Brownsville Metro's Downtown Parking Garage Stuck in Concrete

Sign(now torn down) Announcing Downtown Parking Garage

In this sometimes frugal city, signs are typically updated, not discarded.  The "$3.99 Lunch Special" is blacked out, repainted, reincarnated as the "$4.99 Lunch Special."

Sylvia Garza-Perez had her Cameron County "Judge" signs cleverly covered with "Clerk."(A septuagenarian candidate was even accused of using his high school graduation picture on his campaign sign.)  Penny-pinching candidates all over town cover "10" with "12," then "14," demonstrating how careful they will be with taxpayer money.

The sign in the picture above did not get the typical Brownsville "upgrade," but when the "completion date" of the "Fall of 2013" failed to materialize, the sign was simply uprooted.  

Brownsville Metro's top two officers, Director Norma Zamora and Assistant Director Andrew Munoz, appeared before the Greater Brownsville Incentives Corporation 4/17/14 to ask for a repayment "extension," on monies already advanced.  

In a move of sheer protocol, Director Zamora came merely to give Assistant Director Munoz a 15 second introduction.  Munoz, it seems, is the detail man on Brownsville Metro's (Planned) Downtown Parking Garage.

Munoz covered very familiar ground in describing the work by P.U.B. to electrify the garage.  We heard eighteen months ago about the high cost involved in going underground from International to E. 14th Street.  

This was the first time Munoz mentioned a "soil sample," not saying whether it was taken in 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 or 2014.  Anyway, the soil sample reveals that the concept's original plans calling for 50 piers, 50 foot deep, is inadequate.  The soil sample mandates 160 auger piers, 85 foot deep.  The additional concrete alone adds $650,000 to the project.  

Brownsville Metro received a one year "deferment"(remember that word, Vietnam era guys?), but no money.  They will ask the City of Brownsville for $650,000 in matching funds to complete the project.