If you are one of our three readers you might remember the post of a few days ago where we estimated that the taxpayers of Cameron County were paying its two magistrates about $200 per hour based on their punching in and out of the clock at the Rucker-Carrizales Corrections Unit in Olmito.
We asked how you would like to have a gig where in five months you work less than a 40 hour week and get paid $8,332 for it?
Nice work if you can get it, uh?
Or how about if you really put your nose to the grindstone and tally up 46 hours for the same period for the same amount of pay ($8,300)?
If you paid those two people $16,664 for the 83 hours they actually work, you'd be paying them about $200 an hour.
Well, according to records at the Rucker-Carrizales unit of the Cameron County corrections department, those are the hours punched in by our two magistrates at the calaboose from April to August. Their salaries are set at $25,000 a year.
RED FLAG!
We have been told that in our haste we scribbled down the wrong numbers. It's not $25,000 a year each that the two magistrates are making, but rather the princely sum of $42,500 a piece for a grand total of $85,000 a year for both. Divide that by 12 months and you get $7,083 a month, Multiply that by five months and you get. $35,415. Divide $35,415 by the 83 hours they actually clocked in those five months (April thru August), and instead of about $200 per hour, it's more like $426 per hour.
And that's not all. Not only do these two magistrates (Adolfo E. Cordova and Alfredo Padilla) punch in as little as seven minutes a day (Padilla, April 13) but they also apparently worked out a system where both of them don't have to be there at the same time. On a day when Padilla shows up to do the heavy lifting, Cordova didn't show. Vice versa, when Cordova showed up, Padilla didn't. Pretty sweet, uh?
And, in order to handle the overwhelming paper work, court administrator Dora A. Guzman (at $32,000) has the assistance of a part-time clerk to keep her company.
And even though their office website lists their office hours as Monday thru Friday 8:00 am to 5:00 pm.,and Saturday and Sunday 8:00 am to 1:00 pm, it is a rare day when the magistrates and administrative assistants are there for even one hour on any given day.
Jail administrators were wary of how they spent their time and (being cops at heart) set up a surveillance on the court administrator and part-time clerk Venessa Juarez to see just what it was that they did on county time and found that the girls dis just about everything that a person does when they are not on the public dime.You know, go to the store, take a walk in the mall, visit mom and dad, etc.
Well, we all know it's budget time at Cameron County and that usually means that cuts are made here and there. After being made aware of the sweet deal these two legal eagles have been handed by the county, the district judges at Tuesday's meeting are being let know in no uncertain terms that this situation cannot continue, despite their protests that having two magistrates out there is saving the county money.
Not all the commissioners knew this was happening so hopefully there will be enough votes (all it takes is three, remember?) to make the change so that county taxpayers can get some relief from this legal gravy train. Now, if the county judges get their raises, will they also go along with correcting this obvious abuse of the taxpayers of the county?
1 comment:
The D.A. Luis Was getting paid $450 per hour and he was there for 6 years wher were you Juan.
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