Personal Vendettas Toss Bonart from the PSB

City Council continues to be dominated by politics over policy. The reactionaries are in control. Democracy and progressivism continue to lose out. 

Today City Council voted 7-1 to keep Herr Shoephoerster on the PSB in spite of the fact that he knows something about pacemakers but not a thing about hydrology and stormwater. (Dr. John Walton, a hydrologist and engineer professor at UTEP would have been the better pick.) Schoephoerster is also the Chairman of the PSB and has been pushing for an anti-First Amendment Communications Policy in reaction to the loss of the boondoggle UTEP water project for the Engineering Department over which he dictates as Dean. It was Dr. Rick Bonart who saved us ratepayers from that boondoggle. (By the way, if you haven't, you should read David Crowder's excellent article in the El Paso Inc. about the Communication Policy. A pro-democratic, pro-constitutional document was agreed upon in committee because of the efforts of Dr. Bonart and Mayor Leeser. The entire PSB will vote on it tomorrow.) Niland moved to appoint Schoephoerster even before public comment. Dr. Walton was allowed to speak but those present reported that the members of City Council weren't even listening.

Then came the shameful vote on Bonart's seat. Emma Acosta led the charge against Dr. Bonart. She zeroed in on Bonart's recent organization of a town hall meeting at which the public could meet and hear from PSB candidates for appointment. The meeting was held at the County Building by permission of County Judge Veronica Escobar for no other reason than the fact that Bonart couldn't get an EPWU or City venue - believe it or not. Acosta hates Escobar. Acosta has no political principals only self-serving twitches. Never mind the fact that Bonart was doing something that should have been done all along - let us, the people of El Paso, meet the candidates and then give our input to our City Council reps. Even the resumes of the candidates were not something published on the EPWU web page (or the City page for that matter.) No matter how important the PSB is to and for the citizens of El Paso the good ol' boys and girls want to control the outcome. They don't want your input, people of El Paso. Reactionaries never do. They like their autocratic control too much. Sadly this is what El Paso voted for this last time around and I believe that Mayor Leeser is now beginning to see that those who grabbed on to his coattails are not worthy of his humanity. 

So Acosta ranted and raved and even those who had told others or Dr. Bonart that they would support him, didn't. They know who they are: Ann Lilly, Cortney Niland, Eddie Holguin and Lily Limon. Shame on every one of you for pledging one thing but doing another. The "L" word applies here and I don't mean "Liberal". They voted for Antcliff.

Say-nothing, do-nothing Romero will vote whichever way Ann Lilly or Bob Hoy or Myrna Deckert tells him to vote. I'm sure that he has his marching orders prior to coming to City Council. His imagination stretches only as far as picking up a coke can in a vacant lot. 

It will be interesting to see what the PSB does tomorrow with the Committee recommendation on the communications policy. Expect them to continue to do what the good ol' boys and girls tell them to do (and I include the entrenched establishment at EPWU) regarding stormwater funds. Money will continue to flow to shrubs and sod for park ponds and never for natural open space. It's lazy engineering and popular politics - but not good policy. Moreover, it will be interesting to see whether John Balliew has really been sincere about the pipeline to the Rio Bosque or whether he and others have been stalling to see if Bonart would be reappointed or not.

It will also be interesting to see whether Antcliff is as good of a person as many tell me that he is. Will he be independent? Will he think on his own? Or will he just do the bidding of the establishment which should be his wont as a Republican.

My gloves are now off and are going to stay off. If El Pasoans think that they were kept out of the decision about the ballpark, they should look very carefully at nearly everything that the establishment good ol' boys and girls do on Council and the PSB - and that establishment includes those who fooled all of you with their self-righteous indignation over the old City Hall building. 

Reactionary governments are not there to sustain communities with sound policy. They are there to scratch their own itches and will their own whims with their closed-door, behind the scenes, anti-democratic politics.