Thursday, July 11, 2013

UT/TSC Reach Building/Land Agreement as Mayor Tony Martinez Told by Regents to "Butt Out," Stop "Meddling"

University of Texas Regents
The University of Texas Regents and the Texas Southmost College Board of Trustees just completed a multi-layered land/building swap to facilitate the interests of both institutions despite the annoying "meddling" of Brownsville Mayor Tony Martinez.  Like the Biblical Uzzah, who presumptuously tried to "steady the Ark of God" when it appeared the oxen cart carrying it was going to capsize, Mayor Tony arrogantly assumed that the University of Texas Regents needed his expertise to get the job done.  While the God of the Bible "smote Uzzah,"  Mayor Tony was simply told to "butt out" by the regents.

For the last several months, we've witnessed the normally sedentary mayor, functioning like a bat out of hell behind the scenes to purchase with taxpayer money 11 properties for $3,500,000 to accommodate  the needs of a future satellite campus of the proposed University of the Americas.  Not only was all of this speculative real estate activity by the Mayor and the rubber stamp City Commissioners ill-advised, it was unnecessary.  The University of Texas Regents had this one covered, thank-you-very-much, without the Mayor steadying the ark as it were.

Mayor Tony Martinez
"The mayor was envisioning UTB to be something like New York University, using numerous buildings in the city to complete its campus, but land is cheap in Brownsville compared to NYC, where a single linear foot of store front can be prohibitive.  In Texas, we just find 60 or 70 acres of land and build a campus to suit," suggested one local political operative.

We're told that what unnerved the regents was the proposed gifting or leasing of the idyllic City Plaza to the University of Texas.  Something needed even less by UT than a handout from Brownsville is the wrath of citizens and city officials inconvenienced by a rich university system.  The proposal was not just a dumb idea, but potentially disastrous public relations.

Perhaps stung by the rebuff from the regents, Mayor Tony, in his Mayor's Report at the last City Commission meeting, lauded the agreement between the University of Texas Systems and Texas Southmost College.  He name-dropped UT Chancellor Francisco G. Cigarroa and outgoing UTB President Juliet Garcia, as if he was a player in the negotiations as part of city business.

It's not as if the City of Brownsville is so well maintained and promoted that this impoverished community can afford to see its city government turn its attention away from city needs to placate the interests of one of the world's richest university systems.  Our downtown continues in decay.  While local businessmen have
Sign(Now Removed) Promising
Downtown Parking Garage
invested in the so-called Downtown Entertainment District with a dozen or so clubs due to open soon, the downtown parking garage promised to provide safe parking for patrons, originally scheduled for completion in the fall of 2013, has not even had a groundbreaking.  With the time lag, the estimated 18 month project finds itself underfunded and must go back through the BEDC, GBIC regimen for additional monies.

Brownsville is stuck with Martinez for two more years.  Could someone please explain to the Harlingen native what it means to actually "Believe in Brownsville?"



 

11 comments:

  1. Amazing how the scarce voting public in Brownsville fell for avalanche of blue campaign signs this 4 year term Mayor put out for his own financial windfall. It is pretty obvious Tony and his buddies own a sizable chunk of downtown Brownsville and are only trying to jack up his investments worth. Voter apathy helps the well to do get elected to screw the common citizen here in Brownsville. To think some voters were ignorant enough to vote for this jackass.

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    1. "...To think some voters were ignorant enough to vote for this jackass..." that's what you call LOW INFORMATION VOTERS who are 100% democRATS LMAO LMAO

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  2. both martinez and juliet had no part in helping the negotiations between TSC and UT System. In fact, progress in these talks began only when juliet was told to also butt out.

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  3. Still on the mayor, Jim? sad.

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  4. Why is it sad? This is what I want to know about. I can not believe in the BH so I turn to the blogs. I hope that Phony MartΓ­nez and the Wicked Witch of the Universe of Texas at Brownsville were told to butt out. Butt out, throw them out , just get out, get out of town. No one likes them or respects them. Now that is sad.

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  5. Where did this "University of the Americas" come from? Is it official, because if it is we have even a bigger joke on our hands than one could have imagined. There already is an University of the Americas in Puebla, Mexico. It has been around for over 70 years and is run by some of the wealthiest and most influential people in Mexico. You might want to check with them before you steal their name. It would be one thing if the already named university were in Patagonia but they are our neighbor, so to speak.

    On to real estate, that is the least of UT-Whatever satellite's problems. Numero uno is students. Where are these students going to come from now that TSC will get most of the first two year students because of the higher "standards" required from the Board of Regents to be a full pledged University with access to "unlimited" cash of the permanent fund. Good luck. UT-Whatever will always be a commuter university. No student in their right mind is going to move to Brownsville to attend a university of this caliber. There is literally a state university in every town and city in Texas within walking distance of a student's home. Tell me what the great draw will be? In reality, there should be only one UT-Whatever University in the Valley and that is in Edinburg. The resources should be concentrated there. Now we have this duplication of services we had before with the previous "merger" that worked so well. Now we are off another Julieta ego trip. The Magic Valley does not have the resources to sustain two research level universities, period. It would hard enough to have just one.

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  6. Without the port and BISD, Brownsville would have all the economic might of Rio Grande City on a good day. The port has a future and the BISD is feed by a crop that never fails. As long as the taxpayer money flows in from Central and North Texas, and DC, the circus will play. The town will rue the day the free money stops and it will. In the grand scheme of things, Antonio's downtown real estate empire has all the future of a very tiny Detroit.

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    1. Stop it Barton! You posted this comment. admit it, dude!

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    2. Wrong again! I'm not sure I even agree with it.

      Jim

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  7. Here you go. Top five employers in Brownsville. All public but one private that pays the same wages as Indonesia.

    1 Brownsville Independent School District Education 7,708
    2 University of Texas at Brownsville / Texas Southmost College Education 2,343
    3 Cameron County Government 2,040
    4 Keppel Amfels Manufacturing 1,650
    5 City of Brownsville Government 1,200

    The BISD budget is 529 million
    The Plano ISD budget is 435 million
    Plano has 55,000 students and a population of 225,000
    Brownsville has 50,000 students and a population of 180,000
    (numbers rounded off for ease of interpretation)

    What is wrong with this picture?

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    1. LOW INFORMATION democRATAS ARE INCHARGE.

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