LAST CHAPTER OF 2016 RUNOFF 'TWEEN SANCHEZ TREVINO

"Signs don't vote, son. People do." Former County Clerk Joe Rivera.

"Paga chocolate. Paga lo que debes." Orquesta Aragon

By Juan Montoya

It was, by any measure, a contentious 2016 Democratic Party runoff for Cameron County Judge between Eddie Treviño and Dan Sanchez, the former Pct. 4 commissioner.

Neither man had garnered the 50 percent plus 1 vote required to take the election outright during the March 6 primary election. Treviño had gotten 43 percent of the vote. Sanchez had pulled 36 percent and the rest went to Liz Garza, with nearly 20 percent.

During the runoff election held in May, Treviño bested Sanchez 52.8 to 47.1 percent, in real numbers  a 979 vote difference.

You'd think that would be the end of it. The winner gets ready for the November election with Treviño having no Republican challenger in the November general election. Sanchez would return to his legal profession from which he has made a comfortable living.

But there was a loose string out there in the detritus of the election for county judge. After invoicing Sanchez for payment of an outstanding $8,067 bill for billboard signs across the county, Lamar Advertising finally sued him January 3, 2017 in Cameron County Court-at-Law #2 demanding payment of the principal, interest, and attorneys' fees.

That was two days after Treviño assumed the duties of county judge.

In response, Sanchez had his attorney fellow Harlingenite Travis Bence, husband of County Court-at-Law # 4 Sheila Bence, countersue Lamar claiming that he had never received credits due to him and that Lamar had breached their contract by not delivering on their agreement with his campaign on the timely placing of billboard signs on the southern part of the county where he needed them most.

"I had been a county commissioner...and a justice of the peace," Sanchez told the court in an affidavit. I had run predominantly in the Northern Part of the county and had a lot of notoriety in that part of the county. Where I really needed the help was in the Southern Part of the county which included Brownsville and the Southern Part of the county where a majority of the votes in Cameron County are located."

Sanchez went on to say that his campaign made strategic choices on billboard location suites and specified the correct times for their placement to coincide with holiday greetings (St. Patrick's Day? Cinco de Mayo? Mother's Day?). He said Lamar failed to put up the boards on time and for the duration he had asked for. Promises for credits and offsets were never given, he said.

"I believe that as a result of Lamar's breach I lost the election," Sanchez wrote. "It was a very close election and the precincts that I lost were all in the Southern Part of the county where all those billboards were supposed to be placed...I believe that as a result of the signs not being put up in time it cost me votes and ultimately cost me the election. This was an election where $100,000s were spent. I believe that i have lost a great deal of time and money."

Yesterday, with a visiting judge hearing the case in County Court-at-Law #2, Sanchez and Lamar said they had reached an agreement that was read into court. Today, the court administrator said that the details of that agreement would be entered into the record when the parties handed in their orders that court had asked them to write.

If we wanted to find out the details and we wanted to order a transcript from the court reporter before the orders were entered next week, it would cost us $75. We think we'll wait. After all, Sanchez and Lamar have waited almost two years to put the 2016 election behind them.