Georgetown and did not have the sheepskin yet. She got the job, nonetheless.

Chief Garcia was making $107,966 (plus benefits) as Brownsville Police Chief and was the third-highest paid city employee only behind Cabler at $159,120 (an ex-cop himself) and Assistant City Manager for Finance Pete Gonzales, at $115,696. Now instead of ruling over 250 or so police officers and dealing with those troublesome commissioners (domestic assault suspect Jessica Tetrau-Kalifa, Melissa Zamora who shows up to rescue her friends in DWI's, etc.) he will have a total of seven police officers to worry about for more or less the same amount of loot he was paid at the city.

While at the port, Campirano has favored academic titles over experience, except in a couple of obvious cases such as assistant harbor master Keri Dann, who – without prior experience or academic credentials – was handed a $56,321 salary as an apprentice. While serving as an interim harbormaster, she was given a raise to $65,000 after only being a helper on the job since February.

Another notable high-paid employee at the port is none other than Donna Eymard, who former Port Director Raul Besteiro – on the IBC board of directors – brought to the port as a favor to her husband at a hefty $125,756 price tag. Not bad for a former executive secretary at the bank. Many of us remember that Mr. B's style of management as superintendent at the Brownsville Independent School District consisted in surrounding himself with favorites and sycophants who acted as his eyes and ears to root out malcontents and free thinkers. Rewards followed compliance and he implemented the same system at the port.

Debbie Duke, the port's finance director had no accounting degree when she came on board and – through inertia and good politics – now commends a $88,545 salary.

Many of these port employees are carryovers who have been there for decades and will probably stay until they pry their cold dead fingers from their inflated paychecks.

It is interesting to note, however, that the last police officer hired by Garcia's predecessor George Gavito, Julio Romo, earns only $27,076, way below the starting rate for police officers in Brownsville or Los Fresnos within the port district.

If that is the modus operandi that Campirano is going to bring to the City of Brownsville, then city employees who might not have a degree and only a wealth of experience might start looking out for their interests.