Salinas Slate Sweeps Sunland Municipal Elections

The Salinas slate of candidates swept municipal elections tonight in Sunland Park, and for once the notorious absentee ballot machine run by Guadalupe Valdivia did not make the difference in any of the races.  The money provided to the slate by El Paso developer Russell Hanson did.

Hanson applied to the city for a permit to put 2800 mobile homes into Sunland Park.  The current city council turned him down for a variety of reasons.  His response was to write campaign contribution checks, but on one of them the date on the check was apparently whited out.  This, I was told by several citizens last night, raises the question about when the check was given, since there is a specific window in time for contributions to be made.  Mr Hanson was seen outside the City Hall this evening, chatting with Christian Lira, whose sister was on the ballot, as a cluster of campaign workers waited for the votes to be announced.

Look for the city council to revisit the request for a permit to put mobile homes in Sunland.

Daniel Salinas' sister Lizette, was re-elected municipal judge by a margin of 325-239 against Maria Chacon in regular voting, with absentee ballots adding 78 votes to the winners' total against only 8 for Chacon.  Incumbent Kenneth Giove was defeated by Jessica Avila, a former councilor who voted with Daniel Chacon most of the time.  Daisy Lira defeated incumbent Francisco Jayme and Norexy Frankel.  And Berta Salmon defeated Jesus Soto by a margin of 10 votes in regular voting, and winning all ten absentee votes.  A total of 728 persons voted in these elections, a relatively high turnout for a low-profile race in which the mayor was not on the ballot.

The Salinas faction is named after Daniel Salinas, a former Sunland Park City Council member who pleaded guilty to 2 felony charges of  blackmail after he paid money for a lap-dancer to sit on his opponent while he was video taped.  He then tried to blackmail his opponent with the tape.  He was elected mayor but was not allowed to serve.  Left on the city council are incumbent councilors Donald McBride and Olga Arguelles.