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| City Commissioner Ben Neece |
The May 1 city election resulted in Pedro Cardenas and Commissioner Ben Neece qualifying for a runoff in District 4, finishing with 40% and 35% of the vote respectively. Joe Valdez, with 14%, and Beto Velez, garnering 11% of the votes, gained a little name recognition for next time.
Voters will have to decide if Cardenas, chronically absent while serving on the Greater Brownsville Incentives Corporation and missing all three candidate forums before the election, will actually have time to serve the city as a commissioner despite is duties as owner of Mi Pueblito Restaurant.
Cardenas told us that, while he and Neece may have similar goals for the city, his style differs greatly:
"The incumbent and I differ on how we intend to reach our goals. I believe in respectful dialogue and healthy compromise in order to work with all members of the commission towards common goals."
Cardenas' comment above likely refers to an unsavory online exchange between Neece and Brownsville restaurateur Bob Sanchez published in Juan Montoya's El Rrun Rrun blog.
Neece, elected in 2017 with a promise to get to the bottom of the 35% increase in electricity rates for a never-built power plant, states on his Facebook page:
"There are those who claim we aren't doing anything about Tenaska, but I assure you we are. We are conducting an audit, which, according to the information I received recently, is about 65% complete. It's not an easy undertaking, unlike the audit of the Brownsville Emergency Medical Services in 2017, which was PAPITAS, and resulted in a just and proper outcome and the end to certain corrupt practices being undertaken at EMS. The work would have continued had Commissioner Tetreau (who was under investigation by the A & O Committee) not abolished the Audit and Oversight Committee. Luckily we had the votes to re-establish the A & O Committee and, now it is working diligently on getting to the bottom of Tenaska."
Proposition 8, favored by Neece, making the Audit and Oversight Committee a permanent part of city structure, was approved in Saturday's election.
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