Coverage of Today's City Commission Meeting; Tetreau Flip-Flops on Helping Brownsville Businesses; Galonsky-Pizana Rips Into GBIC

By Diego Garcia III | Editor of The Brownsville Beacon

The Brownsville city commission met via a video conference Tuesday afternoon at around 5:00 pm. 

Among the various city administrators present were elected officials Mayor Trey Mendez and Commissioners Cowen, Cowen, Galonsky-Pizana, Neece, and Tetreau. After the introductory prayer and a moment of silence, the meeting began. 

Nobody signed up for the public comment section, so the meeting continued with the COVID-19 update presented by Dr. Art Rodriguez, director of the Brownsville Public Health Department. As of the meeting, 1,258 tests had been administered, 1,602 people did not meet the criteria, 56% were insured, 44% were uninsured, 72 people had tested positive, 1,125 tested negative, with 117 people with pending results.

An epidemiologist joined Dr. Rodriguez and continued with the presentation explaining some of the data and stated based on the analysis Brownsville is doing better than the state as a whole in flattening the curve. She mentioned the numbers show the hospitals and healthcare facilities in town are not being overwhelmed. 

Dr. Rodriguez continued with the presentation and mentioned mitigation strategies and informing the citizenry as far as accessing drive-thru testing facilities and other helpful information in dealing with the pandemic. 

Dr. Gowen then made a comment about the shortage of tests and there may be people who are ill who do not meet the criteria for testing or admission into the hospital. She cautioned about being over-confident about the data and asked everyone to keep in mind the information is not complete or it sn't an "absolute number." Mayor Mendez echoed Dr. Gowen's sentiments, mentioning less than 1% of the city has been tested and he said, "we probably have a couple thousand people, at least, in the city who are infected." He based this information on the interpretation of the data that showed of the people tested, there was an approximate 5.7% positive infection rate. He urged people to continue with the safety measures and to follow all the appropriate procedures put in place. 

He directed people to btxcares.com for citizens to fill out a questionnaire should they have any questions about potentially being infected.

Dr. Rodriguez and the rest of the staff went through the charts and answered some of the commissioner's questions. 

Commissioner Tetreau made comments and asked if there was any way the city could put out information that would inform the public about potential hot spots around the city, and kept asking if there is any way the government agencies could coordinate with the school district and the Public Utilities Board to give people more information about the virus and the infected areas of the city. She also asked if there was any way the city could break down the information about infections even further; if they could distinguish further between the community acquired and the linked to a previous case designation. Dr. Rodriguez addressed her concerns and questions. The epidemiologist said hot spot mapping would be coming soon as well.

The City Secretary then interjected and mentioned Commissioner Munguia joined the meeting after it had began.

The commissioners then addressed the fact that over 70% of the people in Brownsville are uninsured and they wanted people to know testing is free to those who do not have insurance.

Commissioner Galonsky-Pizana asked about patients' contact history and whether or not people and infections are being tracked. Dr. Rodriguez said university employees along with the county are helping with contact tracing. 

The mayor then suggested asking people questions via robocalls in conjunction with UTRGV to let them know if they are currently experiencing certain symptoms in order to determine whether or not they are ill. Dr. Rodriguez said the university had the technology and the mechanism in place to do the robocalls.

Commissoner Tetreau then said it was important to make sure people knew the calls were coming from the city in order to prevent people thinking the call is a scam call. Commissioner Tetreau is worried people will not be able to differentiate a call giving people helpful information about their health and symptoms versus someone calling pretending to be from the utility company telling her she was going to be arrested for not paying their light bill. 

The Emergency Management coordinator came on and informed the commissioners the emergency management operations center was operating virtually and three grants had been applied for in order to help with funding, including a grant from FEMA and a grant that has already been approved for first responders.

The city secretary then moved the meeting along and the commissioners moved to pass the consent agenda items. The items passed unanimously.

The city secretary then moved on to the individual action items.

Action Item #1, a consideration and action to approve the Third Amended Declaration of Local State Disaster for Public Health Emergency was debated and discussed. 

They went over the items that are going to be changed, including the items that the governor's office decided would be able to be opened. She mentioned items could be purchsed from retail stores as long as they would not enter the store. They could pickup items curbside, have them delivered via mail, or have them delivered by the retail store. She then mentioned the medical procedures that would begin to be allowed as long as they do not take away from COVID-19 resources or infrastructure. 

Schools would be closed to in-person classroom attendance until the governor lifts the restriction; and nothing would stop schools from conducting meal distribution activities or nothing would stop schools from engaging in distance learning activities. 

Health care professionals including those who work in child care centers, adult day care centers, nursing care facilities, plasma centers, doctors offices, and hospitals may only work in one facility and are not allowed to work in more than one.

All city parks are reopened for engaging in recreational and pysical activities provided that all park amenities including playground and fitness equipment and restrooms would continue to be closed to the public to avoid the spread of COVID-19.

Facial coverings, recommended as cloth based coverings, are required for all people over the age of 5 especially in areas of significant community traffic. 

These items are in effect until May 5, 2020, and violations are still Class C misdemeanors.
  
The mayor and city commission discussed the protocol and policies that were going to be set in place in the Third Amended Declaration. The mayor reminded everyone the state and the governor's office's would overrule any decisions the city made. The item was passed unanimously. 

Action Item #2 was to award the Anacua Street and Naranjo Board Pavement, Sidewalk, Driveway, and Drainage Improvement Project to the lowest responsible bidder. Commissioner Neece asked if any of the bidders were local and the commission discussed the procurement process and why local companies were not considered even though one of the companies was based in Los Fresnos. Going with a company outside Engineering and Purchasing mentioned Brownsville would save around 80,000 dollars. Commissioner Neece then mentioned it would be in Brownsville's best interest to hire local workers at a time when locals need work.

A motion was made to award the contract to a local company, G&T Paving, the motion passed with Commissioner Jessica Tetreau voting nay. Commissioner Tetreau was concerned the 80,000 dollars saved could be used for other projects. The other commissioners did not agree.

Action Item #3 passed unanimously. Item 3 was to allow Gonzalez Engineering and Surveying, Incorporated to start surveying projects for street construction in District 2. 

Action Item #4 was to acknowlege the City's Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR). Quentin Anderson, a partner with Carr, Riggs, & Ingram, presented the report. After the lengthy presentation, the item passed unanimously.

Action Item #5 was to acknowledge the Greater Brownsville Incentives Corporation (GBIC) Report regarding emergency assurance efforts provided to businesses in response to COVID-19. Mario Lozoya, the CEO and Executive Director of GBIC conducted the presentation. The presentation was about ways GBIC and local businesses will be able to help restart things once the restrictions from the pandemic are over. 

There was quite a bit of discussion about GBIC. Commissioner Tetreau began her speech with a misstep. After agreeing with Commissioner Cowen on everything he said, Tetreau said, "Now, more than ever, GBIC is going to play an intricate role in bridging, um, a retail, our industrial...everything, um, more than ever because we're about to start seeing people close their doors...and we need to do everything in our power to see that that money stays in Brownsville."

We're assuming she meant intergral rather than intricate, but her mistake in word choice aside, Commissioner Tetreau flip-flopped from a decision she made earlier in the meeting. She seems to have forgotten about the vote she made just a few action items before where she voted against a Brownsville company being awarded a contract to pave a city street. 

It was strange to see Commissioner Tetreau launch into a soliloquy at the end of the GBIC presentation about supporting local businesses and how important it would be for Brownsville to pump money into Brownsville businesses to keep them from closing when she voted against awarding a contract to a Brownsville-based business.

Dr. Gowen mentioned GBIC had not done much to help local retail establishments. 

Commissioner Galonsky-Pizana was not a big fan of how GBIC has conducted their business. She challenged the board to get involved and raise the expectations of what it is GBIC can do. She thinks their actions are pathetic and a waste of taxpayer money. She finished her comments by saying, "Now is the time to step up and do the best you can do."

The motion was approved. Galonsky-Pizana voted no because she was, "very disappointed with the quality of work."

Action Item #6 was to approve the authorization of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act (CARES Act) grant application in the amount of 7.6 million dollars with the Federal Transit Administration for Federal Transportation Assistance.

It was voted on and passed unanimously with no discussion.

The city secretary then moved on to board appointments. The first appointment was to the LGBTQ Task Force. Commissioner Munguia was asked for a recommendation, but Commissioner Munguia was not responding when he was called. Commissioner Munguia then mentioned his audio was not working and through the city secretary Commissioner Munguia appointed Roy De Los Santos. The motion was approved unanimously. 

The meeting was then called into Executive Session to consult with an attorney to receive confidential legal advice in connection with the Brownsville Public Utilities Board. They were having some difficulty with the video conferencing software and were debating whether or not they had to leave the current video chat to go into executive session. The motion was introduced and seconded, but a vote was not held. The mayor and commissioners left the video conference to go into their Executivce Session.

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