Next week on the City Council Consent Agenda are appointments for the Hispanic Cultural Center Subcommittee.
District 5 City Representative Michiel Noe, who represents the Eastside, is appointing former El Paso County employee, Jaime Abeytia, to that committee.
Per the El Paso County Appraisal District, Jaime Abeytia's house is located at:
13427 Cypress Point Court
Socorro, TX 79928
Also per the El Paso CAD, Jaime Abeytia himself is located at:
13427 Cypress Point Court
Horizon City, TX 79928-6496
Either Jaime himself or the El Paso CAD is not sure whether he exactly resides in Socorro or Horizon City.
But one thing for sure is that Mr. Abeytia does not live in El Paso.
City Representative Noe is appointing a non-El Paso resident, a non-El Paso resident who does not pay property taxes to the City, to inform decisions regarding a City expenditure.
Yet more interesting still is that it appears the City does not conduct criminal background checks on appointees. As you all may recall, Mr. Abeytia pled guilty to breach of community security and is on probation as a result. This does not take into account other legal peccadilloes Mr. Abeytia has.
Then there is the issue of his leaving the County. No reason was giving, but it has to be rather interesting that Jaime gave up or was pushed up out of employment to be...unemployed.
So City Representative Noe is using his political capital for a non-El Paso resident with a criminal past and questionable employment history.
This like that time City Representative Emma Acosta appointed Larry Medina to some city post.
Take it back.
It's worse.
We can forgive Acosta for being dumb, but Noe?
Was it really that hard for Noe to find someone in his district without a criminal past, that is employed and is Latino who would like to serve on this subcommittee?
This may explain Jaime Abeytia's recent charm offensive of Forma Group client, City Representative Cortney Niland. Jaime has his panties all in a twist about Forma because Forma actually gets paid to consult. If anyone could torpedo Jaime's nomination it would be Niland.
But I hope Niland and Forma Group were not bought by Jaime with a couple of blog posts.