El Paso Politics

Seriously, leave it to a Gandara to pull some crap like this. Ironically Councilman Cox saved him. This item was on the agenda last night. Councilman Anthony Gandara wanted to slide in a new project into the pacing schedule for the city of Socorro.  Normally it's done by street and depends on the traffic of the street and how poor condition the street is in. Gandara tried to sneak in an entire subdivision. He actually probably got the idea from Cox who has done something similar but that's for another post because there's a bigger paper trail for me to show you. Anywho, here's the item. Maybe he should see about getting Fray Olguin paved before repaving that subdivision. Why does he want that subdivision paved so badly? Because that's where he lives with his parents. Here's the CAD record: And as you can see from the screen shot from his application to run for office, it's the same address he lists as his home address.  This is why people in Socorro don'...

Read campaign finance reports. They are enlightening. There are a million reasons to vote, but let me give you a really important one. Some of the richest people in El Paso have gotten together to invest  some campaign money into candidates. The group is known by a lot of names, but Creed is probably the most noteworthy. They have dropped some major cash into the school board races in Ysleta and EPISD. You need to know that. And thanks to State Rep Marisa Marquez, now you know where the cash is coming from and who its going to. Ironically, its going to Forma Group to run their campaigns. The big business people have dumped about $8,000 just on one candidate in the Bel Air trustee district. The candidate is Mary First Perales. Before I go further, let me explain that she is a really nice lady. Ironically, she really does have a great sense of humor. She and her family are really nice people and I don't think they have any motive to run other than to do the best for kids possible. An...

The Flying Monkey errand boy for some behind-the-scenes people in El Paso, Martin Paredes is jealous that he couldn't get anyone to buy an ad on his blog. There's a reason I call him Fallas Paredes now. Because he's the discounted cheap knock-off of the blogosphere. Poor Martin is really bothered by the fact that all he does is talk smack about me and he can't sell one lousy ad for $100 on his blog. Look, its the free market speaking Martin. More people read my blog. I don't like to toot my own horn but lets be real Martin, I'm better at this than you are. I have better content. I pump out more pieces. I work harder than you. I've forgotten more about local politics than you'll ever know. I know what effective campaigning looks like. You're just an angry man who couldn't cut it here. But let me offer the little monkey some sage advice to help improve. Don't suck. Honestly Martin, I've tried to read through your stuff sometimes and its tor...

Forma Group really $crewed up in term$ of a bu$ine$$move in thi$ cycle.  They not only backed out of a contract to go work for the opponent, but if you look at the late$t finance report$ you might be able to $ee their motivation.  A$ you can clearly $ee, Peter paid $2000.  Weisenberger paid them much more. Like over $10 grand! Don't believe me, $see for you$elf in this $creen$hot of Weisenberger's report: What a terrible me$$age to $end to potential future client$. Za$!

I don't do endorsements and they don't help anyone. Not only do they not help, no candidate would be stupid enough to want it anyway. But I frequently am asked for details about a particular candidate or issue and often people ask me who/how I'm voting. Plus there are a lot of people who are voting that don't normally vote. Which means they are going to be all over the place and impossible to predict what they are going to do. The Fire Fighter Issues UNDECIDED - I'm a union guy, so I'm inclined to support them. But the drug test thing is simply ridiculous to me. I'll make up my mind today. District 1 No dog in the fight because I don't live there. I've said it all along and no one took me serious, but I think it will be a run off between Peter Svarzbein and Al Weisenberger. Gallardo has been pretty unimpressive and so has Bonart's ground game. I expected more out of Gallardo's team. This becomes a contrast between the new and the old. With al...

The spokesman for the AFSCME Local 51 Hector Montes, appears to imply that the chapter is weighing in on an issue that is being championed by his close friend Stephanie Townsend-Allala. I was unaware they were taking a position but here's a screen shot so you can see for yourself.  Montes, the controversial former talk radio host who once managed the campaign of a figure in the public corruption case, has made it a practice of insulting the members of various government bodies that the Union deals with. Today was no different, although he now appears to have focused on Judge Escobar, Commissioner Perez and Commissioner Stout. It is unclear if it is the official opinion of ASCME that Commissioner Stout is unable to put a sentence together but Commissioner Stout has been a vocal proponent of labor. He spoke just a couple of weeks ago to members of another union, along with County Judge Eacobar and Senator Rodriguez. All three were complimented by union leadership and membership for t...

Gotta tip your hat to the firefighters. Everyone's numbers are thrown off because of so many voters that are coming to the polls that never voted before. Why? Because of the fire fighter ballot items. Firefighter, retired firefighters, family, and friends are coming out like crazy.  And they are gonna win even if they screwed up at first. The only message that voters are getting is to support the item. "Yes" is the only group making phone calls, manning polls, and sending mail.