THE WRITING ON THE WALL: DALES ATOLE CON EL DEDO

Special to El Rrun-Rrun

Greater Brownsville...what?

This May 4 general election on the two proposition that would decide whether voters wanted to create a Municipal Development District (GBMDD) and do away with the scandal-plagued Greater Brownsville Incentives Corporation (GBIC) and the Brownsville Community Improvement Corporation (BCIC) shows just how manipulative this city commission and its administration have become.

Instead of just giving voters a straight up yes or no on the propositions (A: Yes to establish the GBMDD, B: YES to de-establish the BCIC and GBIC), the masters of sleigh of hand gave voters the algebraic formula. If X, therefore Y, but only if you vote Yes on A and YES on B.

Uh?

That is, if you vote Yes to increase the sales tax revenue by $400,000 through voting for a GBMDD, it'll pass only if you vote YES yes on proposition B, and do away with the GBIC and BCIC which are sharing $12 million of the sales tax. The GBMDD will simply increase its take by $400,000 increasing the collection of additional sales tax in the Extra Territorial Jurisdiction (ETJ). 

Simple math, right? And if you voted NO to Proposition B to do away with the GBIC, it would only happen if you had voted "YES to Proposition A to create a GBMDD. Simple, they said.

Or so they thought. 

In fact, as you can see in the graphic above, the mural was ready to go with the GBMDD and new slogan "Empowering Economic Growth Transforming Brownsville." 

But, oh, those darn voters. 

They just didn't do what they were supposed to do. As a result Mother Superior Helen Ramirez jumped the gun and started the painters on the sign before the election announcing the passage of the GBMDD. What to do now with the mural since the confusion created by the wording of the propositions led residents to vote NO on A to reject the district, it effectively nullified any meaningful decision Proposition B, which was contingent on the passage of A?

So, in effect, nothing has changed. That election  that was rigged in favor of the GBMDD backfired on the manipulators and left us exactly in the same place we were before the election, with the additional $400,000 that was to be collected by the ETJ dissipating into the ETJ periphery.

We want a refund.

This leaves the $6 million that GBIC and BCIC each pocket from sales tax receipt to their individual boards and susceptible to the whims of their boards, the same inept, corrupt, gang whose performance has been borderline criminal handing out thousands to elected officials and their friends and relatives, board members and their fiends and families, and handing out public money to charter schools to the detriment of public school, who are barely surviving against the charter.

If you're already bored, bear with us just a bit with a little more tedium.

Take the BCIC, please! 

With much fanfare and a drum roll, the BCIC board, just scant days before the May 4 election, held a "special" meeting where they allotted $1,003,345 to build 32 bus shelters and improve the "quality of life" for bus riders. Readers of this blog know we have been vocal about the meager number of shelters and benches for the city's 600 bus stops, with less than one third offering as much as a roof and a bench.

The city – after bungling around for two years – finally is getting around to build 30 of them, simple affairs with benches, metal-screened walls and solar-powered florescent lights. With any luck, one of them may be  operable soon. But after saying that they would cost the city around $611,270 for the construction of 30 shelters, they tweaked down the construction cost to $345,067, resulting in a savings of $266,203, to average about $21,906 per shelter.

Compare this with the $1,003,345 for 32 shelters that the BCIC approved in their last meeting. Divide that figure by 30 and what will it cost per shelter? Would you believe $31,354, or $9,448 more than a city-built shelter. Oh, well, it's Other People's Money (OPM). Will the BCIC shelters require that bus riders adhere to a dress code so as not to diminish the grandeur of the shelter?

Then there is another "quality of life" project that furthers city commissioner Rose Gowen's West Rail Trail to plant 150 native trees on both sides of the trail and create a "canopy" for hikers and bikers and their pets, dubbed the Rose Gowen Dog Pee Trail by her detractors, us included, at a cost of just $198,500 of OPM. This comes out to average $6,516 per sapling. 

But then there's the little matter of  restrictions that the Union Pacific placed on the Port of Brownsville, and then on the county and the city which prohibits any human contact with the dirt surface on the 100-feet right-of way (50 feet from center on each side). And if you are doing any digging for minerals, you can only do it when you pass the 500 foot depth. 

This applies to the abandoned track that was dedicated to the trial instead of a loop that would have prevented downtown congestion and would have gone around the west side to hook up with US 77/83 (I-69) . The rail-end points of the West Rail Trail are just north of 77 Flea Market (Railroad St & Frontage Rd) and Palm Blvd, across from Prax Orive (Sunrise) Park on the south. 

U.P. made sure it would incur no liability for potential chemical contamination of more than 100 years of use making the transfer in an "as is, where is" condition and states that the county (and then the Port of Brownsville and city) acknowledges that it accepted the land on the basis of its own investigation of the "physical and environmental conditions of the property, including the subsurface conditions and  (it) assumes the risk that adverse physical and environmental conditions may not have been revealed by its investigation."

Likewise, U.P. required that the county release it from "all claims, suits, actions, causes of action, demands, rights, damages, costs, expenses, penalties, fines or compensation whatsoever, direct or indirect, which (the county) now has or which (it) may have in the future on account of of or in any way arising out of or in connection with the property (including, without limitation, 

"ANY CONTAMINATION IN, ON, UNDER OR ADJACENT TO THE PROPERTY BY ANY HAZARDOUS OR TOXIC SUBSTANCE OR MATERIAL), OR ANY FEDERAL, STATE, OR LOCAL LAW, ORDINANCE OR REGULATION APPLICABLE,...INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, THE TOXIC SUBSTANCES CONTROL ACT, THE COMPREHENSIVE ENVIRONMENTAL RESPONSE, COMPENSATION AND LIABILITY ACT, THE RESOURCE CONSERVATION AND RECOVERY ACT, THE TEXAS SOLID WASTE DISPOSAL ACT AND THE TEXAS WATER CODE..." EXISTING, NEW, OR CHANGES IN EXISTING LAWS THAT WOULD "IMPOSE ON (UP) ..NEW LIABILITIES FOR ENVIRONMENTAL PROBLEMS AFFECTING THE PROPERTY..., REGARDLESS OF ANY NEGLIGENCE OR STRICT LIABILITY OF (U.P.) ITS EMPLOYEES, AGENTS, OFFICERS, SUCCESSORS OR ASSIGNS."

Good luck in dealing with that restriction. Remediation and mitigation to allow crews to dig holes anywhere within 50 feet on either side of the centerline might cost twice or more than the $198,500 the BCIC threw Gowen's way. And will they grow in the contaminated railway easement after 100 years of unregulated hauling of hazardous materials and countless spills during that time?   

But perhaps the two items in the BCIC's agenda merit a little scrutiny, too. The board thought better of funding a $445,441 proposal to build one bathroom with a attached canopy at vandalism-ridden Oliveira Park, itself built on a long-abandoned landfill but would be fenced off,  and would be closed to the public at night when there are no events scheduled.

The other proposal that was championed by Mother Superior Helen Ramirez and her BF commissioner Linda C. Macias was a plan to spend $965,000 (that's right, $1 million smackers of OPM) on specific vendor Musco Lighting. Why this specific vendor? Did the BCIC go out for bids, or was it just picked out of the air, maybe a "sole source?"

Oh, well, the girls shared a fine meal with a LED light vendor at an upscale restaurant just recently, as one of our eight eagle-eyed readers let us know by sending us this photo. A bit indiscreet, we would think. Was it a rep for Musco Lighting, perhaps? 

Now that the death threat to the BCIC and GBIC has been removed by the rigged election, maybe we can float for a new name for another district for the gullible, finicky, voters...say the Greater Brownsville Manipulating Dupes District (GBMDD). Has a nice ring to it, don't it?