Jobe Destroys the Mountain to River Corridor

The Lower Sunset Trail destroyed

Stanley Pruet Jobe has destroyed the Lower Sunset Trail and with it the cherished mountain to river corridor. With bulldozed trails he has marked his territory much like many male mammal beasts mark theirs with their odorous urine. His No Trespassing signs are aligned like a barbed wire fence over and around the hills above Arroyo 42 and dip down into what was once scenic walkways of sedimentary rock and animal habitat.

Just this past Monday evening Jobe met with the Borderland Mountain Bike Association who first discovered his clandestine slashings of huge swaths of desert. He told them pointedly that he intends to quarry 480 acres of the land that the State of Texas General Land Office leased to him. He is in the right place where transporting mountainsides of dirt and gravel to developers, road builders and landscapers will be cheap and easy and very profitable.

He did promise to build a new trail for the mountain bikers. He has after all proven himself adept at the art of public relations, the price of doing business. Convicted of conspiracy to commit bank fraud and bank fraud, Stanley Pruet Jobe served time, was paroled and then pardoned by President Clinton on his last day in office - the same day that the former President pardoned the notorious Marc Rich. Jobe has learned how to curry favor with charities, contribute to politicians and political organizations (including Mayor John Cook) and advertise well with local news publishers.

The Lower Sunset Trail is one of the best loved, often frequented trails with trailheads in the Franklin Mountain States Parks. It has utilized bike trails through beautiful arroyos that begin in the park and flow toward the Rio Grande.

Jobe's extensive bulldozing from the air

A recent aerial surveillance of the destruction by Jobe revealed that Jobe cut into FEMA #42 at Trail Marker #6, the Mountain to River trailhead. At the time of my first post about Jobe's full frontal assault on the arroyos, an effort was being made to convince him to leave alone a portion of Arroyo 41A that straddles the southern General Land Office property line with the Public Service Board. Jobe wouldn't deal.

Of course, the General Land Office is probably just as complicit as Jobe. They leased their land with Planned Mountain Development Zoning on it - the toughest zoning in the City of El Paso. This parcel of land is one of the most pristine in the City and it will now be subjected to the worst possible land use. Arroyos and mountainsides will disappear as Jobe's No Tresspassing markers and bulldozed roads foreshadow. The GLO is exempt from local zoning ordinances and they knew that when they leased the land to Jobe. The right thing would have been to sell the land to State Parks or even a developer. The land then would have come under tight development restrictions which would have enabled the City to regulate the mountain to river corridor on that land.

Jobe had told public officials that he would not do anything with the land next to the State Park for five years. It is not certain why he changed his mind. However, his actions have destroyed the mountain to river corridor.

He currently operates a quarry to the northwest of the area.

GLO leased land owned by the People of the State of Texas

Throughout the summer, my hiking group (the Sunrise Hikers) often enjoyed treks on the Lower Sunset Trail. The beauty of the rock, the hills, the plants and animals added to our adventures. Soon, very soon, unless something is done - Stanley Pruet Jobe will decimate this land as he has done and is still doing around the City.