Posted on 06/20/2009 9:16:48 PM PDT by Paleo Conservative
CORPUS CHRISTI — U.S. Rep. Solomon Ortiz says he’ll take back $3 million in funds meant to offset Ingleside base closure if the Ingleside City Council confirms Nueces County Judge Loyd Neal to the board that oversees base redevelopment.
Ortiz’s office announced Thursday that the U.S. House Armed Services Committee authorized $550.4 billion that includes a $3 million earmark for the Ingleside Local Redevelopment Authority. The earmark’s purpose is to help mitigate the job losses from closure next year of Naval Station Ingleside.
The funding announcement came the day after the Nueces County Commissioners Court voted 3-1 to name Neal and Nueces County Commissioner Chuck Cazalas to the new Ingleside Implementation Local Redevelopment Authority. The implementation authority will replace a planning authority that included Ortiz’s brother, Nueces County Commissioner Oscar Ortiz.
Oscar Ortiz, who wanted to be appointed rather than Neal, cast the lone no-vote.
The congressman said the makeup of the new implementation board is unfair because it does not have adequate Hispanic representation and does not include seats for small cities such as Robstown.
He does not want Neal on the board because Neal opposed the formation of the original planning authority two years ago.
On Friday, Neal said he was not against forming a planning authority two years ago, but was opposed to the representation on the authority, which was heavy on the congressman’s supporters and did not include space for Neal or then-Corpus Christi Mayor Henry Garrett.
Ortiz, who considers Neal a political foe, said if Ingleside confirms Neal’s appointment, he is ready to transfer the $3 million to anti-drug smuggling efforts.
“If they think they love Loyd Neal more than they love the $3 million,” Solomon Ortiz said, “I can’t change their minds. If they love Loyd Neal more than the $3 million, go with Loyd Neal.”
The Ingleside City Council won’t decide one way or another until at least July 14. Not enough of the seven council members could be reached to determine how the vote will go. Of the five reached Friday, the vote would be 3-1 in Neal’s favor, with one undecided.
Steve Diehl, Stewart Wilson and Willie Vaden say they support Neal despite Ortiz’s threats.
“I have the ultimate respect for Loyd Neal,” Diehl said. “It is not the place of Ingleside to dictate to Nueces County commissioners who their representative should be. Ingleside will thrive, we will grow anyway. This is political blackmail at the highest level.”
Mayor Stella Herrmann said she will side with the congressman against Neal. Herrmann, who is chairwoman of the planning authority, was removed recently from the new implementation authority by a majority vote from Diehl, Wilson, Vaden and Elaine Kemp.
“I could not support Loyd Neal being on the LRA,” Herrmann said. “He was not in favor in the beginning. He accused us of having secret meetings and now that we have been successful there are a lot of people who want to be involved in the implementation authority.”
Councilman Luis Lamas said he hasn’t decided how he will vote. Kemp and Councilman Jacob Lopez could not be reached.
Ortiz, like Herrmann, indicated Friday that he is still angry at Neal’s public accusation that a 2007 meeting to come up with members to serve on the LRA planning board was “clandestine.” Neal publicly denounced the LRA after that private meeting, which included the congressman, Herrmann, Ortiz’s former chief of staff Lencho Rendon, Oscar Ortiz and San Patricio County Commissioner Jim Price.
“The LRA should not be used as a political football,” Solomon Ortiz said. “Our agenda has always been to bring jobs though we have had people opposing it, including Judge Neal. We need people from different walks of life who are interested in bringing jobs together.”
The new implementation authority, administered by the city of Ingleside and San Patricio County, includes four seats for Ingleside, one for the Port of Corpus Christi, two for the city of Corpus Christi and two for San Patricio County Commissioners.
The planning group has spent $1.5 million in federal funding, according to city figures, and if the implementation authority moves forward, it is line to administer millions more.
Neal supports its formation in part because Ingleside has shown a willingness to cooperate with the Port of Corpus Christi’s redevelopment effort, which the port has put in the hands of the Texas A&M University System.
The Ingleside LRA would oversee 155 acres of base property, most of which is underwater. The overwhelming majority of the Navy base property will go to the port and be overseen by the A&M System in a partnership. Neal, a well-connected A&M alum, pushed that alliance behind the scenes. The port property in the redevelopment effort totals 1,009 acres, a combination of base land and adjacent port land.
“I was not in any way opposed to creating jobs for this region,” Neal said in response to Ortiz’s accusation. “And now that Texas A&M has joined the port in attempting to develop Naval Station Ingleside, and the fact the Ingleside City Council asked for a member or representation from the port, I felt like I could contribute on a positive note because of my longtime support of and relationship with Texas A&M.”
Vaden said he received a phone call from the congressman, whom Vaden described as “very angry,” saying that if Ingleside confirmed Neal’s appointment, the city “wouldn’t get a dime.”
“He’s kind of upset the way the board was set up and that his brother got taken off the board,” Vaden said Friday. “It’s just politics. (The Ortizes) got their way and now they are not getting their way. If everybody would calm down and remember, it’s for the people and the people should just be represented. Basically Loyd has fought him too much though.”
Congressman Ortiz confirmed that he called Vaden and said it was meant to be a private conversation.
Price, the San Patricio County commissioner, who did not return phone calls Friday, sent an e-mail Thursday that was forwarded Friday to the Ingleside City Council by City Manager Jim Gray, warning of Ortiz’s plans. In the e-mail Price said Neal and Port of Corpus Christi appointee Judy Hawley should be rejected, because “Ortiz is THE SUPPORT for the LRA.”
Price goes on to suggest in the e-mail that Ingleside should appoint Cazalas and Oscar Ortiz and either Richard Borchard or Ken Berry to replace Hawley as the port’s representative on the LRA.
Borchard and Berry are both considered loyal to Solomon Ortiz, while Hawley, like Neal, is considered a foe.
In the e-mail to Ingleside council members, Gray said Price contacted him Friday.
“Earlier today Commissioner Price told me that Congressman Ortiz told him he would pull three million from the area if we did not put his brother back on the LRA,” Gray wrote.
Solomon Ortiz denies that the issue is about putting his brother on the board.
The Robstown Mafia is starting to act nasty, now that they no longer have a lock on control of the Nueces County Commissioners Court after Republicans took control for the first time ever. Congressman Ortiz, who was first elected in 1982 is probably one of the ten least competent US Congresmen, is trying to set his son up to inherit his congressional seat.
Can you guess what to what party this hero of nepotism belongs? Just another gangsta Democrat. Please don’t tell me anyone is surprised.
He is a very competent member of the DNC.
His use of black mail proves it.
Sounds to me like Ortiz is a lot like William Jefferson.
I started to make that point, but I got tired of writing and posted the article without further elaboration. Thanks for pointing that out.
Interesing how ‘Pay-To-Play’ comes in so many different forms!
The US House Of Lords needs to be cleaned out.
These people have declared themselves to be America’s Royalty on the taxpayers dime.
“When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.”
— Thomas Jefferson
Dean of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus ping!
If you want on, or off this S. Texas/Mexico ping list, please FReepMail me.
What is the Congressional White Folks Caucus position on this issue?
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