Two Public Hearings Where No One is Actually "Heard"

     When City Finance Director Pete Gonzalez mentioned the 6.11% tax adjustment some of us are ignorant enough to call a tax increase,  he also made it clear that,  under charter, the city must schedule two public hearings.   A "hearing" sort of implies that someone is listening, but in actual practice, that never occurs.  Otherwise, the mayor, commission and finance director would at least  acknowledge considering Robert Uresti's suggestion to convert city vehicles to propane, Fernando Ruiz's complaint that 375 acres of prime land were sold for a pittance, or Letty Perez-Garzoria's suggestion to tone down the catering of commission nourishment.  But that is not the way this works at all.  Perhaps "hearing" is the wrong word.  Verbal warning might be more accurate, followed by a written notice in the Brownsville Herald and then the inevitable increased taxes.
     Pete Gonzalez was primed in the second meeting to deal with the phrase "tax increase" that will never leave his lips.   He maintains that despite raising taxes by 6.11%, there was no actual increase in the "debt service tax rate."   Robert Uresti, who learned the arithmetic most of us use, gently corrected him.