The District 1 Runoff election between Albert Weisenberger and Peter Svarzbien scheduled for June 13, 2015 does not have any good choices for the taxpayers of El Paso. Both candidates seem to embrace spending taxpayer monies on ill-conceived projects under the mistaken belief that spending money makes the city competitive with other cities. Weisenberger and Svarzbien received the most votes on Saturday, with Weisenberger coming in on top.
Late Friday, I published on Facebook and Twitter a link chart showing the 14 campaign contributors and whom they contributed money to in the last campaign. These 14 contributors accounted for about 27% of all of the contributions given in this election cycle. Except for Bertha Gallardo who received $5,000 from Jack Winton, all of the other candidates were successful on Saturday.
In other words, the top 14 money givers to campaigns gave money to those that received the most votes. The link chart; “El Paso Follow the Money” shows you how the contributors are linked to the candidates that prevailed in the last election. I am making it available here for those that do not have Facebook or Twitter accounts or who missed my chart.
From that chart, I extracted Albert Weisenberger and Peter Svarzbien so that you could get a better look at what money is supporting each of them.
(UPDATED: the District 1 chart on May 13, 2015 at 07:30 EP; I inadvertently left off some contributors. It has been corrected. The corrected version of the chart is labeled Corrected version 1.a)
In the case of Weisenberger, I shared with you a concern I have over his financial campaign reporting on my post “Albert Weisenberger: At What Point Does It Become Incompetence.” His campaign filings are error prone and there are questions about how accurately he reported his campaign expenses.
Peter Svarzbein, for his part, has pushed forth a trolley project funded by the taxpayers. He argues that boosting the economy will lower the tax burden on the homeowner. The problem, though, is that he does not articulate how he will do that without leveraging taxpayer dollars. He strongly advocated for a trolley system pad for by tax dollars.
In the case of both candidates, their major campaign contributors should be a cause of concern to the taxpayers.
Unfortunately, there is no third option in the runoff and as such, the electorate is stuck choosing between these two candidates.
It is Fat Hipster versus Mr Nice Guy for Dist 1. Either way, we spend and spend.
Don’t vote Fat Hipster. The old man won’t be in politics for too long. On the other hand, the Fat Hipster will linger around like the other younger politicos forming voting blocs with them. He’ll be harder to get rid than houseguests at Christmas time–or Hanukkah in this instance.
I like the two comments and agree with Vegas.
Where are the good candidates for District 1 ? Finally we are getting rid of fugitive and Mrs Sandman. Now the choice is Trolley Boy and Mr Rogers. Both like to spend ! Those money people sure cover their bets by giving money to both candidates.
Trolley Boy! !