DID INCORRECT BISD AGENDA ITEM NIX UNITED B'VILLE $ BID?

By Juan Montoya
A former Brownsville Independent School District trustee noticed it right off the mark after this Tuesday's district board agenda was posted.
The item read: 15. Discussion, consideration and possible action to pay United Brownsville annual membership fees to the City of Brownsville in the amount not to exceed $25,000 from budgeted Local Maintenance Funds.
It did not specify which trustee placed the item on the agenda and we have to assume that it was done by Superintendent Carl Montoya at the behest of one of the board members. We also assume that it was board president Enrique Escobedo, who along with Montoya form part of United Brownsville's 27-member board.
The former trustee pointedly asked how it was that the board could vote to pay United Brownsville, a nonprofit, through the City of Brownsville, as the item read.
"Is the district going to pay the city so that they, in turn, can pay United Brownsville the $25,000 in membership fees?," he asked. "What kind of arrangement is that? That is a poorly worded agenda item. It makes no sense."
For whatever reason, and also because there was a number of residents who gave notice to the bigwigs they were there to speak out against the cash-strapped district giving away taxpayer funds to an organization that has done little or nothing to help a teacher intsruct a child to read or to put a book in his hands – the mission of the district – the administration decided to pull the item from the agenda.
Other boards and public entities might ask themselves the same thing. Among those who have plunked their taxpayer-funded $25,000 to the self-appointed United Brownsville board are the City of Brownsville, the Greater Brownsville Incentives Corporation, the Brownsville Community Improvement Corporation, the Brownsville Navigation District, the Brownsville Independent School District, The University of Texas at Brownsville, Texas Southmost College, and the Brownsville Public Utilities Board.
Has United Brownsville brought one ship in at the port, helped lower the rates at PUB, increased the sales taxes, or graduated one TSC or UTB student? Or has it merely used the money to perpetuate itself and its overpaid, underachieving bureaucracy and supporters hiding behind vague generalizations and platitudes of far-off goals?
It probably won't be until the turn of the year in mid-January when the BISD holds another board meeting that the item will come up again for the board's consideration. We've been told that those opposed to giving away our children's money will be keeping their powder dry.