Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Finance Director Unable to Slip Linebarger Past City Commission

Finance Director Pete Gonzalez tried to pull a fast one at the June 5 City Commission meeting, by depriving the City Commission of the opportunity to select a law firm for the lucrative contract of delinquent tax collection based on competitive presentations.  Gonzalez wanted the commission to simply rubber stamp a recommendation by a committee he characterized as "unanimous."

Commissioner Melissa Zamora wondered "why the commission was not given enough background to make an educated decision?"  "Did you request proposals?" countered Gonzalez.   "I always want enough background to make a good decision.  We were given two pages on this.  That's not enough," responded Zamora.

Quick on his feet, Gonzalez, perhaps facetiously, turned around to face the audience.  "I think we have representatives from all three firms here,   Perhaps, they would like to give some presentations."  No one came forward.

At this point, Pete Gonzalez called one of the members of the so-called "independent" committee forward.  The committee member reiterated that the decision to pick Linebarger was based on a sliding scale of criteria and was "unanimous."

Commissioner Rose Gowen had a question:  "Why did we not get presentations this time when we got them three years ago?"  He said he didn't have an answer for that. Responding to a question by Commissioner Tetreau as to which firm was least expensive for the taxpayer, the committee member admitted that would be the Pena firm.  But, he added, that he had done some calculations that indicated that when court costs and other fees were included, Linebarger was actually the least expensive.

More than once, Mayor Tony Martinez emphasized that "these were all good law firms."  When the mayor called for a motion to either approve or table the action item, he was met with total silence.   Threatening to simply move on to the next item without any action,  the mayor finally got a motion to table.  After stopping Commissioner Longoria from interjecting a thought, Martinez asked for a second.  The motion passed.

So, a deft attempt by Finance Director Pete Gonzalez to take even more decision-making out of the commission's hands was blocked.  The huge Linebarger law firm, noted for influence peddling and generous contributions to politicians, including our own BISD trustees, must wait till the next meeting to be reaffirmed or possibly replaced as the delinquent tax collector for the City of Brownsville.
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2 comments:

  1. AnonymousJune 5, 2012 at 9:33 PM

    On a similar subject, How was it decided to keep a contract for legal services with Attorney Ric Navarro even though he continues to lose cases and arbitrations at a significant cost to the tax payers ???? What monkey is getting the grease on that one ????

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  2. AnonymousJune 6, 2012 at 3:44 PM

    I don't remember seeing an anonymous committee on the ballot during election time. This is a significant decision that should be made by city commissioners, not just approved by them. I don't understand what makes a department head think it is appropriate to tell city government that they should make a certain decision without including a presentation supporting the recommendation and laying out how the conclusion was reached. At best it smacks of laziness by the department head and at worst it looks like manipulation. That he thinks he can get away with it makes it appear that he thinks the commissioners are to lazy or to inept to think for themselves. I hope that is not true. For here it looks like the women are the ones with the balls.
    Mescalero

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