ELIZONDO SERVES 2 MASTERS BADLY: KATY SAVES ART'S BUTT

By Juan Montoya
There it was, the situation that past city commissioners of the City of Brownsville's approved the Personnel Policy Manual section that states:
Section 702: Political Activity
"B. Specifically, City Employees may not engage in the following activities:
4. Hold an elective City office or hold an elective or appointive office in any other jurisdiction where service would constitute a direct conflict of interest with City employment, with or without remuneration. Upon assuming such office, an Employee shall resign or shall be dismissed for cause upon failure to do so."

If you will notice, direct conflict is not specifically described. Is it monetary? Is it personal? Is it part of official duties? Protocol, etc...?
Or is it all?

During Tuesday's meeting of the City of Brownsville commission, there was an item on the agenda dealing with a presentation by Brownsville Fire Department Chief Carlos Elizondo to award a contract for the purchase of two emergency response vehicles for the department.

There was also an addendum agenda item dealing with the city commission negotiations on the contract with the Firefighters' Association which expires this coming October, next month. Elizondo had to be there. Is his taking the city's side against his former union brothers and sisters the payoff for him being named chief?

The city meeting just so happens to have fallen on the same day that the board of trustees of the Brownsville Independent School District held their meeting to decide several items of extreme importance, among them the approval of a personnel compensation plan, and the purchase of several high-dollar items through the buy board and other cooperative purchasing pools.

There was also an item dealing with Superintendent Esperanza Zendejas' move to lower the compensation for Art Rendon, a former Special Needs director, director of Transportation, and now an administrator at the Food and Nutrition Department from Level 6 to Level 5 pay grade.
In order for Elizondo – the former president of the Firefighters' Union – to satisfy the requirement of his city job that he attend to business, and at the same time cast his vote on the important issues facing the BISD, he had to be two places at one time.

The BISD administration and the majority of the board – made up of Joe Rodriguez, Cesar Lopez, Hector Chirinos, and Elizondo – had planned to lower Rendon's salary thinking that Elizondo would be there to pass it 4-3 over the nays of Catalina Presas-Garcia, Minerva Peña and Otis Powers.
But with Elizondo having to attend the meeting on which his livelihood depends, he left only an hour into the meeting and before the compensation and Rendon items came before the board.

Not that Zendejas and the BISD board majority didn't try to accommodate the double-dipping Elizondo. Instead of starting their meeting at 5:30 p.m., they moved it forward to 4 p.m. so that he could attend to business at the city and they could have his vote on their items as well.
They knew that they had a sure vote on the issues that mattered to them: the compensation plan that was still not well done, the demotion of Rendon, and the continued splurging on multi-million dollar expenditures on such issues of critical instructional importance like Rodriguez's pet projects of lining the entire district's surface with artificial turf by his favorite vendor, Paragon.

Almost everything went according to plan, except for the beheading of Rendon.
After only about an hour, Elizondo pulled up stakes from the BISD meet to rush to the city meet to fulfill his municipal obligations. He therefore missed sitting in on the BISD executive session items, among the the Rendon demotion.
The item read: a. Discussion and consideration regarding salary adjustment for the 2015-2017 school years for Art Rendon.

After the board – minus Elizondo – emerged from executive session – trustee Cesar Lopez moved to approve Rendon's demotion and got a second from Presas-Garcia who was in a world of hurt after stubbing her toe on a step on the way back from the boardroom.

The board voted 4-2 with Peña and Powers voting "nay" and Rodriguez, Lopez and Chirinos joined by Presas-Garcia voting "aye" to give the administration's proposal approval.

After the vote, Presas-Garcia, realizing that she had voted to demote Rendon, said she had not realized it was the item that was being voted on and asked to recall the vote. Under Robert's Rules of Order, only a board member who has voted in the positive on an item has the ability to bring it back for another vote.

When the vote was recalled, Lopez again made a motion and...failed to get a second. The motion died as there would have been a 3-3 vote and Rendon's walnuts were pulled from the fire by Presas-Garcia's parliamentary procedure.

The motion (first to approve and then to reconsider) by Lopez reveals some very intriguing undercurrents below the BISD majority motives.

Lopez, BISD long-timers will tell you, got his first employment as a bid control accountant staffer at the district after Rendon personally intervened to recommend him with the BISD administration when he was first cutting his teeth in the department. He told everyone there that Lopez was good friends with one of his sons and that the local Brownsville boy deserved a chance to work for the BISD.

After Lopez had acquired the know-how of purchasing, he landed a gig at the Mercedes ISD as the purchasing agent and after he helped the former BISD board president Enrique and his brother Jaime Escobedo land a contract for their surveillance company, when former trustee Dr. Christina Saavedra left for a job with a San Antonio-area school district, he was appointed to the BISD board. by the late Enrique Escobedo.

The fact that he was willing to pay ball with the BISD administration and the board majority shows the depth of his gratitude (or is it ingratitude?) and loyalty to Rendon and his friendship with his son.

On the other hand, Elizondo showed no qualms about not representing the interests of the 7,418 voters of the BISD district who believed him when he told them he would always be there for them. It stands to reason that when one's livelihood is at stake, the devil with campaign promises to voters of the school district.
If Elizondo had been present for the Rendon vote, it is highly likely he would have cast the vote to demote him to show the majority his loyalty. 

In fact, it wasn't until Lopez felt that the BISD majority needed Elizondo's sure vote with the majority that he called the errant fire chief to cast the deciding vote for the half-baked compensation plan that he left the city meeting and rushed back to comply with the majority.

The majority is backing Chirinos and Phil Cowen in the upcoming November elections to stay in power. Rendon, when he ran and was elected to the Texas Southmost College board, drew 2,104 votes. Will he allow the majority to continue bulldozing their agenda and personnel policies – as was almost done to him? Or will he move to foil their plans and rally his supporters against their candidates? 

Apparently, neither the city nor the BISD administrations – or their legal counsels – see any conflict in the Elizondo scenario above. Do you?