Fireworks Fly During Southwest Texas LIVE! City Candidates Debates

April 20, 2008
By Joe Hyde
Special to LIVE!

Fireworks and frank discussions occurred when two pairs of candidates for Del Rio city government squared off Thursday evening at the Kennedy Room of the Del Rio Civic Center for a lively debate sponsored by the Del Rio Chamber of Commerce and Southwest Texas LIVE! There were 83 citizens in attendance.

Mary Ann Zepeda and Ron Burton are locked in a race for the only contested city councilperson-at-large position, and Robert Garza is challenging incumbent Efrain Valdez to be Del Rio’s next mayor.

Former Del Rio Mayor Dora Alcala fired up the debate with a politically-charged question to all candidates concerning the city council’s recent decision to provide about $7,700 in “in kind” contributions to the George Paul Memorial Bull Riding organization that holds the annual stand-alone bull riding event in Del Rio May 3 and 4. Alcala asked Valdez, “What is the rationale and legality for giving out that [taxpayers’] money?’

Mayor Valdez said the event brings in money to the local economy, and that the city’s contribution will bring millions of dollars in exposure to the local economy. “To advertise [Del Rio] nationally on television would have cost millions of dollars. We are getting that kind of return on our money,” Valdez said. The George Paul will be televised for the first time ever this year on the cable channel RFD TV. Burton agreed. “Anything that has significant ‘bang for the buck,’ a good return on investment, is worthy of consideration,” he said.

Garza, however, took the opportunity to attack his opponent. “This council’s action reflects a clear lack of understanding of the fundamental concepts of good government,” he said. “Never can the city donate taxpayer dollars to a private individual. I disagree with the decision. I also don’t believe the city can legally do that. It is unethical to use city funds to pay for a Las Vegas trip while at the same time refuse to help the Brown Plaza Association,” he said. Part of the $7,700 package for George Paul is rumored to include a $600 voucher for air travel. The Brown Plaza Association is seeking funds for the annual Cinco de Mayo celebration this year and has so far been refused help from the city. Mary Ann Zepeda agreed with Garza. “I am all for promoting Del Rio, but using taxpayer money in that way is not a way to go,” she said.

The debate began at 7 p.m. Thursday evening with introductions of the candidates followed by a two-hour question and answer period with questions prepared by Bill Sontag, the moderator. The last hour fielded audience questions and questions posed on the Southwest Texas LIVE! message board.

Mary Ann Zepeda said she was running because “People need someone on the council who will listen.” Burton noted that although he is not originally from Del Rio, that he spent a large part of his life as a software engineer in Dallas, his ties to Del Rio are deep in the family and he has chosen the city as a place to retire. Garza said that he relocated to Del Rio from Brackettville in the 1980s to serve as Del Rio’s city attorney and hasn’t looked back since. “We need to take proactive action now so we don’t repeat the same mistakes in the past,” he said. “We don’t want to revert back to crisis-type management,” he added. Valdez said he is running for mayor to make sure many of the projects started now are “done right.” “I want to make sure the infrastructure is done right,” he said. He noted that ‘meet and confer’ was initiated under his administration to try to solve the low pay of the Del Rio Fire and Rescue Department. Finally, Valdez noted that the city defeated the lawsuit brought against the city by developer David Earl. “We took it all the way to the [Texas] Supreme Court and won that case against Earl,” he said.

Sontag posed the first question to Valdez. What are you going to do to accelerate repairs and maintenance on the city’s streets?

Valdez noted that there are 255 miles of pavement the city for which the city is responsible. And upgrading it all according to the plan his administration has in place, is going to cost around $95 million. He said they are working with NADBANK, making drainage studies, and making plans to add more curbs, gutters, and better drainage. “But we also spent a half million dollars defending the city,” Valdez said, pointing towards the David Earl lawsuit that would have placed twenty years of unfunded liabilities on the city’s general fund.

Garza noted that the enterprise funds have an over-reliance on the city’s general fund. Enterprise funds, meaning revenues generated by the water, sewage, and gas departments, should be used to supplement the city’s general revenues, not the other way around, according to Garza. “I will work towards ending that reliance,” he said. And that will free money up for capital improvements like upgrading the city’s streets.

The next question was what each candidate would do to protect the grounds underneath the airspace in the immediate vicinity of Laughlin Air Force Base’s traffic patterns. The land at the west gate of Laughlin, and underneath the T-6 traffic pattern, has been slated for a massive housing and retail development called “Monarch Crossing” by San Antonio developer David Earl.

“Protecting Laughlin’s airspace is not a new problem,” Garza said. He said he was involved in a similar fight near Spofford during the last decade involving industrial development that could have posed an encroachment problem in a previous term on city council. “What we should do in limit all development in the immediate vicinity of Laughlin to five or ten acre tracts,” Garza said.

Valdez countered that nothing should be done until the Joint Land Use Study (JLUS) is completed next month, in May 2008. “It will tell us what to do to protect Laughlin,” Valdez said. Zepeda echoed Garza’s suggestion. “Use agriculture to keep the area around Laughlin clear so nothing can be built around it,” she said. Burton listed a number of dates for various releases of the JLUS next month and emphatically stated, “Do not allow encroachment.”

Sontag’s next question was how the next administration might attract new industry to Del Rio. Burton was the first one to respond.

“We need to consider land use, follow the comprehensive master plan, and manage our growth capacity,” he said. He noted that he serves on the current mayor’s Economic Advisory Committee. “And we should watch out for those projects that ask the city to assume 100 percent of the risk and share in only 10 percent of the profit,” he said.

“Everywhere I go, I am marketing the city,” Valdez said. He noted that he just recently returned from Denver where he “sold Del Rio” and persuaded the board of the annual Ports-to-Plains convention to hold it in Del Rio this year. Valdez also noted that his administration is asking for money from the state and seeking more grants than ever before. Finally, Valdez noted that the city needs to work on upgrading the infrastructure and improving the workforce labor skills to attract industry.

“Infrastructure is not a novel or new idea,” Garza said. He said the city is too focused on retail growth, not industrial or service sector jobs. “We need to focus on businesses that hire 200 to 300 people,” he said. He suggested an aggressive effort to recruit call centers and order processing companies to the city.

How to better manage the city’s revenue entered the debate. Valdez agreed with Garza somewhat, noting that enterprise funds need to operate on a “break-even” basis. But, he lamented, it is not always easy to find the right balance. “If water is too cheap, we use too much or it,” he said. “If gas is too cheap, we use too much hot water.”

Zepeda didn’t leave many options on the table. “In my opinion, raising utilities isn’t the answer. And raising taxes isn’t one of them either,” she said.

Garza said he wanted water, sewage and gas rates at a level that will cover the cost of improvements and reiterated his suggestion that the general fund is over reliant on the enterprise funds. But he suggested other plans for the international bridge.

“The bridge is a business,” he said. “Over the past ten years, it has generated $35 million in revenues. It more than pays for itself,” he said. “It is there to make money and to keep the city’s tax rate low” Citing previous council experience where he spearheaded a rate increase for bridge crossings to solve the city’s financial crisis in the late 1990s, Garza said the city should explore other ideas like the bridge to make money for the city in lieu of higher taxes.

Valdez tried to inject reality into the discussion by pointing out that the city is losing revenue at the bridge due to new border crossing requirements brought about since the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. But, he is hopeful revenue will again start rising once the federally funded port-of-entry expansion is completed. The $20 million project will increase the bridge’s entry capacity to twelve lanes, he said. He suggested thinking outside the box to solve the crossing requirements. “We need to get [the state] to place a [computer] chip on drivers’ licenses,” he said, to forgo having to obtain a passport to cross into and back from Mexico.

Individually Tailored Questions

Noting that Burton has a reputation for being a number cruncher, and that many of the decisions put in front of city council are intangible, Burton was asked how he would deal with this. Burton said, “When there is only a finite amount of money,” suggesting that having a number cruncher on council isn’t a bad thing. Burton also indicated that his knowledge of bills presented to the Texas legislature would be an intangible benefit, not involving number crunching. For example, if the Texas Legislature attempts to pass a law that will affect Del Rio, he will know enough of the details to alert the council on it’s ramifications.

Zepeda was asked what the topmost issues that loom on the horizon for the city are. “Laughlin AFB. We need to keep it safe. Keep the airspace safe from surrounding development,” she said. Streets were the second priority and making sure the city water system remains “safe” was third.

Garza was asked how he might have handled the SE Ranch issue differently if he was in city government at the time. Garza didn’t miss a beat to lash out at the incumbent, Valdez, who he thought was taking full credit for the positive outcome. “I think, again, when it first surfaced that it is laughable for anyone to take credit [for preventing the development so far],” he said. Garza gave credit for stopping SE Ranch to the approximately 1500 citizens who organized over an Easter Weekend in 2005 and signed the original petition to have the council reverse its earlier decision to create a TIRZ to develop the project with city help. “This is not the first time something like this has happened,” he continued. He said that the entire debacle could have been avoided if the city had already zoned restrictions around Laughlin AFB. “It is inexcusable this wasn’t done,” he said.

Valdez was asked if he would implement the recommendations of the JLUS or allow the document to collect dust once published. “It is up to the people to implement the JLUS,” he said. “The JLUS is only as good as how you implement it.”

Burton was asked how he would attempt to rekindle an effort to protect Del Rio’s water supply in light of the two recent failures to organize a ground water conservation district in the county. Burton said that he wants to get the commissioners court to draft new legislation to create the district taking into account the city’s position. He said the city couldn’t allow the GCD to cap the city’s water consumption at current levels “to allow marketers to sell the surplus.”

Zepeda was asked if she supports implementing a recycling program for the city. She said the city should immediately implement a study on how to do it, and “make recycling a way of life in Del Rio.”

Citizens’ Questions

Dan Riley said he was worried about the competency of the legal department at city hall. “That water venture at the ‘Y’ … The city spent close to $1.5 million on that venture,” he said. The city purchased land at the north end of town for the purpose of drilling a water well to supplement the city water supply. After the well was drilled and the pumps purchased and installed, the city learned that the land purchase did not include mineral rights, and that the city did not own the water below.

Burton answered first. He said that there are annual evaluations of city employees and that something like this would be brought up in executive session. Zepeda went next. She said not being able to pump the water out of the ground at the “Y” was “like laying a gas line through the street and then saying you can’t use it.”

Valdez defended the city’s attorney. “We are asking for an attorney that knows how to do everything. I don’t think we can afford one [if one exists],” he said. Valdez suggested that the city be allowed to hire more contract lawyers to help with the caseload on specialty cases.

Former city attorney Garza was less forgiving. “A warranty deed is about as basic level of a legal issue as there can be. This is basic first year law school stuff,” he said. Garza said that he would use his experience to provide better scrutiny of the city attorney.

Carmen Guerrero asked Valdez what could be done to improve the quality of life in Del Rio. Valdez replied that there is a need for job training to increase the availability of skilled labor. “What got me through college was my ability to be a car mechanic,” Valdez said. Valdez indicated that training for skilled labor is a stepping-stone towards four-year degrees and that “we can improve the quality of life in Del Rio by providing more opportunities for training.”

Burton said that the city needs to closely monitor grant opportunities that will increase the availability to health care and nutrition. “But I realize that there is a limit to what the city can do in the area of health care,” he said.

Garza fired off again at Valdez noting that when both men were on council together earlier this decade that Valdez opposed the United Medical Center being built on De La Rosa St. “I supported it,” Garza said. UMC provides medical care in clinics located generally in low income areas in southwest Texas. Garza also suggested that a four-year university should be recruited to the area.

The debate was spirited at times, but it ended in a cordial atmosphere with each candidate congratulating the other on his or her performance. The election for city offices will be held May 10. Burton and Zepeda are vying for Rudy Chapa’s seat; Councilman-At-Large Place A. Mike Wrob and Tina Martinez are current members of council who are running unopposed. Garza previously ran for mayor. He was defeated in 2004 in that race by Dora Alcala.