If they’ve got the money, why don’t they fix the schools?

The El Paso Independent School District wants you to believe that they will be good stewards of your tax dollars. That they will conscientiously spend the $669 million they’re asking from you. That it’s “for the children.”

The bond proponents have recently invited the media into their schools to illustrate the deplorable conditions EPISD students confront every day. Peeling paint. Leaky plumbing. Flooding when it rains.

From this weekend’s El Paso Inc.:

[Maintenance worker Joe Parra] pointed to a set of leaking pipes above the ceiling that can’t be fixed — the replacement parts can’t be found. They’re too old, he said. The same goes for broken toilets in bathrooms. And there’s no money for new fixtures to replace the old ones.

Well, that’s funny. Because the El Paso Times reported this weekend that EPISD has money left over from their 2007 bond issue. Money that the district is paying interest on.

An additional $19 million [from the 2007 bond] has yet to be allocated.

. . .

EPISD Chief Financial Officer Carmen Arrieta-Candelaria said the money could be used to bolster the 2016 bond plan “in the event the board wants to allocate those dollars for something additionally or maybe if a project doesn’t come out with everything the board wants, the community wants.”

Gee, don’t you think they could take some of that money left over from the 2007 bond and fix the deferred maintenance in some of those schools?

If they really wanted to do something “for the children,” would they make their current students suffer through those deplorable conditions for a photo op?

Couldn’t they fix those problems if they wanted to?

Sure, it’s only $19 million, but I’m old enough to remember when $19 million was a lot of money, even for the government.

Our school district has $19 million sitting in their bank account, and they can’t fix up the schools for our students.

Kinda makes you wonder about their claims that they need $669 million dollars, “for the children.”