Yesterday's Rule Changes at City Hall

The rule changes at city hall are largely a joke and changed how I view several members of council. 

The bickering is just stupid and embarrassing and completely unproductive. Several rules changes were put forth to solve problems that already have a solution.

Before I go further, yes I think Rep Limón is largely disruptive and likes to bully to get her way. She wants everyone to shut up while she's talking but won't shut her trap when others are speaking.

But that doesn't give other members of council the right to create draconian rules to reign her in.

The mayor just needs to control the meetings more efficiently and the rest of council just need to learn to use Robert's Rules and the problems are solved.

What happened was rules were trying to be slipped in under the guise of making the meetings run more efficiently. But they were more about personal beef than anything else.

I want to highlight three rule suggestions that I had a major problem with.

The first one is the three votes rule. That went down in flames a few weeks ago and was brought up again for some dumb ass petty reason. This rule would require a city rep to get a couple other city reps to agree that an item should be placed on an agenda.

Basically that is Cortney Niland's way of trying to silence Limón and frankly I think the entire town is a little tired of their school girl bullshit on the dais.

And make no mistake, I like Rep Niland and all, but Speak Truth to Power is something I take seriously, the three vote rule is 100% Niland.

She got Rep Noe, Rep Romero, and Rep Acosta to go along with it, but that was her movida from the start and it's a perfect example of a rule that doesn't solve anything.

Each rep is elected by their constituents to be their voice on council. Even if that voice is a bully and lives to grandstand. But it's not up to Niland et al to decide what the people of District 7 may or may not have put on an agenda.

The people of District 7 will decide for themselves if they will send Rep Limón back to council to represent them.

It is the height of arrogance for the four members of council that voted in favor of the three vote rule. Thankfully Rep Ordaz changed her previous position on the issue and voted with Limón, Svarzbein, Robinson, and the mayor broke the tie.

Truth is the three vote rule is punitive. It's just meant to punish council members that aren't popular. This rule is not about making council more efficient. That is basically just a lie. 

This move further marginalizes communities in the valley that already feel frustrated by city government.

And if you want to prevent a rep from using the agenda to grand stand, just use existing rules and move to delete the item. Problem solved.

The other item that really pissed me off was Rep Acosta's idea of moving public comment to a completely different day than the regular meeting. Seriously that is the biggest insult to the community that I can think of. 

Why bother even pretending to care about what the public thinks, let's just move everything to a different day completely!

Look, I know that most of the time public comment is a circus full of clowns. It's the same people bitching and moaning about the same stuff dayin and day out. Sal Gomez and his poor man walking routine or Jack Bradford and his racist comments and the funny way her says Tornillo (Tore-knee-yo) are all very annoying. 

So what! Suck it up buttercup! They get three minutes to say their peace. It's irritating to hear council members whine about how hard it makes their job. 

Oh you poor baby, you have to sit on a comfortable chair in air conditioning and listen to someone else talk. The struggle!

Maybe if you council members would shut your traps during public comment you would get through the time faster. Just watch commissioners court. They don't engage the speakers and let them speak and move on with the meeting. They get the same crazies and have to deal with the same racist comments. Jack Bradford once told Commissioner Perez that he sat in his living room eating menudo while his precinct was flooding. That pissed me off not only because it was racist but more so because I had a sore back from filling sand bags with the commissioner and delivering them to the community during the flood (so screw you Jack Bradford). 

The City should be trying to get more public comment, not suppress it. You have to allow people to comment on individual items anyway so moving public comment to another day doesn't fix anything, it's just a slap in the face to the community.

The last item that pissed me off was something raised by Rep Ordaz. She inquired about agenda pre-meetings that go through the city manager, then legal, and then a secret back room meeting between the mayor and mayor protemp.

What I found interesting was the conversation about the issue. And frankly I can't believe the crazies aren't all over this one.

The city manager said he'd never seen a city other than El Paso have this meeting where the mayor and mayor protemp can just take certain items off the agenda and no one ever knows about it.

All Ordaz asked was to see if there was a way that the other members of council could be made aware of what was deleted and it clearly made some uncomfortable. That's a major red flag and I can't believe the crazies aren't calling for people's heads.

I understand completely that agenda items have to go through the city manager and legal first. And it makes sense that some items don't make it on to the final agenda for various good reasons when they go through the city manager and attorney's office.

So then why is there the need for the secret meeting? What real purpose does that serve? 

I didn't hear a good answer in the conversation about the issue yesterday. 

The bottom line is that the mayor and council already have the power to throw someone out of a meeting. All bets of council can use rules to keep order. 

And that's what the rules should be for, not to suppress people you don't personally like.