The Ennis Daily News (Ennis, Tex.), Ed. 1 Wednesday, March 20, 2013 Page: 4 of 8
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Opinion
Page 4
Wednesday, March 20,2013
Ennis Daily News
Roads
are much
improved
Looking back on the 2012-2013 Street
Bond Program, declared substantially
complete at the end of last week,
shows us a resurfacing and repaving
effort that was handled cleanly and ef-
ficiently by most standards.
The magical words? “On time” and
“under budget.”
Ennis finished this effort to update
city thoroughfares with about $400,000
in funds left over, and we did so within
the allotted time
frame thanks to pro-
fessional work by the
contractor. That is no
small feat, as anybody
who has paid atten-
tion to the larger-scale
work being done on
the U.S. 287 Bypass
since 2010 could tell you. On time and
under budget are not foregone conclu-
sions when serious infrastructure con-
struction is under way.
City management and the city’s
board of commissioners should be
commended for their wise manage-
ment of public dollars in this project.
Anyone who uses the streets in ques-
tion — and there were considerable
improvements in all of the city’s five
wards, so it is pretty much all of us —
can see how much better it is to drive
in town now, and how much of an im-
provement was affected by this effort.
Now, let’s be honest, there’s a lot
more that needs to be done. Road work
on the scale we saw done over the last
several months was deferred year
after year because of inadequate funds
and significant bond loads that pre-
cluded the city taking on more debt
without raising taxes and fees to resi-
dents. In the interest of keeping the
city’s residential and commercial en-
vironments stable, roadwork suffered.
The effects are noticeable in all of the
city’s five wards, with deterioration
more rapid on some streets than oth-
ers. Even after this round of work,
which amounted to several million
dollars of expenditures, there is much
to be done.
With wise management and careful
planning to best use resources, the city
can undertake another bond program
like this one in the near future, im-
proving even perhaps twice as many
streets in the next iteration of road
improvement work. We love what we
see this time, and we support the use
of more bond projects to see improve-
ments continue.
© Contents copyright 2013 and cannot be reproduced
without the written permission of the publisher.
Tre Bischof ■ Publisher Teresa Watson ■ Office Manager
Nick Todaro ■ Editor Fernev Parra ■ Production Manager
Melissa Honza ■ Composition Manager
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A year later, a case open
Sunday was an unremarkable
day for many beyond the cele-
bration of St. Patrick’s Day.
A few families in town
marked it, perhaps. It took me a
few days to realize
what the feeling was
that haunted me a bit
on Sunday. I’d taken
down a mental note to
remember that St.
Patrick’s Day has a
new meaning in this
community, but had
let it slip by without
thinking as I made po-
tato soup and cele-
brated with loved
ones.
It was the one-year
anniversary of the
shooting and burning of local
area 15-year-old Moriah Gona-
zles, known as Mia Gee to many.
In the communal outcry that
followed that unbelievably
heinous murder in 2012, there
were innumerable claims Gonza-
les would not be forgotten.
It seems the poor girl has been
completely forgotten by many of
us.
The Moriah Gonzales Memo-
rial Fund Facebook page sees an
occasional post. People return
there to wish Mia Gee well or
submit a meditation on the com-
munity and family’s loss.
There is still no sign of the
woman wanted in her murder, at
least on the record. That part of
the case is cold.
Mystery surrounds the loca-
tion of Jennifer
Puente, a woman
chillingly accused of
as seeking an unwit-
ting victim to fulfill
her alleged fantasy to
kill and burn a
human being. I don’t
know how much cre-
dence to give to that
allegation, but it cer-
tainly makes you
wonder.
Police say Puente
fled south to Mexico
in the days following
the murder.
Her alleged accomplice Jose
Alvarado is still wrapped up in
pretrial hearings for his murder
charge. It seems likely a trial will
come in the late spring, but
that’s just an educated guess on
my part.
With the ascension of a new
lieutenant in the ranks of the
Ennis Police Department’s crim-
inal investigations division, we
can hope to see a renewed focus
on working with whatever inves-
tigative resources are necessary
to track down Puente and bring
her back to this jurisdiction to
face the charges that have been
levied against her.
This community cannot abide
by the slaying of a teenage girl.
There are just no realistic
ways to minimize or blow off
such a heinous crime. Rumors
swirled in the aftermath of the
slaying about the specifics of the
victim’s lifestyle, the alleged per-
petrators lifestyles and the rea-
sons for the killing, but none of
it matters. Human decency, a
quality that every older genera-
tion bemoans in the generations
that follow them, seems to truly
be on the downswing when such
statements are all that answers a
person’s murder. They aren’t
even tangible; just excuses that
can’t be all we have as a commu-
nity.
We work closely enough with
the information arm of the local
police force to know that they
have resources in play to gather
information on this murder to
this day.
A year after the killing, with
the trail as cold as a deep Janu-
ary morning, it echoes hollowly
for those who think back and re-
member the woman Mia Gee
might have been.
Nick is the editor of The Ennis
Daily News. He can be reached at
nick@ennisdailynews. com.
Nick Todaro
From the editor
Letters tcthe editor
Level of service to be
compromised with
jail privatization
Ellis County is currently in
discussions with LaSalle South-
west Corrections to privatize
our jail. LaSalle and privatiza-
tion proponents claim privati-
zation will save taxpayers
money.
I applaud our county officials
for looking to save taxpayers
money, but I believe the quality
of our jail will be compromised.
Of the 2012-2013 jail budget,
51 percent of the $9,531,770
budget is strictly salaries. When
benefits are factored in, 71 per-
cent of the budget is spent on
salaries and benefits. 19 percent
of the budget is spent on feed-
ing inmates and providing in-
mate medical care. Less than
one percent is spent on em-
ployee training, screening and
jailers’ uniforms. The remain-
der of the budget is spent on op-
erating, capital and auto
expenditures.
For a private company to
profit while reducing costs to
taxpayers, expenses must be re-
duced. The most significant sav-
ings will have to be obtained by
reducing salaries and benefits
or reducing staffing levels.
According to the budget, the
jail is staffed by 127 employees.
Excluding benefits, the average
salary is $38,388. When benefits
are included, the average cost
per employee is $53,139. The
starting salary for an Ellis
County detention officer is be-
tween $27,534 and $34,418.
As has been identified in nu-
merous studies, reducing the
salaries and benefits of deten-
tion officers results in in-
creased turnover, a decrease in
qualified applicants and sub-
standard performance. Quality
of service is significantly re-
duced. Reducing staffing levels
results in the same problems.
I urge the County Commis-
sioners to research LaSalle’s
past problems and problems
other for-profit correctional
companies have created. The
reputations are far from stellar.
The second largest chunk of
the budget is spent on feeding
inmates and providing medical
care. These expenses are diffi-
cult to reduce unless LaSalle
plans on denying medical care
to inmates, which is illegal.
If any of our county officials
honestly believe privatizing our
jail will save money without re-
ducing quality of service, why
do they not instead duplicate
what LaSalle would do to save
money?
There is nothing that LaSalle
can do that our county govern-
ment cannot.
If there are legitimate ways
that LaSalle can reduce costs
that our county is not currently
doing, then that signals to me
that our jail is mismanaged. If
that is the case, then we need to
clean up our mess instead of
looking to a private company to
do it for us.
However, I do not believe this
is the case. Sheriff Johnny
Brown started charging in-
mates a co-pay for medical serv-
ices to help hold medical
expenses at the same levels of
previous budget years. The 2012-
2013 jail budget was increased
$207,542 from the previous year.
$205,974 of that went to salaries
and benefits while inmate med-
ical care and food remained the
same.
I believe LaSalle cannot pro-
vide taxpayers the same level of
services while also making a
profit.
Additionally, we would be
turning over control of the jail
to a company that profits from
increased incarceration when
the goal should be to reduce
crime and reduce jail occu-
pancy.
Instead, we are creating an
incentive to incarcerate indi-
viduals.
If our county officials believe
cost-savings can be found, I rec-
ommend performing an audit
of jail expenditures to identify
areas where expenses can be re-
duced rather than turn a legiti-
mate function of government
over to a private for-profit or-
ganization.
Time, money and resources
are being wasted on entertain-
ing the idea of privatizing our
jail. I urge our County Commis-
sioners to end privatization dis-
cussions so that our county
employees can focus on other
county business.
We are wasting employee pro-
ductivity on something that is
not in the best interest of Ellis
County.
Lost productivity costs
money, so these discussions are
already costing taxpayers.
Dave Vance
Ellis County Precinct 106
Republican Chairman
Waxahachie
The evil of baseline
budgeting
How we got here ... imagine
the scene ... as a young married
couple in the year 1973, you set
your budget using the paycheck
you brought home. You and
your young spouse sat down,
figured out what you could af-
ford, and built your financial
plan accordingly.
Then, things change. Times
are good; the future looks
bright. You and your wonderful
partner realize that you can
have more. You both agree that
credit is OK. You want a new
home, maybe a boat, vacations
in the summer, and a cruise in
winter ... Everyone is doing it,
using credit (the revenue from
the future) to secure the way of
life wanted today. Each year you
spend just a little more than you
earn.
You both work, career paths
are secure. You both expect a
good raise from the boss each
year and plan the future accord-
ingly. However, it turns out you
are systematically spending
more each year than you are re-
ceiving in pay. You realize you
have been increasing your
spending by 7-10 percent each
year, while only getting a 3-4
percent raise in income ... each
time you bump up on the credit
limit, the credit company is
happy to raise the limit just to
keep getting the interest pay-
ment from you.
Over the years, you were able
to get all those things you
wanted for you and your kids
using the plan laid out. Credit is
easy to come by, the houses and
toys get more expensive, but
still attainable to you. Each year
though, you have a higher and
higher debt to pay off.
Now, jump forward 40 years
to today... using the federal
budget numbers as a model, you
are now earning about $29,000 a
year and spending (including
credit card payments) about
$38,000, and now the cumulative
debt has grown to a whopping
$165,000!
This is more than five times
your annual income! Interest on
your debt last year alone was al-
most $3,600, or 12 percent of
your income!
The federal government
started this systematic plan in
the 1974 with the advent of the
Congressional Budget Act of
1974. Although tweaked a little
bit in the years since, the plan is
essentially the same: all discre-
tionary spending programs get
an automatic increase every
year regardless of the increase
in revenue.
American taxpayers now find
themselves collectively $16.5
trillion in debt and we paid $360
billion in interest payments in
2012. This is insanity! It must be
addressed through education
and spreading the word to other
taxpayers.
You do not have to believe me,
do the research, inform your-
self, and then inform your fed-
eral representative in the House
and the Senate. We elect them to
represent us, and they will only
do our bidding if they know
what we want.
Bill Carson
Ellis County Precinct 103
Republican Chairman
Midlothian
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Todaro, Nick. The Ennis Daily News (Ennis, Tex.), Ed. 1 Wednesday, March 20, 2013, newspaper, March 20, 2013; Ennis, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth771486/m1/4/: accessed April 26, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Ennis Public Library.