The city commission continues to lie about the police building’s funding—a special election March 19 will reveal if the people believe them

Only one Truth or Consequences City Commissioner—Rolf Hechler—came clean, finally admitting that it is not true that the police department’s .25-percent gross receipts tax revenue can only be used for public safety projects. It can be used for water-disaster projects if the city commission passes an ordinance amending the original 2011 ordinance that enacted the tax.

He revealed this truth when a special-election resolution came up on the agenda.

The people succeeded in pushing the question of a new police building’s funding to the ballot for a second time. In 2017 a special election resulted in the same project being scrapped. As then, the city commission used a crab-wise method of passing an ordinance to fund the renovation of the old armory building into a new police building for $1.3 million using PD GRT. The actual project was never vetted in public. The city commission passed a similar ordinance in November for $4.5 million. It’s exactly the same project using the old plans, which were not presented or discussed. The ordinance states a $4.5 million revenue bond will be issued and the debt will be paid by the PD GRT.  

Only 209 signatures were needed to get the question on the ballot, but 249 were confirmed as valid among the 300 signatures on the petition. State law requires that the number of signatures equal 20 percent of those who voted, taking the average from the last four elections.  

The special election will be held on March 19. State election laws that changed in 2019 allowed cities to turn over their election duties to the county clerk, with T or C opting to do that in 2020. Special elections run by counties are to be conducted by mail-in ballots, the cost coming out of county coffers.

Rolf Hechler, having served four years and then taking a two-year break and recently finishing up another four-year term, is now entering his ninth year as a city commissioner. His fellow-commissioners made him mayor, giving him the gavel at the Jan. 3 meeting.

Since mid-October, Hechler and the rest of the city commission, as well as city employees, especially police department employees, have spread the false information that the PD GRT may as well go to a new police building because it can’t go to water projects. Amanda Forrister was mayor and had the gavel at the time. Perhaps Hechler only now felt he could set the record straight, although it should have been settled fact by the city’s financial advisor, Chris Muirhead  of Modrall Sperling Law Firm. Muirhead, at the mic at the Nov. 15 meeting, before the vote on the ordinance to issue a $4.5-million bond, confirmed that the city could spend the money on other projects if it passed an ordinance.    

Hechler’s moment of truth did not last long. He did not correct or contradict two city commissioners who were allowed to continue promoting the lie.

City Commissioner Merry Jo Fahl said, “We need to educate the people,” [before the March 19 vote]. “There is a misunderstanding. Some people think the money can be used for water.”

Fahl rubber-stamped the $4.5 million bond issue, despite not understanding it, putting her in a glass house when she now claims it is the people who misunderstand.

Muirhead explained how the city would sell the PD GRT revenue bonds on the open market, as well as other points about the financial instrument at the Oct. 11 city commission meeting. Fahl said, “I didn’t understand a word you said,” and giggled and then proceeded to vote in favor of publishing the ordinance.  

Similarly, City Commissioner Destiny Mitchell stated at the Dec. 13 meeting that the money can’t be used for water and also claimed bloggers, such as myself, were misinforming the public. At the Jan. 3 meeting, Mitchell asked what the people were protesting. “We could get this money but they don’t want us to have this money?” Her statement seems to indicate that she doesn’t know the “money” is local tax money, not a grant. Nor does she seem to understand that the bond is a debt, that she is indebting the people for 20 years or so. The time period of the debt, the interest rate and other variables are unknown until the public sale of the bonds is completed.

Hechler, immediately after admitting that the PD GRT can be used to finance water projects if the city passes an ordinance, undid his good work by reducing the issue to a right-wing trope.

“I personally think we don’t want to defund the police,” Hechler said. When the tax was initiated in 2011, then-Police Chief Patrick Gallagher gave a written and oral presentation, which Hechler referenced. The money was to be used to recruit and retain officers who were certified, offering them higher salaries to stop the cycle of hiring uncertified officers who left the force shortly after the city had financed their training to get them certified.

Hechler pointed out that the city has had five police chiefs within eight years and fairly recently only one officer on night duty. “This is the first time we have been fully staffed,” Hechler said, not giving a time limit, but implying the PD has long been understaffed, while at the same time asserting it has had the PD GRT to recruit and retain officers for 12 years.

Hechler’s argument is highly hypocritical. The tax, generating at first about $250,000 a year and estimated to generate $450,000 this year, has not been used for PD salaries.

Hechler has “defunded” the police.

Last fiscal year, Hechler, Fahl, Mitchell, then-Mayor Amanda Forrister and then-City Commissioner Shelly Harrelson passed a budget that transferred $800,000 out of the PD GRT to balance the general fund.

Around 2017, probably when Hechler was on the city commission, over $300,000 was taken from the PD GRT to build the animal shelter, which was only revealed in 2019 by then-City Manager Morris Madrid.

This year’s budget transfers out about $90,000 from the PD GRT for an unstated reason. About $245,900 in expenses are estimated to be spent, but not for retention and recruiting salary increases. The reason PD is full-staffed is because the PD applied for a state grant that supplements salaries for three years. The city is in its second year of the grant.

Does Hechler not realize that using the PD GRT to renovate a building is also not the intended use of this tax? Of course he does. But no doubt the city commission will try to intimidate voters into supporting the new police building with accusations that they are “defunding the police” otherwise.

Amanda Forrister, who was made mayor pro tem at the Jan. 3 meeting, said, “I agree we need to keep the .25 GRT for the police.” She also said “misinformation” needs to be combated before the March 19 vote. In previous city commission meetings she has specifically stated that the money cannot be used for water projects, ironically being the purveyor of misinformation.  

Forrister didn’t seem to understand the people’s power to force a referendum. She asked City Attorney Rubin, “Do we have to approve this?” During the November meeting, when Hechler was explaining the 2017 referendum on the same project was due to “misinformation,” Forrister asked, “Why did it go to a vote?” Evidently she has never read chapter 3 of state law on municipal government.  

Forrister breezily concluded that since she and Hechler want the PD GRT to remain as it is, it will not be used on the water crisis, end of discussion, as if she is a queen. “The GRT will stay that way. The only thing that will happen is to deny the police a new building,” she said.

Only new city commissioner Ingo Hoeppner understood that the city commission faces a referendum because of its lack of transparency, lack of communication, lack of fact finding, lack of evidence-based decision making and lack of listening and informing the people before imposing more debt on the people.

“When not enough information is given, then misinformation takes over,” Hoeppner said. “We should have a town hall and get the citizen involved. The chief is creating something, for safety,” and understanding can be achieved, “by us being open,” he said, implying he favors the police building project.

Chief of Police Luis Tavizon accused Ron Fenn, who spearheaded the petition, without naming him, of misinforming those signing the petition, claiming two people tried to withdraw their names but couldn’t, since it was officially turned in and could not be modified.

This is the second time Tavizon has claimed Fenn (also at the Dec. 13 meeting) misinformed people to get them to sign the petition. Tavizon does not specify what the misinformation is and fails to state that each person signing the petition can read what they are signing. State law requires that each petition page at the top has the ordinance that is being challenged.  

Tavizon, by using his considerable public platform and police powers to lob vague accusations against Fenn, shows his willingness to use his authority to scapegoat, intimidate and reduce any argument against the police building to one of personalities.

Tavizon had New Hope Revival’s pastor, Caleb Cooper come to the Nov. 15 meeting, who proclaimed Tavizon was “the best chief of police the city has ever had” and therefore the people should support his desire for a new police building.

Hechler made the same personalities argument, claiming Tavizon is “a good chief of police,” without giving evidence or reasons.

Hechler and the other commissioners are supposed to act as the legislative check and balance on city employees, the executive branch, which includes the chief of police.

Hechler also said the city shouldn’t spend the PD GRT on water issues because, “fixing water leaks is not fixing the underlying problem.” The city should seek “colonias” and “water trust board” and other government monies, concluding that “This problem is too big for the city.”

This is Hechler’s additional rationale for incurring 20 years or so of debt for a new police building, now, during a water crisis. He’s content to use straight cash from a tax to pay it off, without any help from state or federal grants, because we’ll get state and federal grants for our “too big” water problem.

I sure hope the state and the federal governments ignore the city leaders’ 80 years of neglect of our water utility and opt to bail us out because the problem is just too big for us. Unfortunately, my experience as a local-government reporter makes me think Hechler’s facile and utterly blank argument will fail. Cities are expected to match utilities grants because they get to charge utilities fees. These fees are supposed to be well managed, with money set aside for repairs, maintenance and capital projects. Good fiscal and physical management, good engineering and a solid plan with good phasing win government grants.