by Max Grossman
Those in our media who have had contact with the City’s Director of Strategic Communications, Laura Cruz-Acosta, will not be surprised to learn that she barred reporters from interviewing the four finalists seeking to become Chief of the El Paso Police Department.
Cruz-Acosta was appointed to the City’s “Leadership Team” by former City Manager Gonzalez back in 2014 and was one of his most trusted confidants, right up until his termination.
She is now the 27th most highly paid employee of the City of El Paso, earning a salary of $147,000 as of 2022.
She has long been the point of contact for the media, who have often been frustrated by her tight control of information and her insistence on controlling news narratives.
According to Adam Powell of the El Paso Times, at the meet-and-greet in question “Local reporters were instructed by city Strategic Communications Director Laura Cruz-Acosta that interviews with the finalists would not be allowed as the event was ‘more for the community.'”
This is exactly the kind of annoying conduct the media have grown to expect from the City’s Director of Strategic Communications, as if communications with the media and public should be “strategic.”
El Paso deserves better.
In the Bob Moore-Joyce Wilson days, El Paso Times was the defacto PIO for City Hall and Borderplex (Paso del Norte Group back then), so this wasn’t an issue. What the Times said was generally the City’s position. After the stadium went up, the two organizations even shared the same building. Talk about cozy 🙂
Maybe this is one of the reasons for the Times decline and irrelevance today? How ironic that Ms. Cruz-Acosta silences them now.