By Jerry Kurtyka, Community First Coalition
When Proposition C was passed by El Paso voters in 2022, they expected to see the results promised on the ballot. The proposition’s $5.2 million bond issue was to construct, improve, renovate, expand, and enhance City facilities for renewable energy and other improvements. Instead, the City came back to us last week with a proposal to spend $1.2 million dollars of the bond money for a study conducted by a Chicago engineering firm. It was a last-minute drama too, with the implied threat that, if Council did not approve the expenditure, the City risked losing access to $500 million in Federal funds.
When have we heard that story in the past? And, for that matter, how many other expensive city studies have ended up on a shelf? The recent $800,000 Arena study would certainly qualify for shelfdom.
This proposal appeared on the Council agenda as Item 18. It was presented by Nicole Ferrini, the City’s Climate & Sustainability Officer. Only one person spoke in favor of the item and that was the County Judge from next door Hudspeth County, 100 miles away. Ferrini’s proposed Priority Climate Action Plan includes the entire El Paso MSA that is the City plus both counties. But your bond money!
By contrast, much of the El Paso environmental community was there to speak against the item. These included Community First Coalition, Sierra Club, Amanecer formerly Sunrise, Eco El Paso, and others speaking as individuals. They were all concerned that they had not been involved in the decision to do a plan rather than to act on the bond’s provisions. This signaled to all of us the indifference City Hall has for the environmental community. Not once did Ms. Ferrini even acknowledge the many who took the time to show up and speak, activists who could otherwise have been her best allies. Talk about a bungled opportunity!
The consensus against the proposed plan, that will take months, is that the local environmental community wants action, not plans. The people there wanted to see solar panels installed on City buildings, trees planted in the heat islands, City opposition to increased emissions from the Marathon refinery, commercial trucks off the Bridge of the Americas and similar actions. Instead, they will get a strategic plan that will cost 20% of the bond issue money.
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At the end, Council approved item 18 by a vote of 6 to 2, with Representatives Molinar and Salcido voting against it. So, the action items that voters expected from Proposition C are now on hold while $1.2 million dollars is sent out of town to a Chicago engineering firm for a plan that will take months and, if experience is any indicator, will likely end up collecting dust on a shelf in City Hall.
Now that we’re stuck with an expensive contract, what do we do? We don’t plan to let it gather dust and we have some suggestions. For starters, the consultants must deliver quickly, starting with a review of the major climate actions mentioned above, low-hanging fruit which are in play now. We need an immediate commitment from City Council that they will engage with these issues, drawing on the consultants’ experience.
We will be watching carefully to make sure that we see action soon. It will be quickly apparent whether this is a step forward for our community’s health, or just another contract and report that stifles progress. If the City continues to ignore us, perhaps the local environmental community could write its own alternative climate action plan and submit it to the EPA as a competitive grass roots effort? EPA Region 6, that includes Texas and New Mexico, has announced the Environmental Justice Thriving Communities Grantmaking program. This new grant program will make it easier for small community-based organizations to access federal environmental justice funding, too. Not just the big guys.
But why not work together? The City must reach out to the local environmental community as a partner. Then, tap into the innate community wisdom for whom the local environment is a lived experience, not one to be studied ad infinitum by consultants.
Like Bob Dylan wrote, “You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.”
About the Author
Jerry Kurtyka, a retired banking and IT manager, is an activist whose focus is on sustainable community and water equity. He writes here in his capacity as Moderator for the Community First Coalition, a nonpartisan network of organizations and leaders whose purpose is to empower the community to bring improvements in social, economic and political conditions in El Paso.
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