After the Gulf War began and the recession hit Santa Rosa I lost 40% of my restaurant clients. I ended up being chef, waiter, dishwasher. That loneliness, that fear--I know what people are going through. We've got to get them out of it. Jose Campos, candidate for Lt. Governor, October 30, 2009
Except for Edgar Lopez’s absence, this morning at Roberto’s was like the old days, when Richardson was still popular when he came to town, before the Gran Traicion (Great Betrayal), as someone there described the spaceport tax project: politicos, candidates, and plebe, mingling with the coffee regulars, gossiping about everything worthless under the sun. Oscar Butler, Chano Merino, Willie Garcia, Bill McCamley (PRC hopeful), Ralph Misquez, were among the regulars this morning. Sen. Mary Jane Garcia, National Committee Woman Mary Gail Gwaltney, PRC Commissioner (and candidate for Land Commissioner) Sandy Jones, candidate for PRC Kent Evans, Arturo Uribe, Jesus Carrasco, Robert Nava, Ray Ibarra, and Manny Garcia: a solid but not complete sampling of Who’s Who on the pecking order in county politics today. All in all I counted about 30 persons listening in both rooms to the campaign talk of candidate Jose Campos, from Santa Rosa, running for Lt. Governor.
Stressing his electability, Campos pointed out his district’s Democratic performance is only 51%, but he won it by 60-40 while being outspent 3-1 by his opponent, Matt Rush. His district includes Roosevelt County and parts of Curry County, strong Conservative enclaves, and the district’s Hispanic population is only about 36-38%. He’s been a state representative since 2003, Mayor of Santa Rosa for 12 years, and before that a county commissioner. But he describes himself, sincerely, as a businessman.
He also spoke earnestly about the possibilities of using renewable energy as an investment in high-paying jobs for New Mexico, something he apparently knows fairly well. This is one of his major campaign themes. He was interrupted at various times by applause. After the talk he mingled for about an hour with people and then sat down with me and his campaign manager, Michelle Mares, at an empty table in the back.
For the current fiscal crisis, as a state representative Campos has staked out a position. He will vote in January for a restoration of the state personal income tax back to ’02 levels for persons earning $200,000 or more. This, he asserts, will generate $250 million out of the 2010 shortfall of $390 million. Taking (“sweeping”) $150 million in capital outlay funds the legislature did not touch during the special session in addition to the PIT tax will, he claims, take care of the 2010 budget. He is against proposals to cut more than superficially into education and he wants nothing to do with the proposal to restore and increase the gross receipts tax on food. Campos is unusually fluent and clear when he talks numbers and the relationships between numbers, a reflection of the B.A. he earned at UNM in economics and the multi-faceted perspectives he has gleaned from running a business, running a town, and working in the legislature. He attended NMMI before going to UNM, and he spent some time in Guadalajara, improving his ability in Spanish, which is highly functional but not flawless.
Asked what he might do for Dona Ana County and the South Valley as Lt. Governor, he suggested he could help local communities with realistic assessments of how to get local projects moving through the maze of multiple levels of government. He said he didn’t need anything new for this role in the way of staffing or legislation: he would get on the road and travel to many communities, listening to their priorities, advising and helping where he could. So whereas Lawrence Rael envisions himself as actually helping manage selective large projects in the state, Campos sees himself as more of an unpaid consultant and advocate for communities, using his access and practical knowledge to help things along. He asserted flatly that there is no region in the state with as high a level of what he called “surplus labor” than the South Mesilla Valley and suggested that Sunland Park is an ideal place for manufacturing, perhaps building generators, windmill blades, assembling things, etc.—getting back to the renewable energy theme he struck in his talk. But he also stressed he wanted to learn about local priorities before jumping to conclusions.
Campos is fortunate to have two seasoned professionals working for him. His campaign manager is Michelle Mares, formerly a campaign field coordinator for Sen. Jeff Bingaman and political director for over two years with Lt. Governor Diane Denish: this gives him credibility in organizing for the preprimary process next spring. The other is Santiago Juarez, former director of the Progressive Alliance for Community Empowerment, an attorney with decades of experience in community organization, and a passionate and persuasive advocate. Expect some creative networking and unusual bases of support.
Bottom Line: my sense of Campos is that he approaches politics less from an ideological position as from a practical one: staying within the cone of what is achievable under the circumstances, using his extensive knowledge of how to get things done as mayor, as legislator, as county commissioner; and uncomfortable with symbolic politics or lost causes, no matter how meritorious.
Friday, October 30, 2009
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Troops Will Stay in Juarez At Least Through This Year
The City Council of Cd. Juarez this morning unanimously approved extending the agreement creating Joint Operation Chihuahua, until December 31 of this year. That means the troops will remain until that time.
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Grading the Special Session: C-
In a crisis, effective leadership is crucial. Think of John Kennedy drawing the line in the Cuban Missile Crisis; Rudy Giuliani on the streets of New York on September 11; Ronald Reagan staring down striking air traffic controllers. But if leadership is poor in a crisis, things tend to go badly.
The disjointed, acrimonious, and ultimately inadequate special session of the legislature was symptomatic of a leadership vise, if not quite vacuum, that surfaced when the governor was forced to withdraw from a cabinet nomination earlier this year. This humiliation, followed by continuing FBI probes and newspaper scandals, left him with legal, but virtually no moral, authority. His absence from day-to-day government during his presidential run, his obvious desire to leave New Mexico last year, and his growing reputation for boorishness only discredited him further. The strong alliance between the governor and the Speaker of the House, which has sometimes weakened the checks and balances of executive and legislative powers, compromised legislative autonomy beyond recognition during the special session. Under normal times this would not matter. The state has lived with ineffective leadership before. Problem is this leadership crisis emerged just as a serious fiscal crisis was brewing, with revenues plummeting a billion dollars below expenditures, the worst fiscal crisis since the Great Depression.
Thus, the governor’s denial (almost certainly a tactical posture) of the severity of the fiscal deficit, his lavish favoritism toward public education (which embarrassed many responsible school superintendents willing to suffer with everyone else), and his intransigence about leaving tax increases off the table until January—backed up by the considerable powers of the Speaker of the House—left the moderate forces in each chamber fighting defensive skirmishes against Left and Right, unable to obtain traction. The results are just about what one would expect: (a) a barely acceptable (I give them a C-) set of fiscal policies; (b) a dispirited set of legislators frustrated by their inability to serve the public well, facing an upcoming session with the heavy lifting still ahead and who knows what tricks the governor might have up his sleeves.
Needing to fix a $650 million budget shortfall for 2010, the legislature succeeded in fixing only $525 million, and, with reserves down to 3.8%, putting bond ratings in potential peril. Adding insult to injury, the governor publicly criticized the onerous 7.6% burden the legislature imposed on some of his agencies, the product of a light 0.8% cut in the 43% of the budget spent on education. In truth, the legislature, refusing to rebel against the inadequate tools the governor offered them in his proclamation at the last minute, tried hard to solve the fiscal crisis within the governor’s constraints. Their failure to do so was not a failure of effort. It was their willingness to play by the crippling rules of the game the governor offered on a matter of grave fiscal policy.
One casualty in this crisis of leadership, then, is good fiscal policy. Another, perhaps even more important, is our trust in the ability of this legislature to take charge when the executive branch falters. Particularly frustrating is the knowledge that the fiscal fate of the state in January is likely to be determined by a discredited governor, whose engagement with the current fiscal reality in New Mexico is tenuous at best, and who will not be held accountable for his actions in the elections of November 2010.
There were efforts in the special session to develop legislative autonomy, but they were amateurish and ideologically motivated toward outcomes, more than unleashing shackles. Liberals in the House proposed tax increases as a means of holding down cuts, ignoring the governor’s explicit veto threat. Attractive as a means of restoring autonomy, however, this alienated Republicans and conservative Democrats, the very coalition that elected Tim Jennings President of the Senate. Senate moderates and Conservatives, now complicit in staying in the box the governor had placed them in, ruled tax increase proposals not germane, voting them down. As if to prove they were more interested in outcomes than in principle, Liberals then launched verbal attacks on Jennings and Finance Chair John A. Smith, but accepted defeat, showing no stomach for confronting the governor to change his proclamation, which at least would have driven home their unhappiness with the rules. By this time the NEA and AFT had been mobilized and the ensuing cacophony drowned out all concerns about the rules of the game.
Proposals were also floated for the legislature to call itself into extraordinary session, which would have freed them from the governor’s proclamation, and, later, when the poor outcome was clear, to extend the session through a short recess that would allow a firmer response to surface. But in the end fear of the governor’s wrath stopped these in their tracks. If the governor has lost his moral authority to lead, he can still impose, as long as the Speaker continues to protect him and the rank and file refuse to rebel.
Legislators: the constitution holds you responsible for the state’s purse strings. If you delegate these to a governor, you are still responsible for the outcome. Under the circumstance voters are likely to forgive your inadequacies. The governor dealt you a sorry hand. But don’t try to blame the outcome of the 2010 session on the governor. He won’t be on the ballot, but you will be.
The disjointed, acrimonious, and ultimately inadequate special session of the legislature was symptomatic of a leadership vise, if not quite vacuum, that surfaced when the governor was forced to withdraw from a cabinet nomination earlier this year. This humiliation, followed by continuing FBI probes and newspaper scandals, left him with legal, but virtually no moral, authority. His absence from day-to-day government during his presidential run, his obvious desire to leave New Mexico last year, and his growing reputation for boorishness only discredited him further. The strong alliance between the governor and the Speaker of the House, which has sometimes weakened the checks and balances of executive and legislative powers, compromised legislative autonomy beyond recognition during the special session. Under normal times this would not matter. The state has lived with ineffective leadership before. Problem is this leadership crisis emerged just as a serious fiscal crisis was brewing, with revenues plummeting a billion dollars below expenditures, the worst fiscal crisis since the Great Depression.
Thus, the governor’s denial (almost certainly a tactical posture) of the severity of the fiscal deficit, his lavish favoritism toward public education (which embarrassed many responsible school superintendents willing to suffer with everyone else), and his intransigence about leaving tax increases off the table until January—backed up by the considerable powers of the Speaker of the House—left the moderate forces in each chamber fighting defensive skirmishes against Left and Right, unable to obtain traction. The results are just about what one would expect: (a) a barely acceptable (I give them a C-) set of fiscal policies; (b) a dispirited set of legislators frustrated by their inability to serve the public well, facing an upcoming session with the heavy lifting still ahead and who knows what tricks the governor might have up his sleeves.
Needing to fix a $650 million budget shortfall for 2010, the legislature succeeded in fixing only $525 million, and, with reserves down to 3.8%, putting bond ratings in potential peril. Adding insult to injury, the governor publicly criticized the onerous 7.6% burden the legislature imposed on some of his agencies, the product of a light 0.8% cut in the 43% of the budget spent on education. In truth, the legislature, refusing to rebel against the inadequate tools the governor offered them in his proclamation at the last minute, tried hard to solve the fiscal crisis within the governor’s constraints. Their failure to do so was not a failure of effort. It was their willingness to play by the crippling rules of the game the governor offered on a matter of grave fiscal policy.
One casualty in this crisis of leadership, then, is good fiscal policy. Another, perhaps even more important, is our trust in the ability of this legislature to take charge when the executive branch falters. Particularly frustrating is the knowledge that the fiscal fate of the state in January is likely to be determined by a discredited governor, whose engagement with the current fiscal reality in New Mexico is tenuous at best, and who will not be held accountable for his actions in the elections of November 2010.
There were efforts in the special session to develop legislative autonomy, but they were amateurish and ideologically motivated toward outcomes, more than unleashing shackles. Liberals in the House proposed tax increases as a means of holding down cuts, ignoring the governor’s explicit veto threat. Attractive as a means of restoring autonomy, however, this alienated Republicans and conservative Democrats, the very coalition that elected Tim Jennings President of the Senate. Senate moderates and Conservatives, now complicit in staying in the box the governor had placed them in, ruled tax increase proposals not germane, voting them down. As if to prove they were more interested in outcomes than in principle, Liberals then launched verbal attacks on Jennings and Finance Chair John A. Smith, but accepted defeat, showing no stomach for confronting the governor to change his proclamation, which at least would have driven home their unhappiness with the rules. By this time the NEA and AFT had been mobilized and the ensuing cacophony drowned out all concerns about the rules of the game.
Proposals were also floated for the legislature to call itself into extraordinary session, which would have freed them from the governor’s proclamation, and, later, when the poor outcome was clear, to extend the session through a short recess that would allow a firmer response to surface. But in the end fear of the governor’s wrath stopped these in their tracks. If the governor has lost his moral authority to lead, he can still impose, as long as the Speaker continues to protect him and the rank and file refuse to rebel.
Legislators: the constitution holds you responsible for the state’s purse strings. If you delegate these to a governor, you are still responsible for the outcome. Under the circumstance voters are likely to forgive your inadequacies. The governor dealt you a sorry hand. But don’t try to blame the outcome of the 2010 session on the governor. He won’t be on the ballot, but you will be.
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Good News in Juarez For a Change: Electrolux to Expand Operations
Yesterday Electrolux, a Swedish company, announced it would shut down two plants in Iowa a year from now, cutting out 850 out of 880 jobs in Webster City and Jefferson, transferring production of front-loading washing machines to Cd. Juárez. Electrolux has a large complex of three buildings in Juárez, producing front-loading washing machines, dryers, refrigerators, and those little round, self-guided vacuum cleaners. It now employs 600 persons in a washing machine assembly plant that began operations in Juárez in June 2008. Electrolux has a 19% share of the market in front-loading washing machines in Europe. It expects to double sales of air conditioners in Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam, and the Phillippines.
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Auditor Balderas to LFC: Help Me With Sen./Superintendent Nava's GISD, Still Not in Compliance
More than a year after it was disclosed Gadsden Independent School District was $3.9 million in the hole, and after failing for four years in a row to fulfill the mandatory annual audit reports required of school districts, GISD still has not caught up with its books. In a sharply worded letter to Rep. Luciano (“Lucky”) Varela, Chairman of the LFC, and to Veronica Garcia, Secretary of Public Education, dated August 28, 2009, state auditor Hector Balderas wrote that reports for 2007 and 2008 are still not submitted. “…We have been working for months with GISD and Gibson (the GISD auditor) for this information and have been unsuccessful. Therefore I would respectfully request that the Legislative Finance Committee and the Public Education Department strongly consider all available options to assist the OSA (Office of the State Auditor) in compelling completion of GISD’s financial audits.”
In reply, Steven Suggs, Associate Superintendent for Finance, wrote to Auditor Balderas on September 8, 2009, indicating that the 2008-2009 audit will be completed “by the end of January 2010.” References to the 2006-2007 and 2007-2008 years were blacked out in the copy of the letter provided by the state auditor’s office, but the GISD finance department indicates the 2006-2007 audit is complete, and the 2007-2008 audit should be finished in the next three weeks.
In reply, Steven Suggs, Associate Superintendent for Finance, wrote to Auditor Balderas on September 8, 2009, indicating that the 2008-2009 audit will be completed “by the end of January 2010.” References to the 2006-2007 and 2007-2008 years were blacked out in the copy of the letter provided by the state auditor’s office, but the GISD finance department indicates the 2006-2007 audit is complete, and the 2007-2008 audit should be finished in the next three weeks.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
The Beat Goes On: 2000th Homicide Victim: 2014 This Afternoon, 201 So Far This Month, 13 So Far Today
The 2000th homicide victim in Cd. Juarez this year was about 35 years old. He was killed at about 11:30 yesterday morning at the intersection of Jose Maria Arteaga and Gardenia in Bellavista, in front of a kindergarden and primary school. He was wearing denim shorts and a black polo shirt and his body fell onto the sidewalk under a public telephone in front of the schools.
As of this afternoon about 201 persons have been murdered this month in Juarez.
Just before noon yesterday Enrique Duran Ruacho, 37, was murdered inside his home at Bambu and Castaneda in Col. Heroes de la Revolucion.
At about 1:30 yesterday four more men, ages 50, 22, 21, and 55, were killed by gunfire in col. Hermila.
At about 5 p.m. yesterday two men, ages 40 and 42, were killed by gunfire at a store in col. San Antonio.
Early this morning (Wednesday) four men were murdered in separate incidences. One man was shot by armed men as he was arriving by car at his home. He was about 50 years old. Three men were murdered this morning at a nightclub (Arriba Chihuahua) in the Pronaf, in front of dozens of onlookers. Several men walked into the nightclub, found the victims, and shot them at close range.
Then at about 11 am this morning a man was killed on the street at Begonias and Plata in Col. Bellavista.
Another man was killed in Col. Infonavit Frontera Nueva, with one person hospitalized by gunfire wounds he suffered during the attack.
Another man was killed in the village of San Isidro on the Juarez-Porvenir highway and in Col Manuel Clouthier a man was assassinated while driving his car.
Then a man was killed near the airport, and a few minutes later two more homicides were reported in Col Chapultepec in separate incidences.
Then Mario Zapata Reyes, 32, was shot and killed in Col Chavena.
Finally another homicide was reported at the intersection of Fco. Villarreal and Cuatro Siglos.
Total for Wednesday up to about 5 p.m.: 13
Compiled from stories in Diario and Norte (by Herica Martinez and Carlos Huerta)
As of this afternoon about 201 persons have been murdered this month in Juarez.
Just before noon yesterday Enrique Duran Ruacho, 37, was murdered inside his home at Bambu and Castaneda in Col. Heroes de la Revolucion.
At about 1:30 yesterday four more men, ages 50, 22, 21, and 55, were killed by gunfire in col. Hermila.
At about 5 p.m. yesterday two men, ages 40 and 42, were killed by gunfire at a store in col. San Antonio.
Early this morning (Wednesday) four men were murdered in separate incidences. One man was shot by armed men as he was arriving by car at his home. He was about 50 years old. Three men were murdered this morning at a nightclub (Arriba Chihuahua) in the Pronaf, in front of dozens of onlookers. Several men walked into the nightclub, found the victims, and shot them at close range.
Then at about 11 am this morning a man was killed on the street at Begonias and Plata in Col. Bellavista.
Another man was killed in Col. Infonavit Frontera Nueva, with one person hospitalized by gunfire wounds he suffered during the attack.
Another man was killed in the village of San Isidro on the Juarez-Porvenir highway and in Col Manuel Clouthier a man was assassinated while driving his car.
Then a man was killed near the airport, and a few minutes later two more homicides were reported in Col Chapultepec in separate incidences.
Then Mario Zapata Reyes, 32, was shot and killed in Col Chavena.
Finally another homicide was reported at the intersection of Fco. Villarreal and Cuatro Siglos.
Total for Wednesday up to about 5 p.m.: 13
Compiled from stories in Diario and Norte (by Herica Martinez and Carlos Huerta)
Sign of the Times: Juarez Runs Out of Crime-Scene Tape
Municipal officials in Cd. Juarez yesterday admitted they had run out of yellow crime-scene tape, due to the recent spike in homicides. The Delicias sector, in particular (the highest crime-rate area in the city) has been without tape for some time. Some police have resorted to using tape of other colors, including (yes!) red tape, to secure their crime scenes. Homicides and drug-related crimes are the jurisdiction of state and federal police, respectively, but it is the responsibility of the municipal police to secure crime scenes within the city. Officials say new supplies of tape have been ordered.
Monday, October 19, 2009
Nava, Garcia, Support Tax Increases in Senate Committee Yesterday
Senators Cynthia Nava and Mary Jane Garcia voted in favor of all proposals to allow tax increases to be considered as part of the fiscal crisis affecting the state, joining a coalition that included themselves, Sen. Carlos Cisneros, and Sen. Timothy Keller. These votes were cast in the Committee's Committee of the Senate yesterday (Sunday)afternoon. These four senators were part of a coalition largely of norteños who tried unsuccessfully to unseat Sen. Timothy Jennings as President Pro Tem of the Senate early this year as the January session began. Jennings was able to retain his position with eight votes from Democrats plus the votes of Republican senators, and the power of the south in the senate was preserved.
None of the votes to consider tax increases held up, as a stronger coalition of seven senators won the day on each vote, denying all motions to permit tax increases to be part of the legislative agenda. The governor's call clearly stipulated that increased taxes were not on the agenda and the winning faction spoke out against motions to consider tax increases on the grounds the governor had not included this possibility in his call for a special session. The winning faction was composed of several powerful senators from the south, including Sen. John Arthur Smith, from Deming, Sen. Tim Jennings, from Roswell, and Senator Stuart Ingle, from the Southeast corner.
Contacted this morning, Sen. Mary Kay Papen, whose district is adjacent to Sen. Nava's, indicated she attended the Committee's Committee meeting yesterday afternoon and agreed with the majority vote. She also said she was not necessarily opposed to tax increases as part of the overall solution to the current fiscal crisis as long as they are proposed within an appropriate constitutional framework. Should the governor revise his call to include tax increases as a potential solution, she indicated she might well support certain tax increases as a means of raising recurring revenues.
None of the votes to consider tax increases held up, as a stronger coalition of seven senators won the day on each vote, denying all motions to permit tax increases to be part of the legislative agenda. The governor's call clearly stipulated that increased taxes were not on the agenda and the winning faction spoke out against motions to consider tax increases on the grounds the governor had not included this possibility in his call for a special session. The winning faction was composed of several powerful senators from the south, including Sen. John Arthur Smith, from Deming, Sen. Tim Jennings, from Roswell, and Senator Stuart Ingle, from the Southeast corner.
Contacted this morning, Sen. Mary Kay Papen, whose district is adjacent to Sen. Nava's, indicated she attended the Committee's Committee meeting yesterday afternoon and agreed with the majority vote. She also said she was not necessarily opposed to tax increases as part of the overall solution to the current fiscal crisis as long as they are proposed within an appropriate constitutional framework. Should the governor revise his call to include tax increases as a potential solution, she indicated she might well support certain tax increases as a means of raising recurring revenues.
Sunday, October 18, 2009
The Budget Debate Continued
Facing the largest budget crisis since the Great Depression, the New Mexico legislature opened up a special session Saturday. At this point the outcome is unclear, although the lines of debate have been clarified.
The Governor's Plan: More Smoke and Mirrors: Are You Really Surprised?
The governor's proposal is to balance the budget without increasing taxes, to cut the budget, and to fund shortfalls mainly using one-time-only, non-recurring funds originally intended for other purposes. Among these are $93.2 million in federal stimulus funds, to be spent next year, leaving none for the following year, in spite of more projected shortfalls. The governor also proposes to use so-called "sponge-bond funds," that is, revenues left over from bonds used to service the debt. These have not been used previously to cover recurring costs and, indeed, some have argued it may be unconstitutional to use them for this purpose. The governor proposes to de-authorize or swap (against severance bonds) $290 million in capital outlay funds, which are one-time only funds. He wants to raid a fund used for college loans, removing $44 million from a fund of $70 million.
The problem with using non-recurring funds for operational expenses, as explained repeatedly by Senate Finance Chair John Arthur Smith, is that they merely postpone the day of reckoning. You can pawn a watch and sell a car to get through this month’s expenses, but if your job doesn’t bring in as much as you spend each month, when those funds are gone you still face the same problem.
While the governor’s tactics might help reduce cuts this year, most of them involve questionable, unwise measures. Sure enough, at best they merely postpone the budget crisis for two months, when the 2011 budget needs to be designed, still in the face of a major fiscal crisis. In fact they are so unwise speculation among many legislators broke out this weekend to the effect that the governor is planning to leave office before the end of the year and won't have to face the consequences of his own actions during the next regular session. Whatever his motivations, smoke and mirrors financing is nothing new to his administration, which, among many other slippery moves, raided the Permanent Fund a few years ago, taking principal from it for his pet projects, with barely a peep of dissent from the legislature.
Conflict in the House
The House is internally divided about the crisis. At the root of the conflict is the Speaker's cozy relationship with the Governor. The Speaker has acted for years as chief enabler for the governor's programs, rather than as the arbiter of conflicting interests among House members and the architect of compromise. This has reduced the Speakers' flexibility in dealing with internal conflict and now, with painful budget cuts looming, his role as chief Richardsonista is alienating many House members. It should be remembered that the Speaker was unable on the last day of the session to deliver a number of key bills he had on his agenda, including the Sun Cal TIDDS. This crisis will clarify the limits of his power.
One issue causing alienation is tax policy. Liberals would like to roll back the tax cuts Richardson delivered in previous years, including the gross receipts tax on food, which would generate about $200 million. Rolling back this and other tax cuts would make it possible to reduce budget-cutting by a hefty amount, and not just for one year. But by backing Richardson in his current stance against the rollbacks, Lujan and his dwindling band of loyalists stand in the way of serious airing of tax policy alternatives.
Connected to this issue is education policy. Once Richardson decided, Saturday, that cutting education modestly was an option after all, Lujan went to work trying to sell it. Problem is many Democratic legislators, particularly the Liberals, are beholden to education unions who feel they have the clout to prevent education from being cut. For a moment Saturday there was the sad spectacle of Majority Whip Sheryl Williams Stapleton, a teacher, screaming back at the Speaker, who had suggested she wanted to protect education only in order to protect her own salary.
The Speaker’s response to these policy conflicts is highly revealing of the corner he’s backed himself into by allying himself to Richardson while ignoring the views of the Democratic caucus and dissident factions. Rather than taking charge and banging heads together to forge a compromise acceptable to all in a moment of crisis, the Speaker has resorted to forming broad subcommittees to deal with discrepancies between the governor’s agenda and that of the House. Delegating compromise at the very last minute strongly suggests the Speaker has no strategy to distance himself from Richardson (allowing himself more flexibility to deal with factional conflict) or to deal with the financial crisis itself. The result is a House that is rudderless, incapable of dealing effectively with internal conflict, and unable to act independently (that is, effectively reflecting the interests of the body of elected representatives) in the face of a major fiscal crisis.
The Senate
This situation is cleaner in the Senate, where leadership has maintained a healthy distance from the governor. Win or lose on the specifics of dealing with the budget crisis, there will be no blood on the floor after the special session concludes since there is no doubt about the legitimacy of the internal workings of leadership. The Senate acted decisively yesterday to accept the governor’s premise that tax increases are not on the table for discussion this session. Proposals to the Committee’s Committee to consider raising taxes all failed. Now the fight begins about the governor’s proposals to finance the deficit and to decide what to cut. I suspect the Senate will assert it’s authority in pointing out flaws in the governor’s proposals and will fight for its own, internally generated view on what parts of the budget to cut.
The Governor's Plan: More Smoke and Mirrors: Are You Really Surprised?
The governor's proposal is to balance the budget without increasing taxes, to cut the budget, and to fund shortfalls mainly using one-time-only, non-recurring funds originally intended for other purposes. Among these are $93.2 million in federal stimulus funds, to be spent next year, leaving none for the following year, in spite of more projected shortfalls. The governor also proposes to use so-called "sponge-bond funds," that is, revenues left over from bonds used to service the debt. These have not been used previously to cover recurring costs and, indeed, some have argued it may be unconstitutional to use them for this purpose. The governor proposes to de-authorize or swap (against severance bonds) $290 million in capital outlay funds, which are one-time only funds. He wants to raid a fund used for college loans, removing $44 million from a fund of $70 million.
The problem with using non-recurring funds for operational expenses, as explained repeatedly by Senate Finance Chair John Arthur Smith, is that they merely postpone the day of reckoning. You can pawn a watch and sell a car to get through this month’s expenses, but if your job doesn’t bring in as much as you spend each month, when those funds are gone you still face the same problem.
While the governor’s tactics might help reduce cuts this year, most of them involve questionable, unwise measures. Sure enough, at best they merely postpone the budget crisis for two months, when the 2011 budget needs to be designed, still in the face of a major fiscal crisis. In fact they are so unwise speculation among many legislators broke out this weekend to the effect that the governor is planning to leave office before the end of the year and won't have to face the consequences of his own actions during the next regular session. Whatever his motivations, smoke and mirrors financing is nothing new to his administration, which, among many other slippery moves, raided the Permanent Fund a few years ago, taking principal from it for his pet projects, with barely a peep of dissent from the legislature.
Conflict in the House
The House is internally divided about the crisis. At the root of the conflict is the Speaker's cozy relationship with the Governor. The Speaker has acted for years as chief enabler for the governor's programs, rather than as the arbiter of conflicting interests among House members and the architect of compromise. This has reduced the Speakers' flexibility in dealing with internal conflict and now, with painful budget cuts looming, his role as chief Richardsonista is alienating many House members. It should be remembered that the Speaker was unable on the last day of the session to deliver a number of key bills he had on his agenda, including the Sun Cal TIDDS. This crisis will clarify the limits of his power.
One issue causing alienation is tax policy. Liberals would like to roll back the tax cuts Richardson delivered in previous years, including the gross receipts tax on food, which would generate about $200 million. Rolling back this and other tax cuts would make it possible to reduce budget-cutting by a hefty amount, and not just for one year. But by backing Richardson in his current stance against the rollbacks, Lujan and his dwindling band of loyalists stand in the way of serious airing of tax policy alternatives.
Connected to this issue is education policy. Once Richardson decided, Saturday, that cutting education modestly was an option after all, Lujan went to work trying to sell it. Problem is many Democratic legislators, particularly the Liberals, are beholden to education unions who feel they have the clout to prevent education from being cut. For a moment Saturday there was the sad spectacle of Majority Whip Sheryl Williams Stapleton, a teacher, screaming back at the Speaker, who had suggested she wanted to protect education only in order to protect her own salary.
The Speaker’s response to these policy conflicts is highly revealing of the corner he’s backed himself into by allying himself to Richardson while ignoring the views of the Democratic caucus and dissident factions. Rather than taking charge and banging heads together to forge a compromise acceptable to all in a moment of crisis, the Speaker has resorted to forming broad subcommittees to deal with discrepancies between the governor’s agenda and that of the House. Delegating compromise at the very last minute strongly suggests the Speaker has no strategy to distance himself from Richardson (allowing himself more flexibility to deal with factional conflict) or to deal with the financial crisis itself. The result is a House that is rudderless, incapable of dealing effectively with internal conflict, and unable to act independently (that is, effectively reflecting the interests of the body of elected representatives) in the face of a major fiscal crisis.
The Senate
This situation is cleaner in the Senate, where leadership has maintained a healthy distance from the governor. Win or lose on the specifics of dealing with the budget crisis, there will be no blood on the floor after the special session concludes since there is no doubt about the legitimacy of the internal workings of leadership. The Senate acted decisively yesterday to accept the governor’s premise that tax increases are not on the table for discussion this session. Proposals to the Committee’s Committee to consider raising taxes all failed. Now the fight begins about the governor’s proposals to finance the deficit and to decide what to cut. I suspect the Senate will assert it’s authority in pointing out flaws in the governor’s proposals and will fight for its own, internally generated view on what parts of the budget to cut.
Diario de Juarez Criticises Joint Operation Chihuahua
Diario has a strongly worded editorial this morning, translated by me, which offers a serious criticism of Joint Operation Chihuahua. One of Diario's reporters was murdered last November 13, and in an incident on July 1 military personnel surprised a detachment of state police officers assigned to provide protection to the newspaper. While these incidents may have motivated some of the writing in this editorial, the critique is much broader than a local grievance.
The editorial is in the form of an open letter to Secretary of Public Security (Gobernacion) Fernando Francisco Gomez Mont Urueta, in Mexico City. Some parts were omitted to save space.
"We would like to convey to you, as head of the security agency that supervises Joint Operation Chihuahua, the outcry raised among the general population of juarenses, expressed in multiple ways, against the failure of the strategy to fight organized crime as applied here and throughout the border.
Just one sign of the Operation’s failure is the fact that from January 2008 until this week more than 3500 murders have been recorded, the vast majority of which occurred after the strategy began; rather than slowing down, as border residents hoped for, the violence has multiplied.
This brutality, which has taken the lives of many innocent persons, and which keeps the city under constant attack, when coupled with the sharp increase in other crimes, has aggrieved this community with its worst crisis since the Revolution, causing a decline in most economic activity and the exile of thousands of residents who have the means to flee this daily intimidation.
While it is true that the kidnapping, extortion, and a great proportion of the thefts perpetrated here are not federal crimes, we know, from declarations the governor has made many times, that they are committed by the same persons involved in organized crime as an extension of their criminal activities.
For that reason we hoped that Joint Operation Chihuahua, assisted by 10,000 soldiers and federal agents patrolling our streets, would deal with this complex situation. Nevertheless, the deplorable reality that we juarenses suffer shows us that the approach shared by the army, and the state, local, and federal governments has not been effective as of now, in spite of this massive military presence.
….It is evident that the strategy has failed because local commanders have rendered meaningless the original intentions of President Calderon, generating a strong lack of trust within the population which has led, due to the lack of support from authorities, to self-protection measures that have met with controversial results, such as those in the community of Lebaron, which left one soldier dead and various arrests. (Note: in July Benjamin Lebaron was found beaten and shot to death in Galeana, a mormon community; after his brother’s kidnapping and subsequent release in May, Benjamin returned to Galeana to take a stand in favor of self-protection measures)
The lack of support for from authorities is causing citizens to take extreme measures, while at the same time the armed forces feel impelled to increase their excesses against the population.
It appears that the top authorities are more interested in the public relations with certains sectors, such as happened with General Felipe de Jesus Espitia, coordinator of the Operation, who sent ambivalent signals to the city because in a closed door meeting in the private home of the De la Vaga family he offered all his support to the richest businessman in the region, but has remained deaf to the demands of the society that deplores the daily massacres and the continual deterioration of their community.
In other words, the work of the military commander is selective.
Last July 1, as you must surely have been informed, a squadron of soldiers beat and disarmed two agents of the State Public Security secretariat, assigned to protect personnel of Diario, in spite of their identification as state security agents and presentation of their permission to bear arms, as well as other official documentation recognized by the ministry of defense.
This incident caused General Espitia to open up a disciplinary action against our state Security Secretary, Victor Valencia—who represents the state as a member of Joint Operation Chihuahua—including a fine, and he threatened to cancel the permission given by the federal government to the state to bear arms for state personnel, if he continued to allow personnel of the state police to provide armed security to private parties.
This affair illustrates the arrogant attitude of the military commander toward an official who supposedly is one of his closest collaborators in Joint Operation Chihuahua; he treated him virtually like a criminal for providing security to private parties, security given because the authorities of local, state, and federal governments have not been able to provide adequate security….This incident revealed a deep lack of coordination and lack of trust that exists within a strategy that clearly should be the product of joint cooperation.
The worst part of this incident is that the authorities still have not defined whether state agents who carry arms do so legally or not. Hundreds of armed state police continue to operate as escorts. Were only those who were assigned to protect our newspaper acting illegally? The Ninth Judicial District exonerated one of the guards, while the Fourth Judicial District ordered the other one to resume his duties. This episode is only one of the unfortunate conflicts occurring at the top levels of Joint Operation Chihuahua, and when added to the situation in Cd. Juarez that we described above demonstrated ho poorly the operation is working.
….With all due respect we call on you to put things in order in Joint Operation Chihuahua. An urgent rethinking is needed to achieve an effective coordination between the governments and the security agencies, and with new strategies that not only can weaken organized crime, but which can return to this aggrieved community its lost peace."
Signed: Osvaldo Rodriguez Borunda, President of the Board and General Director of Diario.
The editorial is in the form of an open letter to Secretary of Public Security (Gobernacion) Fernando Francisco Gomez Mont Urueta, in Mexico City. Some parts were omitted to save space.
"We would like to convey to you, as head of the security agency that supervises Joint Operation Chihuahua, the outcry raised among the general population of juarenses, expressed in multiple ways, against the failure of the strategy to fight organized crime as applied here and throughout the border.
Just one sign of the Operation’s failure is the fact that from January 2008 until this week more than 3500 murders have been recorded, the vast majority of which occurred after the strategy began; rather than slowing down, as border residents hoped for, the violence has multiplied.
This brutality, which has taken the lives of many innocent persons, and which keeps the city under constant attack, when coupled with the sharp increase in other crimes, has aggrieved this community with its worst crisis since the Revolution, causing a decline in most economic activity and the exile of thousands of residents who have the means to flee this daily intimidation.
While it is true that the kidnapping, extortion, and a great proportion of the thefts perpetrated here are not federal crimes, we know, from declarations the governor has made many times, that they are committed by the same persons involved in organized crime as an extension of their criminal activities.
For that reason we hoped that Joint Operation Chihuahua, assisted by 10,000 soldiers and federal agents patrolling our streets, would deal with this complex situation. Nevertheless, the deplorable reality that we juarenses suffer shows us that the approach shared by the army, and the state, local, and federal governments has not been effective as of now, in spite of this massive military presence.
….It is evident that the strategy has failed because local commanders have rendered meaningless the original intentions of President Calderon, generating a strong lack of trust within the population which has led, due to the lack of support from authorities, to self-protection measures that have met with controversial results, such as those in the community of Lebaron, which left one soldier dead and various arrests. (Note: in July Benjamin Lebaron was found beaten and shot to death in Galeana, a mormon community; after his brother’s kidnapping and subsequent release in May, Benjamin returned to Galeana to take a stand in favor of self-protection measures)
The lack of support for from authorities is causing citizens to take extreme measures, while at the same time the armed forces feel impelled to increase their excesses against the population.
It appears that the top authorities are more interested in the public relations with certains sectors, such as happened with General Felipe de Jesus Espitia, coordinator of the Operation, who sent ambivalent signals to the city because in a closed door meeting in the private home of the De la Vaga family he offered all his support to the richest businessman in the region, but has remained deaf to the demands of the society that deplores the daily massacres and the continual deterioration of their community.
In other words, the work of the military commander is selective.
Last July 1, as you must surely have been informed, a squadron of soldiers beat and disarmed two agents of the State Public Security secretariat, assigned to protect personnel of Diario, in spite of their identification as state security agents and presentation of their permission to bear arms, as well as other official documentation recognized by the ministry of defense.
This incident caused General Espitia to open up a disciplinary action against our state Security Secretary, Victor Valencia—who represents the state as a member of Joint Operation Chihuahua—including a fine, and he threatened to cancel the permission given by the federal government to the state to bear arms for state personnel, if he continued to allow personnel of the state police to provide armed security to private parties.
This affair illustrates the arrogant attitude of the military commander toward an official who supposedly is one of his closest collaborators in Joint Operation Chihuahua; he treated him virtually like a criminal for providing security to private parties, security given because the authorities of local, state, and federal governments have not been able to provide adequate security….This incident revealed a deep lack of coordination and lack of trust that exists within a strategy that clearly should be the product of joint cooperation.
The worst part of this incident is that the authorities still have not defined whether state agents who carry arms do so legally or not. Hundreds of armed state police continue to operate as escorts. Were only those who were assigned to protect our newspaper acting illegally? The Ninth Judicial District exonerated one of the guards, while the Fourth Judicial District ordered the other one to resume his duties. This episode is only one of the unfortunate conflicts occurring at the top levels of Joint Operation Chihuahua, and when added to the situation in Cd. Juarez that we described above demonstrated ho poorly the operation is working.
….With all due respect we call on you to put things in order in Joint Operation Chihuahua. An urgent rethinking is needed to achieve an effective coordination between the governments and the security agencies, and with new strategies that not only can weaken organized crime, but which can return to this aggrieved community its lost peace."
Signed: Osvaldo Rodriguez Borunda, President of the Board and General Director of Diario.
Saturday, October 17, 2009
The Budget Debate: Where Things Are As the Special Session Begins
The Special Session of the Legislature is scheduled to begin in just a few minutes, today, Saturday, to deal with the budget shortfall. Here is where we stand so far, as I understand it.
First, the budget shortfall is serious. At an estimate $680 million, this represents about 12-13 percent of the budget passed during the 2009 session. There has never been a budget shortfall of this magnitude in New Mexico since the Great Depression. This is no joke and the state will be feeling this, almost certainly, until 2013, when revenues are projected to equal those of 2008. But purchasing power by then will have been eroded by five years of inflation, so it may take another two or three years after that for revenues in purchasing power to equal those of 2008.
Second, the institutions that must deal with the crisis--the legislature and the governor--are gravely weak. Deciding what must be cut, rather than expanded, is difficult, and neither the legislature nor the governor are likely to resolve the budget crisis in a way that highlights the largely petty reasons things end up as they do in the legislature. The effort will be to accommodate interests, rather than allow factions to walk away angry.
On the one hand the governor, already discredited by strong and believable allegations of "pay to play" politics, is partly responsible for the mess getting to the stage it is now. Governor Richardson was simply not minding the store responsibly as evidence mounted month after month for at least the past 15 months that a full-fledged fiscal crisis was brewing. Last year when Sen. John A. Smith tried to warn him and the public that the state's revenues were in sharp decline, the governor mocked his warnings, calling him "Dr. No," and insisting on a tax rebate that the best budget people in the state warned was untenable. This summer, as evidence continued to mount the shortfalls were still mounting, the governor continued to ignore the warning signs, while still playing politics with the budget. The recipient of the "Best Governor of the Year" award early this summer from the National Education Association, the governor boldly declared public education could not be cut no matter what, even as news media were full of reports to the effect that the educational outputs in New Mexico, after record amounts of funding increases for education, were still dismal, in virtually all categories.
The Governor's credibility in deciding what to cut, under all of these circumstances, is pretty low. Is there anybody in New Mexico who really believes the governor will make his decisions based on what he thinks is best for the state as opposed to what is best for what is left of his political career?
On the other hand, the legislature, especially the House, has shown very little leadership or courage in the face of a dysfunctional governorship coupled with a fiscal crisis of the first magnitude. Top leaders in the House are still behaving as though power relations in New Mexico are still as they were five years ago when Richardson still enjoyed the trust of the public, the legislature, and virtually all segments of society. Then it didn't matter if a few legislators acted more like cheerleaders for Richardson than responsible legislators. Today, with elections coming up and the state in crisis it looks more like a testimony to cowardice and lack of imagination, rather than the cold calculation of realpolitik. The ability of Republican legislators to articulate anything approaching a coherent message about the crisis of the governorship or the crisis of the budget appears to have gone AWOL. There is no lack of talent in the New Mexico legislature, either among Democrats or Republicans. That none is willing to step up to the plate, consistently, and tell it like it is, is a sorry commentary on the state of democratic practice in New Mexico today. That should be a source of serious concern for each of us, regardless of party or ideological orientation.
Third, look for face-saving compromises during the Special Session. The governor has already backed off of his foolish promise not to cut education. If you don't cut the budget for education, and you leave Medicaid and other 3-1 federal dollar matches alone, you must then cut something like 16% of everything else. That means jobs, and lost jobs means angry voters. Only those legislators tied completely to the apron strings of the education unions will end up putting up much of a fuss about this. Cutting jobs would be particularly troubling for legislators in the North, where state government jobs are a major force in the economies of many counties.
Tax increases? The governor was lavish in slashing taxes at the beginning. Remember how he removed food from the gross receipts tax? Restoring that would add about $200 million, I am told by a good source, making a good start at resolving the crisis. After all, New Mexican lived for nearly a century of statehood paying gross receipts taxes on food. During a crisis it might not be too burdensome to go back to it, to generate revenue. But will legislators have the stomach to do this, in the face of the governor's opposition, with elections just a year away? I doubt it, although it would probably be good public policy. Then there is the film tax credit, which I am told by a good source would generate $82 million, and for which New Mexicans get in return, according to serious studies, between 14 cents and 50 cents on the dollar, a net drain. Moreover, the accountability for this give away to the movie industry has been the source of major scandal in recent months. But will legislators have the courage to do away with a favorite pet project of the governor? I doubt it. Watch this proposal die a silent death behind closed doors.
First, the budget shortfall is serious. At an estimate $680 million, this represents about 12-13 percent of the budget passed during the 2009 session. There has never been a budget shortfall of this magnitude in New Mexico since the Great Depression. This is no joke and the state will be feeling this, almost certainly, until 2013, when revenues are projected to equal those of 2008. But purchasing power by then will have been eroded by five years of inflation, so it may take another two or three years after that for revenues in purchasing power to equal those of 2008.
Second, the institutions that must deal with the crisis--the legislature and the governor--are gravely weak. Deciding what must be cut, rather than expanded, is difficult, and neither the legislature nor the governor are likely to resolve the budget crisis in a way that highlights the largely petty reasons things end up as they do in the legislature. The effort will be to accommodate interests, rather than allow factions to walk away angry.
On the one hand the governor, already discredited by strong and believable allegations of "pay to play" politics, is partly responsible for the mess getting to the stage it is now. Governor Richardson was simply not minding the store responsibly as evidence mounted month after month for at least the past 15 months that a full-fledged fiscal crisis was brewing. Last year when Sen. John A. Smith tried to warn him and the public that the state's revenues were in sharp decline, the governor mocked his warnings, calling him "Dr. No," and insisting on a tax rebate that the best budget people in the state warned was untenable. This summer, as evidence continued to mount the shortfalls were still mounting, the governor continued to ignore the warning signs, while still playing politics with the budget. The recipient of the "Best Governor of the Year" award early this summer from the National Education Association, the governor boldly declared public education could not be cut no matter what, even as news media were full of reports to the effect that the educational outputs in New Mexico, after record amounts of funding increases for education, were still dismal, in virtually all categories.
The Governor's credibility in deciding what to cut, under all of these circumstances, is pretty low. Is there anybody in New Mexico who really believes the governor will make his decisions based on what he thinks is best for the state as opposed to what is best for what is left of his political career?
On the other hand, the legislature, especially the House, has shown very little leadership or courage in the face of a dysfunctional governorship coupled with a fiscal crisis of the first magnitude. Top leaders in the House are still behaving as though power relations in New Mexico are still as they were five years ago when Richardson still enjoyed the trust of the public, the legislature, and virtually all segments of society. Then it didn't matter if a few legislators acted more like cheerleaders for Richardson than responsible legislators. Today, with elections coming up and the state in crisis it looks more like a testimony to cowardice and lack of imagination, rather than the cold calculation of realpolitik. The ability of Republican legislators to articulate anything approaching a coherent message about the crisis of the governorship or the crisis of the budget appears to have gone AWOL. There is no lack of talent in the New Mexico legislature, either among Democrats or Republicans. That none is willing to step up to the plate, consistently, and tell it like it is, is a sorry commentary on the state of democratic practice in New Mexico today. That should be a source of serious concern for each of us, regardless of party or ideological orientation.
Third, look for face-saving compromises during the Special Session. The governor has already backed off of his foolish promise not to cut education. If you don't cut the budget for education, and you leave Medicaid and other 3-1 federal dollar matches alone, you must then cut something like 16% of everything else. That means jobs, and lost jobs means angry voters. Only those legislators tied completely to the apron strings of the education unions will end up putting up much of a fuss about this. Cutting jobs would be particularly troubling for legislators in the North, where state government jobs are a major force in the economies of many counties.
Tax increases? The governor was lavish in slashing taxes at the beginning. Remember how he removed food from the gross receipts tax? Restoring that would add about $200 million, I am told by a good source, making a good start at resolving the crisis. After all, New Mexican lived for nearly a century of statehood paying gross receipts taxes on food. During a crisis it might not be too burdensome to go back to it, to generate revenue. But will legislators have the stomach to do this, in the face of the governor's opposition, with elections just a year away? I doubt it, although it would probably be good public policy. Then there is the film tax credit, which I am told by a good source would generate $82 million, and for which New Mexicans get in return, according to serious studies, between 14 cents and 50 cents on the dollar, a net drain. Moreover, the accountability for this give away to the movie industry has been the source of major scandal in recent months. But will legislators have the courage to do away with a favorite pet project of the governor? I doubt it. Watch this proposal die a silent death behind closed doors.
Drug Use in Mexico Vs. U.S.A
Mexican Health Secretary Jose Angel Cordova released a report in Mexico City yesterday, indicating that cocaine usage doubled in Mexico during the past two years, from 1.2% to 2.4%. That is, as of last year 2.4% of the population between the ages of 12 and 65 had at some point consumed cocaine. This compares with the U.S. rate of 16.2%, calculated last year by a World Health Organization study. The states with the highest consumption rate in Mexico are, in order, Baja California, Baja California Sur, and Chihuahua, followed by Mexico City and Durango.
Marijuana continues to be the drug of choice in Mexico.
During the past three years Mexico has quietly moved toward decriminalizing drug use. Mariujuana, cocaine, LSD, and heroin will be tolerated for personal and limited use--about four joints, or half a gram of cocaine, or 50 milligrams of heroin. Bigger quantities, sales, and public consumption are still strictly forbidden.
The US rate of consumption of cocaine is by far the highest in the world, followed by New Zealand, at only 4.3%. Marijuana consumption in the US is calculated at 42.4%, the highest in the world, followed again by New Zealand, with a rate of 41.9%
Marijuana continues to be the drug of choice in Mexico.
During the past three years Mexico has quietly moved toward decriminalizing drug use. Mariujuana, cocaine, LSD, and heroin will be tolerated for personal and limited use--about four joints, or half a gram of cocaine, or 50 milligrams of heroin. Bigger quantities, sales, and public consumption are still strictly forbidden.
The US rate of consumption of cocaine is by far the highest in the world, followed by New Zealand, at only 4.3%. Marijuana consumption in the US is calculated at 42.4%, the highest in the world, followed again by New Zealand, with a rate of 41.9%
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
No Postings Next Two Weeks
La Politica New Mexico will not be posting articles for the next two weeks while the blogger is on vacation. There are, however, some interesting things that are coming up soon after I return, so stay tuned.
Saturday, September 26, 2009
The Dead Women of Juarez: A New Mexican's Retrospective Upon the Appointment of Arturo Chavez Chavez
The Mexican Senate yesterday confirmed the appointment of Arturo Chavez Chavez, former attorney general of Chihuahua, to be Attorney General of Mexico. It was a controversial appointment, opposed by some human rights groups who claimed Mr. Chavez had been negligent in his duties in connection with the investigations of the femicides of Cd. Juarez when he was attorney general of Chihuahua in the late 1990s. I was familiar with the controversies surrounding Mr. Chavez, and I thought my recollections and perspective might be interesting to readers following the issue.
At the time Chavez was attorney general in Chihuahua, 1996-1998, Francisco Barrio was Governor, elected to a six-year term in 1992. Barrio, the first member of the PAN to be elected governor in Chihuahua, was an almost legendary figure in Mexico because of his brave struggle to open up electoral processes in Chihuahua in the face of powerful tactics against him from the PRI, Mexico's dominant political party until the year 2000. But once he became governor, he disappointed many with his autocratic governing style and, some say, his willingness to tolerate corrupt practices in state government. During his tenure in office the Juarez cartel headed by Amado Carrillo Fuentes became the most important cartel in Mexico. Barrio's attorney general from 1992 to 1996 was Francisco Molina, who was later on the shortest of lists to become Attorney General of Mexico in 2000 when Vicente Fox became president. But he was not in fact appointed, almost certainly because of rumors of his associations with the cartel while in Chihuahua. Arturo Chavez Chavez succeeded Molina as attorney general of Chihuahua in 1996.
Chavez's tenure was marked by controversy among other reasons because of pressure feminist groups placed on the attorney general's office to resolve a wave of killings of women in Cd. Juarez that began in the early 1990s. Some of the women were found mutilated, stabbed, or brutally beaten then dumped in random locations. Groups of women, often the mothers of disappeared or murdered women, banded together, moving from office to office between Juarez and Chihuahua City, seeking information about their loved ones, only to be greeted by a bureaucratic cold shoulder. In time the cold shoulder itself became as powerful an issue as the failure of authorities to fully investigate the disappearances and murders. Vickie Caraveo, a well-to-do housewife, began providing support and strategic advice, eventually forming a group called Mujeres Por Juarez. Esther Chavez Cano, a boutique store owner, would close her store every time a new dead body appeared, as a public reminder that the killings were still going on without resolution. In 1999 she opened up the first rape crisis center in Juarez, and remains to this day outspoken about the need for the state to take the killings seriously.
After he was named attorney General Chavez Chavez became virtually a poster child for the insensitivity, incompetence, and indifference of public authorities in dealing with the murders. Instead of sympathizing with the victims and their relatives, he seemed to blame them. For example, Chavez is credited with saying, "if they were raped and killed it wasn't because they were on their way to mass," and on another occasion, "sometimes they (the women) are a fault for dressing provocatively." These suggestions that the victims were often prostitutes simply outraged surviving relatives, some of whom went to great lengths to prove otherwise.
In May 1998, Mexico's National Human Rights Commission asked for an investigation of the attorney general's office in Chihuahua, given mounting evidence that office was severely deficient in its inquiries into the crimes. In response, state authorities belittled the commission's work, characterizing it as "partial," and "leading to false conclusions and statements, and lacking any foundation in objectivity." (Flash forward: last week Chihuahua State Human Rights Commission investigator Gustavo de la Rosa Hickerson moved to El Paso from Juarez, he said, after multiple threats to his life for publicizing complaints about abuses by army personnel in Joint Operation Chihuahua)
New Mexican's Perspective
At about this time, mid-1998, the issue was escalating quickly to national proportions. As director of the Center for Latin American Studies, I sponsored a conference at New Mexico State University to deal openly with the issue, to be held in the Fall at NMSU. A member of my staff, Anne Marie Mackler did much of the work. We invited Chavez Chavez, Juarez Police Chief Javier Benavides, Vickie Caraveo, Esther Chavez Cano, some of the victims' families, Julia Monarrez, a scholar who had studied the statistics of the murders, and others. While preparations were under way, Chavez Chavez was fired and replaced by Arturo Gonzalez Rascon, who, as I recall, immediately appointed a woman to a newly-created position, the Special Prosecutor for the Murders of Women, Suly Ponce Prieto. This was an obvious attempt to signal that he was more sensitive than Chavez Chavez had been about the issue.
To my astonishment and delight, just about everyone, including the new attorney general and Suly Ponce, accepted our invitation. Chavez Chavez understandably bowed out, since he was no longer in the line of fire. For both the attorney general and Suly Ponce it was to be their first major public appearances since they had been named to their positions. For Chavez Cano, Caraveo, and the families of the victims, it was their first public shot at the new officials.
Until the conference virtually all of the politics around the issue was taking place inside Juarez, often behind closed doors, in an atmosphere laced with unspoken fears and very little civic practice in challenging law enforcement officials. On the neutral grounds of New Mexico State University, with uninvolved New Mexicans as witnesses, after years of pent-up frustration, the surviving victims of violence could let it all hang out. This occasion was perhaps the first time all of the parties, news media, families of the victims, law enforcement, and interested observers, were all sitting at the same table, with rules of the game that privileged only straight talk, not position or sympathy.
As you can imagine, the victims lashed out at the law enforcement officials, who appeared shocked at finding themselves under withering fire. Suly Ponce, who appeared to relish the role of villain, was defiant and disdainful, spouting statistics with great flourish, suggesting most of the cases had already been solved and hardly sympathetic toward the victims. The attorney general was more conciliatory, assuring the victims his office would do more than the previous regime to investigate the murders. Other law enforcement officials confessed their forces were poorly trained, with very little technical support for forensic investigation.
As a keynote speaker we had invited Deborah Nathan, a writer for The Nation. She gave an elegant talk, postmodern in tone, suggesting Juarez had become a metaphor for the downside of the newly globalizing world, the boundary line where the first and third worlds meet. Highly sympathetic towards the women, she suggested the maquila plants were also a metaphor for the new age, where corporate giants took advantage of low wages in poor countries, but refused to accept social responsibility. Extending the metaphor more, she suggested the dead women could be viewed as victims of this new age; poorly paid at maquila plants, some of them resort to outside jobs, including prostitution, to make ends meet, and where violence against women was endemic. Ironically, this latter point was precisely the point Chavez Chavez had tried unsuccessfully to make about the dead women: they were prostitutes, and therefore, to him, the deaths were perhaps not so intolerable.
When she was finished with her talk a woman came up to the stage with a framed photograph of a young woman. She showed it to the audience and glared at Nathan: "This was my sister," she cried. "She is one of the dead women. She was not a prostitute, and you have just insulted her memory." A young colleague of mine, a faculty member in the Spanish Department, dashed up to the stage, addressing Nathan, and said: "I worked for several years in a maquila plant before I got my PhD. I did so because it was the highest paid job I could find and I didn't feel like an exploited member of the underclass. The job was dignified, and I didn't know a single woman working in my plant who was a prostitute on the side."
If the victims of the crime were tolerating none of the excuses given by law enforcement for not investigating the crimes with seriousness, neither were they going to tolerate an outsider, no matter how sympathetic, relegating their loved ones to the status of mere metaphors for a newly emerging global order and disparaging their characters. It was important for them to remember their dead as real people, flesh and blood, and innocent.
In many ways the conference helped shape the battle lines for the next few months, since many of the issues debated at the conference would become the re-debated intensely in the weeks and months that followed. It broke the ice in Juarez and the debate about the dead women of Juarez was never quite the same again.
As you might imagine, some of the people involved in the femicide issue are still active. When told Arturo Chavez Chavez had been nominated to be attorney general Vickie Caraveo said, simply, "Jesus, I can't believe it." Esther Chavez Cano said, "This is bad news." The best book I know dealing with the dead women is Diana Washington Valdez, The Killing Fields: Harvest of Women, published by Peace at the Border, 2006.
At the time Chavez was attorney general in Chihuahua, 1996-1998, Francisco Barrio was Governor, elected to a six-year term in 1992. Barrio, the first member of the PAN to be elected governor in Chihuahua, was an almost legendary figure in Mexico because of his brave struggle to open up electoral processes in Chihuahua in the face of powerful tactics against him from the PRI, Mexico's dominant political party until the year 2000. But once he became governor, he disappointed many with his autocratic governing style and, some say, his willingness to tolerate corrupt practices in state government. During his tenure in office the Juarez cartel headed by Amado Carrillo Fuentes became the most important cartel in Mexico. Barrio's attorney general from 1992 to 1996 was Francisco Molina, who was later on the shortest of lists to become Attorney General of Mexico in 2000 when Vicente Fox became president. But he was not in fact appointed, almost certainly because of rumors of his associations with the cartel while in Chihuahua. Arturo Chavez Chavez succeeded Molina as attorney general of Chihuahua in 1996.
Chavez's tenure was marked by controversy among other reasons because of pressure feminist groups placed on the attorney general's office to resolve a wave of killings of women in Cd. Juarez that began in the early 1990s. Some of the women were found mutilated, stabbed, or brutally beaten then dumped in random locations. Groups of women, often the mothers of disappeared or murdered women, banded together, moving from office to office between Juarez and Chihuahua City, seeking information about their loved ones, only to be greeted by a bureaucratic cold shoulder. In time the cold shoulder itself became as powerful an issue as the failure of authorities to fully investigate the disappearances and murders. Vickie Caraveo, a well-to-do housewife, began providing support and strategic advice, eventually forming a group called Mujeres Por Juarez. Esther Chavez Cano, a boutique store owner, would close her store every time a new dead body appeared, as a public reminder that the killings were still going on without resolution. In 1999 she opened up the first rape crisis center in Juarez, and remains to this day outspoken about the need for the state to take the killings seriously.
After he was named attorney General Chavez Chavez became virtually a poster child for the insensitivity, incompetence, and indifference of public authorities in dealing with the murders. Instead of sympathizing with the victims and their relatives, he seemed to blame them. For example, Chavez is credited with saying, "if they were raped and killed it wasn't because they were on their way to mass," and on another occasion, "sometimes they (the women) are a fault for dressing provocatively." These suggestions that the victims were often prostitutes simply outraged surviving relatives, some of whom went to great lengths to prove otherwise.
In May 1998, Mexico's National Human Rights Commission asked for an investigation of the attorney general's office in Chihuahua, given mounting evidence that office was severely deficient in its inquiries into the crimes. In response, state authorities belittled the commission's work, characterizing it as "partial," and "leading to false conclusions and statements, and lacking any foundation in objectivity." (Flash forward: last week Chihuahua State Human Rights Commission investigator Gustavo de la Rosa Hickerson moved to El Paso from Juarez, he said, after multiple threats to his life for publicizing complaints about abuses by army personnel in Joint Operation Chihuahua)
New Mexican's Perspective
At about this time, mid-1998, the issue was escalating quickly to national proportions. As director of the Center for Latin American Studies, I sponsored a conference at New Mexico State University to deal openly with the issue, to be held in the Fall at NMSU. A member of my staff, Anne Marie Mackler did much of the work. We invited Chavez Chavez, Juarez Police Chief Javier Benavides, Vickie Caraveo, Esther Chavez Cano, some of the victims' families, Julia Monarrez, a scholar who had studied the statistics of the murders, and others. While preparations were under way, Chavez Chavez was fired and replaced by Arturo Gonzalez Rascon, who, as I recall, immediately appointed a woman to a newly-created position, the Special Prosecutor for the Murders of Women, Suly Ponce Prieto. This was an obvious attempt to signal that he was more sensitive than Chavez Chavez had been about the issue.
To my astonishment and delight, just about everyone, including the new attorney general and Suly Ponce, accepted our invitation. Chavez Chavez understandably bowed out, since he was no longer in the line of fire. For both the attorney general and Suly Ponce it was to be their first major public appearances since they had been named to their positions. For Chavez Cano, Caraveo, and the families of the victims, it was their first public shot at the new officials.
Until the conference virtually all of the politics around the issue was taking place inside Juarez, often behind closed doors, in an atmosphere laced with unspoken fears and very little civic practice in challenging law enforcement officials. On the neutral grounds of New Mexico State University, with uninvolved New Mexicans as witnesses, after years of pent-up frustration, the surviving victims of violence could let it all hang out. This occasion was perhaps the first time all of the parties, news media, families of the victims, law enforcement, and interested observers, were all sitting at the same table, with rules of the game that privileged only straight talk, not position or sympathy.
As you can imagine, the victims lashed out at the law enforcement officials, who appeared shocked at finding themselves under withering fire. Suly Ponce, who appeared to relish the role of villain, was defiant and disdainful, spouting statistics with great flourish, suggesting most of the cases had already been solved and hardly sympathetic toward the victims. The attorney general was more conciliatory, assuring the victims his office would do more than the previous regime to investigate the murders. Other law enforcement officials confessed their forces were poorly trained, with very little technical support for forensic investigation.
As a keynote speaker we had invited Deborah Nathan, a writer for The Nation. She gave an elegant talk, postmodern in tone, suggesting Juarez had become a metaphor for the downside of the newly globalizing world, the boundary line where the first and third worlds meet. Highly sympathetic towards the women, she suggested the maquila plants were also a metaphor for the new age, where corporate giants took advantage of low wages in poor countries, but refused to accept social responsibility. Extending the metaphor more, she suggested the dead women could be viewed as victims of this new age; poorly paid at maquila plants, some of them resort to outside jobs, including prostitution, to make ends meet, and where violence against women was endemic. Ironically, this latter point was precisely the point Chavez Chavez had tried unsuccessfully to make about the dead women: they were prostitutes, and therefore, to him, the deaths were perhaps not so intolerable.
When she was finished with her talk a woman came up to the stage with a framed photograph of a young woman. She showed it to the audience and glared at Nathan: "This was my sister," she cried. "She is one of the dead women. She was not a prostitute, and you have just insulted her memory." A young colleague of mine, a faculty member in the Spanish Department, dashed up to the stage, addressing Nathan, and said: "I worked for several years in a maquila plant before I got my PhD. I did so because it was the highest paid job I could find and I didn't feel like an exploited member of the underclass. The job was dignified, and I didn't know a single woman working in my plant who was a prostitute on the side."
If the victims of the crime were tolerating none of the excuses given by law enforcement for not investigating the crimes with seriousness, neither were they going to tolerate an outsider, no matter how sympathetic, relegating their loved ones to the status of mere metaphors for a newly emerging global order and disparaging their characters. It was important for them to remember their dead as real people, flesh and blood, and innocent.
In many ways the conference helped shape the battle lines for the next few months, since many of the issues debated at the conference would become the re-debated intensely in the weeks and months that followed. It broke the ice in Juarez and the debate about the dead women of Juarez was never quite the same again.
As you might imagine, some of the people involved in the femicide issue are still active. When told Arturo Chavez Chavez had been nominated to be attorney general Vickie Caraveo said, simply, "Jesus, I can't believe it." Esther Chavez Cano said, "This is bad news." The best book I know dealing with the dead women is Diana Washington Valdez, The Killing Fields: Harvest of Women, published by Peace at the Border, 2006.
Friday, September 25, 2009
A Chat with Lawrence Rael
He is arguably the most overqualified candidate ever to run for public office in New Mexico: Chief Administrative Officer of Albuquerque for 12 years in a row under three mayors; (so he can manage a billion dollar budget and make himself so useful you don't want to fire him). Staffer for Sen. Jeff Bingaman for three years; (so he knows something about Washington). Planner and manager of the Rail Runner Express; (so he can deal with even the most outrageous egos and still get the job done within budgetary limits--more about this later). Called in to clean up part of the housing authority scandal; (so he is willing to take risks accepting a thankless job and a political hot potato to boot). With these kinds of credentials he ought to be running for Chairman of the 2016 Olympics or looking for a top job in the new Obama administration or (dare I say this?) running for governor himself. Why in the world would he want a part-time gavel to herd cats in the senate and answer the phone when angry constituents call up about another snafu?
With these thoughts in mind and fully prepared to form an instant dislike for him as punishment for having acquired such an accomplished resume in a short period of time, I joined Mr. Rael for breakfast this morning at the Encanto hotel.
Bottom line: Rael believes, passionately, that his managerial skills can be put to use in the Lt. Governor's office as a means of improving the management of state business. He has formulated the most ambitious role ever envisioned for a Lt. Governor, and it hinges on putting his proven managerial skills to work. Very few people in that position would even think about playing the role he has in mind.
As he puts it the executive branch normally acts like a set of competing fiefdoms where few executives communicate with counterparts even on closely related issues. They all stove-pipe carefully guarded information to the governor's office. The governor is too busy to insist of day-to-day accountability except for the highest priorities, and the legislature has no institutional capacity to monitor much of what goes on. Result? Poor management, poor accountability. A Lt. Governor with Rael's managerial experience, coupled with the support of a governor, could bring people together within state government to make common cause on high priority policy issues, and to vastly improve the efficiency of the executive branch. Where agencies are feuding, he could try for forge a peace. Where information is withheld, he could pry it loose. Where important projects need stronger management, he could help fill the gap. In addition to all of this, Rael suggests he might also be able to help communications between the legislature and the governor, which often break down by ego-driven turf battles, by acting as a liaison between the two branches, one supposes, as an honest broker of information and by focusing on project-driven, rather than politics-driven considerations.
Now here, I thought to myself, is a new idea for that office, made credible by Rael's unquestionable talent as a manager. But, I said to him, playing devil's advocate, there are two "ifs" here. First, you need the consistent support for this mission from the governor, without which you end up frustrated like Casey Luna under Bruce King when he actually believed King might delegate some policy issues to him. So let me concede that she will enable you to play this role. What about the second "if:" what if you try to get the fiefdom sheiks and sharks to work together and they tell you to butt out of their business? Why should they, with all their budgetary resources, defer to you, who has no budget, no staff?
At this point his passion came into play. "This is where my experience with people comes in," he said, looking me in the eye. "I've been in that position many times before, and I've always been able to get people to work better together." He cited his experience as COG director for the Mid-Region Council of Governments. "I have no authority there, either, but I've managed to get things done." He ended up doing most of the management for the Rail Runner, as he put it, not because he was the logical person to do so, but because he had the skills to get the job done. He could have added, but did not, that if the Governor truly delegated authority to him over recalcitrant cabinet officers, they would quickly defer to him as well. I was surprised by the passionate intensity of Rael as he effortlessly analyzes highly complex integovernmental relations, stressing what appears to be a highly developed sense of the common good being his north star. Very refreshing.
A couple of technical issues. I asked him about the cost over-runs for the Rail Runner. As he sees it, there were no cost over-runs. The legislature appropriated $125 million to plan either a middle lane for the Albuquerque to Santa Fe highway or a rail runner from Belen to Santa Fe. The language in the legislation was deliberately vague and when a decision was made to go with the rail runner, the legislature was asked to come up with $275 million more, for a total of $400 million, to enable the completion of Phase II, from Albuquerque to Santa Fe, inasmuch as Phase I, from Belen to Albuquerque cost $125 million and was already complete. The project was funded $400 million and that's what it cost. I asked for a comment on Paul Gessing's study indicating taxpayers are subsidizing every ride to the tune of $16.89 today. Rael's answer is that the cost-per-drive for many rural highways is far higher than that, and in the case of the rail runner, a subsidy is justified for many reasons, including giving drivers along that corridor a reasonably priced alternative mode of transportation. Moreover, Rael said, Gessing has not factored into his account the revenues (calculated by tonnage and mileage) generated by the lease of the rail line to BNSF and Amtrack when they use the lines. The subsidy would not be as high if these revenues were counted in the calculations.
Ethics reform: Rael stressed the need for various reforms, including the development of a code of conduct for state government officials (including, I assume, legislators), the creation of a reasonably independent commission with subpoena and other powers, and the development of an ethics policy for the granting of contracts.
His Spanish is flawless, the outcome of a Mexican born-and-raised mother who took her children frequently to her former home. He can deal with linguistic nuances and would be at ease negotiating complex issues in either or both languages at the same time. I confess that, while I was prepared to dislike him, imagining the cold, numbers-driven arrogance that drove the likes of Robert McNamara and Don Rumsfeld (and other top managers) into promoting unwise policies that cost countless human lives long after common citizens understood the futility, I found Rael to be a highly likable, people-oriented, and commons sense kind of manager. He inspires you with a can-do optimism, tempered by a realistic assessment of the state of affairs as it is and a well developed sense of public service. In short, he is the kind of manager everyone wants as a boss.
With these thoughts in mind and fully prepared to form an instant dislike for him as punishment for having acquired such an accomplished resume in a short period of time, I joined Mr. Rael for breakfast this morning at the Encanto hotel.
Bottom line: Rael believes, passionately, that his managerial skills can be put to use in the Lt. Governor's office as a means of improving the management of state business. He has formulated the most ambitious role ever envisioned for a Lt. Governor, and it hinges on putting his proven managerial skills to work. Very few people in that position would even think about playing the role he has in mind.
As he puts it the executive branch normally acts like a set of competing fiefdoms where few executives communicate with counterparts even on closely related issues. They all stove-pipe carefully guarded information to the governor's office. The governor is too busy to insist of day-to-day accountability except for the highest priorities, and the legislature has no institutional capacity to monitor much of what goes on. Result? Poor management, poor accountability. A Lt. Governor with Rael's managerial experience, coupled with the support of a governor, could bring people together within state government to make common cause on high priority policy issues, and to vastly improve the efficiency of the executive branch. Where agencies are feuding, he could try for forge a peace. Where information is withheld, he could pry it loose. Where important projects need stronger management, he could help fill the gap. In addition to all of this, Rael suggests he might also be able to help communications between the legislature and the governor, which often break down by ego-driven turf battles, by acting as a liaison between the two branches, one supposes, as an honest broker of information and by focusing on project-driven, rather than politics-driven considerations.
Now here, I thought to myself, is a new idea for that office, made credible by Rael's unquestionable talent as a manager. But, I said to him, playing devil's advocate, there are two "ifs" here. First, you need the consistent support for this mission from the governor, without which you end up frustrated like Casey Luna under Bruce King when he actually believed King might delegate some policy issues to him. So let me concede that she will enable you to play this role. What about the second "if:" what if you try to get the fiefdom sheiks and sharks to work together and they tell you to butt out of their business? Why should they, with all their budgetary resources, defer to you, who has no budget, no staff?
At this point his passion came into play. "This is where my experience with people comes in," he said, looking me in the eye. "I've been in that position many times before, and I've always been able to get people to work better together." He cited his experience as COG director for the Mid-Region Council of Governments. "I have no authority there, either, but I've managed to get things done." He ended up doing most of the management for the Rail Runner, as he put it, not because he was the logical person to do so, but because he had the skills to get the job done. He could have added, but did not, that if the Governor truly delegated authority to him over recalcitrant cabinet officers, they would quickly defer to him as well. I was surprised by the passionate intensity of Rael as he effortlessly analyzes highly complex integovernmental relations, stressing what appears to be a highly developed sense of the common good being his north star. Very refreshing.
A couple of technical issues. I asked him about the cost over-runs for the Rail Runner. As he sees it, there were no cost over-runs. The legislature appropriated $125 million to plan either a middle lane for the Albuquerque to Santa Fe highway or a rail runner from Belen to Santa Fe. The language in the legislation was deliberately vague and when a decision was made to go with the rail runner, the legislature was asked to come up with $275 million more, for a total of $400 million, to enable the completion of Phase II, from Albuquerque to Santa Fe, inasmuch as Phase I, from Belen to Albuquerque cost $125 million and was already complete. The project was funded $400 million and that's what it cost. I asked for a comment on Paul Gessing's study indicating taxpayers are subsidizing every ride to the tune of $16.89 today. Rael's answer is that the cost-per-drive for many rural highways is far higher than that, and in the case of the rail runner, a subsidy is justified for many reasons, including giving drivers along that corridor a reasonably priced alternative mode of transportation. Moreover, Rael said, Gessing has not factored into his account the revenues (calculated by tonnage and mileage) generated by the lease of the rail line to BNSF and Amtrack when they use the lines. The subsidy would not be as high if these revenues were counted in the calculations.
Ethics reform: Rael stressed the need for various reforms, including the development of a code of conduct for state government officials (including, I assume, legislators), the creation of a reasonably independent commission with subpoena and other powers, and the development of an ethics policy for the granting of contracts.
His Spanish is flawless, the outcome of a Mexican born-and-raised mother who took her children frequently to her former home. He can deal with linguistic nuances and would be at ease negotiating complex issues in either or both languages at the same time. I confess that, while I was prepared to dislike him, imagining the cold, numbers-driven arrogance that drove the likes of Robert McNamara and Don Rumsfeld (and other top managers) into promoting unwise policies that cost countless human lives long after common citizens understood the futility, I found Rael to be a highly likable, people-oriented, and commons sense kind of manager. He inspires you with a can-do optimism, tempered by a realistic assessment of the state of affairs as it is and a well developed sense of public service. In short, he is the kind of manager everyone wants as a boss.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
The Beat Goes On
Tonight, Thursday, September 24, a man was assassinated while driving an SUV in Col. Partido Diaz, after being chased by his killers. The chase went on until the assassins caught up to the vehicle and killed him at the intersection of Camino Viejo a San Lorenzo and Espiridion Prudencio.
This afternoon a man was killed in Col Anahuac at the intersection of Melchor Muzquis and Barbachano. He was wearing black denim trousers and a blue polo shirt. He was one of the persons at this intersection who made a living, apparently, by cleaning windshields while drivers waited for the light to turn green.
This morning a dead body was discovered in the Valle de Juarez (South Valley), the third victim found in the same spot in three weeks. There were signs of severe torture and the head was enveloped with gray duct tape.
On Wednesday 13 persons were murdered in Juarez.
On Wednesday afternoon a man, Eufemio Rubio Garcia, was shot to death in the patio of his home, in Col. Nuevo Hipodromo, where he was in the company of friends and family at the moment of death at 4 p.m. He was shot in the head, abdomen, and one of his arms. Eight casings were found near the body.
Later, at 7 p.m., a homicide occurred at Azucena and Nochebuena, outside the home of Hiram Rodolfo Quintero, 30, who was killed when assassins in a black Cherokee opened fire on him. At 8 p.m. a non identified man was assassinated when he received three bullets as he was walking toward a natural gas station with a container that he apparently wanted to refill. His neighbors identified him only as Gonzalo, 37 years old.
This afternoon a man was killed in Col Anahuac at the intersection of Melchor Muzquis and Barbachano. He was wearing black denim trousers and a blue polo shirt. He was one of the persons at this intersection who made a living, apparently, by cleaning windshields while drivers waited for the light to turn green.
This morning a dead body was discovered in the Valle de Juarez (South Valley), the third victim found in the same spot in three weeks. There were signs of severe torture and the head was enveloped with gray duct tape.
On Wednesday 13 persons were murdered in Juarez.
On Wednesday afternoon a man, Eufemio Rubio Garcia, was shot to death in the patio of his home, in Col. Nuevo Hipodromo, where he was in the company of friends and family at the moment of death at 4 p.m. He was shot in the head, abdomen, and one of his arms. Eight casings were found near the body.
Later, at 7 p.m., a homicide occurred at Azucena and Nochebuena, outside the home of Hiram Rodolfo Quintero, 30, who was killed when assassins in a black Cherokee opened fire on him. At 8 p.m. a non identified man was assassinated when he received three bullets as he was walking toward a natural gas station with a container that he apparently wanted to refill. His neighbors identified him only as Gonzalo, 37 years old.
Extortion in Juarez: Paying the Vacuna
As it become clear that the presence of nearly 10,000 troops in Juarez could not contain the violence generated by the wars going on within organized crime and between organized crime and law enforcement, ordinary criminals took note and increased the scale of their activities. One important feature in this development has been a spike in kidnapping, frightening business owners, many of whom have crossed the border into El Paso, sometimes bringing their business with them. For the upper, say, 3 percent or so of the income earners in Juarez, kidnapping is by far the greatest potential danger.
But for the small businesses, mom-and-pop operations, sometimes on wheels, the greatest threat is extortion, which has affected a higher proportion of Juarenses than any other type of increase in crime in recent months.
From a report in Norte this morning, by Beatriz Corral Iglesias, click here
According to a report by Leopoldina Aguirre, president of the National Chamber of Small Business, at least 975 owners of grocery and other supply stores in Juarez claim they have tangled in one way or another with extortionists who have asked them for protection money. Up to now at least five small business owners have died defending themselves against extortionists. Out of the 1300 members from Juarez in this association, the hardest hit are the tire repair stores, the junk yards and other repair stores, and metal recyclers. But it is also true that virtually all grocery and other supply stores have been hit. "Some pay the "vacuna," (the "vaccination,") price, as the extortion is commonly called here, some simply leave town before something bad happens," she said.
Sixteen farmacies have closed, and 30 tortilla makers have closed. Of the 100 tire repair stores that we had two years ago, only 15 are currently operating, none of which operates after 8 p.m., even though many used to operate all night.
Ms. Aguirre spoke of a case she knew about (most people in Juarez have similar stories)in which a woman whose son was kidnapped, agreed to pay about $800 (U.S.) for his return. She was then threatened if she did not pay a monthly protection racket fee, and she subsequently left the city. She also mentioned the liquor store "Nonis," on Gomez Morin and Neptuno (a heavy-traffic intersection) which is now covered with protective metal bars after numerous thefts and extortions, and the "Servicio Angel," a tire repair store which has operated 12 years at Plutarco Elias Calles just before you get to Paseo Triunfo, a solid uptown address where the owner has installed all kinds of video devices and placed the business up for sale.
But for the small businesses, mom-and-pop operations, sometimes on wheels, the greatest threat is extortion, which has affected a higher proportion of Juarenses than any other type of increase in crime in recent months.
From a report in Norte this morning, by Beatriz Corral Iglesias, click here
According to a report by Leopoldina Aguirre, president of the National Chamber of Small Business, at least 975 owners of grocery and other supply stores in Juarez claim they have tangled in one way or another with extortionists who have asked them for protection money. Up to now at least five small business owners have died defending themselves against extortionists. Out of the 1300 members from Juarez in this association, the hardest hit are the tire repair stores, the junk yards and other repair stores, and metal recyclers. But it is also true that virtually all grocery and other supply stores have been hit. "Some pay the "vacuna," (the "vaccination,") price, as the extortion is commonly called here, some simply leave town before something bad happens," she said.
Sixteen farmacies have closed, and 30 tortilla makers have closed. Of the 100 tire repair stores that we had two years ago, only 15 are currently operating, none of which operates after 8 p.m., even though many used to operate all night.
Ms. Aguirre spoke of a case she knew about (most people in Juarez have similar stories)in which a woman whose son was kidnapped, agreed to pay about $800 (U.S.) for his return. She was then threatened if she did not pay a monthly protection racket fee, and she subsequently left the city. She also mentioned the liquor store "Nonis," on Gomez Morin and Neptuno (a heavy-traffic intersection) which is now covered with protective metal bars after numerous thefts and extortions, and the "Servicio Angel," a tire repair store which has operated 12 years at Plutarco Elias Calles just before you get to Paseo Triunfo, a solid uptown address where the owner has installed all kinds of video devices and placed the business up for sale.
Confessions From Paid Assassins in Juarez
An unsigned article in Diario appeared this week containing information provided in confessions by some of the seven members of La Linea (the term most commonly used in referring to the Juárez cartel) arrested by the armed forces earlier this month. At the time of the arrest authorities accused the group of 36 homicides, but as of recently the formal accusations are for only three assassinations.
The confessions were rendered to officials of the Chihuahua state prosecutor working inside the military installation associated with Joint Operation Chihuahua. In the language of the Diario writer "the evidenciary value (of these confessions) was questioned during judicial hearings, because the persons rendering the confessions showed signs of violence, and because the confessions were not videotaped."
According to the confessions, the squads of assassins are organized in groups of five to eight members. One is in charge of weapons maintenance, another is in charge of locating the victim, while another is simply a chauffeur. One or more, known as "hawks," are lookouts at the targeted location for the attack. One or more pull the triggers. The most common practice is to shoot from a stolen automobile, if the target is on the street, or as the target leaves his home.
The five groups of assassins are (or were?) organized by city sector, apparently using the same designations as the city police stations: Aldama, Chihuahua, Cuauhtemoc, Babicora, and Delicias. Each group must restrict assassinations to its own district. A group will receive orders on a telephone. The chief of the squad may have a nickname or a number; no one knows his real name. "He receives orders from Number Two and Number Eleven, whose names I don't know," according to a statement signed by Juan Antonio Munoz Ceniceros, one of the accused, referring to his boss, known as Number Nine, or The Dog, or The Arquitect.
The confession of Jesus Antonio Romero Cigala, a.k.a. El Kalimba, states that he entered the organization through a neighbor who recruited him. On his first killing, he states, "I went to a Del Rio (one of many popular convenience stores by that name) with Estrella in a Blazer. It was on Riveras del Bravo stage 9. We already knew who he (the victim) was and where he would be. When we arrived (the victim) was standing there, with suspenders and black pants. He thought we were going to provide cocaine for him (presumably he was a drug retailer working for a rival organization). Estrella told me to get down from the Blazer. I had a 40 caliber. I hit him five times. Later we went to a safe-house and stayed there for the rest of the day. Later on I realized this was the way I was going to make a living."
The confession of Juan Francisco Costa Barron, alias "El Guero:" "The criminal organization I belong to pays me at different places, shopping centers, like Soriana (a popular group of stores something like Walmart) or a billiards hall. Someone called Number Two gives us weapons and vehicles for us to use." Costa Barron states he started out as a "hawk," in charge of making sure the streets are safe for the hit, without police or military units nearby. Later he was promoted to being a trigger man. According to the confessions the men were paid about $2000-$3000 pesos (about $150-$230 US) per week.
Jesus Romero Cigala (El Kalimba), Jose Luis Prieto Chacon (El Pelon), and Juan Antonio Munoz Ceniceros (El Guero, or El Cuatro), are accused of the homicide of Ramon Montoya Sanchez, 50 years old, murdered outside a grocery store.
Edgar Ivan Martinez Chavez, (El Diez) and Juan Antonio Chavira Vaquera (El Casper), are accused of killing Fabian Martinez Martinez, killed outside his home in Col. Juarez Nuevo on August 3.
Sergio Leonel Castro Rivera (El Goku), and Juand Francisco Costa Barron (El Guero) are accused of killing a municipal police officer.
The confessions were rendered to officials of the Chihuahua state prosecutor working inside the military installation associated with Joint Operation Chihuahua. In the language of the Diario writer "the evidenciary value (of these confessions) was questioned during judicial hearings, because the persons rendering the confessions showed signs of violence, and because the confessions were not videotaped."
According to the confessions, the squads of assassins are organized in groups of five to eight members. One is in charge of weapons maintenance, another is in charge of locating the victim, while another is simply a chauffeur. One or more, known as "hawks," are lookouts at the targeted location for the attack. One or more pull the triggers. The most common practice is to shoot from a stolen automobile, if the target is on the street, or as the target leaves his home.
The five groups of assassins are (or were?) organized by city sector, apparently using the same designations as the city police stations: Aldama, Chihuahua, Cuauhtemoc, Babicora, and Delicias. Each group must restrict assassinations to its own district. A group will receive orders on a telephone. The chief of the squad may have a nickname or a number; no one knows his real name. "He receives orders from Number Two and Number Eleven, whose names I don't know," according to a statement signed by Juan Antonio Munoz Ceniceros, one of the accused, referring to his boss, known as Number Nine, or The Dog, or The Arquitect.
The confession of Jesus Antonio Romero Cigala, a.k.a. El Kalimba, states that he entered the organization through a neighbor who recruited him. On his first killing, he states, "I went to a Del Rio (one of many popular convenience stores by that name) with Estrella in a Blazer. It was on Riveras del Bravo stage 9. We already knew who he (the victim) was and where he would be. When we arrived (the victim) was standing there, with suspenders and black pants. He thought we were going to provide cocaine for him (presumably he was a drug retailer working for a rival organization). Estrella told me to get down from the Blazer. I had a 40 caliber. I hit him five times. Later we went to a safe-house and stayed there for the rest of the day. Later on I realized this was the way I was going to make a living."
The confession of Juan Francisco Costa Barron, alias "El Guero:" "The criminal organization I belong to pays me at different places, shopping centers, like Soriana (a popular group of stores something like Walmart) or a billiards hall. Someone called Number Two gives us weapons and vehicles for us to use." Costa Barron states he started out as a "hawk," in charge of making sure the streets are safe for the hit, without police or military units nearby. Later he was promoted to being a trigger man. According to the confessions the men were paid about $2000-$3000 pesos (about $150-$230 US) per week.
Jesus Romero Cigala (El Kalimba), Jose Luis Prieto Chacon (El Pelon), and Juan Antonio Munoz Ceniceros (El Guero, or El Cuatro), are accused of the homicide of Ramon Montoya Sanchez, 50 years old, murdered outside a grocery store.
Edgar Ivan Martinez Chavez, (El Diez) and Juan Antonio Chavira Vaquera (El Casper), are accused of killing Fabian Martinez Martinez, killed outside his home in Col. Juarez Nuevo on August 3.
Sergio Leonel Castro Rivera (El Goku), and Juand Francisco Costa Barron (El Guero) are accused of killing a municipal police officer.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
1400 Federal Agents Arrive
La Polaka, the most popular political blog in Juarez (for reasons of security it is now published in El Paso), announced this afternoon that 1400 Mexican federal agents have arrived in Juarez, replacing some of the outgoing troops. Out of these 410 are intelligence specialists.
1730 Homicides and Counting
From a Norte story this morning by Hérika Martínez Prado: Yesterday homicide number 1730 this year was recorded. The discovery of an unidentified dead body in an irrigation ditch in Zaragoza near the border crossing there yesterday morning made it 1730. He had suffered gunshot wounds to the mouth, cheek, right pectoral, and forehead. Number 1729 was a man, Edwin Carlos Calixto Paniagua, 22, discovered at 10 a.m. yesterday morning on the Camino Real highway with gunshot wounds to the jawbone, right eye, chest, and neck. Seven spent 45 caliber cartridges were found near the body. The bodies of the four persons executed in room No. 27 at the "La Cupula" motel on Monday were identified. Their names were: Jimmy Albehert Moreno Macías, 21, Daniel Iván Torres Gutiérrez, 22, Brenda Lisette Fernández Torres, 20, and Yolanda Vanessa Torres Fernández, 23. Ms. Vanessa Torres was from New Mexico. Twenty six spent 7.62x39 casings, used in AK-47s, were found nearby, plus three 9 mm casings.
From Diario: This morning (Wednesday) three bodies were found in Valle de Juárez (The South Valley of Juárez), one of them decapitated, head next to the body, wrapped in a sleeping bag. At 12:35 a.m. this morning four persons, including the wife of one of the men, were murdered as they were driving in a red car in Col. Arroyo Colorado. Dozens of spent casings were found near the vehicle. Then at 1 a.m. this morning (Wednesday) a man was shot and killed as he left a nightclub, "Eduardo's," on Vicente Guerrero and Honduras. The man was wearing a white sweatshirt, white and blue running shoes, blue denim trousers and a black belt. He was dark, medium-sized, with a mustache, and he was carrying a bracelet in his hands. By my count we are now at 1738 so far this year, so my headline is already out of date.
If we extrapolate the 1730 (yesterday's figure) and project the same rate for the rest of the year we would arrive at 2374 persons murdered for the year ending December 31, 2009. Using a reasonable estimate of 1.5 million population in Juarez, this would place the homicide rate at 158.
This would place Juárez easily as the murder capital of the world. In a Foreign Policy article for September 2008 (click here for the article) Caracas was at that time named the highest homicide city in the world, at 130 per 100,000 population, and Cape Town South Africa was listed as second, at 62. I looked up Baghdad and found a good article from the Brookings Institutions (click here for a copy) which estimates the homicide rate there at 95 (the article sorts out war-related deaths as well) in 2006. A Time magazine article this year (click here) puts the Baghdad rate at 48, slightly higher than St. Louis in 2008 which came in at 47. Global homicide rates per city are more difficult to get hold of than you might think at first. But there are places in the U.S. that aren't too far behind the worst cities in the world, such as New Orleans, which the FBI estimated in 2008 had a murder rate per 100,000 of 64. The U.S. average in 2008 was 5.6.
From Diario: This morning (Wednesday) three bodies were found in Valle de Juárez (The South Valley of Juárez), one of them decapitated, head next to the body, wrapped in a sleeping bag. At 12:35 a.m. this morning four persons, including the wife of one of the men, were murdered as they were driving in a red car in Col. Arroyo Colorado. Dozens of spent casings were found near the vehicle. Then at 1 a.m. this morning (Wednesday) a man was shot and killed as he left a nightclub, "Eduardo's," on Vicente Guerrero and Honduras. The man was wearing a white sweatshirt, white and blue running shoes, blue denim trousers and a black belt. He was dark, medium-sized, with a mustache, and he was carrying a bracelet in his hands. By my count we are now at 1738 so far this year, so my headline is already out of date.
If we extrapolate the 1730 (yesterday's figure) and project the same rate for the rest of the year we would arrive at 2374 persons murdered for the year ending December 31, 2009. Using a reasonable estimate of 1.5 million population in Juarez, this would place the homicide rate at 158.
This would place Juárez easily as the murder capital of the world. In a Foreign Policy article for September 2008 (click here for the article) Caracas was at that time named the highest homicide city in the world, at 130 per 100,000 population, and Cape Town South Africa was listed as second, at 62. I looked up Baghdad and found a good article from the Brookings Institutions (click here for a copy) which estimates the homicide rate there at 95 (the article sorts out war-related deaths as well) in 2006. A Time magazine article this year (click here) puts the Baghdad rate at 48, slightly higher than St. Louis in 2008 which came in at 47. Global homicide rates per city are more difficult to get hold of than you might think at first. But there are places in the U.S. that aren't too far behind the worst cities in the world, such as New Orleans, which the FBI estimated in 2008 had a murder rate per 100,000 of 64. The U.S. average in 2008 was 5.6.
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