FLORES IS INTERIM, TASK FORCE TO PICK CITY ATTORNEY

Special to El Rrun-Rrun

With one City of Brownsville commissioner symbolically voting against the temporary appointment, Asst. City Attorney Victor Flores will be interim city attorney until a task force composed of Mayor Trey Mendez and two other city commissioners – plus two local attorneys to be named later – recommends a permanent replacement.

On a motion by commissioner Pedro Cardenas, the commissioners approved naming Flores interim city attorney. Cardenas then amended his motion to break it up into two motions, one naming Flores, the other the appointment of the task force.

City commissioner Roy de los Santos cast the only dissenting vote on Flores as interim, but then joined the commission in approving the appointment by Mendez of the task force.

The task force will consist of Mendez, commissioners Nurith Galonsky and De los Santos.   

City Manager Bernal, who did not participate in the meeting Tuesday, appointed City Attorney Rene De Coss to a four-year term and removed former presiding municipal court judge Bobby Lerma, bringing his replacement as an item on Tuesday's city commission meeting.

The city charter gives Bernal the authority to name municipal judges, but there was obvious dissent in naming De Coss to the position. The major complaint seemed to be that Flores is seen as a Bernal crony  from Edinburg who will ascend to the city attorney position by virtue of his friendship with the city manager. Many feel that Bernal cut a deal with De Coss to hire Flores and ease him into the city attorney slot in exchange for the presiding judge appointment..

Some commissioners had wanted Bernal to open the municipal judge appointment so that local attorneys and jurists were given an opportunity to submit responses to a Request For Qualifications (RFQs). Lerma, who was unceremoniously dumped by a Bernal edict, was gobbled up immediately by the City of Port Isabel, whose needs aligned perfectly with Lerma's dismissal with their need for a good judge. 

Local lawyers wonder whether there was some collusion in Lerma's replacement with De Coss before the move. They point to the bringing of outside bureaucrats like City Secretary Laure Morgan ($99,999), Asst. City Manager Helen Ramirez ($195,000), and Communication and Marketing Director Felipe "Flip"  Romero ($97,649), etc., by Bernal to replace local people. 

Under the amendment to the city charter passed during city elections last May, Bernal is authorized to appoint De Coss as presiding municipal judge for a four-year term. Before the election, the appointment was only good for two years. 

Mendez did not name the two other attorneys suggested to make it a five-member task force during the discussion of the item.