While Martinez Lets Charlie Cabler Twist in the Wind, Commissioner Longoria Puts the Blame on Martinez and Gowen

The city's explanation for the abrupt cancellation of the special City Commission meeting June 18 to discuss a real estate transaction between the city and UTB seemed to lay the blame on City Manager Charlie Cabler:

NOTICE OF POSTPONEMENT OF CITY COMMISSION MEETING OF 6/18/2013.
To all:
The decision to postpone the commission meeting, scheduled for this evening, was made at the request of our City Manager to better prepare to inform our commission of the details of the UTB request for lease space at the City Plaza and Cueto Buildings. Specific information as to the terms and length of lease are not available at this time . The university staff is working on details to present to city administration. If approved, relocation of city departments will be to vacate city-owned property such as Market Square etc., however, those details are pending and will not be ready today, thus, the request by our City Manager to postpone the meeting.

Before an important decision of this nature is made all the details need to be organized and presented to our commission and this will be worked on and presented at a later date to be determined.
Thank you.

When a Brownsville Herald story clearly laid blame for postponement of the special meeting at the feet of Cabler, Commissioner Ricardo Longoria added a comment to the article indicating this not to be the case:

Ricardo Longoria Jr. · AP Spanish teacher at Brownsville Independent School District
How can Charlie Cabler opt to cancel the meeting when the item was placed on the agenda by Mayor Tony Martinez and Commissioner Rose Gowen? It wasn't a Staff Agenda item; it wasn't even a scheduled meeting. Open your eyes citizens of Brownsville. The university is looking at other options, but some elected officials have other plans for the city's asset's[sic].

It has been Mayor Tony Martinez, running around like a chicken with his head cut off, trying to placate Juliet Garcia, wanting to turn over 48 acres of "surplus" Brownsville land, the convenient and well-suited City Plaza, offices in the Cueto Building, while proposing to stuff Brownsville city administrators into the antiquated, dusty Casa del Nylon.  

Commissioner Gowen, Mayor Martinez

It is certainly Martinez, not Cabler, who is foolishly trying to push this poorly-thought-out transfer of properties without due diligence.  Is Martinez a structural engineer?  Does he even know if the Casa del Nylon's so-called second floor, that is, in reality simply a dusty, unfinished attic, will support office personnel, desks and citizens?  City Plaza has, not only an adjacent parking garage, but convenient, across-the-street parking, enabling citizens to easily do their business.  Where will city employees and administrators park, once moved to the inadequate Casa del Nylon?  Ground hasn't even been broken on the new parking garage on Adams St., so, although it was scheduled for completion in the fall of 2013, it won't be finished for at least 18 months, if not two years.  

The more pertinent questions are:  "Why is our mayor treating the taxpayers and employees of the City of Brownsville as second class citizens while doting on Juliet Garcia, trying to fulfill her every desire before she can even articulate it?  Why is the mayor not more concerned with the actual needs of the city, like fixing the hellacious pot holes on N. Iowa Rd. adjacent to the airport, the bumpy right hand lane of Paredes Line Road from the cemetary to Boca Chica Blvd., the horrible 14th Street, a principal artery into the city?"  Clearly, someone needs to get their priorities straight.