CORRECTING THE DISINFORMATION ABOUT THE "STUDY" PAID FOR BY THE GBIC

Tom Stellman, President/CEO
of TIP Strategies, Inc.

Tom Stellman, President/CEO of Tip Strategies, Inc.,  according to his bio on the company website, is "the lead author in the TIP's Automotive Profile" and "has spoken extensively about automotive supplier attraction strategies."

Tracye McDaniel, CEO of
McDaniel Strategy Ecosystems

Mr. Stellman, along with TIP senior associate John Karras and Tracye McDaniel of McDaniel Strategy Ecosystems, were in Brownsville Thursday evening for their second presentation to the Greater Brownsville Incentives Corporation.

Over the weekend, an anonymous person, having the ear of blogger Juan Montoya, attempted to discredit some of the facts of our August 16 story on the GBIC meeting at City Hall. 

Montoya simply reposted our article, inserting "counterpoints" from the unidentified contributor, most being factually incorrect, another partially correct, but not differing essentially from what we reported.

The most telling discrepancy by the secret source is that the two firms described above were not paid for their services.

I clearly asked Mr. Stellman of Tip Strategies, Inc. if his firm had been paid yet for their services.  Stellman clearly said "yes."

Next, I asked: "how much?"

"$120,000" was Stellman's response and I don't believe he was lying.  The City of Brownsville pays for services rendered.

Goofy Mike Hernandez III,
OP 10.33 Guru

A telling paragraph included in the "counterpoints" of Juan's repost gives us a clue as to the source of the disinformation:  

"A number of initiatives m in the IB plan were implemented by entities that participated in putting the plan together and that have been a crucial part of moving the community forward including the cross valley power line; Resaca restoration; upgrading the Robindale wastewater plant; creating the BiNED cluster-based economic development strategy that’s become the cornerstone of the OP10.33 economic framework (light manufacturing, heavy manufacturing, hospitality and tourism) and recently became a committee of the LRGVDC; and the $1.5 million "All In" educational/career development grant to United Way among others."

IMHO, automotive entrepreneur Mike Hernandez III is not capable of writing the above paragraph.  He was not even here for the BiNed Economic Summit held December 6, 2013 at the Gran Salon, covered gavel to gavel in this blog.  

Who might be compelled to rewrite history, essentially crediting United Brownsville with everything from resaca restoration to curbside recycling, all projects administered by the City of Brownsville and P.U.B., not the phony shadow government? 

Could that dispenser of disinformation be Carlos Marin, the CEO of Ambiotec, who pocketed the $900,000 for writing the Imagine Brownsville paperback?

Carlos Marin

Yet, if the BiNed "cluster-based strategy" was actually implemented, why was there such an extraordinary push in 2015 to give Jacobs Engineering $750,000 to "implement" the Greater Brownsville Infrastructure & Development Plan for which the taxpayers paid $454,592.08?

Montoya's covert contributor, whether using his own words or another's, claims the "the Jacobs $750k study was never funded by anyone."

Here are the facts, reported in this blog in 2015:

"Jacobs Engineering, the winning bidder and, according to Hilts, the only company to respond to the RFQ, Request for Quotation, was kind enough to offer the plan to be financed in three phases. The GBIC, Port of Brownsville and the Public Utilities Board chose to initially finance Phase I at a cost of $185,000. Hilts also introduced to the GBIC Board, Oscar Garcia, Jr., a well-known Carlos Marin puppet, as Jacobs Engineering choice as Project Engineer.

In his role as "Project Engineer," young Garcia has been busy trying to get the taxpayers to pay for Phase II of the implementation plan of the development and infrastructure plan for an additional $407,000. It has been tough sledding for Oscar. After being turned down by the BEDC, the persistent engineer appeared before the City Commission with his hand out for the $407,000. Still, no cigar!"

So, the truth is that only Phase 1 was funded, with an initial payment of $185,000 to Jacobs Engineering to "implement" the Port of Brownsville and industrial corridor plan, but never the entire $750,000.

The anonymous "counterpointer" also claims:  "GBIC only funded in a very minor way the imagine Brownsville plan."

How is that substantially different from what I wrote:  "Notice just a few of the cons financed in whole or in part by the GBIC in recent years?"