From KVIA.com:
El Paso City Council voted eight to zero to pass a resolution authorizing the submission of an application to the Office of Congresswoman Veronica Escobar requesting an appropriation from the Community Project Funding program to fund the I-10 Deck Plaza project.
The application requests an appropriation of $5,000,000 from the program, in which the federal government would contribute $4,000,000, and the city would match $750,000 and the Deck Plaza Foundation would match $250,000.
If the City gets that five million bucks, we’ll only need $197 million more for the first $202 million phase of the project, and then another $210 million for the the second phase. In this other KVIA story, Paso del Norte Community Foundation CEO Tracy Yellen says that $210 million “reflects what it would cost in total for a future build-out of housing or commercial development.”
Weird, huh, that that number would even come up? Is the Paso del Norte Community Foundation thinking that the cost of a future build-out of housing or commercial development would fall on the taxpayers? Isn’t that like an entrepreneur’s responsibility?
Or maybe “housing or commercial development” is code for soccer stadium?
Whatever that means, it does not bode well for the people who actually live here and pay taxes. This stinks just as bad as the ball park, the trolley to nowhere, the tear down of Cohen Stadium, and all of the ridiculous downtown projects.
Why the obsession with big, unnecessary, expensive, and disruptive projects? Why not direct all this energy and resources towards our real needs, starting with making housing more affordable for more people. Let’s improve our living conditions by addressing real needs.