El Paso needs new and better leadership: Joyce Wilson

The present state of affairs of city government is sad and embarrassing. Over the past two years, the current city council and mayor have done nothing other than create chaos and conflict.

They fired the city manager, paid him out nearly $1 million and then waited nearly 18 months to find a replacement. Now as most of them are going out the door, they’re rushing to hire someone, which is a true disservice to the organization and the new council.

In the meantime, they’ve run off significant talent who basically have had it with the bullying and gross negligence. The organization is in chaos and morale at an all-time low. They’re also being super quiet about the process, which should raise suspicions of motives further, given the lack of transparency among this group.

It took two years to hire a new public health director, and the appointment was immediately immersed in controversy over his previous record. Yet, instead of defending the appointment, they go dark and throw him under the bus, rather than clarify concerns.

This city council basically destroyed the internal audit function. The internal auditor has filed a lawsuit against city and a valuable tool is now being weaponized and politicized.

They killed the Downtown multipurpose center and then tried to sneak in an amphitheater in a ridiculous location, hoping El Pasoans were too busy or naïve to notice.

Then, because they were called out, they approved another boondoggle in the Northeast with ridiculous conditions and restrictions in what would be considered a grossly negligent and spiteful act by any terms.

Our infrastructure is a mess. The same streets are constantly under construction and repair. Orange cones are everywhere and traffic lanes are constantly closed with no one doing any work. And opportunities to partner on significant projects like the Downtown freeway expansion and deck park are being torpedoed for petty reasons. The sheer incompetence and waste of city resources should make everyone enraged.

These same city leaders have also alienated major community partners and abandoned long-standing practices of community collaborations and public/private partnerships. More recently, they abused the power of the city to retaliate against organizations like the El Paso Zoological Society for filing a lawsuit to retain their assets.

In the meantime, El Paso continues to fall behind all other Texas and similar U.S. cities in terms of population growth, median income, quality of life indicators and business growth.

The city is not just treading water, it’s losing ground.

El Paso is one of the few cities post-COVID that has not benefited from emerging industry investment and creative opportunities for business growth and development. Lack of good leadership is at the heart of these problems.

More importantly, El Paso cannot afford nor survive four more years of this same nonsense without irreparable damage. In the meantime, city reps are hanging out in Italy with Max Grossman while they allow him to suppress any real economic development effort to create jobs and grow the economy.

This is your mayor and council at work.

El Paso deserves better and can do better.

What we don’t need are more of Max Grossman’s minions. This fall, we have an opportunity to elect a new mayor and council – leaders with intelligence, accomplishments and a true commitment to our community. Make sure we elect candidates who have a vision for our future, who want to help El Paso realize its potential, and are willing to work together and create partnerships to make it happen. 

We need new and better political leadership. Too much is at stake to settle for less.

Joyce Wilson served as the first El Paso city manager from 2004 to 2013 and retired as CEO of Workforce Solutions Borderplex.