The El Paso Times today editorialized on the need to hurry up and build the “signature downtown projects” authorized by voters in the Quality of Life bond elections two years ago.
Let me point out the obvious, that El Paso two years ago was at the tail end of years of unprecedented growth. Fort Bliss was just finishing a billion dollar expansion, and the Troubles in Mexico had driven the Juarenses who could afford it to move to El Paso. The Times, and other bond proponents, ignored the transient externalities and concluded that recent events were a sign of the future.
Today, things have changed.
The financial forecasts that the City offered to support the bond projects have turned out to be, if not lies, than simply wrong. Hotel occupancy is down. Airline traffic is down. Sales tax revenue hasn’t met projections.
In short, the bond proponents sold El Paso a pig in a poke.
The El Paso Times serves its advertisers. Car dealers are the source of a large portion of the Times’ advertisng revenues. Car dealers also invested heavily in the El Paso Borderplex Real Estate Investment Trust, which invested heavily in downtown. Now the Trust would like to unload some of their downtown property, because they’re realizing that they got bamboozled, too.
Newspaper reporters aren’t, for the most part, financial experts. They’re not experts on economic development. If they were, they’d be bankers and economists and engineers. Reporters are looking for column inches with one eye on their deadline. In lieu of any expertise of their own, reporters turn to “experts.” Confronted with conflicting opinions, editors might as well support the expert whose views support their advertisers. In the face of uncertainty, their objectivity slants towards self-interest.
When the ballpark was being vigorously debated, did the Times ever mention Texas Municipal Code Chapter 334, which prohibits the construction of sports venues without a public election?
SUBCHAPTER B. VENUE PROJECTS
Sec. 334.021. RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING PROJECT. (a) A county or municipality by resolution may provide for the planning, acquisition, establishment, development, construction, or renovation of a venue project if:
(1) the comptroller determines under Section 334.022 or 334.023 that the implementation of the resolution will not have a significant negative fiscal impact on state revenue;
(2) to the extent required by Section 334.0235 or 334.0236, a rapid transit authority determines that the implementation of the resolution will not have a significant negative impact on the authority’s ability to provide services and will not impair any existing contracts; and
(3) the resolution is approved by a majority of the qualified voters of the municipality or county voting at an election called and held for that purpose under Section 334.024.
(b) The resolution must designate each venue project and each method of financing authorized by this chapter that the municipality or county wants to use to finance a project. A resolution may designate more than one method of financing.
The emphasis, obviously, is mine.
If you can’t count on the Times to point out our elected officials legal transgressions, how can you trust them at all? The Times editorial board is not an objective observer, opining on issues affecting El Paso on the basis of what is good for El Pasoans. Instead, they are the mouthpiece of the oligarchy.
Unfortunately they will claim that we did have an election.
Our choice was to either have visitors (an hoteliers) pay for the ball park through the hotel occupancy tax or to pay for it ourselves.
Clearly it was not an election on whether to build the ball park. It was an election on how to pay for it.
Keep up the great work! I look forward to your posts.
Brutus
Thank you, Brutus. I enjoy your work, also.
Great commentary, and pretty much spot on! Keep up the good work.
Back on the ballpark, we are.
Construction of the ballpark was legal. I don’t have the inclination to go back to my old research, but state law, which has been on the books since the late 1990’s, allowed it. I suppose it keeps naysayer blogs active, but it’s usually wrong and misguided.
The “sky is falling” mentality of the old guard in El Paso is distressing.
The point of the post was that the El Paso Times is not an impartial observer. They represent their advertisers’ agenda, which may or may not coincide with El Paso’s best interests.
Some commenters (you included) took the salient anecdote that I offered as evidence and ran with it.
Frankly, I don’t believe that the City did have legal justification under some law from the 1990?s that you can’t cite. I’m surprised you didn’t bookmark it. Also, I’m not sure that even if the law exists, that newer laws wouldn’t supersede it.
The City referenced Texas Municipal Code Chapter 334 when they proposed the ballpark. If they were relying on some other state law, I’m sure they would have mentioned it. Unusual, isn’t it?
You’re a smart guy, Carlos. Does the story you’re peddling sound like the truth? Or has somebody been blowing smoke up your ass?