GAVITO'S TEXT MESSAGE THAT MADE SALAZAR GO WACKO

By Juan Montoya

With some Doubting Thomases expressing skepticism about the existence of text messages from former Brownsville Port of Brownsville Police Chief George Gavito to Brownsville Independent School District general counsel Baltazar Salazar, we are obliged to salvage our credibility.

We first reported that Gavito sent the text message to Salazar during this month's meeting of the board of BISD when Salazar backed away from an agenda item he had personally revised with the administration and approved for inclusion on the agenda scant hours before he backpedaled.

The agenda item allowed for the district to enter into a Letter of Intent for a Private Public Partnership to establish a Performing Arts Center that would also provide a hospitality and culinary industry curriculum.

The proposed LOI envisions the construction of a hotel to complement the instructional component and is first step toward potentially having the BISD, a local university, and private investors explore the idea of collaborating toward the establishment of that facility, estimated by some observers to come at at between $40  $50 million.

Everything was a go until the meeting when the administration was asked if Salazar had asked that the item be pulled. Salazar had pulled the item a month before saying that the discussion of economic development issues such as the P3 letter of intent could not be discussed in executive session.

When confronted with legal opinions by other attorneys that the board could indeed discuss such matters, Salazar let it be known that he would not permit it "por mis huevos."

Then, in this month's meeting, four trustees voted in favor of the district entering the discussions with a local university (UTRGV?) and the BISD and Jacoma Corporation, among others, to "explore" the idea.

That was despite the recommendation of Salazar to the board that the LOI lacked detail and that the district could be exposed to commitments stretching in the future for more than 20 years.


"My recommendation (was to pull it) because there wasn't any detail  and it doesn't fall within the guidelines...," he said, getting cutoff by Lopez who reminded him that his position a few hours earlier was to include it in the meeting.

"I'm a little surprised you say that," Lopez said. "When we reviewed it you were OK with it, then you do a complete 180 (degrees). This is strictly exploratory. We're not obligating the school district to anything."

When Salazar was trying to backpedal on his previous approval of the item, Gavito, who was in the audience, texted him the missive above. In turn, Salazar started forwarding the text far and wide insinuating he felt threatened by Gavito, a border lawman with connection to the criminal elements here. We understand that a copy of the Gavito text was sent to other board trustees, the superintendent, and that it even got forwarded to Cameron County D.A. Luis V.  Saenz, too.

Is Salazar fearful now and counting to four and contemplating his future and potential loss of his $280,000 gravy gig?