$250,000 burning a hole in city's pockets. Let's get some parking meters!

It's ironic that the city has never given much support to promoting businesses downtown. Now, all of a sudden, they are jumping at the chance to install some new, state-of-the-art parking meters that will take credit and debit cards. No word if they will also accept the Lone Star card.

Forget about the city's budget problems, all of a sudden they found $250,000 to splurge in the parking meter fund. Maybe they figure that if you install the meters, they will come.

Here's what the agenda background info back in June of this year looked like.

From the City of Laredo's agenda for June 17th, 2013

The pilot project will entail the installation of 50 new state-of-the-art single parking meters and 25 vehicle detection sensors to reset meters at locations selected by the Parking Meter Division. The pilot project will be in place for a period ofthree (3) months and is scheduled to start approximately in August 2013 and end October 2013.

 

 The City will bare no cost during the implementation of the three (3) month pilot project. The new parking meters include GPRS Wireless communication, solar and battery power; live monitoring for maintenance, audit and enforcement purposes.

Parking meter payment options will be coins and credit cards with future capabilities for pay by cell, tokens, and smart cards. The pilot project will evaluate the revenue of collections comparing current meters with new parking meter options.

The Parking Meter Fund currently has funding to upgrade approximately 300 parking meters including AutoTRAX license and merchant fees should the City decide to proceed with awarding contract to IPS Group after the pilot project.

 

FINANCIAL: $250,000 is available in the Parking Meter Fund.

RECOMMENDATION: STAFF:Staff recommends to proceed with the single parking meter pilot project.

Henry gets stuck due to train, city council tripping over itself to respond.

US congressman from Laredo, Henry Cuellar -D (28), apparently got blocked by the KCS train this afternoon  for about 45 minutes.  He placed a call to city officials (City Manager) and wants something done about this- yesterday. According to Planning and Zoning director Nathan Bratton, a meeting with KCS "corporate" is shaping up in the next couple of weeks.

Of course, something needs to be done to avoid blocking city crossings for any lengthy amount(s) of time. If it takes Henry himself being blocked by the train for something to (maybe) be done- so be it. The mayor and others are correct in saying that these crossings should not be blocked long, especially when an emergency arises.

From past discussions, it doesn't seem that local governments can do much about such things. It appears that it's the Feds that usually make these types of calls when it comes to the nation's trains.

Ever opportunistic, Cm. Alex Perez, quickly added that this issue should be something to discuss when "we go to Washington". There goes another $100,000 dollars again. And that's only for the trip to the nation's capital.

Texas Tribune keeps on trackin'

The Texas Tribune has just updated it's database of government employees' salaries. This includes your very own local, City of Laredo.  According to the Tribune's latest figures. There are 36  city of Laredo public employees (paid with your taxes and mine) making over $100,000 a year. Many of these are well over the $100K mark.  Even figuring 36 x $100K, that equals $3.6 Million dollars a year.  With the city looking to balance it's budget, a mere 5 per cent cut in salary for these 36 public employees would save the city approximately $200,000 dollars. 

Instead the city will raise the garage sale permit fee 200 per cent from $5 bucks to $15 bucks for each garage sale.  Take that you taxpayers.  How dare you try to make a few extra bucks without us taking our cut right off the top.

Where's mayor's next job?

I've heard that mayor Salinas is fixin' to announce that he will be running for county treasurer to replace the retiring? Delia Perales.  He has been reluctant to announce it simply because it's too early.  The mayor should really consider running for US congress given his vast powers of filibustering. He could team up with Rand Paul or something.

Many stickers around town already displaying 2014 candidates. Most of them do not include the particular position any candidate is running for. This is probably due to the fact that it's wayyyy to early in the campaign calendar.

Actual "quote" :  
During tonight's city council meeting, the mayor actually said something the effect of :
"The USA consumes about 80 per cent of the drugs used in this country" ???  OK, mayor, I think we know what you meant to say.

Sneaky, Sneaky

Don't worry, we'll just overcharge you for the water and we'll call it even.

Within the last couple of hours, the ever-informative LMT online posted a very brief article stating that Webb county will have an "emergency" meeting on Friday (tomorrow) to discuss the continuing and embarassing dirty water problem down in Rio Bravo and El Cenizo.  However, there is nothing on the County's agenda as to such a meeting and 311 doesn't have anything on it either.

LMT says

Webb County officials said earlier this week that the boil water alert in El Cenizo and Rio Bravo could be lifted today.

However, they said this afternoon that the alert will remain in effect for at least another day.

Webb County Judge Danny Valdez said county officials will hold an emergency meeting Friday to discuss lifting the boil water alert, which was issued Aug. 8 by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.

TCEQ issued the alert after receiving water quality complaints and water sample testing positive for E. coli.

Trash p/u rates, water rates going up? What to do? Play Golf !

OK, so you have to pay $3 more for your garbage pick up and yes it's only going to be once a week now. Of course, next year it will be $3 more. And yes, our water rates going to skyrocket and are scheduled to keep on doing so. But don't fret, just look at the high-price clubhouse at your disposal.

How will this affect UISD and LISD "cops" ?

The Texas Tribune is reporting on a change in the way Texas school districts will be allowed to handle certain undesireable behavior at your public schools.  How, if at all, will this substantial change in our state laws affect the policing of our local school districts?

From The Texas Tribune

Public school students in Texas who have chewed gum in class, talked back to teachers or disrupted class have often received citations from school police officers. Beginning in September, students who engage in such levels of misbehavior will face discipline in a different manner.

While school administrators and teachers have traditionally handled student discipline, some school districts in Texas over the years have allowed school police officers to deal with certain types of misbehavior by charging students with Class C misdemeanors, a practice commonly referred to as student ticketing. Students charged must appear before a county or municipal judge and can face fines of up to $500 if found guilty by a judge.
Students who do not pay their fines could be arrested as soon as they turn 17 years old. Even if students pay the fines, the offenses could still appear on their criminal records.

The Legislature took steps this year toward decriminalizing such misbehavior at school with Senate Bill 393 by Sen. Royce West, D-Dallas. The measure prevents school police officers from issuing citations for misbehavior at school, excluding traffic violations. Officers can still submit complaints about students, but it will be up to a local prosecutor whether to charge the student with a Class C misdemeanor.