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Newspaper and Travel Guide
for Pecos Country of West Texas
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Chamber ready for Thursday’s awards banquet
A new president was approved and several other items discussed during the regular Pecos Chamber of Commerce Board of Director’s meeting held last Tuesday at the Pecos Valley Country Club.
President of the organization Joe Keese announced that Debbie Thomas was the new president-elect.
Keese told the group that the work at renovating the Missouri Pacific Railroad depot was coming along well. “If you have a chance go by and look at it,” said Keese.
The depot will serve as the new home for the Chamber. Keese said that some chamber members were going to do a walk-through the building and invited anyone who wanted to join them.
Executive Director of the chamber, Linda Gholson, told the group that the Rotary Club would be catering the chamber banquet, which would consist of a rib-eye dinner, scheduled for this Thursday at the Reeves County Civic Center.
“The social hour will begin at 6:30 and the dinner at 7 p.m.,” said Gholson.
Tickets are still on sale for $20 each and Cody West will be the master of ceremonies.
“This year we won’t have a guest speaker, just entertainment and then just do the awards,” said Keese.
Keese said that they had some sponsors, but had room for more. The theme for this year is, ‘Now is the time for change,’ according to Keese. “We have done the same thing the same way for some many years, so whatever you’re doing, do things differently.”
Gail Box said that every year the Women’s Division decorates the civic center for the banquet. “This year, we decided to just hire somebody to do it and they also became members,” she said.
“We also hired somebody new at the chamber, she has a lot of experience with web design and is a graduate of Texas A&M University,” said Keese.
Keese said that they are still looking for a receptionist at the chamber.
“It gets really busy in there,” he said.
Keese said that the chamber had talked about having someone work on a website that would include all the entities and organizations in Pecos.
“We had talked about getting a website together that would combine everything and also have a community calendar with everything going on listed,” he said.
Keese said that plans for the rodeo are coming along well and that this year’s event will be great.
“What most of the rodeos are doing, because of gas prices, is doing back to back, they’re (the cowboys) going to run in here and then move on to another rodeo,” said Keese. “They’ll go to three to five rodeos in three weeks.”
“We plan on having from 600-700 entries range and that will put us back in the top 25, the changes will be good for us,” said Keese.
For the Texas Rodeo Hall of Fame, the group has selected five inductees, according to Keese.
“Peggy (Walker) is doing that for us once again and we hope to have it open in the next few months, we’re really making progress,” said Keese.
“I want to thank everyone that attended the candidate’s forum that we had, we had a great turnout,” said Keese.
“We don’t endorse anybody, but we were really impressed with Miguel Ortiz, who is running for Congress,” he said. Ortiz had been in Pecos on Monday at a candidate’s forum sponsored by the Chamber for the March 2 Democratic Primary. Keese told the group that the chamber would be sponsoring a candidates forum for the city, hospital and school board candidates as well.
“Some people suggested that we host a second forum, but in a debate form,” he said. “It would be pushing it to get it done before early voting.
Keese told the group that they plan to re-engage the community action committee after the elections.
“We had one street claimed and don’t know if we’ve had any more,” said Keese. “It still seems to be the number one thing that we have heard from comments,” he said.
Keese said that there were so many abandoned buildings, but that the main thing was to clean the city up.
Ortiz criticizes Rodriguez over effectiveness
Congressman Ciro Rodriguez has been an ineffective representative for rural West Texas, Rodriguez’s challenger in the March 2 Democratic Party primary election charged during a visit to Pecos last week.
Miguel Ortiz, an attorney from San Antonio, is challenging Rodriguez in next month’s primary election, for which early voting gets underway on Tuesday at the Reeves County Courthouse. Ortiz was in Pecos last Monday to speak to local residents as part of a candidates’ forum sponsored by the Pecos Chamber of Commerce.
“Two-and-a-half years ago, we started looking at why my opponent was re-elected in District 23 after he had lost in District 28,” Ortiz said, referring to Rodriguez’s 2006 win in a special election over Republican Henry Bonilla, after losing a rematch in District 28 earlier in the year against Henry Cuellar, who had beaten Rodriguez in 2004.
Rodriguez ran after the U.S. Supreme Court ordered the District 23 boundaries redrawn, and won a runoff over Bonilla, then won re-election in 2008.
“My expectation was to find my that opponent had done a lot of good things,” Ortiz said. “After two years of research, I find out my opponent has never written a bill as of today that has become law; cannot get sponsorship for his own bills, in nine years has only addressed the congressional floor for 13 minutes, 42 seconds.”
He claimed that Rodriguez is considered one of the most vulnerable Democrats in the November general election, and aside from himself, has over a half dozen other opponents seeking the 23rd District seat.
“There’s five Republicans running, two independents, one libertarian,” Ortiz said. “He has drawn the most opponents of any congressman in Texas. Not just in this election, but every election, and that’s a sign,” Ortiz said.
Ortiz also charged that Rodriguez had not done enough for veterans. “Most veterans know, and family members of veterans know it takes about 19 months to process and issue a claim. It takes about six months to get a regular appointment, and for people who live out here, it takes about four hours just to get to the hospital,” he said. “My concern is right now we have half a million troops in Iraq and Afghanistan who are going to come back and become part of the system, so it’s just going to get worse.”
Ortiz is a military veteran who grew up in Puerto Rico and settled in the San Antonio area after 12 years of service in the U.S. Army. “When I was on duty, I got my bachelor’s degree in business, my master’s degree in accounting and my law degree,” he said, adding that he had set up a law office at Fort Hood to do pro-bono legal services for people on the base once a week.
He said the 23rd District receives the lowest federal funding of any congressional district in the United States, and that the 23rd District has gotten only a small share of the federal stimulus funds handed out during the past year.
On the controversial health care bill, Ortiz said he wasn’t opposed to reforming the system, but criticized Rodriguez for voting for the current House bill without knowing its full contents.
“Now that Obama wants to do something everyone’s going out of their way to become a hero, and everybody’s coming up with their own ideas because they’re looking out for their own personal interest, not for your interest,” he said. “If you don’t understand the bill and they don’t understand the bill, there’s no one who does.
“My opponent said he voted for the bill not because he understood what it says, but because he believes something needs to be done,” Ortiz said. “I think that’s the wrong approach. I think that you need to understand it, because at the end of the day we’re the ones who have to pay for it.”
City seeks funding to boost street paving projects
Town of Pecos City Council members were told that the city is looking for ways to pave Rancho Road on the far east side of the city, to solve the dust and mud problems created by the installation of a new sewer line on the street last year.
Public Works Director Edgardo Madrid went over projects and available funds the city has for street repairs during the remaining eight months of the current fiscal year, and said the Rancho Road project and the city’s portion of the Lincoln Street expansion and repaving project would additional funds from the money set aside by the council for the current fiscal year.
“We’re just going to do the paving on that street, which will cost $52,000,” Madrid said of the Rancho Road work. “If we were to add sidewalks, curbs and gutters the price would go up to $196,000.”
Reeves County completed its portion of the Lincoln Street project late last year, while the city ‘s portion of the work runs from Plum Street to the city line, and will cost $34,000. Another small project, to extend Scott Street from the Interstate 20 south service road to the new Hampton Inn parking area, would cost $6,720.
Madrid told the council they budgeted $73,000 for streets this year, and currently have $51,000 remaining. “There’s $34,000 for Lincoln Street and an additional $20,000 for patching materials,” he said.
The sewer line work was put in last year with emergency funding, due to backups of the existing Martinez Street sewer line into homes and front yards in the area. The new larger line is supposed to handle that problem and prevent any future problems coming from new hotels or other businesses on the southeast side of Pecos.
“People on Rancho Road are very unhappy,” councilman Frank Sanchez told Madrid.
“They were happy about the sewer. It solved one problem, but created another,” Madrid said.
Mayor Dick Alligood said the city is nearing its six-month budget review, and council members at that time can see if there are funds for the Rancho Road paving work.
In other action, the council approved the purchase of three new pickups from Scoggin Dickey Chevrolet in Lubbock, after the company was the low bidder on the vehicles out of two received by Wednesday’s 3 p.m. deadline. Total cost for the three vehicles was $75,220, while the other bid, by Berg Motor Co. of Midland, was for $99,668.
Madrid said the Berg bid was for 2009 vehicles, as specified, while Scoggin Dickey’s bid was on three 2010 pickups. He said delivery would take about 30-60 days longer with the new vehicles, but the city could continue using their current pickups and repairing them as needed until the new ones arrive.
He told the council the city received two other bids that were faxed in, which violated the sealed bid requirements, while a third sealed bid, from Colt Chevrolet, came in 53 minutes after the deadline. City finance director Ysidro Renteria said he was told an increase in sales to the oilfield helped cause the delay for Colt in securing the pickups to meet the bid specifications.
“I’d like to see the bid from Colt Chevrolet,” councilman Cody West said. “I would like to keep it local, if they’re in the (bid) neighborhood.”
However, city attorney Scott Johnson warned, “That’s not a good practice. It’s better to re-advertise and start over.”
“The only thing I have a question with is we’ve had bids before and went with other bids that weren’t on time and that caused a lot of problems,” said councilman Danny Rodriguez, and the council ended up voting 4-1 to approve the Scoggin Dickey bid, with West casting the lone vote against the decision.
Council members also approved the second reading of an ordinance increasing animal shelter fees, while opting against approving the second reading of city water rates for the 2010-2016 period. Johnson recommended going with a different ordinance for only 2010, since rates are unchanged for the next six years compared with the current list. The 2010 change maintains the sewer rates at the 2009 levels.
Council views restroom plans for downtown
The entranceway to the courtyard at the West of the Pecos Museum will be getting new ADA-compliant rest rooms, as part of a project to provide bathroom facilities to visitors to Centennial Park and the Texas Rodeo Hall of Fame.
Pecos City Council members were presented the plans during their Thursday meeting at City Hall, and were also told the new facilities may be ready within the next 30 days, when the Town of Pecos City’s Spring Break Concert will be held for the first time in the downtown area.
Bill Oglesby, who is on the West of the Pecos Museum board and the Pecos Chamber of Commerce’s Advertising Committee , two of the four groups receiving hotel/motel bed tax funds from the city, made the presentation on the new facilities, which will be put on either side of the courtyard entrance from Centennial Park, underneath the shed that separates the park from the courtyard.
“We’re going to take out the gates, and put another gate behind it,” Oglesby said. The new gate arrangement will allow the rest rooms to be used either by both people in the park and the courtyard, or the gates can be set to block off one or the other from the rest room entrances.
“They’re not going to be 24-hour (facilities). They’ll be open when the museum is open,” Ogelsby said. “We want it to be as maintenance-free as we can make it, and be as indestructible as we can make it.”
Pecos Chamber of Commerce President Joe Keese said the restrooms were close enough to the old Missouri Pacific Railroad depot to meet ADA requirements for the Texas Rodeo Hall of Fame, which will be located in the depot, along with the Chamber’s new offices.
“We really couldn’t build anything of size in the depot without losing too much space,” Keese told the council. He added that the facility could be completed in time for next month’s concert.
The Spring Break Concert has been set for March 20. It’s the sixth year for the event but the first time it will take place downtown, after being held in the past at Maxey Park.
“We’re not going to be doing it this year at the park, because at this time of the year the weather’s unpredictable,” city manager Joseph Torres said. “We’re going to move it downtown to showcase the collaboration with the Main Street (Program) the Chamber and the Hall of Fame.”
Workers recently moved the old Union Pacific caboose from the middle of Oak Street to the loading dock at the depot, in order to free up space on Oak Street for events. Torres asked and the council approved closing Oak from Dot Stafford (First) Street to Third Street and Second Street from Elm to Cedar streets for the concert and other events.
He added that the committee has been cleaning up downtown buildings, including the old Pecos Garment Factory, which will be where the paintball tournament, sponsored by the Pecos Police Department, will be held this year.
“This thing has grown so much. We started with 10-15 teams and now it’s up to 60,” Torres said.
He said salaries workers for the city would serve as volunteers, but that the city would need some overtime funds to pay police and hourly city workers to help with clean-up after the event, though due to the tight 2009-10 budget the city currently has no overtime funds budgeted.
“If you approve it, we can put it in there,” said city finance director Ysidro Renteria, while Alligood said he wanted the council to determine a maximum amount of funds to be used.
“I’m really concerned, Mr. Torres, about approving anything without a dollar amount marked,” he said.
Torres said he thought $1,500 would be enough to cover the overtime costs, while councilwoman Bernadette Lopez proposed setting the maximum limit at $2,000, “to give you some leeway.” That total, along with the street closings, were then approved by the council.
Commissioners, JP candidates make cases during forum
The two candidates for Reeves County Commissioner in Precinct 4 and three of the five hopefuls in Precinct 2 delivered their messages to voters last Monday night at the Reeves County Civic Center, as part of a candidates forum sponsored by the Pecos Chamber of Commerce.
Incumbent Ramiro ‘Ram’ Guerra and challenger Tony Trujillo talked about road conditions, the Reeves County Detention Center and county finances, including funds planned for recreational facilities, during their 10-minute speeches, while challengers Ron Garcia and Mario Flores and incumbent Gabriel Martinez covered some of the same issues during their time before the microphone during the Feb. 8 forum.
Both Guerra and Martinez acknowledged the county has had financial problems over the past year, due in part to the cost of repairing the RCDC after the two riots in December of 2008 and January-February of last year. But both said the prison would be hiring more employees once the construction is finished sometime next month.
“I think it’s important we communicate with all the employees, that’s why my door is always open, not just to the employees but to anyone who has a complaint,” Guerra said. “To me, that’s my job to address those concerns.”
He added that the county and the city expect to have more cooperation now that the lawsuit over water and sewer rates at the Reeves County Detention Center has been settled, and said the county is also working to improve maintenance on county roads.
“The roads are a big issue,” he said. “We’ve got more money towards the road and bridge for equipment and are trying to get them more hands.”
Trujillo, who has done surveying work for both the city and county in recent years, and said, “The county road and bridge department is responsible for the maintenance and repair of over 600 miles of road. This is an enormous task to perform on a limited budget.”
He said he would offer his surveying services at no charge if elected, and said he would work with the city on joint street maintenance agreements.
“The majority of city streets in Pecos have received little or no maintenance for many years. The county and the city must work together on this problem. We must invest in equipment to upgrade streets and add curbs and gutters. If we combine our resources we will upgrade a minimum of one block per month.”
Trujillo also questioned if the county should be spending money approved by voters in 2008 as part of a $12 million bond issue on expansion of the Reeves County Golf Course and a new eight-field sports complex.
“I do not believe that residents of Reeves County on fixed and limited incomes should pay for something they will never use,” he said, adding the county should not spend $5 million on the golf course and should look at rehabilitating the fields at Maxey Park instead of building a new complex.
Flores, who followed Trujillo in speaking, defended the plans for the golf course. “The talk about it costs a lot of money. But that is the only thing a lot of us senior citizens have out there to go play. That’s part of our exercise,” he said.
Flores said he has lived in Pecos since 1990 and has worked with the Pecos-Barstow-Toyah ISD as well as at the RCDC before retiring there due to disability.
“The prison will eventually take care of itself. The prison is self-supporting , and it makes a lot of money for the county,” he said, while adding that he would like to see the county get another health insurance administrator for the RCDC.
Flores also said he wanted to focus on cleaning up the area as well as fixing the county’s roads. “Our roads are bad, a lot of our lots are in terrible shape and a lot of them are owned by the (taxing) entities, and we need to clean those up.”
Garcia, who works at the RCDC, made a point of saying he would be available to all his constituents, and will attend all commissioner’s court meetings, and he would try to move the plans for rehabilitating the West of the Pecos Rodeo Arena forward.
“We need to prioritize that which needs to be done, so it will stay before the commissioner’s court agenda,” he said, while also touching on the insurance situation at for RCDC workers.
“They need affordable insurance,” Garcia said, while calling for additional efforts to find more companies to bid on the county’s health insurance contract.
“They (commissioners) need to communicate to the employees. We don’t know what’s going on,” he said. “I teach at the detention center and they come and tell us things. They don’t ask us.”
Martinez defended his attendance at commissioner’s court meetings after comments by Garcia, and said the meetings he had missed were due to family business. “Family’s very important in my life, they’re first to me and I’m going to be there.”
He said before starting his own air conditioning business he worked for nine years at the RCDC for nine years. “I worked there so long I hold the detention center close to my heart,” he said.
“To better communicate with the commissioner’s court and the detention center, we’ve created health care and wellness employee committees. When you’re trying to communicate what’s going on downtown to over 500 employees, it’s a challenge. We’ve tried to remedy that, we’ve called the wardens out there to try and get the staff to come out to some of our meetings, especially with our insurance issues, and I think it was a big success the last time we did that.”
He also mentioned work done in Toyah, including obtaining a matching grant for a community park and senior meals there, along with boosting funding for the fire departments in Pecos and Toyah and buying new equipment for the road and bridge department and the establishment of a rural railroad transportation district.
“One of the things that’s never been done for our retirees is we’ve increase the cost-of-living adjustment rate,” Martinez said.
In the two contested races for justice of the peace, only Precinct 2 incumbent Jim Riley, who is being challenged by Olga Lopez, and Precinct 4 challenger Jay Haney, who will face Eddie Rodriguez in the March 2 primary, were at the forum.
Riley cited his work with the Pecos-Barstow-Toyah ISD on school truancy and delinquency issues, along with his work trying to improve the technology used by the JP offices in the past few years. “It’s going to make it a whole lot easier to get our fines back from people who do not pay,” Riley said.
He said he goes to the AEP classes, “once a week, sometimes three times a week checking on these kids, trying to make sure they’re doing what they’re supposed to be doing.”
Riley said he has handled 97 percent of all truancies in Reeves County over the past seven years. “I’ve done 92 percent of all small claims. I’ve done 45 percent of all the forcible entries, which are evictions, I’ve done 54 percent of all the civil cases in Reeves County, and that’s out of all four JPs.”
Haney focused on the money brought in by each of the JP offices, and said that Precinct 4 had taken in the lowest amount of fine money over the past three years. He said the precinct had brought in only $160,344 of the $2,394,843 taken in by all four JPs in that time. “This number’s sad, and it’s not even half the next lowest revenue, in Precinct 1 ($381,728).
He said 56 percent of the precinct’s total cases are still pending, and said that officers are no longer writing tickets in Precinct 4 due to the high number of dismissals.
“In the last year Precinct 4 has only produced $32,497, and Precinct 4’s budget is just over $45,000. Therefore it’s cost the county money in the last year to operate this office,” Haney said.
Catholic Churches announce new hours, Ash Wednesday celebration
West Texas Catholic Communities announce new hours for the different Catholic Churches in the community.
At Santa Rosa De Lima Catholic Church on Saturday, Mass will be held at 6:30 p.m., instead of 7 p.m.; on Sunday, hours for Mass will be at 8 a.m. and at 12:30 p.m.
At Our Lady of Refuge in Barstow, Mass hours will be at 9:30 a.m.; at Our Lady of Guadalupe in Saragosa, Mass hours will be at 4:30 p.m., Saturday and at Christ the King Catholic Church in Balmorhea at 4:30 p.m., on Saturday.
At St. Catherine’s Catholic Church in Pecos, Mass will be held at 11 a.m., Sunday morning.
Ash Wednesday will be celebrated at in Barstow at 7:15 a.m.; at the Pecos Nursing Home at 10 a.m.; at St. Catherine’s Catholic Church at noon; at Santa Rosa Catholic Church at 4 p.m.; in Saragosa at 6 p.m.; at St. Catherine at 7 p.m. and at Santa Rosa Catholic Church at 8:30 p.m.
Reeves County Library receives grant, begins updates
The Reeves County Library has completed installing three new HP computer stations that were purchased with the Texas Book Festival Technology grant.
The library has eight computer stations plus four laptops, all for public use, and serving 90 to 100 visitors per week. The library also provides wireless internet connection for visitors who bring their own laptops into the library, or use the wireless connection outside the library building.
In addition, the Reeves County Library has fulfilled the requirements set up by the Texas State Library Commission and by the Texas State Legislature, both in Austin and has received the 2010 Loan Star Libraries grant. Reeves County Library has been a member of the Texas State Library ever since Sally Perry, librarian, instigated the membership.
“This year, 2010, the current grant will help cover the cost of maintaining, updating and licensing needs, and this important Loan Star Libraries grant is greatly appreciated by the library users, and the library itself,” said Perry.
Early voting for primaries starts Tuesday
Early voting will begin Tuesday for the March 2 primary elections, and will continue through the final weekday of February.
Early voting for both the Democratic and Republican primary elections runs from Tuesday through Friday, and then from Monday, Feb. 22 to Friday, Feb. 26, from 8 a.m., until 5 p.m., in the lobby of the Reeves County Courthouse.
Applications for ballots by mail must be received no later than the close of business on Feb. 23.
All local candidates except for Reeves County Judge hopeful Bobby Hanks are running in the Democratic Primary, but there are regional and state races on both the Republican and Democratic sides. Persons who choose to vote in the Republican primary can only vote on candidates running in that primary, while Democratic primary voters can only cast ballots for candidates in those local, area and state elections.
Election day will be held March 2, at the different voting locations including the Pecos Community Center, 5th and Oak streets; Odessa College Pecos Center, 1000 S. Eddy St; Pecos High School Gym, 1302 Iowa St.; Toyah Old High School Bldg., 120 E. Second St., Toyah; Balmorhea Community Center, 114 E. N. Main St., Balmorhea; Saragosa Multi-Purpose Center, 204 W. Main St., Saragosa; St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, 416 S. Plum St.; Reeves County Road and Bridge Office, 113 N. Cedar St.; Reeves County Annex North, 700 Daggett St.; Reeves County Civic Center, 1000 S. Cedar St. and Reeves County Hospital, Lobby Area, 2322 Texas St.
Pecos Enterprise
York M. "Smokey" Briggs, Publisher
324 S. Cedar St., Pecos, TX 79772
Phone 432-445-5475, FAX 432-445-4321
e-mail news@pecos.net
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