A FEW THINGS I SHOULD HAVE WRITTEN ABOUT IF I WAS REALLY A BLOGGER!

Ana During Christmas Eve Visit "To Bukidnon Province"
to Tell Her Father about "Us"

I've been fortunate to have two wonderful, strong women in my life, first Nena for 49+ years and now, Ana. 

While U.S. immigration has slowed somewhat in the last two years, we've carefully filed our I-129f and are hopeful.  

If declined, we have options.  I could easily live out my life in the Philippines, creating a new niche for myself, but the preference for both of us is creating a partnership here in the U.S.

Ana will fit in seamlessly if given that opportunity.

Ricardo Longoria, Jr.

I ran into Ricardo Longoria, Sr. at the Taste of La Frontera event.  Nice man.  We didn't talk about Rick, Jr's health, but I empathize.  My own son, just 46, is in a similar situation,  a weird realization for a father to absorb.

Meanwhile, the City Commission continues the idiotic practice of holding "the public is welcome" workshops in the tiny quarters of the City Manager's conference room with 5 or 6 spectator chairs!  Do these dumbasses not realize how non-inclusive that looks?  The damn microphones do not even work.  Mayor Martinez HAS to be smarter than that!  

City Manager Noel Bernal

Speaking of the City Manager, is anyone else getting impatient with Noel Bernal's "first 100 days of "creating a culture" of inter-departmental cooperation before one iota of his "vision" for the city is implemented?  

Brownsville needs newly appointed hotshots, making ten times the region's average salary, to hit the ground running.  Please, Noel!  Make new business permits easier now and pontificate later!(Hopefully, this very nice young man will soon realize this city needs results, not mere contemplation.)

City Attorney Rene De Coss

We keep repeating that the entire point of creating 4A funding for economic development is to keep that exercise away from politics.  That is why we don't need city commissioners serving on the Greater Brownsville Incentives Corporation, but also we don't need the City Attorney serving as the legal representative for BOTH the City of Brownsville AND the GBIC.  It's such an obvious conflict of interest.

That is the same gig Mark Sossi had and now, foolishly, those two assignments have been bestowed upon Rene De Coss.  Yes, now De Coss can pocket $5,000 per month from the GBIC, just as his predecessor did, but it's a bad idea.  

De Coss has done some real work, though.  He's already read through the city's expired Code of Ethics, giving recommendations for improvement to the commission.  That's more work in two weeks than Sossi did on the ethics code in half a decade or so.