You have probably already seen the results of the vote on rezoning the Scenic Transmountain Corridor. By a vote of 3 to 5, City Council did not pass the proposed ordinance. Only Beto O’Rourke, Susie Byrd and Steve Ortega voted for it. What happened? After all, when Council first voted to begin the rezoning process, Ann Morgan Lilly and Eddie Holguin voted in the affirmative.
There are two reasons: first the fear that to vote otherwise would mean that El Paso would lose the $85 million for the Transmountain highway/freeway project. (This just isn’t true.) In addition, Council members were convinced that SmartCode will preserve the land almost as well as NOS (not true) and that the Staff recommendation should be followed. (The rumor is that staff at the behest of City Manager Joyce Wilson went for SmartCode.) The conviction was also there that Mr. Archuleta and the PSB would find SmartCode acceptable.
There are two problems with the PSB, Archuleta and SmartCode. Email between Archuleta and Wilson seem to indicate a reticence about SmartCode on the part of the President/CEO of El Paso Water Utilities/Public Service Board. Nevertheless he repeated his willingness to work with SmartCode during his address to Council prior to the vote. He also indicated willingness to consider changing the proposed commercial development along the edge of the Scenic Corridor. However, he can’t speak for the PSB which passed a vitriolic resolution against NOS zoning on October 22nd. That resolution was brought to the Board’s Strategic Planning meeting by Ed Archuleta and is still posted among John Cook’s online documents. It also adamantly states their position to stay with the Westside Master Plan. (Something they won’t be able to do anyway since their consultant, URS, has already pointed out drainage deficiencies.)
On Wednesday, Matt McElroy, Deputy Director of the city's Planning and Economic Development Division, gave a presentation on SmartCode to PSB members. Asked if they wanted to back-off of the resolution that in essence prohibits SmartCode, PSB members said “NO”. That intransigence makes promises by Archuleta to work with SmartCode somewhat difficult and supplies him with an “out”.
One wonders whether Council Representative Ann Lilly would now change her vote given that she gave as her justification the desirability of SmartCode.
Given all of the above, where is the Franklin Mountain Wilderness Coalition’s two petitions? After much discussion, the gathering of signatures will continue with even more enthusiasm than before.
The urgency was to have more than enough petitions ready for the NOS vote. Many of you worked so hard to make that happen. I appreciate so much those of you who mailed petitions and brought them by my house. One of you drove a long way to give me a petition signed by just yourself and your wife. AND one person even spent over $30 to FedEx petitions to me overnight so that I would have them in time for the Tuesday Council meeting. That is a testimony to this cause and to the love of and sacrifice for our democratic form of government and our sacred right as citizens to participate.
Since the vote, I have been inundated with emails wanting to continue the effort to preserve our Scenic Corridor. Many, who didn’t sign before, are requesting to do so now.
We are so close to gathering the full 1547 signatures. The real drive now is to make sure that there are more than the minimum necessary to “bullet proof” the petitions in case some signatures are discovered to be invalid.
Please keep going. You can download both petitions at www.franklinmountains.org. Both need to be filled out by registered voters living in the City of El Paso. If you can help gather petitions at public events and places, please email me.
We aren’t going to give up.
Finally and quite sadly, after the vote on Tuesday, District 1 Representative, Ann Morgan Lilly, said that El Paso suffers from “petition-itis”. What we should be doing, she prescribed, is just going along with our City Council and City staff and not muck things up.
Being a citizen in a free society is one of our most sacred values and trusts. Ms. Lilly seems to have forgotten that Initiative by Petition is part of our City Charter. She also seems to have forgotten these bedrock words of the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States and of our free society: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
The level of activism of our citizens makes us all proud to be El Pasoans. Many take time to go to City Council and speak every week. Many email, write letters, make phone calls. Many are involved with a variety of political and service organizations. Some even spend hard-earned money on FedEx overnight services to be sure that their “vote/petition” is heard!
El Paso doesn’t suffer from “petition-itis”, it suffers from “elitism” and “politician-itis”.
Politician Ann Morgan Lilly has announced that she will seek re-election to City Council from District 1 in May.
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