THAT'S THE WAY IT'S SUPPOSED TO WORK, AIN'T IT?

By Juan Montoya
It is taking them nigh on to 23 years, but the brainiacs at the state capitol think they just about got it right.
By state capitol I don't mean just the legislators at the state house, but also our own intrepid pair of solons Sen Eddie Lucio Jr. and State Rep. Rene Oliveira. Both are now pushing for the merger of Pan American University at Edinburg with the University of Texas at Brownsville and the creation of a new South Texas university including a medical school to be situated somewhere in the Rio Grande Valley.
In a sense, we've come full circle.
At one time there used to be a satellite PanAm university on the Texas Southmost College campus. Students at TSC who had fulfilled their academic requirements there could then take their classes with PanAm faculty in Brownsville and then continue their studies in Edinburg for the upper-level courses required to get their degree.
If what you were interested was to get a certificate in auto mechanics, auto body work, air conditioning, electric work, etc., you attended the classes at TSC. It worked out fine for decades.
The medical school has come (a la Jeffrey Dahmer, the Milwaukee homicidal cannibal) in bits and pieces. Still, even, as a critic pointed out, the $10 million in annual allotments that Lucio has received for the Regional Academic Health Center in Harlingen since its opening in 2002 equals to what the Valley Regional Hospital in Brownsville spends in one month in operations.
Still, algo es algo dijo un calvo cuando le salio un pelo.
The trick now, say Lucio and Olivieira, is to get the required legislative majority in both the Texas House of Representatives and the Texas Senate to approve the inclusion of funds from the fabulously oil-and-gas royalty wealthy UT system's Permanent University Fund. These PUF monies had been denied both the Rio Grande Valley institutions as a condition of them being part of the system. It was kind of like paying your suitor to take you to the dance instead of the other way around. Others likened it to consensual rape.
When these same gentlemen struck the deal with the UT System to bring the burnished orange cow skull to affix to the TSC taxing-district funded buildings on the college campus, it was with the understanding that the UTB-TSC "partnership" would continue to milk the community tax base though the taxing district and "transfer" millions annually to UTB to afford it the means of opulence that any self-respecting world-class university should.
Over time, this "partnership" evolved into what can only be charitably characterized as an abusive relationship between the taxing district and it's milkmaid. The mission of the community college was lost in the shuffle of tax dollars and the Juliet Garcia's administration quest to establish an academic empire on the backs of the poorest residents in the country.
Tuition rates for students of both the university and the community college were on par, with even remedial students paying the same rates as a freshman at UTB. The TSC faculty and administration was reduced to a handful of caretakers and clerks who kept the records for the district. Students on remedial soon exhausted their Pell grants and other federal assistance paying for the first or second year of tuition and more than half dropped out after the first year.
If you were seeking a vocation like Air Conditioning, Auto Mechanics, Welding, entry-level nursing, Radiology, etc., why pay premium rates at UTB-TSC when you could just jump on a Valley Regional bus and attend TSTC in Harlingen for a fraction of the cost?
Over the 22-year existence of the "partnership," UTB siphoned more than $1 billion in "transfers" from TSC and the taxpayers of the community college taxing district. The academic returns were dismal, with a 17 percent graduation over six years, less than a 50 percent retention rate for freshmen, etc.
Unimpressed with the pomp and glitter, the exorbitant cost to their kids, and the pomp and circumstance of keeping a bloated academic nobility living in the lap of luxury, the voters of the district ousted Garcia's lapdogs on the TSC board and opted for a peaceful separation.
But just as they were about to pull the plug, Garcia and her cadre of overpaid underachievers had one more trick up their sleeves. They tried to ram a proposal down the throats of the TSC board to hand over all the assets of the community college - real estate, bank deposits, buildings, dreams, you name it -   over to UTB. The college taxpayers could keep the bond debt and the "partnership" would solicitously wait until they paid it before the "partnership" was dissolved. Neat, uh?
In other words, there would be no more community college. Everything - except the debt and the $12 million in rent arrears that UTB owed TSC - would belong to the UT System.
The TSC - with the almost full support of the community - said nyet.
Now we see where the Brownsville Independent School District and TSC have reached an agreement to teach dual-degree school district students interested in getting an Air Conditioning Certificate for free as a quid pro quo for the $400,000 from the district in equipment to teach the course.
The college, we're pleased to see, has rediscovered its community mission under President Lily Tercero and the majority on the board who withstood the withering firestorm from Garcia's minions, namely Adela Garza, Kiko Rendon, Rene Torres, and Trey Mendez now joined by Ray Hinojosa and Drs. Reynaldo Garcia and Robert Lozano.  
As Carly Simon used to say: "Well, that's the way I've always heard it should be..."
Now, if we can only free ourselves from the clutches and schemes of Juliet Garcia, Oliveira, and Lucio,  who are at this very moment planning to ensnare us again to be taxed for the money it will take to run the medical school, we might be able to breathe a sigh of relief.
But don't hold your breath.