RRUN-RRUN ENDORSEMENTS FOR TSC, BISD BOARD RACES: CAMARILLO, DR. NORMA LOPEZ-HARRIS FOR TSC, LEAL FOR BISD

 Special to El Rrun-Rrun

It's not customary for this blog to endorse candidates in local races. 

For the most part, we honor the wishes of the voters for better or for worse. Often, we – and the electorate – end up disappointed. Certainly, the last three mayoral choices for the City of Brownsville have ben disastrous for our city. And the jury is still out for the current tenant at City Hall.

Selling advertising to individuals seeking public office here doesn't automatically translate into an endorsement. They know that.

But getting elected to a position in city, the county, or a drainage district, etc., pales before the importance of electing people to the boards of our educational institutions. The Brownsville Independent School District and the Texas Southmost College have provided local students the foundation that shape their careers, indeed, their lives. 

I was fortunate to have graduated from the BISD which was held in high regard and  was the measure other districts across South Texas strived to emulate. A high school diploma from BHS wasn't a gimme. Social promotion was virtually unknown when I attended.

Teachers like Harry Faulk in Algebra, Mrs. Ferraez in English, Mrs. Spinks in Science, and Brother Wm. Mann (on loan from St. Joe) in French had one thing in common. They were all tough.  

High School Principal Raul Besteiro, under the guidance of then-BISD Superintended Arnulfo "Nuco" Oliveira, kept it that way. His successor, Daniel Breeden, I have heard, never lost sight of that dedication to its tradition of academic excellence.

As a veteran under the G.I. Bill in 1974 – as had many other veterans in the 98-year history of the college – I attended TSC and was exposed to that brand of excellence from outstanding instructors under the leadership of now college President Arnulfo Oliveira. After taking the core courses, I transferred to the University of Michigan. 

Gonzalo Garza in Biology, Ruby Woolridge, Anthony Knopp, Milo Kearny, and Jim Sullivan in History, O. Henry Sears and Bob Rossman in English, Tony Zavaleta in Social Sciences and Anthropology, Norm Binder in Social Science, Cipriano Cardenas in Spanish, etc., rounded out a challenging faculty under Oliveira and later under TSC president Al Besteiro.   

All my TSC courses were accepted and I graduated from the U of M-Ann Arbor with a 3.4 GPA, the same that I scored at TSC. Kids with legacy admissions and prep schools whose relatives had gone to the UM for generations in the dorms would come ask me for help with their assignments looking for just the right word or literary citation. When they asked where I had gone to college or prep school, they would invariably be dumfounded when I told them TSC, a little community college on the northern bank north of the Rio Grande. 

Then disaster befell our college and it was ensnared in a disastrous 22-year "partnership" with the University of Texas System that almost saw its dissolution and the loss of this community asset until the separation in 2013 after the "Fab Four" – trustees Rene Torres, Trey Mendez, Adela Garza and Kiko Rendon – stood their ground against local business and political "leaders" under the guidance of UTB-TSC President Julieta Garcia and TSC survived to return to its original mission to provide an affordable education to local residents.

I find that same dedication in two candidates to the TSC board in today's elections. Rather than talk down the other candidates, let me say that the college is still striving to attain the greatness it had before it fell into the clutches of the UT System. Since 2013, the boards have brought down the cost of tuition from the university levels under Garcia, enrollments have gone through the roof, and person-to person instruction (the most effective and a rarity nowadays) is available to the students. 

There's still a ways to go to get back to the levels of those days of excellence, but those metrics are now in sight. So why fix something that is not broken by a slate (Eva Alejandro, and JJ De Leon) which places personal egos, capriciousness, and back-room intrigues to lose sight of the prize and derail the momentum to return it to its original mission? I love our college and am voting for Edward Camarillo and Dr. Norma Lopez-Harris. 

Ph.D. Hilda Silva, who is one of the candidate is a vice-president of UTRGV-Brownsville which, if elected, would be like having a UT spy in the TSC boardroom. In the ongoing disputes between the two institutions, where would she stand: with her employer or with TSC?

Edward and Dr. Norma have been reviled as puppets of board president Garza by scurrilous pundits. But was the late Ruben Herrera and current TSC board members Tony Zavaleta, Delia Saenz, Cameron County's D.A. Luis Saenz's better half, and Alejandra Aldrete "puppets" of the board president? Such dishonest innuendo and despicable insults are a huge disrespect to honorable people who strive to serve their community. 

And if you need any encouragement to vote for Camarillo, former mayor Pat Ahumada is campaigning against him because he didn't support Ahumada's plastic bag ban, which was challenged by the Texas Attorney General and ultimately abolished as illegal taxation.

With 8,809 votes cast in the TSC race cast already during early voting, the other one third (about 3,000) will be cast today and your vote may decide the outcome. Ditto for the BISD, with 5,868 cast and another 1,900 projected for election day. Please vote. 

If you – like me – love our little community college and want to keep it on the road back to its greatness, I ask that you cast your vote for Dr. Norma and Edward Camarillo at TSC and for Marissa Leal in the BISD runoff with religious zealot, pious hypocrite, narcissist, and perpetual Porter Belle Minerva Peña. 

Think about this: When her daughter-in-law was working for the BISD, both were given an ultimatum: One of you have to quit. What does not-so-Minnie do? She stayed as a board member and her daughter-in-law had to resign the profession she loved and something she was very good at: teaching our kids. A few days later the teacher committed suicide. Peña held on to her seat on the board.

Throughout her too-long tenure on the BISD board, Peña has made it all too clear that she thinks everything is about her. It's not.

                                        

 

LEAL FOR BISD PLACE 6

Here's where to vote: https://www.cameroncountytx.gov/elections/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Election-Day-Polling-Places-IAG-4-22-24.pdf