El Paso Politics

As if this election cycle hasn't already been full of drama to begin with, there is actually much more and much worse than just Trustee Mickey Loweree allegedly lying about her experience, and allegedly lying about teaching certification, and allegedly lying about her degree, and being at all connected to Carlos Sierra. Volume 2 of this series is going to be the worst and will make everything else you've heard this election cycle pale in comparison. But I'll get to that later. For now, lets talk about San Eli's races. Its always the small town races were things get really intense. There is a school board race and a city council race down there that are pretty important to the community. To know San Elizario is to love it. While its most known for it's history, landmarks, historic, religious, and cultural sites, her beauty and tranquility, that isn't what is best about her. Its not even the fact that they seem to pretty much own the rest of Texas in cross country...

It looks like a slew of candidates gave up on transparency. Several candidates for the school board races simply didn't file campaign finance reports. Gary Berglund who is running in the Franklin area has not filed a report, and 8 day reports are required to be filed. For real. And I know this is going to shock you, but neither has District 7 Trustee Mickey Loweree. But come on, you just knew it was gonna be her, right? I mean, Carlos Sierra and filing a campaign finance report do not go together in a sentence unless its separated by the words did not file . Carmen Graham who is the incumbent for one of the EPCC Trustee seats, and should therefore know better, did not file a report either. Nina Piña apparently decided to leave Europe and come to El Paso where all us common folk are and filed a report, but it was late and hasn't been posted as of the time of this blog post. I'll go through them and post anything interesting about them.

Yesterday was an important hearing at TCEQ. It was to determine whether or not a medical waste facility, that has plans to be a regional dumping ground for medical waste would be allowed to begin operating in the Lower Valley. And not a single member of the El Paso legislative delegation attended, sent even a low-level staffer, or even bothered to send a letter opposing the facility. Had two elected officials - one from the County and one from the City - not shown up, the facility would've likely been approved and we'd have a medical waste facility in the Lower Valley. Everyone reading this knows that if this facility were planned for the westside, every damn member of the delegation would be leaning on that state agency to make sure a facility like that ever even had a machine start. Remember the recent "controversy" about the Hoover building on the west? They were building facility to process immigrants and everyone had a heart attack. Some fool even said that it di...

Are you mad as hell that Mickey Loweree appears to have lied to you about her education? Do you agree with what the El Paso Times Editorial Board said in their recent endorsements of EPISD candidates when they said: "Transparency should never be a luxury in public service. We should demand that those who choose such a role and take on the responsibility of guiding the education of our children meet the basic standards for transparency and accountability?" Because I do. I think that part of the editorial in particular spoke to a basic expectation that we should all have for elected officials that has been absent in EPISD lately. Well it also appears to have been absent in SISD Trustee candidate Josh Carter Guerra. I've made no secret that I'm not a fan of the guy, and this is just yet another example of why. While Josh Carter is running for the SISD Board of Trustees for the Montwood area in this cycle, he recently ran for the EPCC Board of Trustees in the 2017 cycle a...

I got Frank Macias' mailer today and it was interesting to me. He makes a "promise to never vote for a property tax increase." Never vote for a property tax increase. What an empty platitude. Seriously this kind of shit annoys me because its the kind of irresponsible things people say to get elected. But it damn sure isn't good policy. Now because you guys get your tangas in a twist, I'm not saying tax us to death, waste money, or be poor stewards of public tax dollars. If that is all you get from this, go back to elementary school and learn how to read. What I am saying is that if you've never served on a board or not the particulars about the budget, needs of the faculty, students, and staff, then you shouldn't say that you wouldn't raise taxes. The reality is you may be in a position where you have to raise taxes and there are any manner of situations that could put an entity in that situation. Saying you won't vote for a tax increase is the ea...

Niña Piña is a candidate on the eastside for an El Paso Community College Board of Trustees seat. Those are important seats but they have a really hard time with credibility in the community because, well its a school board seat for community college. People just don't know that is a thing. Well she apparently is SOOOOO committed to earning your vote, that she decided to take a European vacation during the run up to Early Voting and the first part of Early Voting. Nothing sends a clearer message that you don't give a damn about the office you're running for than going out of town in the middle of a campaign. Going out of the country, that is leveling up! Yep, that is how much she cares about being a trustee. Also, talk about being tone deaf about the community you're trying to represent...you're trying to get a seat on a board who's students are largely funding their collegiate investment through Pell grants and other financial aide, but you're off site seei...

Okay well it turns out just when you think Carlos Sierra can't possibly make things any worse for controversial EPISD Trustee Mickey Loweree, he apparently has. And this is like watching a train wreck in slow motion. You just knew it was going to end like this when he was emphatic about Loweree having proof of a degree from UTEP and 10 years of teaching experience in EPISD. Take note people, when you tell a journalist something, they are going to check your story. They aren't going to just take your word for it. So the media put in open record requests to verify Loweree's employment and education. And guess what? No record of employment as a teacher, no record of a degree from UTEP. Mickey Loweree decides to blame this on being bullied by Ross Moore of the AFT. Ross is a union boss and doing his job, protecting is profession. That is the ENTIRE job of a what a union boss is supposed to do. Thats not being a bully, that is catching someone in a big ass lie. Obviously the who...

I haven't seen a story handled this poorly by a campaign staff since David Saucedo's campaign team asked for a time-out in the middle of an interview when it wasn't going well. KVIA decided to follow-up on a story broken by the El Paso Times about Loweree's education and experience, or rather lack thereof in terms of what she stated to have on her bio on the EPISD website. From a public relations and campaign perspective, this is an example of a very easy story to deal with and kill immediately. First, if the facts are on your side, be first. Be first to release the information. Had they actually had documentation of the degree, teaching certification, and work experience, they should've released it right away. That would've undermined the union and prevented them from framing her has dishonest. If they had it and they didn't release it, then that is just simply a failure on the part of her campaign team. Frankly, unless Loweree for some reason didn't wa...

Controversial EPISD Trustee Mickey Loweree has raised eyebrows yet again in this campaign season. This time over a campaign mailer that features a vendor at EPISD. The vendor is El Paso Boxer David Rodriguez. Rodriguez has a contract to provide anti-bullying course/training/services (not really sure what to call it) at EPISD. I can't recall ever seeing a vendor actually show up on a mailer before, although they periodically donate to candidates. If you recall Loweree's predecessor was Dori Fenenbock and she rolled out the endorsement of Rodriguez in a pretty high-profile press event, only to have to walk it back shortly thereafter when Rodriguez' extremist policy stances - and overt support for Donald Trump came to light. At the time he had posted several Facebook posts that were considered anti-immigrant and sexist. Well since then, his demeanor doesn't appear to have evolved much. Here are a couple of recent examples of posts that are anti-immigrant and anti LGBTQ. Th...

Tom Hicks, one of the Carlos Sierra candidates FINALLY filed his campaign finance report. I've written about how how Carlos Sierra candidates always seem to have issues with reporting campaign expenses. Hicks was only about two weeks late! Anywho, he filed his report. Nothing earth shattering on it, other than the guy talking about integrity and honesty decided that the rules didn't apply to him so he didn't have to file a campaign finance report in his mind. But what is MORE interesting about the fact that he took so long to file a report was how former mayoral candidate David Saucedo decided to interject himself into the conversation. As you can see from this picture that I affectionately refer to as the Legion of Douche (its missing two guys that should be in it), Saucedo is a big supporter of Hicks. I recently wrote about the fact that Hicks hand't filed a campaign finance report. The fact that Hicks was the only candidate in EPISD that hadn't filed a campaign f...

El Paso Mayor Dee Margo put his campaign contributions on the agenda for the next meeting and turns out he did pretty nicely at his fundraiser.  As you may recall, I wrote about the fundraiser last week. It was held the day they were holding the memorial services for a fallen deputy who was killed in the line of duty. You may also recall that I questioned why the contributions were reported on the last agenda.  Anywho, he raised a pretty good chunk of money. The problem for Margo is that the money he raised just doesn't go very far. When Forma is your team, a big chunk of your money is eaten up in "consulting fees" and doesn't ever materialize in deliverables. So a hundred large is more like sixty.  But the bigger problem for Margo is that he's going to need a lot more money than what he raised, or he's screwed. The reality is that former Mayor Oscar Leeser is going to win.  I've made the mistake of underestimating Oscar Leeser and his name ID in the past....

Here is video from the Westside Dems candidate forum that was held on Wednesday. I'm posting the videos in the order the candidates appeared at the forum. Apologies for the shaky video, I didn't have my tripod and I recorded them on my phone. No commentary, just presenting it as it happened.

Well, talk about a surprising development. Carlos Sierra's candidate Mickey Loweree had some peculiar answers to the El Paso Times' questions about her experience and education . She was also at a candidate forum last night where she added another layer of intrigue to the questions surrounding her education. The Westside Dems asked the candidates to send in a bio so that it could be printed and the attendees could read about the candidate before they spoke so that the candidates didn't have to waste time giving biographical information. I'm gonna assume that Trustee Loweree's bio was submitted before the news story came out about the allegations from the El Paso American Federation of Teachers regarding Loweree's education and experience hit the news. Now keep up because Loweree's description of her education twists and turns quite a bit over time. So on her bio on the EPISD website it says that she has worked in EPISD as a teacher for 10 years and that she ...

Since we are on the topic of campaign finance reports and Republicans...Mayor Dee Margo had a campaign fundraiser recently. I mentioned it last week because I thought it was tone deaf for him to have it on the night of the vigil of a fallen sheriff's deputy. Well if memory serves, I think the city council requires donations of office holders above a certain amount to be reported at the next city council meeting. Council just met the other day and well, I didn't see any finance reporting on their agenda. So the questions that come to mind right away are - did he just drop the ball? If so, what are the penalties for doing so? Or did he just not raise that much money and didn't want to report it? It'll be interesting to see the answer...

The last post I did was about questionable items reported on a campaign finance report for a candidate tied to Carlos Sierra. This is about a candidate tied to Carlos Sierra that apparently didn't even bother to file a campaign finance report. Yet another candidate from Carlos Sierra's stable appears to have issues with reporting campaign financing in accordance with the law. I know, its almost comical at this point because Sierra is so synonymous with skirting or flat-out ignoring campaign finance reporting rules. Tom Hicks is a candidate for the EPISD seat for the Franklin area and is the ONLY candidate for EPISD in any of the feeder patterns that has NOT filed a campaign finance report. You are required to file a campaign finance report if you spend more than $500 on a given campaign. Given the number of signs he has up, a website, and printed materials - it is hard to believe that he hasn't exceeded the $500 threshold. At a time when transparency is such a focus at EPIS...

I swear, its always something when it comes to Carlos Sierra and finance reports. Trustee Mickey Loweree lists her occupation as a "volunteer" on her application to run for her seat. You can check here if you don't believe me . I don't know if she's independently wealthy or something but there were a few things on her campaign finance report made me curious, so I looked up the address she lists on CAD. She apparently isn't the owner, the owner's name is a guy named Edgar Norton. Here is a link to her full finance report , but I want to draw your attention to what made me curious about her place. Line 4 is how much she loaned herself for this campaign. Yeah, $10,000 is a lot of money for a school board election. I don't know that I've ever seen that much money spent for a school board election previously, which I guess is somewhat of a news story in and of itself. So she lists her occupation as a "volunteer" on the application for a place ...

I'll get to campaign finance reports a little later today, a few of the EPISD candidates don't have their campaign finance reports up yet - which could be they dropped the ball or could be no fault of their own. In the mean time, I'll share this. I was in a local drinking establishment the other evening having a nice tall frosty glass of cold milk to parch the thirst I worked up block walking for a Socorro ISD candidate when I noticed something on a fixture. The image caught my eye and then I noticed it on the bar and suddenly I noticed it throughout the place. This is the logo of the establishment. It obviously reminded me of EPISD Candidate Gary Berglund's campaign logo...for real. Minus the weird space in the middle that kind of looks like a vagina.

El Paso was set to host the 2020 Texas Democratic Party Convention - which would have been a perfect backdrop considering Beto is in his presidential run. Imagine how good that would be for El Paso - the economic impact of a major convention in the hometown of a major presidential candidate. You literally cannot buy press like that. But the El Paso Convention and Visitor's Bureau didn't compete for the convention. Despite former City Representative and current State Democratic Executive Committeeman Eddie Holguin getting the TDP to delay awarding the convention, TWICE, the City never put in for a bid. Seriously, that is a major screw-up on the part of the City, especially given how El Paso is becoming a bigger part of the national dialogue every day. This failure falls squarely on the shoulders of one person. Our Republican Mayor Dee Margo. Also, speaking of our Republican Mayor, it was pretty freaking tone deaf for him to hold his fundraiser the same night as the vigil for the...

I certainly wasn't expecting there to be fireworks at an endorsement meeting for the Eastside Democrats but it really hit the fan last night! Since the Eastside Democrats are a partisan organization that are issuing endorsements for nonpartisan elections, a question was asked about party affiliation of candidates - specifically associations with the GOP and voting history. This is a pretty routine question raised at partisan organizations during the endorsement season. Candidates are asked to disclose any associations with the GOP. EPCC Candidate Frank Macias mentioned his personal and family voting history of voting Democrat but made no mention of the fact that his campaign manager is an officer in a GOP student organization according to the El Paso County Republican Party website. Go ahead, go look. It is still there right now. Here's the link if you don't believe me . Here's a screenshot of the page. But that wasn't even close to the fireworks that happened with ...

Its been awhile since I've given out one of these awards but the Homeboys of the Month are Sheriff Richard Wiles and the El Paso County Sheriff's Officers' Association. Homeboys is a general term. It includes the several women who also participated in the escort! We lost a deputy that did a lot of work in the Valley and his presence is missed. People from the Lower Valley from Ysleta and Del Valle areas all the way out to San Eli and Tornillo showed their respect for the fallen deputy. Its impossible to have not been touched by this story. Sheriff Wiles is up for re-election and I give him props for being very low-key during this tragedy that has affected our community. You don't see him jumping in front of cameras trying to capitalize on a tragedy. The EPCSOA organized an escort for the deputy's daughter's first day back to school following the funeral of her late father. That is a beautiful gesture for the daughter to let her know that she will always have her...