B'VILLE CITY COMMISSION LIVING WAY BEYOND ITS MEANS

By Juan Montoya
As city of Brownsville voters head for the polls to vote for a majority on the city commission this May, they should consider some of these facts:
Under the current administration, the commission passed a $93,942,167 budget. Not only did this include nearly $27 million in property tax revenue, but also an additional $27 million in sales taxes. User fees, construction fees and intra-governmental transfers made up the rest.
Yet, included in the $94 million was a $7.1 cash transfer from the Public Utilities Board and about $4.5 million in free utilities to city facilities.
If you deducted the $12 or so million from the city budget, it means that the true amount available to the city commission would be about $78 million. After all, it is the same PUB rate payers who pay their property taxes to the city who pay for the cash transfer and utilities as well.
The $12 million PUB crutch allows the city commission to live beyond its means from year to year. In 2011 and 2012, the city went to the PUB well again for supplements of $2 and $3 million to make needs meet.
Not quite able to make do with property taxes, PUB cash transfers and increased sales and new construction fees, within the last three years, the city commission under Mayor Tony Martinez has also passed more than $21 million in Certificates of Obligation (COs) that don't have to be approved by voters.

Now, in an upcoming meeting this April, there is another CO issuance planned, this time for another $9 million. Among the items cited for that cash are, among other things, bike trials, the pet project of Mayor Martinez and commissioners Rose Gowen, Deborah Portillo and the rest of the city commission.
So, over the past three years, the city commission has lived way beyond its $78 million in revenues by raiding PUB yearly for $12 million, plus the additional $30 million in COs over the last three years. That's $36 million more than they had (PUB's $12 million times 3) and  an additional $10 million a year in COs ($30 million divided by 3). That's $66 million they spent that they didn't have.
If you add the $325 million in debt that PUB (and the city commission) approved for the construction of the Tenaska plant, it is obvious that these people won;t think twice about borrowing yet more money and digging the city deeper and deeper in the hole.